“Just as you, of course, are the powerful new Mafia.”
Omar gracefully shrugged off the compliment and continued to delay the impending business with a scholarly diversion. “Yes, the Falasha,” he chatted. “Black Jews from Ethiopia. They claim to be descended from Solomon and Sheba who was black, it is said. More coffee?”
“Thank you.”
“Actually, they were simple natives converted to Judaism long before Christ. Then some went over to the new Christianity, and many more later found the True Faith. A vacillating people. Our dear friends, the Israelis, had much trouble with the Falasha when they were founding their magnificent nation.”
Gretchen smiled to herself; her second ploy was gearing into action. When the Palestine Liberation Organization had at last taken over the United Arab Republic, it was just in time to see the last of the fat-cat rich oil reserves exhausted. The P.L.O. very sensibly switched to opium culture and the illegal sale of its derivatives. This was fat-cat until drugs and addiction were legalized; then the bottom fell out of their profits. The one nation still denouncing drugs and fighting furiously to have them outlawed was stiff-necked, puritanical Israel. This made Israelis the beloved of the P.L.O. Mafia.
“So perhaps it would be best to continue the deception, Miz Nunn,” Sheikh Omar said. “I’m sure our soldiers have spread the word already. We won’t contradict them. We do not take kindly to strangers, but we do to Jews. It will make matters easier for you.”
“Yours the honor.”
“Yours the grace. And now, if you will forgive my impetuosity, what matter has brought the celebrated Gretchen Nunn to our humble Oasis?”
“A most unusual contract. It requires that I ask El Plo a question.”
“El Plo! You actually have come for an audience with El Plo?”
“With the PloFather himself. Yes.”
“Unheard of! Will I not serve?”
“All honor to you, Sheikh Omar, but I’m afraid not. The information I need must come from the very top.”
“May I ask the nature of the contract which requires this unusual step?”
“It is crash security, but I will put my faith and trust in your honor, Sheikh Omar, and be as frank and open as possible.”
“Mine the honor indeed.”
“And yours the grace. The contract concerns a unique lethal weapon. Its like has never been known before. I can’t reveal anything about the weapon while I’m negotiating ironclad patents, but I will confide that I used it secretly on two Guff goons in my investigation of its potential.”
“Not two of ours, I hope.” Sheikh Omar smiled thinly. “And the results of your investigation?”
“Oh, Lethal-One, of course,” Gretchen said casually. “Uniquely lethal. Subadar Ind’dni is very much upset.”
Sheikh Omar smiled again.
“But there were strange side-effects which I must explore and explain for the patent application. I need El Plo’s help for this.”
“No more? You merely want to ask questions?”
“Nothing more. Just a few questions.”
“And they are?”
“You will hear when you ask them for me, as I hope you will honor me by so doing. I would not dream of daring to speak to El Plo myself.”
“Yours the grace, Miz Nunn. Please to wait.”
While she waited in the tent with the uproar and stench of the Great Hall battering her, Gretchen speculated on the appearance of the formidable PloFather of the Mafia. Her secondhand sight gave her no clue. She was debating between a massive gorill who had lethaled his way to the top and an acidulous accountant who had bookkeeped his way to the top when Sheikh Omar ben Omar at last returned, looking rather awestruck.
“It is granted,” he said. “I would never have believed it possible. Please come with me.”
“Must I veil my face?”
“No longer necessary, Miz Nunn. The years have accustomed us to the strange ways of the infidels.”
He led her up steep ramps to the top of the pyramid where they were passed by four guerrilla guards and entered a pyramidal chamber. Gretchen was a bit short of breath.
It was an enormous room, carpeted with glowing rugs and hung with priceless tapestries depicting the conquests of Islam. A long, low, inlaid conference table stretched the length of the room with embroidered cushions on the floor flanking both sides for the cross-legged conferees. At the far end a group of magnificently robed sheikhs clustered around a regal ebony chair. Their heads were bent reverently as though they were listening to sacred whispers.
Sheikh Omar indicated a cushion at the near end of the conference table and Gretchen squatted down on it. He remained standing and cleared his throat. The sheikh cluster looked up and spread slightly, but Gretchen still could not see the PloFather in the chair.
“The Falasha woman is here,” Omar announced.
One of the sheikhs bent down attentively, then straightened. “El Plo instructs the Jew bitch unbeliever to stand that she may be seen.”
Gretchen started to rise, but Omar’s hand on her shoulder restrained her. He looked down at her. “El Plo instructs you to stand that you may be seen,” he said and then removed his hand.
Gretchen arose. The cluster of sheikhs spread a little wider to permit El Plo to see her, and she had her first view of the legendary PloFather. She saw an ancient little figure, almost a stick-figure, sitting twisted in the regal chair. The hands were gnarled and knotted with arthritis. The hair was white, long and sparse, exposing bald patches. The face was— What? Veiled? A woman? El Plo a woman? Gretchen was incredulous.
After a long interval of examination, a gnarled finger wavered up like an insect’s antenna and then dropped. A sheikh bent, listened to the veiled mummy, then straightened.
“El Plo says you first crossed our path in ‘71.”
By now cued in, Gretchen waited for Sheikh Omar to transmit. Then she replied, “Yes, the Oberlin contract. I did not know that the P.L.O. was involved when I signed. I’m sorry if I inconvenienced you. It was not intended, I assure El Plo.”
The transmission of her reply was transmitted to El Plo. Then, roundabout, came, “Why did you not then withdraw?”
“I was committed to the contract.”
“In ‘72 you caused the extinction of an entire P.L.O. assault cell.”
“Yes, that was the Graphite contract. That time I knew the P.L.O. was involved and warned the cell to clear out. I gave them good and sufficient notice, but your soldiers were either stupid or stubborn. I didn’t come out of that unscathed. I was in hospital for two months. I—” Suddenly she broke off and her mind blazed: Yes. Blinded in the crossfire. The medics thought and I thought that I’d recovered my vision, but I didn’t. My extrasensory sight took over, and none of us realized it.
But El Plo was continuing, “You were offered double your contract fee to drop the Graphite engagement. Why did you refuse?”
“I was committed to my honor and I do not accept bribes.”
“In ‘74 you were instrumental in the escape of a P.L.O. girl to join a dog of a Christian unbeliever.”
“I was.”
“Where is she now?”
“I will not say.” Gretchen heard Omar gasp alongside her.
“Do you know?”
“Yes.”
“But you will not say?”
“No. Never.” She heard Omar gasp again.
“You are committed to a contract?”
“No. To grace.”
There was another long pause. Sheikh Omar murmured, “I’m afraid you’re in for it now. I’m powerless to protect you.”
The veil before the mummy face fluttered slightly. A sheikh bent to listen to the whisper, then straightened. “El Plo is pleased with your defiance. El Plo is pleased with your strength. El Plo says both of you should have been born men.”
“I thank El Plo.”
“El Plo asks what you need.”
“Information.”
“What will you pa
y?”
“Nothing. I ask it as a favor.”
“Does El Plo owe you favors?”
“No.”
“Nevertheless it is granted. Ask.”
“Thank you. The P.L.O. deals in all drugs. Is there a new squeam just reaching the Guff streets which uses an extremely rare earth metal called Promethium? P-R-O-M-E-T-H-I-U-M.”
The double transmission seemed to take an age. At last came the reply. “No.”
“The P.L.O. knows the sources of all drugs. Is it possible that a new junk is being concocted privately by a squeamie?”
Again a long delay. Then: “The answer is no. Our Enforceurs would know within a week. They have not reported anything new made privately or commercially.”
Gretchen sighed in disappointment. “Then that’s all. I thank El Plo. You have my honor and my grace.” She turned to leave.
“Stop, please.” The projected whisper came as faint and yet as penetrating as a snake’s hiss. Gretchen stopped and turned in surprise. El Plo was actually speaking directly to her.
“You are no Falasha. You are Gretchen Nunn, a woman of clout and respect.”
“Thank you, El Plo.”
“You have earned it.”
“You honor me.”
“If you were offered a contract by the P.L.O., would you accept?”
“You have your own organization, El Plo.”
“Would you accept?”
“Why would you need me?”
“Would you accept?”
“As a bribe?”
“Not as a bribe. Would you accept?”
“I cannot answer a question unless I know why it is asked.”
“You have rare courage, independence, and ingenuity. You also have the rarest of all, earned arrogance. Would you accept?”
Gretchen began to sense the indomitable will that could not be deflected, concealed within that mummy stick-figure. Suddenly she was reminded of Tzu-Hsi, the last Dowager Empress of Imperial China, who maneuvered, murdered, bedazzled, and betrayed her way from slave-concubine to the Celestial Throne.
She replied very carefully. “I will accept and fulfill any and all contracts provided they are not intended to harm anyone or anything directly. I am not a destroyer. Unfortunately, I cannot foresee all possible results, but that’s my accountability, not the client’s.”
“Yes, yes, yes,” came the hiss. “I am pleased with you. Much pleased. I will arrange for us to meet again, and you will be pleased, too. You may go now, Gretchun Nunn.”
After Sheikh Omar ben Omar had seen her out of the Oasis with much courtesy and many compliments, Gretchen took a deep breath and shuddered.
“My God! That woman makes me feel like a child again.”
Shima thought he knew every practicing pharmacy, chemist’s and drug dispensary in the Guff—after all, that was part of his profession—but this grotesque was a surprise to him.
It was a tottering brownstone in Canker Alley plastered with “Bldg Condemned” stencils as old as the Emancipation Proclamation. A corroded sign, well-hung on a crazed gallows arm, read: RUBOR TUMOR. The letters were bordered with explicit and exaggerated erogenous zones. A small crowd of street-geeks loafed around the shop window which was a rear-projection screen displaying blurry hard-porn action that must have been at least a century old. Some of the geeks were wearily trying to get a gig going and not succeeding. Shima entered RUBOR TUMOR, serenaded by a shrill voluntary of catcalls. He took a lightning survey.
“Gloryosky!” he exclaimed. “This place has to like date from the twenty-hundreds. It’s a damned museum.”
There were vats, casks, carboys, volumetric flasks, alembics, retorts, beakers, graduates. “Not ripped yet?” he wondered. “Why? How?”
There were honeycombs of antique nostrums in their original glass bottles with the original labels. The empty bottles alone were worth a fortune as Collectors’ Items: 2-Propynyl Pepsi; New Improved Oxy-Shasta+; Nova Tab; 7-CH3·S·C3H7-Up; Club (K + hv) Soda; Frescathiol; Dr. Brown’s Phenylene Tonic; 1,3-Hexadine-5-yne Sprite; 4-n-hexyl-resorcinol Dr. (Pepper3)2; Coca (R·N+) Cola;
There was a bottle of Ultra-Wink-Erektall, its glass interestingly purpled by light and time. Shima tried to pull it out of its comb cell to examine it for evaporation (glass does evaporate), and his hand was instantly zapped by a charge a hell of a lot more painful than a slap on the wrist.
“And that explains the No-Rip bit,” he muttered, rubbing his hand. “If I tried to grab through the warning, I make it six-two-and-even it’d cost my arm. Whoever runs this pharmacy isn’t going to lose anything, wherever he is.” Shima raised his voice. “Hello, the pharm! Anyone home? Mr. Rubor? Mr. Tumor? Or Miz?”
A faint reply oozed out of the walls. “Hello. This is your Pharman. How can I serve—FLAP-RRR-FLAP— This is your Pharma-FLAP-RRR-FLAP-RRR-an RRR Phar FLAP RRR erve you FLAP RRR Hello—”
“Christ Almighty!” Shima swore in amazement. “This is a goddam twenty-hundred computerized drugstore, and it’s still functioning.”
“Arman-FLAP-Pharman-RRR— Hello. This RRR—”
“Well, sort of functioning, but it’s still a miracle. I wonder how it generates its power.”
“Pharma-RRR—”
“I want a prescription,” Shima shouted, “if you can respond. Can you respond, Pharman?”
“Shillings ten cash in-put slot-FLAP-RRR—”
“Shillings? My God, that coin hasn’t been around since the I.R.A. quit back in—”
“FLAP-RRR-ten cash RRR-slot.”
A sort of turnstile coin slot was flickering in a spasmodic signal, demanding payment. Shima inspected it perplexedly. There was no coin in use in A.D. 2175 that could possibly fit it. He was about to turn away in disgust when inspiration suddenly visited him. He lifted a foot and smashed the payment slot with his heel.
“Advantages of higher education,” he grinned. In undergraduate days a mallet was hung from the dormitory pay CB phone to save wear and tear on the feet.
“FLAP-RRR-FLAP- Not programmed to give change. You may RRR two prescriptions. FLAP. This is your RRR Man. How can I FLAP you?”
“I want a special prescription.”
“Name Remedy FLAP Narcotic Physic RRR Nostrum RRRRR Salve Poultice FLAP Bane Poison RRR Toxicant—”
“I want the same prescription ordered from Rubor Tumor before.”
“Name FLAP person client.”
“I can’t but I can tell you that the prescription was special. It contained PROMETHIUM. P-R-O-M-E-T-H-I-U-M.”
“Contained PROMMMMMium.”
“Yes. A lanthanide rare-earth metal.”
“Group FLAP of periodic table. Atomic number G1. Atomic weight RRR. Fission product of uranium. FLAP FLAP FLAP Request prescription profile records.”
“I request prescription profile records.”
After a pause, a new clear woman’s voice spoke briskly. “Prescription profile records. Shillings ten in-put.”
Shima kicked again. “Got you coming and going,” he mused.
“Beginning year two one hundred, profiles—”
“No,” Shima broke in. “Start with current profiles and report in retro.”
“Shillings ten in-put.”
“Got to install a mallet,” he growled and kicked.
The brisk records voice began reporting filed prescriptions in retro by date, number and ingredients. Shima listened patiently to the long recital, somewhat surprised that this ancient, demented pharmacy did so much business, and wondering what the customers used for shillings. “They couldn’t all use the kick trick,” he thought. “The coin slot wouldn’t be standing.” At last he heard the magic abracadabra: “PROMETHIUM CHLORIDE. Fifty grams.”
“Stop! That’s it,” he shouted and kicked before he could be requested for another shillings ten. “Name and address of person client.”
Pause. Then: “Burne, Salem. The Number of the Beast. Hell Gate.”
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Shima said slowly. “I. Wi
ll. Be. Damned.”
What idealistic Ibet (industry Building a Better Tomorrow) had done was construct the equivalent of the Zuider Zee dam across the Hell Gate channel and continue it across the Hudson River. (Also known as the North River because it was west of ancient New York City. Either early cartographers had rotten compasses, or else they hated Henry Hudson.)
The dam had a threefold purpose: (1) Block the salt water tiding in from the Atlantic and keep the fenced Hudson sweet; (2) Reserve the Hudson’s waters for industrial use; (3) Provide a spillway into upper and lower New York harbor for the boiling wastes from the nuclear power plant built on top of the dam.
Those exasperating eco-dreamers had demanded why the water life of the harbor was being destroyed for an energy never granted to the public, and why the heat couldn’t at least be used to warm the chilly Guff. Patient Ibet kindly explained that the cost made it impractical, and what the hell did the destruction of all littoral and oceanic life for a few hundred square miles matter when a Better Tomorrow would solve everything?
One interesting side-effect of the Hudson–Hell Gate dam was that the reservoir had raised the water level by ten feet, drowning thousands of homes and creating a scattering of tiny islands and hillocks around its shores; a sort of artificial Venice. There were a few hundred private homes still standing or newly built on these island hillocks. No. 666 Hell Gate was one of these privileged homes.
It was no Venetian palazzo, but more of a stone fortress rather like a miniature castle with window-slits suitable for defending archers. As Shima sculled up to the landing pier he was impressed and oppressed by the implicit menace. Gretchen was, too.
“I can easily see our Golem-Hundred-Hander-Thing coming out of this place, Blaise.”
He nodded. “All it needs is a hunchback calling Burne ‘Master’ and bringing him the wrong brain.”
She smiled. “Pity it’s such a lovely day. There ought to be thunder and lightning.”
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