Джон Макдональд - A Flash of Green

“Move we set the date for the twenty-sixth of this month,” Horace Lander said. Bassette seconded him. Bassette, Lander and Dayson voted for it, Bliss against. Lander suggested that the availability of the Palm City Municipal Auditorium be checked. A secretary left the room to phone and came back and said it was available. The time was set for 8 P.M. The commission meeting was adjourned, and the young men shrouded their display table and tenderly carried it away.

J. J. Borklund walked into the corridor with Jimmy. He said, “All I want from you today is more glowing copy than I can possibly use on this thing. Puff it all the way, James. Fatten it with interviews. Pie is raining out of the sky. Hosanna!”

“Then tomorrow you want a really glowing account?”

“That’s the pattern, James. You anticipate me.”

“And they’ll come in for at least two hundred full pages the first year?”

“At the very least.”

As Borklund walked away Elmo came up to Jimmy and said, “See me in fifteen minutes in Lupen’s office.” Jimmy nodded and Elmo hurried up the hall to catch up with Gus Makelder.

Jimmy stopped at a drinking fountain. When he straightened up he saw Tom Jennings and Major Lipe approaching him.

“They seem to be traveling first class,” Jimmy said.

Jennings made a rueful grimace. “Rough. Very rough indeed. As a colleague of mine named Custer once said, where are all these Indians coming from?”

“I have a feeling there’ll be more.”

“And our recruiting is terribly discouraging,” Major Lipe said. “I’ve just been reporting to the colonel. It looks as if I’m not even going to be given a chance to talk to some of the groups I’m supposed to contact. And I haven’t found a single recreational club which will back us unanimously. You know, I can’t even line up a decent committee to help me? I don’t see how they could have done such a tremendous propaganda job without our hearing about it. Jackie tells me she’s having the same problem. And Wally is going out of his mind trying to find reputable people to write the commissioners. It isn’t anything like it was last time.”

“You heard we lost Dial Sinnat?” Jennings said.

“Kat told me.”

Jennings sighed and smiled. “We’ll still make a good presentation at the public hearing. And losing this battle does not mean losing the war. That’s our advantage, you see. They have to win every battle. All we have to do is win one. They won’t be able to endure delay. Their money structure will collapse. And, best of all, Jimmy, we’re right and they’re wrong.”

They walked toward the exit, erect and in step, chins up, arms swinging in unison.

When it was time, Jimmy got into the creaking elevator and rode up to the tower office of Calvin Lupen, the ancient man who held the job of courthouse custodian, and who had been on sick leave for almost a year. His office was a ten-by-ten cube with one narrow window. The scarred desk was thick with dust. One wall was papered with yellowing Playmates of the Month, many of them with anatomical oddities added with pen and pencil.

Elmo sat at Cal’s desk, his feet on the low windowsill. He was staring at the wall of nudes.

“One thing I never noticed before, Jimmy. All different shapes and sizes of girls, but every smile is alike. Look at them.”

Wing had closed the door. He blew dust off a chair and sat and looked at the girls. “I think you’re right.”

“How did I do down there? How did I sound?”

“Eminently fair, Mr. Commissioner.”

“I didn’t want to overdo it. That damn Gormin looked like he was going to crack up. Leroy is the only solid one in the group. And maybe Doc Aigan. Buck has got hisself so pussy-happy over that Prindergast piece, he’s no damn good to anybody. I wish to hell his wife would come home and bust up that romance. Burt Lesser phoned me at home last night and talked like a crazy man.”

“About Sinnat?”

“Hell, yes. The Halley woman chewed him out. Oh, you were there, weren’t you?”

“What did you tell Burt?”

“What could I tell him? I said that if he thought I was the kind of man who’d use underhand methods on Dial Sinnat, then in the interest of harmony, maybe he’d better let me buy a hundred percent of his interest after my term runs out on the commission. That slowed him way down. He’s scared of that mean-mouth wife of his. She’d never let him forget I edged him out of his only chance to make any real money. He likes being president. I said if some nut was going around scaring people, it wasn’t my fault or his. He finally apologized. But I haven’t given up the idea of squeezing him out, that is, if he keeps getting in my hair. Worked out just fine with Di Sinnat, didn’t it though?”

“What made it work so well, Elmo?”

Elmo looked at him too blandly. “Why, I guess he didn’t want his little girl’s name dragged in the mud.”

“Maybe he didn’t want his little girl dragged in the mud, personally. Maybe he didn’t want her whipped by a bunch of south county nuts.”

“What in the wide world are you talking about, Jimmy boy?”

“Di reacted pretty violently. I’m making a wild guess, Elmo. You got a heavy vote from those people.”

“Man, I can’t help who votes for me! Anyhow ol’ Darse Coombs is kin of mine, about a fourth or fifth cousin. His middle name is Harkness, and my pa’s great-aunt married a Harkness from Collier County. But I don’t know as that means much to Darse. He figures me for a sinner. Told me so. Roared right into my face, sprayed me like a faucet.”

“Elmo, I wouldn’t want any part of this if you pulled something like that.”

“Boy, I wouldn’t want any part of it myself. You actually think that little Sinnat girl is going to get her tail whipped?”

“Not now, no.”

“Then don’t get all agitated. Damn it, Jimmy, I got a word for you. You’re morose. You got the sour uglies most of the time. Look out there at that great big broad sunshiny world, crammed full of people having a time. It’s a big world full of beaches and girls and sport cars. Full of bowling alleys and golf courses and cold beer. The things you get so broody about, why, they don’t matter a damn to those folks. They want ball games, westerns, the next drink, the next steak, the next roll in the hay. They can get a little jumpy about being blowed up with atom bombs, but aside from that one thing, you can hardly attract their attention . We’ll just be another part of the entertainment business, Jimmy, after we really get rolling. You give those people a few laughs and a little excitement, and they’ll love you forever.”

“If you say so, Elmo.”

“Here’s this week’s bite, Jimmy. A pair of fifties.”

Wing took the money. “Plus twenty-one dollars expenses.”

“Plus what?”

“Twenty-one dollars I spent doing your work for you. If it’s a hundred a week, the least I can expect is to have it free and clear.”

Elmo shook his head, chuckled, took two tens and a one out of his wallet. “You know, you’re making more sense as you go along, boy. I hope you run this up on that Doris Rowell.”

Wing took the money, and told Bliss what he had learned. Elmo stared at him with a puzzled expression after he was through. “You mean there’s people take a thing like that serious, Jimmy?”

“Yes indeed.”

“Those eggheads that come down here when she yells for help, they’d stay away if they knew about this?”

“Very probably. Even if none of them had ever heard of the incident before. It works like this, Elmo. Industry will use people who have been tossed out of colleges. Industry is interested in ability and results. But other educational institutions don’t want anything to do with anybody who has been caught in unethical practices. It’s a sensitive area.”