Dead and Alive

CHAPTER 61

Victor was in the dark night of his soul, but he was also in a Mercedes S600, arguably the finest automobile in the world. The suit he wore had cost over six thousand dollars, his wristwatch more than a hundred thousand. He had lived 240 years, most of the time in high style, and he had known more adventure, more thrills, more power, and more triumphs of a more momentous nature than any man in history. As he considered his current situation and the possibility that he might die soon, he found that making the fateful decision he needed to make was easier than he had expected when he parked in this rest area. He had no choice but to take the most extreme action available to him, because if he died, the loss to the world would be devastating.

He was too brilliant to die.

Without him, the future would be bleak. Any chance of imposing order on a meaningless universe would die with him, and chaos would rule eternal.

He used the voice-activated car phone to call the household-staff dormitory at the estate in the Garden District.

A Beta named Ethel answered, and Victor told her to bring James to the phone at once. James had been third in the hierarchy of the staff, behind William and Christine, who were now both dead. He was next in line to be the butler. If Victor hadn’t been so pressed by the events of the past twenty-four hours, he would have appointed James to his new post the previous day.

When James came to the phone, Victor honored him with the news of his promotion and gave him his first assignment as butler. “And remember, James, follow the instructions I’ve just given you to the letter. I expect absolute perfection in everything a butler does, but most especially in this instance.”

After leaving his umbrella on the terrace and after thoroughly wiping his wet shoes with a cloth that he brought for that purpose, James entered the house on the first floor, by the back door at the end of the north hall.

He carried the mysterious object that had obsessed him for the past two hours: a crystal ball.

After proceeding directly to the library, as Mr. Helios had instructed, James carefully placed the gleaming sphere on the seat of an armchair.

“Are you happy there?” he asked.

The sphere did not reply.

Frowning, James moved it to another armchair.

“Better,” the sphere told him.

When the crystal ball initially spoke to him, two hours earlier, James had been minding his own business, sitting at the kitchen table in the dormitory, stabbing his hand with a meat fork and watching it repeatedly heal. The fact that he healed so quickly and so well gave him reason to believe he would be all right, though for most of the day, he had felt all wrong.

The first thing the sphere said to him was, “I know the way to happiness.”

Of course, James at once expressed a desire to know the way.

Since then, the crystal ball had said many things, most of them inscrutable.

Now it said, “Salted or unsalted, sliced or cubed, the choice is yours.”

“Can we get back to happiness?” James asked.

“Use a knife and,” the sphere said.

“And what?” James asked.

“And fork.”

“What do you want me to do with a knife and fork?”

“If peeled.”

“You’re making no sense,” James said accusingly.

“A spoon,” said the sphere.

“Now it’s a spoon?”

“If halved and unpeeled.”

“What is the path to happiness?” James pleaded because he was afraid to demand an answer and offend the sphere.

“Long, narrow, twisting, dark,” said the sphere. “For the likes of you, the path to happiness is one mean sonofabitch of a path.”

“But I can get there, can’t I? Even one like me?”

“Do you really want happiness?” asked the sphere.

“Desperately. Doesn’t have to be forever. Just for a while.”

“Your other choice is insanity.”

“Happiness. I’ll take happiness.”

“Yogurt works with. Ice cream works with.”

“With what?”

The sphere didn’t reply.

“I’m in a very bad way,” James pleaded.

Silence.

Frustrated, James said, “Wait here. I’ll be right back. I’ve got something to do for Mr. Helios.”

He found the hidden switch, a section of the bookcase pivoted, and the secret passageway was revealed.

James glanced back at the sphere on the seat of the armchair. Sometimes it didn’t look like a crystal ball. Sometimes it looked like a cantaloupe. This was one of those times.

The sphere was a crystal ball only when the magic was in it. James feared that the magic might go out of it and never come back.

In the secret passage, he came to the first door and removed all five steel bolts, as he had been instructed.

When he opened the door, he saw the corridor that Mr. Helios had described: copper rods to the left, steel rods to the right. A low, ominous hum.

Instead of going farther, James ran back to the start of the passageway, pushed the button to open the bookcase door from this side, and hurried to the sphere.

“What is the path to happiness?” he asked.

“Some people put a little lemon on it,” said the crystal ball.

“Put lemon on what?”

“You know what your problem is?”

“What is my problem?”

“You hate yourself.”

James had nothing to say to that.

He returned to the secret passageway, but this time he took the crystal ball with him.

Victor had asked James to phone him when the task was completed. Alternately consulting his world-class wristwatch and the dashboard clock of his magnificent sedan, he thought the new butler was taking too long. No doubt, awed by his promotion and by the realization that he would be speaking more often with his maker, James approached his mission with excessive care.

As he waited for the butler’s call, the conviction again rose in him that he was not alone in the Mercedes. This time, he turned to look in the backseat, knowing full well no one was there.

He knew the cause of his edginess. Until James completed the task he had been sent to do, Victor remained mortal, and the world could be denied the shining future that only he could create. As soon as the butler reported completion of the job, Victor could proceed to the farm, face whatever threat might wait there, and be confident that the future would still be his.