A Client Gunned Down

Three people were wounded today when a gunman opened fire in the El Sheh restaurant. The business permit of this place was one of my first jobs and got paid - partly - in very good French pastry. I remember that I took pic and bodyguards from the nearby restaurant came to check what I was doing. Criminal protection was rampant in the place. The Municipality never got around to install a water meter and they never paid water.

The gunman entered the restaurant, in the coastal town's old industrial area, at around 1:15 A.M., opened fire with a handgun and wounded the restaurant's owner and two of its employees. The assailant fled the scene in a black car that waited for him outside. The owner is not known to police, but the restaurant is located next door to a restaurant owned by reputed underworld figure Francois Abutbul (pic). From an interview with Mr Abutbul:

"I received a five years sentence when my father was killed in our casino in Prague. Thousands attended his funeral, and I also participated honorably, with handcuffs on my hands. That made me even stronger."

I learned from my father to stop feeling melancholy and to proceed always forward. Now I am the head of the family and manage all the family business. I learned from him to be magnanimous, to be patient, and to avoid the loan sharking business in this town.

We, the Abutbul family, always think in the long term. And you can see, in the long term, six or seven years, who disappeared and who survived. No, I dont "rule" this town. But if somebody touches me or my family, I break his head. I stomp on his head. Somebody threw a grenade into a shop. The papers wrote that anarchy rules this town. What do they know? A grenade is anarchy? I'll show them what is anarchy.

Update: A local fishwrap posits the theory that the place was punished for sinful ambition. The El Sheh restaurant was open 24 hours a day, always full, and was being upgraded and enlarged. They were also opening a large bakery for selling their excellent sweet pastries in the center of the town. Someone, it is implied, felt kind of uneasy with their ambition. Maybe the next door neighbor?

Reflection: Possibly, my work of redesigning the place and getting the permits was already causing disconfort to the Mr Abutbul. I had been interrogated by armed gorillas, but I felt no intimidation, believing they I was being welcomed according to local folk customs. El Sheh may have hired me because they saw me impermeable to intimidation.(In other words, I am dreamwalker astronaut). And I also submitted a very low offer and accepted pastries as part of the payment.