William Gaddis - J R

— Hey look they beat us, they’re here already.

— Hey did you have music in your elevator too?

— And look hey, here comes that same little guy again.

Shooting rights and lefts as though fighting his way through a horde to receive them Davidoff burst upon the elevator bank putting on his jacket, closing the generous bills of his collar with the mean knot of the tie in a sweep of opening a door where there was none. — Your new bosses… his gesture ended in a fling toward a girl packed in yellow coming up behind, his expression in a wink — boys and girls, one of our topflight secretaries. Oh and Carol… he stopped short piling them up on his abrupt authority, — tell Mister Eigen I need him in the board room immediately and Carol, bring in a dozen copies of the Annual Report, I told Eigen to put a little kit together for these youngsters… he poised long enough to keep her off balance, and then — this way, he stepped out with a rewarding report each time a heel hit the hard floor, mounting the corridor to the door opened off it just short of where blue carpeting began, and they piled up at shore’s edge to crane for a glimpse of — my office in here… composition seated chairs vacantly attending the catercornered command of a paper-littered metal desk — oh and Florence, get a mailroom boy into the board room to run that projector, and those box lunches…

— Yes sir. I’m looking for the…

— And where’s Mister Eigen? I need him in the board room.

— He’s working on the new draft of Mister Moncrieff’s speech Mister Davidoff, he needs that corrected third draft…

— Check. If the fire bell rings I’ll be in the board room, right through here everybody… he turned and, in a single stride, dropped his stature into the blue that swallowed his course in silence toward the walnut bulwark ahead where he touched the metal doorknob and quaked, — not scared of a little static electricity…? he dipped and crested, swung the door, and they came through bobbing, streaming, running downwind in the seaway stretched before them where, dead ahead, beating his course close-hauled, hat turned up all round, white handkerchief puffed next to the hearing aid made fast to the leach of light gray flannel, the immaculate specter approaching eased off abruptly to make the walnut piling on a beam reach, luff unsteadily, and begin to gather sternway.

— Oh here Governor, here… Davidoff veered full throttle cutting across vagaries of wind and sail and the dictates of labored metaphor, threatening capsize on all hands — our new, some of our new shareowners sir they’ve, this is Governor Cates boys and girls, he’s a director of the company. They’ve just bought a share of company stock, sir.

— Which company? The Governor sought mooring.

— Diamond, a share of Diamond Cable, sir… Davidoff tipped side to side on the blue ripple of carpet as they scudded past. Governor Cates rocked gently. — Can’t go wrong with that can they sir, he looked back for Mrs Joubert, — here, here…! Governor Cates had begun to gather headway. — This way… Davidoff waved them on in a wide berth, getting the last of them by as the Governor made mid-channel dead in her course.

— Amy…?

— Good morning, Uncle John.

— Good, come along with me for a minute, Amy.

She took his arm, — oh Mister Davidoff…? over his shoulder as Davidoff got the last of them through a door ahead and swung back.

— Take your time, we’ve got a presentation all set up for them.

— And the lunches?

— And the lunches… He listed in a bow and hurried back up the corridor to enter the board room with — Well! You’ve just had an opportunity not many youngsters experience. When you go home tonight you can tell your families you met one of your country’s outstanding Americans.

— You mean you?

— Governor Cates is one of the men who opened the frontiers of America as we know it today, Davidoff leaned knuckled under on the expanse of walnut stretched before him, pad, pencils, ashtray, pad, pencils, ashtray, — he…

— Him? He was this frontiersman?

— Not like Daniel Boone if that’s what you’re thinking of, no. He opened America’s industrial frontiers, her natural resources that make us the wealthiest country in the world. He’s a man presidents come to for advice, and you can be proud…

— Is he rich?

— Well after all, a man who has contributed so greatly to his country’s wealth and power would deserve…

— What are all these here pads and pencils for?

— This is the board room, where your board of directors meets. They sit right in the very chairs you’re sitting in and, oh Carol just bring those in and pass them around. This is your company’s Annual Report boys and girls, we put it out because we believe that you, and all the other company owners, have a right to know all about your company and the activities it’s engaged in Carol tell him to get that projector going, the many varied ways your company serves our great country with cable of every kind you can imagine from the defense industry to communications of every sort, the…

——ubbb… vvvv… vvawwwwg…

— Carol…! Light splashed over the map and drapes behind him. — He’s got that on backwards, tell him to…

— He’s rewinding it, he…

— Oh and Carol where’s Mister Eigen, I said I wanted him in here to handle this presentation find him and send him right in here. Communications of every sort, from interpersonal messages to the vast and growing television audience, whether it be the family gathered at home for the finest in entertainment or the student in the remote classroom absorbing the lesson of the master, whose wisdom can be shared with more fertile young minds in a single hour today than Plato, Aristotle, and the renowned teachers of antiquity reached in their entire we about ready in there? Momentarily blinded, he turned to reach behind the tasteful gold-on-blue arrangement of denarii, ducats, shekels, and similar bright testaments to long submerged mercantile struggles that formed the pattern of the drapes.

— Boy hey, look!

— Hey that’s real neat. Look hey.

The map rose silently and disappeared, revealing a horizontal bar graph in gay shades of orange labeled Plant Investment and Accumulated Depreciation (in Millions), which followed the map to expose Sources of Capital (in Millions) in vertical yellows, Sales Projections by Continent (in Millions) in assorted aggressive hues, and two, three, four more with the haste of snapping window shades, to lay bare an empty screen.

— Reached, in their entire lives. Lifetimes. Now, in just a moment now, you’ll have a close look at the many and varied contributions your company’s products are making toward a growing America, and your share in helping our great country to turn the promise of tomorrow into the reality of today, as the tide of human ready in there? He braced back, doubled fists on his hips in a commanding stance of out-of-doors to look up the length of the table’s sheen broken by balled sweaters, a candy wrapper, elbows and whole arms and even a head or two, chairs swiveled and legs slung outboard twisting, tapping, — we may have time for a question or two somebody might have about the Annual Report. Your board of directors wants every shareowner to, yes?

— Are you one?

— A shareowner? Of course and I’m proud to…

— No I mean like a director, said the girl wadding her sweater.

— Oh, Davidoff inclined restraining his glasses to contain his wink, — maybe some day, if you’ll vote for me. Because, he straightened up — that’s what people’s capitalism is, isn’t it everybody. As one of the company’s owners you elect your directors in a democratic vote, and they hire men to run the company for you the best way possible. When you vote next spring…