No, Howard Christian's mania was for things a lot more recent. He collected twentieth-century ephemera, and automobiles and aircraft of any vintage.
His idea of a wonderful day was to drive his silver-gray 1937 Packard V-12 convertible coupe to a toy collectors' convention and spend ten or twenty thousand dollars on a few rare tin robots from Japan. Or even better, to toodle along Melrose Avenue in his Hispano-Suiza H6B, made for Andre Dubonnet by the Nieuport Astra Aviation Company from copper-riveted tulipwood—the only car of its kind in the world—and turn in under the fabulous white gate of the Warner Brothers Studio, which he owned, gate and all.
He also owned a major television network, several cable channels, a chain of theme parks, and Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus.
He stood now in the eagle's right eye and looked out in satisfaction at the entertainment capital of the world, much of which he owned. As the mighty bird turned, he could pick out all the major sites. Over there was Culver City, where MGM once reigned as the big dog of the silver screen. Now its old backlot was full of condominiums. There was CBS Television City. And there, to the west, was the abomination of Century City, and the corpse of 20th Century Fox Studios, now just a depressing collection of uninspired skyscrapers.
He loved standing there. It made him feel like Batman.
A bell sounded discreetly. "Warburton here, Mr. Christian. I have Professor Wright."
MATTHEW Wright was first out of the elevator. "Oh, wow," he said, and strode straight for the eagle's eye, not seeming to see Howard Christian standing there. He looked out over the city, and down the steep side of the tower.
Christian was somewhat taken aback. No more than a dozen people had ever been in the eagle's head, other than the maintenance crew. He brought people up to impress them, of course, and it was a measure of the reputation Matt Wright had in the small world of cutting-edge physics that Christian had known immediately that no other place would do for their first meeting. But he had expected to control it, as he always did, and in a way he couldn't quite put his finger on, he felt he had lost control already, before he could get two sentences out.
"Oh, boy," Matt said, shaking his head as he stepped back from the window. "I'm doing it again. I'm afraid I don't have a lot of social graces, Mr. Christian. I'm Matt Wright." He held out his hand.
Christian took it, slowly, and allowed his hand to be pumped. Christian saw a man who might be in his late twenties, but whose eyes were considerably older. The dossier Warburton had given him pegged his age at thirty-four. He wore hiking boots and heavy canvas pants, a lumberjack shirt, and, absurdly, a khaki vest with dozens of pockets, festooned with the bright tinsel and feathers of trout lures. Christian himself disdained business clothing almost entirely, preferring cheap jeans and western shirts and outrageously expensive hand-tooled cowboy boots made from all manner of exotic leathers. The last time he could recall wearing formal clothing was three years ago, picking up the Academy Award for Best Picture.
"I understand you've accepted my offer, Professor Wright."
"Your man said something about a hundred thousand dollars."
"Of course. Will you take a check?"
"How long would it take to get it in cash?"
Christian looked at Warburton.
"Five minutes," Warburton said, and reached for a telephone.
"Never mind," Matt said. "I just never held that much money all at once."
"Neither have I, come to think of it," Christian said.
"What, you don't have a money bin someplace where you shove tons of coins around with bulldozers?"
Christian's smile became genuine for the first time. "You know Uncle Scrooge McDuck! I'll have to show you my comics collection sometime."
Warburton was looking at his wristwatch, and he cleared his throat.
"Ah... yes," Christian said. "I'm sorry to have ripped you so abruptly from your fishing trip. But I hope to make it up to you with a late lunch at the Polo Lounge. We have a reservation."
"Okay. But didn't I read that you've said you'd rather eat at Burger King?"
"I grew up eating Burger King," Christian said, with a tight smile. "Never developed a taste for the finer things, I guess."
"Well, I'm not a gourmet, either. You clearly have something you're dying to tell me. Why don't we save time, eat on the way to wherever it is we're going?"
ON the way to lunch, Matt decided he could get used to this way of life.
The helicopter in Oregon had whisked him quickly to PDX, where one of Howard Christian's private jets awaited. It was an all-black vintage Boeing 727 that had once belonged to Hugh Hefner. A bunny head had been painted on the tail. At the tower, he had been swept up into a high place, as Satan had done with Jesus; only, unlike Jesus, Matt had accepted the offer. Not that he intended to fall on his knees and worship at the monetary altar of Howard Christian, but he recognized the billionaire was now his boss, and he knew bosses could turn out to want many things, some of them impossible.
Then down in the private elevator to the fifth subbasement, where there were a dozen fantastic automobiles. Howard Christian didn't believe in letting his toys gather dust—he liked to get them out and play with them. He was probably the richest man in the world who actually drove very much.
Matt paused at a pale yellow convertible with red trim that looked longer, taller, and wider than any car he had ever seen, and yet managed to seat only two people. It had big globe headlamps and four chromed pipes coming out of the hood cowl on each side.
"I see you like this one. It's a '36 Duesenberg Model J, special built with a short wheelbase, standard Deusy V-12 engine."
"This is the short version?"
"It was built for Clark Gable. He drove it to and from the studio while he was working on Gone With the Wind. Or up and down Hollywood Boulevard with Carole Lombard sitting beside him. Get in, we'll take this one."
CHRISTIAN drove them out of the basement and down Wilshire Boulevard, both of them content to enjoy the soft purr of the engine, the smell of the pale yellow leather, the luxurious suspension and road-handling ability, and the stares of other drivers. Sports car enthusiasts might sneer, but only if they were profoundly ignorant of precision engineering.
"It's not for sale."
"No, I mean, could I afford it?"
Christian glanced at him.
"What am I paying you?"
"Two million dollars a year."
"You could make a down payment."
Christian looked over at Matt again, with a smile that was a bit smug but with enough sense of
almost adolescent wonder that Matt could forgive him.
He said, "They say in Los Angeles, you are what you drive."
"So what does that make you?" Matt asked.
"Anybody I want to be."
THERE was no one in the drive-thru at the Jack in the Box. Christian pulled up to the window and nearly shut the place down as most of the patrons and employees craned their necks to get a better view.
Warburton got out of one of the two heavily armored Mercedes SUVs that had been preceding and following the Duesenberg, each carrying two heavily armed men, and hurried to Christian as he was about to pull out with the sack of food sitting next to him. He handed Christian a brown envelope and went back to his car, where he would sweat profusely in the plush air-conditioned interior until his employer was back in the relative safety of a building Warburton controlled.