A crisp, predatory snap of a brand-new fifty-dollar bill echoed across the wet asphalt of the Apex Super-Mart parking lot.
“Next! Keep the queue moving! Exact tender preferred!”
Roger Locke stood on the elevated concrete loading bay beneath a wide canvas awning, his tailored charcoal three-piece suit shielded from the misting rain. Pinned to his lapel, gleaming beside a bright red silk handkerchief, was a newly stamped Silver Notary Deputy Pin. In front of him, resting on a folding card table covered in green velvet, was a battered cardboard ballot box crammed with hundreds of crumpled banknotes.
Two hundred men, women, and children stood shivering in a queue that stretched thirty yards into the dark, rain-soaked asphalt. They were harbor machinists in oil-streaked sweaters, commercial net-menders, and young families clutching cardboard suitcases. Above their heads, the gaudy fifty-foot neon sign of Apex 24-Hour Super-Mart buzzed with aggressive, uncalibrated three-phase current, painting the puddles in shades of poisonous magenta and electric cyan.
Julian Vance stepped out of the shadow of the freight warehouse, his faded blue Starlight apron buttoned to his throat. His newly sutured left palm rested securely inside his coat pocket, the clean white gauze keeping the four nylon stitches protected against the damp air.
