“Any questions?” Percival asked.
“You made it all very clear,” Mary answered him. “We’ll do the best we can.”
There was general agreement, unspoken but indicated just the same.
Barbara was the cell leader, and she summed it up for them all. “God bless this whorehouse,” she said.
Marc Orberg was impatient and restless. His trip had begun badly when he had discovered that first-class seats had been discontinued by the airplanes and he had been compelled to ride in a seat much too narrow to suit his sense of luxury. Furthermore, the people who had taken places next to him had talked in whispers and then gone to the back of the aircraft to sit by themselves. No one had asked him for his autograph on the whole trip.
To hell with them! They would hear about him again soon enough; in the new role he was about to assume they would be coming to him in droves, begging and pleading for favors. And if there were any good-looking chicks among them, they knew what they could do if they wanted him to help them.
At the beach he was disappointed in the press turnout for the landing. The fact that he would appear in person had not been adequately announced, although Nat had sent out all of the usual notices. However the hour was still early, he had seen to that so that no misguided publicity seekers would be there ahead of him to get in his way. To be sure that he would be recognized by everyone on sight, those who were landing and those who had come to witness the spectacle, he had put on his trademark clothing: the laced shirt, the tight trousers, the high-topped shoes. There was only one Marc Orberg — there could be only one because no one else had his combination of looks, talent, and solid cast-iron guts. He was afraid of nothing and nobody; he had proven that when he had busted the whole damn United States Government with the Orberg decision against the draft.
He walked a few steps up and down. There was no son-of-a-bitch in the whole Goddamned world who could stand up to him. He had never been to Sweden, but he knew that they adored him there because his parents had been Swedish and because no one had ever punished the establishment the way that he had. They liked that kind of thing in Sweden. He tossed his head back and looked up into the sky. He let his imagination take over for a short while and visualized himself, still youthful and full of the vigor that made him great, standing before the Royal Academy and receiving the Nobel Prize — the youngest man ever to be so honored.
He broke the chain of that daydream and came back to the present; the limited number of people who had come to see the show were looking seaward and pointing. He looked himself and saw in the clearing visibility that the ships were there, closer than he had expected them to be. The operation would be under way on the beach well within the hour; from the looks of the flotilla the place where he had stationed himself was close to ideal. He sat down to rest himself for a few minutes and to think about the speech of greeting he was going to make. From his vantage point he surveyed the beach and saw that there were now press photographers on hand; actually one good one connected with the wire services was all that he needed, two or three made it sure. He spotted at least half a dozen, so that part of the operation was well in hand.
He lay down on the sand, chewing on a straw that he had plucked, and looked into the sky. Once more he felt the total satisfaction of knowing that he would not be willing to trade places with any man in the world — he had everything that money could buy and he was going to have a great deal more. There were light cumulus clouds floating overhead, he amused himself by studying them and picking out the fanciful shapes that suggested themselves to him.
He was aware that there were more spectators gathering — some of them, most of them in fact, would have come to see him. If he showed himself he would be mobbed and would have to scrawl signatures on a wild assortment of pieces of paper, including matchbook covers. He was happy where he was, the peace of the seashore was affecting him and he was enjoying it as an interlude, a moment of calm in his striking and extraordinary life.
He lifted his head enough to see what was happening on the water. The ships were close in now and the first of them were putting landing craft into the water. It was too early for him to appear. The first boat, that would be larger than the others, would be the one he wanted; it would contain a commander of sorts; he would tip off the press and then make his speech of welcome officially to him. That would infuriate about a hundred million Americans at the least and every one of them would be reminded again that Marc Orberg was king and there wasn’t a damn thing they could do about it.
It was some forty minutes later when he spotted the landing craft he was looking for. It was, as he had anticipated, larger than the others and there would be vehicles on board which a commander would use. It would be landing a little way up the beach, which was fine; the more people who saw him running to meet it the better. That was what he wanted them to do; once again he had outsmarted the whole pack and they would find it out, as they always did, just a little too late. The announcement had been made, of course, but one of the secrets of his success was that he always produced more than anyone expected. He wouldn’t disappoint them this time.
It was essential that he time the thing exactly right. He rose from his semi-hiding place; then began to run down the beach at an easy lope which showed off the play of his muscles under his tight clothing and gave everyone a good chance to recognize him. The distance was a bit more than he had realized, or else the exertion of runnir^g in the sand pulled on him more than he had expected, so that when he reached the scene where the vehicles were rolling ashore he was slightly out of breath. He stood there, letting his chest rise and fall, watching the stolid-faced men who were coming up onto the beach, rifles in their hands, puppets engaged in mock warfare against an enemy which did not exist — on the beach or anywhere else in the world anymore. They were the conquerors, nameless numbers on a military roster who knew only how to do what they had been told.
One of them, a minor noncommissioned officer of some sort, waved him aside. Marc laughed at him; the man did not know who he was, of course, and that excused him.
He spotted the commander without difficulty. He could not read the ranks on the uniforms, but the way in which the man conducted himself revealed him at once as the person in charge. The precision with which the door of his vehicle was snapped open and held for him indicated his importance. It was an absurd little panel hardly a foot high which made it slightly easier to mount into the otherwise open military-type car, but it was enough to symbolize his authority. As the commander came up the beach with properly impressive strides, Marc fell in beside him and with his breath still a little short asked, “Do you understand English?”
The commander glanced at him for just a moment and then answered his question by saying, “Go away.”
That was all that Marc needed. “I’m here to welcome you,” he half shouted. Out of the corner of his eye he had detected a press photographer aiming at him and he wanted to be sure that he was heard.
“No,” the commander said, and strode on.
“I’m Marc Orberg,” he announced, his breath coming a bit harder as he sought to keep up with the man who had not been running for the last few minutes. “Marc Orberg!”
The commander ignored him.
That was impossible; Nat, the damn fool, should have told them to expect him, he should have arranged to have the commander briefed in advance. With the man he was trying to greet ignoring him he was running the risk of being made ridiculous in front of the press and all of the spectators. He knew immediately that he could not recoup by waiting for the next important-appearing person; his initial failure would be reported gleefully from coast to coast. The muttonhead in the stiff uniform would have to be made to listen.