by Earl
His hand went to the telepathy-control.
Dennis Smith, in Beverly Hills, shook his head.
“I’m afraid I’m not interested, Vayder.”
The director almost choked on the olive he was nibbling.
“What? Don’t you realize what I’m offering? I’ll sign you without a screen test, even!”
The dead Jed Wheeler had done a superb job on what was meant to be his new body. Molding synthetic protoplasm as clay, he had modeled a human form perfect from all standpoints. Except for his tragic failure in mind-transference, he would have lived and breathed like a Greek god among lesser mortals. In Pat Vayder’s eyes, Dennis Smith was the ultimate in matinee idols.
Earl Dean stared in surprise at Vayder, seeing his phlegmatic composure for once disturbed.
“A thousand a week to start, Smith!” the director offered.
He was pleading!
A ghost of a derisive smile touched Dennis Smith’s lips, but quickly flicked away.
“I’m really not in the market—”
“Two thousand a week!”
Smith turned away rudely.
“I’ll think it over,” he said airily, leaving the director looking like a child from whom a mountainous dish of ice-cream had been taken.
AWARE that Carroll Dean was following, Smith wandered out on a verandah overlooking beds of scented flowers. The cool night breeze rustled over them. Overhead gleamed the rising full moon.
Carroll touched his arm.
“I think I admire you for it, Dennis,” she said in a low voice. “You declined glamor. You have some greater purpose in life. What is it? What do you do?”
“Nothing,” Smith returned, watching the startled injury in her eyes at the brusque evasion.
He was playing with her too. Why not? She as well as the rest of the stupid world had thrust him into enforced exile. Why not make her suffer a little? Through the guise of Dennis Smith, Moore could make all the people suffer with whom he came in contact. They had had no pity for him. He need have none for them.
It was particularly appropriate to hurt Carroll Dean.
At college, years ago, she had severed their companionship, and hurt him. It was an accident that Earl Dean had met Dennis Smith. Smith had sought him out, inveigled into his good graces, practically invited himself to the party.
But at first only as a test. Only to assure himself that the bio-man could pass freely among humans and be accepted as such. As a test of his “disguise.” Meeting Carroll Dean again, after all these years, had been of secondary interest.
Now it was more.
“Nothing,” Smith repeated. “We do nothing at all. We—”
He stopped at the girl’s widening eyes. That we again. Strangely, Moore had found himself thinking in the plural quite often. Training the bioman, associating with it for months previously, he had almost come to take it as another being. As a companion rather than an instrument. He would have to take more care against saying “we.” The world must never know that Bruce Moore, mass murderer, moved among them freely by proxy, despite their rigid precautions against him.
“You’re strange—strange!” the girl was murmuring. “There’s something about you—something . . .”
“Something—like this?” Smith swept her into his embrace. His artificial arms circled her slender waist, crushing her to his broad chest. His synthetic lips pressed savagely against hers, with all the ardor and warmth of human lips.
She gasped, struggled for a moment, then yielded. Eagerly, the kiss was returned. Her arms tightened about his neck. Her whisper breathed into his ear.
“Dennis—Dennis dear!”
Moore, far away out of ear-shot, laughed wildly, triumphantly. Carroll Dean in the arms of a non-human creation, breathing affection for it! Pressing her sweet young lips against hand-made pseudo-lips and thinking them real! Did she remember the human lips she had turned away from, years ago?
Now, to add the crowning touch, the bio-man pushed her away, roughly.
Red flamed into the girl’s face.
“Childish, aren’t we?” he said insultingly.
“Dennis! You’re—you’re brutal! You’ve played with me. And I thought, all the while that we danced and talked, that—oh!”
Her hand flashed stingingly across his cheek. It failed to register any slightest pain to the remote flesh of Moore. In that, too, the girl was duped, deceived, unknowing that she was a pawn in a stranger game than a man had ever played before.
This was all perfect—perfect!
Dennis Smith smiled imperturably at the blazing-eyed girl. Deliberately he shrugged, hitching one shoulder higher than the other. He was showing utter indifference, telling her to leave and peddle her papers.
“Bruce!”
It was a startled cry from the girl. Her anger had abruptly changed to wide-eyed wonder. She was staring at him as though seeing a ghost.
“You’re Bruce Moore!” she gasped. “You must be! Those mannerisms—the way you just now hitched your left shoulder. I can’t forget those things. No other man could do it just that way.”
She was squeezing his arm.
“I must be mad—and yet I’m not. You’re not Bruce Moore—physically. But your air, your manner, sometimes the tone of your voice. . . .”
“Bruce Moore, of all things!” Dennis Smith scoffed.
But in his isolated home, Moore was cursing himself. The girl was sharp—too sharp. She was seeing through his “disguise” If she exposed him, all his plans and hopes were shattered. All his chance to live and move in the society that had ostracized him.
“What utterly senseless things are you saying?” Dennis Smith pursued quickly. “Look at me. Am I Bruce Moore—my build, my height, my face? They’re all different.”
“Plastic surgery!” the girl hazarded wildly. “I know how he—you—must have suffered, in exile. Your one thought must have been to escape. You did it, somehow. I know you’re here. I feel it. You’re Bruce Moore!”
“I’m not!” Smith flung back, angrily.
It had become a ridiculous scene, with their voices rising.
IV
A MAN stepped from the shadows of a portico. He strode forward and gripped Smith’s arm.
“I’m Commissioner Lewis of the City Police,” he barked. “I heard what Miss Dean said. I’m here as a guest, but duty comes first. If you’re Dr. Bruce Moore—”
Carroll looked at him startled, then interrupted.
“Of course not, commissioner,” she laughed weakly. “I’m sure you heard wrong.”
The official shook his head politely.
“No use to shield him, Miss Dean. The state of California has a standing warrant for the arrest of Dr. Bruce Moore.”
He looked closely at Smith.
“You sure don’t look like your pictures. But plastic surgery can do some marvellous changing. Thought you could sneak out of Nevada, eh? Well, Dr. Moore, now that we have you out of that state, I can promise you a quick trial and execution!”
Lewis’, face showed both repulsion and triumph. Repulsion at sight of the man who had caused death to five hundred innocent people. Triumph at having captured him. He was, in his own opinion, a crusader crunching Evil.
Dennis Smith squirmed in his firm grasp. Bruce Moore squirmed mentally, six hundred miles away. Had he this quickly been trapped and exposed? How could he save the situation? Save the bio-man, when the truth became known, from destruction, and himself from maddening reexile?
Dennis Smith flung off the powerful man’s hand with a savage wrench. Jed Wheeler had also endowed his artificial body with exceptional strength, speed and skill. It would be simple to leap over the verandah railing to the garden and escape. Lewis carried no gun.
Smith tensed for a movement, then relaxed. He would escape, but be branded as a criminal. He would be little better off than before. A faint smile ghosted over his lips. Why not play his cards subtly? There was one daring way out of this dilemma.
He
spoke.
“Just a minute. The accusations of Miss Dean are ridiculous. She nor you have any proof. You can’t arrest me on assumption.” He smiled easily. “You think I’m Bruce Moore. But Bruce Moore is back in Nevada, I assure you.”
“I’ll take you into custody and check on that,” growled the police commissioner.
“I have a better suggestion,” Smith countered. “Suppose we take a plane to Moore’s place in Nevada. If he isn’t there, or anywhere in the state, I’m it. I’d like to meet this famous—or infamous—character myself!”
Carroll Dean half gasped and looked sharply at Smith. Her hand went to her throat.
“But Br—Dennis, you can’t—”
Moore gloated to himself. This was the best way. Carroll thought Smith was Moore. And Lewis did. Seeing Moore with Smith, their suspicions would be over once and for all. And the world’s possible suspicion, in future situations. In fact, Carroll’s nearexposure was working out as a splendid help in Moore’s scheme to break from his exile.
“I’ll take you up on that!” Lewis said quickly. “I know your little game You figure when we arrive in Nevada, you’ll once again be free, according to that state’s court decision. On the soil of Nevada, you’re free. But I’ll clamp you with bomb-proof extradition papers. You won’t get out of it. Dr. Bruce Moore!”
THE special police plane soared from one state to another in less than two hours. It landed in the town nearest Moore’s home. Waiting squad cars of the Nevada state police took them along the rutted road to the isolated place.
The press had already caught it up. “SCIENCE BLUEBEARD TRAPPED IN CALIFORNIA! California police, in conjunction with Nevada police, making final check to prove Moore tried to escape exile through plastic-surgery. Nevada police will yield Moore if it is proven he stepped beyond state boundaries!”
Seated in the squad-car in the lead were Dennis Smith, Carroll Dean, Commissioner Lewis and two police. They had spoken little, all tense over the coming situation. Time and again the girl glanced at Smith with an expression of puzzled dismay.
She finally whispered to him.
“Why are you exposing your plastic surgery disguise so openly? As Bruce Moore, you’ll be executed mercilessly!”
“What do you care?” Smith shrugged, hiding a smile.
His smile faded. Something like a sob came from the girl. Her voice was a threadbare murmur.
“I love you,” she said simply. “I always have, Bruce! It was a mistake to leave you. Father kept me away, after that.”
Shock came over the bio-man’s face. Shock that was reflected from the mind of Moore. Then, a whirlwind of rage swept him. She lied! It was Dennis Smith she loved. His magnificent body, strong features, manly grace. Not the Bruce Moore of before.
She would suffer for this too. For showing him so plainly, without knowing it, that she had considered the “former” Bruce Moore not big or strong or manly enough for her.
Faintly, in the back of his mind, Moore was grimly amused. He was being jealous—of his own proxy! Of a Frankenstein creation. Destiny was weaving a strange pattern.
THE squad-cars rolled to a stop before the ramshackle old house Moore had bought years before, in which to begin his dangerous researches. An annuity from an electrical invention had provided his living comfortably. At the edge of desert-land, the house stood forlornly against the skyline of distant mountains.
It was here that the loneliest man on Earth had spent a year, more shunned and avoided than any hermit.
Commissioner Lewis led the way to the front door, knocking loudly.
He turned. “There won’t be any answer, will there, Moore? You can’t be inside and out here both at the same time.” His voice became harsh. “Why don’t you give up the game, Moore? This is a waste of time—”
He started.
The door swung open creakily. A man stood framed in the doorway, peering out with a surprised expression.
“Bruce Moore!” gasped Lewis. Bewilderedly, he glanced from him to Dennis Smith.
Carroll Dean stood stunned. She stared in disbelief at Moore, then slowly clutched Smith’s arm, as if to make sure he hadn’t vanished.
Moore looked over the group, hiding his triumph. He and his proxy were face to face. No one could deny they were two separate persons, now. The last link had been forged in his foolproof plan.
“Yes, I’m Bruce Moore,” he said, acting his part. He laughed bitterly. “I’m not used to visitors. None has been here for a year. I’m a leper, a pariah, a dangerous maniac! Perhaps you had better go before I blow you all to atoms!”
Commissioner Lewis recovered himself.
“No need for that, Moore. We’re here on official business. It’s all a mistake, however. I just want to know one thing. Do you know this man—Dennis Smith?”
Moore followed his gesture, peering at the bio-man blankly.
“Never saw him in my life before.”
Dennis Smith stepped forward. “Let me explain, Dr. Moore. It seems I was suspected of being you, with your face and body remodeled somehow.”
The two men stood face to face. Even in the moonlight and the electric light from the open door it was clear. Moore was two inches shorter than Smith, with narrower shoulders, darker hair, and embittered features that contrasted sharply with the clear-cut classical face of the proxy. Side by side, they were like black and white.
Moore held the pose—the double pose—for several seconds, to allow that to sink in to the watchers. Then he grinned.
“How ridiculous!” he said bitingly. “Hardly flattering to you, Mr. Smith. May I offer my condolences for the insulting comparison?”
He extended his hand.
Smith hesitated. There was faint repugnance in his face. Finally with a reluctant air, he took the hand. Moore and his proxy shook hands.
Moore drank the dramatic moment to the full. Within himself, he was laughing hysterically. No Bergen had ever handled his Charley McCarthy more cleverly, or with such important effect. The eyes of the duped world were watching, through Commissioner Lewis. A flash-bulb went off. A reporter with a camera had inveigled a ride in one of the squad cars. The morning papers would play up the event, perhaps in a derisive fashion. Dennis Smith would never again be suspected of being Bruce Moore.
So much for that.
Moore smiled to himself. Why not make the comedy a farce?
Smith turned to Lewis. “Well, I hope you’re satisfied, commissioner?”
“Sorry,” the red-faced police official grunted by way of apology. “All a mistake—”
“A rather stupid mistake, I’d say,” Moore put in blandly. “Anyone can see that Smith is an upright, honest, worthy citizen. Whereas I’m a murderous soul with a bloodthirsty gleam in my eye!”
“Dr. Moore,” Smith said, as if impulsively, “I consider it an honor to meet you, regardless of world opinion!”
“Honor!” Moore retorted to his proxy. “But I’m a brutal, cold killer. I have the blood of five hundred innocent, harmless people on my hands.
You’ve read the papers. I’m a beast, a monster, a savage—”
“Please! Bruce!” It was almost a moan from Carroll Dean, biting her lips.
Moore turned to her for the first time. “Miss Dean! An old friend of mine. Nice of you to call on me in my lonely hours—”
Carroll Dean whirled and fled from the cold, harsh voice. Commissioner Lewis turned away with her. Smith followed. The squad-cars rolled away again, leaving the lone man standing before his citadel of exile.
V
“I’VE hurt you, Carroll,” Moore hissed to the wind. “As you hurt me, once. And I’ve made an utter fool of you, Lewis. Now I’m free to go out in the world and hurt, hurt, hurt! Revenge! Revenge for a year of misery, degradation, ruin!”
He stood shaking his fist out over the desert.
Then, suddenly, he darted back into the house. In a back room, he sat himself before his radio and television controls. With the bio-man speeding away in the
squad-car, amplified sight and sound were needed for full control of the proxy.
At the base of the proxy’s skull, under the skin, he had inserted a sensitive tele-radio transmitter, run by nerve-currents. In constructing the artificial body, the genius of Jed Wheeler had solved one of nature’s secrets—that the human nervous system was an electrical circuit. In the bio-man, a super-strong heart pumped energy through a valve, supplying this current. It was almost exactly the principle of an auto’s generator constantly recharging a battery.
Going one little step further, in his months of experimentation, Moore had inserted the tele-radio unit, connected to the optic and auditory nerves. Thus all that the bio-man saw and heard, Moore saw and heard. The unit had enough power to transmit the most distant scenes, by frequency-modulation, developed in 1939. The new type of radio transmission that eliminated static, fading, and all previous disadvantages of radio.
Moore thereby “lived,” for all practical purposes, in Smith. Knowing his exact surroundings, it was easy through telepathy control to guide the bio-man unerringly in its contacts with the world. The telepathy-rapport—mental radio—Moore could not explain. It was something that Jed Wheeler’s dead soul alone knew the explanation for.
Moore breathed a sigh of relief, now.
He had gambled, having the bioman face him. It had taken rigid, precise timing to have first himself speak, commanding the proxy mentally to remain blank. And then mentally to direct the proxy to speak, keeping his own features expressionless.
But it had worked—splendidly! Fortunately, it had not been broad daylight, revealing it all too unmistakably.
There had been one other danger. That Lewis, still suspicious, might have insisted on searching the house. He might have connected the disappearance of Jed Wheeler to Moore.
Fortunately again, Jed Wheeler had come to Moore’s place in utter secrecy, not wishing the authorities to know of his unlawful experiment, dealing with a human life. No one had known that Wheeler visited Moore. No one knew that his moldering body lay buried under the house. The disappearance of Dr. Jed Wheeler had been marked “unsolved” in police records.