The Ultimate Egoist (35 page)

He chose a soft gray suit of radical cut—he could wear those seamless shoulders and still look broad and powerful. A light gray shirt. And as he remembered that he had some murdering to do today, he chose a deep purple tie, which somehow suited the occasion—crepe soles, of course; they would come in handy. Homburg; the stained bamboo cane; a ring to match his tie; ah, splendid.

“The town car, sir?” asked Landis.

“I’ll walk.” He strode out of the house, leaving his butler shocked and shaken at such a radical departure from habit. He must remember to have Landis recall his pretty speech of the morning; the fool would probably drop dead.

He walked to the corner and stood there waiting for the light to change, enjoying the morning air. A round-shouldered youth touched his arm.

“Mister, you look like Wall Street to me—”

Tobin regarded him frigidly.

“As a fellow investor, I want to tell you that Bowery Flophouse is up five points, McGinnis’ hash joint is up two blocks, an’ I’m up a tree. Situation shaky. How’s about a couple dimes? You won’t feel it, an’ it’ll make me feel richer’n you look.”

Tobin laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “As I live and breathe, a panhandler with originality!” He looked the threadbare creature over curiously. Might as well get it over with; this trash would be as good as any. “You can do something for me.”

“Sure, boss. Sure. Name it an’ it’s yours.”

Tobin knew that. “Look! See that big tractor-trailer job that just pulled up for the light? Get underneath it; lie down with your chest up against a tire. Go ahead; now.”

The youth’s eyes glazed a little, and he went off to do what he was told. Tobin walked on casually, glad to have the killing off his mind. “His life for mine; it’s rather a pity. I might have found someone more worthy.”

A shrill scream behind him did nothing to his steady pace. Horror and shame were penalties—and today he paid none.

Curiosity, though, did what shame could not. It would be a confounded nuisance if the boy bungled the job. He stopped and turned. The crowd he expected was milling around the truck; and then he saw a policeman, supporting the reeling panhandler. The boy was fighting to go back to the truck; strong hands kept him away. Of course! Some idiot had seen him, pulled him out in time. Rage surged through Tobin; rage, and hatred of anyone foolish enough to interfere with MacIlhainy Tobin. He snapped himself into line quickly, though. He had all day. He turned and went again toward his offices.

“Good heavens!” I said, letting my fingers slip off the keys. “Must you go about the world making it possible for people to do that sort of thing?”

“Must you write stories?” asked the man
.

“Well—to keep on living. But you—”

“Just,” he nodded, “to remain extant.”

“But what’s the differ— Oh, I—see. Will you have some wine?”

“Thank you.”

He extended a small crystal cup and it touched my arm and was full. There was a … a pale spot on my arm—

“Please go on,” I said
.

“Sykes!” Tobin boomed as he strode into his office suite.

“Yes, sir.”

Sykes would be a little annoying, Tobin realized, for he would be precisely the same under stress of Tobin’s new and absolute command as he was at any other time.

“Get in touch with every available holder of a seat in the Stock Exchange. Have them all here at ten o’clock. Miss Twigg! Have papers drawn up for each of the men that Sykes brings in, signing over to me complete ownership of ninety percent of their properties, holdings, and interests, corporative or private. Miss Allen, I want Krill here immediately. Farrel! Sykes, where the devil is Farrel? Three minutes late? When he comes in, fire him. After seven years with me he should know better. Miss Betteredge, read my mail, except the personals. Miss Willis, read the personals. Philip, drop the profits on 227, 89 and 812, and put them all in Synthetic Rubber. It’s good for two points today. I’m riding it. Give it a number. Sykes! Damn it, where’s— Oh. I don’t want to see anyone but Krill. If Thurston and Greenblatt phone, tell them no. Farrel! Where—That’s right, Sykes. Thanks. Promote Goober, but give him ten dollars a week less than Farrel was getting. Get out of the way.” And, smoothly as ever, the day was begun.

Once in his office, Tobin shrugged out of his coat and threw off his hat. Both were caught expertly before they reached the nub-piled carpet, by the omnipresent Sykes. “Anything else, sir?”

“Yes. Go to hell. Wait a minute! Don’t take me so seriously, man! Get busy on those property transfers. You’re about to be working for the richest man in creation.
Move
, now!”

The communicator gave its discreet whisper.

“Well?”

“There are seven hundred and twelve members of the Stock Exchange on the way to the auditorium. The rest are either unavailable or refuse to come unless they have more information.”

“Refuse? Refuse? Tell them that if they don’t get here immediately, the whole financial world is going to smash—really smash, this time. Tell them I will give all the details when they get here. That’ll scare them. They know me.”

“Yes, Mr. Tobin. Mr. Krill is waiting.”

“Krill, eh? Send him right in.”

The broker was a slender man with a wide forehead and a little pointed chin. He was pale—his face, his eyes, his hands. He came straight across the room and put his hands on Tobin’s desk.

“All right, Tobin. I can take it. You have too many noses scattered around. I knew you’d smell me out.”

“Why did you quote the wrong price on Synthetic, then?”

“I’d tell you, and it would make some difference to you if you were human.”

“Unfortunately, Krill, I’m not particularly human today,” Tobin said, and smiled. “Tell me, anyway.”

“I’ve had my eye on Synthetic Rubber for quite a while. I didn’t know you controlled it, or I wouldn’t have touched it. I got a tip and put every cent of capital of the United Charities into it. Dozens of organizations whose business is caring for poor, sick and old people. I’ve done wonders for United in the time I’ve handled their investments. I didn’t think your man would be interested in the stock, or the fact that I would jump it. I thought I could get out with a decent profit this morning before you were interested. I quoted a lower price on it on the slim chance that you’d have the information from no one else. I lost. If I try to sell now, I’ll be delayed until you dump; I know that. And you can afford to keep the price down until I must let those shares go. What are you going to do?”

“You had no business giving me false information.” Tobin flicked a switch.

“Yes, sir?” said the communicator.

“Dump Synthetic.”

“Yes, sir.”

Krill stood quite still. “Eighty thousand people—sick people, Tobin, and kids—are going to suffer because you did that. My mistake for hoping.”

“Are you going to kill yourself now, Krill?” Tobin asked conversationally.

“Wh—”

“Tell me!”

“What else can I do?”

“Krill, there’s something I tried to do this morning that didn’t work out. I’ll have to try again. It might as well be you. Never let it be said I wouldn’t help out a man in a jam. Krill, I don’t want you cluttering up my office. Go out into the waiting room and die. Go on!”

Krill looked at him strangely and his lips writhed. He closed the door very gently behind him.

Tobin drew interlocking circles on his scratch pad for a few minutes. The communicator buzzed.

“Yes?”

“Mr. Tobin! Mr. Krill just collapsed in the waiting room!”

“
Tsk, tsk!
Will he be all right?”

“He’s—dead, Mr. Tobin.”

He snapped off the instrument and laughed to himself. Ah, well. He was not the first man who had cheated death by giving the old fellow another customer.

“Sykes!”

The secretary popped up like a neat little jack-in-the-box.

“Mr. Tobin. I … I couldn’t help hearing what you said to Mr. Krill. It … it’s uncanny—” He mopped his rabbit-face. “You told him, and … and he— My goodness!”

This was annoying. “Sykes, you heard nothing, remember, nothing of this affair. Understand?”

Sykes said blankly: “You called me, Mr. Tobin?”

Tobin nodded, more to himself than to Sykes. “How many of the Exchange members are here?”

“Eleven hundred odd, sir. That’s about all we can expect, I’m afraid. The rest are out of reach or willing to chance not coming.”

“Hm-m-m. Get whoever is drawing up those property transfers and change ‘ninety percent’ to ‘one hundred percent’ on all those to be signed by holdouts. The fools— In the meantime, get all of them on the phone—a conference line. I’ll talk to them all at once.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then go down to the auditorium and tell those who have come to take it easy and keep quiet until I get there.”

Left alone again, Tobin beamed upon himself. Things were going fine. He’d have everything finished by two this afternoon at this rate, and then he’d have the whole evening to himself. There ought to be a great many amusing things to do. The phone rang.

“Conference call, sir.”

“How many are on the line?”

“Six hundred and twenty-four, sir.”

“Good. That will be enough. Put ’em on.”

The connection was made. “Hello—MacIlhainy Tobin, New York. I want each of you to give me absolute attention. Do not hang up.

“Each and every one of you will have drawn up a document signing over to me all your holdings, private possessions, interests and enterprises. Everything you own, in whole or in part. No loopholes; I want ironclad documents. I want them signed, witnessed, and in the mail before twenty-four hours from the present time. There is no need for me to persuade or threaten you; you will do as I say because you want to and because you must. You will let no one stop you, or change your documents in any way. Those of you who wish may apply for positions in my organization. Remuneration will be on a merit basis. That is all. Drop everything and attend to this immediately.”

He hung up and signaled the switchboard. “Put me on the annunciator in the auditorium.”

Over the loudspeaker Tobin repeated his message. More than a thousand men left quietly and went back to their offices and homes—to figure, to phone, to dispossess themselves.

“I’d no idea it would be as easy as that,” Tobin muttered happily. “Let’s see—there are about one hundred and thirty men who did not get my message. That means I have well over seventeen hundred seats in the Exchange. Enough, I think, to whittle down the objectors. Sykes!”

“Mr. Tobin?”

“We are about to be swamped with highly valuable mail. Double the office force and have a plan prepared for unifying the industries that have been signed over to me. Get it ready as soon as possible.
Two weeks should be sufficient. Sykes, this firm is going places—See that those papers are delivered.”

Well, that was that. Tobin had an organization strong enough to beat down any resistance, and had the best business minds obtainable working for him. He owned the financial structure of the United States and had a stranglehold on the world. That should be enough to keep him pleasantly occupied for the next ten thousand years or so. That third wish— tomorrow he would wish for a lifetime that could be ended only by his own hand. That ought to do it. It still left him an out— He had time for a final decision on that, too. He must phrase it to exclude illness; he was not a young man any longer. Never mind; it could be slept on.

He called it a day at three o’clock and left Sykes to clean up the details.

Again MacIlhainy Tobin refused a car and left Sykes even more surprised than Landis had been. He wandered about casually, peering around, looking for something really amusing to do. A cafeteria seemed a good place; he went in and had a cup of coffee. He hated cafeteria coffee, but today—everything was different. Even his sense of taste could not be penalized by the bellywash.

He spread a late paper out and turned the pages restlessly. A small item on an inside page caught his eye. “Rudolph Krill, broker—Tobin Building—heart failure—” Tobin chuckled. That wouldn’t be on the inside pages tomorrow. Not when United Charities got wind of the facts. Quite a joke, that. Heart failure. Why, Krill—

The smile froze on his broad face. Heart failure? Since when was that a punishable offense—for a second party? It was, of course, suicide. Krill had willed himself to death. But—that wasn’t murder.

Tobin stood up and sent his cup crashing to the floor. He stalked past the startled cashier, who managed to enunciate: “Ch-check, please—”

“Be quiet!” Tobin said, without turning his head, and kept on moving. This wouldn’t do at all. He had to murder someone, or pay the price of his freedom from punishment.

Whose idea was this death penalty for murder, anyway? Blessed
civilization. Tobin snorted. If you killed a man cleverly enough to outwit society, there was no penalty. Society killed without penalty. Armies—Tobin was furious. He thought he had freed himself from the stupidity of mankind for good and all. And now, even with his superhuman power, he had to stoop to the level of man—kowtow to idiocy. He must murder someone so clumsily that it must be detected and traced to him, immediately. He walked a little faster. Time was short. He’d wasted hours—

Opportunity, from force of habit, presented itself to him. A busy street corner, a taxi cutting across traffic to make a turn, a man standing just off the curb—

Tobin pushed him. This was not like the morning. This time the tires were moving, and moving fast. This time they drew blood, chewed on bones and bits of cloth. In the split second of horror before the crowd began to chatter, Tobin saw that he had done it this time. The man was dead. You couldn’t cut an angleworm up that way and expect it to live.

A policeman had his notebook out, was taking names, details. Tobin stepped up and touched him on the shoulder. “I did it, officer. I pushed him.”

The policeman pushed his hat back on his head and stared at him. “Yeah. Me, too. Fifty people see him try to run across and get hit, an’ you pushed him. Better go home and sleep it off, buddy. Move on; I got things to do.” He turned away.