I have to say that it was that urge to consider carefully that struck me as the oddest part of the entire thing . . . after discovering that Heaven and Hell really existed, that was. Nothing in existing popular entertainment of which I was aware—and that I remembered—suggested that a . . . purchasing agent for Hell should be such an apparently nice guy or urge his prospective buyers to consider the price so carefully. I supposed that someone in his position would probably be capable of pretending to be a real prince, and if he’d been around as long as he seemed to be implying, he’d certainly had plenty of time to perfect his act. Yet, somehow, I didn’t think he was pretending. He might be crazy, but he wasn’t pretending to be something he didn’t truly think he was.
And then there were those eyes . . .
“All right,” I said the next morning. “I’ve thought about it. And I’ve come to the conclusion that you probably are who—what—you say you are. Or that you certainly believe you are, anyway.”
“And that I can give you what I’ve promised to give you?”
“Yeah. Or, again, that you honestly believe you can, at least. Which means you really are interested in buying my soul and taking it off to Hell for the rest of eternity. You said I wouldn’t have to worry about all that ‘eternal torment’ stuff. You wouldn’t be telling me that because what would actually happen would be something more like Screwtape?”
“Oh, Screwtape!” Ninazu laughed in delight. “I loved that book! But, no. No one is planning on devouring your soul, Lazarus.” He shook his head. “I can see where some people would consider being separated from God for all eternity a horrible punishment in its own right, but that’s about as bad as it would get. And, let’s face it, there are plenty of people alive right this minute who have already separated themselves from God without so much as a passing qualm.”
I nodded a bit glumly. I’d certainly seen evidence enough of that in the few short weeks of my own memories. Then there were people like Sam and George, though. I couldn’t imagine the two of them ever separating themselves from God! They never threw Him into people’s teeth, but they didn’t have to.
“Okay,” I said after another long, thoughtful moment. “Okay. I’ll do it.”
“You’re sure about that?” He regarded me steadily. “This isn’t the sort of deal you can change your mind about, Lazarus. And any buyer’s remorse is going to last a long time.”
“Kind of figured that.” I chuckled, just a bit nervously. “But, yeah, I’m sure. Of course, it could still turn out I’m almost as big a lunatic for taking you seriously as you are for believing you can deliver on this. I don’t think I am, though. So, where’s the contract? And what do we sign it in? Blood?”
“Nothing like that.” Unlike mine, his chuckle didn’t sound at all nervous. “I’m afraid asbestos contracts and signing in blood are myths, Lazarus. No, this is a handshake deal. I’m assuming you’re an honest man who intends to observe its conditions. And I assure you that we’ve got all the . . . ‘enforcement authority’ we’ll ever need.”
“Figured you might.” My mouth felt a little dry, but I extended my right hand. “Shake on it?”
“Exactly.”
His hand was much smaller than mine, but his grip was strong. And, now that I thought about it, unnaturally warm somehow.
I sat, still gripping his hand and looking into his eyes, for two or three breaths, then released it.
“I don’t feel any different,” I said.
“Really?” He looked amused. “It doesn’t work that way. You aren’t any different.”
“So how does this suddenly wealthy thing work? Do I turn up tomorrow at my luxurious office downtown?”
“It doesn’t work that way, either, unless you want it to.” He shrugged. “We could do it that way, you understand, but I’d advise against it.”
“Really?” My eyebrows rose. “Why? Sounds like the simplest way to go about it.”
“From your perspective, maybe.” He laughed. “From the perspective of everybody else in the world, it could be just a little complicated. We’d have to rearrange a lot of people’s lives, and some of them would probably get hurt along the way. From what I know of you, I don’t think you’d want that. Besides, it’s less satisfying that way.”
“Satisfying? Being instantly rich isn’t ‘satisfying’?”
That was the question I asked, although the one I wanted to ask was why an agent of Hell might be concerned about anyone’s getting “hurt along the way.” Unless he meant he thought I’d feel guilty about that. Which, thinking about it, I probably would have. Still, an . . . odd thing for a minion of Hell to be thinking about.
“Of course, it’s less satisfying! Oh, it probably has its good points, and if that’s how you insist on doing it, we can. But think about it first. Would you rather just suddenly be as rich as Bezos or Gates? Or would you rather build your own empire along the way to getting there?”
“How much real ‘building’ can there be with Hell in my corner?”
“Quite a lot, really. Don’t worry!” He raised an extended forefinger as I started to open my mouth. “We’ll always be there as a fallback if you need us. But based on what I’ve come to know of you, here’s the way I think will give you the most satisfaction, Lazarus.”
He reached into his jacket—he was wearing the entire suit this morning—and extracted a long, elegant coat wallet, made of supple black leather and adorned with the monogram L. Boyd in gracefully flowing golden letters. I took it from him, and the instant it touched my hand, it became a worn, cheap, brown billfold with the same monogram stamped in block letters in flaking silver.
An icicle ran delicately down my spine as that transformation confirmed that whatever else he might be, he wasn’t a simple lunatic. On the other hand—
“And this is . . . what, exactly?” I asked.
“Look inside,” he suggested.
I opened it to the card slots, and my eyes narrowed as I found a worn driver’s licence in my name. There was a Social Security card, also in the name of “Lazarus Boyd,” to keep it company, along with a Blue Cross insurance card and a couple of credit cards. Then I opened it completely and found a fairly thick stack of bills. I spread the compartment wider and realized they were all worn fifties and twenties.
“Seems a little scruffy and thin on the ground for fortune building,” I said with a slow smile, and Ninazu chuckled.
“Looks can be deceiving, my friend!” he said. “As in your own case, for example. First, there’s documentation on record to back up all of that identification. You have a past, now, and it’s guaranteed to stand up to any scrutiny. You’ll ‘remember’ all of it when you wake up tomorrow morning, and there are even people who’ll remember you from school, although, alas, none of them were very close friends of yours.”
He smiled briefly, and I nodded.
“Second, you can never lose that billfold. It will stay with you, and its appearance will change to suit your status, however that status changes. Pickpockets won’t be able to steal it, you won’t be able to lose it, and no one can ever take it from you against your will.”
“That sounds useful,” I acknowledged.
“Third, you now have two credit card accounts, although there isn’t a huge balance in either of them at the moment. Back in the good old days, it wouldn’t have been a problem to stuff them full of cash, but it’s a little trickier these days with all of the computerization and digital bookkeeping. Besides, I think you’ll have more fun the other way.”
“What other way?”
“Why, paying cash!”
“There can’t be more than—what? A thousand bucks in here?”
A thousand dollars was, in fact, way more cash than I remembered ever having seen, of course. That wasn’t exactly my point, though.
“Around twenty-five hundred, actually. In used, nonsequential bills. That’s your seed money.”
“Twenty-five hundred dollars to build my empire?” I snorted. “There’s
got to be a catch. Right?”
“Of course!” He chuckled. “Take it out.”
I did. The stack of bills between my thumb and forefinger was thicker than it had looked in the wallet, but it was still only twenty-five hundred dollars, and I looked at him, one eyebrow raised.
“I said take it out,” he said.
I opened my mouth to reply, then paused as he pointed at the wallet in my other hand. I looked down, and my eyes widened. It was still full of money.
“That wallet will always contain exactly two thousand, four hundred, and ninety dollars,” he told me. “You can empty it as many times as you want, and it will still contain that amount—always in used, nonsequential, absolutely genuine, US dollars. Well, there is an inflation clause built in. It will always contain the equivalent of that amount in 2021 dollars, so it’s probably a good thing it’s a coat wallet, once it’s all grown up again. I imagine sitting on something that thick could get uncomfortable in a decade or two.”
My jaw dropped slightly, and he laughed again, harder.
“If it gets too thick, we can always adjust the bills’ denominations. Oh, and here’s this.”
He reached into his jacket again and extracted an iPhone.
“The security code is your birthday. Congratulations, by the way; you turned thirty today. You can’t lose it, either, and it contains all of the access codes for your Internet subscription, your web sites, your credit cards—with Wi-Fi, of course. There’s also a rather lengthy memo file saved on here. It contains the names of stocks and purchase dates over the next, oh, five years or so. Between that info and the wallet, you should have everything you need to build yourself a healthy little portfolio. I think of it as your grubstake. After that, you’ll be on your own. Like I say, knowing you, I expect half—more probably two thirds—of the fun to come from making your own decisions down the road. On the other hand, you’ll find me in your contacts list. If you decide you’d rather take a shortcut after all, drop me a text.”
I slid the billfold into my back pocket, then took the phone—which, predictably, was suddenly in a cheaper, scratched case—and slid it into another pocket.
He was probably right, I realized as I put the phone away. Oh, I’d be “cheating” a little bit—quite a lot, actually—at least to start. But after that, after I had a certain level of security, the wherewithal to back my own decisions . . . that would be when it became truly enjoyable for me.
“You said something about meeting someone who loved me?”
I kept my tone casual, but even as I did, I realized that was important to me. Way more important than getting filthy rich, in fact.
“Lazarus, I probably won’t even have to cheat for you on that front. You’re the sort of person people find it easy to love. Trust me. Just be yourself. You’re a pretty good judge of character, anyway, and this little agreement isn’t going to hurt that one bit. Just . . . think about the people you meet. Don’t jump until you’ve looked. I don’t think you want me to ‘make’ someone fall in love with you any more than you’d want me to just hand you the keys to the penthouse suite at Amazon. You’re not that kind of guy, and you believe in free will—maybe sometimes a little too much. So, no, I’m not going to throw anyone into your arms unless she wants to be there. But I will confidently predict that someone—the right someone—will want to be there. And I will guarantee that, just like you, she’ll live a long, long life in good health, and that the two of you will have a stack of kids to love. Deal?”
“Deal,” I said firmly, reaching out to shake his hand again.
“Good.” He gripped my hand. “And if everything goes the way I confidently expect it to, this is the last time we’ll be speaking to each other until, well—”
He shrugged, and I smiled.
“In that case, until then,” I said.
“I was wondering when you’d be along,” I said, leaning back in my chair as my visitor stepped through the study door. “I figured it couldn’t be too much longer. Especially after Emily died.”
“No. No, it couldn’t have been much longer,” Mister Ninazu agreed. “I thought you wouldn’t want to wait too long after that.”
“Know me pretty well, don’t you?”
I stood and reached out to shake his hand as he crossed to the enormous desk.
“Even better than you know, yet,” he agreed, gripping firmly. “So, you’re satisfied we kept our end of the deal?”
“More than satisfied.” I pointed at the chair in front of my desk and settled back into my own.
And that was nothing but the truth, I reflected. It wasn’t many men, even with twenty-second-century medicine, who moved as easily and with so little pain on their 130th birthday.
He’d been right about “building my own empire,” too. The truth was, I’d actually enjoyed it more because of the occasional setback. I might not have if I hadn’t had that wallet in my pocket, like the shoebox of hundreds stuffed under the bed, but it had been so satisfying to know when I’d made the right decision, backed the right hunch.
It had been even more satisfying to spend some of that money paying back . . . and paying forward, I thought. I’d become the patron Sam and George needed to do things right, and as their retirement gift, I’d created the Dellinger Foundation for the Homeless, built around their philosophies and work ethic, with a $200-million endowment. They’d both been members of the Foundation’s board until their deaths, and their funerals had been attended by thousands of the people they’d helped.
Including me. That had been important, because I knew damned well where their souls were going, and I’d needed to say goodbye properly. They’d shown me there was light even in very dark places. I was going to miss them, a lot, but I was incredibly grateful that I’d gotten to know them well enough to miss them.
Sometimes we get far more than we deserve out of life. Like George and Sam.
And like Emily. My God, Emily. To know she’d loved me for myself, for who I was, not because someone had shoved her into my arms or my bed. Emily, who’d fallen in love with me long before I was one of the youngest billionaires in the world. To have eighty-six glorious years with her. To see her kids—her kids—grow to adulthood, have kids of their own. Every one of them, an individual miracle in my life and hers. And their grandkids. Even a half dozen of their great-grandkids. Every single one of them his or her own person, and every one of them an echo of Emily and how much I loved her.
“No regrets?” Ninazu probed gently.
“Only that it has to end,” I said. “And thank you for Emily, too. She never knew, but I did, and you kept your word about her, too. I don’t think she was ever sick a day in her life, not even a cold, and she went so peacefully, in her sleep. I’d’ve sold you my soul for just that.”
“I know you would,” he said. Then his nostrils flared as he inhaled deeply. “I know you would have, but now it’s time.”
“Trust me, I’m ready. The kids are ready, and I don’t really want to hang around here without Emily. So, let’s do this thing.”
“Of course.”
He smiled a bit crookedly, stood, and walked around to put one hand on my shoulder.
I blinked. There was a moment of vertigo, and then I found myself standing beside him, in a T-shirt and cargo pants that smelled slightly of cut grass, raked leaves, and damp earth. A tall, broad-shouldered, still-muscular old man with a neatly clipped, snow-white beard, dressed in an elegant leisure suit, slumped in a custom-made wingback chair behind a huge desk. The skin was wrinkled, with the lived-in textured of someone who’d spent his life doing things—and there was an incredibly peaceful smile on that lined, hawk-like face.
I looked down at my own hands, saw the same calluses they’d borne the day Ninazu and I met, then looked across—and down—into his eyes.
“That was painless,” I said wryly.
“Of course, it was. I promised Emily.”
“What?” I blinked at him.
“Don’t worry about it.�
�� He shook his head. “The way she loved you, I knew what she would have wanted, just like you wanted it for her. So, I promised her, whether she knew it or not.”
“I have to say this isn’t what I expected,” I said. “I mean, promises of no eternal torment aside, I don’t think anybody would have expected this.” I waved a hand at the office and my discarded corpse, then at myself. “By the way, I’m assuming we are invisible at the moment? I hate to think what this’ll do to the security guys when they examine the video, if we’re not!”
“Don’t worry about it. Would be amusing, though wouldn’t it?” he chuckled.
“You have a very strange sense of humour,” I told him.
“So I’ve been told.” He shrugged. “Give me your hand.”
I reached out once more, and he touched it.
I don’t remember actually leaving the office, but suddenly we were in midair, outside its 200th-floor floor-to-ceiling windows, looking down, down, down on the glittering lights of the city streets and up at the running lights of air cars. The regular midnight shuttle to the L5 habitats had just lifted off from the downtown airport, and I watched it streak into the heavens.
Then we were in flight ourselves, streaking across the cityscape at a speed to dwarf the shuttle’s. We burst up and through the clouds, flashing above their moon-silvered mountain crests, the air cold and thin and bracing. Faster we flew, and still faster, until the cloud summits were a blur, until there was only that vast, enormous sense of motion, of flight, of boundless travel.
And then, with a transition that was sensed more than seen at our stupendous velocity, it was no longer clouds below or the moon above. There was only blackness above us, and a pulsing glow beneath.
We slowed abruptly, and I realized the blackness was the roof of an unending cavern. And that the glow came from lambent pools far below us. Pools of lava, I realized, as we slowed still further and I saw their viscous flow. The smell of sulphur filled my nostrils, but not with the stench I would have expected. It was strong, pungent, unpleasant, and yet somehow . . . exhilarating.
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