— Which company? The Governor sought mooring.
— Diamond, a share of Diamond Cable, sir… Davidoff tipped side to side on the blue ripple of carpet as they scudded past. Governor Cates rocked gently. — Can’t go wrong with that can they sir, he looked back for Mrs Joubert, — here, here…! Governor Cates had begun to gather headway. — This way… Davidoff waved them on in a wide berth, getting the last of them by as the Governor made mid-channel dead in her course.
— Amy…?
— Good morning, Uncle John.
— Good, come along with me for a minute, Amy.
She took his arm, — oh Mister Davidoff…? over his shoulder as Davidoff got the last of them through a door ahead and swung back.
— Take your time, we’ve got a presentation all set up for them.
— And the lunches?
— And the lunches… He listed in a bow and hurried back up the corridor to enter the board room with — Well! You’ve just had an opportunity not many youngsters experience. When you go home tonight you can tell your families you met one of your country’s outstanding Americans.
— You mean you?
— Governor Cates is one of the men who opened the frontiers of America as we know it today, Davidoff leaned knuckled under on the expanse of walnut stretched before him, pad, pencils, ashtray, pad, pencils, ashtray, — he…
— Him? He was this frontiersman?
— Not like Daniel Boone if that’s what you’re thinking of, no. He opened America’s industrial frontiers, her natural resources that make us the wealthiest country in the world. He’s a man presidents come to for advice, and you can be proud…
— Is he rich?
— Well after all, a man who has contributed so greatly to his country’s wealth and power would deserve…
— What are all these here pads and pencils for?
— This is the board room, where your board of directors meets. They sit right in the very chairs you’re sitting in and, oh Carol just bring those in and pass them around. This is your company’s Annual Report boys and girls, we put it out because we believe that you, and all the other company owners, have a right to know all about your company and the activities it’s engaged in Carol tell him to get that projector going, the many varied ways your company serves our great country with cable of every kind you can imagine from the defense industry to communications of every sort, the…
——ubbb… vvvv… vvawwwwg…
— Carol…! Light splashed over the map and drapes behind him. — He’s got that on backwards, tell him to…
— He’s rewinding it, he…
— Oh and Carol where’s Mister Eigen, I said I wanted him in here to handle this presentation find him and send him right in here. Communications of every sort, from interpersonal messages to the vast and growing television audience, whether it be the family gathered at home for the finest in entertainment or the student in the remote classroom absorbing the lesson of the master, whose wisdom can be shared with more fertile young minds in a single hour today than Plato, Aristotle, and the renowned teachers of antiquity reached in their entire we about ready in there? Momentarily blinded, he turned to reach behind the tasteful gold-on-blue arrangement of denarii, ducats, shekels, and similar bright testaments to long submerged mercantile struggles that formed the pattern of the drapes.
— Boy hey, look!
— Hey that’s real neat. Look hey.
The map rose silently and disappeared, revealing a horizontal bar graph in gay shades of orange labeled Plant Investment and Accumulated Depreciation (in Millions), which followed the map to expose Sources of Capital (in Millions) in vertical yellows, Sales Projections by Continent (in Millions) in assorted aggressive hues, and two, three, four more with the haste of snapping window shades, to lay bare an empty screen.
— Reached, in their entire lives. Lifetimes. Now, in just a moment now, you’ll have a close look at the many and varied contributions your company’s products are making toward a growing America, and your share in helping our great country to turn the promise of tomorrow into the reality of today, as the tide of human ready in there? He braced back, doubled fists on his hips in a commanding stance of out-of-doors to look up the length of the table’s sheen broken by balled sweaters, a candy wrapper, elbows and whole arms and even a head or two, chairs swiveled and legs slung outboard twisting, tapping, — we may have time for a question or two somebody might have about the Annual Report. Your board of directors wants every shareowner to, yes?
— Are you one?
— A shareowner? Of course and I’m proud to…
— No I mean like a director, said the girl wadding her sweater.
— Oh, Davidoff inclined restraining his glasses to contain his wink, — maybe some day, if you’ll vote for me. Because, he straightened up — that’s what people’s capitalism is, isn’t it everybody. As one of the company’s owners you elect your directors in a democratic vote, and they hire men to run the company for you the best way possible. When you vote next spring…
— With one share we get like one vote?
— You certainly do, and what’s more you’re entitled to…
— And like if I owned two hundred ninety-three thousand shares then I’d get like two hundred ninety-three thousand votes?
— That’s not fair! Like we get this one lousy vote and he gets like two hun…
— What’s so not fair! You buy this here one share so you’ve got like this lousy twenty-two fifty working for you where I’ve got like six thou, wait a second… the pencil stub came up to scratch, — nought times nought is…
— He couldn’t could he?
— I could so boy I could even vote two hundred ninety-three thousand times for myself for a director if I wanted to couldn’t I?
— I mean like that’s democracy? It sounds like a bunch of…
— Slow down now slow down, before a family squabble starts here let’s come to this little lady’s rescue… she cringed from Davidoff’s wink behind the sweater wad, — every shareowner wants profits whether you’ve got one share or a million, right? So you’ll all want to vote for directors that will hire topflight management like your company here’s got to keep those profits rolling in and if they’re not, this little lady with her one share has just as much right to question the directors and management as somebody with a million shares because they’re working for her too, aren’t they. If she thinks they’re not running things for her and all the other owners she can even take them to court and start a lawsuit for damages to make sure they’re obeying all the company’s rules, that’s why we put a copy of the company’s bylaws in your little kit there. Those are the company’s rules and anybody who breaks one has to answer to this little lady, like a regular club boys and girls and those are the club’s rules one for all and all for one, I think that’s a pretty good little lesson in democracy that film about ready in there?
— Could I just ask if…
— Looks like we’ve got another minute… he looked past the arm straining the sweater’s dreary pattern in front of him, — look right in the back of your Annual Report there and you’ll see the pictures of your directors, that’s Governor Cates up in the corner you can say you’ve actually met him can’t you, and the big man right under him you might have heard about in your history books about the war let’s speed it up in there we can’t take all day, General Box, he was the famous armored division commander who stopped the whole German army in the big winter Ardennes… they startled to a blare of music and he shielded his eyes, — all right boys and girls I think we’re ready to see…