Order of the Air Omnibus: Books 1-3 (107 page)

"No," he said. After all, he still hadn't told her about Henry's offer, the one he said he would think about over the holidays. He hadn't told anybody. "No," Mitch said. "You never said you were getting out of the game."

"I didn't," she said. "A girl's got to have options."

"Yeah." He lifted his chin, resting it on top of her head, trying not to hold on too tight, looking for the right words. "Just tell me when you do," he said at last. "So I can watch your back."

Her breath caught. He couldn't see her face, but her hand tightened on his sleeve, twisting the fabric in her fingers. "Ok," she said.

He couldn't help dropping his face against her hair, holding her so tight, her arms around him even tighter. He couldn't help dropping a kiss against the top of her head. What's a kiss on the top of the head? Not dangerous, surely. And how else do you say the things that come crowding in and can't be said, a wealth of promises that can't be kept, a horde of passions that can't come to anything? I want you every moment for the rest of my life, to bury myself in you, to burn up in you, to fall into you deeper than the Grand Canyon in a flat spin to oblivion in you….

So tempting to try it. So tempting to make a move. Surely she wanted him to. Surely every bit of body language was asking. But it wouldn't work. Mitch knew that. It wouldn't. No sensation, no touch, no thought, ever did. The desire in her eyes would turn to pity. He couldn't stand that. Anything else, but not that. Not pity.

She'd be so kind. She'd be understanding and nice. And she'd feel terribly sorry for him. She'd be sorry he was broken.

Mitch let out a long breath. Ok. It was what it was. Breathe and let it go. He could be this for her, the friend who has her back. He could be the one who's warm and affectionate and safe, the one who'll never mistreat her because he can't. Someone had, maybe more than one. But he was safe. She knew he was safe. She could flirt and dance and fall asleep on him and he'd never be able to hurt her. And so maybe she could have some affection and fun. Maybe she could relax a little. He'd never ask for anything she didn't want to give. Not sex. Not even for her to stay. He could be that for her.

She took a deep breath, her face against his neck, raised her face for one tentative kiss. Surely that was safe. Not a real kiss, just a brush of lips, almost an apology. Or maybe it was just affection. "You're awfully sweet, darling," she said, and her voice sounded almost normal.

"I'll watch out for you, and you watch out for me. Ok?" he asked.

"Deal," she said, but there was that strange catch in her voice again. "I'll watch out for you and you watch out for me. I expect I'll be more trouble than you will."

"Probably," Mitch said. He held onto her very, very tightly until they both fell asleep.

I
t had been a beast of a day — a fruitless search for provenance for one of the Rosenthal denarii, no progress at all on who might have owned the medallion before Rosenthal, no taxis to be found at closing, the diner where he could usually get an inexpensive meal unexpectedly crowded, so that he had to resort to the automat — and when he finally limped back to the Club, he couldn't resist a drink in the Mayflower bar. It was dark and quiet, not even the strains of a radio to break the murmur of genteel conversation, and he collapsed at a corner table with a sigh of relief. Maybe he should call Iskinder, he thought, but that seemed too much trouble. And anyway, he wasn't sure he was fit company.

The waiter brought his drink and he sipped carefully, savoring the contrast of sweet and sharp. Now that he could stretch his leg, the ache in his stump subsided to a bearable level, one that a merely reasonable amount of alcohol would improve. Maybe one more drink after this one, and then he'd be able to sleep….

"Hello, Ballard."

The voice was oddly familiar, and Jerry looked up to see a face he hadn't thought of in almost twenty years. Lyford Merrill had been — not a friend, precisely, but a big man on campus, played football with Iskinder and been secretary of the Cincinnatian Society, the only club to which Jerry had ever belonged. He was also one of the few people who hadn't voted to expel him from the club after he'd been caught with Piers. Of course, part of that had surely been because Merrill had shared his tastes — but the Cincinnatian had been full of horticultural youths who'd voted for his expulsion. He was staring, he realized, and managed a smile.

"Merrill."

"May I join you?"

Jerry nodded, and the other man pulled out the chair across from him and signaled for the waiter. He placed his order — Jerry waved away a refill — and rested his elbows on the table. He was still a handsome man, though he'd filled out a bit since his college days — simple maturation, Jerry thought, not gone to seed. He had the look of a man who kept himself solidly fit, his skin bronzed as a movie star's even in the depths of winter.

"I imagine you're wondering why I looked you up," Merrill said.

Jerry nodded, dredging his memory for the details of the last Class Report. "You live in the city, if I remember."

"Yes."

"But," Jerry said, and Merrill nodded. The waiter returned with his drink and Merrill waited until he was out of earshot before he spoke again.

"You're quite right, I was asked to talk to you. But I also wanted to take the opportunity to apologize for what happened senior year. I should have done more, and I'm sorry I didn't."

Jerry blinked. That was the last thing he'd expected to hear from anyone, and probably least of all from Merrill, who had actually spoken up for him. "I — I appreciated what you did do," he said. "It was more than most people, and I was, I am, grateful." He smiled, trying for a lighter touch. "And, honestly, I should have been more careful."

"It certainly taught us all a lesson," Merrill said.

That was something Jerry didn't particularly want to think about. He said, "No offense, but — I'm curious who sent you, and why."

Merrill nodded as though he was pleased to get down to business. "I've been asked to talk to you about the Rosenthal Collection."

Jerry shook his head. "I'm employed by the Met. I'm really not in a position to discuss it. I'm sorry."

"Just hear me out," Merrill said, and Jerry sighed.

"I'll listen."

"My principal, who'd prefer to remain nameless at this point, has reason to believe that — regardless of what you say — the Met is not going to buy the collection. There are whispers that the collection isn't of sufficient stature to be housed here — that the collector's choices revealed his Semitic roots and render the collection unimportant."

Jerry swallowed the last of his drink and waved for the waiter after all. "Usually when people say things like that, they're not complaining that the objects are of lesser worth."

Merrill grinned. "True. But you know how that goes. Somebody doesn't want the Met to buy the collection, and that's hard on Rosenthal. He's a nice old man, and he's probably being sensible — but that's neither here nor there. I have someone who's willing to buy the collection at a reasonable price, and I thought you might be able to help arrange it once the Met sale falls through."

"If it falls through," Jerry said, though there was a hard knot in the pit of his stomach. He took a sip of the fresh drink the waiter set in front of him. "Who's your principal, Merrill? I expect it's someone I know."

"I doubt it," Merrill answered. "He's not a collector, per se. His name's Pelley."

Jerry froze, then made himself take another careful drink, moving with exquisite care. "Not William Pelley. The politician?"

"He's not really a politician," Merrill said. "Not in the usual sense, though he is interested in politics. Well, who isn't, these days?"

"Times are tough," Jerry said. He wanted to knock the man under the table, but that would be frowned upon in the genteel environs of the Harvard Club. First they send men with guns, and now they send Merrill —

Merrill was watching him, an odd expression on his face. "Something's happened — someone else has contacted you."

"Not exactly," Jerry said, tightly.

Merrill shook his head. "Damn it. There are times — I told them to let me talk to you before they made any other offers, and now… Well, I can't blame you if you don't want to listen."

Jerry paused. There was no telling how much Merrill knew about what had actually happened, whether he'd been party to the attempted theft or not, and Jerry wasn't about to give him details, at least not yet. "It was an unfortunate… encounter."

"Damn it," Merrill said again. "Ballard, that's not the way we — the real organization — do things. Whatever they said or did, I apologize without reservation, and I give you my word that it won't happen again. Whether or not you listen to me, and whatever you decide."

That was a good deal more than Jerry had expected to hear, and he tipped his head to one side. "You take Pelley very seriously."

"I do."

"I don't see it."

Merrill leaned forward slightly. "I won't deny he has a bee in his bonnet about Roosevelt — the man's no better and no worse than most of his kind — but that's beside the point. We don't need a dictator, and we don't need a president who's in bed with the unions and out to ruin business, and we certainly don't need another Hoover, fiddling while the country burns. What we need is for the best of the country to come together and lead it out of this depression, and Pelley knows how to do that. We need men who'll act, who'll create jobs and draft the men to fill them — take the broken-down farmhands and the factory workers who haven't had a real job in years and the riff-raff from the cities who've never worked and mold them into a proper labor force. A real labor party that knows its job and knows it's serving the greater good. No, there won't be union wages, not if every man is to be employed, but every man who can work will have a place."

"Is that what Pelley wants?" Jerry couldn't help sounding skeptical, though the idea had some merit. Yes, the country needed work, needed jobs more than anything right now, but no one seemed able to find a way to create them. If there was some way to get everyone to pull together, to parcel out the work that was there and make more…

"It's the start of it," Merrill said. "The fight's already started, Ballard, whether we like it or not. Men like Stalin have to create an enemy, and we're it. Our way of life is a deadly threat to them, and the only thing they can do is try to bring us down while we're still weak and divided."

"I'm not fond of Stalin," Jerry said. "Nor of Mussolini or Franco or Hitler or any of the other Fascists. What we need is democracy — more voices, not fewer."

Merrill nodded. "But, by the same token, we need someone who can teach everyone to sing the same tune. There's nothing this country can't do, if we could only pull together."

"And you think Pelley's the man to do it." Jerry took another swallow of his drink.

"Hoover certainly wasn't."

"Roosevelt —"

"Has the support of half the people, but hardly the better half. And the ones who opposed him — they hate him, they'd act against their own best interest just to spite him." Merrill's smile was wry. "I expect you've gotten an earful of that already."

"I've heard more than I'd like," Jerry admitted.

"That's why it can't be a politician," Merrill said. "The process is too heated, too flawed. But take someone from outside, someone who can pull the elite with him — not just the cream of society, but men of wisdom, men from every rank who share the vision and are willing to sacrifice for it."

"There's been plenty of sacrifice already," Jerry said, more sharply than he'd meant.

Merrill nodded again. "And that's part of the problem right there. The sacrifices our veterans made have gone almost entirely unrewarded. You can't say that's justice."

"No." Jerry shoved away the memory of his Chicago boarding house, sitting on the edge of the bathtub with his misshapen foot draining into the hot water, trying to decide whether he had to pay his week's rent or the doctor, while another boarder pounded on the door demanding to know when he'd be done. His stipend from the university hadn't come close to covering both, and there was no pension for a wounded man. The war was over, after all.

"But here's the thing." Merrill leaned forward again. "Imagine if Pelley — if anyone — were able to gather a corps of men from all walks of life, men who understood what was necessary and were willing to make the sacrifices to make it happen. A coalition of the willing, people who are smart enough and educated enough to look at American industry and say, 'here is someone who needs men, and here are men who need work,' and make the two match — ship them there in boxcars if we have to, but put people into the jobs that are there. And then we need to make jobs — build up the army again, for one thing, it'll get men off the streets and it'll teach them to be men again. And if, God forbid, Stalin does make a move, well, we'll be prepared, for once. We'll reform the schools, make sure all our boys are educated to the best of their ability, ready to take their place in society, and we'll make sure everyone understands what society expects of them. The rules will be simple and clear and clean, entirely American, and anyone who doesn't want to follow them is free to go. That's the only way — it's only if we all pull together that we can get out of this mess we're in."

"It's a pretty thought," Jerry said, and there was less of a sneer in his voice than he had meant. "But how do you plan to get everyone to cooperate?"

"In the long run, of course, we'll all be brought up to it," Merrill said, with a quick smile. "That's what school is for, the Boy Scouts, things like the Silver Legion. In the short term — well, that's where people like us come in. The coalition of the willing. It's our place to ensure that this all happens fairly, justly. After all, if you owned a factory, what would be the temptation to tilt the scales in your favor, even just a little, so your sons and grandsons would be better off? But people like us, you and me, we have no such obligations — no family, no children to tempt us. We can keep our colleagues honest."