“Click.”
“Who did that?” Twelve lobsters faded. “Don’t do it again.”
I’d also like, I decided, to see friend Ktch’s reaction to a seafood restaurant. A lobster house, for instance.
Another massive weakness: the bugs were basing their ideas about the human race on Laszlo Scott, for Christ’s sake. You might as well believe you can handle wolves because you’ve had a dog. A yellow dog. If these blue plate specials thought they were dealing with a planetful of Laszlos, they were in trouble.
Anything I could do that Laszlo couldn’t, I figured — like overpowering Ktch’s mind control goody — almost anybody else could also do, Laszlo being pretty much at the bottom of the racial totem pole, wherein might lurk some nasty shocks should the lobsters ever come to grips with the human race at large.
Just to be mean, I filled my head with “Love Sold in Doses” again. Ktch winced. The others twitched rhythmically. Nice.
“All right,” I said, still keeping it harsh. “I’m done thinking for a while. You can move again. But keep it quiet, you hear?”
Hesitantly, the eleven working lobsters went back to work, muffling clicks as best they could. Some of the starch, returned to Ktch’s feelers.
“Spy?” humbly.
“Yes?”
“The torture. Did you break under the torture? Ah, are you ready to talk now?”
“Not a chance.”
“Oh my. I didn’t really think so.”
“Right. What are you doing?”
“Conducting the morning interview, as prescribed by The Rules. Ah, um, may I ask you some questions, please, Mister Spy?”
“Not a chance. What are the rest of them doing?”
“I’m not allowed to answer questions. The Rules…”
“Remember what happened yesterday?” I whistled a phrase in case he’d forgotten.
He hadn’t. “They are making ready for phase two, which begins tonight, Mister Spy.”
“Indeed. Just what is phase two?”
“Oh my. Large-scale testing of the chemical weapon, sir. We have already studied its effect on individuals and small groups. Now, Phase Two, we must observe its effect on large population masses before we can initiate Phase Three. The effect, you see, is — I shouldn’t be telling you this — is both qualitatively and quantitatively different in large groups. There is a resonance factor, and…”
“That’s nice. What are you going to do to get Phase Two started?”
“Please! The Rules specifically forbid…”
“I offered you riches an’ all of them things,’” fortissimo,
“For all of your fingers I offered you rings…”
“Ai! Stop! Oh, Stop!”
“To cover your body, silk fabric that clings:
And you gave me Love Sold in Doses.”
“Please, no more.” There’s something in the sight of a cringing lobster. “I beg of you, sir…”
“It’s an awfully long song, but I’ll sing it all if you insist”
“Oh dear.”
I rather liked the way Ktch kept changing colors. It lent variety to what would otherwise’ve been a fairly monotonous exoskeleton.
“Our plan,” he whispered, “is to pour six hundred gallons of the liquefied chemical into the reservoir called Croton under cover of darkness. Laszlo Scott will lead us there.”
“Oh yeah? Six hundred gallons, you say?”
“Shh! The others will hear you.”
“That’s nice. How many doses in six hundred gallons?”
“Doses? Oh, roughly ten billions, I believe.”
That stopped me. But, “Isn’t that a bit much for only ten million people?”
“We expect some waste, you understand. Besides, it’s really quite harmless. There is no lethal dose. We couldn’t do a thing like that.”
“Um. You shellfish have some pretty twisty ethics.”
That bothered him. He embarked on an elaborate defense of lobsterian ethics, full of feeler-flippings, claw-clickings, and similar rhetorical devices. Very dull. And I thought about Phase Two: the whole city high on Reality Pills. My imagination was too good.
I could see it all. Birchites launching millions of missiles against Russia, starting at last the war we’d avoided so long. Racists suddenly become omnipotent. The persecuted manufacturing impossible revenge. Cops really stamping out crime. Kids getting even with grown-ups. Mental patients striking back at the world. Sadists getting infinite kicks. The weak grown powerful beyond endurance. Lovers crushing all things under love…
And not just the city, no. The lobsters underestimated us. The whole world in flames, at the very least. And back of it all the blond Abaddon, Laszlo Scott, leading twelve blue lobsters to the Croton Reservoir.
And only I could stop it. I felt ill.
Why me? I never volunteered to save the world. I wasn’t even very good at saving myself.
But there it was, my job, whether I liked it or not, and time was running short. I reinstated yesterday’s rock-n-roll festival chorus and orchestra. “Untie the spy,” they played and sang, “Untie the spy,” over and over again, “Untie the spy,” in B flat, a domineering key.
Ktch weakened. His argument began to run down, to falter, and his gestures grew sloppy. He took one tentative step forward, then another. The argument petered out and stopped. He moved around behind me. I could feel the small pincers he used for delicate manipulation working at my ankles.
The other lobsters had stopped what they’d been doing and were standing frozen in their tracks like polyethylene-extruded monster models, paralyzed by my music, I presumed. Just to be on the safe side, I changed my text to, “Let the spy go home.” It had a catchy Latin beat.
There! My left foot was free. I wiggled it gratefully. Ktch was working on my right.
Then, “What’re you Doin’?” a shriek, and the whole thing fell apart. Laszlo had arrived.
Ktch backed away, gibbering percussively. The other lobsters took up defensive positions around me. One of them, ignoring my most vigorous kicks, retied my left foot. Phooey!
All the lobsters were clattering like up-tight teletype machines, and, “You was lettin’ ’im Go!” Laszlo complained. “You was gonna let ’im Go!” It was all very noisy.
“Shut up!” I yelled.
It didn’t work this time. That is, the lobsters shut up, but Laszlo didn’t. He stomped over to me like an angry gob of mayonnaise, screaming, “He was gonna let you Go!” while Ktch scurried out the door.
That blew it. When Ktch returned, his carapace was covered with a silvery blanket-like affair that evidently shielded him from my musical assaults. Ignoring me altogether, he concentrated on directing the other lobsters’ work.
That left me to Laszlo. “You know what I’m gonna Do to you?” he said, among other things, taking care no lobster overheard. “What I’m gonna do, soon’s all these Blue cats split, man, I’m gonna Take Care of You, baby. Real dirty an’ slow-like, you dig?”
He went into it in whispered detail, drooling over every indignity and pain he had in store for me. I’d never realized that Laszlo had such a fertile imagination. He must’ve been working on this for years. I was worried.
Then the loft fell silent. Laszlo shut up. The lobsters were gone, all but Ktch, who stood, glimmering in his silver safety suit, by the door.
“We are ready now,” he said.
“That’s boss,” said Laszlo, his little eyes twinkling.
“Come along, Laszlo Scott. Your services will be required Come. Now.”
“Me? But, man,” distress, “don’t you want, like, someone oughtta Look Out for this guy? I mean…”
“No. He will be all right here. Come.”
Laszlo slowly wilted and went.
“Downstairs now,” the lobster told him. “Hurry.”
Then, as Laszlo thudded down the stairs, “Farewell, Spy,” Ktch said. “I hope you will not be harmed in the disturbances tonight. You have been a brave and worthy
opponent. Now farewell,” and he was gone, leaving the door slightly ajar behind him.
I had failed. I was still a prisoner, still attached to the torture machines (they were lit and humming, but I didn’t feel anything, so they were probably on standby), still absolutely helpless. So much for saving the world.
Aside from the hum in front of me and a clocklike ticking behind me somewhere, the place was deathly still. Not even traffic noises could be heard. Time passed.
Bang! from downstairs suddenly, the street door opening. Heavy feet started up the stairs.
Laszlo! I thought. I began to tremble. I tried to brace myself against the trembling, but it wouldn’t stop.
The feet came closer, moving slowly and deliberately, and still closer. They were on the landing one floor down. They came slowly up the stairs. They were on this floor. The door flew open. I screamed!
16
THIS IS how Mike told me it happened, but I suppose it’s close enough for jazz:
Michael awoke at half-past seven, after less than four hours’ sleep, in the grumpiest mood imaginable. Swearing muddily, he turned off the three alarm clocks that’d been trying to rouse him since seven and clumped out to the living room to answer the vidiphone.
He stabbed fiercely at the Accept button, cutting the poor phone’s whistle off in midtweet. Colors swirled briefly on the screen, and then a pretty face appeared.
“Seven-thirty, Mister Cowland,” she said sweetly, “rise and shine.”
“Rise and Shine?” Mike was offended.
“This is the Midtown Wake-up Service,” she said primly, “and you placed a call for seven-thirty.”
“I did?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I must’ve been crazy.”
“I’m sorry, sir, I can’t tell you about that. Here’s your card.” She held it up to the screen.
Mike read the card in total disbelief until he came to the space marked Special Instructions, where the words, “Find Anderson,” were printed in big block letters.
“Oh,” he said. “Why didn’t you say that?”
“You mean, ‘Find Anderson’?”
“Yes.”
“Well, it seemed rather silly…”
“Rise and Shine isn’t silly?”
“Please, sir, I have other calls to make.” She hung up.
Michael was now awake. Not particularly happy about it, but awake.
He burst into Sean’s room, interrupting something, yelled, “Find Anderson!” and dashed off to the kitchen to brew a pot of maté.
Sean stumbled into the living room, looking bewildered. Behind him, still in bed, Sativa yelled, “What’s happening?”
“Hey, man,” Sean complained, “find Anderson?”
“Right.” Michael scurried off to shave.
By eight-twenty they were strolling down Avenue A toward Laszlo’s midden. “Man, this is Stupid,” Sean was saying for the severalth time. “Laszlo, he ain’t even Up yet.”
“Cool it! Duck.”
They ducked into a doorway. Sean started to say something, but Mike pressed his hand over Sean’s mouth. Sean bit Michael’s hand (there’d been no time for breakfast). Then Laszlo walked by, looking as displeased with the time of day as everybody else, and Sean let go.
“Oh,” he whispered.
“We’ll discuss this later,” Mike snarled, rubbing his abused paw. “C’mon.”
Laszlo was ridiculously easy to follow that morning. In fact, Mike told me, he and Sean could probably’ve walked right beside him without being noticed. He seemed to be two-thirds asleep, which made Mike feel considerably better.
The chase paused for fifteen minutes at a dingy diner where Laszlo presumably took on some breakfast, then went on in a relatively straight line to a century-old loft building at 239 Canal Street. Laszlo went inside, Sean and Michael waited outside. It was nine o’clock.
At nine-fifteen Sean became impatient. “C’mon,” he urged, “let’s go in.”
“Cool it. They may have a whole army in there.”
“So what? We gotta help Chester, man. C’mon.”
“We won’t be much help if the Commies catch us, too. Listen to me, Sean. We wait another fifteen minutes, see? Watch who goes in or comes out. Right? Right. And if nothing happens before then, okay, we’ll go over and take a look. But we’ve got to be Careful, you understand? These Reds are tough.”
So at nine-thirty they ducked and dodged across the street and, very cautiously, into the building. They stood in the lobby for a moment, catching their breath and listening. From above somewhere they could hear, faint but unmistakable, the sound of small arms fire.
“Oh wow!” said Mike.
“Too late?” Sean asked.
Then they heard the elevator painfully descending. They dashed to the door and out, just in time to see a large green turbo-truck pull up to the curb and park.
Sean said, “Wow!” and Mike agreed. There was nobody driving the truck.
Then the elevator reached the ground floor.
“C’mon! We’ve got to hide.” Mike grabbed Sean by the arm and dragged him away.
In front of the building next door there were half a dozen empty plywood barrels, about five feet tall, all dirty and battered, one or two with small holes punched through them. Mike scrambled into one of these, Sean into another.
They regretted it at once. Somewhere along the line, the barrels had harbored fish, and the memory was still fresh and vigorous. But it was too late to find a less fragrant hiding place.
The front door of the loft building creaked open. Mike, holding his nose, crouched down and watched through a conveniently placed hole.
First a long, segmented stalk, cobalt blue, with a bulbous swelling at the end that Mike thought might be some kind of camera, snaked out and turned slowly to the left and right as though surveying the sidewalk. Then another stalk joined it and did the same. Then the side door of the truck slid open and a ramp extended itself to the sidewalk. The two stalks retracted themselves.
Then Michael gasped, inhaling an unhealthy lungful of essence of fish, as six huge blue lobsters emerged from the building. Two of them stood guard while the others formed a bucket brigade from the door to the truck. Fifty-gallon oil drums passed from claw to claw while Michael goggled.
After the oil drums came four large crates. Then the lobsters themselves, plus five more from inside the building, went into the truck.
The, ramp stayed down and the door remained open, otherwise Mike would’ve run for the nearest phone booth to get help. Instead, he remained in his fishy hideaway until ten o’clock. The hot July sun beat down on him, the stench of ancient fish conspired to turn his stomach inside out, and the cramped position he was forced to maintain began to hurt his legs. He was an increasingly unhappy Theodore Bear.
At ten o’clock, Laszlo came out of the building, looked around nervously, and went back inside. Michael forgot his discomfort.
A few minutes later, Laszlo reappeared, scouted the sidewalk again, and said, “It’s cool, man.”
Out came yet another lobster, this one wearing a fetching little silver jacket.
“Youthful Laszlo,” it said, “you shall ride in the driver’s seat.” It started up the ramp.
“But, man, like, I can’t drive!”
“No matter. Get in.”
Walking as though he were hypnotized, Laszlo got into the cab. He didn’t look at all pleased, which comforted Michael slightly.
The ramp slid back into the truck and the door slid shut. The turbos started with a loud whine. Laszlo looked scared. Then the truck pulled smoothly away from the curb and drove off.
Mike and Sean exploded from the barrels, saying “Phew!” and, “Did you see That?” interchangeably.
“Lobsters,” Mike said, unbelieving.
“That’s good. I was scared it was me.”
They dashed for the door, trailing clouds of glory as they went.
17
“GROOVY!” I screamed whe
n they burst in, and then went on more quietly: “You sure as hell took your own sweet bloody time about it, mister. What kept you?”
“Later.” Michael Superspy was casing the joint, standing in the doorway looking very hot and paranoid.
Sean didn’t bother. He plunged in like the puppy he was, yelping, “You okay, baby?” without waiting for an answer. “I did a Things at The Mess last night an’ they really Dug it, man. What’re these things?”
He’d reached the torture machines. Michael was beginning to enter the room.
“Torture machines,” I explained. “Leave them alone.” I had plans for those gadgets. If they could just be stolen, I could make narcotics obsolete in Greenwich Village.
“Hmm. They’re turned on.” Michael had arrived. “How do you turn ’em off?”
I said, “God knows. Just leave ’em be, will you? I want to save them if I can. How about untying me?”
“Torture machines, you say?” Michael eyed them with a hungry look I didn’t like at all.
“Come on, Michael, turn me loose.”
“Maybe this red button here…”
“No! Cool it! Don’t touch any…”
ZAP!
“…thing.”
Sparks — green, blue, scarlet, quite electrifying — flew from machine to machine, a depressingly gaudy display. The room suddenly stank of ozone. Sharp popping noises and loud bubbling hisses issued from the depths of the machines. Wisps of plaintive blue smoke rose into the air.
“No,” Mike said, backing off, “I guess not.”
I had nothing to say.
It was Sean who finally untied me. Mike was too engrossed in watching the machines destroy themselves to move.
I’ll admit it was quite a show. As the rainbow sparks continued to fly and the smoke grew thicker, the machines began to glow dully, then to sag, and then to melt. Liquid metal gathered in small pools under the machines, and then ran slowly across the room, setting the ancient wooden floor afire.
My boots and briefcase were up against the rear wall, beside an open barrel half full of those well-known little blue pills. Impulsively, I filled the briefcase with pills. “Evidence,” I explained to myself. Then I grabbed my boots and cut for the door.
The Butterfly Kid Page 14