“Yes, sir,” the boy replied.
“Keep it up,” Charles said. Then buzzed for his secretary. “I want you to go in the lobby with Miss Mary, while your father and I handle some business.”
Mason’s smile left. He couldn’t take away his trump card. “I thought he’d stay, and sit in on it.”
Charles’s voice remained measured and clear. “He’s not sitting in,” he said, as his office door opened and Mary Stalworth, his secretary for over a decade, walked in.
“Yes, sir?”
“Take this young man in the lobby with you, Mary. I need to talk with his father.”
“Yes, sir.” Then she smiled. “Come on, son. Daddy won’t be long.”
The boy looked at his father, but then followed Mary.
When the door was closed, Charles leaned back. “What can I do for you, Joe?” he asked.
“You’re taking my house,” Mason said.
“You didn’t pay your mortgage. For the past five months.”
“It’s been hard finding work. This economy’s a mess. Clinton and his thug administration has this country going to hell in a hand basket!”
“But back to your foreclosure,” Charles said. “That’s what you need to worry about. Not the government.”
“I have six children, Big Daddy,” Mason said, remembering his own woes. “And you know Agnes is not in the best of health. They said she could lose a leg if those clots don’t stop. And my oldest girl’s back home.”
Charles didn’t respond to that. What could he say? He never said life was easy. His wasn’t a bed of roses either. And he didn’t see what any of it had to do with the fact that he didn’t pay that mortgage for the past five months.
“I have a lot going on,” Mason said. “You can’t take my house!”
“It’s not your house. It’s the bank’s house until you pay for it. You stopped paying for it, Joe.”
“Because I took a hard hit! Don’t you understand that? I sell feed. Because of Clinton, business has been lousy lately. Nobody trust what he’s doing with our country! This country is going to hell---”
“In a hand basket,” Charles finished for him. “I heard already. But I’m also sure President Clinton has nothing to do with why you haven’t paid that mortgage. Or why Jerichodians aren’t buying more feed. Maybe, and I’m shooting in the dark here, but maybe they aren’t buying more feed because three other feed stores have opened in town in the past year and you’re no longer the only game in town. And you never cut your costs and adjusted your lavish lifestyle to fit that reality. Maybe that has more to do with your business woes than President Clinton. What do you think?”
Asshole right, Mason thought as he stared at Big Daddy Sinatra. Big Daddy his foot! Everybody told him he was wasting his time. Everybody told him Big Daddy thought mercy was a hospital and kindness was a horse. He didn’t have a clue what either was, and Mason was wasting his time if he thought he’d get either from a man like that.
“What can I do to make this right?” Mason asked. “Can I get the loan restructured?”
“It was restructured eight months ago. And you paid for a couple months. Then you stopped again. Loan restructuring is out.”
“Then what am I supposed to do?” Mason asked with desperation in his voice.
“Sell that Mercedes, catch up your mortgage, and restructure your high-flying lifestyle to reflect the realities on the ground. That’s a start.”
Charles grabbed a pad and pen and began writing down a name and number. “Call Ed, the manager at my dealership. He’ll give you top dollar for that car and pay off the remaining balance. It should be enough for you to catch up the loan.”
“You’ll allow that? You’ll pull the foreclosure?”
“You have until five pm today before that loan becomes due in full, as you already understood in the countless warning letters you’ve received. You sell that car or you don’t sell that car, payment in full on that house will become due by five pm today. If you catch up before then, it will be pulled. If you don’t, it won’t. No ands, ifs, or buts about it.”
Mason wasn’t satisfied. “I love my car,” he said. “Why should I have to sell it?”
“Don’t sell it,” Charles suggested. “Live in it. You and Agnes and all of the children.”
Mason looked at Charles with an angry glare. “Have you no pity for your fellow man? What good is my old house to you? The last thing you need is more property in this town!”
“So what are you saying? Because I don’t need your home, you shouldn’t have to pay for it?”