Society of the Mind

by Eric L. Harry

  "You mean he had earned doctorates in math, engineering, and computer science — except for his dissertation? After majoring in philosophy?"

  He nodded his head, then sighed. "Greatest waste I've ever seen."

  "Why's it such a waste?" Laura blurted out, then lowered her voice. "I mean" — she held her hands out and loosed a burst of air from her lungs that was neither a sigh nor a laugh—"so he wasn't all caught up in the academic rat race. There are other things in life, you know." The stern-looking man stared at her with knitted brow.

  "Other, you know, than…" she began lamely, but then fell quiet and looked away. "Did… did he reply to your letter?"

  Petry snorted and went over to a small side drawer to extract a single sheet of paper. It appeared to be the drawer's only contents.

  Looking at it, he read, "'I regret that I am otherwise occupied. Thank you for your kind offer.'"

  "May I see it?" she asked, and he handed it to her — holding the edges carefully with his fingertips.

  The short text of the letter was typed beneath the bold letterhead

  J.G.

  Below was Gray's signature with its sweeping strokes of black ink.

  She handed the letter back and thanked him. At the door, she heard, "By the way, why are you asking all these questions? Is he trying to hire you, too?"

  Laura turned and cocked her head. "Well, yes, as a matter of fact. How did you guess?"

  He nodded, looking at her differently now, Laura felt. "He's been raiding us for years… us and the people out in Palo Alto. You say you're in the psychology department?" He was standing beside his desk, still holding Gray's letter with two hands. Laura nodded. "Well, whatever he's got cooking down there it must be big. He must've hired off close to two dozen of the top people from this department alone."

  "What's it like to work for him?"

  Petry shrugged. "I don't know."

  "Well, I mean, what do the people say who've been down there?"

  "I don't know." The man stared back at her. "Nobody has ever come back. Not that I know of, anyway." Laura felt a chill. "Oh, tell him they cracked Fermat's last theorem before he did, but there's still the Riemann hypothesis or the Langlands program if he wants to get a shot at history. Give us a chance to put those insufferable algebraic geometry people back in their place."

  "What?"

  "Tell Joseph that Princeton got it before we did. If he had taken as much competitive interest in math as he did in watching football…"

  Petry shook his head again.

  "Was Gray working on solving Fermat's last theorem when he was here?"

  Petry laughed. "Said he didn't have to. Said he had not only the theorem, but a final proof to the whole Taniyama conjecture." He shook his head and frowned. "He promised me that proof. I'm still waiting."

  "Well, I'll mention it if I see him, but I don't know if I'm going to take the job."

  "Oh," Petry said loudly, nodding, "you'll take it. You'll take it, all right. I don't know who you are, or what you do, but if Gray wants you, you must be onto something."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean he only hires the best." He stared at her — measuring her.

  Trying to see in her, she imagined, what had drawn Gray's interest.

  "Only the very best and brightest."

  The words echoed through Laura's head as she walked back to the Harvard campus. Words she'd dreamed of hearing some day from someone.

  "Only the very best and brightest."

  "Dr. Aldridge?"

  Laura stopped in her tracks and turned to face two men wearing suits and sunglasses, walking toward her. "Yes?" she said, keeping her distance.

  They pulled badges from their jacket pockets. "FBI, ma'am. May we have a word with you?"

  "About what?" Laura asked, involuntarily clutching her fanny pack to her stomach. She tried to relax — to appear less defensive.

  They stopped right in front of her. "We'd rather not talk here. Would you mind coming with us downtown?" The man motioned to the open door of a car parked along the curb.

  "Yes, I think I would mind." They stood there impassively, apparently not terribly insulted. "Have I done anything wrong?"

  "No, ma'am. We'd just like to talk."

  "Well, then… talk," Laura said, shrugging and staying put.

  Students streamed past them, staring at the odd sight. Classes had just let out, and she felt comforted by the crowds.

  "Can we step over there?" the man asked, and she followed them to the base of a statue just to the side of the walk. The two men in sunglasses seemed unperturbed by the bright light, but Laura stood in the statue's shadow. "We know that you've received an offer of employment from a Mr. Joseph Gray."

  It wasn't really a question. It sounded more like an accusation.

  "Not employment. I'd be an independent consultant. And besides, how do you know that, and what business is it of yours? Is it illegal to hire a consultant?"

  "No, ma'am." The two men looked at each other. "How much do you know about Mr. Gray?"

  "I've never met him. I just received his offer today. Look, why don't you just tell me what it is you're after?"

  "We're not after anything, ma'am. We just wanted to ask you some questions."

  Laura waited.

  "Do you know a Dr. William Krantz?"

  Laura cocked her head. He was in the physics department, she remembered. He'd broken his finger playing touch football against the psychology department. Laura nodded. "Yes. I believe I know of Dr. Krantz. Why?"

  One of the agents was writing in a notebook. "You work in the psychology department at Harvard, is that right?"

  "Yes."

  "And you have nothing to do with high-energy physics?"

  Laura laughed. "Would you mind telling me what this is all about?"

  "I'm afraid I can't, ma'am, but we need your help."

  "Well, just what kind of help do you need?"

  "We've been investigating Mr. Gray's operations for some time, now. We have reason to believe that… well, that things there have reached a critical phase."

  "A critical phase of what? What operations?"

  They looked at each other and then handed Laura a business card.

  On it was a telephone number with a Washington, D.C. area code.

  "That is a number you can call, anytime, twenty-four hours a day, should you see anything that you find… suspicious."

  "What do you mean, 'suspicious'? Just what is it that you think is going on down there?" There was a long silence. The two men stared back at her.

  Finally, the talker said, "We don't know."

  After the two agents left, Laura sagged against the cool stone base of the statue. The statue's plaque was right at her feet.

  "Galileo Galilei. 1564–1642."

  6

  Jonathan followed Laura into her office and sank into the sofa as he had so many times before. Laura slung her fanny pack onto the desk and collapsed into her chair. Jonathan was arched forward, eagerly awaiting a continuation of the day's drama.

  "So," he asked, "what are you gonna do?"

  "I'm being followed," Laura said, rising and walking to the window to look out. She couldn't see anyone lurking down there, but of course she wouldn't see them.

  "They're professionals. And I think they're rifling through my personal records at my bank and my video store."

  She turned to see Jonathan staring at her. "What?" Laura demanded.

  "'Doctor, heal thyself' seems to come to mind."

  "It's not paranoia!" Laura snapped, pulling the card from her pocket and tossing it to him. "The FBI stopped me, and we had chat about Gray."

  Jonathan examined the card and then handed it back. "And you'd have thought they'd have learned their lesson after Watergate. Raided your video store, did they?" Laura groaned through gritted teeth and sank into her seat. "So, what are you going to do?" he asked.

  "I don't know." She looked up at him. "Jonathan, I can't tell whether the
guy is an eccentric maverick who's being persecuted by the establishment, or the frigging Antichrist!"

  Jonathan had picked up a magazine through which he now absentmindedly thumbed. "I phoned a guy I met at last year's Chicago neuroscience thing. He had told me in Chicago that he'd been in an undergraduate philosophy class with Gray here years ago. Said Gray was a quiet kid."

  Laura waited, but Jonathan just turned the pages. "That's your big news?"

  "That's what he said back then. But I called him this afternoon and quizzed him up."

  Again Laura waited, and Jonathan licked his index finger to turn a page. "Jesus, Jonathan?"

  He tossed the magazine onto the end table. "His theory is that Gray might be losing it."

  "Losing what?"

  "Let's see. How can I say this politely about your prospective boss?" Jonathan looked thoughtful. "He thinks Gray might be going completely mad." Laura stared back at him, saying nothing.

  "Extreme antisocial behavior. Borderline misanthrope. He thinks it's classic. As a prodigy, you see, he has a fairly bizarre childhood. He has nothing in common with his peers and turns into a loner. When he grows up, he's no longer the brilliant sideshow. Others' intellects begin to match and exceed his own. He withdraws. Begins to hate mankind. He buys islands in the South Pacific, for Christ's sake. Lets his fingernails and hair grow long. Obsessive-compulsive washing of his hands and fear of germs. Oxygen-rich tents to increase his longevity. Et cetera, et cetera."

  Laura was nodding slowly. "This 'friend' of yours hasn't seen Gray since college, has he?" she asked. "He doesn't know a single goddamned thing about Gray."

  "It was just a theory," Jonathan said. "He does know one thing, though."

  Laura stifled another laugh. "Don't tell me Gray is gay."

  "No, you'll be happy to learn. He's straight. I asked."

  "So your friend knows two things."

  Jonathan smirked, but then to Laura's surprise did not return a flippant riposte. "He lost his parents in a car accident when he was twelve. No brothers, no sisters, no aunts, uncles, cousins. His high school's English teacher took him in for the year before he came to Harvard on a scholarship. One night back in college, my acquaintance from Chicago was pulling an all-nighter cramming for an exam. When the library closed, he headed back to his dorm. Gray's light was on in his ground-floor room, like always. Gray apparently never slept, just read all night long. Only this time, he wasn't reading. So my friend walked over to Gray's window and looked in. Gray, it seems, was sitting there, at three o'clock in the morning, all by himself, just staring at the wall." Jonathan paused. "They'd had a cake for him at the department earlier that day. It was his sixteenth birthday."

  7

  The heavy, humid air of the South Pacific hit Laura as she stood in the door of the plane.

  Parked on the tarmac were a few jets, prop planes, and helicopters, but there were no people to be seen anywhere. The lone flight attendant directed Laura to a small building that sat at the foothills of a lush green mountain, but then warned, "Don't get near the plane's fuselage. It's still hot."

  The supersonic corporate jet had made the trip from Boston in just six hours.

  Laura descended the steps to the concrete as the pilot powered the engines down.

  A deep and distant roar like the tearing of a heavy cloth drowned out the dying whine of the jet's turbines. Over the verdant mountain that rose from the center of the island appeared a bright fire in the sky.

  Holding her hand up to shield her eyes, Laura saw it was a brilliant tail of exhaust jetting from a squat, flat-sided rocket.

  The craft had a blunt nose and landing gear that was retracting into its fuselage. Laura stopped to watch it rise through the thin layer of clouds as it arced through the heavens toward space. When it had disappeared from sight, she resumed her walk to the terminal.

  "Welcome to the Gray Corporation's South Pacific Facilities," a large and hospitable sign over the building's entrance read. "Trespassers are subject to arrest," a smaller sign beneath it cautioned.

  The Gray Corporation logo was the large sign's centerpiece. As Laura approached the building, her eyes remained fixed on the logo.

  Its shape was roughly that of a human head. The corporate emblem — now recognizable the world round — was formed out of broad diagonal swaths of gray that ranged in tint from gunmetal to slate. The variations in tint gave the logo the basic contours of a human face. The design was decidedly high-tech, futuristic in its complexity of subtle tones and of form, although Laura couldn't quite decide why she thought that.

  When you looked at it closely, the effect dissolved and it was simply a dozen or so diagonal lines of slightly varying shades.

  Laura shook her head, realizing she was out of sorts because of the flight. She had slept most of the way, having woken only when the jet's wheels touched down. In her current groggy state, she knew, she would've found herself mesmerized by a simple traffic sign.

  A man emerged from the building, and after a momentary spike of anticipation Laura felt a twinge of disappointment. He wasn't the one she'd expected.

  "Hello, Dr. Aldridge," the young man said, grabbing her single bag. The door to the terminal slid open automatically. Inside, instead of counters and rows of seats there was simply a curbed white roadbed running through the center of the building. In the sunken bed stood a strange car — both doors on its near side lifted into the air like the wings of a great bird.

  The man put her bag into the open rear door. The passenger compartment of the vehicle had four seats that were surrounded by clear Plexiglas.

  Each of the seats was identical. There were no controls for a driver.

  The man stood beside the open front door. After waiting a moment, he said, "This car will take you to Mr. Gray's house." Laura hesitated. "It's all right," he assured her. "It's automated. All you have to do is sit. It's about fifteen minutes from here up the mountain."

  Laura got into the car and sat in the front passenger seat. She was surprised when the two doors shut automatically, a soft whoosh of air preceding the total quiet of the tightly sealed compartment.

  The man waved from where he stood beside the road. A thin tone sounded, and a light on the dash in front shone "Please fasten your seatbelt" in red. As soon as Laura closed the belt's mechanism, the car started to move and the door at the end of the building began to rise.

  She braced herself, grabbing the seat's armrests with both hands as the car accelerated smoothly. There were no rails on the road ahead or rubber boundaries lining its curbs. The car's four tires appeared unfettered by such mechanical constraints.

  The hum of the electric engine rose steadily as the car left the building for the bright sunlight outside. Laura was surprised and alarmed that its acceleration continued unabated. She could feel it in her back and, as the car climbed the hill away from the airport, from the downward press into her seat. Her grip on the armrests grew tighter with the steadily increasing speed, and she locked herself in place — rigid with alarm.

  The road ahead was banked and curved gently. Unlike normal roads, it had no intersections and lights — just forks. Although the road was wide enough for two cars to pass, the smooth pavement had no markings, and its invisible driver appeared to make no attempt to stay within any imaginary lanes. When the car whipped blindly around one particularly sharp fork, Laura's heart skipped a beat in anticipation of a rending head-on collision. Her ride up the mountain, however, proceeded uneventfully.

  Laura only slowly and by degrees began to loosen her hold on the armrests. The car must have reached sixty before its speed leveled off. The scenery flew by as the car flawlessly took successive forks in the road, each leading higher — progressively farther up the mountain. Laura's ears popped, and she took deep breaths to calm herself. The effort began to pay off, and her focus shifted gradually from the impending danger imagined on the road ahead to the unfolding sights that flashed by the car's windows.

  Several times in the near d
istance she glimpsed nondescript buildings before they disappeared behind dense foliage. Through narrow gaps in the brush she saw that huge white spheres like steel balloons tethered to concrete dotted the landscape. Some were half coated in ice and vented wisps of vapor, but none bore any markings to hint at their mysterious contents. Those snapshots of Gray's works gave Laura two general impressions — the sense that everything on Gray's island was new, and that everything was industrial in purpose.

  As the car ascended the steep mountain, the road cut a path every so often along the side of a hill or over the crest of a ridge.

  There, vast expanses of the island came into view. A seemingly impenetrable jungle stretched far and wide, giving the island a wild and primitive look. That contrasted starkly to the appearance of the terrain that streaked by the windows of her car, which had a tamed quality to it.

  Thick jungle foliage lined the road's curb on one side and formed a similarly unbroken wall that bordered the paved walk alongside the other. But the dense island flora was groomed neatly — edged and trimmed and beaten back where it encroached on the artery of man's commerce. It reached out, straining for the sunlit air laid open through its lush domain, but it had bowed — reluctantly — to the will of another. To the will of Joseph Gray.

  When the road rose and curved gently through the saddle of two small hillocks, Laura saw high atop the mountain above the first hint that all was not work at the Gray Corporation. A building that looked like a resort hotel clung to the concave face of a great cliff.

  Its glass walls and balconies faced what were surely impressive views of the jungle far below.

  The car crested another ridge, its motor now humming at a deeper pitch as it began a more deliberate and challenging phase of its ascent. From her new and higher vantage, Laura could now see clusters of buildings — small and large — nestled at the base of the huge mountain face. The small town lay half buried in thick trees and green shrubs that seemed to spring vigorously from the island's rich soil, and where its streets ended, the omnipresent dark jungle again resumed its reign.