The Last Tomorrow

FIFTY-ONE

At nine twenty, with the Lazarus sun drowned once more in the western sea, a heavy-set man in a gray suit with a blue silk tie wrapped around his neck and a matching handkerchief poking from his breast pocket steps from a DC-6, descends a set of rolling steps, and, trailed by three men, makes his way across the tarmac, through Los Angeles Airport, and out the front doors. Crowds, without realizing they’re doing it, part for him as he walks. People simply glance in his direction as he cuts through space with the ease of a sharp knife and step out of his way. They do it as a unit, a group of people suddenly moving as one, like a sheet of paper unfolding.

He carries in his right hand a black leather briefcase.