(FORTUNE Magazine) – Chairman John Teets, who likes to brag he's ''tough like leather,'' swore he would turn around Greyhound's wreck of a bus line by cutting costs and jawboning the unions (FORTUNE, October 28, 1985). He put the company into the black, but the fight turned out to be too much even for Teets. His Phoenix- based conglomerate (1985 sales: $3.3 billion) announced it is selling its Greyhound Lines to BusLease Inc. of Dallas for $350 million. The Amalgamated Transit Union, which represents 7,500 Greyhound drivers and employees, rejected wage cuts designed to help the line, the largest in the U.S., boost its weak profits. How will BusLease deal with the Greyhound union blues? Chairman Fred G. Currey points out that his company is under no obligation to honor the union contract. ''We want to sit down and talk,'' he says, ''but if we can't reach an agreement, we'll just go out and hire new people.'' Tough words, even for a successor to John Teets.