Chapter Eleven
Garnet moved into, what was by his standards, a relatively small condo close to the marina in Titusville, Florida, where he was able to live in virtual obscurity, spending his days peacefully watching the rich and varied bird life on the Indian River, and gazing across at the strange and assorted structures that comprised the eerily silent Kennedy Space Center.
Despite his lifelong obsession with the attainment of the high airs, the conquest of space had never been an achievement that had particularly excited Garnet. He had read about Yuri Gagarin’s first manned space flight with disinterest, similarly, had heard Neil Armstrong’s immortal words uttered from the surface of the moon without them stirring any feelings of either pride or patriotism. The concept of Space tourism was still something from the pages of a science fiction novel, and the idea that money could buy you a passage to the stars - as Dennis Tito was to later prove in April 2001 - was inconceivable: astronauts were only chosen from the fittest of the fit, and by no stretch of the imagination did Garnet consider himself among their ranks. For him, though, the fascination, and necessity for proximity to the Space Center, was not the desire to watch the shuttle launches which brought crowds of thousands flocking to the wetland marshes, unconsciously following the like of the Great Egret and the White Ibis but, instead, was his love affair - growing stronger by the day - with the Vehicle Assembly Building. There was something else, too: a recognition that he was no longer a young man; a desire to discover what it was that old folk did with their time when they were past the legitimate age for sabre rattling.
It was only nine months since the Challenger disaster in January 1986 and NASA and the shuttle program were in crisis: new launches had been halted and the whole direction of the project was under debate. The Vehicle Assembly Building, which had proudly witnessed the blossoming stages of production of all of America’s major ventures beyond the earth’s stratosphere from Saturn, through Apollo, to the recent shuttle missions, lay a dormant, empty shell. One of the largest buildings in the world - the equivalent of fifty-two storeys high and with an internal capacity to house five Statues of Liberty with room to spare - was a washed-up has-been: redundant and ridiculed. Garnet knew exactly how it felt.
••••••••••
In the spring of the following year, Garnet invited Leyton Drisdale to join him on a fishing trip: he proposed a boat on the St. John’s River, where the Large Mouth Bass were known to bite. Drisdale cancelled long-standing plans to travel to Paris, where he had been intending finally to visit the Louvre and, instead, caught the next available plane down to Orlando.
It was the first time Garnet had actually seen his lawyer since the busy brief had visited him in Zurich. Of the two men, though, it was Drisdale who was most shocked to see the change the intervening years had wrought upon his client. The troublesome, fine, fair hair which had only ever played coquettishly about the older man’s temples, had now receded to such a point that the description ‘bald’ could no longer be denied, a fact that Garnet appeared to try to hide by the habitual donning of a cheap, Knicks basketball cap, a fashion statement in itself, that Drisdale would have been amazed to witness in the man he knew of old. Gone was every sign of the old aesthete, replaced instead by a grotesque caricature of a middle American tourist: even the gold and diamond-encrusted Rolex watch which still sat proudly on his thin wrist, now looked a parody of itself; vulgar and showily ostentatious. The man was lesser, too, both in his physical presence and in his ability to dominate a room: Drisdale saw a man shrunken into his wheelchair, overcome by his disability, not raging despite it. For the first time in their relationship, Drisdale was aware of feeling sorry for the confinee. Some things did not change, though. The boat, which Garnet informed Drisdale he had hired for the duration of their trip, along with skipper, cook and professional piscator, would have served duty for a transatlantic crossing. Drisdale deposited his minimal luggage in his personal cabin, wiped his hands together and brushed away a small fleck of black dirt from the leg of his trousers, and joined Garnet for a glass of champagne on deck.
“I was sorry to hear about Russia,” Drisdale said.
Realising that the lawyer’s concern was purely for his own exploits, rather than any benevolent interest in the welfare of the Soviet state as a whole, Garnet replied, philosophically, “Perhaps it was all to the good. It was a time bomb waiting to happen. It could have been worse. I could have completed my tower, only for it then to be placed in the exclusion zone. How big a jerk would I have looked then? The world’s tallest building, and no one able to get within thirty miles of it.”
“You seem to have taken it all remarkably well.” Garnet shrugged without answering, and Drisdale continued, more uneasily, “I’m sorry that my fears about Zurich were realised too.”
“Is that lawyer speak for ‘I told you so’?”
“No, really...”
Garnet interrupted him, “You know what they say about love. There is no fool like an old fool.”
“You’re not so old,” Drisdale said. He looked down at the shrunken form seated before him, lying, “The Florida air must agree with you. You look great.”
Garnet sipped from his glass, the myriad bubbles from the sparkling wine momentarily shooting up his nose and making him splutter. Drisdale lent forward to pat him on the back.
“Get off me,” Garnet complained, “I’m fine, for God’s sake. And I don’t pay you to compliment me and tell me lies. I pay you because you are the only person I can trust who will tell me the truth. Forget that and you cease to be of any use to me. You understand?”
“Perfectly.”
“And the truth is that I look shit. You know it and I know it.”
“I must admit, I was surprised to hear that you had decided to return to the States,” Drisdale answered, skirting around the issue of Garnet’s appearance. “And why here of all places? Why not return to New York?”
Garnet, ignoring Drisdale’s question, placed his hands on top of the rubber tyres of his wheelchair, one on each side, and propelled himself forward several yards across the wooden deck of the luxury cruiser, to a position from which he could hail the skipper of the boat, the head of whom it was just possible to see, bobbing back and forth, busily, behind the smoked glass window of the control cabin. “Will you cast this vessel off. Or whatever it is that you do with these things,” shouted Garnet. “And get the fishing expert guy up on deck. It’s about time he started earning his money.” Once he was satisfied that his instructions were being carried out, he wheeled himself back to Drisdale’s side, saying, “I’ll tell you all about it when we’re safely out on the water.”
••••••••••
The Large Mouth Bass is an unappealing-looking, unimaginatively-named creature, usually most at home in the warm, sluggish-moving waters of a wide, meandering, estuarine river, commonly hiding itself away from the sunlight beneath rotting logs or surface weed, close to the river’s edge. Not the most conducive-sounding of habitats, although for three unlucky individuals, who were currently floundering, breathlessly, upon the deck of the River Rider III, it would have been a paradise. The largest of the three fish was held up for public scrutiny.
“Almost seven pounds, I’d guess. Not a bad catch,” observed the pro. fisherman, appraisingly. “Put up quite a fight too, which is always good to see. Anyone else had any luck?”
Garnet yawned unabashedly. Beside him a thick fishing rod stood supported in a specially constructed depression in the boat’s side, its line trailing lethargically in the vessel’s wake. Next to him stood Leyton Drisdale, one legged nonchalantly crossed over the other in an attitude of relaxed ease, his champagne flute still held in his hand, his own rod discarded on the boards of the wooden deck. “Not yet,” he replied, waving politely to the enthusiastic angler.
Garnet continued the conversation he had been holding in hushed to
nes with Drisdale before they had been interrupted. “I’m fifty-five, you know that Drisdale, right? Almost fifty-six. I’ve been down here a good few months now. It’s given me time to think a little. To review what I’ve done with my life. To see where I’m going.” Garnet paused.
“And?”
“It’s not a very pleasant conclusion.”
“Oh?”
“Do you know that quote from Richard II?”
“Shakespeare? Possibly not, but carry on.”
“I have wasted time, and now doth Time waste me.”
“I think you’re being a bit harsh on yourself,” said Drisdale.
“What have I ever done?” Drisdale tried to interrupt, but Garnet carried on, “No, I mean really achieved. It was my great-grandfather who founded the business. That was his achievement. It was my grandfather who made the first million. That was his achievement. And my father. He made the Wendelson refineries a household name. He was a colossus. His life was nothing but achievement. And me? All I have done is live off the profits.”
“So what’s wrong with that?”
“Piggybacked on the successes of those who have gone before me,” said Garnet, ignoring the question. “I stand on the shoulders of giants. Do you know who said that?”
“Another quote?”
“Quotation, yes. Isaac Newton. A great man, in his own right. Me, I stand on the shoulders of giants and yet it still doesn’t help me to see any further. If I had a son, what would he think of me? I often wonder that.”
“But you haven’t got...”
“No,” said Garnet, with emphasis, “I haven’t even managed to produce an heir. Yet another monument to my failure.” He changed the subject suddenly, “Do you ever think of retiring?”
“Me?” said Drisdale, surprised, “No. I love my work. Besides, I’m only...”
“I know. You see this place.” Garnet spread his arms wide to include not only the visible, sleepy river basin, but the town and the Sunshine State as a whole. “It seemed like a nice place to retire. I mean plenty do, don’t they. Little house by the beach. Good climate. Spot of fishing.” He prodded his rod violently so that the shaft dislodged itself from its groove and tumbled to the deck. “You know, it’s not retirement,” he concluded, “It’s just waiting to die.”
“You could describe the whole of life in those terms,” said Drisdale, pessimistically.
“I suppose so,” said Garnet, falling silent.
Drisdale had been growing progressively more confused as Garnet’s dialogue had continued. Now he saw an opportunity to voice a question that had been on his mind ever since the cabin cruiser had first departed, “I don’t quite understand why you have invited me on this trip. Is there something that you need sorting out? I mean, I’m perfectly happy to listen to your current philosophy on retirement, but I charge by the hour, you know. This is all costing you money. Was there a specific reason why you asked me down here?”
Garnet looked up at the other man, amused. “No, no reason. I guess, I did it just because I can.”
Drisdale looked bewildered, “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“Of course there is a reason. Don’t flatter yourself that you are my first choice companion with whom I would want to spend a week on the river. Like I say, I’ve had time to think down here. Too much time perhaps. It makes you indulge in morbid thoughts. Gives you ideas about your own mortality.”
Drisdale was beginning to understand the direction of Garnet’s talk. Growing impatience he interrupted, “Am I correct in thinking that you want me to draw up...”
“My will? Yes, you are.”
••••••••••
It took the full seven days of the cruiser’s voyage before the legal document was produced to Garnet’s satisfaction - and Drisdale’s consternation - and had been witnessed by the professional angler and the boat’s skipper. Even then, Drisdale was uncertain as to the legitimacy of the agreement that he held.
“You know, none of this is relevant, in any case, unless...”
“Unless I construct the world’s tallest building,” Garnet interrupted. “I know. That’s rather the point, isn’t it?”
“And there is nothing that I can do, or say, that will make you change... well, you know which paragraphs I mean?”
“None.”
“I really don’t know that they will hold up to legal scrutiny, you know. What you are suggesting is highly...”
“Immoral?”
“I was going to say irregular, but yes, that as well.”
“I don’t know why you are complaining,” Garnet said, “You do very nicely out of it. Or don’t you think so?”
“Yes. Yes. you are more than generous. It’s just...”
“Just nothing. Let’s have no more talk about it. Here.” Garnet wheeled himself across to where a bottle of champagne was kept perpetually on ice in a white, plastic cool box which had been brought on board originally with the intention of preserving the results of their fishing endeavours. “Drink a toast with me and enjoy the rest of the day. The sun is shining. The bass are supposedly jumping. It’s a beautiful day. Cheer up Drisdale.” He held his glass aloft, remembering the last occasion he had done similarly, in Yershov’s flat in Kiev. He had been about to repeat the sentiments of that earlier evening, but instead, his light mood changing as he speculated upon the fate of the jovial Russian, said quietly, “To absent friends.”
Drisdale looked at his employer suspiciously, the increasing concerns he had been having, during the past few days, as to the disabled man’s mental well-being, renewed. “I think you’ve been working harder than you realise,” he finally said. “All this thinking about your will, perhaps it has been more... how can I put it... strenuous than you imagine. Have you ever thought about taking a real holiday? Get away from everything. Perhaps it might give you a new perspective.”
Rather than the outburst that Drisdale had anticipated to his comments, Garnet, instead, sat thoughtfully, before finally replying, “Do you know what? You may just be right.”