Lanier, so far, had made his journey unnoticed. He had helicoptered from the nearest airport and taken a motel just outside of town. After his dinner, he had taken an idle stroll through the town, past the little "shoppes" on main street, and he was surprised and disappointed at just how much the town had grown since he had last been there, years ago.
Whatever else went wrong with the country, there were still those devotees to summer and winter recreation who could still afford—both financially and spiritually—to come here and play. And play they did. The stores were expensive and quaint, the people outrageously beautiful. Rumors constantly circulated of debauchery and unholy fun. And no one appeared to be over thirty-five, and no one appeared to be in the least bit poor. Aspen hadn't changed in a hundred years.
Christy's map and directions were explicit and detailed. The drive up to Burton Shaughnessy's hideaway didn't take him long. Tucked away behind a wilderness of pines, and partly lodged into the side of the mountain as if a giant woodsman had shoved it in like a logging wedge, the mansion glowed with the party which was already in progress. And, much to Lanier's surprise, there was music pounding out through the encompassing forest.
In front of the mansion was a circular driveway and a wide lawn that boasted several pieces of modern sculpture. Lanier recognized a giant Calder stabile that was also part mobile. Its garish crimson discs turned slowly in the presence of a slight wind. In the driveway itself was an odd mix of vehicles ranging from expensive gassers to steamers like Lanier's own rented Bronco. There was even a very unfashionable army half-track amphibian that was at least a century, and two wars, old.
Americans and their toys
, he thought.
"This should be amusing," he murmured to himself as he walked up the graveled driveway to the front door.
The party was well into third gear, if the din was any reliable indication. The door vibrated from the inside with music and laughter.
At least they're laughing and having a good time
, he thought. The Syndrome would have a field day at a gathering like this if the party chemistry wasn't just right.
Like the Masque of the Red Death
.…
Lanier decided not to knock, realizing that this was no formal cocktail party where decorum reigned and etiquette came before all else.
Inside, he encountered a rainbow of luminescent colors. Everyone sported the ornamentation that the fashions of the time demanded. Several people, though, were wearing tuxedos, and one very plastered young lady wore a green khaki jumpsuit and an army helmet with infrared field goggles strapped to the top. African War surplus, he reasoned. She probably owned the half-track outside as well.
Then there were several people in ski bibs; others wore flannel shirts and hiking boots.
Locals, no doubt
, he thought,
prepared for anything
. He felt suddenly obvious, and knew that he wouldn't fit in. But he wasn't dressed any differently than anyone else. No one was looking at him, but he still felt awkward.
A small, brown-eyed, large-breasted girl in farmer's overalls flitted by, holding a large beer mug with a swizzle stick lurching sideways in it.
"Hi," she said cheerfully. "They're in the kitchen mixing up this stuff, whatever it is." She held up the mug triumphantly. "Go on in and try it. It's great!"
Lanier couldn't ignore her enthusiasm. Besides that, he wanted to introduce himself to his host.
The main room of the mansion, which held the bulk of the party, did not reflect the usual ostentatiousness that most domiciles of the wealthy seemed to require. In fact, Shaughnessy had kept the decor quite simple and utilitarian. This whole floor—and there appeared to be at least three—was totally for socializing. Two fireplaces blazed at opposite ends of the room, and four large wooden beams were exposed along the ceiling. The floor was sunken by about a meter, and cushions lay everywhere. On them were a score of people in various stages of inebriation or hallucination. Whatever these people did for their livelihoods, one thing was certain: all of them were rich. And they showed it very well.
Lanier found the kitchen with no problem. It was the water hole. There was enough movement to the party that he didn't feel out of place, finally realizing that everyone was loose enough to accept a stranger in their midst. In fact, everyone was quite friendly.
Burton Shaughnessy stood in the middle of a chattering group of friends of his, who were mostly young. He held a small, almost petite, glass of the brew that came from a large kettle squatting on the kitchen table. Shaughnessy wore a large tan Stetson and a bolo tie that held the largest single piece of turquoise that Lanier had ever seen.
Here
was the garishness that the mansion lacked. Another piece of turquoise, this one of a pale greenish tint, was on his belt buckle. When Shaughnessy turned around to refill his drink, his belt read "Burt" on the back.
Lanier pondered Shaughnessy's character.
Put him on a horse and we'd see just what kind of cowboy he is
.…
Receiving a glass of the compound from a man who seemed, despite his casual dress, to be either part of the staff or the catering service, Lanier looked around the kitchen. Food, in varying states of preparation, lay everywhere. Shaughnessy had apparently hired the United States Army to cater the supply. Perhaps
they
were the ones who came in the half-track. There was so much food that Lanier got the impression Shaughnessy expected more than just a few friends to show up for his party.
The ceiling pounded. From the sounds that were coming from down the stairs and thundering through the roof, Lanier surmised that there were twice as many people upstairs as there were downstairs. The band was somewhere directly overhead.
Shaughnessy caught Lanier's eye as he stood in the doorway looking lost.
"'Scuse me," he said to his compadres, plowing a meaty hand through the crowd that engulfed him. Shaughnessy was a large man and moved through his guests like an icebreaker.
"Shit, how the hell are you?" He grabbed Lanier's right hand, squeezing it to the bone. "You're Francis Lanier. I recognize you from your picture in the scandals. Glad that you could make it."
"Glad to be here," Lanier smiled, overwhelmed by Shaughnessy's size. He was bigger than Charlie Gilbert.
Shaughnessy clapped a hand to Lanier's shoulder. "Man, this is gonna be
great
!" he bellowed, moving out into the hallway. "We got about a thousand people coming here tonight."
Lanier felt as if he were in the presence of a beached whale. Shaughnessy's girth was absolutely comic and endearing. The man was powerful and friendly.
"What can I call you? Frank? Francis?" He made a funny face, his nose glowing slightly from the alcohol. "Please, God, not 'Francis.' I couldn't live with myself." He laughed uproariously.
Lanier felt as if he'd just been rechristened. "Fran or Frank," he laughed with the man, "will do. Call me anything you want."
What an odd person
, he thought, so he countered with, "What do I call you?
Burton
?"
They grinned like poker players. Shaughnessy snorted. "Hell, just call me Burt. Just about everyone does, except my ex-wives. I won't tell you what they call me."
"I can guess."
The two of them laughed.
Lanier wasn't finding it too difficult to like this man, and he could understand how Burton Shaughnessy survived amid the barracudas of Hollywood and New York. And it wasn't too hard to figure why this man was one of the richest individuals associated with the movie industry.
Of course, as a Stalker, Lanier himself wasn't without means. Shaughnessy seemed to sense this as they stood there talking.
"Well, hey, Frank, tell me about what you do. Sounds incredible to me, since it's never happened to me yet" Shaughnessy took a huge drink, but continued before Lanier could respond. "Of course, I lost my last wife to the disease, and I got a daughter at Syracuse right now I haven't heard from in weeks. But, hell, you know kids. Never stay in touch." He was jolly about everything, it seemed. "I didn't know you people were for real. I guess it's happening to just about everyone these days."
"I'm sorry about your wife."
"Hey, listen pal, she deserved it. She was as crazy as they come." They entered the large main room. "I hear you live up in Malibu Canyon."
"Yes, I did."
"Did? Couldn't take the Canyon crowd, I suppose."
"No, it's not that. It's the only place near Los Angeles I could live. I had to move because of the press exposure when I saw the President." Lanier made it clear in his intonation that the matter was to be dropped.
If Shaughnessy got the signal, he didn't visibly let on.
"Oh, right! I know exactly what you mean. Jesus, I was filming a new holo in this dingy little suburb outside São Paulo, and hundreds of these stupid peasants—and I mean
stupid
—came out of the hills and wanted to be movie stars. I know what you mean. They fucked up everything. I think it was someone from Abraxas Studios who announced that we'd be filming. They've been on my ass for twenty years. We had to move out of town to finish the damn thing."
Lanier nodded, taking a calculated pause to taste the substance in his glass. He would allow a little alcohol tonight. But
only
a little.
"Hey, well, listen, Frank." He patted Lanier on the back. "Why not just mingle around for a while. Get to know some of the folks here. I'll be honking upstairs and down all night long. I do want to sit and talk a bit, though. I gotta go and make sure my ladies can hold up for the night. If they go, I won't have anything to do with myself."
He winked like a uncle.
"No problem." Lanier raised his glass as Shaughnessy weaved down the hallway, his Stetson was like a wild bull above all the heads he passed in the crowd.
Music tumbled down the stairs, pushing ahead of it an attractive blond couple. Lanier recognized the man as a well-known movie actor who owned a ranch in northern Colorado. He was very famous, and now very looped. Lanier began wondering where the actor's wife was, but then tabled his morality, realizing that here in Aspen, one didn't concern oneself with trivialities. The actor seemed better paired with his companion anyway.
Lanier mounted the stairs, rolling back the sleeves of his shirt. He had decided to wear casual dress for the evening, and that meant just shirt, Levi's, and boots. He hated foppery and hated to spend his money on the styles and gimcracks that hung in the windows of the best New York fashion salons. And Shaughnessy wasn't at all offended by such casual dress. Shaughnessy himself looked like a buffoon, Lanier thought to himself, but then again, this is a party, not a fashion show,
or
an inquisition.
But Shaughnessy had style. Lining the walls of the hallway were several valuable paintings. Lanier recognized a Chagall and an Oscar Kokoschka. They were originals. There was also a small Picasso etching, and in the main room was a very large, three-meter square Fritz Scholder original showing an Indian chief reposing serenely with a dog that rested its head in his lap. It was extremely valuable.
Upstairs there was another enormous room, and this one had the band. The band was a small consortium of jazz musicians who had hooked up all of their instruments into a bank of portable synthesizers and mellotrons. The guitar and piano keyboard played their normal chords and notes, but they came out sounding like crystal wind-chimes, or vibrating sheets of tin. Sometimes the sounds reminded him of the vermilion rushing of blood in veins. Lanier closed his eyes, testing the vibrations, testing the presence of possible harmonies on which the Syndrome could feed. He assumed that everyone here was on Baktropol. Its amphetamine quality might account for the high pitch of the party itself.
He soaked up the sound, calming himself inwardly. There was not enough alcohol in his drink to affect his perceptions yet, but he knew that he would have to quit drinking soon.
What he felt he didn't consider too dangerous. Though delightful, the music was unfamiliar enough not to arouse the disease. Whether the people here at the party were fairly normal, or borderline psychoneurotics, he couldn't tell. But the party seemed to be progressing well. He knew that parties were for letting off steam, for raising hell. No one he knew had ever vanished simply by letting his or her emotions reach a peak. But, given how the disease was changing, anything could happen.
It was because he was a Stalker that he felt somewhat apprehensive, despite the festive atmosphere of the party. He, perhaps of them all, knew what the consequences of succumbing would be.
On the other hand, there was no small amount of anxiety in his heart about the possibility of meeting Ellie Estevan. When it turned out that she hadn't originally succumbed weeks ago, but was merely missing on a whirlwind romance, Lanier had come up with a lot of questions and no answers. Mainly he was concerned about just who had requisitioned that she be stalked. Was she playing games with the Stalkers? He didn't know. And meeting her here, with so many different people, he couldn't help being suspicious about the games the rich people play. He knew that he didn't belong here, and he refused to accept the fact that he was someone important.
But Ellie Estevan would fit right in.
Lanier circled the band and found another set of stairs that led up to the roof. The roof of the mansion ran into the mountainside, and a number of people reclined on chairs, crouching on benches at tables, and everyone was eating and drinking heartily. What caught his attention was the generator chugging away off to one side in a clump of low evergreens. A silver tank of propane shone like a landed torpedo in the half-moon's light.
Lanier noticed that Aspen had shut down its electricity after dark, except for the traffic lights and some streetlights. Ever since the dam at Lake Powell had been destroyed by eco-terrorists, most of the four-corners area was without power for occasional periods. The Denver stations had enough drain on their own, providing for a population of twelve million. And every community had to shut down after dark.