A Man of Affairs Read Online Free PDF Page B

game. She scrawled a check on her Texas bank.
    We made West Palm on schedule, landing amid the heavy civilian and Air Force traffic on the joint base, and it took fifteen minutes to get clearance to West End.
    Warren had drunk himself into a semi-catatonic state, sleepily and massively out of touch with reality. The rest of us looked out the windows as we flew east over Palm Beach, over the big hotels and the random blue patchwork of swimming pools, out over the Atlantic surf line. In twenty-five minutes we began to see the islands of the Bahamas, the vividly streaked blue and tan and green of the shoal waters of the Bahama Flats.
    I saw a huge waterfront establishment which, except for an enormous swimming pool, looked from the air like some sort of military base. A narrow paved road ran along the shoreline to a ramshackle village about a mile away, and continued on through the village and down the coast. Except for the big establishment and the village, the rest of what I could see of the narrow island looked overgrown and uninhabited.
    We landed on a paved, eroded airstrip and taxied to the terminal building. It was a small frame building surrounded with dust. It had a stubby tower, and had at one time been painted gaily but the colors had faded. Across the taxi strip from the terminal several light planes were parked and lashed.
    As we went down the steps a man came toward the aircraft, walking briskly and smiling warmly. He seemed impervious to the grubby surroundings of the airport. At forty feet he radiated impressive charm and complete efficiency. He wore sand-colored walking shorts, a chocolate-brown sports shirt, a yachting cap, Allan Murray Space Shoes in a sandal design with tall dark-brown wool socks. His exposed knees were sturdy and dark brown, the hair on them bleached pale. He was tall, with solid shoulders and a handsome rather heavy face. He had a wide white smile and he was theatrically gray at the temples. As a television huckster he would have been termed true and valid. I had the uncomfortable feeling that you could be marooned on an island with this fellow for seven years and never get a clue as to what he was thinking. He would be inevitably and interminably polite and charming, and were he forced to kill you and eat you, he would be deft and slightly apologetic and quite noble about it. And he would know exactly which leaves and berries to boil with you to give you the right flavor.
    He went directly to Louise and took her hand in both of his and made like Gregory Peck being a young girl’s uncle and said, “I’m so glad you could make it, Louise. Mike sends his apologies. There’re other guests on the island and he couldn’t get away or he would have met you himself. Hello, Tommy.” The handshake was both manly and Ivy League.
    Louise introduced him to Puss, and then to Warren. Warren had a ponderous list and a bleared expression. And she said, “And Sam Glidden, Fletcher Bowman.”
    I got the manly handshake. He looked directly into my eyes, unwaveringly. It is an unnatural affectation and it always makes me feel uneasy. “Glad you could join the party, Sam. Mike is delighted. He’s been following your career, and we both feel you can make valid contributions to our little conference on the island.”
    “Uh. Thanks,” I said. I wished I could have been glib. I wished he’d let go of my hand. He made me feel as if I were wearing coveralls and chewing a kitchen match.
    “I’ll get your stuff hustled through customs,” he said. “And I’ve lined up three so-called taxis. Don’t be alarmed by them. They’ll get us to the Grand Bahama Club. It’s only three quarters of a mile away. Our boat is tied up at the club dock and well have a fifty-minute run to Dubloon Cay. Suppose you all wait over there in the shade and we’ll hustle the baggage off.”
    When we were in the shade of the terminal building I looked back. He was talking to the crew and they were bobbing their heads. Two