“Of course she told you about the pigs,” he smiled.
And the trump card was summarily plucked from my fingers.
“What pigs?” I played dumb, but he saw through it.
“Yes, I see she did. She never understood it. She and that milquetoast Orange County crew never had to taste a struggle.” I recalled the dusty balcony at the convalescent home and thought she may finally be tasting that struggle after all, though this one was against the onslaught of old age where there was no happy ending no matter how long you held out.
“I built this off people’s trash,” he said, admiring the sweeping views of the canyon and beyond. He was leaving out the three failed business ventures funded by his former father-in-law. Success stories were often written long after the fact. With time, the brain got the distance it needed to self-select the events that led to those grand accomplishments. Distance also allowed one to conveniently forget the numerous failures that somehow didn’t quite fit into the narrative.
“Who is the beneficiary of your estate?” I asked brazenly. I wasn’t in the mood for an acceptance speech and the details of his estate might play a role in his granddaughter’s disappearance.
“That’s not any of your concern,” he shot back.
“It’s okay, I know enough to get the big picture. I know The Barnacle is out and that there will be a foundation for the art. And by the way your daughter spoke, it sounds like she’s none too pleased about future finances. Is it all going to your granddaughter?”
Valenti stared at me with a mixture of contempt and admiration; he was impressed that I knew the details about his affairs but he was angry that I knew so much.
“For a beaten man you have quite a chip on your shoulder.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“And I’m not going to,” he replied.
“Fair enough,” I said. “But it might play a role in your granddaughter’s disappearance.”
He studied the bottle and even spoke directly to it.
“Why do you say that?” he asked softly.
“Doesn’t money always play a role?”
He chewed on that. We were finally singing off the same hymnal.
“Jeanette and the museum, of course, are the sole beneficiaries.”
“I imagine that at some point your daughter and perhaps others were to receive a share?”
“You are correct in that assumption.”
“When did that change?” I asked.
“Recently.”
“How recent?”
“Last month,” he answered.
That seemed to coincide with the time that Jeanette disappeared.
“Who knew that you changed your will?”
“My former son-in-law,” he smiled.
“But he’s known he’s been out for a while now.”
“Correct.”
“What about your daughter?”
A long pause.
“Yes.”
“And Jeanette?”
He shook his head. It was information that he didn’t have to share but felt compelled to.
“May I ask if there was a reason that precipitated the change in beneficiaries?”
“Because I’m trying to break the cycle,” he answered mysteriously.
“Which cycle is that?” I probed.
“The cycle of wealth.”
“You’re going to have to help me out, Mr. Valenti. I am not familiar with that one, for obvious reasons.”
“Everything is cyclical,” he began, “including wealth. The American fortune undergoes a lifespan very similar to that of the four seasons.” The passion in which he elaborated on his theory told me he had spent a good deal of time thinking about it. Spring was apparently the season of accumulation. There, the entrepreneur rose up out of anonymity and amassed a fortune from nothing. He was the risk-taker of a unique sort for he truly had nothing to lose — monetarily, that is. He risked more fundamental things — ethics, pride, values — in a bid to grow the money at all costs. For a brief moment, I began to sympathize with the old man for no other reason than the fact that he was being honest with all its uncompromising details. “I broke many men,” he said with neither pleasure nor regret. There was no pretense in the way he described his rise. That’s just what one did.
“Summer is why you do this nasty work,” he went on. “Your children have been elevated to a social status that you were never able to get. Sure, towards the end I can buy my way into the neighborhoods and country clubs but to the people there, I’m always the outsider. My children, however, were born into that class,” he said with pride. Summer was the full embracement of wealth and all it afforded you. The second generation was catapulted into a world of professionalism and prominence. They became the doctors and lawyers and politicians of our times, influencing society through both work and charity, and still enjoying all the comforts that massive wealth afforded them. “It should go on forever,” he dreamed.
“Why doesn’t it?”
“Because the third generation, my children’s children, get flabby with the wealth,” Valenti scoffed. “They take it for granted. They are too far removed from the actual creation of wealth to see what it took to amass it. And they have that aloofness that comes with entitlement. Environmentalists and social workers and teachers,” he rattled off with the disdain reserved for terminal diseases. “They feel the need to pay for the past sins that got them to this spot. But they don’t realize that I committed all those sins so they wouldn’t have to!”
I could guess wealth’s final stage, winter. The fortune has not been tended to for some time. The erosion of capital worsens exponentially and is now hurtling down a certain course where the only end is some dark and cold day in late February when it’s all over. The money is gone and the only thing that remains is the once-glorious name attached to it.
“And they never see it coming,” Valenti explained. This self-absorbed generation put half-hearted attempts into careers at screenwriting and poetry. “They’re too dumb to see the drama unfolding before their very eyes,” said Valenti. “And that’s why I changed my will. Because my daughter is doing her damnedest to speed the whole process up. She’s already leapfrogged one season and the way she is going, she’ll leapfrog two. She always was old for her age,” he reflected after a moment’s pause, “though she’s fighting it every step of the way. Do you know she has two trainers? One for each arm.”
He wanted a laugh out of me but got none. Then he seemed to realize the excessive cruelty in his words and took a moment to gather himself. He stared at the sun inching down towards the ocean’s horizon. “Jeanette is my last hope.”
MORNING LECTURE
I made an appearance at work the following day and popped into a few meetings in the morning just to be seen. On conference calls I was sure to be vocal in order to let everyone know I was there. And even though being vocal meant parroting what five other people had already said, it was necessary that I do it in order to keep my visibility at a level appropriate for someone about to interview for the role as head of the department.
Echoing other people’s thoughts was a tried and true strategy in the corporate world. To challenge someone publicly, even if you thought you were right, was always a mistake in this passive-aggressive environment. But to agree with someone even if you fundamentally disagreed with them, made one many allies.
“I need to jump early,” I said to the five people in the room and to several more on the phone, “but before I do, I just want to echo what Bill and Walt have said about keeping the focus on the big picture. I have nothing really to add,” not that anyone would care if I actually did have something to add, “but I do want to say that I am in full agreement with everything that’s been said.”