Free Drought by Graham Masterton Page A

…’
    Halford gave another of his dismissive shrugs. ‘Look around you, Saskia. You see these guys sitting here, having their lunch? They have money, they have influence. So far as they’re concerned, they keep the local economy going. Without them, the less advantaged people in this county would have no jobs, no homes and no social security. They wouldn’t even have access to a faucet, let alone have any water coming out of it. These guys having their lunch here rightly feel that they deserve special treatment. They’ve worked their rear ends off all of their lives and they’ve given more to the community than anybody else, so they expect to get more back out of it. You can’t say that isn’t fair.’
    â€˜What you really mean is, they’ve donated more to your campaign funds than anybody else, and you owe them, big time.’
    â€˜Come on, Saskia. Stop being so cynical. These guys are wealth-creators. They’re philanthropists. They give millions to charity. If they want to continue to play golf, then they shall. It’s the least we can do to show how much we appreciate everything they’ve done for this community.’
    â€˜Halford – San Bernardino is officially bankrupt. It’s the second poorest city in the nation, after Detroit. What have these vultures done for it?’
    â€˜I know how bad things are. You only have to look at the place from the air. But without these guys, believe me, things would have been a whole lot worse.’
    â€˜Maybe you’re right,’ said Saskia. ‘But if the thirsty masses see that thousands of gallons of precious water are being sprayed on to a golf course, they might start getting a little restless about it, am I right? And this is why you’ve called in Joseph?’
    â€˜It’s pointless having an austerity program if you can’t enforce it,’ said Halford. ‘Just ask the President. Now, Joseph here is director of public safety at Empire Security Services. You must know ESS … they employ over two thousand four hundred security guards and they handle everything from cash transportation to guard duties to crowd control.’
    â€˜ESS – oh, yes, I know all about ESS.’ said Saskia. ‘Two of your security guards were accused of randomly shooting three innocent bystanders during that Chase Bank siege in Rialto last February. I know. I represented the bereaved family of one of them. “Trigger-happy to the point of psychotic,” that’s how the judge described your ESS men.’
    Joseph hadn’t taken his eyes off Saskia once. ‘That bank siege really was a one-off, Saskia. I hope it doesn’t mean that you and I can’t work in harmony together.’ His voice soft but abrasive, like somebody rubbing a pillow with glasspaper, and he made ‘harmony’ sound like some kind of devious conspiracy.
    â€˜I’m totally confident that you can mollify the masses, Saskia,’ said Halford. ‘But if things
do
start getting out of hand, you can call at any time on Joseph and his people to supply any extra protection that might be required. It’s just a precaution, sweet cheeks. The thing of it is, the police have enough on their plate already, and a large number of officers live in neighborhoods where the water supply will be quite severely restricted, so I’m not one hundred percent confident that we can rely on their wholehearted support.’
    â€˜Well, you may be a liar, Halford, but you’re a realist, I’ll give you that.’
    â€˜This woman,’ grinned Halford, shaking his head and giving Joseph an unwelcome nudge with his elbow. ‘I love her. I do. I love her.’
    They sat down at one of the tables and talked for another twenty minutes, then Halford lifted his wrist and peered at his weighty Rolex watch. ‘Well, time I was gone, my friends. I have a meeting with some oil people before this pesky TV