The last game Read Free

his shirt undone and
the tie loose, without its usual pin, bouncing against his chest as
he walked.
    Dante took a thirteen page financial report out of a drawer and
put it in an empty folder and left his office. He went down the
corridor to the meeting unaware of the looks that his employees
were giving him.
    He hardly had a hair on his head and the
few locks that still resisted the ravages of time were totally
white. His face was furrowed by a sea of wrinkles. An enormous
stomach, a wide back and two dark eyes were the first things one
noticed about him. Dante was sixty-three years old and his
retirement in two years was foremost in his thoughts.
    In the meeting room his lawyer and only
friend waited for him with his main financial assessor.
    “ Have you checked the information that I
sent you?” The advisor asked.
    “ I´ve got it right here.” Dante said waving
the folder in front of him. He sat down and then took the report
out. “Is this the report you´re referring to?”
    The financial advisor confirmed with a
quick glance that it was the complex analysis that his
te am had put together
during the last two weeks.
    “ That´s it. As you can see the numbers are
correct and they reveal that . . .”
    “ Everything’ s in order. I agree with everything I´ve
read.”
    “ Then it would appear that we’re all of the
same opinion.” The lawyer said.
    The financial advisor could barely contain
his happiness.
    “ It´s a safe property deal. In five years,
when the land is revalued, the value will increase tenfold. You
won´t regret it.”
    “ Definitely not.” Dante replied. “Because
we´re not going to do this deal.”
    An uncomfortable silence followed his
words.
    “ I don´t understand.” The advisor said. “If you agree with
the report, what´s the problem? We´ve bribed all the key people.
There´s no risk.”
    “ Can´t you see it?” The lawyer asked
confused. “It´s your type of operation. You´ve done thousands like
this.”
    “ That´s true. I know that well enough.”
Dante agreed. “But I´m not getting involved with this one. I want
to sell.”
    “ What? That doesn´t make any sense.” The advisor said. “We´ve only
got to wait five years and we´ll make a packet. You can´t pass that
up.”
    “ Yes, I can.” Dante rebuked him. “I´m not interested in investing
in this. I just want to sell.”
    “ But that’s absurd.”
    The advisor said nothing more. He was
aware that he´d just exploded in front of his boss. Even so it
wasn´t easy to contain himself. The rejection of an opportunity
like this was almost impossible for an ambitious man like him to
accept.
    The lawyer interrupted the two of them
before things got any further out of hand, convincing the financial
advisor to leave the room before it was too late.
    “ You have to admit he was right.” The lawyer said to Dante
after the advisor had left. ”It was a great deal. Besides,
thousands of families will be without a home if we pull
out.”
    “ That´s not my problem,” Dante informed
him. “Someone else will go ahead with the project. I´ve got other
priorities.”
    “I´ve seen a change in you in the last few
months.” The lawyer reflected. “What´s happened here today doesn´t
seem like you at all.”
    “That´s my business.”
    Dante picked the report up off the table
and opened the folder to
put the report back inside but didn’t get that far. His hand
remained in the air.
    “ Is something wrong?” The lawyer asked,
looking at Dante´s hand suspended in the air.
    Dante didn´t answer him. He kept on
looking at a letter that was sitting inside the folder and that he
was sure he hadn´t put there. He put the report down and took the
envelope out. It was black with white edges, without any address.
He opened it and took a sheet of paper with a note written in red
ink out. He was amazed at the exceptional handwriting. He began to
read it carefully.
    “ What are you reading?” The lawyer asked
out of curiosity.