Page 8 - Just Deserts

Prologue

opted or destroyed by the stupid greedy nasty people in the power
structure that I don’t know where to turn. It has been very
frustrating!”
I spoke up again, feeling a bit left out of this stirring
conversation. “Well, it’s not surprising: it doesn’t take much to knock
something good off course, and the bad guys know all the dirty
tricks. As soon as anyone decent comes up with a plan to make
things better in this country, those s.o.b.’s go right after him—or
her,” I added hastily.
“Yeah,” said Carlos, pounding the table and making the
coffee cups rattle. “They can ruin anyone! They’ve got money
and they can hire investigators to dig up dirt on people!”
“And we all know about that—don’t we, Doreen?” said Lester,
still chewing on his dismay at being discovered (God knows
where: I never asked).
She took the dig personally, as intended. “Damned right I do,
Lester! And don’t think I’m not aware of all the investigating you
did—all of you did—after you received my invitation. It’s just
another indication of how low we’ve sunk that we resort to all this
cloak-and-dagger stuff to keep our own privacy.”
Suddenly Gerald stood up, spilling crumbs in a wide arc.
“That’s it!” I had never seen him so excited. “That’s the third
track! A grand synthesis! Why didn’t I see it before? Eureka!”
This revelation was met with several derisive responses from
the rest of us, but I cannot recall who said what. Gerald, truly
inspired, was not to be deterred by our puny barbs.
“Look,” he went on in a rather high-pitched voice, “we spent
years honing our skills in doing research—reading piles of
material, analyzing it for essentials and drawing conclusions. At the
same time we participated in life as members of the have-nots; we
saw the injustices perpetrated by ill-intentioned nitwits occupying
positions of power in our imperfect social order, but as victims we
had few resources to deal with the perpetrators. Then the lottery.
Lots of money, no background in spending it; that discomfort led us
to develop new skills: subterfuge, deception, manipulation of
identity—all necessitated by, but affordable as a result of, our new-
found wealth.”
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