Part Six: The Invasion Of The Smart-Asses
As the crowd thinned and things got back to normal, I rounded up my core group to take them and Primavera out to dinner. It was now well after nine at night, and nobody had eaten more than a sandwich, what with all the excitement of the standoff.
We got to the restaurant, and it was a great night until two incidents at the end took the glow off it. What made it so good was that everybody hit it off.
For example, once we had placed our orders, Primavera turned to me and said, "Let this be a lesson to you. You wanted my help. You called me and asked me for it, and here I am. I came without being entrapped, charmed, bribed, inveigled, deceived, threatened, or abducted."
"True," I conceded, "but if you'd refused, though…"
"It's clear you know him well." said Lovell, smiling and nodding.
"Yes," she answered him. "Inside and out. In fact--." She turned and told me, mock-confidentially, "I left my initials somewhere on you. I'm not saying where, but don't worry. Not even your wife will ever see them. Unless she murders you in a particularly messy way,"
"She might murder him yet," replied Radcliffe. "They're getting a divorce, and while she wants one, she's furious because he refuses to be heartbroken."
"Oh, poor girl," sighed Primavera. "I'm the only one who could ever have broken his heart." An appalled silence fell over the table. They were silent; I was appalled. When had she realized it? And did she have to say it out loud?
Her glance darted around the table at our faces, her smile beginning at 'Mona Lisa' and going all the way up the scale to 'Cheshire Cat'. Then she finished, "After all, I installed it." Everybody cracked up and laughed.
It was a convention of the Smart-Asses. It was The Invasion of the Smart-Asses. All through the meal.
I was thinking, This is how it's supposed to be, as I relaxed and made wise cracks, and, With this crew, I could take over the world, while I was polishing off the strawberries Romanoff, just about the time it got to be less pleasant.
Norfolk finished the story of how he had come to work for me with, "Oh, and when I told my cousin, who's a public defender, she said, 'Richard Genet-York? He's the one they call The Prince of Sharkness'!"
We all laughed, and then I said, "That's a great compliment, and thank you. I'll do my best to deserve it. But I'm not satisfied with just being a prince. I want to be King."
"What kind of King?" asked Catesby. "B.B. or Elvis?"
"What? I know who they were; what do you mean?"
"B.B. King and Elvis Presley are what I think of as the two archetypes of modern kingship. There's no middle ground. If you're an Elvis, you get incredible amounts of money and you're a Star."
"Sounds right to me," I said.
"Wait. Elvis got trapped by it all. He lost creative control and died wondering what went wrong. Plus, people don't take him seriously. B.B. King, on the other hand, lived a lot longer and made a lot more music. He didn't have fame or money on the same scale, but God, can you hear the difference."
"That's a good metaphor, but since I want to be King of A.L.-Bion, how do you make it fit the circumstances?" I asked.
"If he does anything else like what he pulled today, he won't be King of Shit." Bock Ingram had come up behind me. He pulled up a chair from another table and sat on it with the backrest in front like a shield. "You may not be Imagist, and I may not be, but more than half the directors still are." He was visibly angry.
"My nephews will not go to school and get called Blob-face." I told him. "I think it was well worth it."
He looked away at that. "I understand why, and while it may have been the right thing to do, it was not the Imagist thing to do. I tracked you down because I have a question. Who would be your Head of Science?"
"This is not the time or place."
"You're ducking out on it again."
"It's after midnight, it's been a long day, and I'm tired, Bock."
"Do you have someone in mind?"
"At this point, I don't want to give you an answer. You're souring what was, till now, an outstanding day and a really good mood. But to get you out of my face, I'll say this. You are not my first choice. There. Was that your price for your vote, that post?" The waiter brought me the receipt module and I pulled out my key ring of transfer links, stuck one in at random, authorized it, and told him to write his own tip, while I kept Bock's gaze.
"No. Maybe—why not me? Who's your first choice?"
"I-am-not of a mind to answer you. Primavera, which hotel did you say you were staying at?"
"The Djen-shu Abernathy."
My small crowd spilled out into the street, and that was when and where the second thing to spoil the evening happened.
I am predicting this: the next big trend will be those stupid Jump-Bump Riders. Buy stock in them now, but sell it within three months. I don't know why they were there, in the restaurant district, after midnight, but Hastings and Janine Shore were having a tearing good time. They were laughing and shouting as they jumped and bumped along, and one of them—I don't know which—jumped the railing and came down on the stairs as I was climbing up. The repulsor field caught me on my rebuilt shoulder.
It felt like a bullet or an explosion. It knocked me flat. I was sure the bones had shattered and my shoulder was destroyed. I rolled on the stairs, swallowing my dinner again, trying not to pass out or fall on that shoulder. It was dislocated. They got me back in the restaurant, where Primavera popped it back into place and I uttered dire predictions about what I was going to do to Hastings and Janine both. Then my doctor prescribed me a muscle relaxant, which knocked me out, and she went off to her hotel. Everybody else went home.
I think it was Norfolk who got me home; I was gone.
I didn't know Bock Ingram was in the restaurant foyer and heard the threats I made in my delirium and pain. And who would take them seriously, given the circumstances?
The problem was, I had a loud fight with Hastings about it two days later, right after a morning meeting of the directors, and someone murdered him before lunchtime.
Bock Ingram told the police about it, and about what I said that night at the restaurant.
Some days, I think God just plain hates me.
That's getting a little ahead of myself, though. First thing in the morning, the morning after the showdown at the hospital, Primavera's arrival, the dinner, etc, I got a call. Not, alas, from Primavera, offering to come over and not leave for the rest of my life, but from Elyse.
"All right. You got what you wanted. Now, who is this—this shyster doctor you got to come in and front for you? Is she fit to take care of my babies? And what am I supposed to tell people?"
I wasn't in a good mood. My shoulder ached, and together the wine from dinner combined with the muscle relaxant had left me with a slightly hung-over feeling. "First of all, get your archaic slang right. When you're referring to a doctor, the word you use is quack. A shyster is a lawyer. I am the shyster. Doctor Visconti is the quack. Not that she is a quack, but you get my drift."
"Richard! I will bar you from the house, so help me, I will, you conniving little weasel!"
I needed to placate Elyse, or she could forbid Primavera from taking on the boys' case, and then what reason would Primavera have to stay?
"I'm sorry, Elyse. It's just too early in the morning for me. I did right by your boys. I got the same doctor who worked on me. I trusted her enough to have her perform brain surgery on me."
" Oh, and is that why your mind's so twisted?"
"No. There were limits to what even she could do for me. My mind stayed as it was. Primavera Visconti is an X.D. She went to Hopkins-Oxbridge-Sakamura."
Elyse said nothing.
"She was nominated for the Nobel this year," I tried again.
Silence on the other end. I was not impressing Elyse.
"Wait a minute." I had thought of something that Elyse could relate to. "You subscribe to Rag Trade magazine, don't you?"
"Yes."
"In this month's—no, this past month's, find the feature on Schiavoni & Fortuny."
"Just a sec. Okay."
"Look at the digital that's captioned, 'With clients like these, who needs models?' She's the one on the right."
"I can recognize her, Richard, I did see her on the vid last night. I didn't realize she was this tall, though. She's not what you'd call pretty, either…"
I knew the pic in question. Primavera was sharing a fitting room with Dulcie Leah Wilkins, the basketball star, and Llewella Reese, the architect, all of them looking very much at home, extremely tall, and, despite their differences in facial feature and skin tone, like members of one tribe, rather as if they had dropped in from their native planet to do some shopping and see if Earth was worth conquering.
Elyse was reading the accompanying paragraph out loud. "Friends since childhood, these young women are representative of the new jetsetters who work harder than they play. Their combined I.Q.s add up to more than 500 points, their combined net worth is over twenty billion global currency units, and they need wardrobes that reflect it. The design philosophy of Luciano Schiavoni—Richard, how long have you known this woman? How could you keep her a secret like this?" Elyse demanded.
"She's not an Imagist and she's a doctor. I thought it would be tactless of me."
"As tactless as forcing her on me now? I mean, she'll have gotten the wrong idea about us. And she seems like the sort of person I would like to know outside of her work. What's her background? Who are her people?"
"As for that—Do you have more of that Chianti you served after the services?"
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Patience. If you do, take a look at the label."
I heard distant thumps and clanks as she went over to the wine storage unit and returned.
"All right. I have it."
"Read the label."
"Visconti Vineyards… She's one of those Viscontis?"
"Yes. There's a picture of her aunt and uncle's trattorria on the label. And as for the rest of her family—." I keyed in my mother's code and joined the lines. "Mom, I know you're mad about last night, but please pick up anyway. It's for Elyse."
"Yes, Richard? Good morning, Elyse."
"Good morning."
"Mom, do you remember Hugo Visconti?"
"Of course. Horrible man. But he was politically advantageous. We were on that food committee together years ago. What was it called? Pro Vide? Why do you want to know?"
"What was so bad about him?"
"He said your father and I were—It doesn't matter now. As I recall, he's passed away."
"Yes. I went to his funeral."
"You did? What for?" asked Mom.
"Out of friendship for his daughter and respect for his memory. He was a man of great intellect and great integrity."
"Mmm. And a man of great wealth. Is that—that doctor related to him?"
"Yes. His daughter."
"Did she inherit?" interjected Elyse.
"She was his principal legatee, yes."
"What did he leave in the way of real estate?" asked my mother.
"Mom!"
"A lot? A little?"
"I'm not going to answer that."
"Quite a lot, then," my mother concluded.
"So she's the daughter of an old colleague? A family connection, in a way?" asked Elyse.
"I'm not sure I care to know a friend of Richard's. I cannot approve of her profession." Mom stated.
"You make it sound like her calling is prostitution, Mom."
"Mere prostitution is cleaner in the sight of God than what she has chosen to do."
"That's enough, Mom! Elyse, I think you can call her a friend of the family without lying. I don't know if you remember, Mom, but she did visit us with her father once, when she was a little girl."
"Oh. You mean that sweet little child grew up into that great gawky creature?"
"She's not gawky, Mom, just tall. Yes, one and the same."
"We do need to put a better face on things," fretted Elyse. "If she's a friend of the family, at least that's something I can tell people. If only I could meet her somewhere outside the hospital…Will her spouse be joining her?"
"She's not married."
"Not married? Richard, can you arrange our meeting?"
I never thought your preferences ran toward women, and isn't it awfully soon after Edward's death, Elyse, I thought, but I didn't say it. Elyse's true preferences ran toward money. Elyse had a great reverence for worldly things, despite her Imagism.
"I find that lunch is a good way to introduce people. You can fill in gaps in the conversation with food. Sure, I'll arrange it."
"Yes…Do you think she would like it if I treated her to a day at the spa?" Elyse wondered aloud.
"I can't say." I told her. "What if I get off these lines and see if she's up for lunch?"
I extricated myself from the conversation and went to splash some cold water on my face. It was not the beginning of a beautiful friendship between Elyse and Primavera. They were never comfortable with each other, being far too different. For example, when they met at lunch, Elyse wanted to talk clothes, while Primavera thought she was there to discuss the boys' treatment.
I didn't get arrested for Hastings' murder; neither did any of my people. We were detained and questioned thoroughly, especially me. Being innocent isn't necessarily the advantage you'd suppose. Fortunately, Lovell had gone to college with one of the detectives. He told his friend that when I talked about litigation, I was a much greater threat, as death would be a kinder fate than facing me in court. There wasn't even circumstantial evidence against me or mine, only those unfortunate coincidences, so the police turned their attention to other aspects and people in Hastings' life.
I wasn't a serious suspect in their eyes, but A.L.-Bion's directorship families were not as inclined to hold us blameless. Especially my mother. I had another nasty run-in with her in the hospital a few days later.
We were sitting in the visitor's lounge, waiting for Elyse and Tom to finish their visit, and she was ignoring me. I didn't mind at all, and I was ignoring her right back, until she began to talk aloud.
"I was happy, once. When I was young, I wanted to be an Imagist minister, because I knew God was good. The world around us was His kingdom, and Heaven itself had no greater glory, if only I could open peoples' eyes to it. I could feel God's presence, just as surely as I could feel the air.
I met a man who was good down to his bones, and he loved me just as I was. He didn't want me to color my hair or paint my skin, enlarge my breasts and slim my legs. Everyone else was making themselves stranger and stranger in the name of beauty, but he thought me beautiful as I was. So I married him.
We had a son and named him Edward. He was perfect. He was proof that genetic modification wasn't necessary. How could people question the wisdom of God by altering His work? Edward was everything we wanted. It was ten years before we had another, but that was all right, we were young, and it gave me a chance to get my master's, to learn and grow.
George was a joy. We had each other, we had our sons. We had enough. But I was greedy. I hoped for a daughter, and we decided to have one more child.
I was sick through your whole gestation. It was horrible. I had felt so good when I carried my first two, but I was miserable when I carried you. I went into labor early; I thought that was a blessing at first, but that labor was a torture."
"But finally I was born, and delighted you and made your life complete." I said what I thought that time. It felt good, but it didn't last.
"You didn't even look human. You looked like a skinned toad. I could not touch you, while you were in the hospital, you had so many tubes and wires going in and out of you. You shrieked when I laid a hand on you. When I tried to hold you, you screamed. You let the nurses pick you up and rock you, but not me."
"You probably weren't doing it right." She ignored me.
"As you grew, I liked you even less. You were too quick; everything came too easily to you. It was as if you were an adult hiding behind a child-face mask. You were artificial. You made a mockery of everything I ever believed in, first by just existing, then by what you said, and now by what you have done and are still doing.
I had a husband—God took him young. I had two splendid sons—now one is dead and I will not see the other again in the years remaining to me. All I have left is you, and you have tainted everything."
My head was pounding, and I was going to explode.
Primavera had come in. When, I don't know, but she must have heard a lot of my mother's speech. She had decided to stay on and oversee the boys' case, until such time as she found out what was happening in Australia.
She said, "It's a great pity you think God is so small and mean. Speaking as a representative from the outside world, it would seem to the rest of us that you have it backward. I met your son Edward at a cocktail party last year. He was a typical CEO; promoted beyond his abilities, full of himself, selfish and offensive. He spent the evening pursuing young women who obviously weren't interested, including me. He didn't give the attention he should have to his job, his wife or his children. Sordid. Hardly splendid.
And George—well. He's in prison. He defrauded, lied and stole from you, your entire family and all your friends. He didn't have splendid qualities either. Did you bring him up to be what he was? If you didn't, who did? Did George think of you, his wife or his children before he started in his criminal career?
I'll grant you Richard is devious and deceitful, but he had the decency to become a lawyer, which is the equivalent to giving a leper a bell to ring and warn people off."
"Thank you." I said. There is a difference between teasing and mockery; it's called affection, and when there's mutual affection anyone can tease me all they like.
"Any time. He has distinguished himself in his chosen career and earned the respect of those who have had dealings with him. You should look at his achievements, and compare them to those of your other sons. And remember that what Edward and George did, they did with family help and influence. Richard was on his own. His accomplishments become even more impressive.
Your other sons have lied and cheated, but you seem to have excused it in them on the grounds that they were beautiful babies."
My mother opened her mouth to speak, but Primavera cut her off.
"I'm rude, I'm presumptuous, and I'm not a family member, so I couldn't possibly understand. Have a nice day." She left.
It was great. She cured my headache without a single pill.
We are still some weeks away from here and now in my story, and I want to get to the important stuff. I'll try and speed this along.
On the day Primavera got the news that the Australian project was officially dead, I took her out to lunch, and finally asked her if she would agree to be my Head of Science, thereby helping me become Executive Director. I explained the plan to her fully and honestly, much as it pained me to do it. I came clean.
"Uh-huh. Having changed the course of my life once already, without asking me first—"
"I asked this time! I did! You heard me!"
"Oh, be quiet. You now propose to do it again. I knew you had me in mind. Ever since that dinner on the night I arrived."
I shook my head. "How did you figure it out? Saying it's easy. Back yourself up with proof."
"You glanced at me when Ingram asked who your first choice was. Involuntarily, I'm sure, but you did."
Had I? Maybe I had. "You're making that up. It's a lot to read into just one glance." I riposted.
"However, I was right. Argue with that. And I read between the lines when it comes to you—between the lines on another page in a completely different chapter, that is." She paused, and went on. "You didn't do me such a bad turn, you know."
"I don't know, but I'm very glad to hear it. When was this?"
"When you brought me yourself to work on. Do you know what brand-new doctors get to do on ecological engineering projects? Even X.D.s with the highest G.P.A's?"
"No."
"Wash bottles, essentially. Once I had my license to practice medicine, and you came along—came to me, specifically to me, put me in charge—it was a great opportunity. It was a career-making opportunity."
"I didn't know."
"I agree. You didn't. I did. The things I discovered about cartilage alone have made my name known around the world. Even though the Prize committee didn't award me the Nobel for it."
"There will be other years. You just didn't get it this time."
"And that is part of why I am still your friend. Anybody else who said that would be joking, not sympathizing. You're serious. You genuinely think I'll be up for a Nobel again."
I was surprised. Nothing seemed more likely to me, but then I believed in her.
"This is drifting away from my point, though. The fact is, that although positive things happened as a result of your manipulations and using me, you didn't ask first. I would have said yes."
"I never believed you would." To more questions I might ask you than just that one, more's the pity.
"I know. It took me a while to figure that out. Now, about this Head of Science job…"
We discussed the position for a while, and what the potential problems would be.
She then asked, "Okay. What I want to know is, how did you ever manage the mudslide?"
"The mudslide was an act of God, spontaneous and free. I didn't even pray for it. Seriously, though. Given everything, especially since I am yet again asking for your help rather than repaying you for your many kindnesses and efforts on my behalf, can you? Will you?"
"I have some misgivings."
"Well, tell me what they are. Maybe I can resolve them."
"It's very early in my career for me to be taking on an essentially administrative position. I would want to be involved in R&D, and get my hands dirty."
"Simple. You can write your own job description and name your own salary. I'll back you."
"You're a trusting soul, aren't you?"
"Trusting in general, no. My trust in you, however, is absolute. Besides, it wouldn't be much of a gift if it came with strings."
"I would not want to make a lifetime commitment to A.L.-Bion. I might not like it; I might want to pursue other things."
"—I accept that. Given the state of A.L.-Bion and the importance of the position, I would need a definite commitment of some length, to be agreed upon later."
"All very well, at least so far. Last of my misgivings, though, is this: While I think you can run A.L.-Bion, and run it well and profitably, I don't think you'll enjoy it. I think you'll be bored and frustrated inside of three years. You're meant to be fighting battles, in court or out of it, by fair means or dirty, attacking or defending as the situation calls for, and as you see fit. You're not cut out to be a placid, day-by-day administrator." "I don't know how to answer—Why do you think that?"
"Because I know you well. Because you've spent this past year at A.L.-Bion bored out of your skull, bored with your job, bored with A.L.-Bion, bored with Daenne, bored with your life. Except when you were after George, and now, when you took up arms in the defense of your nephews. You are never quite so happy as when you're coming down on someone like the wrath of God."
"Well," I admitted, "there's a lot of truth in that. It is fun. But this is my heart's desire. Just as much as being healthy and normal was my heart's desire." And as much as a life with you is, I thought.
"Yet being healthy and normal is something you now enjoy every day, after you paid for it with your pain and your work. A.L.-Bion, I fear, will be the other way around, and after a brief period of enjoyment, it will be followed by an enormous amount of work that's a pain in the butt," she responded. "I think you should play to your known strengths."
I laughed. "The pot calls the kettle black. Quite frankly, it seems to me that you're not exempt in this."
"In what?" she asked.
"Obstinately pursuing one career path when another provably suits you better."
"Oh, continue, please. I want to hear this one."
"What have you been doing for the last two years? After spending the better part of a decade working on human beings—."
"Careful! I may unforgive you at any time. Do not forget it!"
"I'm not likely to! But, as I was saying, after experiencing great success working on human beings, and accomplishing revolutionary work on cartilage in particular, you left medicine to take up ecological engineering, where you foundered for far too long doing grunt work under people with half your skills and half your brains, even if you didn't wind up quite as low as washing bottles."
"You're oversimplifying the situation. Pray, go on."
"I will. Immediately after you returned to medicine, at, may I remind you, my request—"
"If you must!"
"The hospital welcomed you with open arms, and you are now heading a plan to separate conjoined twins in utero and induce normal development after separation. Try to tell me that isn't more significant than anything you did in those two years."
"Like the taste of that cemetery dirt, do you?" she asked me.
"Excuse me?"
"Do you realize that you're digging your own grave with your mouth?"
"—I am?" I couldn't help but grin. I liked mixing it up in a battle of wits with this woman. Her rejoinders were so unexpected.
"Yes. If, as you say, my métier is human medicine..."
"Which it is."
"Then, why do you want me to leave it again and go to work as Head of Science at A.L.-Bion?"
"Ah. Um… Open mouth, insert foot, after shooting myself in said appendage."
"Indeed. You'd have us both butting our brains out against the wall of A.L.-Bion."
"That can't be proved or disproved, except through time."
"And you want your revenge. Very well. I will help you to it. I want to be right there to say 'I told you so' when the time comes."
"Or eat crow?"
"If you serve it, I'll eat it. You just have to catch and cook it first."
I went forward with my plans and gave my presentation to the director's panel. I knew it was good. No, not merely good. It was excellent. They were listening to me and seeing my vision. It was like lovemaking—when you're doing it right, you can tell from the response, and it spurs you to more.
I didn't make the earth move for everybody, though. My mother's eyes were dry and hot; Richmond and his mother remained distant, and Hastings' wife sat grey and still. Bock Ingram's expression was helping to air-condition the room. Those five were set against me. That left six who were for me, though they were older and Imagist. Five against, and six for, makes eleven directors.
I was the twelfth. The executive directorship was going to be mine.
The next day, we heard Richmond. I'll grant you, his plans were good. Solid, conservative, and practical. Uninspiring. He wasn't as good a speaker as I was, either. There were others. Nobody particularly worthy of note; just also-rans.