The Transvection Machine

by Edward D. Hoch

  “You said he didn’t know where you were living. Could you tell me some more about the circumstances of your separation?”

  She hated thinking back to those early days, the happy days, of her marriage. She hated even more the frustrations of having to sit here like some criminal answering the questions of this handsome young man. Perhaps if she could get to the laudanum tablets it would help her.

  “Separation?” she mumbled in reply. “I can’t really see where that concerns your investigation in any way. Vander was much older. He’d been married before and his wife was killed in a sea-rail accident. That started him thinking about safer modes of transportation, and led him to Hubert Ganger’s transvection machine.”

  “Ganger was the actual inventor of the machine?” She nodded. “I don’t really think it’s a secret any longer. Hubert did all the preliminary work and then my husband moved in as a partner. When the partnership dissolved, Vander had the machine for himself.”

  “Was there bitterness on Ganger’s part?”

  She had to be careful here. “No, not at all. He credited Vander with doing a great deal of the final testing on it. There was no bitterness at all.”

  Earl Jazine nodded. “That’s what he said too.”

  “Oh?” Surprise here. She considered herself something of an actress when it came to men. “You’ve questioned him, too?”

  “Briefly. It’s part of the routine to question everyone.”

  “But you’re not with the regular police, are you?”

  “At this point we don’t know that it’s police business. If the Computer Investigation Bureau discovers evidence of homicide, we’ll naturally turn it over to the Washington police.”

  “I see.”

  “But I was asking about your separation.”

  “Yes, you were, weren’t you?” She smiled at him. “I was getting to that. You see, the transvection machine played a big part in it. The thing became an obsession with him, especially after his cabinet appointment. He spent so much time on it … and then there was the age difference. You know what I mean. I finally had to leave him.”

  “But why didn’t you get a divorce?”

  “I would have. He was a wealthy man, and it was only a matter of working out a fair settlement.” Her mouth was dry and her eyes were beginning to water. She dearly wanted a laudanum tablet.

  “Were there any other women in his life that you knew about?”

  “I … Pardon me, Mr. Jazine, but you really must excuse me for a moment.” She rose from the sofa and went into the bathroom, hitting the push-plate without really seeing it, her eyes cloudy now with tears. She struggled with the laudanum bottle, pushing the plunger to dispense a single tablet, but her fingers were too moist and it fell to the floor, bouncing to the side of the bidet. She cursed and scooped it up, popping it into her mouth before it could escape again.

  All right, all right now. Calm down. Peace, peace.

  She felt the old familiar glow as the drug began to catch hold. Straightening her knit body sweater, she returned to the living room. “Now, where were we?”

  “I was asking about other women,” he reminded her, his eyes taking in the bulge of her breasts and the angle of her thighs. She always felt sexier after taking the laudanum, and believed she looked sexier too.

  “Well, there weren’t any. He was always faithful enough, in his fashion. My only competition was the machine, but that was enough.”

  “You’re a very handsome woman, Mrs. Defoe.”

  “Thank you.” She smoothed the sweater again in front, liking the way the syntho material clung to her flesh.

  “Have you had other men?”

  “I don’t see where that’s any of your business.”

  “There were rumors about you and Hubert Ganger,” he told her frankly.

  Damn, double damn! Her brain was becoming clouded with the drug, and she couldn’t think straight. Had Ganger told this guy anything? She couldn’t remember for sure, but she didn’t think so. Somebody else, then? That punk Tromp? She tried to clear away the cobwebs. Maybe another tablet would help.

  “I … you’ll have to excuse me again. …”

  She hurried to the bathroom, not quite sliding shut the door this time. The bottle was in her hand when he hit the push-plate and stepped quickly through the widening doorway. “Give me those!” he barked, sounding now like her big brother.

  “Go to hell!”

  “Don’t you know what laudanum tablets can do to you? The stuffs pure opium and alcohol when it’s in liquid form. When it hits your stomach juices it’s like downing five shots of liquor while smoking a pipe of opium. It could kill you like that!”

  “Go to hell!” she repeated, slurring the words. “Big fucking brother!”

  They were wrestling for the bottle, close up, her body pressed against his. “Give it to me, Gretel.”

  She went soft against him, looking up into his eyes. “I’ve got something for you, big boy.”

  He seemed uncertain, weighing the possibilities. “What about Ganger?” he asked. “I don’t want to be just another one of the guys he catches you with.”

  “Ganger doesn’t care,” she told him, reaching up for the laudanum bottle. But he tossed it into the shower cabinet.

  She took his hand and led him into the bedroom, aware that he was not resisting. She still knew how to pick them. He turned her around and kissed her gently, and she pulled him onto the bed. “I’ll show you how, mister.”

  They rolled over, and she popped up for an instant. “Where to now?” he wanted to know.

  “I’ve got something for you. A little surprise you’ll like.” She pulled open the drawer of the closetier, brought out the electric lance, and padded back to the bed with it. “Here! All for you, honey! Put it on.”

  He knocked it from her hand. “When I’m old enough to need one of those damned contraptions, I’ll give up. No machine does it for me.” He took her wrist and pulled her down on top of him. “Come here and I’ll show you.”

  The laudanum was in full control now, and though she wished still for a second tablet, the feeling was just as good without it. He was more of a man than Ganger ever had been. Or Vander. Or the others. She nestled against him and imagined herself floating in a pool of big green water lilies, naked and alone, with only the croaking of bullfrogs to disturb the silence of the night.

  After a time she opened her eyes and saw the sunlight of late afternoon streaking the wall opposite her window. She rolled over and gazed at the man by her side. “Was it that good with Ganger?” he asked.

  “Ganger is a fraud,” she mumbled. “The biggest fraud I ever knew.”

  “What kind of a fraud?”

  “A fraud fraud!” She buried her face in the sheets.

  “Did Ganger kill your husband in order to have you?”

  She sputtered with laughter, trying to collect her thoughts. “To have me!”

  “How did Vander die?”

  “Fraud,” she repeated. “Fraud fraud.” Her voice was muffled by the sheets.

  “Freud?”

  “That too! Yes, that too! Fraud and Freud. …”

  He stood up. “I have to go now, Gretel.”

  She got to her hands and knees, and reached down to fumble on the rug for the electric lance. But by the time she found it, kicked beneath the bed, he was gone.

  10 CARL CRADER

  HE OPENED ONE EYE first, and then the other, very slowly, as if uncertain just what sight might greet his eyes. He’d been dreaming that he was back in San Francisco, where he’d grown up as a boy. The dream had been very real, even to the way the ground churned and the buildings swayed and toppled during the earthquake of ’97. He hadn’t thought about that in years, and he’d been very small at the time it happened.

  Awake, he realized it was not the ground that was churning. He was on a boat of some sort. He tried to remember where he was, what had happened, but at first all he could remember was the sea-rail ride. Then, gradually, the re
st of it came back to him—the minister, and the island of Plenish, and HAND. And finally the blast from Axman’s stunner. He sat up suddenly and bumped his head on the low cabin roof.

  The noise must have attracted someone on deck, because after a moment the cabin door was unlocked and a brawny seaman stuck his head in. “I’ll tell ’em you’re awake,” he said, and then relocked the door.

  Crader tried to stand up, clinging to the rail that ran around the edge of the bunk. His knees were weak, but otherwise he seemed to be all in one piece. It was his first experience with the blast from a stunner, and on the whole he felt himself lucky. There were occasional reports of people being killed by them at close range, or at least being rendered unconscious for several days.

  Then he realized he didn’t really know what day this was. Perhaps he too had been out of it for longer than he thought. He walked to the square porthole and peered out through the thick polarized glass at the harbor. At least he was still at Plenish. They hadn’t transported him to some far-off headquarters to be guarded by robot slaves or Venusian revolutionaries.

  The lock clicked in the door again and it slid open. This time Bails—or Axman, as he’d identified himself—entered alone. There was no sign of the stunner pistol, but Crader had the distinct feeling it might be just outside the door, in the hands of the brawny seaman.

  “Did you have a pleasant rest?” Axman asked.

  “I suppose so. That’s the first time I’ve been hit by a stunner. What day is it?”

  Graham Axman allowed himself a slight chuckle. “You were only unconscious overnight. I had the weapon at its lowest setting. We don’t really want to harm you if we can help it.”

  “Is this your yacht?”

  “It’s a pleasure launch belonging to the resort, but they allow us to use it. We thought it might be best to have you on water and ready for a quick journey in the event your people came looking for you.”

  “They aren’t likely to do that,” Crader told him. “At least not for a few days.”

  “Good! Now about the reason for your visit here, and your inquiries about an organization called HAND.”

  Crader focused his eyes on the man opposite him, taking in the details of his dress for the first time. There was no longer any trace of the friendly middle-aged minister who had made the sea-rail journey with Crader, and allowed himself to stop off at the resort overnight. Though Axman still wore his small pointed beard, his eyes now had taken on a deep, fiery radiance. He looked more like a devil than a minister, more like a madman than a simple traveler. His clothes too reflected this new image. He wore a crested silver jacket of metallic fabric, over a black body stocking such as actors and homosexuals sometimes affected on the streets of New York.

  “You know a great deal,” Crader told him. “But of course you followed me from Baltimore.”

  “Of course,” Axman admitted. “I was leaving on a journey to Plenish myself, and when I recognized you at the sea-rail port I made arrangements to travel with you. Naturally you must realize that your face is not exactly unknown among my people.”

  “And your people are HAND?”

  “Just how much do you know about HAND, Mr. Crader?”

  “Humans Against Neuter Domination. A ten-year-old revolutionary group getting a sudden new surge of life from somewhere. And you, Graham Axman, are in charge of the American section of the group.”

  “Very good,” Axman said with a smile. “But I must correct just one word. We are not revolutionary in the sense that we revolt against people. Our revolution is only against machines—you might call it an industrial revolution in reverse. We do not want to harm people.”

  “Not even people like Vander Defoe?”

  Axman shrugged his shoulders. “Some, like Defoe, are special cases. They would invent machines where there are already too many. What good would the transvection machine do, except to transport people more swiftly to where they are not wanted in the first place?”

  “The only ones who don’t want them on Venus are the Russo-Chinese, who fear competition with their own colony.”

  “Ah, but that is not true, Mr. Crader. There are a good many people on Earth and Venus—good people, patriotic people, who do not necessarily wish to see us carry the troubles of this planet into outer space.”

  Crader was growing tired of the dialogue. He wanted to get to the point. “Did you kill Vander Defoe?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Did any member of HAND kill him? Did a man named Euler Frost kill him?”

  “That is a question you will have to ask Mr. Frost directly. Since I assume you came all this way to find him, it’s only fair that you two should meet.”

  The words made Crader perk up. Whatever the reason for their kidnaping him, it seemed they did not mean to simply kill him. Was it to be more in the nature of an educational session, or had they already made some demands on Washington to insure his release? The destruction of Defoe’s transvection machine in return for Carl Crader’s life? He wondered what sort of a bargain that would seem to the people in Washington.

  “I’d be happy to meet anyone,” Crader said, “but of course you must realize that while I’m a prisoner I in no way represent the government of the United States of America and Canada. I have no bargaining position.”

  Axman eyed him speculatively. “That’s understood,” he said at last. “Come along now.”

  As Crader had suspected, the seaman was waiting outside the door, although there was no weapon visible. He brought up the rear as Axman led the way onto the deck and along portside to the gangplank. It was a cloudless morning, with more of the island’s vaunted perfect climate, and a number of tourists were sunning themselves on the dock. Crader considered a break for freedom, which would not have been difficult, but the prospect of meeting Frost and learning something more about Vander Defoe’s death had piqued his curiosity. He walked along between the two men, not sure where they were taking him.

  Presently Axman turned in at one of the houses along the north shore of the island. The house must have been equipped with a proximity device, because they were still several feet from the door when it slid open to reveal a slender Chinese girl wearing a long dragon-print gown. Axman said something to her that Crader could not understand and she went off to the back of the house.

  Soon a handsome young man joined them. He also wore an Oriental costume, but with his deep-set eyes he looked more like Graham Axman than some Russo-Chinese agent. He was younger, and better-looking than Axman, but there was something of the same dedication about his expression. Crader recognized him at once from the hologram he’d seen in Tromp’s office.

  “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Frost,” he said. “How was life on Venus?”

  Euler Frost smiled. “A pleasant place to visit, but I hated living there. You would be Carl Crader of the CIB, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “Mr. Crader has some questions about our organization and its activities,” Axman said. “I thought he’d best talk to you.”

  Euler Frost sat on a low cushionlike chair that brought him almost to the floor. “You haven’t come all this way to deport me back to Venus, have you?”

  “Illegal entry belongs to another agency of the government,” Crader assured him. “I’m investigating the death of Vander Defoe.”

  “Really?” Frost let his right hand dangle along the floor, and almost at once a large white cat darted from somewhere to playfully intercept it.

  “You arrived from Venus just five days before he died, and you left Baltimore by sea-rail the day after he died. It seems worth an explanation.”

  “I see.” Frost brought his hand up, but the cat jumped after it. He glanced toward the doorway where Axman and the guard still stood. “I think I can take care of this, Graham,” he said. “Mr. Crader and I are going to have a little talk.”

  Axman nodded. “I’ll be having breakfast in the garden.” The seaman went with him, and Crader was left alone with Frost.<
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  “Now, then,” the man from Venus said. “Just what did you want to know?”

  “The president has reason to suspect you may be implicated in the death of Vander Defoe. Your travel schedule would tend to confirm it.”

  Crader was becoming aware of the extreme pallor of the man’s skin, the result of ten years on sunless Venus. There were some things even the vitamin lamps couldn’t replace. Or perhaps they simply didn’t have vitamin lamps in the Free Zone or the prison where Frost had spent his last several months.

  The man stared at him for a moment, seeming to read his thoughts, and answered, “If you’d spent ten years as an exile on Venus, never seeing the sun, going for nearly two months at a time without even daylight, maybe you’d have acted the same way. I spent a few days in Washington just getting reacquainted with Earth, and then I came here.”

  “And are you a member of HAND?”

  “Yes.”

  Carl Crader simply shook his head. “What do you hope to accomplish? This business about the destruction of machines is pretty fantastic, after all.”

  Euler Frost leaned back in his chair, one hand continuing to play absently with the purring white cat. “Let me tell you a little bit about my life, Mr. Crader, and then you can decide how fantastic it is. My father, a missionary in one of the Canadian states, was killed by the blast from a rocketcopter’s engines while trying to prevent a computerized mineral survey which would have taken reservation land away from the Indians. A girl I knew and probably loved on Venus was killed by a stunner fired at close range. Her only crime was that she wanted to live free, and that a friend of hers had tried to attack the transvection machine.”

  “So you came back to Earth and killed Vander Defoe in revenge.”

  Frost ignored his words and kept on. “Do you realize what we’ve become here on Earth, what the computers have done to us? Nearly a hundred years ago a man named Lewis Mumford wrote a two-volume work called The Myth Of The Machine. Mumford was not a radical nor a bomb-throwing revolutionary. In fact, he was a highly respected man of seventy-five when the book appeared. In it he decries the worship of the god of technology, and he points out the dangers of the megamachine—which he symbolized at the time as the Kremlin and the Pentagon. The megamachine required, he said, a permanent state of war in order to exist, and that is very nearly what we have had during this past century. The machine—more specifically the computer and its automated accessories—has become everything. Manual work has been turned into machine work, machine work into paper work, paper work into electronic simulation of work, divorced from any organic functions or human purposes, just as Mumford predicted.”