There. That was better.
‘Very well,’ Boothe said coldly, and he returned to his desk. He settled into the brass-studded, dark-green leather club chair behind the desk and was almost entirely in shadow, except for his face, which was part blue and part green and part yellow in the spears of multicolored light from the Tiffany lamp.
Uhlander went to one window that was not concealed by green drapes, and he stood with his back to the French panes. Outside, because the storm-gray afternoon was waning toward an early-winter twilight, not much daylight found its way past the lush vegetation of the formal gardens and to the library window. Nevertheless, sufficient brightness lay behind Uhlander to reduce him to only a silhouette, leaving his face in deep shadows that concealed his expression.
Dan approached the desk, stepped into the circle of jeweled light, and looked down at Boothe, who had lifted a glass of whiskey. ‘Why would a man of your position and reputation get involved with someone like Willy Hoffritz?’
‘He was brilliant. A genius in his field. I have always sought out and associated with the brightest people,’ Boothe said. ‘They’re the most interesting people, for one thing. And for another, their ideas and enthusiasms are often of great practical use in one of my businesses or another.’
‘And besides, Hoffritz could supply you with an utterly passive, totally submissive young woman who would endure any humiliation you wanted to heap on her. Isn’t that right, Daddy?’
At last a crack appeared in Boothe’s self-possession. For a moment his eyes narrowed hatefully, and his jaw muscles bulged as he clenched his teeth in anger. But his control slipped only one notch, and the crack closed up again in seconds. His face recomposed itself, and he sipped his whiskey.
‘All men have … weaknesses, Lieutenant. In that regard, I’m a man like any other.’
Something in his eyes, in his expression, and in his tone of voice belied any admission of weakness. Rather, it seemed as if he were merely being magnanimous by claiming to share the weaknesses of ordinary men. It was all too clear that he didn’t believe there was anything wrong or even slightly morally suspect in his behavior with Regine, and his admission was not an act of contrition or humility but one of smug condescension.
Shifting to another tack, Dan said, ‘Hoffritz might have been a genius, but he was bent, twisted. He applied his knowledge and his talents not to legitimate behavior-modification research but to developing new techniques of brainwashing. I’m told by people who knew him that he was a totalitarian, a fascist, an elitist of the worst sort. How does that square with your own widely heralded liberalism?’
Boothe regarded Dan with pity, disdain, and amusement. As if speaking to a child, he said, ‘Lieutenant, everyone who believes that the problems of society can be solved through the political process is an elitist. Which means most people. It doesn’t matter if you’re a right-winger, a conservative, a moderate, a liberal, or an extreme left-winger. If you define yourself by any political label, then you’re an elitist because you believe that problems could be solved if only the right group of people held power. So Willy Hoffritz’s elitism was of no concern to me. I happen to believe the masses need to be guided, controlled—’
‘Brainwashed.’
‘Yes, brainwashed, but for their own good. As the world’s population grows ever larger and as technology leads to a wider dissemination of information and ideas, the old institutions like family and Church break down. There are new, more dangerous ways for the discontented to express their misery and alienation. So we must find methods of eliminating discontent, of controlling thought and action, if we’re to have a stable society, a stable world.’
‘I see why you used libertarian political-action committees as a front for financing McCaffrey and Hoffritz.’
Boothe raised his eyebrows. ‘You know about that, do you?’
‘I know considerably more than that.’
Boothe sighed. ‘Libertarians are such hopeless dreamers. They want to reduce government to a minimum, virtually eliminate politics. I thought it would be amusing to work toward exactly the opposite ends while employing the cover of a libertarian crusade.’