CHAPTER 27
S
HENANDOAH
V
ALLEY
, V
IRGINIA
C
lifton—the luxury, four hundred and eleven acre estate and farm, an hour outside Washington, D.C.—had belonged to George Washington’s cousin, Warner Washington. Pierre Damien loved it as much for its history as he did for its exquisite Classical Revival manor house and the panoramic views of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
George Washington had spent extensive time on the property and when Damien walked the grounds, he liked to imagine himself walking in the footsteps of history. Damien wondered, if Washington were alive today, would he see the world the same way. Would Washington realize that in a modern era such as this, certain viewpoints and philosophies of government had run their course? Wouldn’t such a noble man realize that individual, selfish pursuits only served to harm mankind, not advance it? And as a farmer, a true man of the soil, certainly Washington would recognize the responsibilities that all human beings had to the planet.
Taking a deep breath of crisp fall air, Damien breathed in the scent of nature. The colors along the distant mountains were extraordinary. There was no better place to be in autumn. Of all the properties he owned, even his private Cay in the Bahamas, Clifton was his favorite. It was why he had wanted to bring Helena here. That, and there were final preparations to be made. Tonight would be the organization’s last dinner for some time.
The tiny Thomas Malthus Society didn’t have a web site or a mailing address. Its membership was one of most closely guarded secrets in D.C.
The society was based on the teachings of the eighteenth-century cleric and scholar, Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus—particularly his
An Essay on the Principle of Population
.
Influential in the fields of political economy and demography, Malthus believed that a Utopian society could never be achieved as long as the world’s population was allowed to continue to grow unchecked. The only way to protect the earth and improve the existence of mankind was to have less of mankind—something he believed Mother Nature would eventually deliver in the form of widespread famine and disease.
The anticipated population reduction event was popularly, and rather dramatically, known as the “Malthusian catastrophe.” It had yet to happen, but there were those who not only believed it necessary but who were eager to help usher it forward. They simply referred to it as “the event.” Some of those people lived and worked in Washington, D.C.
By custom, the dinner’s ingredients were locally sourced. Tonight, all of it came from Clifton. There would be fresh herbs, lettuce, radishes, sorrel, chives, and garlic, as well as farm-raised lamb shoulder and duck breast, foie gras emulsion, and goat’s milk and sheep’s milk cheeses.
The pièce de résistance was dessert. George Washington was an ice cream fanatic. In his honor, Damien served fresh, hand-cranked strawberry ice cream from an actual Washington family recipe.
There were organic wine pairings, an incredible vintage port, and the most delicious, fresh-roasted, certified free-trade coffee any of the guests had ever tasted.
The dinner party was a huge hit—as the guests had known it would be. Damien was a man of both astounding wealth and impeccable taste. It was the society’s best dinner of the year.
The conversation, as usual, revolved around domestic and international affairs, but also included science, mathematics, literature, the arts, and culture. These were incredibly erudite men and women. The depth and breadth of their intelligence was equaled only by their power—and that’s why Damien had selected them.
He knew a thing or two about power, small truths that others often failed to realize. Heads of agencies and their immediate underlings would
come and go, subject to election cycles and political approval. The same was true of politicians. Their influence was only worth so much.
The truly powerful were those deepest inside the government. Like the Wizard of Oz, they were the ones behind the curtain. They were the ones who knew which ropes to pull. Their hands were on the very levers of power.
They could not only raise or lower the sets but also brighten or dim the house lights. They weren’t just inside the machine as middle managers, they
were
the machine. They knew the game. They knew the system. They had been masters of it for years.
Theirs was a modern Rome, Rome on the Potomac—an empire in miniature—a land in and unto itself.
New Rome knew no economic vicissitudes. There were no vacant storefronts, no depressed housing prices, or reductions in take-home pay.
Taxes, fees, fines, and lines of credit that stretched to the stars and back made sure that the treasury was awash in coin. Things in New Rome were positively booming. The future was bright indeed.
That didn’t mean, though, that the empire was secure. As its fortunes grew, it seemed to come under a more regular and more prolonged assault by the country class.
“Country class” had replaced “fly-over country” as the new contumelious term used to describe the great unwashed living outside D.C. or the nation’s other Megalopoli.
Through social media, a handful of sympathetic news organizations, and grassroots activism, the country class waged incessant guerrilla warfare, demanding that the New Rome be put on a diet and scaled dramatically back.
As far as the New Romans were concerned, it was an odd, stupid little war waged by odd, stupid little people. They were most definitely in the minority. All of the polling showed it. Instead of shoving their faces full of McDonald’s drive-thru and watching reality TV like the rest of the country-class Hobbits, they were strangely obsessed with what was happening in Washington and how things should be changed.
If they were so eager to dictate how it should be done in Washington, why were they sitting on their asses in Tennessee and Texas, Idaho
and Indiana? Why weren’t they trundling their fat little children onto buses and coming to D.C. to help lend a hand? The answer was simple—because it was beyond them.
They had no idea how government worked, much less how important government workers were to its continued function. Without Federal employees, it all stopped—all of it. Fees at National Parks didn’t get collected, school lunch regulations didn’t get enforced, borders were left unprotected, and that was only the beginning. The inmates wanted to run the asylum. There was no way that could ever be allowed to happen.
Anything that grows is, by definition, alive. Washington, D.C. was no exception.
As a living organism, the Federal Government’s number one job was self-preservation. Any threat to its existence had to be dealt with.
When the country class came with its pathetic rhetorical torches and meddling electoral pitchforks, New Rome was ready.
It fought back with tools no one had ever seen coming. New Rome weaponized its own Federal agencies. The Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Justice, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms—they all swatted away each and every attack.
The country class could storm the battlements over and over. They didn’t stand a chance. Not only could you not fight City Hall, you couldn’t survive a fight with the Federal Government. New Rome could take every single thing you have and put you in prison. It wasn’t even a fair fight. (It wasn’t supposed to be.)
New Rome would do what it took to win, and it would do so every single time. Its responsibility to its own survival was bigger than any responsibility to its clueless constituents. If they really cared about Washington, they’d be paying much closer attention. But they didn’t, and so, New Rome proceeded accordingly.
The phenomenon was fascinating to Damien. Listening to the conversations around the table, he had been captivated. These were not evil people. They were actually incredibly compassionate, clear-eyed, and focused. In short, they
got
it.
They grasped not only what was at stake, but more importantly, what needed to be done. These were reasonable people.
Though not a religious man, Damien knew these people were meant to inherit the earth. It was why he had selected them.
It was a spectacular night. No one was feeling any pain, and no one wanted it to end. Breaking with their locally sourced tradition, Damien dispatched Jeffery to retrieve one of his best sauternes. It was a bottle of liquid gold, a 1934 Château d’Yquem. And he had been saving it for just this very night.
Its copper and orange hues reminded him of the magic bird the next phase of his operation celebrated. The seven-thousand-dollar dessert wine boasted rich crème brûlée, orange, caramel, flowers, spice, and butterscotch flavors, along with earthy whorls of cocoa, chocolate, and coffee.
It was delicious and the absolute best way imaginable to celebrate the rebirth of the world.
Of course, it was exquisitely painful not to be able to share any of this with Helena and be able to show her off. She wasn’t a member of the society, though, and thereby wasn’t allowed to attend the dinner. Instead, Damien had ordered in her favorite, Italian, and had set her up in the guesthouse. He would join her once his other guests had left.
He had Jeffery bring out a second bottle of Château d’Yquem. This one was a delicious yet much less expensive ’66. Some partook, some did not.
Twenty minutes later, society members began to thank him and melt away into the night.
Once they were gone, the woman next to him reached out and put her hand on his arm.
“What a glorious evening, Pierre,” she said.
Damien smiled in response. Linda Landon had been working for the Federal Government for over forty years and had seen it all. She was his lynchpin in everything that was about to happen.
Reaching into her shoulder bag, she pulled out a small box. “I brought you something.”
“Linda, you shouldn’t have gotten me a gift.”
“No, no,” she stated, looking down and shaking her head, “it’s just a small token.”
Damien lifted the lid. Inside was a pair of silver cuff links.
“Gordian Knots,” she explained. “I thought you would appreciate them.”
He did indeed. It was one of his favorite ancient myths. The knot was meant to symbolize an impossible problem solved with bold, outside-the-box thinking.
In the story, a man named Gordius celebrates becoming king by dedicating his chariot to Zeus and tying it to a pole with an impossible to unravel Gordian knot. An oracle predicts that a man will come and untie it, and that man will go on to become king of all Asia. Like the legend of the sword in the stone, many tried and failed to untie the knot. Then Alexander the Great visited the city.
He searched and searched for the loose ends of the knot so he could set to work. When he couldn’t find them, he pulled out his sword and sliced right through it. Alexander then went on to conquer Asia.
“They are very handsome,” he said. “Thank you.”
“I’m glad you like them,” Landon replied. “Now, I think you and I should talk about the—”
Damien held his finger up, suggesting she pause, as Jeffery entered the dining room to see if there was anything else they needed.
“Perhaps another coffee?” she said.
“Make it two,” Damien stated. “We will take them in the library.”
Jeffery nodded and walked back to the kitchen.
Damien stood and motioned his guest into the large main hall. It was hung with magnificent oil paintings in thick, gilded frames. They depicted bucolic scenes of hunting, fishing, and farm life. Landon could only imagine how much they had cost.
Beyond the grand staircase was an elegant paneled door. Damien paused just long enough to turn the handle and then step back so his guest could enter.
Landon barely made it two steps inside before coming to an abrupt stop. Curled up on a couch in front of the fireplace, reading, was an attractive young woman in jeans and a rather tight sweater.
“Helena,” Damien said, taken off guard. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to find a book,” she replied, laying aside the leather-bound copy of Edward Pollard’s
The Lost Cause
and standing.
She walked over and extended her hand to Damien’s guest. “My name is Helena. Helena Pestova.”
“Pleased to meet you,” the older woman replied coldly. “I’m Linda.”
Helena waited, but the woman didn’t give her last name.
Damien had not intended for the two to meet. In fact, he had not intended for Helena to meet any of the society members. The dinner was a boring philanthropic obligation, he had explained. No spouses. No significant others.
Helena had appeared to take it in stride, but entering the main house and establishing herself in the library communicated another message. She wanted his attention, and she would get it soon enough, plenty of it, but he needed to finish his business with Landon first.
“We have some business items to finish up,” he said to her. “I’ll find you afterward. Okay?”
“Okay,” Helena replied as she picked up her book and cell phone, then walked over and kissed him on the cheek.
At the library door, she turned to the other woman and said, “It was nice meeting you.”
Landon shot her a bitchy smile. “You too, dear.”
As Helena exited, Jeffery entered with a tray and set up the coffee service on a small table near the fireplace.
Landon took a seat on the couch, removed her computer from her shoulder bag, and powered it up. Damien sat down at his antique desk.
“Will you be needing anything else?” Jeffery asked.
Damien looked everything over and replied, “I think we’re fine. Thank you, Jeffery.”
Clearing away the tray, Jeffery opened the door and stepped out into the hallway.
As he did, Damien noticed that Helena had left her cell phone charger behind. She always seemed to be forgetting it. She would forget her gorgeous head if it wasn’t attached. She was always leaving that stupid charger somewhere.
He thought about having Jeffery unplug it and take it to her, but decided against it. The less that was said about her in front of Landon, the better.