Ezra placed the photograph on the well-polished surface of his desk, the rough picture of the killed valet a smudge of lack on the flawless mahogany. He summoned Baron von Hauser immediately, the latter entering with the footsteps of a hunter, his face still set with the grievance of their last conference. He was prepared for the continuation of their wrangling over the Soviet atom, wrangling about failure of strategy.
Nevertheless, Ezra simply nodded at the photograph without speaking.
The Baron took it, his initial anger falling away in response to concentrated, analytical interest. He studied the picture of Riley, studied the back of the card, reading the engraved quotation. His superior, intellectual disdain fell away, his face assuming the expression of concentrated worry that Ezra had never before observed in him. The Baron, a man who had orchestrated murders and revolutions, appeared shaken.
"This is not the work of a reporter or of a competitor," said von Hauser, his voice tense, losing the suave tone. "The press is too rough. Your corporate rivals are too direct. They would demand payment or for favoritism. This..." He laid his manicured finger on the Faulkner passage. "This is a psychological battle. It is a message of intellectual intimidation, given for the purpose of creating fear, not for the start of negotiation. The method is precise. This is government."
He looked up, his eyes connecting with Ezra's. Calculation in the depths was quick and cold.
"Only one man in Washington conducts his business with this kind of subtle brutality and has a morbid interest in the innermost life of the powerful men. This is the business of J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI Director."
The name dropped in the silent room like it was a physical blow. Hoover. A man who had established his own personal empire within the government, an inaccessible spider at the center of a web of intimidation and blackmail. The Baron, himself a master of the dark arts of espionage and assassination, looked at the man superior of the dark arts of terror.
"You see, Ezra," continued von Hauser, his tone now that of the man aware that he was fighting the losing fight, "this is one man whom you can in no way threaten. You can't buy, since the whole federal budget is at his hands. You can't blackmail, as his whole currency is blackmail. This is one monster who has been aware of your one fatal vulnerability. Your mythic infamy, the same which you fashioned for protection, has made you the big enough target to gain his personal concern."
Ezra rose and crossed to the window, looking out into the lights of Fifth Avenue. His city, his world, the reality that he was building seemed suddenly like the prison whose walls were closing in. At appalling speed, the fabric of his reality was fraying. To the East of him, the Soviets, an enemy of a man he had been unable to hold in check, were now building their own arsenal. In his own home, his own nephew, secretly bankrolled by his own wife, was carefully building his own competing empire for ripping him apart. And now, out of the seeming heart of his own government, there was moving in secret, untouchable, a blackmailer who waved the threat of Thomas Riley in his face like the guillotine.
The supreme irony was crushing. He had risen to the public question of his past in order to deliver himself, gift-wrapped, to the man who lived off the private power of information. He was immobilized, not by markets or armies, but by a photograph and newspaper quotation in the hands of the one man who could in no way be beaten, only endured through.
He knew in an instant defying Hoover would be fatal. The Director would never approve of a direct confrontation. No, he would leak. A leaked rumor in the ear of his pet columnist. An unverified, confidential file dropped in the lap of the key senator. A slow, creeping technique of the thousand cuts, bleeding power and credibility out of Ezra, all while Hoover had plausible denial to claim in the end. To ignore the message was to invite the torture to begin.
His only move was the one his foe was anticipating: walking into the trap.
He spun away from the window, his decision made. He picked up the telephone and called his chief of staff. Not the trouble-shooter with the mailed-fist tactics, Sullivan, but Mitchell, his careful right-hand man for administration.
"Mitchell," said Ezra, his tone devoid of emotion. "Get a message to the office of Director Hoover. Use the most secure backchannel that we have. The message is this: 'I shall be in Washington D.C. the upcoming week and should be most honored to discuss at the Director's convenience matters of national security.' No staff. No lawyers. Merely a friendly conversation between two men who take the nation's future seriously."
He addressed himself in Hoover's own code speech, the jargon of politics. He was informing the world that he understood the rules of this odd, terrifying game. He was not requesting himself for a conference; he was answering one. He was giving the Devil his due.
A week later, in the dark corner booth of the serene, panel-lined bar of the Mayflower Hotel, was the solitary Ezra. This was the neutral ground, the place the powerful of Washington brought to effect the business that could not reach the well-lit office rooms. Fifteen minutes had passed, as Hoover deliberately aimed at proving his superiority. Before him, on the dark wood, was the glass of untried water, the appearance of it unaltered.
The men stepped in, dressed in crisp suits with blank faces and watchful eyes. They surveyed the room before standing to the side of the doorway, their presence transforming the quiet bar into an enclosed room. J. Edgar Hoover emerged a moment later. Thicker and shorter than Ezra had imagined, but moving with the demeanor of coiled, unyielding power, he moved to the booth of Ezra, his strides measured and parsimonious, and sat on the leather banquette opposite him.
He placed his clean fedora on the table, folded his hands across it, and regarded Ezra with eyes devoid of passion altogether. It was the gaze of a pathologist studying a specimen. He did not smile. He did not greet him. He simply began right in.
"Mr. Prentice," said Hoover, his voice in a nasal, flat monotone that had the unpleasant authority of command. "I read your Times piece. A true American epic."
He leaned forward, the movement slight but edged with menace. His dark, diminutive eyes seemed to vacuum in the light in the dark booth.
"Tell me," he added, the edge of his lip twitching in what might have been the outline of a smile. "Are you going to write a sequel?"