Dance Lest We All Fall Down - Margaret Willson [134]
“Well, Mario’s working on the plans already,” she said. “You can tell them what you like. And I’ve hired three boys from down the road to clean the place up. We can’t really start demolition until we can see what’s in there. They should be done by the end of the month.”
“I’m supposed to tell you not to do anything.”
“Fine. So, you’ve told me. So what?” Rita paused. “Margaret, those big shots in São Paulo don’t know anything about how we do business in Bahia. Your guys there in Seattle just don’t think we can do any big project here unless we have some white male overseeing us, a white male who has close ties with the States so he can convince them, while he’s cheating them the entire time, that he’ll do things just like they would have done in the States. Well, that’s just not going to happen.”
“The board in the States actually owns the building, Rita. I didn’t quite understand the implications of this when we set it up. As nonprofits, Bahia Street in Brazil and Bahia Street in the States are legally separate entities—as I set them up so you could retain more secure control—but that separation is broken now because they really can control the building. They own it.”
“Then if worse comes to worst, we just sell the building. We’re running Bahia Street just fine now without it. We can figure out another way to buy one and not give them control at all.” We were both silent for a moment. “You understand what they’re trying to do, don’t you, Margaret? These middle-aged white men on your board?”
“They’re good people, Rita. They’re just scared. Henry’s being ethical, in his view as a U.S. lawyer.”
“That’s his problem. What they really want to do is take over Bahia Street. It happens all the time. Groups get started, people work very hard to get them successful, and then some newcomers to their boards decide they want to change the entire idea of the program, get the votes on their side, and just take over. I don’t know about the States, but here, legally, the board can fire you.”
“Here, too. But they wouldn’t do that. You wouldn’t work with anyone else anyway. You and I started this whole thing. None of them really understands anything about Bahia.”
“So? Do you think they care? They understand their world. And all of Bahia Street falls apart. Well, that isn’t going to happen. You set it up smart, Margaret. This is where your idea of the infrastructure works. You can just shut the Seattle office entirely if you have to. We sell the building and survive on the money from England. We can get Meps and Barry to help us, or your friend Bobbi from Australia who came last year.”
“Right.” My voice did not carry enthusiasm. “By the way, we got another grant from England.”
“For the building?”
“No. For the photography project. Part of it is to build a photography lab so you can teach the kids photography.”
Rita laughed. “Life’s ironic, isn’t it? This has been my dream forever, but now I can’t even think about it.”
Henry wanted us to have a meeting with his São Paulo contact, Walter, who seemed to spend half his time in São Paulo and half in Seattle. I wasn’t clear what, exactly, Walter did, but it was something big in construction for companies like Monsanto. I doubted he could be a person I’d like or respect.
A week before the scheduled meeting, I arrived at the office to see Karima sitting on the sofa. Karima had become an indispensable volunteer. She treated Bahia Street with the dedication she would any job, and over the months had taken from my shoulders a huge amount of the increasingly heavy administrative load of managing the international aspect of Bahia Street. She’d recently become pregnant, and I could see her belly growing round already. She sat slumped, staring at the floor.
“Margaret,” she said. “I’ve decided to quit.”
“What?”
“Well, I came to this organization thinking it was a cool group, that it was actually doing something. I liked the people. Here I thought I could do something meaningful, work with