Read Online It's Superman! A Novel by Tom De Haven - Free Book Online

he has to quash an imperative instinct to cut and run. No matter who he is now, and he has worked hard to create himself, to build formidable identities both public and secret, at base he remains his father’s son, and his father killed a man, then lived the rest of his miserable existence as a fugitive in constant fear of being recognized, seized, and punished.
    Once, when the family—calling itself the Littles that year—was living in Ashland, Virginia, and Lex was eleven, a photographer snapped a picture of him parading on stilts at the town’s July Fourth picnic. Next morning, it appeared on the front page of the daily newspaper, and there for all to see was Lex’s father cringing in the background, one hand flung up to conceal his face. God, that look of sheer terror. Lex never forgot it. Or forgave it, either.
    Now, decades later and just minutes after Willi Berg leapt out of nowhere and clicked a jeopardizing picture of him, of Alderman Lex Luthor standing in a bookie joint with two known criminals and five murdered men, he wonders if his face looked as stricken as his father’s had on that Independence Day. Jesus Christ, he hopes not.
    But he will never find out—will he?—since that film is never going to be developed. Is it?
    “No, boss. We’ll find him.”
    “Yes, Paulie, we will.”
    “I don’t know how he got in—”
    “But we certainly know how he got out, don’t we?”
    “I thought Stick closed the door.”
    “Hey! You came in last, you shoulda closed it.”
    “Shut up, the both of you. And take a left here, Paulie. At Thirty-eighth.”
    “But how do you figure he’d go east, boss? He’s some kind of news-hawk, right? So the closest paper’d be the Times. Or the HT. And they’re a couple blocks up on—”
    “He’s a tabloid rat, Paulie. He’ll head for the Mirror or the Daily News. East.”
    “But why do you think he took Thirty-eighth?”
    “Because Thirty-seventh is closest, and he’d expect us to think he took it.”
    “How do you know he’s on foot?”
    “I don’t. I’m hoping. And for your sake, Paulie, you’d better hope I’m right. ” His eyes lock on the driver’s profile and don’t blink.
    “I thought I closed it, boss. It musta stuck.”
    “Just drive. And Stick? When we spot him?”
    “I’m out in a flash, sir, you bet. And I’ll get you that camera, no problem.”
    “I expect you to get more than just the camera.”
    “Yes, sir. Goes without saying. That stinkin’ little hebe is history.”
    “Stick, please. I don’t want to hear that kind of name calling.”
    Then: “Paulie, speed up a little, I think I see him!” says Lex, thinking if that picture ever were developed, which it won’t be, he might look surprised, possibly shocked, but not terrified, not craven. Not caught. Not him. Never.
    He’s not his father.
    “Stick! Now! Go, go!”
    2
    Not again. Lois feels as though she’s wasted half the evening on the telephone—who’s calling her now, dammit?
    (Be Willi.)
    “Oh, it’s you,” she says. “Flat leaver.”
    “Cut it out, Lo, and lis—”
    “You really left me in the lurch, you know it? Moving in with your hotshot boyfriend, thank you so very much.”
    “Lois, Willi’s been shot. They just brought him in.”
    “What are you talking about, in ? In where? What are you saying?”
    “I’m saying, Lois, that somebody shot Willi, and they just brought him into Roosevelt. I’ll meet you down in Emergency. ”
    “Skinny! That’s not funny! Skinny!”
    3
    Seated in the rear of a gray Lincoln town car parked with the motor running on West Thirty-seventh Street, Lex Luthor idly jiggles a roll of twelve-exposure Kodak film in his left palm while observing a large-bellied cop at the Seventh Avenue corner smoking a cigarette.
    Lex hates smoking, detests the habit. First thing, soon as he’s the mayor? It becomes a felony. Smoking becomes a Class A felony—you get caught with those things, expect to do some hard time. Or maybe he’ll