It started with a phone call. A call made thirty years ago.

He made the call then. It was the right thing to do. He believed that still.

The old man had built an empire. He had been ruthless. He did whatever was necessary to hold on to power. To vanquish his competitors.

Under the old man’s decades long domination of crime and corruption, he had made phone calls of his own. He had assigned death to uncounted others. Those who opposed him disappeared like the American version of the Russian kulaks; millions of whom died after a phone call from Stalin.

The old man had grown weak. He began to speak of abandoning the businesses that continued to bring them tens of millions year after year.

While the old man grew weak, his competitors grew strong. They were openly adding muscle to their already formidable forces.

He had made the phone call. The next day he assumed control of the businesses. The old man was gone. Another American kulak. Never seen again.

Thirty years later he found himself looking at another man seated across the desk from him. Now he was the old man; the other was the younger. Another decision to be made.

The young man was highly competent. Even brilliant. His understanding of business was unmatched. He added much value to their organization.

But just as the old man did three decades earlier, the young man now spoke of abandoning their outrageously profitable, though illegal, businesses. He spoke of “legitimate” business.   He listened carefully to the young man. Perhaps he was right.

Or was he now becoming the weak leader that alarmed him so many years past. True, he had seen none of his competitors attempting to increase their power in a way that would alarm him.   If he listened to the young man’s advice, it could mean a bright future. Or it could mean destruction.

He had a decision to make.

He was investing heavily in a business in the United Kingdom, which would be overseen by a talented manager not involved in any illegal business. He could send the young man to the United Kingdom. He could do that with a phone call.

Or he could condemn the young man to the fate of one more American kulak with another phone call.

It hadn’t mattered that the old man he eliminated thirty years earlier was his father.

Should it matter now that the young man was his son?

He picked up his phone and dialed a number. When the call was answered, he spoke one sentence.

“I have an assignment for you.”

Which call did he make?