as the car hurtled across town, Nick was certain of the destination.
The iron gates at Armiger’s lakeside estate swung open. The gray Ford sped toward the munchkin chateau.
“That meter must be off?” Nick said, stepping from the car when it stopped. “I think you’re padding it. Last time I use this taxi company.”
“You’re a regular David-fuckin’-Letterman,” the blond goon said. “Wonder how funny you’d be with your dick in your mouth.” He took a lock-blade knife from his pocket and flicked it open with deadly skill. “The lady’s waiting for you.”
Armiger sat where Nick had last seen her, similarly attired, a different color scheme and pattern to her caftan. But she seemed years older, not a woman you’d see in the pages of Town and Country, mingling elegantly with other society bigwigs. Now she reminded Nick of a very sick patient in the waiting room of a doctor’s office, prepared for the worst possible news.
The framed picture of Zola and the gold pillbox were close at hand.
Her real religion and hope for salvation. The weak spots in her armor.
She was deep in thought and didn’t seem to notice the incongruity of a nearly naked slob walking into the severe elegance of the room. Nick sat down.
When she finally looked up, in the instant before she composed herself, he saw that weariness, worry, and physical anguish distorted her face. She seemed to have crawled out of one of the canvases of abstract horror downstairs.
She began in a scratchy near-whisper: “This has become more serious than I had imagined, Nick. This claim of heirship. I had never heard of these people before you turned them up. These Balzars.”
“Ironic, isn’t it?” Nick said. “Our crimes give birth to their own justice. You tried to put one genie in the bottle, and let another one out.”
Very Miltonic, Nick thought; his friend Dion would love it.
“You don’t realize what you’ve done. Not only have you caused an estrangement between my daughter and me, but you have also nearly destroyed what I have struggled so hard to create. Merely with the discovery of one illegitimate union! It would have been much better if my ancestors had cleaned up their own mistakes, as I have,” she said, a deep bitterness slicing up her words. “Never have I seen such an outflow of funds from Artemis, not even in the great bear market of ’73-74. The company is in serious jeopardy, which, fortunately, the financial press hasn’t discovered yet.”
Why is she telling me this? Am I going to walk out of here alive? In the intervening silence Nick formulated and rejected ten scenarios of escape.
“I liked you,” Armiger said, as if he had spoken his thoughts. “Again, my emotions led me astray. I admire talent, intelligence, stubbornness against daunting odds. Repeatedly, I warned you. But I should have seen: people like you make their own rules, take no advice from those who wish them well. Or ill. We are, after all, Nick, much alike.”
“You must not be looking in the same mirror, lady.”
“My penchant for the underdog has been costly,” she said, pressing on in what seemed to Nick more and more like a prepared speech. “Now I must attempt to repair the damage that I am responsible for, just as much as you are. I have had you brought here today to give you a last warning. I am not a monster. And I understand your moral dilemma perhaps better than you yourself do.
“Turn over the Balazar documents to me, documents which I now know you possess–I have my sources in Natchitoches and Natchez. You’ve been wise not to part with them. There is a letter, I understand, about which I can do nothing–for the moment. You were foolish enough to share that with the opposing camp. But without documentary evidence of my descent from Hyam Balazar, the case will be nearly impossible to prove. When I have what you discovered in Natchitoches, I will no longer be a Balazar, as far as anyone can tell. All of this will then become merely the flawed research of a sadly incompetent genealogist. My unfortunate pedigree will then cease to be a liability.”
“I’ve been thinking,” Nick said, “maybe I’ll go to the police? Tell them about Corban and the woman from Poland. The whole sorry spectacle of what your family did to the Balzars pales in comparison with murder. That’ll cost more than any lawsuit. A lot more.”
“You’re smarter than that, Nick.” She gave him a condescending smile. “Who