“You’re dead,” she said. “Go away. I smell you, the dead inside you.”
“I’ll go,” he said, and managed to find the handle of the door. She let go of him, then; he saw her right hand flash up, the nails directed at his face, possibly his eyes—he ducked, and her blow missed him. “I want to get away,” he said, covering his face with his arms.
Kathy whispered, “I am Gam, I am. I’m the only one who am. Am alive. Gam, alive.” She laughed. “Yes, I will,” she said, mimicking his voice perfectly. “Claude St. Cyr was right; okay, I’ll go. I’ll go. I’ll go.” She was now between him and the door. “The window,” she said. “Do it now, what you wanted to do when I stopped you.” She hurried toward him, and he retreated, backward, step by step, until he felt the wall behind him.
“It’s all in your mind,” he said, “this hate. Everyone is fond of you; I am, Gam is, St. Cyr and Harvey are. What’s the point of this?”
“The point,” Kathy said, “is that I show you what you’re really like. Don’t you know yet? You’re even worse than me. I’m just being honest.”
“Why did you pretend to be Louis?” he said.
“I am Louis,” Kathy said. “When he died he didn’t go into half-life because I ate him; he became me. I was waiting for that. Alfonse and I had it all worked out, the transmitter out there with the recorded tape ready—we frightened you, didn’t we? You’re all scared, too scared to stand in his way. He’ll be nominated; he’s been nominated already, I feel it, I know it.”
“Not yet,” Johnny said.
“But it won’t be long,” Kathy said. “And I’ll be his wife.” She smiled at him. “And you’ll be dead, you and the others.” Coming at him she chanted, “I am Gam, I am Louis and when you’re dead I’ll be you, Johnny Barefoot, and all the rest; I’ll eat you all.” She opened her mouth wide and he saw the sharp, jagged, pale-as-death teeth.
“And rule over the dead,” Johnny said, and hit her with all his strength, on the side of her face, near the jaw. She spun backward, fell, and then at once was up and rushing at him. Before she could catch him he sprinted away, to one side, caught then a glimpse of her distorted, shredded features, ruined by the force of his blow—and then the door to the room opened, and St. Cyr and Phil Harvey, with two nurses, stood there. Kathy stopped. He stopped, too. “Come on, Barefoot,” St. Cyr said, jerking his head. Johnny crossed the room and joined them.
Tying the sash of her robe, Kathy said matter-of-factly, “So it was planned; he was to kill me, Johnny was to. And the rest of you would all stand and watch and enjoy it.”
“They have an immense transmitter out there,” Johnny said. “They placed it a long time ago, possibly years back. All this time they’ve been waiting for Louis to die; maybe they even killed him, finally. The idea’s to get Gam nominated and elected, while keeping everyone terrorized with that transmission. She’s sick, much sicker than we realized, even sicker than you realized. Most of all it was under the surface where it didn’t show.”
St. Cyr shrugged. “Well, she’ll have to be certified.” He was calm but unusually slow-spoken. “The will named me as trustee; I can represent the estate against her, file the commitment papers and then come forth at the sanity hearing.”
“I’ll demand a jury trial,” Kathy said. “I can convince a jury of my sanity; it’s actually quite easy and I’ve been through it before.”
“Possibly,” St. Cyr said. “But anyhow the transmitter will be gone; by that time the authorities will be out there.”
“It’ll take months to reach it,” Kathy said. “Even by the fastest ship. And by then the election will be over; Alfonse will be President.”
St. Cyr glanced at Johnny Barefoot. “Maybe so,” he murmured.
“That’s why we put it out so far,” Kathy said. “It was Alfonse’s money and my ability; I inherited Louis’s ability, you see. I can do anything. Nothing is impossible for me if I want it; all I have to do is want it enough.”
“You wanted me to jump,” Johnny said. “And I didn’t.”
“You would have,” Kathy said, “in another minute. If they hadn’t come in.” She seemed quite poised, now. “You will, eventually; I’ll keep after you. And there’s no place you can hide; you know I’ll follow you and find you. All three of you.” Her gaze swept from one of them to the next, taking them all in.
Harvey said, “I’ve got a little power and wealth, too. I think we can defeat Gam, even if he’s nominated.”
“You have power,” Kathy said, “but not imagination. What you have isn’t enough. Not against me.” She spoke quietly, with complete confidence.
“Let’s go,” Johnny said, and started down the hall, away from room 309 and Kathy Egmont Sharp.
Up and down San Francisco’s hilly streets Johnny walked, hands in his pockets, ignoring the buildings and people, seeing nothing, merely walking on and on. Afternoon faded, became evening; the lights of the city came on and he ignored that, too. He walked block after block until his feet ached, burned, until he became aware that he was very hungry—that it was now ten o’clock at night and he had not eaten anything since morning. He stopped, then, and looked around him.
Where were Claude St. Cyr and Phil Harvey? He could not remember having parted from them; he did not even remember leaving the hospital. But Kathy; he remembered that. He could not forget it even if he wanted to. And he did not want to. It was too important ever to be forgotten, by any of them who had witnessed it, understood it.
At a newsstand he saw the massive, thick-black headlines.
Gam Wins Nomination, Promises Battling Campaign
for November Election
So she did get that, Johnny thought. They did, the two of them; they got what they’re after exactly. And now—all they have to do is defeat Kent Margrave. And that thing out there, a light-week away; it’s still yammering. And will be for months.
They’ll win, he realized.
At a drugstore he found a phone booth; entering it he put money into the slot and dialed Sarah Belle, his own home phone number.
The phone clicked in his ear. And then the familiar monotonous voice chanted, “Gam in November, Gam in November; win with Gam, President Alfonse Gam, our man—I am for Gam. I am for Gam. For GAM!” He rang off, then, and left the phone booth. It was hopeless.
At the counter of the drugstore he ordered a sandwich and coffee; he sat eating mechanically, filling the requirements of his body without pleasure or desire, eating by reflex until the food was gone and it was time to pay the bill. What can I do? he asked himself. What can anyone do? All the means of communication are gone; the media have been taken over. They have the radio, TV, newspapers, phone, wire services… everything that depends on microwave transmission or open-gap electric circuitry. They’ve captured it all, left nothing for us, the opposition, by which to fight back.
Defeat, he thought. That’s the dreary reality that lies ahead for us. And then, when they enter office, it’ll be our-death.
“That’ll be a dollar ten,” the counter girl said.
He paid for his meal and left the drugstore.
When a ‘copter marked TAXI came spiralingby, he hailed it.
“Take me home,” he said.
“Okay,” the driver said amiably. “Where is home, buddy?”
He gave him the address in Chicago and then settled back for the long ride. He was giving up; he was quitting, going back to Sarah Belle, to his wife and children. The fight—for him—apparently was over.
When she saw him standing in the doorway, Sarah Belle said, “Good God, Johnny—you look terrible.” She kissed him, led him inside, into the warm, familiar living room. “I thought you’d be out celebrating.”
“Celebrating?” he said hoarsely.
“Your man won the nomination.” She went to put the coffee pot on for him.
“Oh yeah,” he said, nodding. “That’s right. I was his P.R. man; I forgot.”
“Better lie down,” Sarah Belle said. “Johnny, I
’ve never seen you look so beaten; I can’t understand it. What happened to you?”
He sat down on the couch and lit a cigarette.
“What can I do for you?” she asked, with anxiety.
“Nothing,” he said.
“Is that Louis Sarapis on all the TV and phones? It sounds like him. I was talking with the Nelsons and they said it’s Louis’s exact voice.”
“No,” he said. “It’s not Louis. Louis is dead.”
“But his period of half-life—”
“No,” he said. “He’s dead. Forget about it.”
“You know who the Nelsons are, don’t you? They’re the new people who moved into the apartment that—”
“I don’t want to talk,” he said. “Or be talked at.”
Sarah Belle was silent, for a minute. And then she said, “One thing they said—you won’t like to hear it, I guess. The Nelsons are plain, quite commonplace people… they said even if Alfonse Gam got the nomination they wouldn’t vote for him. They just don’t like him.”
He grunted.
“Does that made you feel bad?” Sarah Belle asked. “I think they’re reacting to the pressure, Louis’s pressure on the TV and phones; they just don’t care for it. I think you’ve been excessive in your campaign, Johnny.” She glanced at him hesitantly. “That’s the truth; I have to say it.”
Rising to his feet, he said, “I’m going to visit Phil Harvey. I’ll be back later on.”
She watched him go out the door, her eyes darkened with concern.
When he was admitted to Phil Harvey’s house he found Phil and Gertrude Harvey and Claude St. Cyr sitting together in the living room, each with a glass in hand, but no one speaking. Harvey glanced up briefly, saw him, and then looked away.
“Are we going to give up?” he asked Harvey.
Harvey said, “I’m in touch with Kent Margrave. We’re going to try to knock out the transmitter. But it’s a million to one shot, at that distance. And with even the fastest missile it’ll take a month.”
“But that’s at least something,” Johnny said. It would at least be before the election; it would give them several weeks in which to campaign. “Does Margrave understand the situation?”
“Yes,” Claude St. Cyr said. “We told him virtually everything.”
“But that’s not enough,” Phil Harvey said. “There’s one more thing we must do. You want to be in on it? Draw for the shortest match?” He pointed to the coffee table; on it Johnny saw three matches, one of them broken in half. Now Phil Harvey added a fourth match, a whole one.
St. Cyr said, “Her first. Her right away, as soon as possible. And then later on if necessary, Alfonse Gam.”
Weary, cold fright filled Johnny Barefoot.
“Take a match,” Harvey said, picking up the four matches, arranging and rearranging them in his hand and then holding out the four even tops to the people in the room. “Go ahead, Johnny. You got here last so I’ll have you go first.”
“Not me,” he said.
“Then we’ll draw without you,” Gertrude Harvey said, and picked a match. Phil held the remaining ones out to St. Cyr and he drew one also. Two remained in Phil Harvey’s hand.
“I was in love with her,” Johnny said. “I still am.”
Nodding, Phil Harvey said, “Yes, I know.”
His heart leaden, Johnny said, “Okay. I’ll draw.” Reaching, he selected one of the two matches.
It was the broken one.
“I got it,” he said. “It’s me.”
“Can you do it?” Claude St. Cyr asked him.
He was silent for a time. And then he shrugged and said, “Sure. I can do it. Why not?” Why not indeed? he asked himself. A woman that I was falling in love with; certainly I can murder her. Because it has to be done. There is no other way out for us.
“It may not be as difficult as we think,” St. Cyr said. “We’ve consulted some of Phil’s technicians and we picked up some interesting advice. Most of their transmissions are coming from nearby, not a light-week away by any means. I’ll tell you how we know. Their transmissions have kept up with changing events. For example, your suicide-attempt at the Antler Hotel. There was no time-lapse there or anywhere else!’
“And they’re not supernatural, Johnny,” Gertrude Harvey said.
“So the first thing to do,” St. Cyr continued, “is to find their base here on Earth or at least here in the solar system. It could be Gam’s guinea fowl ranch on Io. Try there, if you find she’s left the hospital.”
“Okay,” Johnny said, nodding slightly.
“How about a drink?” Phil Harvey said to him.
Johnny nodded.
The four of them, seated in a circle, drank, slowly and in silence.
“Do you have a gun?” St. Cyr asked.
“Yes.” Rising to his feet he set his glass down.
“Good luck,” Gertrude said, after him.
Johnny opened the front door and stepped outside alone, out into the dark, cold evening.
Orpheus With Clay Feet
At the offices of Concord Military Service Consultants, Jesse Slade looked through the window at the street below and saw everything denied him in the way of freedom, flowers and grass, the opportunity for a long and unencumbered walk into new places. He sighed.
“Sorry, sir,” the client opposite his desk mumbled apologetically. “I guess I’m boring you.”
“Not at all,” Slade said, reawakening to his onerous duties. “Let’s see…” He examined the papers which the client, a Mr. Walter Grossbein, had presented to him. “Now you feel, Mr. Grossbein, that your most favorable chance to elude military service lies in the area of a chronic ear-trouble deemed by civilian doctors in the past acute labyrinthitis. Hmmm.” Slade studied the pertinent documents.
His duties—and he did not enjoy them—lay in locating for clients of the firm a way out of military service. The war against the Things had not been conducted properly, of late; many casualties from the Proxima region had been reported—and with the reports had come a rush of business for Concord Military Service Consultants.
“Mr. Grossbein,” Slade said thoughtfully, “I noticed when you entered my office that you tended to list to one side.”
“Did I?” Mr. Grossbein asked, surprised.
“Yes, and I thought to myself, That man has a severe impairment of his sense of balance. That’s related to the ear, you know, Mr. Grossbein. Hearing, from an evolutionary standpoint, is an outgrowth of the sense of balance. Some water creatures of a low order incorporate a grain of sand and make use of it as a drop-weight within their fluid body, and by that method tell if they’re going up or down.”
Mr. Grossbein said, “I believe I understand.”
“Say it, then,” Jesse Slade said.
“I—frequently list to one side or another as I walk.”
“And at night?”
Mr. Grossbein frowned, and then said happily, “I, uh, find it almost impossible to orient myself at night, in the dark, when I can’t see.”
“Fine,” Jesse Slade said, and begin writing on the client’s military service form B-30. “I think this will get you an exemption,” he said.
Happily, the client said, “I can’t thank you enough.”
Oh yes you can, Jesse Slade thought to himself. You can thank us to the tune of fifty dollars. After all, without us you might be a pale, lifeless corpse in some gully on a distant planet, not far from now.
And, thinking about distant planets, Jesse Slade felt once more the yearning. The need to escape from his small office and the process of dealing with gold-bricking clients whom he had to face, day after day.
There must be another life than this, Slade said to himself. Can this really be all there is to existence?
Far down the street outside his office window a neon sign glowed night and day. Muse Enterprises, the sign read, and Jesse Slade knew what it meant. I’m going in there, he said to himself. Today. When I’m on my ten-thirty coffee break; I won’t ev
en wait for lunch time.
As he put on his coat, Mr. Hnatt, his supervisor, entered the office and said, “Say, Slade, what’s up? Why the fierce trapped look?”
“Um, I’m getting out, Mr. Hnatt,” Slade told him. “Escaping. I’ve told fifteen thousand men how to escape military service; now it’s my turn.”
Mr. Hnatt clapped him on the back. “Good idea, Slade; you’re overworked. Take a vacation. Take a time-travel adventure to some distant civilization—it’ll do you good.”
“Thanks, Mr. Hnatt,” Slade said, “I’ll do just that.” And left his office as fast as his feet would carry him, out of the building and down the street to the glowing neon sign of Muse Enterprises.
The girl behind the counter, blonde-haired, with dark green eyes and a figure that impressed him more for its engineering aspects, its suspension so to speak, smiled at him and said, “Our Mr. Manville will see you in a moment, Mr. Slade. Please be seated. You’ll find authentic nineteenth century Harper’s Weeklies over on the table, there.” She added, “And some twentieth century Mad Comics, those great classics of lampoonery equal to Hogarth.”
Tensely, Mr. Slade seated himself and tried to read; he found an article in Harper’s Weekly telling that the Panama Canal was impossible and had already been abandoned by its French designers—that held his attention for a moment (the reasoning was so logical, so convincing) but after a few moments his old ennui and restlessness, like a chronic fog, returned. Rising to his feet he once more approached the desk.
“Mr. Manville isn’t here yet?” he asked hopefully.
From behind him a male voice said, “You, there at the counter.”
Slade turned. And found himself facing a tall, dark-haired man with an intense expression, eyes blazing.
The Minority Report and Other Classic Stories Page 41