A Galaxy Of Strangers

by Lloyd Biggle Jr

  The two of them moved their heads closer together and continued to talk.

  *

  They loomed up out of a chill night and rang the Penal Authority’s gong. Farley was wearing an outlandish, enveloping cloak; Helpflin was similarly attired and also wore a disguise Farley had selected from his collection of props for criminal attractions: false nose and teeth. In addition, Helpflin had stopped off at the Poverty Control Agency and manufactured a complete identity kit.

  The door guard gazed at them curiously. “This is Dr. Berr,” Farley said. “I have to get medical approval for Lyndyl’s new act.”

  The guard sourly signed him in and waved them along. All the security checks were casual. No one ever had escaped from the Penal

  Authority, or even tried to. How could the prisoners escape, when all of them were in cages?

  Farley hurried Helpflin past the three interior checkpoints, each superintended by a watchman who nodded sleepily from his enclosure. The punishment night attendant was asleep. Farley did not hesitate—he released Lyndyl, attired him in his own concealing cloak, giving it a fold that hid the face, and watched Helpflin lead him away. Surreptitiously he saw them past the first checkpoint, and then he went to an upstairs window and watched until they safely emerged from the building.

  With a feeling of immense satisfaction he staggered drunkenly back down to the punishment ward, entered Lyndyl’s cage, and closed the door.

  *

  “I appreciate the loyalty,” Mallod said, “but you shouldn’t have done it.”

  Farley had never seen his boss so flustered, but because of a gigantic headache he was having difficulty in concentrating. He could only stare at him.

  “I didn’t mean that seriously about getting Lyndyl released,” Mallod explained. “But it worked. He’ll be worth half a million to us now.”

  Comprehension came slowly to Farley. “You mean—Lyndyl has committed another crime?”

  “Another murder,” Mallod said, with deep satisfaction. “Now he’s a double murderer, and also the only criminal escapee in two generations, and he won’t have to have an act. He can sit there smiling and make the audience shudder.”

  “Who did he murder?” Farley asked, aghast.

  “Who’d you expect? That Dr. Berr you brought to see him. We found his cloak and identification, but Lyndyl won’t tell us what he did with the body. If he shoved it into a commercial disposer, and he had the opportunity, we’ll never find a trace of it. Which is neither here nor there. You shouldn’t have done it. The Authority doctor is of the opinion that you were of unsound mind due to a food poisoning he can’t identify, and that’s your best line of defense. Stick to it, and don’t mention what I said about getting Lyndyl out, and I’ll do everything I can for you.”

  *

  “Life imprisonment,” the arbiter said, “with mandatory punishment at a minimum fifty per cent level. I’m prohibiting your lease to any public or private exhibition—though why one would want the author of such a sordid crime I couldn’t comprehend.”

  Farley said bewilderedly, “But I didn’t do any murder!”

  “You helped to free a homicidal maniac, so you were responsible for what he did—which is beside the point. I wouldn’t give you mandatory punishment for that. Murder is a crime against one person. In conspiring to release a legally confined criminal, you committed a horrendous offense against your government—in other words, against half a billion people. Get him out of here before I make it punishment at the hundred per cent level!”

  *

  A wretched soul, bruised with adversity … Twelve times each day—once every two hours—Farley felt the preliminary tingle that signaled the beginning of the next punishment cycle. Wearily he began to search for the neutral spot. His few attempts to defy punishment failed; he was physically incapable of standing the shocks, and eventually he would be forced to search desperately for the neutral spot with the same pathetic, groveling whimpers that had so revolted him when he witnessed the punishment of others. He looked forward to the final shock that brought unconsciousness; it was the only rest he had.

  There’s some ill planet reigns:

  I must be patient till the heavens look

  With an aspect more favorable.

  He nevertheless had cause for thanks. He had committed a crime; he deserved punishment. At least he had escaped the humiliation of public exhibition.

  *

  He suffered eight days of continuous fifty per cent punishment; then, regaining consciousness after a punishment cycle, he found himself caged in the Penal Authority ‘copter used to transfer criminals. It landed, and he was brusquely removed and thrust into another cage.

  A beaming Dr. Savron looked in on him. “Welcome to Rolling Acres!”

  Farley regarded him incredulously.

  “Mallod and I arranged this,” Savron said. “Officially, someone made a mistake and brought you instead of the criminal we contracted for. It’ll take time to straighten out the mixup, and you’ll have a few days of rest from punishment.”

  “Thank you,” Farley said. “That’s very kind of you.”

  “Not at all. I’d like to have you here permanently, to help with the attractions. But since you’re an enemy of the government, under a sentence of mandatory punishment with exhibition prohibited, naturally that’s out of the question.”

  “Naturally,” Farley agreed, with a faint smile.

  “Unless,” Savron went on, “you’re able to perform an act yourself.”

  “I’m a student of history, not a performer.”

  “Exactly. But if you were to come up with something extremely popular, and it would have to be sensational, then we could put pressure on the arbiter to let us keep you. Mallod thinks you can do it. You created so many great acts for others—surely you can do one for yourself. That’s the real reason we arranged this. Mallod says to tell you he’s doing the best he can for you, but it may be a long time before you’ll have another opportunity like this one.”

  “Thanks,” Farley said, “but I prefer punishment to public humiliation.”

  “Exactly. But we have some distinguished visitors in addition to the usual afternoon audience. The entire Board of Commissioners is here, and if they see something they like they’ll certainly persuade the arbiter to let us keep it. It’s the chance of a lifetime for you, and you may never have another one like it. But the act will have to be exceptional. Good luck—you’re on in half an hour!”

  His face vanished. Farley stared after him contemptuously. “I haven’t got an act!” he shouted. “I don’t want an act! I won’t do an act!”

  There was no response; Savron had left, and the panel was closed. Farley dropped into a chair and looked about him. The exhibit’s stage was set to resemble an ordinary room: chairs, a table, a rack of book tapes (but no player), cheap ornaments, and knickknacks. Idly he wondered what preposterous stupidity of an act had been planned for such a setting, but it was no concern of his. The one dignity left to him was the right to refuse the indignity of performing publicly in a cage. When Savron returned he would tell him so, emphatically.

  But he was not ungrateful for the respite from punishment. He was exhausted, and certainly it would be a long time before he again enjoyed the luxury of uninterrupted sleep. He stretched out in the chair and dozed off immediately.

  What hath this day deserved? What hath it done

  That it in golden letters should he set

  Among the high tides in the calendar?

  *

  The warning buzzer awakened Farley. For a moment he could not think what it was, or where he was. Then he shouted, “I haven’t got an act! I won’t do an act!”

  The stage lights came on, the panels went transparent, and he found himself glaring furiously at his audience.

  He had never seen an audience before. In the past, he always had been in the audience, listening to its reaction but concentrating intensely on what the performer did. Now, for the first time, he saw the fac
es.

  The leering, the coarse, the mocking faces. From the front, small boys were shouting taunts at him. Girls were tittering, women giggling, men grinning. Only the commissioners, unmistakable in their flamboyant uniforms, looked on solemnly.

  Farley leaped to his feet. At one side, staring at him, was his alleged friend from the Anachron, the supposedly murdered phony Dr. Berr, whose real name Farley had not learned. “You told me to do it!” Farley screamed. He pointed a quivering finger. “You! It’s your fault!”

  The crowd dissolved in hilarity. An explosion of laughter smote Farley; a hideously cackling mouth gaped at him from every distorted face. Only Dr. Berr was not laughing. He was staring in consternation.

  “You!” Farley shouted.

  Dr. Berr turned and fled.

  Fury overwhelmed Farley. He picked up his chair and sent it crashing against the panels. “You!” he screamed again. Another chair. Crash. A table. Crash.

  “You!” Farley screamed. “You told me to do it!”

  Cushions. The book tapes. The ornaments and knickknacks. Anything he could lift, and his strength was prodigious. He dashed into the adjacent sleeping quarters, returned with a chest, and flung that. From the convenience lounge he brought tumblers of water at a panting run and splashed them at the audience.

  Then he hurled himself against the panels and futilely beat on them with his fists.

  His anger began to fade, and he stared dully at the packed faces before him.

  They were convulsed with laughter. The children were rolling on the ground, the adults were helplessly clutching their sides, even the dignified commissioners were howling.

  Again his wrath overwhelmed him. He screamed insults, he hurled every loose object in his cage, and when the stage lights faded and the panels again became translucent, he lay on the floor at the front of the cage, kicking with impotent rage and futilely hammering the panels with bloody hands.

  Slowly he got to his feet. For a long, stunned moment he contemplated the debris that lay scattered in the wake of his anger, and then, defeated, humiliated beyond any hope of atonement, he sank to the floor and wept for the cool dimness of his punishment cage, for the honest torment of the electrical regimen’s unsullied pulsations.

  “Farley!”

  He looked up uncomprehendingly. Dr. Savron was beaming at him. “Great act! Absolutely great! Sensational! You did it! You’re the best attraction we have! I’ll get statements from all of the commissioners and see to your permanent transfer in the morning. I’ll also tell the stage man to get you some cheap props so you can put on a show without breaking up good furniture. We won’t exhibit you again until it’s ready.”

  His face disappeared. The stage man entered a moment later, wiping his eyes. “Never laughed so hard in my life,” he said. “Great act. I’ll find some cheap props for you.”

  He removed the debris from the cage and returned with an inflated chair. “Just to give you something to sit on while we rummage the prop room,” he said. “You can throw this one as much as you like.”

  He left, and Farley dropped into the chair and closed his eyes.

  He was caged. It was illegal to cage animals for display, but it was not illegal to cage Wace Renoldon Farley, 673 492 479 341 895, and train him under the threat of dire punishment if he learned slowly, and make him perform ten times daily for a leering audience of inhumane humans.

  Never before had he thought of an audience in terms of faces, but now he had seen them: the hideously flushed, twisted, coarse, cackling, screaming, howling puffs of animate flesh. He had not imagined that anything could be so repulsive, and he was caged and helpless and fated to look out on them ten times daily.

  But he had not lost, not yet. They could not force him to perform. Punishment was his lawful destiny, and it held no terror for him.

  He opened his eyes and looked about him. The Rolling Acres accommodations were the most lavish he had seen. He got to his feet and made a hasty inspection. Behind the stage was a comfortably sized bedroom and the private convenience lounge with bath. The stage was oversized and could serve as living quarters and study when he wasn’t performing. The apartment he’d been able to afford on his Penal Authority salary seemed cramped by comparison. Probably they would let him have his library if he claimed to be studying Shakespeare in search of ideas for a new act.

  They could not force him. There was no possible way they could compel him to perform.

  He sat down again. If his demented violence had brought howls of laughter, what would a real act do—an act with pacing, and continuity, and motivation, and climaxes, and a finish with a genuine punch to it?

  They could not force him.

  But if they’d let him have a water tap in full view of the audience, he could fill a container with water and throw that. He’d need two containers. He’d fill one and splash the panels, and they’d be convulsed. Then he’d fill it again.

  Somehow he’d have to arrange for the panels to slide aside at precisely the right moment. Then he could pick up a container and dash toward the audience, the panels would open, and the audience would think this notorious criminal was loose and about to drench it with water. But he would be carrying the second container, and as the spectators tried to scatter in panic, he’d dump a cloud of paper confetti over them.

  It would slay them.

  He leaned back in profound satisfaction. Wace Renoldon Farley, notorious enemy of the government and the people, Wace Farley would kill his audiences dead. With a gentle smile on his face he fell asleep.

  His glassy essence, like an angry ape …

  Condemned into everlasting redemption …

  page 151

  WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT!

  The monthly National Lottery drawing was being held in the 100,000 car parking lot of Yosemite Valley. Searchlights dissected the night sky, and on the dim rostrum a young lady in spangled, iridescent tights stood postured beside a fountain of tossing, luminous globes, her long-handled net poised to strike. In the foreground, heavily pulsing music contested with the incessant, grinding purr of the fountain; in the background hung the rumbling murmur of the waiting thousands. In every direction, as far as the ubiquitous infrared TV cameras penetrated, the valley was a tossing blur of tense faces.

  The net swooped. With practiced deftness the young lady flipped the captured globe into a launcher’s yawning mouth. The TV scene switched to a night view of the valley from Glacier Point, and cameras followed the fiery arch of the globe’s path until it exploded spectacularly into a gleaming number six that hung suspended over the valley and slowly began to blur into a luminous cloud.

  On the rostrum below, on marquees at L Headquarters across the nation where millions thronged the streets and stared upward, on the L Specials from the nation’s TV stations, the A Boards flashed the number six; and on the drawing rostrum, the spangled young lady was poised to fish for another globe.

  Benjamin Franklin went to the bar to fix himself a drink. Although diligent and expensive research had uncovered no family connection with the famed historical figure, Franklin liked to hint that there was. If pressed, he would concede that he had followed a famous ancestor’s bent for electrical research. Franklin was chairman of the board of one of the nation’s largest energy conglomerates.

  With his present associates, Franklin liked to pretend that the relationship was ironic. The historical Benjamin Franklin had once sponsored a lottery to finance the purchase of cannon for the defense of Philadelphia. The later-day Franklin was masterminding a conspiracy to destroy the National Lottery, and he’d put up half of a million-dollar fund dedicated to that purpose.

  On the wall-sized TV screen, the spangled young lady had captured and launched another globe, and the gleaming number three was slowly dissipating. Franklin said, raising his glass, “The state of Georgia once ran a lottery to raise five thousand dollars for a school. That was back when a dollar was worth fifty. The cost of the lottery exceeded three hundred thousand dollars, an
d that didn’t include the prizes. Even so, when compared with our National Lottery’s management—”

  Edmund Cahill, president of the nation’s largest brokerage firm, drained his own glass, set it down, and remarked pompously, “Well, we’ve got to do something. We’ve got to re-educate the public. When a man buys a bad stock, at least he has something to show for it. Very few bad stocks are completely worthless, and a bad stock can improve. But what is a non-winning lottery ticket worth after the drawing?”

  Charles Jaffner, an insurance executive and notorious statistic dropper, announced, “According to the latest economic projection, the National Lottery will drain off thirty per cent of the national income this year, and the proceeds returned to the government will have dropped to one per cent of the original projection. Thirty per cent of our national income—buying nothing! The Lottery Governors answer complaints of mismanagement by adding a few more piddling prizes, and the people give them resounding votes of confidence. We’ve got to do something, but I’m not sure that fixing the Lottery—”

  Franklin grinned good-naturedly. “Don’t try to run out on me now. We agreed at the last meeting that this was the only way. We’ve got to make the public see how ridiculous the Lottery is. Unfortunately, most of the Lottery categories are invulnerable. People overlook silly results like teen-aged girls taking lunar safaris and little old ladies going bankrupt trying to manage the businesses they win. The fact is that on most of the category boards a winning ticket is the dream of a lifetime come true, and the dream of a lifetime can’t be ridiculed. There’s no point in exposing the hideous waste if people approve of the result.”

  “I’m still not convinced that the PR Board is any more vulnerable than the others,” Jaffner said. “Be anything you like—what’s wrong with that? Most people would like to be something other than what they are.”