Читать книгу Death in the Polka Dot Shoes: A Novel - Marlin Fitzwater - Страница 12

Chapter Five

When the public relations man for Chesapeake Resorts International said his new hotel would bring better highways and streets, a twelve-foot slide flashed on the screen showing a spaghetti pattern of Los Angeles freeways at rush hour. Some young business school graduate no doubt put these slides together, thinking the string of cars inching along six lanes of traffic would be a wonderful backdrop to the words. But to the citizens of Parkers, gathered in the local elementary school to hear the future of their town, it was explosive.

Six hundred people gasped. Air gushed from the gymnasium. And then as one body, as if practiced in some philharmonic hall, every farmer, waterman and wife in the place screamed “NO-O-O-O.” And it didn’t stop for long minutes. People stomped on the wooden bleachers in the gym. One lady screamed, “My God. My God.”

“My God,” I said, turning to my brother’s wife, “what are the briefers doing? They can’t be this stupid.”

“Does CRI think we want more cars and roads?” Martha gasped. “They’re crazy.”

The briefer was turning whiter than the free throw line below his table. He just sat with his four colleagues and said nothing. After several minutes, the audience settled, and he tried to make a joke.

“I guess we took a wrong turn back there,” he said sheepishly.

“No Shit!” someone screamed. And then the crowd roared again. The briefers could do nothing but wait until everyone settled down, and hope to start again.

Martha got a babysitter for Mindy so she could accompany me to the first public briefing by the Chesapeake Resorts International, my newest client, concerning their hotel and shopping complex to be built on Jenkins Creek. I invited Martha because my brother had also worked for CRI, but I never heard exactly what he did for them. Maybe Martha could tell me, plus I remembered she had mentioned meeting the corporate brass at some reception. I also thought it would be nice to give her a night out, even if it was work related. That’s how I assuage my guilt in these matters.