Platinum Pohl: The Collected Best Stories

by Frederik Pohl

  Then it hurt.

  Pulcher screamed. It didn’t accomplish anything, he no longer had a voice to scream with.

  Funny, he had always thought of mining as something that was carried on underground. He was under water. There wasn’t any doubt of it. He could see vagrant eddies of sand moving in a current; he could see real fish, not the hydrogen Zeppelins of the air; he could see bubbles, arising from some source in the sand at his feet—No! Not at his feet. He didn’t have feet. He had tracks.

  A great steel bug swam up in front of him and said raspingly, “All right, you there, let’s go.” Funny again. He didn’t hear the voice with ears—he didn’t have ears, and there was no stereophonic sense—but he did, somehow, hear. It seemed to be speaking inside his brain. Radio? Sonar? “Come on!” growled the bug.

  Experimentally Pulcher tried to talk. “Watch it!” squeaked a thin little voice, and a tiny, many-treaded steel beetle squirmed out from under his tracks. It paused to rear back and look at him. “Dope!” it chattered scathingly. A bright flame erupted from its snout as it squirmed away.

  The big bug rasped, “Go on, follow the burner, Mac.” Pulcher thought of walking, rather desperately. Yes. Something was happening. He lurched and moved. “Oh, God,” sighed the steel bug, hanging beside him, watching with critical attention. “This your first time? I figured. They always give me the new ones to break in. Look, that burner—the little thing that just went down the cline, Mac! That’s a burner. It’s going to burn the hard rock out of a new shaft. You follow it and pull the sludge out. With your buckets, Mac.”

  Pulcher gamely started his treads and lurchingly followed the little burner. All around him, visible through the churned, silty water, he caught glimpses of other machines working. There were big ones and little ones, some with great elephantine flexible steel trunks that sucked silt and mud away, some with wasp’s stingers that planted charges of explosive, some like himself with buckets for hauling and scooping out pits. The mine, whatever sort of mine it was to be, was only a bare scratched-out beginning on the sea floor as yet. It took him—an hour? a minute? he had no means of telling time—to learn the rudiments of operating his new steel body.

  Then it became boring.

  Also it became painful. The first few scoops of sandy grime he carried out of the new pit made his buckets tingle. The tingle became a pain, the pain an ache, the ache a blazing agony. He stopped. Something was wrong. They couldn’t expect him to go on like this! “Hey, Mac. Get busy, will you?”

  “But it hurts.”

  “Goddamighty, Mac, it’s supposed to hurt. How else would you be able to feel when you hit something hard? You want to break your buckets on me, Mac?” Pulcher gritted his—not-teeth, squared his—not-shoulders, and went back to digging. Ultimately the pain became, through habit, bearable. It didn’t become less. It just became bearable.

  It was boring, except when once he did strike a harder rock than his phospher-bronze buckets could handle, and had to slither back out of the way while the burner chopped it up for him. But that was the only break in the monotony. Otherwise the work was strictly routine. It gave him plenty of time to think.

  This was not altogether a boon.

  I wonder, he thought with a drowned clash of buckets, I wonder what my body is doing now.

  Perhaps the tenant who now occupied his body was a businessman, Pulcher thought prayerfully. A man who had had to come to Altair Nine quickly, on urgent business—get a contract signed, make a trading deal, arrange an interstellar loan. That wouldn’t be so bad! A businessman would not damage a rented property. No. At the worst, a businessman might drink one or two cocktails too many, perhaps eat an indigestible lunch. All right. So when—in surely only a few hours now—Pulcher resumed his body, the worst he could expect would be a hangover or dyspepsia. Well, what of that? An aspirin. A dash of bicarb.

  But maybe the tourist would not be a businessman.

  Pulcher flailed the coarse sand with his buckets and thought apprehensively: He might be a sportsman. Still, even that wouldn’t be so bad. The tourist might walk his body up and down a few dozen mountains, perhaps even sleep it out in the open overnight. There might be a cold, possibly even pneumonia. Of course, there might also be an accident—tourists did fall off the Dismal Hills; there could be a broken leg. But that was not too bad, it was only a matter of a few days rest, a little medical attention.

  But maybe, Pulcher thought grayly, ignoring the teeming agony of his buckets, maybe the tenant will be something worse.

  He had heard queer, smutty stories about female tenants who rented male bodies. It was against the law. But you kept hearing the stories. He had heard of men who wanted to experiment with drugs, with drink, with—with a thousand secret, sordid lusts of the flesh. All of them were unpleasant. And yet in a rented body, where the ultimate price of dissipation would be borne by someone else, who might not try one of them? For there was no physical consequence to the practitioner. If Mrs. Lasser was right, perhaps there was not even a consequence in the hereafter.

  Twenty-four hours had never passed so slowly.

  The suction hoses squabbled with the burners. The scoops quarreled with the dynamiters. All the animate submarine mining machines constantly irritably snapped at each other. But the work was getting done.

  It seemed to be a lot of work to accomplish in one twenty-four-hour day, Pulcher thought seriously. The pit was down two hundred yards now, and braced. New wet-setting concrete pourers were already laying a floor. Shimmery little spiderlike machines whose limbs held chemical testing equipment were sniffing every load of sludge that came out now for richness of ore. The mine was nearly ready to start producing.

  After a time Pulcher began to understand the short tempers of the machines. None of the minds in these machines were able to forget that, up topside, their bodies were going about unknown errands, risking unguessed dangers. At any given moment that concrete pourer’s body, for instance, might be dying…might be acquiring a disease…might be stretched out in narcotic stupor, or might gaily be risking dismemberment in a violent sport. Naturally tempers were touchy.

  There was no such thing as rest, as coffee-breaks or sleep for the machines; they kept going. Pulcher, when finally he remembered that he had had a purpose in coming here, it was not merely some punishment that had come blindly to him for a forgotten sin, began to try to analyze his own feelings and to guess at the feelings of the others.

  The whole thing seemed unnecessarily mean. Pulcher understood quite clearly why anyone who had had the experience of renting would never want to do it again. But why did it have to be so unpleasant? Surely, at least, conditions for the renter-mind in a machine-body could be made more bearable; the tactile sensations could be reduced from pain to some more supportable feeling without enough loss of sensation to jeopardize the desired ends.

  He wondered wistfully if Madeleine had once occupied this particular machine.

  Then he wondered how many of the dynamiters and diggers were female, how many male. It seemed somehow wrong that their gleaming stainless-steel or phosphor-bronze exteriors should give no hint of age or sex. There ought to be some lighter work for women, he thought idly, and then realized that the thought was nonsense. What difference did it make? You could work your buckets off, and when you got back topside you’d be healthy and rested—

  And then he had a quick, dizzying qualm, as he realized that that thought would be the thought in the mind of the tourist now occupying his own body.

  Pulcher licked his not-lips and attacked the sand with his buckets more viciously than before.

  “All right, Mac.”

  The familiar steel bug was back beside him. “Come on, back to the barn,” it scolded. “You think I want to have to haul you back? Time’s up. Get the tracks back in the parking lot.”

  Never was an order so gladly obeyed.

  But the overseer had cut it rather fine. Pulcher had just reached the parking space, had not quite turned his clanking s
teel frame around when, rip, the tearing and the pain hit him…

  And he found himself struggling against the enfolded soft shroud that they called “the squeeze.”

  “Relax, friend,” soothed a distant voice. Abruptly the pressure was removed from his face and the voice came nearer. “There you are. Have a nice dream?”

  Pulcher kicked the rubbery material off his legs. He sat up.

  “Ouch!” he said suddenly, and rubbed his eye.

  The man by his head looked down at him and grinned. “Some shiner. Must’ve been a good party.” He was stripping the sections of rubbery gripping material off him as he talked. “You’re lucky. I’ve seen them come back in here with legs broken, teeth out, even bullet holes. Friend, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. ’Specially the girls.” He handed Pulcher another bleached towel. “All right, you’re through here. Don’t worry about the eye, friend. That’s easy two, three days old already. Another day or two and you won’t even notice it.”

  “Hey!” Pulcher cried suddenly. “What do you mean, two or three days? How long was I down there?”

  The man glanced boredly at the green-tabbed card on Pulcher’s wrist. “Let’s see, this is Thursday. Six days.”

  “But I only signed up for twenty-four hours!”

  “Sure you did. Plus emergency overcalls, naturally. What do you think, friend, the Agency’s going to evict some big-spending tourist just because you want your body back in twenty-four hours? Can’t do it. You can see that. The Agency’d lose a fortune that way.” Unceremoniously Pulcher was hoisted to his feet and escorted to the door. “If only these jokers would read the fine print,” the first man was saying mournfully to his helper as Pulcher left. “Oh, well. If they had any brains they wouldn’t rent in the first place—then what would me and you do for jobs?”

  The closing door swallowed their laughter.

  Six days! Pulcher raced through medical check-out, clothes redemption, payoff at the cashier’s window. “Hurry, please,” he kept saying, “can’t you please hurry?” He couldn’t wait to get to a phone.

  But he had a pretty good idea already what the phone call would tell him. Five extra days! No wonder it had seemed so long down there, while up in the city time had passed along.

  He found a phone at last and quickly dialed the private number of Judge Pegrim’s office. The judge wouldn’t be there, but that was the way Pulcher wanted it. He got Pegrim’s secretary. “Miss Kish? This is Milo Pulcher.”

  Her voice was cold. “So there you are. Where have you been? The judge was furious.”

  “I—” He despaired of explaining it to her; he could hardly explain it to himself. “I’ll tell you later, Miss Kish. Please. Where does the kidnap case stand now?”

  “Why, the hearing was yesterday. Since we couldn’t locate you, the judge had to appoint another attorney. Naturally. After all, Mr. Pulcher, an attorney is supposed to be in court when his clients are—”

  “I know that, Miss Kish. What happened?”

  “It was open and shut. They all pleaded non vult—it was over in twenty minutes. It was the only thing to do on the evidence, you see. They’ll be sentenced this afternoon—around three o’clock, I’d say. If you’re interested.”

  4

  It was snowing again, blue this time.

  Pulcher paid the cabdriver and ran up the steps of the courthouse. As he reached for the door he caught sight of three airfish solemnly swimming around the corner of the building toward him. Even in his hurry he paused to glance at them.

  It was past three, but the judge had not yet entered the courtroom. There were no spectators, but the six defendants were already in their seats, a bailiff lounging next to them. Counsel’s table was occupied by—Pulcher squinted—oh, by Donley. Pulcher knew the other lawyer slightly. He was a youngster, with good political connections—that explained the court’s appointing him for the fee when Pulcher didn’t show up—but without much to recommend him otherwise.

  Madeleine Gaultry looked up as Pulcher approached, then looked away. One of the boys caught sight of him, scowled, whispered to the others. Their collective expressions were enough to sear his spirit.

  Pulcher sat at the table beside Donley. “Hello. Mind if I join you?”

  Donley twisted his head. “Oh, hello, Charley. Sure. I didn’t expect to see you here.” He laughed. “Say, that eye’s pretty bad. I guess—”

  He stopped.

  Something happened in Donley’s face. The young baby-fat cheeks became harder, older, more worried-looking. Donley clamped his lips shut.

  Pulcher was puzzled. “What’s the matter? Are you wondering where I was?”

  Donley said stiffly, “Well, you can’t blame me for that.”

  “I couldn’t help it, Donley. I was renting. I was trying to gather evidence—not that that helps much now. I found one thing out, though. Even a lawyer can goof in reading a contract. Did you know the Tourist Agency has the right to retain a body for up to forty-five days, regardless of the original agreement? It’s in their contract. I was lucky, I guess. They only kept me five.”

  Donley’s face did not relax. “That’s interesting,” he said noncommittally.

  The man’s attitude was most peculiar. Pulcher could understand being needled by Donley—could even understand this coldness if it had been from someone else—but it wasn’t like Donley to take mere negligence so seriously.

  But before he could try to pin down exactly what was wrong the other lawyer stood up. “On your feet, Pulcher,” he said in a stage whisper. “Here comes the judge!”

  Pulcher jumped up.

  He could feel Judge Pegrim’s eyes rake over him. They scratched like diamond-tipped drills. In an ordinarily political, reasonably corrupt community, Judge Pegrim was one man who took his job seriously and expected the same from those around him. “Mr. Pulcher,” he purred. “We’re honored to have you with us.”

  Pulcher began an explanation but the judge waved it away. “Mr. Pulcher, you know that an attorney is an officer of the court? And, as such, is expected to know his duties—and to fulfill them?”

  “Well, Your Honor. I thought I was fulfilling them. I—”

  “I’ll discuss it with you at another time, Mr. Pulcher,” the judge said. “Right now we have a rather disagreeable task to get through. Bailiff! Let’s get started.”

  It was all over in ten minutes. Donley made a couple of routine motions, but there was no question about what would happen. It happened. Each of the defendants drew a ten-year sentence. The judge pronounced it distastefully, adjourned the court and left. He did not look at Milo Pulcher.

  Pulcher tried for a moment to catch Madeleine’s eye. Then he succeeded. Shaken, he turned away, bumping into Donley. “I don’t understand it,” he mumbled.

  “What don’t you understand?”

  “Well, don’t you think that’s a pretty stiff sentence?”

  Donley shrugged. He wasn’t very interested. Pulcher scanned the masklike young face. There was no sympathy there. It was funny, in a way. This was a face of flint; the plight of six young people, doomed to spend a decade each of their lives in prison, did not move him at all. Pulcher said dispiritedly, “I think I’ll go see Charley Dickon.”

  “Do that,” said Donley curtly, and turned away.

  But Pulcher couldn’t find Charley Dickon.

  He wasn’t at his office, wasn’t at the club. “Nope,” said the garrulous retired police lieutenant who was the club president—and who used the club headquarters as a checker salon. “I haven’t seen Charley in a couple of days. Be at the dinner tonight, though. You’ll see him there.” It wasn’t a question, whether Pulcher would be at the dinner or not; Pop Craig knew he would. After all, Charley had passed the word out. Everybody would be there.

  Pulcher went back to his apartment.

  It was the first time he had surveyed his body since reclaiming it. The bathroom mirror told him that he had a gorgeous shiner indeed. Also certain twinges made him strip an
d examine his back. It looked, he thought gloomily, staring over his shoulder into the mirror, as though whoever had rented his body had had a perfectly marvelous time. He made a mental note to get a complete checkup someday soon, just in case. Then he showered, shaved, talcumed around the black eye without much success, and dressed.

  He sat down, poured himself a drink and promptly forgot it was there. He was thinking. Something was trying to reach the surface of his mind. Something perfectly obvious, which he all the same couldn’t quite put his finger on. It was rather annoying.

  He found himself drowsily thinking of airfish.

  Damn, he thought grouchily, his body’s late tenant hadn’t even troubled to give it a decent night’s sleep! But he didn’t want to sleep, not now. It was still only early evening. He supposed the Chester A. Arthur Day Dinner was still a must, but there were hours yet before that…

  He got up, poured the untasted drink into the sink and set out. There was one thing he could try to help Madeleine. It probably wouldn’t work. But nothing else would either, so that was no reason for not trying it.

  The mayor’s mansion was ablaze with light; something was going on.

  Pulcher trudged up the long, circling driveway in slush that kept splattering his ankles. He tapped gingerly on the door.

  The butler took his name doubtfully, and isolated Pulcher in a contagion-free sitting room while he went off to see if the mayor would care to admit such a person. He came back looking incredulous. The mayor would.

  Mayor Swinburne was a healthy, lean man of medium height, showing only by his thinning hair that he was in his middle forties. Pulcher said, “Mr. Mayor, I guess you know who I am. I represent the six kids who were accused of kidnaping your son.”

  “Not accused, Mr. Pulcher. Convicted. And I didn’t know you still represented them.”

  “I see you know the score. All right. Maybe, in a legal sense, I don’t represent them anymore. But I’d like to make some representations on their behalf to you tonight—entirely unofficially.” He gave the mayor a crisply worded, brief outline of what had happened in the case, how he had rented, what he had found as a renter, why he had missed the hearing. “You see, sir, the Tourist Agency doesn’t give its renters even ordinary courtesy. They’re just bodies, nothing else. I can’t blame those kids. Now that I’ve rented myself, I’ll have to say that I wouldn’t blame anybody who did anything to avoid it.”