THE MONEY MEN
John Hammond, a tall, exuberant man of seventy five, sat in a wicker chair on the third floor of Cowain, Swain, and Ross, reading an article about a couple of field botanists who'd discovered a plant that had supposedly been extinct since the cretaceous period. Hammond knew that even dinosaurs, in their own way, still remained; crocodiles, snakes, hell, even birds. But Hammond wasn't entirely convinced, even through all of Grant's insistence, that dinosaurs had evolved into birds. In fact, he had his own theory about cockroaches containing pieces of dinosaur DNA, but that was his own-
"Mr. Hammond?" A young man in his early twenties announced himself. "I'm Donald Gennaro. I'm here to speak to you about the financing of your park."
"Gennaro, yes!" Hammond said eccentrically, standing and shaking the man's hand vigorously. "I've heard so much about you from your advisor, what's his name? Ah, yes, John. That's my name, you know-"
"Mr. Hammond, we're extremely excited but also extremely concerned about the nature of your park, sir. We want to confirm that this is strictly animatronics, correct?"
"No, no, not at all. Who the hell wants to see animatronics in the year 1990? No, no, I mean the real thing. Gennaro, this is the opportunity of a lifetime."
Gennaro and Hammond began walking down the long, drab hallway lined with offices.
"What exactly do you mean? How can they NOT be animatronics?"
"That's the beauty of it, really. I want the park to be as authentic as possible."
"With what, Mr. Hammond, is the question here."
"Yes, I realize that, of course. But we don't know yet."
"Mr. Hammond, you're requesting three million dollars as a start; how can you not know?"
"We're working on it. I've got John Arnold, a computer specialist, and Robert Muldoon, I don't know if you've heard of him or not, but-"
"Mr. Hammond, we're going to need to see more of this project to believe it."
"Well," said Hammond, leaning on his walking stick, "Then I guess you're just going to have to see it."
Returning to his spacious office on the second floor of the law firm, Donald Gennaro was shocked. How had a prestigious name like Cowain, Swain, and Ross been dragged into a sham like this? Hammond's motives were completely unknown, and even the nature of the park was still a bit of a mystery. Gennaro sighed. Hammond was a big bit of business around here, and it would have been hard to turn him down. He could, however, turn him over to another investor. If things got bad, which he suspected they might, he didn't want to be there to see it happen.
Gennaro was about to try and do just that, when his phone rang.
"Donald Gennaro, Cowain, Swain, and-"
"Yes, yes," A gruff voice on the other line said. "I know all of the fluff. That's why I called you, damn it."
Gennaro was taken aback. "May I ask who's speaking?" he asked, politely.
"Muldoon, Robert Muldoon. The game warden for Jurassic Park."The voice was slurry, and mean. He sounded drunk.
"Jurassic Park? What are you talking about?" He had to be talking about Hammond's park, but this was the first time he'd heard a name.
"The park, y'know. Hammond's park. You know. Anyway, I need to ask a bit of a favor of you."
"Yes?"
"Call Grant. Ask him if he knows anything about the urinary habits of raptors." Gennaro heard something in the background, something like an owl or maybe it was a car trying to start. He couldn't tell.
A loud thud! came from Muldoon's end, and he grunted. "Very sorry, chap. Have other things gnawing on my mind at the moment." With that, he hung up.
