Ramsey Douglass felt edgy and irritable when he parked at the curb and walked to the heavy glass doors. The waiting room inside was freezing cold; the air-conditioning had been built for 120-degree summers and nobody had adjusted it for the 85-degree outside temperature of early April. The skinny man at the reception desk sat with a telephone against one ear and a finger stuck in the other to block out the piped music that flooded the room like an oil spill. An American flag hung limp on a standard in the corner and above it, suspended from the ceiling, an animated color cartoon flickered on the screen of a television monitor, without sound. Douglass waited for the receptionist’s attention; finally the man at the desk hung up the telephone. “My name is Douglass, to see Miss Lawrence. It’s important.” “I’ll see if I can locate her.” The bow tie bobbed up and down at his throat. Douglass said, “You could hang meat in here.” “I know. Mr. Burgess likes it cold.” “Look, it’s on the urgent side.”
