2012 Part 3

'Now then Alex, there's something I need to tell you. Are you listening to me?'

'Sorry mother, I'm a little distracted today.' As Marina left his view he made eye contact with his mother. 'I mean this party for one thing and what Thi's just told me.'

'Ah,' said Penny. 'So you know about her and the Firm. I agree, it's time you branched out alone. I think it's a very good idea.'

'Yes, but mother, how am I going to manage. I've never been alone before without Thi.' Given that Thea had been so adamant he was now getting a bit used to the idea. Maybe it would give him a lot of freedom of action, for what? He hadn't a clue. And he'd still have Nemmi around. He could easily get home for the weekends. That would compensate a bit and he'd see Thea at the weekends too. He could probably cope with that. 'I'll just have to cope with Nems then and see Thi at weekends too,' he said.

'Nemmi? No no, she's going to the New York office. Didn't I tell you? And it looks like Thea is going back to Ios for the time being to be with Lucina.

'What! It's not true! What the h.e.l.l's going on Ma?' He got up paced about and sat down again heavily. 'No of course you didn't tell me any of this. It's a complete b.l.o.o.d.y conspiracy! Why can't I just get on with my life like I always did? Why does everyone want to interfere with me? It's not fair ma!'

Penny waited a moment before replying she felt for him but she was pleased he was going to be left alone, he'd cope fine she had no doubt. 'People have to have their own lives. Thea's grown up like you and twin or no twin she has her own way to make in life. As for Nemmi, she can't spend the rest of hers as nursemaid to you exclusively.'

'She's not a nursemaid, she's a......I dunno, but she's more than that and I need her. I need them both,' he pouted petulantly. 'It's too much mother it really is. Is this your idea or....' He hesitated.

'It's ours. Mine and Lucina's. Thea and Nemmi of course agree. I've tried to make you see you need to be free of both of them but you persist in them being the only company you need.'

'I need you too.'

'Do you? Do you actually? Most great lumps of your age can't wait to get away from home and sow a few wild oats. This conversation is normally the other way around with mothers trying to restrain their children. Especially nowadays.

'Is that right? Well I'm not other children. I know what I need!' This was dangerous ground for both of them. He flinched from actually saying he wanted them near because he was afraid there was something directing his life and that he needed them to guide him if it ever got hold of him and that he couldn't cope with the degree of vulnerability he felt when alone. However, they never finished the conversation as Peny was called away by Marina.

The party next day was a great affair. Alexander thought it unutterably boring but is was clear the JNO bigwigs, including his mother, thought it was very successful. Although Zarian Dodona was unable to attend, many New York staff flew over for the occasion. There were also representatives from the Far East, Europe and Australasia. There was lots of networking, excellent food, clay pigeon shooting on the lawn, golf if you wanted, boating on the lake with strawberries, Champagne and Pimms and a gallop if that was your thing. There was a jazz band on the lawn and a string quartet in the hall.

Alexander kept a look out for Marina whom he saw at a distance from time to time but never managed to get to her alone as she was always busy with somebody whenever he managed to escape his mother; so that he was unable to interrupt. Penny kept him meeting people and making him engage with them in the various activities. He popped at clay pigeons with a big man from Brazil who clapped him on the shoulder a lot, played tennis with a gorgeous j.a.panese lady who treated him as if he were her pet Pekinese. There were several others. They asked him if he was enjoying himself and what he was going to study and what career plans he had. He stock response was that beyond studying cla.s.sics he had no idea what job he wanted. He wasn't even sure he wanted any kind of job. Penny gave him a good allowance which he a.s.sumed would be enhanced as he got older. He told a tall kindly Chinese man who persisted, that he'd thought a bit about journalism and was immediately introduced to a senior member of the McMa.n.u.s press organisation. So it went on all afternoon. Alexander met scores of senior JNO personnel and others while Thea was meeting even more. In the evening there was a dinner followed by a ball. During the dinner a telegram from Lucina Dodona arrived which was read out by the MC. There was much murmuring in the hall at this as many of the guests had come expecting her to appear. It wasn't that Penny had invited them on false pretences, even she had thought Lucina would arrive. After all it had been her idea. The telegram said that she regretted she was unable to come in person but that the CEO Europe Division, Penny Conway had an announcement to make on her behalf. She had intended to come but was prevented by circ.u.mstances beyond her control. Penny stood up from her chair where she was flanked by her children aware there was a sense of disappointment in the room.

'Ladies and gentlemen, I hope this little party has been enjoyable and I too regret the inability of the Dodona's to be with us to share our delight in the coming of age of Alexander and Thea. Most of us know how close Zarian and Lucina feel to these children who so much represent the future of our society. It is to the children of their generation that we will eventually deliver the fruits of our work in our various endeavours. The announcement I have to make is that from next Monday Thea Conway will be joining JNO at its subsidiary base on Ios. So you will being seeing and hearing from her from time to time. Alexander is to go up to Cambridge to study and we hope to see him in the Firm in due course. I know you will wish them both well and I ask you to drink a toast with me to the health and welfare of them both on this occasion.'

Gla.s.ses were raised and there was a chorus of ,'For they are jolly good fellows.' Alexander rose to thank everybody for making his and Thea's day so special and his mother for putting up with them for so long and that he hoped they had all had a good time and that he hoped to meet them all again one day if, and only if he joined the Firm. He sat down feeling immeasurably stupid. Thea spoke after him. Any sense of disappointment in the room vanished with Thea's precocity. She hoped she offered the company her gift for seeing issues and a way of solving problems. She spoke of the ma.s.sive task facing JNO and expressed a depth of wisdom for one so young beyond education or erudition. She spoke eloquently of her one desire to come into the Firm as soon as she finished high school, insisting the experience would be better than university, and that she felt old enough to play a full part, with their help and how she expected to have a thoroughly interesting and productive time.

There was a poise and authority about Thea that entranced her audience and they all secretly agreed she was right and just and that having her in the company was exactly the right thing to happen. Alexander was totally eclipsed from their minds and they all forgot everything except how right they were to do what they did for JNO The following day Penny nevertheless felt bad about the non-appearance of Lucina and felt let down and demeaned by both her and Thea. She felt something beyond her control had occurred but had no proof anything was happening and no way of retaliating. So she let it ride while feeling foiled. The truth was that ever since she opened the letter from Lucina in Paris, she knew something was going on and that Lucina made her too busy for it to matter. She knew it concerned Thea and Alexander but no one would tell her why or how. Whenever she considered the question a veil was drawn. There were too many things to do, advantages to exploit, situations to handle. Determined to sustain herself without answers from sources which would not divulge their secrets she was forced to use her considerable intellectual powers to pattern the world in ways which made sense to her. She truly believed in the way the Firm achieved its ends. She was no feminist in the anti-men, bra-burning sense, but deplored the machismo territorialism of the men she met, and would not see the world exploited. She had long suspected her children were born for a reason. She knew in the part of her which had given up asking questions that it had something to do with the Firm and that Lucina was to play a leading role, she suspected Zarian was in it too and there were plans for Alexander and Thea. Even so she still felt used by these people and helpless in their presence.

On the highest unseen floor of the Olympic Building in New York Zeus and Hera were lounging comfortably after another delicious session of love-making. Zeus was pleased Hera continued to care so well for his needs. He considered it his due, naturally, but after the birth of the boy to the English girl, he had wondered if she would make things difficult. Relieved of his guilt, which in truth was really pleasure at apparently being allowed to get away with his infidelity, Zeus was even more inclined to let Hera manage the affair of Gaia's recovery than become involved himself. He saw how JNO was developing and was happy about how Hera used the material resources the Family had acc.u.mulated over the centuries. He saw she meant to carry out his design and involve the boy without Penny knowing anything. He smiled at the partic.i.p.ation of Themis masquerading as the twin. He had thought of asking what a t.i.taness and the queen of order and common sense in all Olympia, felt like to be re-born as a mortal with all their defects, but did not want Hera to find out that he knew about the implantation. He was glad the boy had such mentors as Themis and Mnemosyne, the guarantor of remembrance. Besides he had no idea how effective the child would be in carrying out his necessary part in the great plan.

'I see the boy is well educated my cuckoo.' Zeus crooned in his wife's ear, not wis.h.i.+ng to set any reverberations going about his begetting but wanting to show Hera how much he approved of her work on his behalf. Hera, never quite sure how much he knew, and suspecting he knew everything, but relying on him to allow her to continue without interference, stroked his inner thigh. As he lay back enjoying her attention she whispered.

'All goes well my Lord, the boy is of age and I will now set him loose on his task.'

Zeus, now seemingly taking more interest in his risen phallus than of the conversation asked casually, 'And who is to lead him to Hades for me?'

'Pan will communicate with him and Pan has access to the Underworld. You also need to know I have sent Haephestos as Hep Mulciber, technology expert, to Penny to help her in her work.'

'There are no problems then at your end, my love, to complicate our project?'

'None that cannot be handled, my Lord,' Hera caressed the Thunderer's now quivering manhood and he groaned with pleasure. 'There's the usual little difficulty of course.'

'Whaaa'ts thaaa't. Ooooh! Aah,' she increased the pressure of her fingers while gently squeezing the immortal s.c.r.o.t.u.m.

'Like all mortals they sense their connection with us but cannot understand it. It makes their behaviour unpredictable, I see it is counteracted wherever possible, but their free will is always a risk as you well know.'

Zeus was too pre-occupied to speak and Hera knew he had not been listening for the last several moments. She did not want him to be too aware of problems as this would tempt him to interfere. Diverted, he could not say he was not told of any difficulties, but she hoped he would take no notice. Hera was not too worried about the human tendency to self-hood despite the efforts of the G.o.ds, She would handle Penny through Haephestos and Thea and Mnemosyne would manage the boy. Pan would be sent to lead him on his journey and she herself would supervise the whole thing. Whatever false turns mortals made she could probably put them right. It was Zeus' bigger plan that really concerned her. What would happen once Yhawhe, he and Hades were present in the same times.p.a.ce? What would become of them after the confrontation he was inevitably setting up? If time allowed Gaia would be rescued, she would see to that. But what next? Zeus was playing with the fires of creation and she felt acutely uneasy.

Chapter 5.

Three years later on the official dot of five o'clock, on a sunny spring day, Alexander Conway left his office, eschewed the lift and walked down the seven flights of stairs to the vast, green, marble foyer of JNO's new London HQ. His eyes searched for his mother who was not immediately visible in the throng of office workers hurrying home. He waited for her by the bank of lifts, jostled by the crowd. He wore a dark pin-striped suit, his hair was cut and combed and he resembled many other of his fellow workers. Any casual observers, would have seen a relaxed, debonair and striking young man and they might have found it hard to believe he thought his suave manner was really built on no more than a fine suit of clothes and good grooming. He wasn't sure he belonged there. Maybe he did in the end, but it didn't feel like it. JNO he was constantly being told, was terribly interesting. Nevertheless he found its sheer size and the scope of its influence more than he really wanted to grasp. Here among the working crowd, he wondered if its fascinating delights, were for him. He'd worked for an entire month against the nap of his desire and was surprised to find there were aspects of the work that were enjoyable. So, was it cowardice or weakness of will or something more positive that made it all right to be standing there?

Certainly he felt coerced by Penny, ably aided and abetted by Thea. After the years of self-indulgence at Penny's expense, she told him straight that JNO was his birthright and had simply demanded he did a trial month to make up for her previous good will and expenditure. He had not long returned from a particularly wild and somewhat drunken trip to the Andes with a gang of college friends, where he had broken his leg in a skiing accident. When he could walk properly, Penny had said enough.

She had ordered, rather than invited him to lunch in a modish wine bar in Convent Garden, to, she said, celebrate his new first steps by joining the Firm. He read this as more of the 'taking in hand' process he'd been threatened with on his return. He'd found lying around with his leg in plaster made him unusually vulnerable to the strictures of both mother and sister. He supposed it was time to buckle down. Get on with the rest of his life, start now, no more gallivanting. This time, there seemed no escape from doing the sensible thing without outright rebellion which he thought about but knew he couldn't sustain in reality. It would mean cutting himself off deliberately from Nemmi, Thea and his mother. Impossible. Thea as usual had been particularly clear. Join the Firm, she had said when she met him at Heathrow to help him with his leg in a pot. It's really interesting. 'There's more adventure in JNO really Alex,' she'd said. 'Than all the flying around the world getting into sc.r.a.pes. Better to fly around for JNO doing something useful. You'll find it fascinating....really! Anyway JNO is ours for the future, Lucina says so and Ma wants us both there, it's for everybody's future.'

Thea accompanied him by taxi to convent Garden where they met Penny. They spoke amiably about this and that as family members will, wondering who was going to get to the point first, which happened when the waiter brought the coffee. Then Penny fixed him with her serious eye - and implicated Thea by a glance in her direction.

'I'm so glad you're coming in Alexander. You will have an excellent career, at last you can make something of yourself. You will start in s.h.i.+pping and can go on from there, it's where I began.'

Penny unable to stop herself deliberately rode over his usual opposition to things to do with the Firm, ignoring his objections and the unspoken dissonance between them, so was more brusque than she liked. It was always like this with him and it was always unsatisfactory.

He had hesitated, not having much of a leg to stand on. 'It's not really for me Ma. I don't want to join the Firm. I mean like....you know.....I don't have any feel for it, not like Thea has. I mean aren't the two of you enough for it; for JNO I mean? There you both are giving it all the hours there are, why do you need me too?' This response was prompted by the old resistance which now came over him again.

'What else are you going to do Alexander?' Penny asked in her 'not to be gainsaid' voice. 'You've been playing around for a long time now. You don't have anything to do'.

His voyaging had shown him some of the extent of the ravages of commercial enterprise in the more remote as well as the more populated parts of the Earth. The Firm at least was doing its best to repair the damage and find alternatives, he could be part of that; he had no problem at all with that view. Just because he felt this pull against the Firm didn't mean he had to oppose it on principle. He recognised that parts of it were okay.

'There's no future in your current behaviour - and you know it, said Thea softly. 'You know it too, I know you do.'

'You should try to be more like your sister,' said Penny, He had often tried to be more like Thea. To accept at once her powerful grasp of the best thing to do in any given circ.u.mstances. He knew the pair of them were right and it would be good to use their practicality to clarify his own confused response to an incoherent world. Why not gratefully accept their stability, their certainty and learn from them? He argued with himself up hill and down dale and couldn't find any good reason other than his ill defined need for resistance.

So there he was in JNO at the end of his month's trial, unable any longer to deny the emptiness of the playboy life which was rapidly becoming his trademark. So he'd played at being a trainee buyer of precious metals and minerals on the first rung of the ladder, trying to master the mysteries of the s.h.i.+pping office; bills of lading, insurance and freight rates. Nothing in his previously unfocussed life had prepared him for the minutiae of the s.h.i.+pping office; neither had it prepared him for being rudely awakened in the morning by alarm at an hour he had only dimly heard of, to strap-hang in the Underground and clamourously disappear into its black hole.

The cosseted rich boy regarded the people scurrying through the foyer to join the flow in the street beyond, as so many ants on the floor of the city jungle, foraging for a living. None of them seemed to be enjoying it. n.o.body acknowledged anybody else, they didn't appear to have any communal purpose, each wrapped up in themselves, focussing on the middle distance, avoiding eye or body contact. He watched their movements, amazed how so many people could be crowded so closely without communication. Now he was part of all this, another worker-ant in the giant heap of making a living.

The building surrounding him was equal to the vastness of JNO. An ant-hill of gla.s.s, chrome and concrete, warrens and corridors, a honeycomb of boxes, designed to squeeze excess value from each inhabitant in the great economic machine that tick-tocks the world. And, he was one of the lucky ones, an heir of the queen ant herself. His destiny among the gla.s.s and chrome was a.s.sured, given certain minimum provisos of application. The future was bright with promises of deals, the excitement of the chase to swell the already immense profits of the pervasive JNO conglomerate.

So what if he was seduced by this promise and was delivering himself up to the inevitable without a fight? Did it matter if he was trapped somewhere between the jungle of his inner mind and this promissory ant-heap of the outer world? What if he wasn't really able to come to terms with any of it? Did anyone?

He had run out of alternatives and had submitted to the daily Tube-ride, the expensive suit and even the haircut, though this only after much protest. Thea and Penny had immense satisfaction toting him round like a mobile coat-hanger in men's outfitters from Bond Street to Knightsbridge via chromium unis.e.x hairdressers, populated by vacuous nymphs, all thighs and conditioner. He was surprised to find he liked being pampered, and felt good well turned-out.

He learned quickly that the right image, was an important mystery ingredient in the sum of the components which added up to the correct gravitas expected in the JNO universe if he was to be thought of seriously. Ironically, the uniform gave him more of a readiness to travel the Tube and he discovered it also gave him an added standing among the denizens of the s.h.i.+pping office. Of course the name Conway might have helped. He was clearly on his way to being a somebody. Why was it that he couldn't quite take it seriously?

I need to come to grips with myself, he thought. To get my ducks in a row before committing myself. The problem was his particular ducks seemed to like their personal freedom. It would help if I knew what my ducks were exactly, perhaps then I could make them line-up. Certainly both his mother and Thea had lots of them well trained to march in unerringly straight lines all the time - or else pate!

I should be more like Thea and have more certainty about what matters, be a go-getter. She had 'gone off' and 'got' before she could walk, no questions asked and no quarter given. 'Never complain, never explain', she would say, tossing her glossy, black mane, and sweeping from rooms. He thought his mother also went in some awe of her. Thea was outside her control, her powerful predisposition for action outside the patterning of Penny's own. He was far less pragmatic or determined than his mother, but they shared a sense of doubt and an awareness of the intangibles of the world and gave them value despite their lack of price in the market place. Perhaps she indulged him as a way of handling her problem with Thea?

He watched the numbers on the floor indicator diminish as the penthouse lift finally came to rest uncharacteristically at the ground floor. Usually it swept imperiously down to the sub-bas.e.m.e.nt to allow the ill.u.s.trious to un.o.btrusively exit directly into their limousines. His mother emerged from its s.h.i.+ny walnut interior accompanied, to his surprise, by the statuesque Lucina Dodona, and there was a third pa.s.senger Alexander could not quite make out.

Lucina Dodona, the President of JNO commanded an authority which demanded automatic respect. All the old feelings from Ios rose up in him. His only memory of her was from Ios and once when he had been introduced while escorting his mother to a formal diplomatic dinner. He of course heard about her all the time. The same overwhelming awe he had always felt in her presence, was rekindled now.

Her age was difficult to pin-point, around forty but with the bloom of a woman in her best years. 'People' magazine always described her as the 'Ageless G.o.ddess'.

The crowd instinctively hushed and perceptibly gave ground to Lucina and her companions as she stepped from the lift. All Alexander consciously knew of her was that she and her husband Zarian, owned Olympic Holdings of which JNO was a significant subsidiary. Zarian Dodona ran the American mother company and was reputed to be the world's richest man. The Dodona's were universal figures. However they never gave interviews nor put themselves in the limelight. Nevertheless, all the right people made sure they were seen with them when they could, presidents, prime-ministers, luminaries of the stage and screen, royalty, major and minor, all offered them house-room and more.

He knew from the glossy pages of 'People Magazine' that the family name was ancient, once well known in Europe and then a long time forgotten. In Greece it had been current for ages, but it was relatively new on the international stage. In ten years JNO had become a giant, involving almost anything derived from the productive earth and fifteen years further on, had budgets envied by governments many of which they indirectly and discretely may well have controlled. His mother of course, had been Lucina's a.s.sistant from the beginning.

The third person in the lift, emerged from the background. He kept himself slightly aloof from the two women and simply materialised from the polished woodwork.

Try as he might, Alexander could not overcome the feeling that this person was the most bizarre as well as the ugliest little man he had ever seen. He stood around five feet, wonderfully dapper in spats, striped trousers and a morning coat. These archaic trappings made him amusing, but strangely, seemed to fit with him without incongruity, although they did nothing to conceal that he was all angles, knees, elbows, pointed ears and very hairy. Long russet locks jutted over his collar and stuck straight up from his crown. The hair on his head mingled with his hairy face and pointed goatee beard, and a wicked grin played around his large s.h.a.ggy lips stretching into a half-smile, to disclose little tombstone teeth. He bent slightly from the waist as if in constant back-pain.

Penny quickly spotted Alexander, smiled thinly in recognition and came over to him. Behind her, unrolling like a flag, he heard the commanding tones of Lucina.

'Ah - Alexander my boy,'her voice resonated with a quiver of excitement. She beamed at him. 'My dear child, you remember me do you not?' Penny stood aside to allow Lucina to get a full view of her son.

Of course he remembered her, how could anyone forget? He was however, surprised, and at the same time shocked to his core, that so ill.u.s.trious a person remembered him. All the old feelings surged in him and he knew without a doubt they came from her. He also noticed the way his mother allowed the older woman bustle into her s.p.a.ce, but had no time to reflect as Lucina's unexpected frontal a.s.sault bore down on him unsettling his confidence and leaving him quite unsure exactly how to address this imposing figure.

'h.e.l.lo...er... Mrs...er...Dodona,' Alexander stammered, his composure fully deserting him.

'Please, call me Lucina, everyone does you know.' The 'please' was warmth personified and accompanied by such an intensity of heartfelt regard that Alexander loved her instantly. This unexpected emotional twist did nothing for the debility of will-power which again a.s.sailed him in her presence, merely adding to the weakness he already felt in his knees.

'We expect great things from you at JNO, don't we Penelope? He has been well educated for his work, do you not think so?'

Alexander was not sure if the 'We' was royal or not, nor if he was supposed to reply. Before he could open his mouth Lucina continued, 'What a beauty he is Penny, didn't we do well with him. You'll pay attention eh Pannie? Keep an eye open, Ne?'

She addressed the goat-like man who had sidled up close to Alexander, adding to his discomfiture. Pannie's grin broadened as he examined Alexander up and down like a beast in an auction. He then somehow re-insinuated himself beside Lucina. Alexander thought of a mischievous Siamese cat, using his owner as a s.h.i.+eld for excessive effrontery.

'Allow me to introduce Pannie Ljeschi, he is my right-hand man. He is in all our little secrets, my Alexiki, he will be useful to you.'

Alexander felt more than heard, the use of the diminutive and gave a sudden frisson of mixed pleasure and alarm. Her sincere familiarity folded him into the warmth of her presence, an involuntarily sense of closeness and affection gathered him under her protecting mantle of dignity and offered him the merest touch of her power. She seemed to explain all his anxieties. Before the moment had quite pa.s.sed altogether, he decided he was over-reacting and she was probably just interested in the welfare of the son of a colleague as might any friendly employer, but he was not convinced. Nevertheless, he felt somewhere in the region of his stomach that she had begun to control him.

He watched Pannie who was grinning broadly in his direction while seeming to nod. He felt subtly overpowered - these people exuded strength and authority in spite of their extreme amiability and they also seemed to know all about him.

'Pannie knows a lot about JNO's business,' Lucina continued, radiating her smile. 'And will guide you in and out of its little mysteries, you will find him invaluable, I do - I commend him to you. But you must have your little tete-a-tete with Penelope, this is your first month with us, no? Please, Penelope, you may remove him from us now, but do not keep him shut away, such beauty will have its place - how you say - more central in things. Endaxi. Come Pannie, we must go.'

She turned imperiously; the throng in the foyer parted like the Red Sea, and she and her strange companion swept through the crowds on the pavement to be swallowed by a large grey Mercedes parked on double yellow lines; which immediately made an impossibly fast 'U' turn in the dense traffic and disappeared.

Alexander was left exhilarated, weak-kneed and breathless.

Had he been less discomfited, he would have seen Penny on the other hand struggling to control her fury. Grim faced she gripped him by the arm and led him through the revolving doors, onto the street and into a nearby pub. She caught the barman's eye who recognised her and motioned her to a small empty booth.

Alexander was now caught up in her unease. A cloud had descended on both of them with the executive lift. Penny was highly agitated. He felt the coming of awkward questions. Through his own inadequacy he felt for her. Clearly things were different now he was in the Firm. There was a businesslike air between them which was new. This was the real world. He wasn't sure he could bear too much of it.

He watched her order and receive a gin and tonic which she sipped while she struggled to regain her composure, he paid attention to his own gla.s.s of bitter. He was both relieved and disappointed that she did not allow the moment to risk frankness.

'I'm sorry if you were startled by her, Lucina doesn't usually come down in the lift like that, you know, publicly, but she so wanted to meet you and she can be so indiscreet when she's impatient. I think she surprised a lot of people by speaking to you in a public place like that. It's rare she appears so openly, you may find you are treated more respectfully by your colleagues after that encounter, word travels fast in JNO'

He didn't know what to say so he played with his beer mat, looked around at the bijou city pub filling up with executives delaying the journey home, and drank his ale. At last all he could think of saying was, 'she's quite a character! I think I'm in a state of shock....... and who's the little bloke with her? What's his name, Panic? He's scary, did you see how he looked me over?'

'That's Pannie, Pannie Ljeschi, he's of Russian origin, I think, speaks eleven languages fluently, but all in the lowest possible vernacular. He's quite cunning and protects Lucina in public, I don't know what their private relations.h.i.+p is, but he's often with her.'

'What, like a kind of bodyguard?'

'No not really, not in that sense, although he is capable of some surprising acrobatics. I've seen him stop determined journalists from getting near her by simply getting in their way and confusing their efforts to bother her, they sort of trip up over him and each other. I first thought it was stupidity, but it's not. The rat-pack who know, give him a wide birth. It's partly because of him that Lucina is one of the few really famous people who's hardly ever bothered by the media.' She paused and changed the subject abruptly. 'How has your first month been?'

Normally Alexander would have been glad of the deliberate change of subject, to avoid the areas where it was dangerous to venture and risky to explore. Where dragons lay in uncharted depths and which they normally tacitly agreed to let lie. He was however truly shaken by the encounter at the lift. A real live dragon had risen from the deep, or rather descended from the heights, and breathed fire on him. He couldn't get out of his mind the image of its companion demon, the grinning Pannie Ljeschi. Hadn't Lucina thrust him forward as his potential companion?

'She said some amazing things I don't understand - and I can't get that weird little Pannie creature out of my mind.'

Penny smiled mirthlessly. Trust Lucina, she thought, to jump the gun through impatience before she could break him in gently herself. d.a.m.n-it! Lucina had no idea of the power of her presence, or more probably, she didn't care. Blast her! It was as if Lucina was deliberately making it difficult for her, something quite possible where Lucina was concerned. Lucina loved running high risks and got away with them; which meant that others got caught in her wake. Penny acted quickly to handle this new situation and she relied on Alexander's easy going nature to help her to break Lucina's spell.

'You're being far too serious about this. She was just being pleasant. She's always expansive like that with people she takes to, and she's taken to you, she's got an eye for a pretty face and you're very handsome, now we've taken you in hand. She's Greek remember, you mustn't pay too much notice of her 'enthusiasm', it's just....a mannerism, it doesn't mean anything, really darling, don't take her seriously....I mean, yes she's a serious person and powerful like you say, but she and I have been friends and colleagues for years and she naturally has an interest in my family. She sees Thea from time to time, and gushes over her in exactly the same way. Thea doesn't get all fl.u.s.tered by her, and neither should you, just a.s.sume it as her natural curiosity.'

'That's Thea though, she wouldn't would she?' he replied. 'But did you see those eyes, you could get lost in those eyes.' He was still mesmerised.

'Yes she's a real character,' she forced a little laugh. 'You're right about the eyes, I often get lost in them myself. She has this wonderful way of making you seem the most important person in the universe when she's talking to you, she gives you her full attention, drawing you into her orbit. I admit to being captivated by her, even though she exasperates me to distraction, but she's like that with everyone, the whole of JNO why do you think the Dodona's are so popular? Everyone who is in contact with her feels the same.'

'Some mannerism! She ought to carry a health warning!' They were silent for a moment. 'Anyhow,' continued Alexander 'what am I do about little Mr. Pannie 'whatsisname', and what do you think she meant about me being more central to things?'

Penny was concerned because she was convinced Lucina had plans for him, which she'd never fully divulged beyond making it clear that she would always be on the alert for him as the child of Alexis. Ever since those first days Penny had never had real answers from Lucina and what she said about being mesmerised was the truth. There were times when Lucina exasperated her beyond belief. All attempts at explanation met with the same sidetracking responses. Mostly she ignored it, but occasionally it got to her and she thought about leaving the Firm. She didn't think Lucina would stand directly in her way, but she was afraid - of what she wasn't sure. She had skills and knowledge for which many of JNO's rivals would pay dearly. Some had already gone to extraordinary lengths to head-hunt her. But she hadn't been able to abandon Lucina and all she owed her. Above all the remaining central mystery of Alexis held her to Lucina.

Most of the time all this was in the background. Together they schemed and plotted take-overs, union deals, undercutting here, share deals there, globe trotting, mixing with the who's who of the world while the Firm grew inexorably. It was clear Lucina cherished their varied relations.h.i.+p, now, as an older sister, sometimes as a mother, as well as confidant, mentor and colleague. But the purpose, the real point which Penny was certain went beyond the business, was never clarified.

All this piling up of influence and power must have an outcome, but what? The Dodona's simply grew and grew and why had she never met Zarian? He always arrived just after she left, or left just before she arrived. They always missed by inches. She had never even so much as seen a decent photograph of him.

Now, was crunch time - Lucina had raised in Alexander a need to investigate the dissonance Lucina created between them. He needed answers to the same questions she had allowed to lie dormant. She was clear that although she had made her trade-off with Lucina she could not ask that he accept the same terms. It was her responsibility to stop the child of Alexis, the key-stone of her adult life, from being enmeshed in the same net which ensnared her and which she had unthinkingly set for him.

If only she had left the Dodona's and avoided all contact with Lucina and the Firm and prevented this moment of his first real contact with the central enigma of Lucina which she knew too well once encountered could be neither answered nor ignored. He was spellbound by her as she had been on Ios. He may even remember her from that time despite the unaccountable fuzziness of her own recollections. Notwithstanding her cleverness, logical mind, status and power in the Firm; the only thing she knew for certain was the mystery of Lucina, the mystery of Zarian and above all the mystery of the Firm.

To ackle Lucina was not within her power but she thought with foreboding that Alexander might try. He always had resisted what she wished for him. She had never pressed the point, hoping that common sense and the excitement of the Firm would prove enough of a distraction until he bedded down. She believed she had read him correctly. In contrast, the lack of explanation for Thea often made her blood run cold. The fact of her birth had never made sense to her and had meant she could never really accept Thea as her begotten daughter. This was another central mystery which she tried to ignore.

She searched the face opposite. Maybe the answers were somehow in him, in his life. As always she shrugged off the feeling as beyond her control. But she couldn't shrug off the feeling of being a phoney. She who controlled so much else in her life, was sitting before her son knowing her grip on the real things were based on the will of others. It would be a relief to blurt it all out to break the tension once and for all - to share it with Alexander. Something nevertheless constrained her; why burden him with her problems? If she were a vehicle for the will of others and if he was an instrument of a destiny beyond her power, what use was it to tell him, he'd only ask futile questions of her and torment both of them. It was best left as it was. Those with the control would no doubt exercise it. She would protect him as best she could whatever happened. Lucina had never done anything to hurt either her or hers, quite the opposite in fact. What could there be to worry about? A little relieved by this logic she continued in her attempt to divert him but without believing she could succeed.

There's nothing to worry about Alexander. Believe me I've had more experience of Lucina than most, that's her - really - normal for her....forget it.' She heard herself speak a fraction more earnestly than she intended, but as convincingly as she was able.

He felt her demons were on the move, felt them symbiotically and was distressed by her discomfiture and uncharacteristic lack of certainty. His world stood squarely upon hers, she was the turtle upon which it sat, if she wobbled he would fall off.

Changing the subject again. Penny said, 'tell me about the s.h.i.+pping office, what's it like? I'll bet it's changed a lot since I began there.'

If he ignored the wobble, he thought, perhaps it wasn't really happening, an illusion, like the meeting with Lucina, only a chance encounter like the others. Not anything significant, not really - ignore it. That's the thing to do. Nothing had happened.

'I'll bet it hasn't, he replied colluding with her. 'I think you'd still recognise the types. The main difference is that the place was probably awash with paper when you were there, well there's quite a bit of it still, but what with everyone having a PC we can contact anyone anywhere about anything - no paper. I'm on the network. Got my own pa.s.sword. Actually it's quite interesting. Only an hour or two ago I was in touch with an agent in Honduras about iron ore s.h.i.+pments. Now that's quite a long way from olive-oil. I'm immensely impressed, JNO has tentacles everywhere, I'm overwhelmed by the sheer scale of it. How on earth do you keep track of everything?' He hesitated and went on thoughtfully. 'I mean it's all very fascinating all this stuff bought here, sent there, insured by this one, s.h.i.+pped by that one, sold on via Durban, reappearing in Cairo and so on ad infinitum. I know it's business and all that, but I can't seem to take it seriously. I mean I know it's got to go on - Iron ore is useful stuff of course, and everyone in the chain needs their cut or what's the point? But it does seem all one way traffic. Produce from the third world and the big money in the first. When I mentioned this to the head of s.h.i.+pping, he stared at me funny and said what did I think it was about and was I some kind of eco-nut or something. Don't get me wrong, I'm really quite interested in how it all happens, the wheels within wheels. There's a kind of patterning to it, a shape, a tangible world of things happening, people doing, transporting, s.h.i.+fting money, like a sort of business orchestra. Part of me wants to know what it's for, what's my role, where are the Dodona's, where do you, and Thea, all of you fit in? But part of me also wants to ignore it, but I can't think of anything else to do with myself'.