Jude

by Jeff Nesbit

  “Yes,” Gentry said. “Meet my wife, Kayla. She created Fortress and brought it here. I’m just the mechanic. Kayla is the creator.”

  “And you must be the enigmatic twin of Jude Asher, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, soon to be Senator Asher and president-in-waiting in just a matter of days,” Kayla said, with a slight nod. I couldn’t tell if she was serious or not. “We’re honored to see you here.”

  I looked back at Dr. Simons. “So that’s where the name of this place came from, then? This place is named after a new programming language built to run supercomputers?”

  “Exactly,” he said. “But since that early time, as many very talented and intellectually curious programmers have joined us and worked away at it—adding new and surprising complexity to it—we now have something vastly different than the original Fortress open-source programming language that Kayla once created and that both of them assembled here.”

  “So what is it now?”

  “Well, not to put too fine a point on it—and at the risk of bringing back the old ghosts that once haunted me—I would say that this is now as close an approximation to the mind of God that you’re likely to find on earth,” he answered.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Jude and I had begun to drift in opposite directions even before he became chairman of the Federal Reserve following his dramatic efforts to yet again risk everything in order to short the Chinese yuan and keep the dollar from crashing.

  The flattering profile in Forbes with the ridiculous and essentially unanswerable question—“Can He Save Us?”—hadn’t made matters any better for us. I knew Jude. And I could safely say that no other human being on the planet did.

  He was well on his way to a position where he could literally dictate the wealth of nations. I was still wondering why I was on the earth in the first place and about the meaning and frailty of human life. Jude had no time for such introspection. It was all I seemed to think about. He knew his own destiny.

  More and more, I found myself wondering if Jude’s master plan was worth it. As he gained control of pieces and places of the earth, I wondered about the cost—not to his soul, if such a thing existed, but simply to his humanity. He was becoming something other than a mere mortal with each passing day and new victory.

  The forces that Jude had called on since our childhood didn’t particularly bother me. I’d made peace in my own mind with the reality of Singen Prithar, the regents, and the others—those things—quite some time ago. They were lords of the world, pure and simple. If your aim was to master the earth, control it, bend it to your will, and subdue both peoples and nation-states for whatever purpose, then they were instruments of that war. They were necessary soldiers, from the captains and lieutenants to the foot soldiers. Jude had called on them for those purposes, and they obeyed.

  Genghis Khan was thought to have killed 40 million people in his efforts to conquer the world. In the modern era, both Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin had been responsible for the deaths of millions in their respective quests to tame and control great portions of the earth. Their aims had been to gain the world at whatever cost. In all cases, they used whatever means and methods they had at hand to achieve their military and political ends. History judged them as cruel, wanton killers. But history could not erase their ability to conquer. In that, they had been wildly successful—for a time—by simply ignoring the conventional laws of morality.

  I had no feeling, one way or the other, about Jude’s morality. I know that should have troubled me. I’m sorry that it did not. Perhaps it was because he was my twin, and I could not condemn him. Perhaps it was because I’d only ever seen him call on forces to achieve specific, personal goals—not attempt to destroy people or nations. Perhaps I was just naive and blind.

  I didn’t view Jude as particularly evil or even all that manipulative. He was just extraordinarily skilled at getting what he wanted by any means necessary. He was a walking, living, breathing embodiment of the concept that the ends do justify the means. By that standard, Jude was successful in his efforts to master the universe. The world did, seemingly, belong to him.

  Following his dramatic and quite successful move to keep the dollar from crashing, Jude had been compelled to accept the job as chairman of the Federal Reserve. The president’s chief of staff had called Jude to the White House so he could be offered the position. He was thirty-five when he was appointed and confirmed by the US Senate, making him the youngest Fed chairman ever—by a country mile.

  Jude didn’t even bother to ask me whether I’d agree to take over Asher Enterprises while he served as chairman of the Federal Reserve. He knew I’d never agree to work with Singen and the regents. I didn’t even need to have that conversation with him. He placed our assets in a blind trust, with Singen as caretaker, while he took control of the largest private banking system in the history of the world.

  In truth, Jude rarely asked for my counsel or advice on anything any longer. He didn’t require it for Asher Enterprises—he’d had my proxy for as long as either of us could remember. There was virtually no piece of advice I could offer that outranked what he received from his regents, counselors, and advisors. He no longer needed either a sidekick or a validator for his actions. He had an adoring public for that now.

  Now when he called me, it seemed like a summons. Which is precisely what it felt like the day he phoned to see if I could join him in Washington later that week to meet someone. He’d called me from aboard Air Force One as he was accompanying the president to the G8 Summit in Brussels. I was certain he’d gone out of his way to phone me from the president’s plane just to annoy me.

  “Why are you calling?” I asked wearily. “And did you really have to call me from Air Force One? It couldn’t have waited until you’d landed in Europe?”

  “This is a lot more fun,” Jude said. “Admit it.”

  “I won’t admit anything. So why’d you call?”

  “To make sure you can meet someone.”

  “Who?” Jude had stopped going to red-carpet events with Hollywood actresses and Ford models. In fact, I hadn’t seen a picture of him in the tabloids in ages. That, alone, should have told me something had changed.

  “You’ll see,” he said mysteriously. “You’ll like her. She has an exotic name and an even more exotic background. Plus, she’s beautiful, and she might be a princess because of the family she was adopted into …”

  “Wait,” I said. “She’s an orphan?’

  “Yes. Like us. And she may be the one.”

  “The one what?” I asked, a bit incredulous. It had never occurred to me that Jude would ever settle down. “Like the person you’re going to marry some day?”

  “Yes, maybe. I don’t know. We just met at a state dinner in Paris. We visited the Louvre the next day. She knew every artist, every story behind nearly every painting we came across. She is a tour de force.”

  “So she’s into art?”

  “Not just art. She seems to know something about nearly everything—politics, art, culture, history, even sports. She knew the story and history behind Alydar’s Ghost, for crying out loud!”

  “Half the world knows the backstory of Alydar’s Ghost and the Triple Crown, thanks to you and your big mouth,” I chided him gently.

  “Yeah, well, she knew the last five teams to win the Super Bowl, the World Series, and even the Stanley Cup. I don’t know those, and I’ll bet you don’t, either. I had to look them up just to see—and she was right. And then, for good measure, at dinner last night, she rattled off the names of every world leader in two dozen countries on all six continents. I’d asked her to name one or two, merely as a joke, and I had to stop her before she went through the entire list of countries on the planet.”

  “So, what, she has a photographic memory?”

  “Beats me. All I know is that she’s both the smartest—and most beautiful—woman I’
ve ever met.”

  I whistled softly. “That’s saying something, Jude. You aren’t easily impressed.”

  “So you’ll meet her? See what you think?”

  “You need my blessing for something like this? Since when?”

  “Since you’re the only family I have, which you somehow keep managing to forget. We’ll be in DC for a state dinner at the White House. I can get you two tickets at the president’s table. Can I count on you?”

  I closed my eyes. It really did feel like a summons. “Sure, why not? I’ll come meet your mystery princess, if you insist. But I can’t promise I’ll bring a date.”

  “Don’t worry. Just be there. And remember, it’s black tie. You can’t show up in your usual slacker suit.”

  It was pathetic, actually. Because I was sitting at the head table with the president and the first lady—not to mention the chairman of the Federal Reserve and his special guest—I had to endure not one, but three successive, meaningless conversations as I ran the gauntlet just to get to the first course of the meal.

  It turned out that there is an elaborate and quite strict protocol for state dinners at the White House. Who knew?

  First, I spoke to the White House social secretary. I quickly concluded that she had a thoroughly thankless job—all risk and very little reward. If she made a mistake, she was toast. And success was measured simply by the lack of mistakes. Then there was the White House chief usher. In past eras, this person might properly have been the lead servant. Now they had a fancier title. I didn’t envy this person his job, which seemed primarily to consist of making sure the food was served as unobtrusively as possible. And finally, there was the chief of protocol of the United States, who worked at the State Department. I had no idea what this person did, other than to make sure weird diplomatic gaffes didn’t occur. This, too, seemed like a particularly thankless job.

  I hadn’t even bothered to find out who this particular White House state dinner was honoring. Honestly, I didn’t care. I’d flown to DC on the shuttle from New York simply because I’d been summoned by Jude. It turned out that it was kind of a big deal as state dinners go. The king of Norway was in town. I wasn’t entirely sure how many kings and queens were left in various parts of the world. But surely there weren’t many of them left, so this had to be a bit special as these things went.

  When I finally cleared the diplomatic gauntlet and entered the actual State Dining Room, I scanned the room of elaborate, round tables to see if I could find my brother. When I finally saw him—standing next to the president—I knew instantly why I was here.

  I’d been to more red-carpet and eye-candy social events with Jude than I wanted to count since we’d inherited our fortune from the Ashers. I’d been to world premieres with the best-known actresses in Hollywood. I’d consorted with supermodels on immaculate beaches beneath sun-kissed villas in various parts of the world. I’d sat in owners’ boxes at Super Bowls and world championships with tall, tanned, and perfectly manicured women who’d won Miss Universe titles.

  None of them compared to the woman standing beside Jude across the room.

  Every single eye in the room—male and female—was stealing glances in her direction. Some did it unashamedly. Others did it furtively. But all tried, at some point, to look at the woman in the shimmering gold, floor-length dress with its modest neckline.

  It was nearly impossible to discern her ethnicity or what part of the world she hailed from. The dark brown features of her face were framed by smooth, shoulder-length black hair.

  As I made my way through the crowded room toward the head table, she turned her long neck in my direction. Her hair swept away from her face. Our eyes met. I could see the immediate recognition in her visage. She smiled at me. Despite my best intentions, I smiled back and did my best to still my heart.

  She separated herself as I approached the head table. She took three graceful steps away from the president’s party that was gathered, standing, beside the table and intercepted me before I could reach my brother and the others. She extended her left hand toward me, palm down. Again, despite my best intention, I took it. She squeezed it affectionately, as if we’d been friends for years.

  “Thomas, I am so happy that you agreed to join us,” she said. “I’ve so looked forward to this moment and our time together this evening.”

  I was slightly disoriented for a moment. Her beauty was magnified at such close range, making it difficult to think clearly.

  Jude looked over at that moment, caught sight of the two of us talking, and tilted his head to one side. His unspoken question to me was obvious.

  “I … I’m sorry,” I stuttered. “I would introduce myself to you properly, but my brother didn’t tell me your name when he invited me to this dinner.”

  She turned away quickly, casting a disapproving glance back at Jude. As she looked away, I noticed the stunning diamond necklace she wore—a small figurine with two slim arms hanging to the side. It was not dissimilar to an ankh and was attached to a slim, gold chain. I’d seen something like it before, though I couldn’t place it exactly. It was attractive and distinctive. It stood for something.

  “How rude of your brother,” she said, pivoting fluidly back toward me. Despite my efforts to ignore others around us, I could see that quite a few onlookers continued to steal glances in our direction. “He shouldn’t have done that to you.” She extended her right hand more formally this time. “My name is Isis Kent, and I am thoroughly delighted to make your acquaintance.”

  I tried not to stare. I held onto her right hand far longer than I should have. “I am … delighted to meet you as well,” I finally managed.

  She took a step closer. “Don’t worry,” she said to me in a hushed half whisper. “People have that sort of reaction all the time. I know it’s an unusual name. But it was the one they gave me when I was adopted in New Zealand. I like it actually, and I do enjoy the looks I get when I first introduce myself.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I offered. “I’m not usually so inarticulate. But I believe Jude basically set me up here. He told me virtually nothing about you—where you’re from, what you do for a living, even your name. I know nothing about you whatsoever, and I’ll wager you know a great deal about me already thanks to Jude.”

  “Yes, it’s not fair,” she said with a light laugh. “So we must balance the equation a bit here, I believe. I will tell you more about myself. But in return, you must agree to tell me some things about your brother that I don’t already know. Deal?”

  “It’s a deal,” I said with a sigh, thankful that my social ineptness was apparent only to her—and that she had clearly already forgiven me.

  We spent the balance of the state dinner talking, she and I. Jude left us alone—either by design or accident. He spent most of his time networking. He made a point of visiting every table at the dinner, which left Isis and me to talk quietly. I was a bit surprised at her choice. She actually ignored the world’s most powerful leader, seated two chairs away, to focus on her conversation with me.

  Isis wasn’t her original birth name, she told me. She’d been born in Egypt, and whatever records existed of her birth were lost. She’d spent years searching records in Cairo, trying to find her original birth parents, with no luck. For whatever reason, she’d been orphaned during a period of civil unrest in Egypt. A New Zealand couple, diplomats, had adopted her when she was nearly a year old, she said.

  It was only years later, she said, when she was a teenager, that she’d learned the history of the Kents, the couple who had adopted her. The Kents were distant cousins in the House of Windsor, long transplanted halfway around the world to the untamed coast of New Zealand.

  “So you’re royalty?” I asked her.

  “Hardly,” she said, raising a well-manicured brow. “I’m an orphan rug rat.”

  “But you were adopted into the … the what? The House of Kent?�
��

  She laughed at that. “If by ‘the house of Kent’ you mean the farm cottage on the coast of New Zealand where I grew up and looked after the sheep to make sure they didn’t run off the cliff into the ocean, then, yes.”

  “But you’re connected to the House of Windsor?”

  “In as roundabout way as you could possibly imagine. I’ve never actually met any of my cousins, and I seriously doubt anyone in the House of Windsor has ever heard of the Kents of New Zealand.”

  “Really? Never?”

  “The closest I will likely ever come to the royal House of Windsor is the time I spent as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford.”

  “So you were a Rhodes Scholar?” I said in awe.

  “Sure, after graduating from St. Andrews.”

  “The University of St. Andrews in Scotland?” I grew more impressed with Isis’s mind with each turn of our conversation. “That’s one of the finest universities in the world.”

  “Not if you ask anyone from Cambridge or Oxford,” she said dryly.

  That made me laugh. Jude went to Harvard. I went to Duke. I liked this woman.

  “So why’d the Kents name you Isis?” I finally managed to ask her at some point in our conversation.

  “They wouldn’t tell me. But I suspect it was a private joke between the two of them at first. And then the name stuck. They never actually got around to telling me why. It’s just the name I grew up with. And now I can’t ask them …”

  “So they’re both dead?” I asked gently.

  “They were caught in a bloody uprising while he was stationed in the Congo. They were both killed before they could get out of the country.”

  “I’m sorry,” I offered.

  “Thank you. But it was years ago. I’ve been on my own for some time now.”