Slater, part time, advisory, etc. The idea for the jungle maze, and the crude drawings presented to the board for same, originated in conversation between Elliott Slater and Scott. Present Location of Slater? Unknown. 'Unknown?'
Chapter Thirty-Three
33 -- Lisa
In Sickness and in Health
'He split an hour before you arrived.' 'You told him I was on my way in?' 'Yeah, we did.' Scott glanced at Richard. I wanted to hit both of them. 'Goddamn you. And you didn't tell me this, you let me believe he was still here!' 'Look, Lisa, what were you going to do, chase him to Port au Prince? You went right into the boardroom. I didn't even have a chance to tell you. He was so damned anxious to get off the island he wouldn't even wait for the Cessna. He had to have the copter take him to Haiti and from there he went to Miami and then on to the West Coast.' 'But why did he go? Did he leave any message for me?' Disgusting exchange of glances between the two of them. 'Lisa, we didn't do anything bad here,' Scott said. 'I swear to God. I went into his room this morning and told him you'd left New Orleans. He'd been drinking all night. He was in a real mean mood. He was watching that Road Warrior movie. He's nuts about that movie. And he just turned off the screen and started pacing the floor. And then he said, "I have to get out of here. I want to get out of here." I tried to talk him out of it, to get him to stick around for an hour, for Chrissakes. But it wasn't any good. He called the Time-Life office back there. They gave him some assignment in Hong Kong. He said he'd be there day after tomorrow, had to go home for his equipment. He called some guy to bring his car to the San Francisco Airport and open up his house.' I hit the intercom. 'Send Diana to my room immediately. And change the flight plan to San Francisco. And get me the file on Elliott Slater. I want the address of his Berkeley house.' 'It's here,' Scott said. 'He left it with me. Just in case anyone should want to reach him, he said.' 'Well, why the fucking shit didn't you say so?' I grabbed the paper out of his hand. 'Lisa, I'm sorry ...' 'The hell you are,' I said, heading for the door. 'And to hell with you, and to hell with The Club.' 'Lisa ...' 'What?' 'Good luck.'
The limousine was on the Bayshore Freeway fifteen minutes after we landed, burrowing north through a light evening fog into San Francisco and towards the Bay Bridge. I don't think the craziness of it hit me, however, until I saw the ugly urban squalour of University Avenue: that I was back in my own hometown. This little chase, that had begun in another galaxy, was leading me right back into the Berkeley hills where I'd grown up. Nice going, Elliott. Only for you. The limo swayed awkwardly as we started up the steep, winding streets. It was worse than familiar. The very sight of the overgrown gardens, the houses nestled among the tangled oaks and Monterey cypresses, curdled my soul. No, not just home, this place: rather the landscape of an identity, a period of life that was almost indistinguishable from constant pain. I had the terror suddenly that someone would see me in spite of the darkened window glass, and know who I really was. I hadn't come this time for a wedding or a funeral, or a week of vacation. I was Sir Richard Burton slipping into the Forbidden City of Mecca. And if I got caught I'd be killed. I looked at my watch. Elliott was two hours ahead of me. Maybe even not there. And in an instant of sheer perversity, I told the driver to turn and take me down my own street. I didn't know why I was doing it.
But I had to just stop for a moment at my own house. We cruised slowly downhill until I saw the lights on in my dad's library. I told the driver to stop. Quiet here under the black acacia. No sound but the lawn sprinkler spinning its shower of light across the dark, glossy grass. Blue-white flicker of a television in my little brother's upstairs bedroom. A shadow moved against the library shades. The