*  *  *  *  *

Sabrina and Eve had tried to bypass hospital authorities and sneak directly to Ferd's hospital room.  The plan didn't work.  They were stopped at the nursing station in the intensive care ward.  There seemed to be an unusual amount of security people around that desk and they were asked to sign a register stating they had come to visit Dr. Steinbrenner.  The staff said it was routine, but Sabrina had never heard of such a procedure.

They were just giving the flowers that Sabrina had brought for Ferd to the floor duty nurse, when Alexander Steinbrenner went past, not noticing them in his haste, manipulating his crutches with practiced ease.

Sabrina called out to him.  Alexander turned around and scowled.  He made an abrupt motion with his head, arrogantly indicating that he would speak to them in the lounge area, away from the watchful nurses.  They all sat down.  Alexander sat with his broken leg sticking straight out in front of him, resting it on the couch they were sitting on.

"How is Dr. Steinbrenner?"  Eve asked Alexander.

"I'm not answering any questions until my brother gets here,"  Alexander said.  He glared at the women.  Sabrina thought he was trying to intimidate them as he gazed at them, one and then the other, without taking his eyes away for even a moment.  Sabrina also felt uncomfortable at his proximity.  The man was sitting too close and invading their space with his large presence and accusing eyes.  Then she noted that Eve was looking directly back at Alexander without blinking.  Sabrina was afraid Eve would give herself away, so she said she was very sorry about Ferd.  Alexander just gawked at her, silently hostile, and did not comment.  She wondered if he used this offensive hostile staring tactic on juries.

After what seemed at least an hour, but was only a few minutes, Stephan came down the hall from the direction of his father's room in his motorized chair.  He was wearing a coat and no one would have realized that he had bandages, dressing for a gunshot wound, under the shoulder of his business suit.

Stephan wheeled over and stopped too close to the couch where Sabrina and Eve were sitting.  They were penned in, with Alexander's cast making it impossible to leave from one side and Stephan's chair blocking the other end of the couch.

"I guess you came to find out about our father,"  Stephan said.

They nodded.

"Well, Dad's temporarily lost his ability for speech, so it's hard to access his mental acuity."

"Can't we just see him for a minute?"  Eve asked.

"No,"  Alexander exploded, so loudly that the nursing staff at the desk turned and looked at him.

"Shh..."  Stephan said, frowning severely. 

"What I want to know,"  Alexander said belligerently but quietly, "is if the computer will be at the meeting tomorrow."

"We will be there,"  Sabrina said pointedly, stressing the 'we.' She felt contemptuous that Alexander still seemed to think that making money was his foremost concern, when his own father was in such serious condition. 

"You will provide the documentation and the bank card as you promised?"  Sabrina asked.  "As your father wishes."

"Only if the computer shows up,"  Alexander said bluntly.

"That was not a condition imposed by your father,"  Eve said.

"No, it was not,"  Stephan interjected.  "But I have power of attorney, and I'm making the decisions now." 

There seemed to be nothing more to say and Sabrina and Eve stood up.  Eve had to step over Alexander's cast to get past him.  As she did so, he grabbed her arm so that she was off balance for a moment.  Then she wrenched her arm violently away. 

"You're the one, aren't you,"  Alexander said.

"Can you tell us apart?"  Eve asked.

"Not with the hair alike, no, but that was an easy test.  You responded exactly as I expected." 

Sabrina knew Alexander was greatly underestimating Eve, who was smiling at him, but probably very angry. 

Eve leaned forward and took one of Alexander's metal crutches from him.  She bent the very tip of it, right above it's rubber padded end, like a wishbone.  When Alexander started to protest, Eve barred her teeth and growled very quietly, almost inaudibly.  Sabrina was reminded of a deadly tiger for just an instant.  She felt a thrill of fear herself.  Eve suddenly appeared deadly.  She was reminded of the transformation from Dr.  Jekyll to Mr.  Hyde, but this was not done with camera tricks that showed a fade in, with a watery, wavering, out of focus picture.  The change had been instantaneous.

The noise Eve made was almost imperceptible, but the effect of her expression and the threatening growl was immediate.  Alexander pushed away from her and almost toppled his chair backward.  Stephan quickly moved his wheelchair back to allow the women room to leave.

As they walked out of the lounge and down the long hospital corridor, Sabrina looked back and saw Alexander trying in vain to straighten out his metal crutch.  She couldn't help smiling, but wondered if it had been a wise thing for Eve to do.  At least she found herself in a greatly improved mood. 

"No one was watching."  Eve seemed to be reading Sabrina's thoughts.  "I just couldn't resist with them acting like that.  Big bullies."

"They are obnoxious." 

"I thought they were scaring you." 

"Yes.  A little,"  Sabrina admitted.  She didn't want to acknowledge that Eve had also scared her for a moment.

"I'll be careful not to give myself away in the future.  But I couldn't let Alexander hold my arm like that, like he could physically manhandle me."

"He could with most women, so just for the meeting tomorrow, you might have to restrain yourself." 

"It will be hard, if I get really angry."