excerpt
“There are all kinds of people here,” he said, grabbing Ken’s arm. “They
want to talk to you, and I told them to go down to the restaurant.”
The tables were filled with media people, and Ken spent the morning
answering questions. When the last of the journalists left, Rocco handed
him an envelope that had arrived in the morning mail. The address was
written in old-fashioned curlicue script and inside was a card and a note
from Salvador Grimaldi, a landscape architect, congratulating him on the
event and on his magnificent paintings. “I would appreciate a call,” the
note said. “I would love to meet you. We have crossed paths many times
although we have never met. Please call.”
Ken dialled the number and they met at the gallery later that day. Salvador
Grimaldi sparkled – his eyes twinkled, his smile stretched across
his cheeks and he bounced when he walked. He was like a boiling kettle,
bubbling over with life.
He explained that he had once done aerial surveys of the Arctic and
had flown across the land many times. On occasion, he had noticed
groups of people travelling across the land. He had been told that they
were Eskimos on the move, and a white man who had gone native was
travelling with them.
“That was you!” Salvador exclaimed. “And I’ve wondered about you
for years. And here you are with all these Inuksuit. This is the first time
I’ve heard anybody in the southern part of this country talk about them
or describe them, and here you have a world full of them. I just had to
meet you!”
They talked all afternoon. Ken told Salvador about his ambition to get
his message out to the public, and Salvador told him about his work as a
landscape architect. The Reichmann family was one of his largest clients.
“The Reichmanns?” Ken asked.
“Yes,” Salvador nodded.
“Would you mind if we returned to the subject of the Reichmanns another
time?” Ken asked, arranging to meet him again in a couple of days.
He wanted time to consider how to use this information and to plan his
next steps.
In the morning, while he was working on the Reichmann painting and
pondered Salvador’s relationship with the family, Henri banged into the
studio shouting, “I’ve had enough! I’m selling the company!”
Rocco suggested that Ken buy him out and hire someone to run the
framing studio for him. He introduced him to Diane Lyle, a young woman
in her twenties who had grown up on a farm and wanted to make
a name for herself in the city. Ken agreed with Rocco. She was just the
sort of enthusiastic, no-nonsense, ambitious person who could make the
business thrive. Ken met with his lawyer, David Freeman, drew up the
papers and purchased the framing company for fifteen thousand dollars.
Mayanaam
vequinox
Manolis 