Iris smiled wanly. “John is reserving for himself the pleasure of doing
what he must do without Paul’s assistance.”
“Or knowledge?”
Iris shrugged. “Paul will find out about it this evening, I suppose.
There will be an announcement. John’s secretary is getting it ready now
... one for the public and another for the Establishment.”
“When will it happen?”
“Tomorrow. I go with him, Gene.”
“You? You’re not going to die too?”
“I don’t see that it makes much difference what I do when John dies.”
“You can’t leave us now. You can’t leave Paul in charge of everything.
He’s a dangerous man. Why, if....”
“You’ll be able to handle him.” It was perfectly apparent to me that
she was no longer interested in me or in the others; not even in the
fate of the work we had begun.
“It’s finished, if you go too,” I said bleakly. “Together we could
control Paul; alone, I’d not last ten days. Iris, let me talk to him.”
“I can’t. I won’t.”
I contemplated pushing by her and searching the penthouse but there
were guards everywhere and I had no wish to be shot myself on such an
errand.
She guessed my thought and said, quickly “There’s no possible way for
you or anyone to get through to him. Sometime tonight or tomorrow he
will leave and that’s the end.”
“He won’t do it here?” This surprised me.
She shook her head. “He wants to go off alone, away from everyone. I’m
to be with him until the end; then I’ll send the body back here for
burial ... but he’ll leave full instructions.”
“You mean I’m never to see either of you again? Just like that, you
both go?”
“Just like this.” For the first time she displayed some warmth. “I’ve
cared for you, Gene,” she said gently. “I even think that of us all you
were the one most nearly right in your approach to John. I think you
understood him better than he did himself. Try to hold on after we go.
Try to keep it away from Paul.”
“As if I could!” I turned from her bitterly, filled with unexpected
grief: I did not want to lose her presence even though I had lost her
or, rather, never possessed more of her than that one bright instant
years before on the California coast when we had both realized with the
unexpected clarity of the lovers we were not that our lives had come to
the same point at the same moment and the knowledge of this confluence
was the one splendor I had known, the single hope, the unique passion
of my life.
“Don’t miss me, Gene. I couldn’t bear that.” She put her hand on my
arm. I walked away, not able to bear her touch. Then they came.
Paul and Stokharin were in the study. Iris gasped and stepped back when
she saw them. I spun about just as Paul shouted: “It won’t work, Iris!
Give it up.”
“Get out of here, Paul.” Her voice was strong. “You have no right here.”
“I have as much right as you. Now tell me whose idea was it? yours? or
was it John’s? or Gene’s? since he seems to enjoy playing both sides.”
“Get out. All of you.” She moved to the old-fashioned bell cord which
hung beside Cave’s massive desk.
“Don’t bother,” said Paul. “No one will come.”
Iris, her eyes wide now with fear, tugged the cord twice: the second
time it broke off in her hand. There was no response.
Paul looked grim. “I’m sorry to have to do it this way but you’ve left
me no choice. You can’t leave, either of you.”
“You read....”
“I saw the release. It won’t work.”
“Why not? It’s what you’ve wanted all along. Everything will be yours.
There’ll be nobody to stop you. John will be dead and I’ll be gone for
good. You’ll never see me again ... why must you interfere?” She spoke
quickly, plausibly but the false proportion was evident now, even to
me: the plan was tumbling down at Paul’s assault.
“Iris, I’m not a complete fool. I know perfectly well that Cave has no
intention of killing himself and that....”
“Why do you think I’m going with him? to send you the body back for the
ceremony which you’ll perform right here, publicly....”
“Iris.” He looked at her for a long moment. Then: “If you two leave as
planned tonight (I’ve canceled the helicopter by the way) there will be
no body, no embalming, no ceremony, no point ... only a mystery which
might very well undo all our work. I can’t allow that. Cave must die
here, before morning. We might have put it off but your announcement
has already leaked out. There’ll be a million people out there in the
street tomorrow. We’ll have to show them Cave’s body.”
Iris swayed; I moved quickly to her side and held her arm. “It’s three
to two, Paul,” I said. “I assume we’re still directors. Three of us
have agreed that Cave and Iris leave. That’s final.” But my bluff was
humiliatingly weak; it was ignored.
“The penthouse,” said Paul softly, “is empty ... just the five of us
here. The Doctor and I are armed. Take us in to him.”
“No.” Iris moved instinctively, fatally, to the door which led to Cave,
as if to guard it with her body.
There was a brief scuffle which ended with Iris and myself,
considerably disheveled, facing two guns. With an apology, Stokharin
pushed us through the door.
In a small sunroom we found Cave sitting before a television screen,
watching the installation of a new Resident in Boston. He looked up
with surprise at our entrance. “I thought I said....” he began but Iris
interrupted him.
“They want to kill you, John.”
He got to his feet quickly, his face pale and his eyes glaring. Even
Paul was shaken by that glance. “You read my last statement?” Cave
spoke sharply, without apparent fear.
“That’s why we’ve come,” said Paul; he and Stokharin moved, as though
by previous accord, to opposite ends of the little room, leaving the
three of us together, vulnerable at its center. “You must do it here.”
Paul signaled Stokharin who, after some fumbling, produced a small
metal box which he tossed to Cave.
“Some of the new pills,” he said nervously. “Very nice. We use
peppermint in the outer layer and....”
“Take it, John.”
“I’ll get some water,” said Stokharin; but Paul waved to him to keep
his place.
Cave smiled whitely. “I will not take it. Now both of you get out of
here before I call the guards.”
“No more guards,” said Paul. “We’ve seen to that. Now, please, don’t
make it any more difficult than it is. Take the pill.”
“If you read my statement you know that....”
“You intend to take a pleasant trip around the world incognito with
Iris. Yes, I know. As your friend, I wish you could do it. But, for one
thing, sooner or later you’d be recognized and, for another, we must
have proof ... we must have a body.”
“Iris will bring the body back,” said Cave. He was still quite calm.
“I choose to do it this way and there’s nothing more to be said.
You’ll have the Establishment all to yourself and I will be a most
satisfactory figure upon which to build a world religion.” It was the
only time in my experience with Cave that I ever heard him strike the
ironic note.
“Leave us alone, Paul. You have what you want. Now let us go.” Iris
begged but Paul had no eyes for anyone but Cave.
“Take it, John,” he repeated softly. “Take Cavesway.”
“Not for you.” Cave hurled the metal box at Paul’s head and Stokharin
fired. There was one almost bland moment when we all stood, politely,
in a circle and watched Cave, a look of wonder on his face, touch his
shoulder where the blood had begun to flow through a hole in the jacket.
Then Iris turned fiercely on Paul, knocking him off balance, while
Cave ran to the door. Stokharin, his hand shaking and his face silver
with fear, fired three times, each time hitting Cave who quivered but
did not fall; instead, he got through the door and into the study. As
Stokharin hurried after him, I threw myself upon him, expecting death
at any moment; but it did not come for Stokharin had collapsed. He
dropped his gun and hid his face in his hands, rocking back and forth
on the floor, sobbing. Paul, free of Iris’s fierce grip, got to Cave
before I did. By then it was finished.
Cave lay in the corridor only a few feet from the elevator. He’d fallen
on his face and lay now in his own blood, his hands working at the
floor as though trying to dig himself a grave in the hard stone. I
turned him on his back and he opened his eyes. “Iris?” he asked. His
voice was ordinary though his breathing was harsh, uneven.
“Here I am.” She knelt down beside him, ignoring Paul who stood
looking down at them, his pistol held at an absurd angle in his
inexperienced hand.
Cave whispered something to Iris; then a flow of blood, like the full
moon’s tide, poured from his mouth and he was dead.
“Cavesway,” said Paul at last when the silence had been used up: the
phrase he had prepared for this moment, inadequate to the reality at
our feet.
“_Your_ way,” said Iris as she got to her feet. She looked at Paul
calmly, as though they’d met only at that moment. “_Your_ way,” she
repeated.
In the other room Stokharin moaned.