operation of selling the incoming settlers nursery
shrubs and saplings to restock the scorched earth which he had created—a side
line which was not to be sneezed at.
Simon Templar had friends of his own to visit
in Delray on his way down, and thus it was that his route took him past a pine
wood off the main highway which was in course of being swiftly and efficiently
razed in the interest of such an improvement as has just been described. He
slackened his foot on the speed pedal as he saw the tallest tree in
the grove, already canted at a crazy angle, rocking under the ruthless onslaughts
of the gas powered monster butting at its base.
The Florida native pine is a commercially
useless tree, dis dained as timber, pulpwood, and even fireplace logs. But it will
grow, slowly, to a fifty-foot height of massive broad- branched thick-leaved
evergreen that is one of the few ar boreal majesties in a land of shallow
contours and generally shallow vegetation. It may take twenty years
to do this, so that it is not exactly expendable, except in the most
coldly materialistic
philosophy.
The Saint thought of himself poetically
quite as seldom as Edmund Diehl, but the creaks and groans of the tree and
the roars and growls of the steel behemoth worrying it pierced his ears like the sounds of an
animate conflict, as his car drifted slowly
by; and as the struggle reached its foregone conclusion and the tree toppled
and gave up the ghost in a great
rending shuddering crash like a stentorian death- rattle, an actual physical hurt seemed to strike deep through his own body. He even trod the car to an abrupt
full stop, with a savage insensate
impulse to get out and go over and drag
the driver out of the bulldozer and smash him down with a fist in the face and drive the bulldozer
slowly over him. But he knew just as
quickly as he controlled the reflex how stupid and unjust that would have been:
the driver was only an innocent and
earnest Negro, capably and methodi cally
doing the job that he was paid to do. The man who Simon realized he really wanted was the one who
hired the driver and gave him his
instructions.
And at that susceptible moment, the Saint
looked farther down
the road and saw the enormous billboard which pro claimed that this was to be the site of “ BLISS HAVEN VILLAGE —Another
Contribution to Florida’s Future by ED (Square) DIEHL. ”
Even if Mr. Diehl had been physically aware of
the extra-special attention which he had attracted, it is doubt ful if it
would have perturbed him. Although he had never outgrown an unquestioning loyalty to his
father’s corny touch in the naming of
projects, he had come a long way since the
precarious days of the Heavenleigh Hills promotion. In fact, he had often thought of taking that skeleton
out of his closet and burying it, but a certain stubborn cupidity could never quite let him renounce the small but steady
revenue that still flaked off its
bones. Aside from that, the new boom in
Florida land values which began in mid-century had made fabulous profits possible even by legitimate
methods, so that Mr. Diehl was even
accepted as an upstanding mem ber of
the community by many citizens with short memo ries. His dishonesties
were mostly neater and mellower than they
had formerly been, and always cautiously covered by shrewd legal advice; and such a brazen piece of
chicanery as he had perpetrated on Jim Harris was due more than anything to an incurable attitude of mind that
would always get the same kind of
egotistical lift out of hornswoggling an unsuspecting victim that a Don Juan type derives from a callous seduction.
Mr. Diehl had little else in common with the
picture of a Don Juan, being a large gross man with a beefy red face and small
piggy eyes as bright as marbles. He wore a very large diamond ring
with apparent disregard for the fact that its flashing drew particular attention to his hands,
which nearly always featured a set of grimy
fingernails; and he had other
unpleasant
shrubs and saplings to restock the scorched earth which he had created—a side
line which was not to be sneezed at.
Simon Templar had friends of his own to visit
in Delray on his way down, and thus it was that his route took him past a pine
wood off the main highway which was in course of being swiftly and efficiently
razed in the interest of such an improvement as has just been described. He
slackened his foot on the speed pedal as he saw the tallest tree in
the grove, already canted at a crazy angle, rocking under the ruthless onslaughts
of the gas powered monster butting at its base.
The Florida native pine is a commercially
useless tree, dis dained as timber, pulpwood, and even fireplace logs. But it will
grow, slowly, to a fifty-foot height of massive broad- branched thick-leaved
evergreen that is one of the few ar boreal majesties in a land of shallow
contours and generally shallow vegetation. It may take twenty years
to do this, so that it is not exactly expendable, except in the most
coldly materialistic
philosophy.
The Saint thought of himself poetically
quite as seldom as Edmund Diehl, but the creaks and groans of the tree and
the roars and growls of the steel behemoth worrying it pierced his ears like the sounds of an
animate conflict, as his car drifted slowly
by; and as the struggle reached its foregone conclusion and the tree toppled
and gave up the ghost in a great
rending shuddering crash like a stentorian death- rattle, an actual physical hurt seemed to strike deep through his own body. He even trod the car to an abrupt
full stop, with a savage insensate
impulse to get out and go over and drag
the driver out of the bulldozer and smash him down with a fist in the face and drive the bulldozer
slowly over him. But he knew just as
quickly as he controlled the reflex how stupid and unjust that would have been:
the driver was only an innocent and
earnest Negro, capably and methodi cally
doing the job that he was paid to do. The man who Simon realized he really wanted was the one who
hired the driver and gave him his
instructions.
And at that susceptible moment, the Saint
looked farther down
the road and saw the enormous billboard which pro claimed that this was to be the site of “ BLISS HAVEN VILLAGE —Another
Contribution to Florida’s Future by ED (Square) DIEHL. ”
Even if Mr. Diehl had been physically aware of
the extra-special attention which he had attracted, it is doubt ful if it
would have perturbed him. Although he had never outgrown an unquestioning loyalty to his
father’s corny touch in the naming of
projects, he had come a long way since the
precarious days of the Heavenleigh Hills promotion. In fact, he had often thought of taking that skeleton
out of his closet and burying it, but a certain stubborn cupidity could never quite let him renounce the small but steady
revenue that still flaked off its
bones. Aside from that, the new boom in
Florida land values which began in mid-century had made fabulous profits possible even by legitimate
methods, so that Mr. Diehl was even
accepted as an upstanding mem ber of
the community by many citizens with short memo ries. His dishonesties
were mostly neater and mellower than they
had formerly been, and always cautiously covered by shrewd legal advice; and such a brazen piece of
chicanery as he had perpetrated on Jim Harris was due more than anything to an incurable attitude of mind that
would always get the same kind of
egotistical lift out of hornswoggling an unsuspecting victim that a Don Juan type derives from a callous seduction.
Mr. Diehl had little else in common with the
picture of a Don Juan, being a large gross man with a beefy red face and small
piggy eyes as bright as marbles. He wore a very large diamond ring
with apparent disregard for the fact that its flashing drew particular attention to his hands,
which nearly always featured a set of grimy
fingernails; and he had other
unpleasant
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