The Heir

15

Life was so good that by Monday I was suffering from conflict deprivation.

I had the old reliable problems I could pull up at any time: all the corruption I owned; the governor, and now the senator, I was trying to own; Melvin’s murder, if it had been, and by whom. They were all just different chocolate chips in the same cookie.

But the sun was shining, and the cookie gently crumbled.

I pointed the Mercedes west, around town, to a gentrified semi-suburb, still recognizable as the rural village it had once been. Just past a very upscale neighborhood, I turned through a gate in the stone wall, marked with an immense but tasteful bronze sign mounted on a massive stone pedestal.

Melvin H. Boyer Foundation.

A small parking lot appeared, and the two-story headquarters it earnestly served. The spaces were marked, Mr. Hyde, Dr. Fitwell-Monoque, Dr. Grambling, Mr. M’fele, and ultimately, Mr. Kern. The second row of spaces, occupied by twenty or more less prestigious cars, was not marked. The staff no doubt.

I set my car in a space marked Visitor.

The building itself, of mellowed brick and polished wood, might have been from the same architect as my new house, just with his dial changed from “House” to “Office.” The budget knob was not changed from “Obviously Expensive.”

The receptionist, whom I had never seen before, stood immediately as I entered.

The executive offices were arranged around the reception lobby and took up the whole first floor. I had only a moment to glance at the displays of good done that filled the room.

“Mr. Boyer. Mr. Kern is expecting you. Please come this way.”

I was escorted into the prestigious office of the director.

This sumptuous room provided a second chance to be impressed by displays of the foundation’s works, and wasn’t the real purpose of the foundation to give a person a second chance? It was an eclectic mix of architectural models of inner city recreation centers, African objets d’art, photos of smiling state officials, and Nathan at his desk.

He leaped up at my appearing.

“Jason! What a pleasure.” He shook my hand, and the receptionist retreated. “It is so good to see you!”

And it was. There was so much good for me to see. It was not the same as the opera, which was the grandiose height of human culture. This building was founded on a different importance-that of human worth. The budgets of the two were actually nearly the same.

I met Dr. Hugo Grambling, a sociologist, whose groundbreaking insight on the risks to youth of urban culture could hardly be underestimated. Dr. Gloria Fitwell-Monoque directed the foundation’s programs in the schools. Mr. Cordele Hyde was at the state capital, lobbying on behalf of the disadvantaged.

I could direct Mr. Hyde to four of my own executives who could advise him on lobbying.

And Mr. Ebenezer M’fele was in New York at a UN conference on aid to developing countries. He had so greatly expanded the scope of the foundation’s efforts since he had come on board the previous year. With the new African projects, they were truly thinking globally as well as locally.

We went upstairs to the staff offices. These people were not introduced to me, only pointed out. They were researchers, writers, and accountants-the full-time staff. Others were contracted in as needed.

The overhead alone for this operation, as I knew from George Elias, was four million a year, the majority of it executive salaries and their travel expenses. They spent six times that on programs.

So much good was done, one might wonder how any bad could be left in the world. At least, in this one state. But I knew better, at least concerning this one state.

As we passed the receptionist, she deferentially interrupted our tour.

“Mr. Rosenberg is faxing some papers.”

“Very good. Set them on my desk.” Nathan returned his full attention to me. “Jacob Rosenberg is our legal advisor. He is newly on the board. Your father was very impressed by him, and I’m sure you will be, also.”

The ground floor was not all offices, I found. There was also the board room. Nathan and I settled there after the tour, amid yet more conspicuous exhibits of accomplished charity, and discussed the past and the future.

This had been the salve for Melvin’s conscience, where it hadn’t been seared senseless. Had he really had enough inner conflict that he’d needed this much of a foundation to ease his guilt? Was I going to have enough guilt that I needed something this big to ease mine? I tried to look at it objectively. Nathan was doing lots of good things. It was reasonable for a person with extra money to use some of it philanthropically. There didn’t have to be other motives, and did the motives matter anyway?

“I expect I’ve been presumptuous,” Nathan said, “simply assuming you would take on your father’s role with the foundation.” He lit a cigarette. We obviously needed a smokescreen for this conversation.

“It would have been a natural assumption,” I said.

“Then I would like to ask you, what is your expectation? What do you think of the foundation?”

“I’m very impressed.” Melvin probably had been. “And there’s no question about the funding. That will continue as it has.”

Nathan laughed. “I hadn’t really had a chance to consider that it might not. That would have been upsetting!”

Upsetting, right. At least upsetting. I could imagine these experts trying to get real jobs.

“As for my own participation,” I said, “I’m not sure. I’m willing to put money in. For now, we’ll leave it at that.”

“That’s quite a lot.”

“And I’d like to get together once in a while, Nathan. We started a conversation two weeks ago that I’d like to continue.” I considered the man in front of me-sophisticated, sincere, intense, waiting patiently for the next words of this callow youth. “I’ve been going through Melvin’s papers. The picture they’re painting isn’t nice.”

“I understand.”

“How do you feel about the money you got from him, knowing where it came from?”

He leaned back with a deep sigh. “I’ve simply done the best I could with it.”

“I’ve been wondering,” I said. I hadn’t meant to get into this. “You warned me before, how money corrupts. I knew it was true, but now I’ve seen more closely how that works. What if…”

“Yes?” he said, after my long pause.

“What if I shut it all down? In some way that wouldn’t put too many people out of work. But what if I got myself out of it all?”

His stare was piercing, right through me. As debonair as he might be, his eyes were the eyes of a very deep man.

“I think you would have done a very noble thing.”

“Even if the foundation lost its funding?”

He took a moment to load, and let me have it with both barrels. “The foundation’s good work is small compared to the evil that your family’s business practices have wrought. On balance, shutting down the foundation would be a small price to pay to restore integrity to this state.”

He said it calmly, which helped me listen the same way. Then I calmly considered whether I should deck him, and then whether I should just fire him.

“Well, I asked for it,” I said. “You wouldn’t have said that to Melvin.”

“He wouldn’t have asked. Would you actually consider taking such a step?”

“I don’t think it’s possible. The tumor is too big and too deep. The patient would die on the operating table.”

We stepped back from the precipice. “It is something to think about,” he said. “I agree it would be, at least, tumultuous.”

Time for a new subject.

“Did you have a chance to call Angela?”

He smiled. “Yes. It was an excellent conversation. She didn’t commit, but she had a number of questions. I think she will decide to join the board.”

“Good,” I said. “That will be to everyone’s benefit.”

Back toward my office. I decided I needed a second opinion on the meaning of life.

“Mr. Spellman’s office,” the voice said.

“This is Jason Boyer. Could you please tell him that I’d like to drop in, in about thirty minutes? If he’s free.”

“Just a moment.” I was pulling out of the foundation parking lot. “He would be pleased to see you.”

As much as I would be to see him. I got on the highway and crossed the vast space between Nathan Kern and Fred Spellman.

Fred was waiting, as large as life.

“I’m just checking in,” I said. “Is anything happening?”

“From Governor Bright? No. I’ve heard nothing.”

“Is that good?”

“Probably not. Although I expect he’s still off-balance.”

“I’ve been through Melvin’s papers. I guess I know a lot of the details now.”

“I would advise you to stay away from the individuals named in those papers.”

“My own employees?”

“They’re doing what you employ them to do.”

“That’s an interesting point,” I said. “It was Melvin who employed those gentlemen.”

“Of course.”

“But I’m going to have to claim them as my own, sometime.”

“Yes. In what context do you mean that?”

“I can’t play ignorant forever.”

“No. Are you worried that these people might betray you? Or that they might need encouragement that you continue to approve of their activities? That might be useful, but it should be done very carefully. With this type of person, a financial bonus would be the best way to enhance their cooperation.”

Yes, this was certainly an alternative viewpoint on life.

“That had crossed my mind,” I admitted. “But that’s not what I mean. My threat against Governor Bright is to expose the whole bid-rigging arrangement. It’s only a threat while I’m still supposedly innocent. But the threat fades the longer I don’t use it.”

“I know.” He’d been through all those angles. “Which you should have considered earlier.”

“What if I still mean to carry through?”

“Then go ahead and do it, and get it over with.” Apparently Fred was one person who no longer believed I would. What did that say for Bright or Grainger? “But Governor Bright will quickly decide you’re not serious, if he hasn’t already. If he ever thought you were. So I suggest you start working on your next step.”

“I will think about it,” I said. “Would you have any thoughts?”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Perhaps a financial bonus would enhance your cooperation?”

He scowled, but he did appreciate the humor. “Just remember, you are now the man in the locked room with the gun, and the governor is the desperate one, trying to disarm you. That may be just as dangerous a place to be in.”

First opinion, second opinion-I wanted a third opinion. I got back into the elevator and pushed the up button.

There were signs of Pamela, but no Pamela. After the morning of facing other people in their offices, I settled into my own.

What is my opinion?

What am I doing here?

Pamela’s gray head popped through the open door. “Jason? There you are!” She blinked suddenly and dabbed at her eyes. “It’s like your father sitting there.”

That’s what I’m doing here: being Melvin. Except I didn’t hold her observation against her the way I did against Fred.

Instead, I jumped up and smiled and gave her a hug. Then I sat her down at her desk and I pulled up a chair and we talked for an hour. It was partly business, and a lot about old times.

It was a strange feeling, remembering my youth with someone who’d watched me go through it, and enjoying the conversation.

But then she had papers I’d asked for from George Elias and my corporate accountants, which easily filled my remaining afternoon hours. I was trying to get some handle on what would happen without Melvin’s framework.

I called home at four, and Rosita told me Katie was out at the new house.

I surprised her there. The place was being transformed. Furniture was arriving, the grounds were trimmed-it was all feeling snug and homey and palatial.

Katie was in jeans and a sweatshirt and I was still in my suit.

“Do I have any other clothes here?” I asked.

“No. Everything’s still at the old house.”

“Are there any stores around here?”

I thought my wife might swoon. I called Rosita and told her to put dinner in the freezer, and Katie and I went shopping. Dressing Eric might have been fun, but he was no substitute for her own husband. The first place we found was a farm supply store, and I soon had a new identity in good, honest work clothes. My pants even had an actual hammer loop.

Autumn was running rampant through the trees. We took a slow back road and explored our new district. There were still farms and open spaces and countryside.

“I hope it stays this way,” Katie said.

“I’ll just buy it all. Then we can keep it the way we want.”

The roads were lined with stone fences and paved with yellow leaves, and stands sold apple cider and Indian corn and fall flowers. Everything was gold except the sky, and Katie had her head on my shoulder.

We got back to the house and I ordered pizza, just plain peasant food, and when it came thirty minutes later, I tipped the kid a hundred dollars. Katie was giggling like a high-school girl at the fun and adventure of it. We ate our first meal there sitting on the flagstones in the dining room, imagining our lives in that new place, the rulers of the world. That was my third opinion.

I went back out Wednesday to see the progress again. She was spending a huge amount, but no one could do it with better style.

On Thursday I was talking to some division president or other on the phone when Pamela tapped on my door.

“Mrs. Boyer’s on the other line.”

That was not what she called Katie, so it took me a second to realize who she meant. I threw the man overboard and switched lines.

“Hello? Angela?”

“Jason?”

“Yes, I’m here.”

“Jason,” the forlorn voice whimpered. “I won’t be on that board.”

“The foundation? Oh, Angela. Are you sure?”

“I won’t.”

“All right, Angela. Is something wrong?”

Something was wrong. Even Angela was not this erratic.

“I just won’t.”

“That’s fine. Has something happened?”

“Good-bye, Jason.”

It was fine. Completely fine. I slammed the phone down, but only after she’d already hung up. It would spare Nathan a lot of headaches to not have this person to deal with. I called him.

“Yes, Jason? This is Nathan Kern.”

“Nathan, have you talked with Angela?”

“Well… yes… just last night. Did she call you?”

“This moment. She said she would not be on the board.”

Long pause. “What else did she say?”

“That was all.”

Long pause again. “She didn’t say why?”

“No. Did she tell you last night?”

“Well, I talked with her quite a while about the foundation. But she actually seemed quite excited about it. She was very interested.”

“In being on the board?”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

“That’s what she said?”

There was a long pause. “She still hadn’t committed, but after the conversation I was certain she would.”

“So she changed her mind,” I said.

“She gave no reason at all?”

“No. I asked.”

He sighed. “Very well. I will be out of town a few days, over the weekend, at a conference in Washington. I’ll call her when I get back. How strange.”

Exactly.

Not for the first time, Angela had ensured that Katie and I had something to talk about at dinner.

“She didn’t say anything about why?” Katie asked.

“No.”

“I’ll talk to her.”

“It’s okay, really. I don’t want a lunatic on the board.”

“I think she just panicked. She felt she was being pushed too hard. She’s really very fragile.”

I shrugged. “I give up. From now on, I won’t go near her. I obviously cause her great pain.”

“Give her some time.”

“No problem. She can have years if she wants.”

I was tired. At that moment, I’d run out of energy for dealing with people. It had been a long three weeks.

Katie found me in my office later.

“I’m having lunch with her tomorrow.”

“Good for you,” I said. “I think I’m sailing for the weekend.”

“Good.”

“Yeah. A little recreation.” No Fred, no Nathan, no Angela. Even no Katie, just for a weekend.

“You’ve been working very hard. Isn’t it going to rain?”

“That’s okay. I need gloom. It’s good thinking weather.”

“Don’t think too hard.”

“Not too hard.”

“What will you be thinking about?”

“Meaning of life, purpose of existence, what color carpet for the hall upstairs.”

She smiled, a little tightly. “I don’t trust you with any of those.”

“Then you can take care of the carpet.”

“I don’t think you should worry about the others, either.”

“I probably will.”

“Jason.” That was what she didn’t want to happen. “Everything is going very well. Don’t try to make it seem wrong.”

I nodded. “I’m trying to make it seem right.”