"Steven Gould - Wildside" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gould Stephen Jay)

we'll ship the birds to you."

"What? No contract? No paperwork? How do we know you have them?"

"I already delivered my evidence of good faith. Remember? It eats pigeon feed and shits."

"How about half before delivery, half after?"

"There are other zoos."

They agreed that there were other zoos. They also agreed to my terms.

The next phone was on the Northwest Freeway, on our way back out of town.

"Sierra Club."

"I'd like to speak with Mr. Saunderson."

"May I have your name?"

"The Lazarus Company."

"Uh, your name please?"
 "John Smith."

"One moment please."

I listened to classical music as she put me on hold. My watch read 3:02.I started the stopwatch
function. At forty-five seconds I hung up.

"Another phone," I said. "Somewhere else."

We drove away from the freeway and stopped at a 7-Eleven.

"Sierra Club."

"This is John Smith of the Lazarus Company, again. Your phone system hung up on me. I need
to talk to Mr. Saunderson." I started the stopwatch again. The hold music stretched on and on. I hung
up.

Rick looked at me, his eyebrows raised. Joey looked annoyed. "How are we going to sell them
the pigeons if you keep hanging up on them?"

"I could be wrong, but I think they're trying to trace the call."

Rick said, "On what grounds? Don't they have to get the police involved to do that? We didn't
do anything illegal." He stood beside me at the phone. Joey was leaning against the hood of my truck.

"I don't know. I don't like it, though." I got back into the truck. "We'll give it one more try. If he
isn't on the line in under a minute, I say we blow off the Sierra Club."