Джон Макдональд - A Flash of Green

He opened his door and said, “Sit tight. I’ll be back in a little while.”

She sat upright. “Oh, no! You can’t attend that clambake. Please, dear. They’d shred you.”

“I just want to listen for a couple of minutes. Outside. Wait right there.”

She caught up to him when he was fifty feet from the car. “I’m coming along to see you don’t get any dramatic ideas, lover.”

The sound was audible a long way from the auditorium. A male voice would give a long impassioned metallic garble, and then there would be a hard concerted roar of enthusiastic approval. It would die away quickly and the voice would begin again. He stopped fifty yards from the building. It was a hot and windy night, and the air was not as moist as usual. There were many city police standing near the exits. Groups of children romped and rolled and yelped on the green lawns of the auditorium. Bands of teenagers were clotted in the shadows, making their obscure jokes, tilting communal bottles.

Mitchie took hold of Jimmy’s hand and said, “Just listen to them! It makes creepy things run up and down my back. And it reminds me of something.”

“Newsreels, Mitchie? From long ago. We couldn’t understand what that voice was saying either, but they all yelled the same way.”

“Jaimie, it scares me a little.”

“It’s a mob. Mobs always believe they are brave and strong and a thousand percent right. There’s an old definition of how to find out how smart a mob is. You take the I.Q. of the most stupid person in the group, then divide that number by the number of people in the group.”

“Let’s go, hon. Please let’s go.”

As they started back toward the car there was prolonged applause and cheering, then a frailer voice and then a great flood of jeering, hissing, booing, derisive yelps.

“They’re expressing an opinion about bird lovers,” Jimmy said.

“Take me to the nearest bowl of kitchen whiskey, driver.”

At eleven they went back to Mitchie’s beach apartment. It was tidy and spotless. She put a stack of records on and turned the volume low. She pulled the draperies open so that the only light in the small room came from the reflected glow of the floodlighting around the pool area, shining through the window wall. She fixed their drinks, then changed to a brief fleecy cabana coat and came back to sit close beside him on the broad low couch facing the wide window.

“This is the Class A treatment,” she said. “This is for the very good friend of a very good friend. McClure Enterprises, a significant contribution to a vacation economy. No muttonhead conventioneers here, hon, because this is where I live.”

“Nice,” he said absently. He wondered how many drinks he’d had.

“It’s worth more than I paid for it. It’s co-op, you know. I had the sense to buy it with the settlement, and the stinking little alimony is the plus factor. I could sell it tomorrow.”

“Very nice.”

“The expensive ones stare out at the Gulf. Actually, I’d rather look at the pool.”

“Sure.”

“I like the way you keep yelping with sheer pleasure.”

“I’m sorry, Mitch. I’m a drag. That drunk at the bar, I’ve known that guy for six years, at least. I did him a pretty good favor one time. So tonight he wanted to see if he could smash my face in. He was eager. He acted as if he was doing no more than would be expected of any good citizen. And he had some things to say to you, just for being with me.”

“I didn’t learn any new words, Jaimie. And he kept repeating himself. It was very dull.”

“So who got asked to leave? Me.”

She put her glass down and turned deftly to lie across his lap, looking up at him. All he could see of her face was a pallor of her hair, a bright highlight on her eye, another highlight on a moist lip.

“Rather be there than here, huh?”

“No, Mitchie.”

“Darling, I still think you could be cheered up somewhat in a very ordinary old-fashioned way. So you should give it a small try, don’t you think?”

After several minutes she moved away from him and sighed and picked up their empty glasses. “I guess we’re down to one vice, hon.”

“I’m sorry, Mitchie, I just...”

“Jeepers, Jaimie, don’t get abject about it. At a time like this it isn’t exactly a definitive test of manhood. If I thought it was necessary to your morale, boy, I would persevere, but we’d be up to our hips in raggedy nerves. Honestly, I don’t feel at all scorned or spurned or anything. I was just making a small scorched offering anyhow.”

She carried the glasses into the kitchen and turned the light on. She hummed along with the gentle music as she pried ice cubes loose.

“Mind if I use the phone?” he called.

“Your house, your phone, your woman,” she said, and came in and turned the music off, turned the small lamp on beside the phone and went back to the kitchen.

Brian Haas answered and said, “I just came through the door, Jimmy. I didn’t note any fistfights in the audience, and I didn’t see anybody hanging from a tree when I left, so I guess you didn’t attend the festivities.”

“How did it go?”

“Like hot buttered wax, friend. First off, our Elmo gave a humble little address. He had been slandered. An irresponsible report had been published without the knowledge of his great and good friends, Mr. Ben Killian and Mr. Borklund. A retraction would be published. But, in view of the doubt it might have created in a few minds, he was abstaining from voting on the issue after the public hearing. Long, loud applause.”

“Naturally.”

“Next came the Reverend Coombs. He too had been slandered. And then he proceeded to slander all the Save Our Bayers. Slur, sneer, smear innuendo. Gist of message as follows: The soft weak do-gooders, the so-called liberals are gutting the strength of this great capitalistic God-fearing nation, and it doesn’t take any secret organization to put them down, because the common man, in his wisdom, will rise up as a multitude and smite them down. There is no place in our grrreat community for irresponsible, pleasure-seeking, Godless parasites and so on. Poor Tom got his turn next. Believe me, not one single word was audible. Same with a scared professorial type from Washington, from some national conservation group. Then Kat Hubble went up onto the stage and faced the animals. Couldn’t hear a word of that, either. My God, she is a lady. She is brave and true. That decency was like a banner in the sunlight. Then came the perfect timing. Burt Lesser scolded them for being so rude. He made his pitch. Then the golden voice of the Chamber of Commerce made a financial pitch that had them all breathing heavy. That was all. The commissioners called a short recess to determine if they would vote on it at once. They so determined. They voted yes. Gus Makelder gave a little sermon on the need for harmony, forget old differences, hand in hand into the golden future and so on and so forth. Not a peep out of the Costex people. The proponents had the sense to trim the presentation way down. With the S.O.B.’s whipped before they ever got started, there wasn’t any need for the customary parade of talent. It was hot in that auditorium, Jimmy. Hot, sweaty, noisy and a little bit dangerous. They went swarming out with some steam left to release. When the hot dry winds blow, the natives get restless anyway. So we’ve had a little flurry of alarums and arrests tonight. Fistfights, car thefts, rapes and other little evidences of high spirits.”

Mitchie handed Jimmy his drink. He said, “How are things at the zoo?”

“Your desk is empty. I’ve got your stuff in a carton in my car, and your check in my wallet. I’ll stop by your place tomorrow before I go in, okay?”