I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream

by Ellison, Harlan;

  When she was touched by them, by any one of them, by the men, by all the Nuncios, they left little pitholes of bloody rust on her white, permanent flesh; cobwebs, sooty stains. She had to bathe. Often.

  She strolled down between the tables and the slots, carrying eight hundred and sixteen dollars. Eight one hundred dollar bills and sixteen dollars in ones.

  At the change booth she got cartwheels for the sixteen ones. The Chief waited. It was her baby. She played it to infuriate the Sicilian. He had told her to play the nickle slots, the quarter or dime slots, but she always infuriated him by blowing fifty or a hundred dollars in ten minutes, one coin after another, in the big Chief.

  She faced the machine squarely, and put in the first silver dollar. She pulled the handle that swine Nuncio. Another dollar, pulled the handle how long does this go on? The reels cycled and spun and whirled and whipped in a blurringspinning metalhumming overandoverandover as Maggie blue–eyed Maggie hated and hated and thought of hate and all the days and nights of swine behind her and ahead of her and if only she had all the money in this room in this Casino in this hotel in this town right now this very instant just an instant thisinstant it would be enough to whirring and humming and spinning and overandoverandoverandover and she would be free free free and all the world would never touch her body again the swine would never touch her white flesh again and then suddenly as dollarafterdollarafterdollar went aroundaroundaround hummmmming in reels of cherries and bells and bars and plums and oranges there was suddenly painpainpain a SHARP pain!pain!pain! in her chest, her heart, her center, a needle, a lancet, a burning, a pillar of flame that was purest pure purer PAIN!

  Maggie, pretty Maggie Moneyeyes, who wanted all that money in that cartwheel Chief slot machine, Maggie who had come from filth and rheumatic fever, who had come all the way to three baths a day and a specialist in Very Expensive Beverly Hills, that Maggie suddenly had a seizure, a flutter, a slam of a coronary thrombosis and fell instantly dead on the floor of the Casino. Dead.

  One instant she had been holding the handle of the slot machine, willing her entire being, all that hatred for all the swine she had ever rolled with, willing every fiber of every cell of every chromosome into that machine, wanting to suck out every silver vapor within its belly, and the next instant—so close they might have been the same—her heart exploded and killed her and she slipped to the floor…still touching the Chief.

  On the floor.

  Dead.

  Struck dead.

  Liar. All the lies that were her life.

  Dead on a floor.

  [A moment out of time • lights whirling and spinning in a cotton candy universe • down a bottomless funnel roundly sectioned like a goat’s horn • a cornucopia that rose up cuculiform smooth and slick as a worm belly • endless nights that pealed ebony funeral bells • out of fog • out of weightlessness • suddenly total cellular knowledge • memory running backward • gibbering spastic blindness • a soundless owl of frenzy trapped in a cave of prisms • sand endlessly draining down • billows of forever • edges of the world as they splintered • foam rising drowning from inside • the smell of rust • rough green corners that burn • memory the gibbering spastic blind memory • seven rushing vacuums of nothing • yellow • pinpoints cast in amber straining and elongating running like live wax • chill fevers • overhead the odor of stop • this is the stopover before hell or heaven • this is limbo • trapped and doomed alone in a mist–eaten nowhere • a soundless screaming a soundless whirring a soundless spinning spinning spinning • spinning • spinning • spinning • spinning • spinninggggggggggggggg]

  Maggie had wanted all the silver in the

  machine. She had died, willing herself

  into the machine. Now looking out from

  within, from inside the limbo that had

  become her own purgatory, Maggie was

  trapped, in the oiled and anodize interior

  of the silver dollar slot machine. The

  prison of her final desires, where she had

  wanted to be, completely trapped in that

  last instant of life between life/death.

  Maggie, gone inside; all soul now; trapped

  for eternity in the cage soul of the

  soulless machine. Limbo. Trapped.

  “I hope you don’t mind if I call over one of the slot men,” the Slot Machine Floor Manager was saying, from a far distance. He was in his late fifties, a velvet–voiced man whose eyes held nothing of light and certainly nothing of kindness. He had stopped the Pit Boss as the stocky man had turned in mid–step to return to Kostner and the jackpotted machine; he had taken the walk himself. “We have to make sure, you know how it is, somebody didn’t fool the slot, you know, maybe it’s outta whack or something, you know.”

  He lifted his left hand and there was a clicker in it, the kind children use at Halloween. He clicked half a dozen times, like a rabid cricket, and there was a scurrying in the pit between the tables.

  Kostner was only faintly aware of what was happening. Instead of being totally awake, feeling the surge of adrenaline through his veins, the feeling any gambler gets when he is ahead of the game, a kind of desperate urgency when he has hit it for a boodle, he was numb, partaking of the action around him only as much as a drinking glass involves itself in the alcoholic’s drunken binge.

  All color and sound had been leached out of him.

  A tired–looking, resigned–weary man wearing a gray porter’s jacket, as gray as his hair, as gray as his indoor skin, came to them, carrying a leather wrap–up of tools. The slot repairman studied the machine, turning the pressed steel body around on its stand, studying the back. He used a key on the back door and for an instant Kostner had a view of gears, springs, armatures and the clock that ran the slot mechanism. The repairman nodded silently over it, closed and relocked it, turned it around again and studied the face of the machine.

  “Nobody’s been spooning it,” he said, and went away.

  Kostner stared at the Floor Manager.

  “Gaffing. That’s what he meant. Spooning’s another word for it. Some guys use a little piece of plastic, or a wire, shove it down through the escalator, it kicks the machine. Nobody thought that’s what happened here, but you know, we have to make sure, two grand is a big payoff, and twice…well, you know, I’m sure you’ll understand. If a guy was doing it with a boomerang—”

  Kostner raised an eyebrow.

  “—uh, yeah, a boomerang, it’s another way to spoon the machine. But we just wanted to make a little check, and now everybody’s satisfied, so if you’ll just come back to the Casino Cashier with me—”

  And they paid him off again.

  So he went back to the slot machine, and stood before it for a long time, staring at it. The change girls and the dealers going off–duty; the little old ladies with their canvas work gloves worn to avoid calluses when pulling the slot handles, the men’s room attendant on his way up front to get more matchbooks, the floral tourists, the idle observers, the hard drinkers, the sweepers, the busboys, the gamblers with poached–egg eyes who had been up all night, the showgirls with massive breasts and diminutive sugar daddies, all of them conjectured mentally about the beat–up walker who was staring at the silver dollar Chief. He did not move, merely stared at the machine…and they wondered.

  The machine was staring back at Kostner.

  Three blue eyes.

  The electric current had sparked through him again, as the machine had clocked down and the eyes turned up a second time, as he had won a second time. But this time he knew there was something more than luck involved, for no one else had seen those three blue eyes.

  So now he stood before the machine, waiting. It spoke to him. Inside his skull, where no one had ever lived but himself, now someone else moved and spoke to him. A girl. A beautiful girl. Her name was Maggie, and she spoke to him.

  I’ve been waiting for you. A long time, I’ve been waiting for you, Kostner. Why do yo
u think you hit the jackpot? Because I’ve been waiting for you, and I want you. You’ll win all the jackpots. Because I want you, I need you. Love me, I’m Maggie, I’m so alone, love me.

  Kostner had been staring at the slot machine for a very long time, and his weary brown eyes had seemed to be locked to the blue eyes on the jackpot bars. But he knew no one else could see the blue eyes, and no one else could hear the voice, and no one else knew about Maggie.

  He was the universe to her. Everything to her.

  He thumbed in another silver dollar, and the Pit Boss watched, the slot machine repairman watched, the Slot Machine Floor Manager watched, three change girls watched, and a pack of unidentified players watched, some from their seats.

  The reels whirled, the handle snapped back, and in a second they flipped down to a halt, twenty silver dollars tokened themselves into the payoff trough and a woman at one of the crap tables belched a fragment of hysterical laughter.

  And the gong went insane again.

  The Floor Manager came over and said, very softly, “Mr. Kostner, it’ll take us about fifteen minutes to pull this machine and check it out. I’m sure you understand.” As two slot repairmen came out of the back, hauled the Chief off its stand, and took it into the repair room at the rear of the Casino.

  While they waited, the Floor Manager regaled Kostner with stories of spooners who had used intricate magnets inside their clothes, of boomerang men who had attached their plastic implements under their sleeves so they could be extended on spring–loaded clips, of cheaters who had come equipped with tiny electric drills in their hands and wires that slipped into the tiny drilled holes. And he kept saying he knew Kostner would understand.

  But Kostner knew the Floor Manager would not understand.

  When they brought the Chief back, the repairmen nodded assuredly. “Nothing wrong with it. Works perfectly. Nobody’s been boomin’ it.”

  But the blue eyes were gone on the jackpot bars.

  Kostner knew they would return.

  They paid him off again.

  He returned and played again. And again. And again. They put a “spotter” on him. He won again. And again. And again. The crowd had grown to massive proportions. Word had spread like the silent communications of the telegraph vine, up and down the Strip, all the way to downtown Vegas and the sidewalk casinos where they played night and day every day of the year, and the crowd moved toward the hotel, and the Casino, and the seedy–looking walker with his weary brown eyes. The crowd moved to him inexorably, drawn like lemmings by the odor of the luck that rose from him like musky electrical cracklings. And he won. Again and again. Thirty–eight thousand dollars. And the three blue eyes continued to stare up at him. Her lover was winning. Maggie and her Moneyeyes.

  Finally, the Casino decided to speak to Kostner. They pulled the Chief for fifteen minutes, for a supplemental check by experts from the slot machine company in downtown Vegas, and while they were checking it, they asked Kostner to come to the main office of the hotel.

  The owner was there. His face seemed faintly familiar to Kostner. Had he seen it on television? The newspapers?

  “Mr. Kostner, my name is Jules Hartshorn.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you.”

  “Quite a string of luck you’re having out there.”

  “It’s been a long time coming.”

  “You realize, this sort of luck is impossible.”

  “I’m compelled to believe it, Mr. Hartshorn.”

  “Um. As am I. It’s happening to my Casino. But we’re thoroughly convinced of one of two possibilities, Mr. Kostner: one, either the machine is inoperable in a way we can’t detect, or two, you are the cleverest spooner we’ve ever had in here.”

  “I’m not cheating.”

  “As you can see, Mr. Kostner, I’m smiling. The reason I’m smiling is at your naiveté in believing I would take your word for it. I’m perfectly happy to nod politely and say of course you aren’t cheating. But no one can win thirty–eight thousand dollars on nineteen straight jackpots off one slot machine; it doesn’t even have mathematical odds against its happening, Mr. Kostner. It’s on a cosmic scale of improbability with three dark planets crashing into our sun within the next twenty minutes. It’s on a par with the Pentagon, the Forbidden City and the Kremlin all three pushing the red button at the same microsecond. It’s an impossibility, Mr. Kostner. An impossibility that’s happening to me.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Not really.”

  “No, not really. I can use the money.”

  “For what, exactly, Mr. Kostner?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it, really.”

  “I see. Well, Mr. Kostner, let’s look at it this way. I can’t stop you from playing, and if you continue to win, I’ll be required to pay off. And no stubble–chinned thugs will be waiting in an alley to jackroll you and take the money. The checks will be honored. The best I can hope for, Mr. Kostner, is the attendant publicity. Right now, every player in Vegas is in that Casino, waiting for you to drop cartwheels into that machine. It won’t make up for what I’m losing, if you continue the way you’ve been, but it will help. Every high–roller in town likes to rub up next to luck. All I ask is that you cooperate a little.”

  “The least I can do, considering your generosity.”

  “An attempt at humor.”

  “I’m sorry. What is it you’d like me to do?”

  “Get about ten hours’ sleep.”

  “While you pull the slot and have it worked over thoroughly?”

  “Yes.”

  “If I wanted to keep winning, that might be a pretty stupid move on my part. You might change the thigamajig inside so I couldn’t win if I put back every dollar of that thirty–eight grand.”

  “We’re licensed by the state of Nevada, Mr. Kostner.”

  “I come from a good family, too, and take a look at me. I’m a bum with thirty–eight thousand dollars in my pocket.”

  “Nothing will be done to that slot machine, Kostner.”

  “Then why pull it for ten hours?”

  “To work it over thoroughly in the shop. If something as undetectable as metal fatigue or a worn escalator tooth or—we want to make sure this doesn’t happen with other machines. And the extra time will get the word around town; we can use the crowd. Some of those tourists will stick to our fingers, and it’ll help defray the expense of having you break the bank at this Casino—on a slot machine.”

  “I have to take your word.”

  “This hotel will be in business long after you’re gone, Kostner.”

  “Not if I keep winning.”

  Hartshorn’s smile was a stricture. “A good point.”

  “So it isn’t much of an argument.”

  “It’s the only one I have. If you want to get back out on that floor, I can’t stop you.”

  “No Mafia hoods ventilate me later?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I said: no Maf—”

  “You have a picturesque manner of speaking. In point of fact, I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m sure you haven’t.”

  “You’ve got to stop reading The National Enquirer. This is a legally run business. I’m merely asking a favor.”

  “Okay, Mr. Hartshorn, I’ve been three days without any sleep. Ten hours will do me a world of good.”

  “I’ll have the desk clerk find you a quiet room on the top floor. And thank you, Mr. Kostner.”

  “Think nothing of it.”

  “I’m afraid that will be impossible.”

  “A lot of impossible things are happening lately.”

  He turned to go, as Hartshorn lit a cigarette.

  “Oh, by the way, Mr. Kostner?”

  Kostner stopped and half–turned. “Yes?”

  His eyes were getting difficult to focus. There was a ringing in his ears. Hartshorn seemed to waver at the edge of his vision like heat lightning across a prairie. Like memories of th
ings Kostner had come across the country to forget. Like the whimpering and pleading that kept tugging at the cells of his brain. The voice of Maggie. Still back in there, saying…things…

  They’ll try to keep you from me.

  All he could think about was the ten hours of sleep he had been promised. Suddenly it was more important than the money, than forgetting, than anything. Hartshorn was talking, was saying things, but Kostner could not hear him. It was as if he had turned off the sound and saw only the silent rubbery movement of Hartshorn’s lips. He shook his head trying to clear it.

  There were half a dozen Hartshorns all melting into and out of one another. And the voice of Maggie.

  I’m warm here, and alone. I could be good to you, if you can come to me. Please come, please hurry.

  “Mr. Kostner?”

  Hartshorn’s voice came draining down through silt as thick as velvet flocking. Kostner tried to focus again. His extremely weary brown eyes began to track.

  “Did you know about that slot machine?” Hartshorn was saying. “A peculiar thing happened with it about six weeks ago.”

  “What was that?”

  “A girl died playing it. She had a heart attack, a seizure while she was pulling the handle, and died right out there on the floor.”

  Kostner was silent for a moment. He wanted desperately to ask Hartshorn what color the dead girl’s eyes had been, but he was afraid the owner would say blue.

  He paused with his hand on the office door. “Seems as though you’ve had nothing but a streak of bad luck on that machine.”

  Hartshorn smiled an enigmatic smile. “It might not change for a while, either.”

  Kostner felt his jaw muscles tighten. “Meaning I might die, too, and wouldn’t that be bad luck.”

  Hartshorn’s smile became hieroglyphic, permanent, stamped on him forever. “Sleep tight, Mr. Kostner.”