"The guy in fancy dress isn't John Milton," said Gavin Maps. "So he can't sue. My client was writing about the real John Milton, not this masquerade man put together by the Ghoulish Arts Corporation."
Masquerade Man - the title stuck. It was a spur-of-the-moment formulation, but it filled a need. A one-second sound bite to sum up the nature of the thing the Hallelujah Arts Resurrection Corporation had formulated.
"Resurrection man," said Gavin, capitalizing on his success. "That's a term with a history. The original resurrection men were grave robbers. Stole bodies hot out of the grave, sold them to people who got kicks out of cutting them up. The Resurrection Corporation is working in the same tradition."
This was dirty fighting. A low blow. A half-accurate fragment of history being used to rake up mucky images of blood and filth, of creaking graves hauled open in the dead of night, of limp corpses being vivisected in the dark dungeons of science. And, as Terrance Azlenabek watched Gavin's efforts, he experienced an increasing depth of frustrated rage.
To be spoken for rather than speaking in his own right - that in itself was intolerable. For Terrance, the hot arena of the lecture theater had always been the best of the world's good places. There, he was king. The indisputable master of his field. Power, mastery - this is what it's all about. But Gavin, by insisting on speaking for him, reduced him to a position of penitent silence.
So -
"I am not penitent," said Terrance, when the tabloid reporter ambushed him on the street. "I regret nothing. To the extent to which he's Milton, he is what Milton is. As for the work, well, it's the work of a sex pervert."
*
The next afternoon, when Gavin Maps and Terrence Azlenabek met in the wake of the tabloid's MILTON SEX MANIAC headlines, Gavin was even more furious than before.
"Not one more word," said Gavin. "You are not to say so much as one more word to anyone. No more radio, no more TV, no nothing."
"But what about free speech?" said Terrance. "And academic liberty, what happened to that? For a lifetime I've been committed to the liberties of the liberties of the mind. As one of the great intellectuals once said: A good book is the lifeblood of a master spirit."
"You aren't a book and neither is he," said Gavin. "This isn't theory, this is fact. We're talking about a real live person. Terrance - are you listening to what I'm saying?"
"Yes. In an uncouth and bad-tempered manner, you are advising me to gag myself."
*
Night.
At the end of a long and unproductive debate, trembling with exhaustion, Gavin got to his feet and stood facing the city night, arms folded. The darkness of the early night doubled his image in the uncurtained window. The fatigue on his face was so bitter that it was close to pain.
Terrance sat upright in his chair, watching Gavin. For a long time now, the chair had been inviting Terrance to relax into its leather embrace. But he was still holding out against the temptation.
"I apologize for my attitude," said Gavin, turning and unfolding his arms. "But," he said, as he sat, "this is a very difficult position that we're in."
"That I am in."
"That you are in, yes. And that you will drown in unless you do what is necessary to save yourself. And the first necessity is silence."
"And the second?"
"You could always recant," said Gavin.
"Recant?" said Terrance. "Who are you? The Holy Inquisition?"
"I'm your lawyer," said Gavin.
"Then start talking like a lawyer!"
"I am," said Gavin. "As your lawyer, I'm advising you to apologize."
"That is hardly consonant with your advice to stay silent."
"You apologize through me. You say nothing. I'm the mouthpiece, I do the talking."
"I'm beginning to see why your marriage came to its unfortunate end," said Terrance.
Gavin took a deep breath, shook his head, then, with professional zeal, continued to hammer the key point:
"You apologize, and withdraw some of the more extreme statements you've made."
"For example?"
"You've been calling him a sex maniac. A child rapist."
"I didn't say that," said Terrance. "I merely remarked that in all probability there was an incestuous element to his relationship with his daughters, albeit one which, in all probability, was subconscious, a submerged element which conditioned his art without ever being implemented in the mode of action."
"You know your problem?" said Gavin.
"What?" said Terrance.
"A relative clause won't fit in a sound bite."
*
Gavin Maps was firm in his advice. Recant. Take it back. Issue a statement. Go on TV and say you never meant it. But his client, Terrance Azlenabek - not Terry, please, Terry sounds like someone in a boy's cartoon book - was stubbornly defiant.
"Giordano Bruno wouldn't recant," said Terrance, "and neither will I."
"Oh, please," said Gavin, wincing. "If you want to be a martyr, what do you want a lawyer for? All you need is a carpenter with a couple of pieces of lumber and a bag of big nails."
"What?" said Terrance, sharply. "What are you on about? I didn't understand that remark at all."
"Then think about it," said Gavin. "I do have your best interests at heart, Terrance, but there's a limit to what I can do if you insist on pursuing what is, frankly, a course of self-destruction. Now - do you have any questions?"
"Yes. It's not related, but ... well, I really don't know who to ask."
"I'm your lawyer, Terrance. You can speak to me about anything."
"Well. The thing is. I ate a hamburger once. It was some years ago. In fact, it was back when we didn't yet appreciate the danger. And I've been wondering, recently - just how contagious is this mad cow disease?"
Gavin, it seemed, did not properly appreciate the vital urgency of this enquiry, and became somewhat brusque. While their relationship was still outwardly cordial by the time Gavin ushered Terrance out of his office, inwardly, Terrance was seething. Everyone's concerned about Milton's life, but what about mine? Who cared about me when the waitress delivered the hamburger? Recant? Take it back? No! If I'm to suffer, then Milton can suffer with me. And, besides - the truth is the truth, and that's all there is to it.
*
Terrance refused to hide. When the meeting was done, he ventured forth, meaning to perambulate through the city streets.
Out on the street, one of the paparazzi was waiting in the cool evening. He snapped off photographs. Poor guy must be desperate. But then, it's too early for the starlets to be at their restaurants. And who is this? Another of those - what do you call them? - process servers?
The stranger was a person of color. A young man of intense blackness, in fact. His body was armored in black leather and weighted down by a ransom in gold. A pimp? A drug dealer? A hired assassin the pay of Milton or his minions? Or could he be - God forbid! - a performance poet? The performance poets are the plague of our times, we should bring back hanging and hang the lot of them.
"Got a minute?"
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