This is a novel which sounds the depths of a man who becomes Secretary General of the United Nations. It take him through his troubled childhood, and his effort to overcome unspeakable traumas, to become a human being capable of world leadership. Not only do we explore his private life, but we see him deal directly with the most difficult problems of international diplomacy. Here I am drawing on my own career in the diplomatic service, and my lifetime commitment to working for world peace.

Dwight stands in front of Father, who gropes around his back; with the other hand, he opens Dwight’s bathrobe, and draws him in still closer. Now sweaty hands are moving down his stomach. The space around him has no density, makes no obstruction, as the hands move through it like satellites; beyond them, inaccessible, are planets, stars.

Father turns him around, then penetrates—their bodies, now connected, swing into orbit. Father is panting as he speaks: “I missed you all day, Dwight. I thought of you as I was sitting in the NSC. I wonder why then. . . . You have the most beautiful face—not from me, God knows—it’s your mother’s, lucky for you.” His own face stares back at Dwight as if in a mirror, its blue eyes, red lips, pale skin—the face Father

sees. . . .

The phone jangles, their two bodies crack apart, and begin to drift away, as if hit by a missile. “Of course, Henry, I went over the whole matter at the NSC. . . . No, if the Paks want to commit national suicide in Kashmir, and take the Indians with them, there may be little we can do. . . . Really, you’d commit American forces? For what? . . . A UN peace force? Don’t be absurd! . . . There are almost a billion of them, so ten or fifteen million more or less. . . . Scrooge?—I was trying to be funny, Henry.”

Father sits naked, sprawled in a chair, pot belly, a huge balding head, loose jowls, rimless glasses, an irascible look in his eyes, his nose a pitted appendage of meat hanging over his mustache. “What have we got in the area that would be worth it?” The trail runs into white noise, then silence. Father smirks, puts down the phone, still holding Dwight.

“If he objected, he should have objected at the NSC!”

“. . . Who was that?”

“Henry Morgenstern—some puffed-up Jew who’s written a mammoth study of the region, and now he’s caged the number two job at State. I’ve nothing to worry about on this issue, unless he talks directly to the President, but the President and I just talked. You see, Dwight, you have to keep all these lines in your head so none get around you, out of your control.”

Father’s hands begin to pass over his body, but again the phone rings. “Just a minute.” He covers the receiver. “Mix me a martini, will you, light on the vodka? I do have to work tonight.” Dwight runs out of the room. When he returns with the drink—he’d remembered the pitted olive—Father is still on the phone. “Yes, I know Singh will be at the British embassy tonight, which is why, Leonard,—it should be obvious enough—I’m making an appearance. . . . Yes, we will talk, and Singh will be vague and discursive for perhaps ten minutes, alluding to his years at Cambridge, and, of course, his genuine admiration for the West. But as his time runs out, or, by his calculation, my patience, he will finally get down to the business at hand, which is to tell me that war can break out at any time. . . . Yes, yes, I am prepped, you’ll receive an

A-plus on your efficiency report for ‘Care and Repair of the Secretary.’ Good night, Leonard!”

Father puts down the receiver, takes one more look at Dwight, sighs, lights up one of his stinking cigarettes, and stands up. “I suppose I’d better get ready.” He lurches toward the bathroom as Dwight glances about the empty bedroom, suddenly alone, like a

piece of junk or garbage abandoned in space; he is crying, even as he makes no sound, emits no tears, but only stares inside the room as if it were the black sky. view abbreviated excerpt only...

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