Human? You mean weak. People always mix those two words up.”

“My nightmares are me,” Janson said, in a clear, steady voice. “I have to live with the things I’ve done on this earth. I don’t have to like them. I’ve done good and I’ve done bad. As for the bad—I don’t want to be reconciled with the bad. You tell me I can take that pain away? That pain is how I know who I am and who I’m not. That pain is how I know I’m not you.”

Suddenly Demarest lashed out, batting the gun out of Janson’s hand. It flew clattering to the marble floor.

Demarest looked almost mournful as he leveled his pistol. “I tried to reason with you. I tried to reach you. I’ve done so much to reach you, to bring you back in touch with your true self. All I wanted from you was an acknowledgment of the truth—the truth about us both.”

“The truth? You’re a monster. You should have died in Mesa Grande. I wish to God you had.”

“It’s remarkable—how much you know and how little. How powerful you can be, and how powerless.” He shook his head. “The man kills the child of another and cannot even protect his own … .”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The embassy bombing in Caligo—did it shake your world? I thought it might when I suggested it, five years ago. You’ll have to forgive me: the idea of your having a child just didn’t sit well with me. A Paul Junior—no, I couldn’t see it. Always easy to arrange these things through the local talent—those wild-eyed insurrectionists dreaming of Allah and the virgins of Paradise. I’m afraid I’m the only one who could appreciate the delicious irony that it was all brought about by a fertilizer bomb. But really, what kind of a father would you have made, a baby-killer like you?”

Janson felt as if he had been turned to stone.

A heavy sigh. “And it’s time for me to be going. I have great plans for the world, you know. Truth is, I’m getting bored with conflict resolution. Conflict promotion is the new order of the day. Human beings like battle and bloodshed. Let man be man, I say.”

“Not your prerogative.” Janson struggled to get the words out.

He smiled. “Carpe diem—seize the day. Carpe mundum—seize the world.”

“They made you a god,” Janson said, recalling the president’s words, “when they didn’t own the heavens.”

“The heavens are beyond even my ken. Still, I’ll be happy to keep an open mind. Why don’t you file a report about the hereafter when you get there? I’ll look forward to your MemCon in re Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates.” He was expressionless as he leveled the pistol two feet away from Janson’s forehead. “Bon voyage,” he said as his finger curled around the trigger.