The gate was a formidable barricade. A whole squad with pointed and cocked rifles blocked the way, combat ready.
An officer, web-cross-belted and helmeted, stepped up to the car. The National Guard was determined to confront the Regular Army with a snarl.
“Get out and get your hands up!” said the officer.
“No, no,” said Heller. “This is a family matter.” He turned around to Twoey. “Give me your driver’s license.” Twoey handed it over. “We’re here to get his father’s permission for him to join the Army.”
“Delbert John Rockecenter, Second!” said the officer, looking at the license and then at Twoey. “Jesus Christ, I’m sorry!” He hastily grabbed a pad from his belt and scribbled a pass with the word FAMILY in block letters and slid it under the windshield wiper. “Open the gates, men, we got orders not to interrupt the household.” He saluted Heller.
They drove on up the winding drive past tents, troop carriers, motorcycles, field pieces and two tanks.
“I am not going to join the Army!” said Twoey with determination. “They shoot pigs!”
“You shut up,” said Heller. “Let me do the talking.”
“All right, brother,” said Twoey, “but don’t you go getting me in any Army!”
They drew up before the front entrance to the house. Everything was oversize. So were the two National Guardsmen who stood on either side of the door.
Heller handed his shoulder satchel to Bang-Bang. “You just sit tight out here.”
Izzy and Twoey and Heller got out and walked up the steps. An officer appeared. He glanced at the pass under the windshield wiper: the word FAMILY could be read fifteen feet away. He said, “Sorry, but orders are that everyone be searched.” He frisked them for weapons and found none. He looked into the briefcase Izzy was carrying, saw nothing but papers and gave it back. He saluted and had an enlisted man open the door.
The three walked into an enormous living room heavily furnished with outdated, enormous furniture. Huge, enlarged photographs of severe-looking Rockecenters glared down at them.
Voices were coming through a closed door of another room. Heller walked up to it, opened it, shepherded the other two in and closed it behind them.
It was a study, huge, out-of-date. French doors opened out of it on to a side drive.
Delbert John Rockecenter was standing like an angry vulture back of the desk.
Bury, his attorney from the firm of Swindle and Crouch, was standing unhappily against the far wall, his prune face aggrieved.
“And that’s very plain to me!” Rockecenter was saying. “You did NOT do your job! I ought to turn you over to Miss Agnes and get her to electric shock some sense into you! If you had taken any precautions at all, I would not have to be making a long, tiresome drive to Philadelphia just to see that nincompoop of a president! I am sick of doing your work! I should terminate both you and your firm! And I mean terminate! You’re all against me anyway!”
Bury had caught sight of Heller. He was staring. He went white. “WISTER!”
Rockecenter would have gone on talking but it began to be borne in upon him that he had lost his listener. He glanced with annoyance at the group which had entered. “Tell the general,” he said to Heller, “that I am not leaving yet.” He turned back to Bury. “I am not through telling you what I think of you! And I will remind you, Bury, that what I think is important! LISTEN TO ME!”
Bury was making little stabbing points at Heller, “Sir, that’s your . . . sir, that’s the fuel man. . . . Sir, oh, my God!”
“Fuel man? Fuel man?” said Rockecenter. “What are you gibbering about now?”
“Perhaps I had better explain,” said Heller. “We have come to make you a fair offer that can settle all this oil trouble, Mr. Rockecenter.”
“Who is this?” Rockecenter asked Bury. “What’s he talking about?”
“Sir, that one in uniform is Jerome Terrance Wister!”
“And this,” said Heller, “is Mr. Israel Epstein. He controls the companies that own the microwave-power setup, Chryster Motors, gasless carburetors, gasless cars—and he controls, as well, all the US oil reserves now possessed by Maysabongo.”
Rockecenter sat down very suddenly. He stared at Izzy. Then he said, “The Jew. You’re that (bleeped) Jew!”
Heller said, “I think you two can make a deal that will make everybody happy.”
Rockecenter was still staring at Izzy. Then his eyes went slitted and a look of cunning came over his face. “Do I understand that you own the patents of that carburetor and those cars and that microwave-power setup?”
“Companies that I can control do,” said Izzy. “They’re right here.” He opened his case and took them out, advanced and put them on the huge desk.
Bury instantly shifted over behind Rockecenter and inspected them. He whispered something to the effect that they were valid.
“You mean,” said Rockecenter to Izzy, “that you are willing to turn these over to me in exchange for peace?”
“Not exactly,” said Izzy. “Turn them over to you, yes, but there is something we must have in return.”
“Oh,” said Rockecenter, seemingly disappointed. Then he glanced sideways at Bury and looked again at Izzy. He smiled a slight, strange smile. “So what do you want in return, Jew?”
Izzy said, “We have certain options we will exercise tomorrow that will put us in possession of billions and also the shares of every oil company. You may have forty-nine percent of the money and forty-nine percent of the shares.”
“That’s giving me even more,” said Rockecenter. “So there’s something crooked afoot here.”
Izzy said, “Mr. Rockecenter, you once had a wife. You also had two sons.”
Rockecenter looked like he had been shot.
“According to earlier family wills,” continued Izzy, “a son of yours would receive a ten-billion-dollar trust fund. You are trustee of that fund. What we want you to do is recognize Delbert John Rockecenter II as your son.”
“I am withdrawing any rights I may seem to have,” said Heller.
“This allegation is preposterous!” blustered Rockecenter.
“The documents are right here,” said Izzy and drew out copies and passed them over.
Rockecenter stared at them, stricken. The Wall Street lawyer scanned them. Bury whispered something in his ear. Heller only caught a phrase that Miss Agnes had botched it.
“We want,” said Izzy, “that acknowledgment. We also want you to pass over that trusteeship, for your son here is now the required age. We also want you to make a will leaving him your entire estate, appointing me executor.”
“And if I do this thing?”
“The oil companies can have these patents, the US will have its oil. The refineries will get back in operation. . . .”
“They can’t!” said Rockecenter. “The protest marchers claim they’re radioactive! They won’t let them open!”
“I will promise to see that they are decontaminated and gotten back into operation,” said Heller.
“It’s all propaganda anyway!” said Rockecenter. “So what’s a little radiation in people’s tanks? Riffraff anyway!”
“I can also call the marchers off,” said Heller.
Rockecenter sat back. “You’re pretty smart, Jew. If I only have forty-nine percent of the oil companies, you will control their boards and policies. I’ll have to resign from everything!”
“That’s a little more drastic than was intended,” said Izzy. “But let me point out that you would be the wealthiest man in the world.”
“And if I say no?” said Rockecenter.
“Why then,” said Heller, “I’m afraid Mr. Bury here will be defending you in court on a charge of conspiracy to murder your wife and son. I’m sorry to put it so bluntly. And all the rest of this will also go to court and you’ll lose anyway.”
“That’s blackmail!” said Rockecenter.
“That’s murder,” said Heller coolly. “And when you add
it up with millions of other murders in the name of war, millions of babies dead from your abortion programs and hundreds of millions of lives ruined with inflation just so you can make a quick buck with oil, I wonder that they haven’t hanged you a hundred million times over. I’d be glad to hold the rope myself!”
“No, no,” said Izzy hastily. “This is a business conference.”
“Well, this bird has caused me a lot of trouble,” said Heller. “What he calls business is just banditry on a planetary scale. He’s just a pirate and I don’t like looking at him or talking to him. I disagree completely with the generosity of your offer, Mr. Epstein.”
“Mr. Wister,” said Izzy, “please stand over to the side, there, and let me continue these negotiations. Mr. Rockecenter can recognize a profit when he sees it.”
A scowl drew in the prune wrinkles of Bury’s face. He knew he was looking at the good-guy/bad-guy conference approach. He bent toward Rockecenter to whisper some advice but he didn’t get a chance to utter it.
Rockecenter whispered at him and then looked at Izzy with a sly expression.
“Jew,” said Rockecenter, “I’m afraid we’d have to call in attorneys to draw up such a deal. We–––”
“No, you wouldn’t,” said Izzy, opening his case. “You have Mr. Bury here and our attorney Bleedum was up half the night typing all this out.”
One by one, Izzy laid the assignments of patents to the oil companies on Rockecenter’s desk. Then he laid out the transfer of Maysabongo oil. Then he drew out the assignment of forty-nine percent of the sell-option profits and followed it with an assignment of forty-nine percent of the oil-company shares. Then he laid out the document assigning the trust. Then he laid out a will.
Rockecenter and Bury read them.
Rockecenter said suddenly, “All right. I will sign them. Mr. Bury is a notary. We will execute everything right now.”
“And call off the war?” said Heller.
“Of course,” said Rockecenter. “You can even have my sacred word on that. When we’re through, I’ll just ring the president and that will be that.”
PART SEVENTY
Chapter 7
Rockecenter drew the pack of assignments and contracts to him. Smiling slightly, he rapidly began to sign on every signature place. He finished straight on through to the will and scrawled his name on it with a flourish.
“Now, Jew,” he said, pointing to Izzy, “it’s your turn.”
Izzy grabbed the pack, bent over, adjusted his spectacles and began to sign.
“Now you,” said Rockecenter to Twoey when Izzy was done. “There’s a document here relating to the trust that requires your signature.”
Twoey shuffled forward and scrawled his name.
Rockecenter looked at Heller, then at Bury. “Doesn’t he need to sign a quitclaim?”
Bury nodded and went to his attaché case and got out a blank form. He brought it over to the desk.
“Now,” said Rockecenter, “Bury, as a notary, will need your ID to verify your signatures, so lay your wallets out right here.” He tapped the middle of the desk.
All three put their wallets there.
Bury looked at them and the signatures. He got busy with notarial stamps and worked down through the pile. Rockecenter whispered something to him.
The Wall Street lawyer got to the last sheet. It was Heller’s quitclaim. “You’ve signed this Jerome Terrance Wister.” He finished notarizing it. “But I am going to have to have one signed Delbert John Rockecenter, Junior, from you also. I’ll get another blank.”
He walked around Heller and went to the wall where his attaché case lay. He reached in and handed Heller the second quitclaim.
Heller bent over to fill it in and sign it.
He had his eye on the top of a solid silver inkwell.
In distortion, he saw Bury draw!
Behind his back, the gun came out like a striking snake!
Heller whirled. His hand shot up!
He caught Bury’s wrist, forcing it toward the ceiling!
THE GUN WENT OFF!
Heller bent the arm into a smashing blow!
He made the clenched gun strike Bury’s head!
The scalp parted to the bone!
“HOLD IT!” came a shout.
Heller whirled.
The library doors had slammed open.
THERE CROUCHED AN INFANTRYMAN WITH A BAZOOKA!
TWO MORE SOLDIERS HAD THEIR RIFLES ON HELLER!
Bury fell to the floor behind the couch, blood pouring from his head.
He had taken the gun with him!
Heller stood there, unarmed. The soldiers were too far away to rush.
Rockecenter stood, with a sharp, crazy laugh. He scooped up all the papers. He scooped up their wallets. He reached down and grabbed a huge steel briefcase. It had a circular dial combination. He opened it. The only thing that made it different from a safe was that it had a handle.
“You think I’d keep my word on a crazy deal like that? All I wanted from you was the patents! Now we can nullify and hide this work and keep the world on profitable oil.” He peered over at Bury on the floor. The man appeared to be dead. “I’ll take the rest of this along to keep it out of plotting hands.” He stuffed the papers and wallets and all Izzy’s papers into the case, got them out of the way of the beveled, fitted edges, closed it and spun the combination.
A major general came rushing in, followed by a squad.
“General,” said Rockecenter, “hold this riffraff until I return. Then, as we will be at war, we’ll have work for a firing squad!”
About the Author
L. Ron Hubbard’s remarkable writing career spanned more than half-a-century of intense literary achievement and creative influence.
And though he was first and foremost a writer, his life experiences and travels in all corners of the globe were wide and diverse. His insatiable curiosity and personal belief that one should live life as a professional led to a lifetime of extraordinary accomplishment. He was also an explorer, ethnologist, mariner and pilot, filmmaker and photographer, philosopher and educator, composer and musician.
Growing up in the still-rugged frontier country of Montana, he broke his first bronc and became the blood brother of a Blackfeet Indian medicine man by age six. In 1927, when he was 16, he traveled to a still remote Asia. The following year, to further satisfy his thirst for adventure and augment his growing knowledge of other cultures, he left school and returned to the Orient. On this trip, he worked as a supercargo and helmsman aboard a coastal trader which plied the seas between Japan and Java. He came to know old Shanghai, Beijing and the Western Hills at a time when few Westerners could enter China. He traveled more than a quarter of a million miles by sea and land while still a teenager and before the advent of commercial aviation as we know it.
He returned to the United States in the autumn of 1929 to complete his formal education. He entered George Washington University in Washington, DC, where he studied engineering and took one of the earliest courses in atomic and molecular physics. In addition to his studies, he was the president of the Engineering Society and Flying Club, and wrote articles, stories and plays for the university newspaper. During the same period he also barnstormed across the American mid-West and was a national correspondent and photographer for the Sportsman Pilot magazine, the most distinguished aviation publication of its day.
Returning to his classroom of the world in 1932, he led two separate expeditions, the Caribbean Motion Picture Expedition; sailing on one of the last of America’s four-masted commercial ships, and the second, a mineralogical survey of Puerto Rico. His exploits earned him membership in the renowned Explorers Club and he subsequently carried their coveted flag on two more voyages of exploration and discovery. As a master mariner licensed to operate ships in any ocean, his lifelong love of the sea was reflected in the many ships he captained and the skill of the crews he trained. He also served with distinction as a U.S. naval officer during the Second
World War.
All of this—and much more—found its way, into his writing and gave his stories a compelling sense of authenticity that has appealed to readers throughout the world. It started in 1934 with the publication of “The Green God” in Thrilling Adventure magazine, a story about an American naval intelligence officer caught up in the mystery and intrigues of pre-communist China. With his extensive knowledge of the world and its people and his ability to write in any style and genre, he rapidly achieved prominence as a writer of action adventure, western, mystery and suspense. Such was the respect of his fellow writers that he was only 25 when elected president of the New York Chapter of the American Fiction Guild.
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