A God in Ruins - Leon Uris [127]
“That’s what George Bush thought after the Gulf War.” Lifting the phone to the bridge, “Captain, have we got a few rays left?”
“We should be heading in in forty minutes, Mr. President. The Secret Service wants us to land before dark.”
Thornton stared at the sea pensively. “We don’t get to see many sunsets, Darnell. It’s been a long time since we sat here watching sunsets with our daddies.”
“Why did you change your Labor Day itinerary?” Darnell asked.
“I didn’t like it. Besides, I like to outfox the press. From Detroit we fly to Kirkland Air Base in Albuquerque and helicopter to Glen Canyon. Three columns of Eagle Scouts are converging for a twelve-hundred Scout jamboree. We will sing, “Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree,” pin on a few merit and bravery badges, and address them as the new leaders of the new generation.”
“What the hell has that got to do with Labor Day?”
“I hear say,” Thornton answered, “that architects will soon be redundant…obsolete. In fifteen seconds a Bulldog can put up on the screen detailed plans of every major structure that has been built in the last two thousand years.”
Thornton Tomtree stared at Noah’s Rock in puzzlement. To Darnell he looked like Orson Welles about to say the word, “Rosebud.”
“Architects are done. Writers are going. We can put every known piece of literature on the screen in seconds. Creative arts were once the beacon of civilization. But now the people have come to realize that the one perfect and infallible mechanism on earth is the computer,” the President said. “I am the man who can control the Internet. The people know that.”
* * *
In his Nanatuck study, the President etched out his Labor Day speech. Who could he offend by going to the Eagle Scouts? What the hell! These were lads who knew to get a sane haircut and wear a necktie and polish their shoes.
Eric brought dinner to his desk, and Pucky came in. She looked rather interesting. Thornton had never seen her in his office in exactly this kind of configuration.
Pucky had a gossamer-draped material over her breasts, which had remained surprisingly young. She was otherwise flashy and elegant, her height allowing her to wear whopping jewelry.
“I’m off to the Van Aldens’. Some new Vivaldis have been unearthed. The Juilliard String Quartet will be playing. Are you all right, Thornton?”
“I’ve a rotten week coming up.”
“You are always in a snit when you go out to Noah’s Rock.”
“Is that a fact?”
“Should I stay in with you? I’d like to.”
“No, no, you run along,” he said reflexively.
Chapter 35
The worst part of this job, Maud Traynor thought, was moments like this, flying into a smuggler’s redoubt in a single-engine penny glider. All of them were hidden in jungle and scorched mesas. The Cessna woofed up on a sortie of hot air off the desert floor. Now ponderous, brooding rock formations of dull color flipped quietly beneath their wings.
She tried to rest and closed her eyes, but the plane’s motion made it impossible. Maud lit up.
Already ten years she had been “special counsel” for The Combine. She had been working in a massive Washington law firm as a labor lawyer, married Morton Traynor, also a labor lawyer, and settled into dulldom.
Yet her appearances at legislators’ offices on the Hill had gained her a measure of notice. The Combine had offered her a position that assured her a life of creature comforts.
Her husband had objected. With The Combine she would be immersed in secrecy, among sleazy characters, and straddling the line of legal and illegal.
One thing was for certain. Morton had to go. She divorced him.
A short while later, Maud proved her mettle to The Combine, and she purchased a horse farm over the state line in Virginia.
Maud’s daughter, also divorced with a pair of children, became the centerpiece of her life. Maud did not struggle long or hard to make peace with the morality of her work: three hundred fifty acres, a very rapid sports car, eye-dazzling