CHAPTER TEN V: THE MAN WHO HAD A VOTE
Hugo asked Nora to meet him at a small bakery near the harbor before the hearing.
He looked exhausted and had not touched the tea cooling beside his hands.
He said that he was considering changing his vote on the committee’s final position.
Nora reminded him that the committee had already rejected the memorial offer.
Hugo explained that he was not reconsidering the old offer.
He wanted the volunteers to support a conditional agreement with the developer if the original building proved too expensive to repair.
He feared that public loyalty to Walter would prevent the committee from considering any alternative.
Nora asked whether Imani had dismissed the idea.
Hugo said that she had encouraged him to bring a written proposal to the group.
He looked almost disappointed by her fairness.
Nora asked why he had come to her instead.
Hugo admitted that he wanted someone to tell him whether he was betraying his mother’s memory.
Nora looked at the framed photographs on the bakery wall.
She said that she could not make that decision for him.
She could help him ask whether the replacement would provide the things his mother had valued about the theater.
Hugo described his mother arriving home after rehearsals with paint on her sleeves and songs stuck in her head.
She had loved the people she worked beside more than the old building itself.
He said that he had forgotten that distinction while defending the theater’s walls.
Nora asked whether he had spoken to Peter about the proposed replacement.
Hugo said that Peter believed both options required honest safety standards.
He had refused to endorse either building without knowing who would operate it.
Nora suggested that Hugo bring those questions to the committee rather than hide his doubts.
At the next meeting, Hugo presented a proposal for conditional support of a new facility if the developer guaranteed affordable access, safe technical spaces,
and an independent governing board.
Several volunteers objected immediately.
Mara Coyle asked whether the proposal weakened their preservation case on the eve of the hearing.
Hugo answered that a responsible committee should know what it would accept if the building could not be saved.
Imani asked everyone to listen before voting.
The discussion lasted almost two hours.
In the end, the committee agreed to present preservation as its preferred option while remaining open to a binding community-space agreement if safety assessments made restoration impossible.
Walter did not speak during the vote.
Afterward, Hugo thanked him for allowing the younger members to decide.
Walter answered that he had no authority to allow anything.
The committee belonged to its members.
Hugo smiled at the correction and began helping stack the chairs.
