Cyberbooks Page 24

  Despite the stylized crystal flutes before each one of them and the silver bucket that bore a heavy magnum of champagne in the middle of the table, Carl stared morosely out the window nearest their table at the skyscrapers that marched row upon row up the long narrow avenues of Manhattan. Like the windmills of Don Quixote, he thought glumly. And like Don Quixote, I've tilted against them and lost.

  For this was a farewell party.

  Even so, there was laughter. "The crowning blow came the next morning," Scarlet Dean was saying, "after we all returned to the office and started to sort things out. Mrs. Bee came running into my office, waving a sheet of paper from the law firm that represented us at the trial. The bastards had charged Bunker Books $45,000 for the nine hours those five twerps had spent as hostages!"

  Ralph Malzone wiped at his eyes. "That was the last straw. When P. T. heard that he ran right out of the house and bought the yacht."

  "And they've already taken off?" Lori asked.

  "Yeah. First stop, Bermuda."

  "And P. T. has made you the head of Bunker Books while he and Mrs. Bee sail off around the world," Lori said.

  Still looking slightly dazed by it all, Ralph ran a hand through his rust-red thatch of hair and replied, "Yeah. I'm now the chief operating officer of Bunker Books. And Scarlet is taking over Mrs. Bee's role as publisher."

  Carl had drunk as much champagne as any of them, but he did not feel drunk. Nor happy. He was numb.

  Ralph toyed with his fluted glass, gave a sidelong glance to Scarlet, then turned his attention back to Lori. "And I've got some news for you, kid. You're the new editor-in-chief of Bunker Books."

  Lori gasped with surprise. "Me? Editor-in-chief?"

  "That's right," said Scarlet. "Ralph and I agreed on that right away."

  Forcing a smile that he did not feel, Carl raised his champagne glass. "Here's to your success, Lori," he toasted. "You've earned it." With bitterness burning in his gut, he added, "And to yours, Scarlet. And to yours, Ralph."

  They sipped, but then Ralph's face grew somber. "My success isn't going to do you any good, pal."

  "I know," said Carl. "I understand."

  Scarlet put a hand on Carl's arm. "The only way to keep the company from going down the tubes was to make a deal with Woody and the sales staff. We've agreed to drop Cyberbooks."

  Carl's lips pressed into a tight, white line. But at last he said, in a low voice, "Lori's been keeping me informed. I guess it's the only thing you could do."

  "I didn't want it to end like this," Ralph said.

  "It's not your fault," said Carl. "I understand the fix you're in."

  Lori tried to brighten things. "At least I get to publish Mobile, USA."

  "Now that's something I don't understand," Carl admitted. "You told me that the novel was a work of art, and if you published it, it wouldn't sell enough copies to pay for the ink used to print it."

  "Oh, that was before the author became famous. Taking over the courtroom and holding us hostage has made him a celebrity."

  "But he's in jail, isn't he?"

  "We got him released into our custody," Scarlet said. "He's doing interviews with all the big news magazines and TV talk shows. We're rushing his novel into print, to take advantage of the publicity."

  Carl took a longer swig of his champagne. "You'd be able to get the book out this week if you'd do it as a Cyberbook."

  Ralph shook his head. "No can do, pal. We made the deal with Woody and his people and we've got to stick with it. Nobody in the whole publishing industry will touch Cyberbooks."

  "It's a damned shame," said Scarlet without much feeling.

  Carl took a deep breath. "Yeah. A damned shame."

  They finished their brunch in a quiet, subdued mood. Ralph and Scarlet were obviously overjoyed at being handed Bunker Books on a platter, but they could hardly celebrate properly when the price of their good fortune was scuttling Carl's invention.

  The four of them took the long elevator ride to the lobby and went out onto the sun-filled street, where Ralph and Scarlet hailed a taxi uptown. Carl and Lori walked toward their apartment building, some twenty short Manhattan blocks downtown.

  "What will you do now?" Lori asked him.

  Shrugging, "Go back to MIT. My sabbatical is just about over, anyway."

  "Carl, I'm so damned sorry about all this. . . ."

  "It's not your fault," he said. Then, looking squarely into her dark, limpid eyes, he worked up the courage to ask, "Lori— would you come to Boston with me? Will you marry me?"

  Tears welled up in her eyes. "I can't," she said, her voice almost pleading. "I've just gotten the first big break of my career. And with this novel finally coming out, I can't leave now. This is my first real chance. I can't give it up, no matter how much I love you. Carl."

  "You do love me?"

  "I do. I love you. Didn't you know?"

  "I love you!"

  They melted into each other's arms and kissed passionately. Thirty-seven pedestrians, including three married couples accompanied by children and fourteen singles walking their dogs, passed them on the sidewalk before they broke their fervent embrace.

  "Stay here in New York, Carl," Lori said eagerly.

  "No," he said. "This isn't the town for me."

  "But . . ."

  He shook his head sadly. "It's not like the romantic novels, Lori. This is real life. True love doesn't always win."

  "I don't want to lose you!"

  "Then leave the publishing business and come up to Massachusetts with me."

  "I can't! You can't expect me to throw away my career, my life. . . ."

  With a bitter smile, Carl said, "And I can't stay here and let you support me. I've got a career to think about, too."

  They walked in dejected silence back to their apartment building. Once in the elevator, going up, Carl said:

  "We'd better say good-bye right here and now, Lori. It'll hurt too much to prolong it."

  The elevator stopped at Lori's floor with its usual jolt. The doors slid open. Lori leaned a finger against the button that held them open.

  "You mean . . . this is it?"

  "I'm going to take the next train to Boston. Today. This afternoon."

  "But . . ."

  "Good-bye, Lori. I love you and it's tearing my guts apart."

  They kissed one last time and she pulled away from him and stepped out of the elevator. Carl stood there, frozen with grief and guilt and doubt, staring at Lori's troubled, teary face. Then the elevator doors slid shut and he could no longer see her at all.

  ROOM AT THE TOP

  P. Curtis Hawks sat at the broad desk in the spacious office on the next-to-the-top floor of the Synthoil Tower. Chairman of the board of Tarantula Enterprises (Ltd.). At last!

  He wore a magnificent military uniform of his own special design, heavy with braid and medals. The emergency meeting of the board of directors the previous week had gone extremely well: he had been elected chairman unanimously. Weldon W. Weldon was safely tucked away in a well-guarded private sanitarium far upstate, pretending to be a cripple once again. The Old Man was hopelessly insane and would spend the rest of his days in his powered chair making imaginary deals with phantom associates and tiptoeing around his funny farm at night to slaughter hallucinatory rivals.

  It had taken the better part of two weeks to clear away the jungle that the Old Man had created. Just cleaning the rugs had been a Herculean task. But now the office was back the way it should be: sparkling, grand, imposing, even humbling to the lower-caste visitor.

  Hawks inhaled deeply and smelled the new leather and high-gloss aroma of power. He sat in his magnificent elevated chair. It's mine, he congratulated himself. All mine!

  The desk phone chirped.

  "Answer answer," Hawks said crisply.

  "Mr. Hawks, sir"—the phone computer's voice was that of a groveling bhisti's singsong—"a certain Mr. MacDonald McDougall requests the honor of your presence in the boardroom of the Synthoil Cor
poration at eleven o'clock this morning sharply, sir."

  Hawks exhaled. The Synthoil board wanted to meet him. The computer was merely reminding him of the appointment in the groveling way it had been programmed.

  Hawks took the private elevator up the one flight to the Synthoil offices. While Tarantula was on the next-to-the-top floor of the mighty tower, Synthoil was at the very top.

  A slim, dark, curly-haired young man dressed in a jet-black Italian silk suit was waiting for Hawks at the elevator doors. Without a word, he ushered Hawks into the plush and paneled conference room of the Synthoil Corporation.

  MacDonald McDougall smiled genially at Hawks, Even though Hawks had never before met the CEO of Synthoil, the Scotsman's bushy red beard and handsome mustache were unmistakable. He wore a bulky tweed business suit, with a plaid sash of the distinctive McDougall tartan slanting beneath his jacket.

  "Sit yerself doon, Mr. Hawks," said McDougall, waving his huge hand toward the only empty chair at the long, gleaming conference table.

  The chair was at the very foot of the table. All the men on one side of the table were stocky, frozen-faced Orientals, dressed in gray business suits. And every man sitting on the other side was dark of hair, wide of girth, and dressed in jet-black suits of Italian silk. And sunglasses.

  Hawks's heart sank as he was introduced to his new masters.

  WINTER,

  BOOK IV

  RETIRED NAVY OFFICER DIES

  Chelsea, MA. Capt. Ronald Reginald Clanker, USN (Ret ), died yesterday in the Army/Navy nursing home where he had spent his final ten years.

  Capt. Clanker, last remaining veteran of the Battle of Midway in 1942, was 93. He was the author of Passion in the Pacific, a novel published three weeks before his death. According to a spokesperson for the nursing home, Capt. Clanker suffered a fatal heart attack shortly after being informed that his book was no longer available for sale, and all unsold copies had been pulped by the publisher.

  There are no survivors.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Two things surprised Carl that cold February afternoon.

  First had been the telephone call from P. T. Bunker, Junior. Out of the blue, Junior had invited Carl for drinks at the Parker House in downtown Boston.

  Second was the snow. The day had dawned frostily clear, and the sky had still been crystalline when Carl had entered his lab building at MIT. He had scooted along the basement tunnels to get to his 2:00 p.m. class, as he usually did. It was quicker and warmer; he didn't need a winter coat. After the class he had returned to his windowless laboratory through the same tunnels.

  So when he stepped outside for the first time since early morning, he was surprised that nearly a foot of snow lay on the ground, with more gently sifting down out of a darkened sky.

  It took a little longer for the transit train to make the short run from MIT station to Beacon Hill, but Carl reached the cozy bar of the Parker House only a few minutes after four.

  Junior was already there, at a little table in the corner, chatting amiably with the cocktail waitress.

  They shook hands, Carl took off his snow-wet coat, and settled down onto one of the comfortable easy chairs. He ordered a light beer. Junior was drinking something big and bulbous and frothy, exotic and lethal looking.

  Junior looked somehow more mature, more relaxed with himself, than he had a scant few months earlier, the last time Carl had seen him. Maybe it's his clothes, Carl thought. Junior was wearing a conservative beige business suit with an executive's turtleneck shirt of sky blue.

  "How've you been?" they asked in unison. Then they laughed.

  "You first," Junior insisted.

  Carl shrugged. "Doing okay, I guess. Got some bright kids in my classes. Tinkering with some new ideas for electro-optical computers that will link directly to the nerve system. Working with a couple of biologists from Harvard on that one."

  Junior nodded. "And the Cyberbooks idea?"

  The pang that sliced through him made Carl wince visibly. "That's dead. No publisher wants to touch it."

  "Too bad," said Junior.

  Carl nodded, thinking more of Lori than his invention.

  The waitress brought Carl's beer and smiled prettily at Junior. He grinned back at her. Then, turning to Carl, he said, "I've gotten out of the publishing business, too. With Mom and Dad off sailing around the world and Ralph doing such a good job of running the company, I went out and looked for new worlds to conquer."

  "Really?" Carl felt no real curiosity, no interest at all.

  "Yup. I'm in the toy business now." Some of the old craftiness seemed to creep back into his expression.

  Carl sipped at his beer because he did not know quite what to reply.

  Junior went ahead anyway. "Y'know, I've been thinking. The toy industry is a lot different from book publishing. The accent is on innovation, new ideas, new gadgets." He laughed. "You've got to run damned fast to stay ahead of the five-year-olds!"

  Carl thought of the nephews and nieces he saw at Christmastime. "Yes," he agreed. "They can be pretty sharp."

  Junior licked his lips and leaned closer to Carl. Lowering his voice, he said, "I was wondering if you could make a Cyberbooks kind of thing for kids. You know, something to help them learn to read. And then they could keep it and go on to real books as they get older."

  The only sound that Carl could get past his utter surprise was, "Huh?"

  Junior explained the idea to him again. And then once more.

  "But it's the same device, the exact same thing," Carl blurted, once he was certain he understood what Junior was saying. "The only thing that changes is the content of the books we put on the chips. We'd be doing children's books instead of adult books."

  Junior's smile widened. "Right, except that there's one other thing that changes."

  "What's that?"

  "The distribution system. We distribute Cyberbooks through toy stores, not bookstores. We won't have any trouble with guys like Woody Baloney."

  "Won't the toy salesmen . . ."

  "They already spend most of their time pushing electronic gadgets for the kids. Cyberbooks will be just another toy, as far as they're concerned."

  Sinking back in his soft chair under the realization of what Junior was suggesting, Carl said, "You could create a whole new kind of book publishing industry this way."

  "That's right," Junior agreed, looking as if he had just swallowed the most delicious canary in the history of the world. "We start in the toy industry, but we end up taking over the entire publishing industry. It'll be Cyberbooks, just the way you wanted it!"

  "Through the back door."

  "Right."

  Carl thought it over. "It could hurt a lot of people. People we know, like Ralph and the others."

  "They can come to work for us, when the time comes."

  "I don't know. . . ."

  Leaning even closer, Junior said, "We'll have to start out on a shoestring. You and I will be equal partners, we'll share everything right down the middle, fifty-fifty. And, of course, you'll have to spend a lot of time in New York. Probably have to come down to the city every week or so."

  "Every week?"

  A small shrug. "Every week, ten days. Give you a chance to see old friends, huh?"

  Lori's phone number flashed through Carl's mind. He thought he had forgotten it, but every digit shone in his thoughts. He stuck his hand out and Junior grabbed it and pumped it hard.

  "You've got a deal," Carl said.

  EPILOGUE

  Fifty Years Later

  News Release

  WASHINGTON, D.C. The Library of Congress put on display today the last book to be printed on paper in the United States. Carefully protected in a shatterproof glass airtight casing, the book—the fortieth edition of the classic novel, Mobile, USA—will remain on public display until the end of the year.

  Carl Lewis, Jr., son of the inventor of Cyberbooks, said at the opening ceremony, "My father would have been proud, I'm sure, to see his in
vention of the electro-optical publishing system totally replace paper books. He was a dedicated ecologist, and he loved both literature and trees."

  Mrs. Lori Tashkajian Lewis, the inventor's widow and managing director of Cyberbooks Inc., added, "Back in the old days, when my late husband first invented Cyberbooks, there were fears that electronic publishing would destroy the book industry. History has shown that those fears were groundless."

  With tears in her eyes, Mrs. Lewis continued, "I'm proud to have played a small role in bringing inexpensive literature to the huge masses of poor people all around the world."

  Cyberbooks' latest publication, she revealed, is Blood of the Virgin, by Sheldon Stoker Beta, one of the clones of the late best-selling author.