A change of gravity

His breath's too sweet; must be really bad before he uses too much mouthwash. He's ugly, too; he's already got jowls, at what, twenty-eight or twenty-nine? That's fuckin' indecent, too young to have jowls. But it figures; he's starting to get heavy all over. His waist's already begun to disappear. Some day pretty soon he wont have one anymore. Wake up some fine morning and find he's dispensed with it. He'll say he got rid of it because he couldn't find any purpose for it. He'll taper: Narrow at the ends, his head and his feet, and thick in the middle, his ass and his belly for ballast, like Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

Thirty years or so from now, he's pushing sixty, he'll have wattles, like a turkey. And those beady little eyes like a snake, a short, fat snake that spits. A garden adder, green and black. Except I don't think those're poisonous, and he is."

"Are adders smart?" Hilliard said. "I don't know that much about reptile IQs."

"I dunno, why?" Merrion said.

"Because if they're not," Hilliard said, "Pooler's no adder. I don't argue with you that the guy's a snake. You know him lots better'n I do, since I don't know him at all, but if he's a snake and adders aren't smart, Pooler's a different breed."

"Yeah, well," Merrion said, "I called him an asshole, which he is, smart or not. I said it politely, of course. Just making an observation: "You're the biggest asshole I've met in a long time."

"He seemed to take it personally, looked shocked and backed away, so that's where I guess we agreed to leave it. Little prick."

Hilliard said it would be best if no one heard that part. "Bob Pooler isn't just trying to look dangerous he is dangerous. His mother's maiden name was Corey, and his daddy is a partner, along with his granddaddy, Warren, in Butler, Corey. Which means his family's got a major piece of that mammoth law firm, which makes nothing but money.

Furthermore, it's been a big wealthy firm ever since the first Pynchon, Sam, pulled up a tuffet and sat down by the river to catch his breath, and before you knew it, he'd gone and founded a city.

"And if plain old big money doesn't impress you, you can throw in a herd of state and federal judges, ambassadors, law school deans, and a slew of directors of operas and museums and chairmen of corporate boards. Money buys power, and power brings in more money, which in turn ac cures more power, even for obnoxious little assholes such as Bobby Pooler who get everything wrong except their choice of ancestors.

When poor humble peasants like us go up against powerful rich assholes, the behoovin' begins. It behooves us to do our best to get along with them.

"It'll be a damned sight better for us if everyone else who meets that kid forms his own opinion of him which'll probably be the same as yours without any assistance from you. So that when the day finally comes when Junior doesn't get what he really wants, at least a federal judgeship, he wont come gunning for us. When he gets it in the teeth, his own people'll have to tell him. "When it's unanimous that you're a little shit; everybody who's dealt with you hates your guts; you're outnumbered. There's too many of 'em to single out one or two like Amby and Danny, and get even."

Bob Pooler still dressed beautifully but he wasn't aging well, Merrion decided happily, as the younger man with Pooler stopped at the office door nearest the reception desk, clearly eager to go in. Pooler's wavy black hair had thinned out on the top, the remainder growing grey, with a straggly end or two where the comb-over brushed the ears. His waist had all but disappeared. The obtrusive attitude had not. Pooler halted when his captive did, still holding onto him and talking, completing his train of thought.

His conversation was full of minor visible events. He made a chopping motion with his right hand each time he wanted to drive home a point, puffing and deflating his cheeks, furrowing his brows, to vary the intensity of what he said. Merrion could read his lips; he punctuated every third or fourth sentence with "You see? You see that? You see?"

The younger man, restless, seemed to feel obliged to nod at each gesture, as though believing that there must be some quota of obeisance which when satisfied would enable him to get away.

Then Pooler abruptly released the elbow, frowning, staring after the other man's back, as though considering whether to become annoyed at him for leaving with his folder. He apparently concluded that to do so would be pointless; there was no hope that he would ever understand what Pooler had explained. He shook his head once, irritably, then turned toward the reception area. He saw Merrion sitting in the wing chair; recognizing him in curiously Giving no sign of having recognition, he proceeded to the reception desk; accepted a thin sheaf of pink messages; riffled through them without evident interest; put them back on the reception desk and looked up again at Merrion.