ADVENTURE JOURNEY EPISODES
by Jeremy Russell

Episode 7: Sydney, Australia, Spring 1991
This is one episode in a developing story. Links to PRECEDING EPISODES at bottom.

Giselle's effeminate editor was bragging about the other galas he'd attended since the Sydney opera house first opened in 1973 when he interrupted himself to say, "There's your man."

"In the glasses?" she asked, tippling from a champagne flute.

"No,” he scoffed. “The tall mustachioed gentleman to the left of the man with the glasses. That's Martin Ray. And, unexpectedly, there's his son, David. Go see what's up.” He gave her a pert shove in the direction of the entourage.

She went, placing her glass on the bar as she slipped through the opera-house crowd.

"eCommerce?" Martin was saying to his son with audible distaste as Giselle came within earshot. Then, as if endowed with a sixth sense, he reached back and took her elbow, cradling it the way a father might his daughter's at the nuptial aisle as he eased her up to his side. "My son wants me to invest. What do you think of this information superhighway, Ms. Kirkaldie?”

“I, uh-”

Before Giselle could compose a response, Martin introduced her to his son as a "journalist writing a story on me whose reputation has preceded her."

"Well, she ought to appreciate that I came to you, instead of the Silicone Valley venture capitalists."

Martin seemed to have epiphany. "I could be persuaded, but I'd need a favor."

"What favor?"

Instead of responding, Martin turned to the small, tan young man in the glasses who stood beside him and said, "Reynaldo, I think we've finally found your escort to Siberia. Meet my son, Dave."