Free Slow Burn by G. M. Ford Page A

pyramid scheme, rather than a
self-supporting corporation.
    "It's easy
enough as long as interest rates are high," she went on. "Nobody
wants their investment back. Why should they? They're making a fortune on the
interest. Nowadays ..."
    Abigail
Meyerson treated me to a five-minute primer on the trials of restaurant
ownership in the late nineties. Skyrocketing real estate prices, the perils of
the pluralistic workforce, the added strain of just-in-time inventory, the
heartbreak of psoriasis. I waited her out.
    "Abby's
Angus can provide its customers with a full-pound, three-inch porterhouse steak
which is less than four percent fat. Did you realize that?" I confessed
that it had escaped my attention. "That’s the market, Mr. Waterman. If s
the fats against the skinnys and, unlike the generations preceding us, ifs the
skinnys who have all the money. Mr. Del Fuego is a relic from the CB-radio
period. I can't imagine what he thinks he's doing in a health-conscious market
such as Seattle. Ifs lunacy. I have no need to sabotage Mr. Del Fuego."
"Besides which," I said, "you're not that kind of girl."
Without altering either her voice or her facial expression, Abby replied,
"On the contrary, Mr. Waterman, I'm exactly that kind of girl. I readily admit
that it is my intention to drive Mr. Del Fuego from the industry. I have been
opening restaurants right on top of him for over two years. I consider it to be
my civic duty. I make no bones about it." "A little steak joke
there," I tried. I regretted the words the minute they escaped my hps.
"Oh," she said. "A joke. Yes. Bone." Silence. "Well,
here's a bone for you, Mr. Waterman. The only reason I'm not buying up Mr. Del
Fuego's back paper and demanding immediate payment is that somebody else is
saving me the time, trouble and expense."
    It took a
moment for me to process this. "You're saying that somebody out there is
trying to put Jack out of business, and it isn't you."
    "No. I'm
saying that somebody in addition to me is trying to put Mr. Del Fuego out of
business. And doing quite well at it, too, I would expect." "How
so?"
    "I've been
told that his Toledo store was forced to close when a
three-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar note was suddenly and quite unexpectedly
called due. When Mr. Del Fuego was unable to meet his obligations, the property
reverted to the noteholders, who then proceeded to allction it off down to the
last rivet. They're supposed to have walked off with almost eight hundred
thousand."
    "And Jack
thinks ifs you who's doing this to him."
    "Which is
why he's started this preposterous charade with that poor animal and why he
must be stopped."
    "Still
seems like a whole lot of trouble, without much reward."
    "Mr. Del
Fuego, beneath all that rural charm, is one of those unfortunate creatures who
harbors what used to be called a good old-fashioned mean streak. Nowadays, they
probably have some other name for it and count it as a disability, for which
one can collect a government dole. But that's how it is. Ifs how he's operated
since the very beginning. You only have to look at how he got his first restaurant
and at that poor woman and her family."
    I knew who she
meant, but I played along.
    "What
woman is that?"
    "His first
wife. I believe her name was Sheila Somers. She had a nice little steak house where
she used to play the piano and sing."
    "Where and
when was this?"
    "Allstin, Texas," Abby said. "What . . . eighteen, twenty years ago. She made the
great mistake of marrying our friend Willie Wogers."
    "Who's
that?"
    "That's
his real name, you know. Long o—Wogers. Willie. He was just another small-time
hoodlum and gambler." "Interesting," I said.
    "She
killed herself. Hanged herself in the garage, or . . ." Abby eyed the
room. "At least that's what the authorities ruled," she finally said.
    "Really."
    "Less than
two years after they were married."
    Her tone
suggested she considered it a minor miracle -that the woman had lasted that
long. "And Jack got the