Various Fiction

by Robert Sheckley

  “We understand very well what you mean,” Pelops said. “Since you chose not to identify your fellow traitors, would you mind telling us the location of your cell? No? Tell me, Comrade Jonski, does the name Ronald Black mean anything to you? Or to put it more simply, when did you last see Black?”

  “I never met him,” Joenes said. “Never? That is a very big word, Mr. Joenes. Are you trying to tell me that at no time could you have met Ronald Black? That you might not have innocently passed this man in a crowd, or perhaps attended a movie with him? I doubt if any man in America can so flatly state that he has never met Ronald Black. Do you wish your statement to go on the record?”

  “Well, I mean, I might have met him in a crowd, I mean been in a crowd where he was, but I don’t know for sure—”

  “But you allow the possibility?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Excellent,” Pelops said. “Now we are getting somewhere. Now I ask you what crowd you met Black in, and what he said to you, and you to him, and what papers he passed you, and who you passed those papers to?”

  “I never met Arnold Black!” Joenes cried.

  “We have always known him as Ronald Black,” Pelops said. “But we are always glad to learn his pseudonyms. Note please that you yourself admitted the possibility of your association with him, and in view of your admitted Party activities, this possibility must be judged a probability so strong as to be a certainty. Furthermore, you yourself gave us the name by which Ronald Black was known in the Party, a name which we hitherto had not known. And that, I think, is sufficient.”

  “Look,” said Joenes, “I don’t know this Black or what he did.”

  In somber tones Pelops stated, “Ronald Black was convicted of stealing the plans for the new Studebaker Roadclinger Super V-12 Luxury Compact Convertible, and selling those plans to an agent of The Soviet Union. After a fair trial, Black was executed in the manner prescribed by the law. Later, thirty-one of his associates were discovered, tried, and executed. You, Comrade Jonski, will be associate number 32 in the biggest spy ring we have yet uncovered.”

  Joenes tried to speak, but found himself speechless and trembling in fear.

  “This committee,” Pelops summed up, “has been granted extra-legal powers because it is merely investigative, not punitive. This is perhaps a shame, but the letter of the law must be followed. Therefore we now hand the secret agent Jonski over to the office of the Attorney-General, there to undergo fair trial by due process of law, and to suffer whatever punishment that branch of the government deems fitting for a self-admitted traitor who deserves only death. This meeting is now adjourned.”

  In this fashion, Joenes was swiftly transferred to the punitive branch of the government and bound over to the Attorney General.

  4. HOW JOENES WAS GIVEN JUSTICE

  (As told by Pelui of Easter Island.)

  The Attorney-General, to whom Joenes was bound over, was a tall man with a hawk face, narrow eyes, bloodless lips, and a face that looked as though it had been hammered out of raw iron. Stooped and silently contemptuous, startling in his black velvet cloak and ruffled collar, the Attorney-General was the living embodiment of his terrible office. Since he was a servant of the punitive branch of the government, his duty was to call down retribution upon all who fell into his hands, and to do so by any means in his power.

  The Attorney-General’s place of residence was Washington, ancient capitol of the Hellenic Confederacy. But he himself was a citizen of Athens, New York, and in his youth had been an acquaintance of Aristotle and Alcibiades, whose writings are the distillations of American genius.

  Athens was one of the cities of ancient Hellas, from which the American civilization had sprung.

  Near Athens was Sparta, a military power which had held leadership over the Lacedaemonian cities of upper New York State. Ionian Athens and Dorian Sparta had fought a disastrous war, known as the war Between the States, and had lost their independence to American rule. But they were still influential in the politics of America, especially since Washington had been the seat of Hellenic power.

  At first, the case of Joenes seemed simple enough. Joenes had no important friends or political colleagues, and it seemed that retribution might be visited upon him with impunity. Accordingly the Attorney-General arranged for Joenes to receive every possible sort of legal advice, and then to be tried by a jury of his peers in the famous Star Chamber. In this way, the exact letter of the law would be carried out, but with a comforting foreknowledge of the verdict which the jury would render. For the punctilious jurors of the Star Chamber, utterly dedicated to the eradication of any vestige of evil, had never in their history given any verdict but guilty.

  After the verdict had been delivered, the Attorney-General planned to sacrifice Joenes upon the Electric Chair at Delphi, thus winning favor in the eyes of gods and men.

  This was his plan. But further investigation showed that Joenes’s father had been a Dorian from Mechanicsville, New York, and a magistrate of that community. And Joenes’s mother had been an Ionian from Miami, which was an Athenian colony deep in Barbarian territory. Because of this, certain influential Hellenes urged mercy for the erring son of respectable parents, and for the sake of Hellenic unity, which was a force to be reckoned with in American politics.

  The Attorney-General, an Athenian himself, thought it best to comply with this request. Therefore he dissolved the Star Chamber and sent Joenes to the great Oracle at Sperry. This met with approval, for the Sperry Oracle, like the Oracles at Genmotor and Genelectric, was know’ll to be absolutely fair and impartial in its judgments of men and their actions. In fact, the Oracles gave such good justice that they had replaced many of the courts of the land.

  Joenes was brought to Sperry and was told to stand before the Oracle. This he did, although his knees were shaking. The Oracle was a great calculating machine of the most complex Variety, with a switchboard, or altar attended by many priests. These priests had been castrated so they should think no thoughts except of the machine. And the high priest had been blinded also, so that he could see penitents only through the eyes of the Oracle.

  When the high priest entered, Joenes prostrated himself before him. But the priest raised him up and said, “My son, fear not. Death is the common destiny of all men, and ceaseless travail is their condition throughout the ephemeral life of the senses. Tell me, do you have any money?”

  Joenes said, “I have eight dollars and thirty cents. But why do you ask, father?”

  “Because,” the high priest said, “it is common practice for supplicants to make a voluntary sacrifice of money to the Oracle. But if you do not have the money, you can give equally acceptable things such as chattel mortgages, bonds, stocks, deeds, or any other papers men deem of value.”

  “I have none of these things,” Joenes said sadly.

  “Do you not own lands in Polynesia?” the priest asked.

  “I do not,” Joenes said. “My parents’ land was given to them by the government, to whom it must return. Nor do I hold other properties, for in Polynesia such things are not important.”

  “Then you own nothing?” the priest asked. He seemed disturbed.

  “Nothing but eight dollars and thirty cents,” Joenes said, “and a guitar which is not my own but belongs to a man named Lum in distant California. But father, are these things really necessary?”

  “Of course not,” the priest replied. “But even cyberneticists must live, and an act of generosity from a stranger is looked upon as pleasing, especially when the time comes to interpret the words of the Oracle. Also, some believe that a penniless man is one who has not worked to amass money for the Oracle in case the day of divine wrath should ever be upon him, and who is therefore lacking piety. But that need not concern us. We will now state your case, and ask for a judgment.”

  The priest took the Attorney-General’s statement, and Joenes’s defence, and translated them into the secret language in which the Oracle listened to the words of men
. Soon there was a reply.

  The Oracle’s judgment was as follows:

  SQUARE IT TO THE TENTH POWER MINUS THE SQUARE ROOT OF MINUS ONE:

  DO NOT FORGET THE COSIGN, FOR MEN MUST NEEDS HAVE FUN.

  ADD IN X AS A VARIABLE, FREE-FLOATING, FANCY-FREE.

  IT WILL COME AT LAST TO ZERO, AND MORE YOU NEED NOT ME.

  When this decision had been delivered, the priests met to interpret the words of the Oracle. And this is what they said:

  SQUARE IT means correct the wrong.

  THE TENTH POWER is the degree and number in which the penitent must labor in penal servitude in order to correct the wrong; namely ten years.

  THE SQUARE ROOT OF MINUS ONE, being an imaginary number, represents a fictitious state of grace; but being instrumental, represents also the possibility of power and fame for the supplicant. Because of this, the previous ten-year sentence is suspended.

  THE X VARIABLE represents the incarnate furies of the earth, among whom the supplicant shall dwell, and who shall show him all possible horrors.

  THE COSIGN is the mark of the goddess herself, protecting the supplicant from some of the terror of the furies, and promising him certain fleshy joys.

  IT WILL COME AT LAST TO ZERO, means that the equation of divine justice and human need is balanced in this case.

  FURTHER YOU NEED NOT ME, means that the supplicant may not apply again to this or any other Oracle, since the rendering is complete.

  So it was that Joenes received a ten-year suspended sentence. And the Attorney-General had to obey the decision of the Oracle and set him free.

  Once freed, Joenes continued his journey through the land of America, bearing upon his head a curse and a promise, as well as a ten-year suspended sentence. He departed hastily from Sperry and rode a train to the great city of New York. And what he did there is a story which must now be told.

  5. THE STORY OF JOENES, WATTS, AND THE POLICEMAN

  (As told by Ma’aoa of Easter Island.)

  Never had Joenes seen anything like the great city of New York. The ceaseless rush and bustle of so many people was strange to him, but curiously exciting. When night came, the frantic life of the city continued unabated, and Joenes observed New Yorkers hurrying in and out of night clubs and dance halls in their quest for pleasure. Nor was there any lack of culture in the city, for great numbers of people were attentive to the lost art of the moving pictures.

  In the small hours of the night, the city’s pace slowed. Then Joenes came upon many old men, and some young ones too, who sat listlessly on benches or stood near subway exits. When Joenes looked into their faces he saw a terrible nothingness, and when he spoke to them he could not understand their mumbled replies. These atypical New Yorkers disturbed him, and Joenes was glad when morning came.

  At first light, the frenzied movements of the crowds began again, and people pushed and shoved each other in their haste to get somewhere and do something. Joenes wanted to learn the reason for all of this, so he picked a man out of the crowd and stopped him.

  “Sir,” Joenes said, “could you spare a moment of your valuable time and tell a stranger something about the great and purposeful vitality I see all around me?”

  The man said, “Whattsamatter, you some kind of nut?” And he hurried off.

  But the next man Joenes stopped gave the question careful thought, and said, “You call it vitality, huh?”

  “So it appears,” Joenes said, glancing at the restless crowds surging around them. “By the way, my name is Joenes.”

  “Mine’s Watts,” the man said, “as in Watts the matter?” In answer to your question, I’ll tell you that what you see is not vitality. It’s panic.”

  “But what are they in a panic about?” Joenes asked.

  “To put it in a nutshell,” Watts said, “they’re afraid if they stop hurrying and pushing, somebody will find out they’re dead. It’s a very serious matter being found dead, because then they can fire you from your job, foreclose all your bills, raise your apartment rental, and carry you squirming to your grave.”

  Joenes found this reply scarcely credible. He said, “Mr. Watts, these people do not look dead. And in actual fact, all exaggeration aside, they arc not dead, are they?”

  “I never put exaggeration aside,” Watts told him. “But since you’re a stranger, I’ll try to explain a little more. To begin with, death is merely a matter of definition. Once the definition was very simple: you were dead when you stopped moving for a long time. But now the scientists have examined this antiquated notion more carefully, and have done considerable research on the entire subject. They have found out that you can be dead in all important respects, but still go on walking and talking.

  “What are these important respects?” Joenes asked.

  “First of all,” Watts told him, “the walking dead are characterized by an almost total lack of joyous emotionality. They can feel only anger and fear, though they sometimes simulate other emotions in the crude manner of a chimpanzee pretending to read a book. Next, there is a robotic quality in their actions, which accompanies a cessation of the higher thinking processes. Frequently, there is a reflex motion toward piety, which is not unlike the frantic movements which a chicken makes after its head has been chopped off. Because of this reflex, many of the walking dead are detected around churches, where some of them even try to pray. Others can be found on park benches or near subway exits.”

  “Ah,” said Joenes. “When I walked in the city late last night I saw certain men at those places—”

  “Exactly,” said Watts. “Those are the ones who no longer pretend that they are not dead. But others copy the living with a great and pathetic earnestness, hoping to pass unnoticed. They can usually be detected because they overdo it, either by talking too much or by laughing too hard.”

  “I had no idea of all this,” Joenes said.

  “It is a tragic problem,” Watts said. “The authorities are doing their best to cope with it, but it has assumed formidable proportions. I wish I could tell you other characteristics of the walking dead, and how they resemble the old-fashioned non-walking dead, for I’m sure that you would find it interesting. But now, Mr. Joenes, I see a policeman approaching, and therefore I had better make my departure.”

  So saying, Watts broke into a full sprint and raced through the crowd. The policeman started after him, but soon gave up the pursuit and returned to Joenes.

  “Damn it,” the policeman said, “I’ve lost him again.”

  “Is he a criminal?” Jones asked.

  “Smartest jewel thief in these parts,” the policeman said, mopping his massive red brow. “He likes to disguise himself as a beatnik.”

  “He was talking to me about the walking dead,” Joenes said.

  “He’s always making up those stories,” the policeman told him. “Compulsive liar, that’s what he is. Crazy. And dangerous as they come. Especially dangerous because he doesn’t carry a gun. You can’t figure a criminal who doesn’t carry a gun. I’ve almost caught him three times. I order him to stop in the name of the law, just like the book says, and when he doesn’t stop, I shoot at him. So far I’ve killed eight bystanders. The way I’m going, I’ll probably never make sergeant. They make me pay for my own bullets, too.”

  “But if this Watts never carries a gun—” Joenes began, then stopped abruptly. He had seen a strange sullen expression cross the policeman’s face, and had seen his hand drop to the butt of his gun. “What I meant to say,” Joenes continued, “is there anything in what Watts told me about the walking dead?”

  “Naw, that’s just a beatnik line he makes up to kid people with. Didn’t I tell you he was a jewel thief?”

  “I forgot,” Joenes said.

  “Well don’t forget it. I’m just a plain ordinary man, but a guy like Watts gets me sore. I do my duty just like the book says, and in the evening I go home and watch the TV, except on Friday evenings when I go bowling. Does that sound like being a robot, like Watts said?”

/>   “Of course not,” Joenes said.

  “That guy,” the policeman continued, “talks about people not having no emotion. Let me tell you, I’m maybe no psychologist, but I know I got emotions. When I have this gun in my hand, I feel good. Does that sound like I got no emotions? Furthermore, let me tell you something. I was raised in a tough section of this city, and when I was a kid, I used to run with a gang. We all had zip guns and gravity knives, and we enjoyed ourselves with armed robbery, murder and rape. Does that sound like no emotion? And I might of gone right on in that way, from being a kid criminal to being an adult criminal, if I hadn’t met this priest. He wasn’t no stuffed shirt, he was just like one of us, because he knew that was the only way he could reach us wild types. He used to go out on stomps with us, and more than once I saw him cut the hell out of somebody with a little switchblade he always carried. So he was regular and we accepted him. But he was also a priest, and seeing he was regular I let him talk to me. And he told me how I was wasting my life in that way.”

  “He must have been a wonderful man,” Joenes said.

  “He was a saint,” the policeman said, in a heavy brooding voice. “That man was a real saint, because he did everything we did but he was good inside and told us to get out of criminality.”

  The policeman looked Joenes in the eye and said, “Because of that man, I became a cop. Me, whom everyone thought would end up in the electric chair! And that Watts has the nerve to speak of the walking dead. I became a cop, and I’ve been a good cop instead of some lousy punk hoodlum like Watts. I’ve killed eight criminals in the line of duty, winning three merit badges from the department. And I’ve also accidentally killed twenty-seven innocent bystanders who didn’t get out of the way fast enough. I’m sorry about those people, but I’ve got a job to do, and I can’t let people get in the way when I’m going after a criminal. And no matter what the newspapers say, I’ve never taken a bribe in my life, not even for a parking ticket.” The policeman’s hand tightened convulsively around the butt of his revolver. “I’d give a parking ticket to Jesus Christ himself and no number of saints would be able to bribe me. What do you think about that?”