“Mrs. Hill . . .” Blaise lowered his voice.
“Where is he? Where is Gordon?”
“At Heaven’s Gate.” Blaise dried his sweaty hand on his shirt. His beer had left a puddle of condensation on the shelf under the phone. “I don’t think they’ll let you see him.”
“I have to try.”
“Do that, Mrs. Hill. I think you’ll be safe. Gordon would find a way to crucify whoever bothered you. But if you can’t talk to Gordon or he won’t see you, tell Hemmett that Gordon better call me or you’ll make tsunami-sized waves.”
“Why won’t Gordon see me?”
“That’s what I want to find out.”
Mrs. Hill was obviously dissecting Blaise’s answer instead of blurting questions.
“Don’t tell Hemmett what you plan to do. Let him use his imagination and he’ll think up something that really scares him.” Blaise paused. “You know, they may not go for this again, but it’s all we have. And I think Gordon is voluntarily avoiding you. I’m sorry I frightened you. Will you do it?”
“Yes.” Her voice was tiny.
Blaise jiggled coins in his pocket, looked at the flat beer and decided he didn’t want it. Dobie whined with ecstasy when he came outside.
“Are you hungry, Dobie?”
Dobie wiggled and emitted two brief barks. Blaise scratched his ears until Dobie sighed, then went into the deli next to the bar and bought a pound of liver and a sandwich. He unwrapped the liver and laid the open paper on the sidewalk. Dobie dipped his head and it disappeared.
“You’re supposed to chew your food,” Blaise chided. Dobie looked at the sandwich with ineffable longing. So did Blaise. His stomach didn’t feel any better. He threw the halves to Dobie one at a time. Neither touched ground.
“Dobie, it’s best not to eat before you go into battle. Just in case you get a stomach wound.”
Dobie wagged his stub tail in appreciation of this wisdom. Also for his full belly. Nobody was going to shoot him when they got back to Helen’s house.
“Lucky dog,” Blaise said. Dobie led the way.
The living room was subarctic. Linda was saccharine. Helen remained formally correct. Blaise’s skin prickled. “Why don’t you stay for lunch?” Helen looked at Blaise with eyes as expressive as Dobie’s and with a more urgent appeal.
“I’m expecting a phone call at home.”
“I see. Well . . .” Helen laughed recklessly, though Blaise didn’t see anything to laugh about. “I guess I may as well feed Dobie.” She opened the broiler. Steam roiled out along with the odor of hot meat. With a long-tined serving fork she speared a whole porterhouse and flopped it on a piece of her best china. She put plate and all on the floor.
Dobie looked at the still-steaming steak and licked his chops. His eyes were shiny.
“All yours, Dobie.” Helen patted him.
Dobie moved like a four-legged ballet dancer on ice skates circling the steak. A tentative nip and yip forced him to let it cool another minute. “That,” Helen said, “is how we Polacks feed our dogs.”
As the steak disappeared Blaise heard bones crunch. “We really have to go,” he said.
“Go.” Helen didn’t look at him.
They were getting into the VW when Linda asked what he’d been doing. “Nothing much,” Blaise said. “I did learn Dobie’s a slow eater when he has a bone to chew on.”
At his house, Linda held the cordless phone dubiously. “Did you know everybody in the neighborhood can listen in on these?”
“I have no secrets.” Practice was turning Blaise into a better liar.
She took the phone into the bedroom and closed the door. Blaise fed instructions into the portable to be transmitted to Alfie on the modem line.
After a while Linda came out and gave him the telephone. Blaise wondered about her call. But she didn’t volunteer.
They sat in silence for a while. “Jon says he took the treatment at Human Enhancements in San Francisco.” Linda offered the information without comment.
“I’m surprised.”
“Blaise, it wasn’t an ego trip. He did it for me.” Linda huddled on the couch, pathos in every line.
“He’ll be all right.”
She swallowed. “Uncle Milo never liked him. Jon’s not smart—or even clever. He just works like a dog.”
“He’s not stupid.”
“No. But nothing comes easy. Uncle’s friends were all top of their class without straining. Money came to them easily. They got academic positions on the basis of grades and honors. Jon just worked harder.”
“He’ll be all right.” Blaise fidgeted at Linda’s unspoken condemnation. “Why listen to your uncle instead of your husband?”
“Uncle Milo’s my family, Blaise.” She looked at him with guileless eyes. “We Irish have to stick together.”
“Burkhalter?”
The telephone rang.
Blaise spoke in monosyllabic mumbles, then hung up. “Let’s go,” he said.
Linda picked up her purse. “Where?”
“To meet Gordon.”
There is every reason to suppose as many brilliant people exist in institutions of the mentally incompetent as are members of the societies of science. It is a happy accident when intelligence and brilliance occur in the same entity.
FROM A SEMINAR ON
THE CUNNINGHAM EQUATIONS
CHAPTER 14
Blaise hustled Linda into the belly-to-back crowd and they drifted toward the seal pool, Linda clinging to him with barnaclelike tenacity as they traversed a circular sidewalk that suggested seclusion without actually delivering. On the other side of a fake rock held together by mortar, a girl with a bullhorn warned the crowd to keep its distance. Something erupted from a nearby pool with an ear-shattering roar, then fell back with a splash that drenched the audience.
“Remember, ladies, any gentleman of your acquaintance can be taught to roar.” The girl in the blue uniform seemed pleased with herself as she told the audience good afternoon. With the show over and the crowd melting away, Gordon became visible leaning on the pipe railing looking down into the grotto.
“Christ, Gordon, let’s go. That monster may grab your head next time.” Blaise glanced at the pool where a glistening black obelisk with gaping red mouth and saberlike tusks towered for an instant in the air before falling back with a splash that sprayed them both.
Breaking from the crowd, they walked to the water show building, a huge bunker shape empty of practically everything, including light. It was cool, damp, and quiet inside. Gordon smiled. “We meet again, Miss Lovely.”
“Mrs. Peters,” Blaise said.
“Well,” Gordon said, “things are seldom what they seem.”
“You haven’t changed.”
“On the surface, Blaise.”
“I have a message from your wife.”
“I know what it is. We’ve been married a long time. Not in years, perhaps, but in our hearts. I don’t think I can relay emotional messages through a third party. Just tell Stella I’m well, and I believe I know what I’m doing.”
“She said to remind you that you’ve been wrong before.”
“Yes.” Gordon seemed reflective. “It’s hard to evade the truth with someone who knows all your failings.”
“Why are we meeting here? Are you in danger”
“I used to bring the kids when I could. I have passes. They liked Sea World.” Gordon eyed Blaise for a moment. “I don’t think I’m in danger. Not yet, anyway. But you could be. Mrs. Peters, too, if you both keep sneaking off to meet me.
Gordon looked into the pools of quiet water as if drawing a message from them, finally raising his eyes to meet Blaise’s. “I am not a prisoner. You understand?”
“I think I do.” Blaise closed his eyes to rest the red veins. “I know about Human Enhancements and I understand about Dr. Gibson.”
“Mrs. Peters. Would you kindly get us some soft drinks?” Linda started to object.
“I think you’d b
etter,” Blaise said. “We’ll be here when you return.” Both men watched Linda leave the domed building.
With Linda gone Blaise felt Gordon loosen up. “Tell Stella to give up,” he said. “Quit trying to get me back.”
“Gordon, she’s worried sick about you.”
“The innocent suffer from the actions of the guilty. Be careful when you give a hostage to fate. It would be best for Stella to give up on me. You might consider the context of that in regard to Miss Lovely Peters. We’re not academic now.”
“That’s not a reason.”
“It is.” Gordon took off his glasses and rubbed the sweat off his forehead. “It works,” he said.
“What works?”
“Can’t you guess? Even after I told you about Marie Gibson’s successful transplants of foreign brain tissue?”
“You’re using Tillies to enhance human brains. The cerebellum is the controller. Tillie is simply an enhancement of other brain functions that require the cerebellum to operate.” Gordon nodded. “And?”
“I don’t know. I’m no geneticist, no biologist, no brain surgeon. Is it surgery?”
“Implant. Tillie’s parasitic. You and I were both doing the same thing: looking for a controller to use all that raw brain tissue. You tried hardware—metal and electricity. I went to a smarter computer: an animal brain.”
“Dobie?”
Gordon nodded.
“I wasn’t sure,” Blaise said. “I’ve never had a dog, but he does seem awfully bright.”
“Keep him out of sight. Hemmett and West are covering their tracks. Destroying project notes, specimens, everything.” Gordon stared off into the empty depths of the building.
“Why?”
“I wish I knew. Dobie won’t get any smarter though. He’s gotten all he’ll ever get. With improved memory and better information handling he’ll seem smarter, but he won’t be. He remembers details. Things you don’t notice. He remembers what he catches, how he did it. He can repeat that and compensate to become more efficient. He sorts his memories out faster.”
“How do you know?” Blaise was afraid to hear the answer.
“How else?” Gordon watched Blaise thoughtfully. Even the whispers in the big building had echoes. “I had to know. Hemmett and West wouldn’t wait. West was in trouble if he didn’t turn the company around. Big trouble. I’ve met more unsavory people than I ever knew existed—and West is in hock to them all one way or another.”
“Why won’t you see your wife and kids?”
Gordon was silent.
“All right, then why Dobie?”
“Tillie is a larval worm.” Gordon looked ill and Blaise wondered if he wouldn’t be better off sitting down. “Modified chromosomes to produce almost pure nerve tissue. Brain tissue. I attached it directly to the lower end of the medulla where it could reach the cerebral cortex. It interfaces animal cells.”
Blaise waited for more that was not forthcoming. “And?”
“It works.”
“So?”
“I’ve got a worm in my brain.”
“For Christ’s sake!” Blaise exploded. “Would it bother you if you had a metal plate—or a pacemaker, or a corneal transplant?”
Gordon sighed.
“There’s more?” Blaise knew there had to be.
Gordon stared across the building, as if seeking a sign. One of the Sea World technicians was at a control panel, making jets of water rise and leap from freeform pools as he tested the system. The technician, dressed in reddish-tan and brown coveralls with a huge Sea World insignia on the breast pocket, made adjustments and the water subsided with a tinkling sound. He walked out and the green door clanged behind him.
“I’m not Gordon Hill anymore!”
“You’re crazy.”
“That, too.” Gordon leaned closer, more intense. “At first it was just the memory. Clearer, photoaccurate, expanded. I didn’t forget anything. Then I started thinking faster. I solved problems—puzzles that used to take minutes—in a fraction of a second. Remembering and integrating became painless. I don’t believe I’m really more intelligent. I just test smarter because I’m faster.
“Then I started hearing voices. One voice. You know what happened?”
“An echo?”
“Yes. An identical voice. Now, Blaise, what would you call that in a computer?”
“A backup. Putting the same information into two different memory locations. Both play back in sync. It’s redundant but sometimes memories glitch and that way you almost always have one to fall back on.”
“Then the echo went away.”
Blaise didn’t look at Gordon. He was afraid of what Gordon might see on his face.
“At first there were two brains: worm and human. The worm brain shared all the human brain’s memories. Even the program that made the human brain think. And then there was only one.”
“The human brain exerted control.”
“Come.” Gordon gestured toward the entrance. “Your friend is waiting.”
Blaise couldn’t move his feet.
“I had control animals that I’d checked from time to time.
I was always afraid I’d forgotten something. But they looked all right. I attached a very small worm to the medulla and after a while it disappeared into the mass. Absorbed, I thought. Just added brain tissue. But I forgot something.” Blaise stared at Gordon.
“The Tillies grow! They have to be starved to slow their growth.”
“I dissected a rat and sectioned the medulla. The cellular tissue was alien. And then I took sections from the cortex. They were alien, too. The cortex, Blaise.”
Gordon sat in one of the bleacher chairs. Tears rolled down his cheeks. “I’m brain-dead. I don’t have Gordon Hill’s brain anymore. Just his memories.”
“Does Hemmett know? Does West?”
Gordon nodded. He stood and took off his glasses and wiped his red, bleary eyes. “Let’s get out of here.”
Blaise searched for something comforting to say. “I’ll talk to your wife,” he finally said. “I won’t tell her. You still love her, don’t you, Gordon? She loves you.”
They stepped into the glaring sun. “She loves Gordon Hill.”
“You’re Gordon Hill.”
“Would you still be Blaise Cunningham? Or would you be some kind of echo lodged in the brain of a worm? You know, every animal is born with ingrained knowledge. Mammals, how to suckle. Worms, how to eat. Even man has the urge to mate without instruction. Australian wild dogs feign death. Probably the most advanced animal to be born with that survival mechanism. The matrix must exert itself.” Blaise couldn’t answer that at all. Not then.
“Dobie is my only long-term experimental animal, Blaise. Dr. Hemmett had all the others destroyed. I wasn’t even allowed to do an autopsy.”
“I see.” Blaise studied his hands. “You’re your own guinea pig. And Dobie.”
“You understand how important this is?”
“Yes. Is there any way I can reach you?”
“Can you remember this telephone number?”
Blaise repeated it.
“You can call me there without anyone knowing.”
“Is it important that no one knows?”
“It’s important to you.”
They stared at each other in silence. “Can you get out if you want to, Gordon?”
“I’m not a prisoner. They need me. But they want to know everything I do, every place I go, everyone I see. It’s not safe for the people I talk to. My that fellow who goes around holding up walls—if I talk, he listens. Not for himself, you understand.” Gordon stuck his hands in his pockets. “Tell Stella to get the kids out of school and go hide. Hide good.”
“Why? If they need your cooperation, Gordon?”
“Jensen had orders to kill Dobie if he couldn’t catch him.” Blaise nodded. “Do they know you’re your own guinea pig?”
“I don’t want them to find out.” Gordon held his hand out and Blaise took it. “I
can’t tell you everything, but you’ll figure it out.” Gordon slipped away into the crowd. Linda seemed disappointed when she came back.
“What did he talk about that I couldn’t hear?”
“His sex life.”
“You’re lying.”
“Just getting in practice for my next meeting with your uncle.”
Linda contemplated Blaise, her own thoughts hidden.
He made a point of going out by a different exit than Gordon used. The holiday crowd absorbed them and Blaise thought they were home free when a voice said, “Fancy meeting you here!”
The man who had introduced himself on the plane smiled, showing strong teeth. His pinstripe suit had been switched for pastel slacks.
“How was the park? Wonderful buffet. Lots of pasta.” Blaise stared.
“Well,” he said. “I see you didn’t take my advice.”
“I don’t remember any.”
“That’s all right. I’ll remind you. Later.” As they walked past he called. “By the way, Dr. Cunningham!”
Blaise turned. Linda tugged at his arm.
“I should tell you. Dr. Hemmett says you have some property that belongs to GENRECT.” The button man smiled. “I don’t have anything.”
“Sure you do, Doctor. Dr. Hemmett wants it back.” Slowly, comprehension dawned. “I’m not sure it belongs to Dr. Hemmett. Besides . . .”
Blaise hesitated. Too much depended on the right answer. “Considering Dr. Hemmett’s intentions, I can’t do that. Neither should you.” He looked the stranger solemnly in the eye.
The button man examined Blaise carefully. “You may well be right, Dr. Cunningham.” He laughed. “Well, you’re in luck today because property recovery isn’t my job. That’s somebody else’s. But I’d be very careful about loose ends if I were you.”
“I appreciate the advice.”
“I have my reasons.” He contemplated Blaise and Linda for what seemed an eternity. Finally he seemed to make up his mind. “You can always leave word with the GENRECT switchboard if you have anything to say to me. Ask for Sergio Paoli.”
Blaise blinked. “Will Dr. Hemmett stand for that?”
The Cunningham Equations Page 15