7
THE BILLIONAIRE
THE BILLIONAIRE
From the book by Vladimir Megre "The New Civilization", part I
(translated by Susan Downing)
Billionaire John Heitzman lay dying on the forty-second floor of his office
building. That entire floor had been converted into an apartment suite for
him. Over the past three years, its two bedrooms, workout room, pool, living
room and two offices had become his refuge. Never once in these years had
he set foot outside his apartment. Never once had he ridden the express el-
evator down to any of the offices where the staff of his financial industry
empire worked. Never once had he gone up to the roof where his helicopter
stood, its crew always at the ready to carry out the boss’s orders, except that
for three years, the boss had never once appeared.
John Heitzman only ever saw his four closest assistants, whom he would
receive three times a week in one of his offices. At these short meetings,
which never lasted more than forty minutes, he would hear out their reports
without any particular interest, and occasionally he’d give them brief in-
structions. The billionaire’s directions were never discussed. They were
simply carried out, swiftly and precisely. The financial worth of the empire,
of which John Heitzman was the sole owner, increased by 16.5 percent
yearly. And over the last six months, when Heitzman had stopped holding
any meetings whatsoever, the profit had not decreased. There were no inter-
ruptions whatsoever in the administrative mechanism he had created and
then left to function on its own.
No one knew how much the billionaire was really worth. His name was
