Various Fiction

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by Robert Sheckley

“What’s that?” the Minotaur asked.

  “Nobody’s ever late for work.”

  “I should think not.”

  “That’s a joke, actually,” the Alien Observer said.

  “Oh, I see,” the Minotaur said, chuckling hollowly.

  “I must admit, though,” the Alien Observer said, “that we are reaching a point of virtual capacity, beyond which the tracks are liable to collapse into one solid mass. The railroad phase of our civilization is about at an end.”

  “Ah,” said the Minotaur. “What will you do?”

  “A civilization,” the Alien Observer observed, “must either evolve or perish.”

  “Yes, I believe that’s true,” said the Minotaur.

  “My mission here,” the Alien Observer said, “is to see if Dædalus can use some first-rate track in his maze, which we can let him have at unbeatable prices. Meanwhile, we of ’Fang are already moving into the next phase of our evolution.”

  “What’s that?” the Minotaur asked.

  “Fashion design,” the Alien Observer said.

  “Really?” said the Minotaur.

  “Yes. We have voted to throw away our old wardrobes at the end of each year and buy new ones, thus ensuring a permanent market for our industries. There may be a limit to how much railroad track you can lay, but there’s no end to the home market for fashions. The social necessity of doing it keeps us alive, and its frivolity keeps us happy. It’s really a good system. But of course I don’t suppose that what makes blue-lipped aliens happy would be of interest to Earth people.”

  “There might be a market for your fashions here in the maze,” the Minotaur said. “Among my people.”

  “Your people?”

  “The monsters. Most of us wear no clothes at all. But it may be time for a change. I could speak to some of my friends about it.”

  “That would be very good of you,” the Alien Observer said. “I have samples of our new line back in the hotel.”

  “I’d be happy to do it,” the Minotaur said. “Ah, but I forgot for a moment, I’m a hunted monster.”

  “Ah, yes,” the Alien Observer said. “I had forgotten.”

  “I can assure you,” the Minotaur said, “that Theseus hasn’t forgotten.”

  “Hmm,” said the Alien Observer.

  “Beg pardon?” said the Minotaur.

  “‘Hmm’ is a term in ’Fang that means that an interesting thought has occurred to me. I have a plan, good monster, that might enhance our mutual positions in this convoluted world that Dædalus has wrought.”

  The car came to a stop.

  26. The Telephone Booth.

  Theseus entered the telephone booth.

  Inside, on one of the walls, he found a telephone number scrawled in black crayon, and under it the initials M.R. Theseus realized with quickening excitement, that these were the Minotaur’s initials, Minotaurus Rex.

  But how had this lucky circumstance come about? Theseus, on a hunch, stuck his head outside the telephone booth and looked skywards. Yes, sure enough, there was a fading purple glow near the horizon, sure sign that a synchronicity-rich sun had just gone nova.

  Theseus fumbled in his pockets and found a universal telephone token, put it into the telephone, dialed.

  In another part of the maze the Minotaur sat on a giant toadstool, holding a blue flower in his hand and feeling hung over and stuffed from last night’s dinner of maidens, not live ones, concentrated maidens in the form of large blonde candy bars with nuts, standard emergency rations for Minotaurs on the run. The Minotaur was trying to abstain from eating live maidens; he was no barbarian, but canned, frozen, freeze-dried or concentrated maidens were something else again; they didn’t even look like maidens. He still didn’t feel completely right about eating them, but he consoled himself with the thought that the Cannibal Island Canneries would go on producing them whether he ate them or not.

  There’s a telephone beside the Minotaur on a small toadstool of its own. The telephone rings. The Minotaur answers it.

  “Minotaur speaking.”

  “Hello, Minotaur, this is an old friend, three guesses.”

  “It’s Theseus, isn’t it?”

  “You win the prize, my friend: immolation, followed by hard words. I’m coming after you, Minotaur, I’m going to get you.”

  The Minotaur shuddered—that horrible redneck voice! He pulled himself together. “Listen,” the Minotaur said, “Can’t we make a deal, come to an arrangement, find an accommodation? This is crazy, why should you go running around after people threatening to kill them, what did I ever do to you?”

  “I’m just following the legend,” Theseus said, “no hard feelings.”

  “Give me a little more time,” the Minotaur said, “I’m getting out of this Minotaur gig; they have plastic surgery these days. I’m going to move to another country and take up soil banking.”

  “You can’t get out of it,” Theseus said. “I’m coming for you.”

  The Minotaur wondered if Theseus could be having his telephone traced. Theseus was an ingratiating fellow. The Minotaur wouldn’t put it past him to come on to a telephone girl, seduce her, dazzle her with promises, ingratiate himself with promises, get her to trace the call late at night when the supervisors have gone home to their tents and their swimming pools and leave the world to darkness and to me. He knew he should hang up, get moving, but he goes on listening.

  “What’s it like where you are?” Theseus asked the Minotaur. “Is it sunny? Raining? Night or day? Is there enough air? Are you in a place which is entirely water? What’s the first thing you see when you wake up? Who do you hang out with? Are there any decent restaurants out your way?”

  The Minotaur knew that as long as he had Theseus on the telephone he wouldn’t have him sneaking up on him.

  “Oh, it’s pretty nice around here,” the Minotaur said. He looked around. He was sitting on a giant toadstool at the edge of a bog, with dark oak trees growing nearby. The sky was overcast, and some fellow was walking on the ridge above him, smoking a clay pipe and rubbing his hands together and whistling to himself.

  “Yes, I’m in quite a nice village,” the Minotaur said. “It’s perched on top of the only mountain for miles around; you can’t miss it.”

  “Give me another clue,” said Theseus.

  “The only other thing I can tell you,” the Minotaur said, “is that the sky hereabouts is an unusual shade of green.”

  There’s a pause. Then Theseus said, “You’re putting me on, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not clever enough for that,” the Minotaur said. “Now tell me something about where you are.”

  “I’m in the lounge of a cruise ship,” Theseus said. “The waitress is just coming with my drink.”

  “What does she look like?” the Minotaur asked.

  “She’s blonde and sexy,” Theseus said. “I think she puts out. Eat your heart out, monster.”

  The Minotaur felt a sudden despair. Not only was his life in danger, his dialogue was dragging, too! It occurred to him that death might be a considerable improvement over the current situation.

  “I have it on good authority,” said Theseus, reading the Minotaur’s mind, “that death is not nearly as bad as people say. Why don’t you just let me kill you so we can get on to something else?”

  “Well, I’ll think about it,” the Minotaur said.

  “I really think you ought to,” Theseus said. “I’m speaking as your friend now. When will you know for sure?”

  “I’ll call you in a couple of days,” the Minotaur said, “and let you know for sure one way or the other.”

  “You won’t forget?”

  “Minotaurs never forget,” the Minotaur said, and hung up.

  Theseus planned to go home immediately and await the Minotaur’s telephone call. But then he remembered he didn’t have a home just now, that would come later and earlier. He needed a home quick, one with a telephone.

  27. Girl Named Phædra.

  Theseu
s is sharing an apartment with a girl named Phædra.

  Several months have passed. He is still waiting for the Minotaur’s phone call.

  He knows it’s not too likely that the Minotaur will simply give up. But it has been known to happen; Minotaurs get into these moods sometimes, it’s not entirely unprecedented, other monsters in the past and in the future have been known to throw it in, say, “kill me, baby,” or whatever words they please, and bare their necks to the blade, their shoulders to the axe, their ankles to the noose, their lungs to the fire. And then it’s all over except for the royalties and the movie options.

  Theseus would really like to get this over. Then he can marry this girl he lives with, Phædra.

  Theseus knows that marrying Phædra may not be such a good idea. According to all the old legends, he will have a very bad time with her.

  The Phædra legend as it is generally known: After marrying Theseus, Phædra, a daughter of King Alcæous of Crete, falls in love with Theseus’ son by a previous marriage, Hippolytos. She tries to seduce him, but Hippolytos is a jock, only interested in athletics, and a very self-righteous guy. He gives her lectures instead of love, and this gets her so angry that she accuses him of raping her, then commits suicide by hanging herself from a doorpost.

  Heavy, hysterical stuff, the sort of thing that happens in Grand Operas, but not in Dædalus’ maze.

  Theseus thinks the Phædra matter has been much exaggerated by the mythographers.

  People simply don’t act that way, especially Phædra, who seems a level-headed girl, rather pretty, not too tall, with large gray eyes and a kissable mouth.

  Theseus thinks that the Phædra legend is one of Dædalus’ tricks, presenting an alternative that you don’t take because it looks bad, whereas actually it could work out very well. That’s the sort of thing Dædalus does to complicate his maze.

  Of course, Dædalus could be presenting a situation that looks bad figuring you’ll try to outsmart him by choosing it anyhow, and then it turns out to be worse than bad.

  Maze makers are devious people.

  Maybe Phædra is a little unstable. Maybe marrying her is a little extreme, not to say heroic. It’s been pretty good living with her, why get married? Because Phædra wants to be married; she’s a conventional girl; she thinks a lot about what people will think, and Theseus always marries them, Ariadne, Phædra, Antiope, probably a few others he’s forgotten.

  Well it’s something he doesn’t have to think about just yet. He’s still waiting for the Minotaur’s call. Nothing can happen before that.

  And the telephone does ring; sometimes it’s for Phædra, sometimes it’s for Theseus, but it’s never the call Theseus wants.

  There’s some man who calls Phædra all the time. He has a heavy foreign accent. He never leaves his name when Theseus answers.

  Theseus suspects it might be his son, Hippolytos, calling from a future part of the maze, trying to horn in on his father’s act before Theseus has even properly consummated his relationship.

  The fact is, Theseus hasn’t slept with Phædra yet.

  He has tried to get Phædra to sleep with him, because Theseus is something of a traditionalist in these matters and he figures that if he’s going to be stuck with a messy situation in the future he might as well get a little fun out of it in the present. And Phædra is quite attractive, a toothsome little morsel, and young. Theseus likes them young, but she refuses: it’s not that I don’t love you, it’s just that it doesn’t feel right. I could never face my parents, oh, if only we could be married! But Theseus is still married to Ariadne, the divorce from Delphi hasn’t come through yet; everybody is going to have to wait.

  Theseus doesn’t take Phædra’s calls anymore. Theseus has his own special signal; he knows the call is for him if, between each ring, there is a lightly aspirated S sound. He has asked all his friends to produce this sound when they call him so he can differentiate his phone calls from Phædra’s. This will make it harder for the Minotaur to get through, but Theseus is sure the resourceful beast will find a way. Theseus has tried to explain all of this to Phædra, but it’s no use; they have no language in common: This was appealing when Phædra was a blonde waitress with a come-hither look in her eyes. Now she wears horn-rimmed glasses and has lost what little she had known of the Hellenic language. The only phrase they have in common is “will you have a drink,” and, “will you have another drink?” She’s always on the telephone with someone. Could it be the Minotaur? What in hell is going on around here?

  It’s raining outside, so Theseus smokes a couple of baguettes to calm his nerves. He goes out for a walk. When he comes back the telephone is ringing, and the aspirated S is clear, yes, it’s for him, his call, and he races upstairs, five flights, fumbles with the locks, gets in at last, heart pounding, “Hello, yes, who is it?”

  “It’s me,” says the Minotaur.

  “Gasp.”

  “Beg pardon?” says the Minotaur.

  “Just trying to catch my breath,” Theseus says, his lungs laboring for air, light metaphor.

  “I hope,” the Minotaur says, “that you didn’t run up those five flights.”

  “How did you know about that?”

  “And how is Phædra?”

  “How did you know about her?”

  “We have our ways,” says the Minotaur.

  “No doubt,” says Theseus. “What have you decided?”

  “I’m going to wear the blue organdy,” the Minotaur replies. “The choice was not as easy as you might think. I look good in jeans, and it’s not really a formal occasion, eating moules in the Tarzan Trajectory, but I think it’s the right decision.”

  “What about giving up, letting me kill you?”

  “Had I said something about that? Oh, I remember now. But I was depressed then. And now there’s a party. You can’t expect me to give up before the party.”

  “I suppose not,” said Theseus. “Is it going to be a good party?”

  “It looks like it’ll be a lovely party,” says the Minotaur.

  “Could I come?” Theseus asks.

  “Really!” the Minotaur says.

  “We could declare a night’s truce. I haven’t been to a party in a long time.”

  “Theseus, you’re a cunning Hellenic bastard, but I could almost feel sorry for you. Almost but not quite. It is against the law of conflict for me to invite you to the party.”

  “For the love of God, Montressor!” Theseus cries.

  “Yes,” the Minotaur says quietly. “The cask of Amontillado.” He hangs up.

  Phædra comes home, makes a phone call, gets out again.

  Theseus goes to bed.

  28. Modalities of the Reclinational.

  Theseus is asleep now, or, if not actually sleeping, at least lying down on his bed, smoking a baguette, reading a book, listening to his cassettes.

  It is strange how little time authors give to describing the life of a man as it is lived when he is lying down. Yet what a topic there is in the modalities of the reclinational!

  Perhaps a third of our life is spent sleeping, an activity essential to the propagation of dreams and fantasies. Another large percentage of our time is given to such activities as reading, getting a suntan, and talking on the telephone. Then there are the hours we devote to the amateur theatricals of sex. These are not limited strictly to the reclinational, since they take man, or couples, through a bewildering repertoire of postural possibilities for conjoined bodies, yet return ever again to that fundamental proneness which is our subject.

  Even eating, an activity which just escapes our list of sedentary pursuits, since an upright or semi-slouched posture is generally considered desirable for its pursuit, may be viewed as nature’s way of getting you to lie down, a full stomach being a powerful inducement to this end.

  The ancient Greeks and Romans needed no such inducement. They took all their meals lying down, or, to be precise, in a reclinational position as close to lying down as was possible given the nec
essity of keeping the mouth elevated in order to enlist the assistance of gravity in moving the food from mouth through throat to stomach. They were clear-sighted and active, those cleanshaven men in their togas and chlamys. The Orient was amazed at how much bustling around these fellows did, usually in phalanxes and carrying spears. They were practical hedonists, and when they had fulfilled the necessities of the upright they turned to the arts of the reclinational with a will.

  Petronius is to the point here, the author of the first novel which considers lying down in some depth. The central portion of the fragment of Petronius’ Satyricon that has come down to us describes the feast of a fellow named Trimalchio. At this feast, which was, of course, a lying-down feast, everything was brought to you, food, girls, drink, entertainment, you didn’t have to move at all. Instead of considering this a good thing, Petronius affects to find the spectacle coarse and laughable and to be avoided at all costs. Perhaps Petronius and his small circle of effete friends didn’t like parties. A modern reading of the situation, however, puts the matter in a different light. There aren’t many of us who would turn down a party where there were a lot of good things to eat, pretty girls dancing on the table, an abundance of wine and plenty of laughs. What in heaven’s name is vulgar about this? It is precisely the party we all wish to be asked to.

  Compare it to Plato’s Symposium, where a bunch of gay men sit around talking about the meaning of love, which, since Socrates has ruled out sex, they find very complicated. In fact, the high point of the evening is when a guest announces how remarkable it is, the way Socrates is able to keep his hands off the delectable Alcibiades.

  Trimalchio’s feast comes out looking a lot more fun than Plato’s, but different feasts for different folks; the essential thing is that both were important occasions in the cultural history of the world, and both were performed in their entirety in the reclinational mode, i.e., lying down.

  The reader of the future will put down our facile action-oriented novels of today and ask, “Why doesn’t the author ever say anything about the characters’ thoughts while lying down? Why doesn’t he tell us about the sensation of a scratchy blanket spread over a lumpy couch? What is it like to lie on your back on a dusty rug on the floor gazing up at a white sky with dead trees black against it? What about lying on a narrow wooden bench at a friend’s house, sharing a bottle of wine while the radio plays and the baby chases the cat?” Our upright-oriented books will give him no reply, unless, of course, he happens to look into this one.

 

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