The echo was ricocheting in what seemed to be all directions, and the sound of a powerful presence was thus established for the present moment in time.  Groundsmaster of the National Palace, J. C. Alluviende, was dressed to the hilt, his formal black military suit having been pressed in the Palace Laundry only eighteen minutes earlier.

He was a person with who possessed an attraction towards great men, yet quite arguably did not fully possess the quality himself; in this capacity, he was quite similar to the Second President-for-Life  of Haiti.  The difference was that while J.C. could afford to be so dull within his own insignificant life, Baby Doc Duvalier was a man who held the lives of millions, or lack thereof, in the palm of his indifferent hand.

After spending a rather dull twelve years in the service of Papa Doc Duvalier, the first tyrant of the House of Duvalier, J. C. was rewarded with a simple duty that placed him in charge of the house and grounds staff of the largest and only governmental compound in the Caribbean with any pretensions towards aspiring towards the standards set by true European royalty.

Haiti was a country that had it's eyes set upon an illusionary past, upon one in which a benevolent God would assure the calm continuance of civilized life through the deposition of leaders selected to serve their fellow countrymen for life.  In reality, the converse was the truth: Haiti was a country held hostage by a family that lacked even the basic rhetorical propaganda of Libya.

Neither the mundane hassle of elections, nor a bloated capitalist bureaucracy, were to be found in the rather small nation; what could be found, inescapably so, was that it was possessed by a ruling family with a cumulative ego far greater than the size of the Bermuda Triangle.

The House of Duvalier, rather fraudulently established in the years following World War II, was the governing head family of the island. Duvalier best succeeded at essentially converting it into a small principality of sorts, a land of people captivated by a single figurehead, a man with aspirations of defining what a modern monarchy in the Western Hemisphere should look like.

Pomp and circumstance, while optional for republics, are essential for a tyrannical style of government, at least for any leader hoping to properly operate for any substantial period of time.  A lineage that suggests a refinement of superior intelligence should be instituted, and marriages within the ruling family must be an affair dictated by power and control, never love and life.

A person who was born into the Haitian House of Duvalier was restricted in life to only a handful of feasible occupations:  a dictator, a mistress to the power brokers, or a concubine to the autocracy. 

The stranglehold upon authority over the peasant masses was enforced through the best paying job a commoner could hope to aspire to in Duvalierian Haiti: police officer.  The single most prevalent means of employment for the growing middle class of the island was working for the regime, to become a member of the monolithic State law enforcement was akin to essentially selling one's own soul into complicity with a centralized government consumed with but one main priority: to out-luxuriate any other diminutive European principality or duchy in the world.

Thus, Luxembourg, Monaco, French New Guinea, and any number of other independent city-states were in the line of fire for receiving a consistently competitive tone from the ambassadors of Haiti.

Since the inception of the Duvalierian command, there had been a Cold War of sorts going on among the smallish monarchies, a war fought not with guns and bombs, but a conflict defined by the fashionable clothing of a certain season, the proper car for the day of the week, attending only the most fresh and overdone of discotheques, and obligatory clothes shopping accomplished only in Paris at a minimum of four times per year.

These individuals who were blessed enough to have been born into a silken walled world found themselves caught in a trap of melancholy snobbery.  One can only sail the French Riviera or the coast of Southern Spain but so many times before the thrill of sheer materialistic excess looses its luster. It is a lifestyle in which watching the shimmering holiday fireworks of Pomp-du-laine, reflected into the perfect Bermudan seaside during May Day,  all of it becomes laborious and trite.  Most often, a time of revelry for the commoners becomes, for a member of the royal household, a tedious habit, a time of the year which feels something akin to a bowel movement; necessary but completely mundane.

There is a line one can cross in life from which point almost no activity nor event nor person can instill any sense of actually being alive in the midst of such materialism.  Despair was the unfortunate sequel to an early set of years with an exciting, spoiled childhood.  The biggest problem is that this mental line we speak of is invisible, and up until the point that one crosses the threshold of miserable decadence, most people are compelled to rush towards it as if running for their very lives.

If only the nouveau Riche really understood anything, or could possible try to understand the nearly unbearable task that it is to be born into a royal bloodline, then perhaps they wouldn't be so damn quick to marry the first real Prince that walks into their vapid lives.

This was the curse and problem faced by Michele Joan Bennett.

Only two years earlier she had been the personal secretary for Mr. Rudolph B. Kirkpatrick the Third, a very driven stock broker in New York City.  She had spent the years between 1975 and 1978 behind an Olivetti typewriter and standing in front of a long row of IBM mainframe reel-to-reel data storage computer systems, getting dizzy as she gazed into the round tape reel as it spun at 700 rotations per minute, the complex electronics calculating the predicted performance of Mr. Kirkpatrick's massive stock portfolio.

The dark complexioned and stunning beauty that was possessed by Michele was complemented by a quick mind that was endlessly curious about the minute details of the financial system of which she was a very small part.  In November of 1979, with genuine curiosity and an adorable amount of enthusiasm she had bounced in her black high heel shoes, clapping her hands fervently as Mr. Kirkpatrick had authoritatively rang the large bell that sounded the opening of the New York Stock Exchange.  Not satisfied with merely being an owner of stock in various companies, he had in the Summer of 1979 founded Kirkpatrick Holdings Incorporated, and promptly rose to the status of having its stock traded on the NYSE.  Special occasions and VIPs are treated to the honor of starting and ending the trading hours just as they began in the 19th Century; with the ringing of very loud bell.  Michele secretly wished that it were her that was her who was at the center of the high podium, overlooking the massive floorspace of the exchange.

She had never seen so many cathode ray tube computer monitors in one place!  They were everywhere, hanging on metal frameworks, bordered by long digital ticker tape stock prices and information sliding past in a very eerie shade of green.  Nuclear Green, or Radioactive Green, thought Michele, is what the neon shade should be named.  The stacks of ticker tape machines that were suspended over the trading floor raced together into a vivid, fluorescent green smear, an appropriate sight considering the color of American money.

Michele was giddy with excitement, she felt such a rush of energy just by gazing into the bustling grounds of stock and commodities traders.  The din of the shouting and talking was incessant, it was more enthralling than any shopping mall.  But this, thought Michele, this place is far superior.  The excess that had colored the entire decade so far was at a pinnacle in that immense room at the NYSE.  It was as if the energy there was palpable; Michele could actually feel the tension she thought, an electric feeling that something bigger than any one person was happening all around them.

The entourage was in the midst of the monster of Capitalism, dead in the center of its Brain.  They were immersed in the culture of money and material so much more than any previous generation, and perhaps more than any that would follow them.  At least, that's what rising stars like Michele liked to think about themselves in a social context.  She pulled in a deep breath through her nose, and the scent of computer paper and ink wafted in her mind.  There were rows and rows of impact printers blasting out reams of wasted paper covered with even more wasted black ink.  The impact  style printers were tough and resilient, but exceedingly noisy.  One had to yell to manage conversation to keep above the 100 decibels that were pounding in unstopping succession as financial reports telexed in from around the world.

There was an abundance of information, data about the most complex imaginary game ever instituted: the worldwide financial markets.  Every Western Country longed to be able to match the prowess of America, but few did.  The commitment to the game and the investment of tremendous technology had made it possible in New York City, on Wall Street.  America was at the pinnacle of the analog age of technology, on the cusp of the coming digital revolution, with tape reels being the most common form of memory storage for a computer system.  Diskettes were in existence, but not commonplace.  Printers were everywhere, by the thousands, while computer monochromatic monitors were a novelty.

But that world of decadent analog technology was well North of Michele at the moment. 

She held a heavy silver fountain pen in her hand, savoring the moment.  It was a priceless antique from France, and with a great surge of fulfillment, she placed her right hand down on the heavy parchment and signed on a long dark line, legally passing her first Presidential Order.  There were more than thirty other Executive Orders and laws waiting for her authorization, begging for it, much like the entirety of Haiti, she thought to herself.  Some of them had been laying in neglect in the Presidential Office for more than two weeks. 

Michele was determined to make an instantaneous first impression upon all of Haiti.  She did so with dark black ink, committing funding for several charitable ideals; several new hospitals would be constructed due entirely to her signature.  The peasants had always looked towards their dictator for guidance; perhaps now, in the form of Michele Bennett, they their own active savior in place. 

Baby Doc Duvalier was a playboy, a lush, a great conversationalist, but most certainly not a dictator.  A person had to possess an internal drive to be the head - of - state of an Authoritarian - style of government.  And since Baby Doc found far too much pleasure in roaming the Caribbean islands, he had appointed a person with the proper forcefulness needed to hold things together at the top of Haitian society.  Or, more correctly, he had married the solution to his troublesome problem of having inherited an entire nation upon his father's death in 1971.

Jean Cleaude Duvalier had been only 19 at the time,  and had been content to enjoy the privileges of his position in life, but not particularly interested in the incumbent responsibilities. 

That was why he had found Michelle.  God himself had sent her, believed Jean Cleaude.  To himself, and more than that, to all of Haiti.

In the most exorbitant ballroom in The White Palace, scheduled site of the reception gala to honor the afternoon's marriage, the 29 - year old Madame Michele Bennett Duvalier was nowhere to be seen. 

And that in and unto itself was unusual for the young woman, since the most immediate attribute of Michele was that she had existed primarily to be seen by other members of the human species. 

Observed, but never analyzed.  Caught in her rare public appearances at her utmost best, and conversely sequestered away at her worst on a yacht that had cost ten million dollars in 1973.  Michele on parade was art in motion; all elements of a person, of a woman, came together and she excelled at exuding all of the qualities lacking in President-for-Life Jean Cleaude Duvalier, such as compassion, intelligence, and any discernible passion for the island nation of Haiti and its masses of peasants.

The ballrooms of the Presidential Palace of Haiti were pristine; the masses of wealthy debutantes and plaintive young men were in position; the household staff was more excessive than ever, numbering in the hundreds; the House of Duvalier was well represented, with the widow of 'Papa Doc' Duvalier seated at the head table, sipping down endless glasses of champagne, staring with a piercing intensity into the social abyss splayed out before her; yet the main star of any wedding reception was now pushing beyond being sixty-six minutes late.

Marianne turned to Katherine and blinked a few time in rapid succession.

"Darling, what could possibly be happening in the palace apartments?  I mean, Michele simply does have to be fashionably late, but this is just brutal!  You just know she has to be wearing another $10,000 dress, not to mention the change of jewelry I bet she's doing right now....that's it!  Katherine, that's it!", squealed the half intoxicated graphic artist.

Katherine Kunakovitch was never as consumed by mindless superficial socializing as Marianne so often was.

"What exactly then is it?", responded Katherine, forcing a modicum of interest to match the enthusiasm of Marianne.

"The jewelry, the diamonds, the brooches, the tiaras, the bracelets, the rings, the bangles, the earrings, the hair clips, the cigarette holder  --- she must be changing everything, not just the damn dress!  Don't you see, Katherine?  No bride would want to take this long to get into the crowd for the reception, would they?  I can't imagine!  She's in there, I just know it!  Rummaging through the piles of diamonds and rubies and gold,  trying to put on just the perfect assortment of stuff to dazzle us, you know?!?", blasted Marianne, clearly demarking the point in time where the line was crossed into the zone of being officially 'drunk'.

"Oh, God, Marianne, I don't know what she's doing...other than being a bitch!  COME ON MARIANNE, the damn Madame Michele Bennett --  oh, excuse me!  I meant to say, Madame Michele Duvalier -- well, that bitch just needs to get the hell out here so this show can get on the road, Marianne.  Get over it, won't you!?!  Just stop being so enamored with this ridiculous ostentation, this foul feigning of aristocratic ways as if the Duvaliers were entitled to be running this country the way they do!" hissed Katherine towards her half-crossed eyed partner in partying.

The fact that Katherine couldn't or didn't recognize the brilliance of the excess of Michele was in particular a point of anger for Marianne.  She stared, as best she could, towards her friend of more than six years, and tried to think of what to say in response.

It didn't matter in any case, because at that very moment the awaited bride suddenly burst into the room.

"là où est la musique! où est l'action? Mon dieu, ont à Cheryl Barnes sur la droite d'étape cette minute même, si je n'entends pas que l''amour et la passion 'et maintenant je vais laisser ce gaspillage d'une partie!", screamed the manic twenty-nine year old bride who, as a matter of fact, had just finished snorting the longest line of cocaine she had ever attempted.

The entourage swarming in behind the bride was as far-gone into intoxication as the bride was at that moment, and thus simply continued on in the multitude of conversations, most of them being spoken in French, flourished into the massive ballroom, through the first salon, brushing past the posturing guests with an amount of aloofness that was beyond imagination.

Immediately upon hearing her name, the discotheque star Cheryl Barnes burst into tears of joy.  The fact that the first song that Michele demanded to hear was the latest piece of music that Cheryl herself had produced --- it was all simply overwhelming.