DANIEL DUBOIS REPLACED THE handset on its console. He remained motionless for a moment, staring thoughtfully at the phone. He was a small man, totally bald, with a large head and a shriveled body. The flesh of his face was sallow, cross-hatched by countless lines. The muscles on the left side of his face had slackened, leaving his mouth sagging and the lid of his left eye half closed. He wore a blue business suit, and sat in an elaborately appointed wheelchair, his partially paralyzed body angled slightly to the right. Fingers permanently crooked, his left hand lay helplessly in his lap.
The right side of the wheelchair was drawn close to the Regency table that served as DuBois’ desk. Except for two telephones, both within reach of DuBois’ right hand, the top of the table was uncluttered. Now, slowly, DuBois lifted the console phone with his right hand, set it aside, used a palsied forefinger to touch a single button on the console. He put the phone in his lap, pressed one of three buttons on the wheelchair’s right armrest. The chair pivoted to the left, allowing him to look out through the floor-to-ceiling window, with its panoramic view of the ocean. Today the sky was overcast: long, leaden, low-lying clouds, roll upon roll out to the horizon, casting the water beneath a sullen gray.
When he lifted the phone to his right ear, the connection had already been made.
“Justin?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’ll have to come over.”
“Right away.”
“Thank you.” He turned the chair again, pressed another button, spoke again into the phone: “Mr. Powers will be coming. Show him right in. And no more calls, please, unless they’re critical.” He listened, then nodded. “Yes, thank you.”
He replaced the phone, and again sat immobile for a moment, once more staring at the phone, a modern-day electronic miracle. The push of one button connected him with his secretary. Press another button, and he was talking to Justin Powers. With equal facility, other buttons connected him to New York, and London, and Bonn, and Tokyo.
In an earlier age, the measure of a nobleman’s power was the number of courtiers who attended him, or the number of swordsmen he commanded. Today, the telephone, not the sword, was the symbol of power. A touch of a button, a few words exchanged, and fortunes were made—or lost. In moments, lives were ruined—even lost.
He’d been eighteen years old—a brokerage clerk—when he’d gotten his first phone. A year later, he’d gotten a second phone, his first tangible talisman of success: two phones on his desk, one for outside calls, one for inter-office calls. It was 1929, the year of the crash—the year he’d first experienced sex. Looking back, remembering, it was plain that of the two—the second phone or Florence LeMay—the second phone had been infinitely more significant, more definitive. And secretly, perhaps, more satisfying.
At the thought, he smiled: a twitching of his mouth on the right side, making the sag on the left side more grotesque.
He touched a button on the chair’s armrest, backed away from the Regency table, turned again to the window that framed the distant seascape. He would remain here until Powers arrived, in about twenty minutes.
Telephones and women…
If he chose to reduce his life to its symbolic essences, certainly a telephone and a woman would be primary. Years ago—twenty years ago, at least—when he’d been less stringent about his contacts with the outside, a man named David Griffin had gotten in to see him. Griffin had been recommended by Jack Curtis, whose instinct for the bizarre had always been amusing. “Give him fifteen minutes,” Curtis had urged. “You’ll never forget it, I promise.”
Griffin’s card had described him only as a “Heraldic Scribe.” He’d been a young man, energetic and smooth-talking, with a quick, engaging smile. He’d come directly to the point, saying that he sought a commission to execute the DuBois coat of arms. He’d already done considerable research, he’d claimed, already discovered that an ancestor on DuBois’ mother’s side had been an aide to Louis the Fourteenth. Then, getting briskly down to business, pencil poised over a pad of paper that he’d taken from an expensive attaché case, Griffin had inquired as to DuBois’ primary “life interests.” Amused, he answered that he enjoyed power, paintings, and women, more or less in that order. Apparently Griffin had taken him seriously. A week later, unsolicited, he’d received a rough sketch of the “DuBois coat of arms.” Along with the obligatory knight’s helmet and stylized battlements, the elements had included—yes—a moneylender’s scale, crossed paint brushes, and the outline of a woman’s body.
Could one vicariously experience the pleasures of the flesh once erection was no longer possible, and the body was infirmed? Sometimes, in his sixties, he used to wonder. And now, in his seventies, bound in his wheelchair with a safety belt, alone with his view of the ocean, with the best of his French impressionists hung on the walls, he knew the answer. Too late, he knew the answer.
Once, in his eighties, Montaigne had been asked whether he regretted having lost his sexual desires. Theatrically, the old man had raised a forefinger to his lips, dramatically demanding silence. “Do not speak so loudly, young man,” Montaigne had said, “lest the gods discover my bliss.”
Florence LeMay…
She’d be seventy-six now, if she were still alive. Her body would be shriveled, her voice cracked. Like him, she would lie awake in the night, chronicling her infirmities, wondering how the next day would differ from the day just past. Did she remember him, as he remembered her? Of course, in later years, she would have heard of him. Everyone who read newspapers would have heard of him. But, before she’d read about him, Florence could have forgotten him—as he had forgotten, long ago, so many others, so many anonymous women, in so many darkened rooms.
Had Florence LeMay forgotten those few minutes in her living room, on the couch, the two of them coupled so urgently, so artlessly? It was, he knew, a possibility, a distinct possibility. Because, for Florence, it hadn’t been the first time. So, like him—like everyone else on earth—she could have forgotten. She could have—
The console was buzzing. From a small holster on the left arm of the wheelchair he took a cordless phone.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Powers is here, Mr. DuBois.”
“Thank you. Send him in, please. No calls.”
“Yes, sir.”
He propelled himself behind the desk, maneuvering into position just as Powers came through the door, which Katherine closed soundlessly behind him. As always, Powers wore a dark suit, gleaming white shirt, perfectly knotted regimental tie. And, as always, his manner was stiff and studied, a second-rate actor who’d played one part so long that he’d finally managed a limited credibility.
“Sit down, Justin—” He gestured to one of two antique armchairs, placed to face him across the Regency table.
“Yes. Thank you.” Powers placed his attaché case on the floor beside his chair, sat down, crossed his legs, arranged his trouser creases, absently tugged at his shirt cuffs—all without looking directly at DuBois.
“Did everything go smoothly last night?”
“I—ah—” Simultaneously, Powers seemed to both nod and also shake his head. Finally: “Yes. Th—there weren’t any problems, that I know about.”
“Good. Has the second payment been made?”
Powers swallowed, then nodded: a single ill-at-ease inclination of his head, a mannerism that evoked a child’s discomfit, compelled to perform in the presence of adults.
“I don’t mean to press you,” DuBois said. “I’m not asking for details.”
“I know—” Powers nodded again, then raised an uncertain hand. “It’s just that this, all this, it’s—” He broke off, searched for the words. His eyes, DuBois saw, were hollow, his gestures ineffectual, an embarrassment to behold. “It’s unsettling.”
DuBois permitted himself a small, half-paralyzed smile. “I always enjoy your choice of words, Justin. Understatement, it’s a gift—” Ironically appreciative, he nodded. “‘Unsettling,’ indeed. Very good.”
This time, Powers made no response. At his temple a vein had begun to throb.
“The reason I asked you to come,” DuBois said, “is to tell you that Betty just called, not more than an hour ago. She was upset. Very upset. Which is understandable, of course. One reason for the, ah, exercise, after all, was to make her think, shake her up. But it’s impossible to limit these reactions, once they’re started. That goes without saying. So—” Regretfully, he shook his head. “So we may have to deal with Betty, too.”
“Deal with—?” As if he couldn’t comprehend it, Powers frowned fretfully, moved forward in his chair, focused his gaze intently on DuBois. “You mean—?” Clenched on the arms of the chair, his hands were knuckle-white.
DuBois nodded. “It’s possible. It was always a possibility. For now, though, I want you to find her, keep her under surveillance. I have reason to believe that she’s here, in fact. In Los Angeles.”
“Here?”
DuBois nodded. “Perhaps it’s the moth and the flame—the victim drawn inexorably to his fate. It’s a phenomenon that’s always interested me, the extent to which each of us is preprogrammed, governed by an elaborate set of psychological reactions that is incredibly predictable. Science is learning more and more about genetics—physical traits that are immutable. I suspect the same predictability is applicable to psychological traits. Day to day, we think we’re free to make choices. But I suspect we may be deluding ourselves. I suspect that one’s persona is immutable, formed partly by genetics and partly by experience, otherwise known as habits. And habits, I submit, are actually nothing more nor less than well-worn electrical pathways embedded in the circuitry of the brain. That’s not stated very precisely, I admit. But when we consider that, more and more, science is discovering that electricity is actually the elemental component of all matter, then I think the theory holds up.”
“But—” Powers was shaking his head now, transparently denying that which his cowardness wouldn’t allow him to face. “But we can’t do it again. I—I can’t. I simply can’t.”
As if he hadn’t heard, DuBois spoke reflectively, his eyes soft-focused: “People like Betty have their destiny—and people like us have our destinies. Betty is destined to be used by others. She’s a victim type. That’s the way her experiences have programmed the circuitry of her brain, if you accept my previous premise. But people like me—” He paused to consider. “People like me are the predators, the manipulators of lesser men. And you, Justin—” His eyes came into sharp focus, fixed on the other man. “You are a lesser man. People like you depend on people like me. It’s bred in the bone. Or, if you like—repeating myself—in the circuits of the brain.”
A brief, desperate flicker of dissent showed in Powers’ eyes. “If you’re talking about business, then that’s true. But this other, it’s—” He broke off, visibly shaken, struggling to find strength enough to pronounce the word that, finally, must be spoken between them. When he finally summoned the strength, the word was only a whisper: “It’s—it’s murder.” For a moment Powers sat mute, his hollow eyes staring at nothing. Then, mutely, he shook his head. “I—I still can’t believe I did it, actually did it, had it done.”
“You did it because you were paid to do it, Justin. You depend on me. We’ve already established that. And, conversely, you are an extension of me. I am the brain, you are the instrument—the arms, the legs, the voice. You are the visible me, one might say. And Nick Ames was a threat to me. Possibly a very serious threat. So it became necessary—vital—that he be eliminated. I made the decision. And you executed the decision. It’s as simple as that. In olden times, I suppose I would have cleaved Nick Ames asunder with my broadsword. Or, to continue the analogy, you would have done it, to oblige me. But we live in a complex society. Things are managed differently now. However, the elementary fact remains that, occasionally, someone becomes so dangerous that he must be killed.”
“I know that. And I never questioned what you—”
DuBois raised his right hand a few inches above the arm of his wheelchair. The gesture was enough to silence the other man in mid-sentence. “This has happened before, Justin. In fact, it’s happened several times, before your, ah, tenure. Fortune, after all, calls me the world’s third richest man. My net worth is more than many nations of the world. And when one operates at that level—when one does what’s necessary to parlay a few thousand dollars into billions—people sometimes die. It’s regrettable, of course. Richard the Third, I’m told, often wept, surveying the dead after a battle. But that didn’t mean there wouldn’t be another battle, even though it might be fought for nothing more substantive than pique. The point being, of course, that it was royal pique. And the truth is, Justin, that for centuries, lesser men have always died to avenge royal pique.”
“But I don’t—”
“Nick Ames, of course, was nothing more than an insect—a bug—waiting to be squashed. And to that extent, I regret the necessity for all this. He wasn’t a fit adversary, wasn’t worth the risk. But, through a fluke, he became a problem, as I’ve already said. He stumbled on a secret—on a carefully concealed vice, to be accurate.” DuBois shook his head: a pale, skin-covered skull, a death’s head rotating on a sagging column of waxen cords. “And we must be prepared to pay for our vices, Justin. Major or minor, we must be prepared to pay. And that imperative, that immutable law, is the reason it was necessary to do what we did.” He paused, allowing himself a moment of compassion, even a sympathetic smile, as he stared at the other man. “This is hard for you, Justin. I realize that. You’re not in complete possession of the facts, and that’s always a difficult position. But suffice it to say, for now, that I made a mistake when I decided to surrender to a vice. Not a minor vice, but a major vice. And Nick Ames, through a fluke, caught me up. It’s as simple as that. I gambled, and I lost. So now I must redress the balance.” He smiled again—benevolently, he hoped. “Does that make it easier for you, Justin?”
“I—ah—” Predictably, always predictably, the other man shook his head. “I—ah—”
“When we become older, Justin, we give ourselves the pleasure of surrendering to our vices. It’s part of our reward. However, in the process, we can become vulnerable, even to insects like Nick Ames.”
Powers waited a moment, until he was sure DuBois had finished speaking. Then, tentatively: “You’ve never told me the reason—never told me why Ames had to be—” He broke off, swallowed, moistened his lips. “You didn’t tell me what he did, what he tried to do.”
Gently, DuBois nodded. “That’s correct. I didn’t. And when you think about it, Justin, you’ll realize that we should leave it like that. Don’t you agree?”
Hesitantly, Powers nodded. “I agree to a point, of course. But I also think that—”
“It’s for your own protection, Justin. When you think about it, you’ll see that I’m right.” He paused, watching the other man’s face as the words registered. “You’re in an exposed position. So the less you know about motivation, the safer you’ll be. Don’t you agree?”
This time, the purpose of Powers’ answering nod was plain: in defeat, he could only hope to hide the despair that registered so plainly on his face. So he sat inert, head cravenly lowered, eyes averted. Patiently, DuBois waited for the other man to finally lift his head. Then DuBois nodded in the direction of Powers’ attaché case. “Since you’re here, let’s do a little business. There’s a coup brewing, I understand, in Zimbabwe. I think we’ll go long on palladium. Don’t you agree?”
Powers frowned, pretending to consider the point. Finally, he nodded. Cordially, DuBois returned the nod.