"Destroyer - 007 - Union Bust" - читать интересную книгу автора (Murphy Warren)

"I can't see the fuckin' roof. How the hell am I going to set it right?" yelled the operator.

"We'll get a flood up there. We'll get a flood," the builder yelled back. He turned to Jimmy McQuade.

"Yeah. What do you want?"

"We're the phone installers. It looks like we're four months early."

"No. You're late."

"Where do you want the interoffice lines, in the cement?"

"Well, do what you can now. You have the plans. You could be stringing outside wire."

"Most of my men are inside."

"So work 'em outside. What's the big deal?"

"You don't know too much about phones, do you?"

"I know they're going to be working by April 17, is what I know."

That was the first complaint. The president of the local said it wasn't up to him. Call the vice-president. The vice-president told Jimmy McQuade he didn't receive the money because it was an easy job.

Two weeks later, one of the inside men threatened to quit. More money came for Jimmy McQuade from Washington. When the other installers found out about this episode, they all threatened to quit. They all got more money.

Then one of the men did quit. Jimmy McQuade ran after him down Nuihc Street, now paved to a three-lane-wide thoroughfare. The man wouldn't listen. Jimmy McQuade phoned the vice-president of the union and asked if he could recruit another man to fill the crew.

"What was his name?" asked the vice-president.

"Johnny Delano," said Jimmy McQuade. But he did not get another man. Nor did the quitter return.

And when the lineman committed the mistake of a rookie and the installer passed out, Jimmy McQuade had had it. Enough.

The kid slept over his tool box, and all the others filed into the new elevators, which they hoped would work this time. Jimmy McQuade went with his men.

He went home to his wife who had not known his body since he started the job. She embraced him passionately, shooed the kids off to bed, and undressed him. She took great care in the shower, and put on the special perfume he loved.

When she entered the bedroom, her husband was dead asleep. No matter. She knew what would wake him. She nibbled at his ear and ran a hand down his stomach to his navel.

All she got was a snore.

So Mrs. McQuade accidentally spilled a glass of water on her husband's face. He slept with a wet face. At 3 a.m. there was a buzz at the door. Mrs. McQuade nudged her husband to answer it. He slept on.

She donned a bathrobe, and mumbling curses about her husband's job, answered the door.

"FBI," said one of two men, holding forth identification. "May we speak to your husband? We're awfully sorry to disturb you at this hour. But it's urgent."

"I can't wake him," said Mrs. McQuade.