Snippets

John Burden's Cigars

John Burden’s Cigars

 A/N: This story is fiction and any resemblance to any of the characters or events depicted in the story is purely coincidental. That said! I did read a paragraph tucked away in a middle page of the New York Times many years ago that mentioned somebody had tried with similar lack of success to engineer an insurance swindle on these lines ..'

Like most successful young business executives of his age, John Burden enjoyed the good things in life. This meant expensive and desirable experiences, pleasures and possessions. He was indeed fortunate that his high income allowed him to indulge his passions to the fullest extent of his earnings. 

His success, however, was only partly due to his own efforts. The greater part of his present abundance he owed to the team around him and his company. John worked for a highly reputable stock brokerage that was currently enjoying a prosperous and expanding rise in its fortunes. But John’s vanity would not allow him to admit this at all - not even to himself.

He told himself that he was smart; not now and again, but each time he looked up from his desk to gaze at the Manhattan townscape below. He would, on these occasions, jam the telephone to his ear and look out of the window of his office high in the Chrysler building. Then, whenever there was a lull in his telephone conversation, would tell himself what a clever person he was.

‘Johnny boy! You’re one ‘helluva’ smart cookie - maybe even the smartest and you’d better believe it.’

He never tired of uttering these trite phrases. Neither did he tire of hearing them. It did not matter to him if his telephone party overheard him and asked him to repeat what he had said.

Whenever he heard in his earpiece, ‘What was that John ?  Wha’ diddya say?’ He would shamelessly reply.

‘Oh it’s just somebody in the office talking to me.’

Although he never tired of praising his own real and imagined attributes he craved for others to speak of him in similar terms. His colleagues in the office just were not openly talking of him in hushed or legendary terms: not yet anyway.  He needed a happening, a coup of some sort in which he would excel to start it all off and earn the deep respect and awe of his fellows.

His chance of a lifetime for celebrity came from an unexpected source. One of the company’s clients, for whom John was account manager, had recently made a lot of money through following the company’s investment advice. John had persuaded him to invest heavily in an oil stock that had since doubled in value. The client, an elderly Armenian textile merchant was lavish in his praise of the brokerage and generous in his hospitality. The man and his wife, invited John and his young wife to an exclusive downtown club where they provided an elaborate entertainment for them.

The food, service and ambience were wonderful. After the meal the men each took an expensive corona cigar from the humidor proffered by the waiter. The conversation turned to cigars at this point. John expounded his limited knowledge forcefully. The passion of his arguments, although unoriginal, presupposed his hosts to believe he was a connoisseur and an expert on the subject. 

The present examples were undoubtedly of excellent quality and in first class condition, but John remarked that they were not Havana’s and therefore not the  very best the world had to offer.

The embargo against Cuba and its produce was still intact and Havana cigars were denied them in the USA as a direct consequence of the legal ruling.

John continued to bemoan the fact that they could not conclude their excellent evening with one of the best cigars in the world - a hand rolled Havana. His depth of feeling, although contrived, seemed genuine to his host who felt that his hospitality towards this young bon viveur was lacking.