Robert Heinlein - I Will Fear No Evil

To Rex and Kathleen

The room was old-fashioned, 1980 baroque, but it was wide, long, high, and luxurious. Near simulated view windows stood an automated hospital bed. It looked out of place but was largely concealed by a magnificent Chinese screen. Forty feet from it a boardroom table also failed to match the decor. At the head of this table was a life-support wheelchair; wires and tubings ran from it to the bed.

Near the wheelchair, at a mobile stenodesk crowded with directional mikes, voice typewriter, clock-calendar, controls, and the usual ancillaries, a young woman sat. She was beautiful.

Her manner was that of the perfect unobtrusive secretary but she was dressed in a current exotic mode. "Half & Half"—right shoulder and breast and arm concealed in jet-black knit, left leg sheathed in a scarlet tight, panty-ruffle in both colors joining them, black sandal on the scarlet side, red sandal on her bare right foot. Her skin paint was patterned in the same scarlet and black.

On the other side of the wheelchair was an older woman garbed in a nurse's conventional white pantyhose and smock. She ignored everything but her dials and a patient in the chair. Seated around the table were a dozen-odd men, most of them in spectator-sports style affected by older executives.

Cradled in the life-support chair was a very old man. Except for restless eyes, he looked like a poor job of embalming. No cosmetic help had been used to soften the brutal fact of his decrepitude.

"Ghoul," he was saying softly to a man halfway down the table. "You're a slavering ghoul, Parky me boy. Didn't your father teach you that it is polite to wait for a man to stop kicking before you bury him? Or did you have a father? Erase that last, Eunice. Gentlemen, Mr. Parkinson has moved that I be invited to resign as chairman of the board. Do I hear a second?"

He waited, looking from face to face, then said, "Oh, come now! Who is letting you down, Parky? You,

George?"

"I had nothing to do with it."

"But you would love to vote ‘Aye.' Motion fails for want of a second."

"I withdraw my motion."

"Too late, Parkinson. Erasures are made only by unanimous consent, implied or overt. One objection is enough—and I, Johann Sebastian Bach Smith, do so ob­ject... and that rule controls because 1 wrote it before you learned to read.

"But"—Smith looked around at the others—"I do have news. As you heard from Mr. Teal, all our divisions are in satisfactory shape; Sea Ranches and General Textbooks are more than satisfactory—so this is a good time for me to retire."

Smith waited, then said, "You can close your mouths. Don't look smug, Parky; I have more news for you. I stay on as chairman of the board but will no longer be chief executive. Our chief counsel, Mr. Jake Salomon, becomes deputy chairman and—"

"Hold it, Johann. I am not going to manage this five-ring circus."

"Nobody said you would, Jake. But you can preside at board meetings when I'm not available. Is that too much to ask?"

"Mmm, I suppose not."

"Thank you. I'm resigning as president of Smith Enterprises, and Mr. Byram Teal becomes our president and chief executive officer—he's doing the work; it's time he got the title—and pay and stock options and all the perks and privileges and tax loopholes. No more than fair."

Parkinson said, "Now see here, Smith!"

"Hold it, youngster. Don't start a remark to me with ‘Now see here—' Address me as ‘Mr. Smith' or Mr. Chairman.' What is your point?"

Parkinson controlled himself, then said, "Very well, Mister Smith. I can't accept this. Quite aside from promoting your assistant to the office of president in one jump—utterly unheard of!—if there is a change in management, 1 must be considered. I represent the second largest block of voting stock."

"I did consider you for president, Parky."

"You did?"

"Yep. I thought about it...and snickered."

"Why, you—"

"Don't say it, I might sue. What you forget is that my block has voting control. Now about your block— By company policy anyone representing five percent or more of voting stock is automatically on the board even if nobody loves him and he suffers from spiritual bad breath. Which describes both you and me.

"Or did describe you. Byram, what's the late word on proxies and stock purchases?"

"A full report, Mr. Smith?"

"No, just tell Mr. Parkinson where he stands."

"Yes, sir. Mr. Parkinson, you now control less than five percent of the voting stock."

Smith added sweetly, "So you're fired, you young ghoul. Jake, call a special stockholders' meeting, legal notice, all formalities, for the purpose of giving Parky a gold watch and kicking him out—and electing his successor. Further business? None. Meeting's adjourned. Stick around, Jake. You, too, Eunice. And Byram, if you have anything on your mind."

Parkinson jumped to his feet. "Smith, you haven't heard the last of this!"

"Oh, no doubt," the old man said sweetly. "Meantime my respects to your mother-in-law and tell her that Byram will go on making her rich even though I've fired you."

Parkinson left abruptly. Others started to leave. Smith said mildly, "Jake, how does a man get to be fifty years old without acquiring horse sense? Only smart thing that lad ever did was pick a rich mother-in-law. Yes, Hans?"

"Johann," Hans von Ritter said, leaning on the table and speaking directly to the chairman, "I did not like your treatment of Parkinson."

"Thanks. You're honest with me to my face. Scarce these days."

"Removing him from the board is okay; he's an obstructionist. But there was no need to humiliate him."

"I suppose not. One of my little pleasures, Hans. I don't have many these days."

A Simplex footman rolled in, hung the vacated chairs on its rack, rolled out; von Ritter continued: "1 have no intention of being treated that way. If you want nothing but Yes men on your board, let us note that I control much less than five percent of the voting stock. Do you want my resignation?"

"Good God, no! I need you, Hans—and Byram will need you still more. I can't use trained seals; a man has to have the guts to disagree with me, or he's a waste of space. But when a man bucks me,. I want him to do it intelligently. You do. You've forced me to change my mind several times—not easy, stubborn as I am. Now about this other—sit down. Eunice, whistle up that easy chair for Dr. von Ritter."

The chair approached; von Ritter waved it back, it retreated. "No, I haven't time to be cajoled. What do you want?" He straightened up; the boardroom table folded its legs, turned on edge, and glided away through a slot in the wall.

"Hans, I've surrounded myself with men who don't like me, not a Yes man or trained seal among them. Even Byram—especially Byram—got his job by contradicting me and being right. Except when he's been wrong and that's why he needs men like you on the board. But Parkinson— I was entitled to clip him—publicly—because he called for my resignation—publicly. Nevertheless you are right, Hans; ‘tit for tat' is childish. Twenty years ago—even ten—I would never have humiliated a man. If a man operates by reflex, as most do instead of using their noggins, humiliating him forces him to try to get even. I know better. But I'm getting senile, as we all know."

Von Ritter said nothing. Smith Went on, "Will you stick?—and help keep Byram steady?"

"Uh...I'll stick. As long as you behave yourself." He turned to leave.

"Fair enough. Hans? Will you dance at my wake?"

Von Bitter looked back and grinned. "I'd be delighted!"

"Thought so. Thanks, Hans. G'bye."