Pool_1

>> turpe lucrum <<

( more recently, in the age of paper - lower than lead ) Let's call this meeting to order, gentlemen. Come on over here, Beej. What-cha- got?" The long cherry wood table that could easily seat twenty along each of both long sides had a business chic distended center, not unlike half of the men gathering around its periphery. It narrowed at the ends to allow, at either extreme, space for only a single seat. The one narrow end nearest the general entry door was situated beneath a motor controlled drop down projection screen which was at this time withdrawn into the ceiling. That same table end was additionally outfitted with electronic display devices which preempted anyone from sitting there. At the opposite narrow table end, on the far side of the room, away from but with a view of the main entrance, was a single obvious main seat of power, the chair. Some attendees called it the electric chair, but only cautiously in private. It was actually more a throne than a seat with its ridiculously tall back richly appointed in red velvet crowned in gold rivets. Complex carvings looking more like devils than angels embellished the mahogany wooden frame. A close scrutiny suggested a tangle of bodies cast into hell. This unlikely piece of sitting furniture, a cleaning lady's nightmare, was quite unlike all the others, the low partly black enameled smooth cherry wooden chairs which populated the sides of the elongated surface. The room had twenty foot ceilings which just screamed waste in such a tight urban multistory building where space was outrageously expensive. Three cut crystal chandeliers descended from or arose toward the vaulted frescoed ceiling automatically by a control located at the head of the table. Behind the imperial singular seat, floor to