I had to limit my thoughts to immediate problems. There was the house and everything in it: what would I do until Myshkin came back? To ask what if he wasn’t coming back was to raise the specter behind every thought that involved Myshkin. What would happen to the house… to the machine… to the products of the machine…
I could hear Siegman’s voice again. “Henry, how long do you think we’ll be here? I’ll call the hospital now, but I’d like to leave a number where I can be called back.”
I didn’t answer him.
“Listen, Henry, don’t think I don’t know how tough this is on you. It’s difficult for most people to realize that medical standards don’t coincide with ordinary, common sense notions in a thing like this, but unless you achieve some degree of detachment, you’re sunk.”
He let me alone then and went back across the room to call the hospital. Presently he was discussing Myshkin, slinging technical jargon, but there were occasional phrases—I had no doubt they were for my benefit—that were clear enough, references to auditory and visual hallucinations, schizoid personalities, delusions of grandeur and persecution and so on. I decided I’d had enough and was getting out of there.
I turned, took a single step and held my breath.
A moment later Siegman looked at me curiously, and then, when he suddenly realized that I was fighting back laughter, he quickly broke off his conversation, replaced the phones and got up to come to me. And then I really let go.
“HELLO, BORIS!” I roared. “WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?”
Siegman whirled, took one look, moaned, and keeled over.
Little Boris Borisovitch Simeonof-Pishtchik emerged from under the table where he’d been patiently standing, regarded Siegman’s prostrate form, scratched his head and looked up at me.
“Very disappointing,” he nodded. “Absolutely.”
* * * *
It took fifteen minutes to revive Siegman and make it stick. I’d bring him to but he’d take another look at Boris and go out again, so finally I persuaded Boris to stay out of sight until Siegman was prepared for the next look. The trouble was that Boris was in a rush to leave, but he wanted to hear about Myshkin first—apparently he knew something had happened—and I wanted him to stay at least long enough for Siegman to talk to him.
Because there was something else about Boris—a decided air of optimism and a bubbling restless energy that had him hopping around, shooting questions at me until his high, piping voice thinned out to a ridiculous squeak. It worried me to think about the possible reasons Boris might have for his cheerfulness.
So, after awhile, Siegman was able to sit up in the big chair and listen to Boris and me talking. I shouldn’t have felt sorry for him but I knew how frightful an experience it was to come to accept the fact of Boris—to look at that little manikin in blue jeans and sweatshirt and canvas shoes; to watch the swift succeeding emotions play on his face when he thanked me for saving his life, or referred to Myshkin with terrible vindictiveness, or smiled mysteriously when he hinted at new developments, shaking his tiny feathery mop of hair or wrinkling his long nose in thought—and to realize that this was a sentient being, possessed of an intelligence with which I was very carefully reckoning.
“What I want to know,” Boris was saying, “is why they took him away. And on whose complaint? Yours?”
“No,” I said. “What complaint could I make?”
“What complaint?” He threw up his hands. “Is murder a crime in this society or a philosophical abstraction? The streets around here are full of police this morning—for what? For the murder of two men! But Myshkin has slaughtered who knows how many of us—three today alone!—and you ask what complaint?” He shook his head bitterly as he murmured, “Forgive me, my friend. I should not expect justice to drop into my hand like a ripe grain of corn.”
“But they don’t even know about you,” I said. “They should—and I want to tell them about you—but not unless you and your countrymen come with me and let yourselves be seen. Otherwise there isn’t a chance in a million they’d believe me.”
Boris looked wise and sad and amused. “I don’t trust you,” he said simply. “I say this at the risk of injuring our increasingly pleasant relationship. You saved my life, but when it comes to delivering my few remaining compatriots to your hands, no. It not only violates the counsel of my instincts, but of reason. What can we gain by letting ourselves be known? Look at your friend here. I came upstairs as he was working the telephone, and I listened attentively because he was talking about Myshkin. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t understand too much of what he said, but when he mentioned that fiendish Myshkin’s delusions of grandeur, I was instantly impressed with the high quality of his intellect and perception. A person of stature and fine sensibilities, I told myself. But what happened when he saw me? He fainted! So why should—”
“But you forget what a shock it is to—”
“Bah! The trouble isn’t what I forget, which is very little, but what I expect, which always seems to be too much. Forgive me for my impatience, but I expect an extremely busy day, on my word, so if you will be good enough to tell me when you expect Myshkin back, I’ll be on my way.”
“I haven’t the least idea when he’ll be back. It may be days, weeks or months.”
“Impossible! Whatever trivial offense Myshkin committed—”
“But you see.” I said, “it was Myshkin who was committed.”
“What?” Boris started. “Myshkin was—you don’t mean—”
“I mean he’s in the psychopathic ward at Bellevue,” I said. I had considered the risks involved in telling him, but there didn’t seem much to lose. “If you do what I ask.” I went on, “we may get him discharged in a hurry. If not, there’s a serious question about when he might get out—and as long as he’s there you haven’t a chance of finding out what you’re after—where you came from, how he brought you here, how to return. So you see—”
“No, my friend.” A thoughtful smile spread over his tiny features. “If that monster’s in a psychopathic ward, he’ll never get out because he belongs there. But,” he nodded, “that doesn’t mean I don’t want him out.”
“Then you’ll do it? Just in case it does work?”
Boris laughed. “Hardly. For such a madman the case is hopeless—legalistically. But there are other possibilities. It so happens that matters have suddenly taken a most fortuitous turn for my friends and me, and I think I can promise to do almost all that you ask.”
“Obviously you have a plan.”
“But the plan itself is less obvious, no?”
“You call yourself my friend?” I protested, trying to decide whether or not to make a grab for him. There was no telling how dangerous it might be. “How can you stand here and do the dance of the seven veils with these juicy hints about what’s coming? Is that gratitude?”
“Let’s not befuddle the issue, shall we?” He drew himself up. “What I owe you—I don’t deny it—I owe you alone. But what I owe that incarnate ghoul Myshkin, I intend to pay off swiftly. And now, if I have your permission to return here this afternoon, I must leave.”
“Just a moment!” Siegman called.
“Yes?”
“Do the rest of you chicken boys look like Myshkin too?”
“Chick-en boys!” Boris shrieked, crimsoning with rage. “How dare you, you popinjay! Save your febrific eructations for the rodomontade canaille at the pothouse, or I’ll administer a bastinado that’ll put more stripes on you than a zebrula!”
Siegman and I looked at each other with awe, and he said to Boris, “But Boris, all I did was ask a question.”
“To me,” Boris snapped, “it was a borborygmus! Good day! Bah!” And he turned on his heel.
“Boris, did you say you’d be back this afternoon?” I called.
He was at the door when he turned back again. “Ye
s, I did.”
“Do you mind if I ask why?”
“Not at all. To dismantle that infernal machine downstairs.”
“Nothing doing,” I said.
“So?” said Boris softly, nodding his head the least bit, as if in confirmation of some private expectation. “But we need some of its parts.” he said, with the manner of one offering an explanation certain to be rejected. His little body had visibly stiffened.
“For what?” I said. “Not that it matters.”
“My friend, I am unable to divulge that information.”
“Then keep away from that machine! Understand?”
His face flushed violently. “Only too well…”
A moment later he vanished down the stairs. There was a swift very faint patter of rubber-soled shoes, then silence. I went down immediately. The door was unlocked but closed. The doorknob was too high for Boris, even if he could have moved the door. And he wouldn’t have ventured into the street in daylight, not this day anyway.
The door to the downstairs room was ajar. I went in, but in that wild disorder it was impossible to tell if anything had been disturbed. I knew the police had been there; they’d left dozens of shoe tracks in the yellow powder on the floor, and there was no hope of finding Boris’s among them. The machine’s green mantle still covered it but nothing underneath warranted attention. I went to the forge. Myshkin had used it, so the chimney was probably clear. There was no trace of Boris having been there, but I knew we’d have to guard the machine now until we could block off either the chimney or forge.
Siegman was sitting on the bed smoking. I told him what I’d decided about the forge. I figured the best thing was to stay matter-of-fact and hope Siegman wouldn’t blow his top, so I talked, but I couldn’t tell if he was listening. Then suddenly he looked up.
“I can’t get over his vocabulary,” he said. “Not its violence or archaic flavor, though I was damn near floored by both, but his use of more or less medical terms like febrific and borborygmus—and with such familiarity. Where did he learn them?”
“I told you he said he goes to the library. Maybe it’s a medical library. I should have grabbed him and stuck him in a coop until Myshkin comes back. Now we’ve got a war on—”
“You’re not going to fight him? You’re crazy!”
“Huh!” I said. “You don’t think I’m going to let him have his way, do you?”
“Think!” said Siegman. “Myshkin’s been terrified ever since he realized what the chicken-men were up to, but he wasn’t ready to quit until last night. Then he made a last futile effort to wipe them out. Why? Because they’ve won. It was in every confident word of Boris’, in his beady eyes when he listened to you, and I knew it was too late to avoid the whirlpool—”
“Who ever heard of chickens in a whirlpool? You’re confusing them with ducks. You’ll end up a quack if you’re not careful.”
“But there’s an answer—”
“Sure—let’s stop them. From what Myshkin said, and Boris, too, I think they still need parts from the machine downstairs. My guess is that Boris is only up to the final step, whatever it is.”
Siegman said slowly: “And my guess is that whatever it is, the final step is up to Boris only.”
“Dazzling,” I said. “I congratulate you.”
“Is that all you intend to do about it?”
“Do you want it chiseled on the Washington Monument?”
“I would prefer it on your monument,” said Siegman, “and maybe you’ll get one real soon. I’ve thought of something that might work out this whole mess, or at least postpone things until we get Myshkin back and let him decide. Instead of being hostile to Boris, my plan is to try hypnotism.”
“Why hypnotism? Who gets hypnotized? And by whom? And for what?”
“Boris gets hypnotized. By me. End of rebellion.”
“Huh?” I said.
“He considers Myshkin his enemy? I make Myshkin his greatest friend. He thinks the machine’s an incubator turned execution-happy? I convince him it’s a health ray generator. He’s got the rest of the chicken-men hidden? I fix it so’s he marches them in here, single file. Anything else?”
“Sure. Get them elected to the House of Representatives.”
“You don’t believe it can be done? Is that it?”
“It isn’t that I’m skeptical about hypnotism or its general efficacy,” I said. “Or even that I have doubts about your ability with it, though it wouldn’t be unreasonable if I did.”
“Then what is it?”
“Al, we’re talking about chicken-men!”
“Well?” he asked, frowning.
“It’s utterly…” But I didn’t finish. “At that,” I shrugged, “your idea’s no more absurd than just talking about chicken-men…”
So we talked about Siegman’s plan with increasing seriousness, realizing that without the vital condition of Boris’ return, any plan would be useless.
That involved my guess about the importance of the machine to Boris. Certainly, after his furious exit, we could hardly expect any social calls from him. If he returned, it would be only because he wanted to get at the machine. And that meant we were to do nothing to make his ingress more difficult. The chimney and forge would be left untouched. Then a close watch would be kept, so that if Boris did come we’d know it. After that, avoiding the merest breath of enmity, we might be able to woo him into position for Siegman’s crack at him.
That decided, we felt better and I took Siegman down, finally, to see the machine. It meant as little to him as it had to me. He gave it a quick once-over, shrugged, and went back upstairs with me, talking about things he’d observed about Boris. Most of it was too technical for me, like his remarks about Boris’ eyes—about the lens being held in place by the ciliary process which attached to the eyeball at the ora serrata, while the iris attached to the choroid, and the large posterior eyeball and distinctively developed pecten—and so on.
But I did catch what he said about Boris having a cockscomb. He called it a fleshy caruncle and a gallinaceous crest, but when he asked if I’d noticed it too, he had to translate, and it turned out he was talking about a cockscomb!
“You’re kidding!” I said.
“The hell I am,” said Siegman. “I saw it every time he turned his head quickly. It’s usually hidden by his filiplumes—what you call his hair—though they do seem to be an amazing cross between hair and feathers. Of course,” he rambled on, “some are more like plumulae or pennae than filiplumes, but where the apteria is so obviously much greater than the pterylae—”
The phone rang while we were laughing. Siegman dived for it, picked it up, spoke a few words, then turned to me. “It’s for you,” he said. “It’s Harriet Hopper.”
I grabbed the phone and talked to her or tried to. The news about the waterfront robbery had been broadcast, and she’d heard it and realized it had happened on the street next to Myshkin’s house. That was why she’d called. Were we all right? What was Al Siegman doing at Myshkin’s, when he’d gotten home at maybe six in the morning? How did she know? Because Gladys was with her and she said so. I said, well, if Gladys could be with her, Al could be with me. But Gladys had a reason for being there, she said. There was a reason for Al being here, I said. No, I couldn’t tell her. Couldn’t swap reasons either. Nothing was wrong. I wasn’t aware I sounded odd. All right, I’d put Al on and let him talk to Gladys.
Al took the phone, said hello honey, listened for half a minute without saying another word, and hung up.
“What’s wrong?” I said. “Why’d you hang up?”
“Gladys hung up,” he said, blinking. “They’re coming here.”
“Who’s coming here? Why didn’t—”
“Gladys said don’t waste time arguing; she has to see me and Harriet wants to see you; they’ll be right down.”
; “They’ll go right back.”
“But why shouldn’t they come? Now wait. I want to go to the hospital and see about Myshkin, and if I leave you alone you’ll be dead asleep before I’m out the door, and who’ll be watching the place in case Boris shows up?”
“And what if Boris shows up while they’re here?”
“Not a chance. The voices would frighten him. Besides, he’s a fanatic and fanatics hate women. I don’t see where company would hurt—”
“You lecher. I know just—”
“Don’t tell me you’re too tired to see Harriet?” he grinned.
So I went out and walked to the corner, where I found a police sergeant. I told him what Nulty had said about visitors and that we expected two ladies, and would he see that they were allowed to come in? The sergeant winked and said it was a fine day for it and he would certainly see to it. I thanked him and asked how the search was getting on, and he said nothing had turned up so far except, apparently, for us, and he winked again.
I was feeling pretty good by the time I got back to the house. It almost seemed like an ordinary Sunday.
* * * *
The girls hadn’t been at the house very long before Siegman and I realized we’d overlooked something that was wrecking our hopes for a rosy interlude—the explanations we were obviously expected to make.
A little lie destroyed us. It wasn’t even a lie, it was just an omission—we didn’t mention Boris. But omit Boris, you might say, and obit us. The lie multiplied like an amoeba. Pretty soon Siegman and I were contradicting each other about every third word. When our conversation began to consist almost exclusively of buts, Harriet gave me a look that made my teeth ache and said no more.
But not Gladys. Evidently she and Al had become romantically entangled the night before. Now she suspected another girl might be mixed up somewhere in Al’s horribly inept evasions. She kept poking everything he said as if she wanted to see how big a hole she could make in it. It was a fascinating experiment but she finally quit. Reason one was, as she said: “I know you had only two or three hours to double-cross me in, but if you can work that fast, on no sleep, you’re for me.” Reason two was what had brought her dashing early that morning to Harriet’s apartment, and now to Siegman—her own trouble.
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