Interface (87 page)

Instead the violence had infected a whole new generation with
the notion of the cheapness of human life, and the flow of weapons
into the region that made semiautomatics available to even
preteens. The doctors who worked emergency rooms in the
District had become some of the world's leading experts on the treatment of gunshot wounds. During the Gulf War they had been sent straight to the front lines, where they felt right at home.

Awaiting Eleanor was the Lady Wilburdon Gunshot Wound
Institute, an ugly, brand-new, fortresslike structure built on the
bulldozed foundations of the first of the War Against Poverty
projects. Its architecture reflected its function, which was to treat
people involved in deadly combat. The place had been made secure
and bulletproof to discourage shooters from coming by to finish off
their victims while they were being worked on by the doctors.

The only shooters here now were carrying cameras. Eleanor got
out of her limo and followed her advance person through a wall of
photographers and cameramen. She made her way, along with her
Secret Service escort, to a small auditorium in the institute. Already
present on the stage were the Mayor of D.C.; the medical director
of the institute, who was a young black Gulf War veteran named
Dr. Cornelius Gary; and the founder and namesake, an imposing
Englishwoman named Lady Guenevere Wilburdon. An empty seat awaited Eleanor.

"Ms. Richmond," Lady Wilburdon said, extending her hand,
"it's a pleasure to meet you. I look forward to your inauguration."

"Thank you so much, Lady Wilburdon, but we do have to go
through the election."

"Pfft," Lady Wilburdon said, and waved her hand as if shooing
flies away.

Eleanor repressed an urge to laugh. This was exactly the kind of
attitude that she had sported, back before she was a candidate.

They were not able to converse anymore before the ceremony
began. It opened with a presentation of songs by the massed choirs
of several local churches, a lengthy, involved oratory-cum-prayer
by the Mayor, and the presentation of Dr. Cornelius Gary, the executive director of the institute. Who in turn presented Lady
Wilburdon, who said nothing except to introduce Eleanor, who
dedicated the institute.

"It was nice to have met you, Lady Wilburdon," Eleanor said after
i
t was over.

"Not so fast, Ms. Richmond," Lady Wilburdon said. "We are
going to have a chat."

"I would like nothing better, but my schedule-
"Arrangements have been made," Lady Wilburdon said firmly.

On their way out the front doors they had to jump out of the
way of an incoming gurney: the institute's first patient, a thirteen-
year-old boy who had been gunshot with a .357 Magnum.

Eleanor's advance person explained it to her in the motorcade.
Eleanor's next two engagements had both been cancelled at the last
minute. She had a couple of free hours. Nature abhors a vacuum
and Lady Wilburdon had rushed in to plug the gap. They would be
having lunch at the Willard.

It was a small lunch too - just Eleanor, Lady Wilburdon, and her secretary, Miss Chapman. Lady Wilburdon used both force of
personality and sheer physical bulk to eject all of Eleanor's hangers-
on from the room. Then they sat at the table together and lunched
on tiny sandwiches.

"I should explain that I knew Bucky," Lady Wilburdon said.

"Bucky?"

"Salvador. The fellow who was shot by the madman across the river and exploded in front of the sushi bar. It is tasteless, I know,
but I have become inured."

"I didn't know him myself," Eleanor said. "All I know is that he
ran the company that does media consulting for our campaign. And
that Cy Ogle has taken over from him."

"Bucky was the very embodiment of low cunning," Lady
Wilburdon said. "Impressive in a superficial way. But flashy." She said this word with the same intonation she might have used if she were calling him a child molester. "In a way it is surprising that the
Network hired him. Normally we have higher standards. But we
are in an age when high standards are no longer fashionable."

"Network? He worked for one of the television networks?"

Lady Wilburdon rolled her eyes. "Certainly not. Not even
Bucky would do that. You need to know about this, as you will be
spending the next eight years - possibly the next sixteen - in a
position of great responsibility."

"We have to win the election."

"You will," Lady Wilburdon said. "We have solved the problem
of elections."

It was somewhat later in the afternoon. Lady Wilburdon had
dipped into a bottle of sherry and held forth at some length on the
subjects of Bucky, Ogle, Cozzano, and the functioning of the
PIPER 100. Eleanor listened politely, soaked it all up, and made up
her mind that she would not try to figure out until later whether
this woman was completely out of her mind or telling the truth.

It would be easy enough to pass her off as a dingbat. But her
words explained a lot. From time to time Eleanor would feel an
uncomfortable shock of recognition as Lady Wilburdon's explana
tions matched up perfectly with what she herself had noticed. Consciously she kept an open mind. Subconsciously she had long
ago decided that everything Lady Wilburdon said was true.

"If what you're saying is true," Eleanor said, "an unbelievable
amount of money has been spent."

"It's all relative," Lady Wilburdon said. "It's all part of a long-
range strategy."

"How long-range?"

"Centuries."

"Centuries?"

"There are only five entities in the world with sufficient wisdom
to pursue consistent strategies over periods of several centuries," Lady Wilburdon said. "These entities are not national or govern
mental in nature - even the best governments are dangerously
unstable and short-lived. Such an entity is self-preserving and self-
perpetuating. A world war, or the rise and fall of an empire or an alliance such as the USSR or NATO, is no more serious, to it, than a gust of wind buffeting the sails of a clipper ship."

"What are these entities?" Eleanor said.

"In no particular order, one is the Catholic Church. One is Japan
- which is nothing more than a group of
zaibatsus,
or major
industrial combines. The third is a loose network of shtetls. After
the expulsion from Spain in 1492, they forcibly realized the
importance of long-range planning, and in the intervening years
have accumulated formidable assets. The fourth one we don't
know much about; it seems to connect many of the recalcitrantly
traditional cultures of the Third and Fourth Worlds and to be
headquartered somewhere in Central Asia. And the fifth is the Network. It is an alliance of large investors, both individual and
institutional, predominantly European and American. You might
think of it as the legacy, the residue, of the East India Company, the
Hudson's Bay Company, the American railway companies,
Standard Oil, and the technological empires of our time. It is the
most decentralized of the five entities - really just an effort to
pursue investments, and certain other activities, in a coordinated
fashion. Before the war its funds were managed by a lovely Scottish
gentleman who lived in an old castle near Chichester. Afterward it
was moved to the interior of the States and placed in the hands of
an American fellow, a mathematical prodigy who attended the
Lady Wilburdon School for Geniuses on the Isle of Rhum."

"The Network owns Ogle Data Research?"

"Yes."

"And by implication, Cozzano?"

"Yes."

"So you're saying that the Network is going to take over the
United States?"

"The Network wouldn't want it," Lady Wilburdon said.
"Governments, as I mentioned, are dodgy. All the Network wants
is to stabilize the return on its investment in the national debt."

"Wait a minute. You're saying that the Network would put
together this incredible conspiracy just to get a couple of extra
points on a loan?"

The idea did not seem troubling to Lady Wilburdon. She seemed
a bit surprised that Eleanor didn't accept it. "My dear lady," she said, "do you have any idea how much money your government
has borrowed?"

"A lot," Eleanor said. "Ten trillion dollars." It was a figure she had to cite regularly during campaign debates.

"Well, you certainly can't expect to borrow that much money from someone without incurring certain obligations, can you?"
Lady Wilburdon said, as if it were all perfectly obvious. And it was,
in fact, perfectly obvious.

"Of course, not," Eleanor said, "you're right."

"When a business borrows money from a bank, and does so irresponsibly, and is profligate and incompetent, what happens?"

"It goes bankrupt. And the bank takes it over."

"Yes. The bank simply wants what is best for the business. It gets
rid of the dead wood, fires the miscreants who drove the business
to ruin, cleans it out, and sets everything right, so that the business is once again able to meet its obligations."

"And I'm one of the people who is supposed to set everything right."

"You and Mr. Cozzano, yes. And I'm sure you'll do a splendid
job of it."

"You are? Are you kidding?"

"Of course not. I've been following your career, Ms.
Richmond. Everything you've been saying in the last year about
the failure of American politics is correct," Lady Wilburdon said.
"Without going round and talking to them personally, I daresay that most of the people in the Network consider you something of a folk hero."

Eleanor's mind was whirling, and not just because she had taken
two glasses of sherry. She had to see Mary Catherine. And
providentially, one of her assistants broke through and signaled it
was time to go. Eleanor had been listening with such rapt attention
that she had not moved for an hour. One of her legs had gone to
sleep, and the sherry also had reduced her coordination. When she
stood up, it showed.

"You need to do some stretching exercises," Lady Wilburdon
said. "Take it from me - I travel even more than a presidential candidate."

"I'll keep that in mind, Lady Wilburdon. Thank you for an
illuminating chat."

"It was my pleasure, I assure you," Lady Wilburdon said, seeing
her to the elevators. Eleanor had now been enveloped by her
campaign staff.

"Good-bye," Lady Wilburdon said, as the elevator arrived, "I
should enjoy paying a call on you at the Naval Observatory, if you
would have me. I love telescopes."

53

The Prince of Darkness arrived at Dulles Airport at one p.m.
on the ninth of October, in a chartered Learjet with the windows
painted black. He was met on the end of the runway by a black limousine that gave the terminal building a wide berth as it swung
on to the Dulles Access Road. The limousine made its way into the
stream of traffic, headed directly in toward the District of
Columbia, trailed by a dark sedan full of men in sunglasses and suits.

Within half a mile the limousine had changed lanes all the way
over to the left edge of the roadway and was traveling in excess of
ninety miles per hour. In the back of that limousine, an astonish
ingly loud, grating voice was egging on the driver, like a hot poker
shoving him in the ass. There were only two men in the vehicle,
the driver and the passenger, they had been together for less than
sixty seconds, and the driver was already fighting a nearly uncon
trollable urge to pull on to the shoulder, vault the seat, and wrap his
fingers around the Prince of Darkness's neck.

They were less than a mile from the airport when the limousine's
brake lights flared and it suddenly veered on to the shoulder. The
black sedan grumbled to an emergency stop directly behind it,
spraying gravel. The high-speed traffic in the left lane of the
roadway veered, screeched, and honked, nearly rear-ending this
strange little caravan.