“Don’t say dumb things at a time like this,” Dorothy said.
He dropped her on the couch. “I just had to say something,” he explained. “Dumb or not. I felt like saying just that. From now on, Dotty, I intend to say just exactly whatever I feel like saying to you.”
“That’s nice,” she said. She brushed away a tear. “Say something clever like that at the wake, too, why don’t you.”
“What wake?”
Dorothy burst into new tears.
“You know one of, the last things Pat told me?” Clinton said awkwardly. “He said we ought to have some kids. I think he’s right. We ought to have.”
“At a time like this,” Dorothy blubbered, “how can you talk about things like that.”
“It’s not as though they were dead. Dotty.”
“Well you’re just crazy,” she cried. “If they’re not dead, what are they?”
“If we’ve learned anything, Dotty, it’s that there’s no such thing as death. Now isn’t that right?”
“Well they’re dead to us,” she moaned. “That’s what counts. To us, Milt, Pat and Barb are dead!”
“Well I don’t give a shit about that!” Clinton declared. He pulled his wife to her feet and began to undress her.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked indignantly.
“I’m taking your clothes off,” he told her.
“Why are you doing that?”
“I just suddenly felt like I wanted to. One for the road, eh?—for Pat and Barb’s road—a wake, Honor style, for Pat and Barb, eh? What say old woman? A grand sendoff for Pat and Barb?”
“Milt, you’re terrible,” she said. But she was unbuttoning his shirt. “Well . . . I guess . . . why not? I mean, yes, that seems highly appropriate. It isn’t death, is it Milt? It’s freedom, a special sort of freedom.”
“That’s right.” He pulled her into his arms. “We’ll celebrate their freedom with an exercise of ours.”
Dorothy sighed and said, “I guess I’d better take a pill.”
“No. Don’t do that.”
“Well, I’d better. I’m already on overtime.”
“I said don’t do that.”
Dorothy sighed again and fell against him. “Shall we go upstairs?” she asked lazily.
“Let’s use Pat’s room. Eh?”
She nodded. “Okay. Pat’s room it is. One for the road, Pat. One for the road, Barb. Here’s to you guys.” As they entered the bedroom, she began crying again. “They’ll always be part of us, Milt,” she declared, trying to smile through the tears. “Isn’t that right? Wherever they are? They’ll always be right here with us.”
“I hope so, Dotty,” Clinton said soberly. He lifted her onto the bed and stared at her with melancholy eyes. “Yeah. Yeah, they always will be.”
8: The Harmonic
Arm in arm, Patrick Honor and Barbara Thompson approached Hadrin and Octavia. Hadrin stepped forward and embraced them, then moved back to give Octavia her turn.
“Mission accomplished, I believe,” Honor said, smiling.
“Brilliantly so,” Hadrin replied, returning the smile.
“How’s the image?” Honor asked.
“Just very nearly perfect, I’d say,” Hadrin said.
“I mean the image beyond the image.”
Hadrin’s smile broadened. “Secure for the moment. Yours was a tremendous victory, Honorkir. But there will be others.”
“All we won was a battle, then,” Honor observed. “Not the war.”
Hadrin nodded. “But a most significant battle. Why do you wear such a grievous face, my brother?”
“I’m pissed off because Barb and I died,” Honor replied. “I mean . . .” He shrugged and looked about him. “. . . this is a nice place, but . . . well, I think I could be a lot more effective out there. There’s a hell of a lot yet to be done . . . isn’t there?”
Hadrin and Octavia looked at each other and smiled. Octavia squeezed Barbara’s hand and said, “And you too, little sister? You share your brother’s assessment the situation?”
“I just want to be with Pat,” Barbara whispered. “I don’t care where it is.”
Hadrin gazed warmly at Honor, smiled the smile of divine mystery, and said, “There is no finality in death, Brother Honorkir. You may return, if that is truly your wish.”
“You wouldn’t mind?” Honor asked. His gaze flicked from Hadrin to Barbara. The message from each was unmistakable. He embraced Octavia while Hadrin and Barbara exchanged fond farewells. Then Hadrin took Honor’s hand, Octavia took Barbara’s, and they began a leisurely stroll across the blue meadow.
“This is the only way back now,” Hadrin announced, halting near a rapidly flowering geometer. “Look and decide. There is room for two. Hurry. You have but a microsecond.”
Honor and Barbara looked. Their eyes flashed with understanding. Barbara turned her gaze warmly to Honor and said, “Ohh, the Clintons . . . yes, Pat, let’s.”
Honor’s eyes gave his reply. He embraced her and they swirled together through the sub-microscopic geometer.
“I’ll always love you,” Barbara sighed, in her final micro-instant of divine understanding.
“And I you,” Honor replied, “even though we know not who we are.”
The twin geometer split. Honor went his way, exploding up into a creative chaos of a new universe in unfoldment, and immediately forgot the world he had known as he threw all his energies into the staggering complexities of mitotic construction. As he expanded to assimilate the diverse activities of the exploding ovum, he even forgot who he’d been, from where he’d come, and why he had chosen to go through it all again. Barbara, too, became lost in the all-consuming subjectivity as she busied herself in the little-girl ovum just across the way.
Dorothy Clinton moaned softly in the close memory of ecstasy. She rubbed her husband’s back and whispered, “I just hope you know what you just did, old man. That one took, I know it did, I feel it.”
“How could you feel something like that,” Clinton asked, almost shyly. “There’s no difference, is there?”
She smiled languorously. “When you’ve had as many dry runs as this gal, daddy, well, yes, there’s a difference. It took. I’m had.”
“Well, I hope you’re right,” Clinton said, sighing.
“Me too, and I hope I have twins.”
“We’ll name them Pat and Barbara,” Clinton said, perking up delightedly.
“You know something, Mr. Clinton,” Dorothy said, “ after all these years of marriage, I have discovered something. I married an incurable romantic.”
“Aw, well . . .” Clinton colored and pulled the sheet up over his hips. “Twins would be too much to ask for. Tell you what, old woman. I’ll settle for anything human, okay? Just so it’s human.”
“How about a Godmaker?” Dorothy said teasingly.
“Oh god oh god,” Clinton said. He fell back onto the pillow. “Anything but that,” he muttered.
Afterword—The Full Measure
Hadrin, the perfect man, and Octavia, the perfect woman stood quietly at the edge of the infinite sea. Hadrin gently rubbed her belly and said, “Well, we have grown a bit.”
“Yes,” Octavia agreed. She laughed, adding, “Quite a bit.”
“I believe I have that axiom worked out now,” Hadrin mused.
“Try it on me,” she suggested.
“Man is the measure of all that is, even of his God.”
Octavia clapped her hands with delight. “I like that,” she cooed.
“Me too,” Hadrin said soberly. He peered into the geometer of geometers. “Now . . . let’s see if we can catch someone’s attention with that one.”
Octavia leaned over to join the search. “Let’s see ... there’s little Angie Linc—I mean, Wilkins.”
Hadrin frowned gently. “I don’t know,” he said thoughtfully. “She’s only 12 years older than . . . and there always has been an attraction there and . . . well, why not, Octavia?”
“What was that axiom again?” Octavia asked.
“Man is the measure of all that is, even of his God.”
“Let’s add, and a woman is the measure of a man.”
Good, good,” Hadrin applauded. “Let’s call it that way. Now . . . let’s see, Octavia, how do we get Angie and young Pat together? I mean, 12 years is some difference up there.”
‘She’s the perfect age for baby-sitting,” Octavia pointed out.
“Oh boy, this is an endless wheel, isn’t it,” Hadrin said.
“You’d better hope so, Big Brother,” Octavia said.
~End~
The Olympians
Don Pendleton
Even the gods love their jokes.” ~Plato
Prologue
One can never say whether a man made History, or history made the man. The same can be said of nations. It can, for example, be said of the United States of America. Certainly this wild and undisciplined political entity was a phenomenon of its times—a political paradox, a geographic improbability, a philosophical impossibility. From its earliest beginnings it was all of these; throughout its measured history it never ceased to be each of these.
The United States is also an historical paradox. The writers of history insist that the original American colonies were founded by men who sought only liberty, self-government, and religious freedoms. Yet the men who lived that history pledged their allegiance to a mother country across the sea, took slaves, and established Christianity as a state religion. Not until nearly two hundred years after establishment of the first English settlement (Jamestown, Virginia) was the umbilical cord to England severed; separation of church and state did not come about until adoption of the first amendment to the Constitution, some fifteen years following the Declaration of Independence; nearly another century and a convulsive civil war were required before massive, formalized slavery was ended; true self-government was never realized.
The American Republic, as envisioned by the framers of its original constitution, was not to be so much a government of democratic freedom as of republican aristocracy. This, indeed, was the condition which gave rise to the loudest and best organized criticism of the proposed constitution, and it was the democratic champions who led the resistance against ratification of the proposed constitution by the various states. Even the debates which preceded the formal drafting of the constitution revolved chiefly around the issues of states’ rights and democracy. The question, as most often expressed, was this: Should the rank-and-file of free men be given a voice in the election of their representatives in the federal government? Or, more to the point: Could the American people be entrusted with the process of self-government?
George Washington, hero of the American Revolutionary War, was unanimously elected to serve as president of the constitutional convention that began in May of 1787, though Benjamin Franklin is generally recognized as the guiding spirit of that body. Most of the delegates to the convention were openly hostile to democratic ideas; of all, no more than three or four championed the cause of democratic rule. These were James Madison, James Wilson, George Mason, and perhaps Franklin.
Said Madison: “The great fabric to be raised would be more stable and durable if it should rest on the solid foundation of the people themselves.” Mason, an aristocratic Virginian, added: “We ought to attend to the rights of every class of people.”
Wilson, a famed jurist and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, went even further, to state, “No government could long subsist without the confidence of the people.”
Franklin appeared more in the role of arbiter and unifier of the convention, but he left no doubt as to where he stood in the matter of democratic government. “It is of great consequence,” he declared, “that we should not depress the virtue and public spirit of our common people; of which they displayed a great deal during the war, and which contributed principally to the favorable issue of it.” In other words, the common man had won the country—he should certainly have a voice in its government.
Nevertheless, the finished document which was eventually presented to the individual states for ratification had little to say about the rights of individuals, and gave only token recognition to the right of the people to govern themselves. Of all the branches and houses created by the Constitution, only the legislative was given over to the control of the governed, and even of this only the inferior side—the House of Representatives. Fearful of the havoc that might be wrought by the “undisciplined and uneducated” masses, the United States Senate was devised as a watchdog and screening agent over legislation enacted by the Representatives. Moreover, the Senate was not left to the promiscuous whim of a common electorate; its members were to be appointed by the individual states’ legislatures. Senators’ terms of tenure were six years, the Representatives’ but two.
Thomas Jefferson, on his return from France, where he had been serving as Ambassador throughout the constitutional convention, critically asked Washington why he had favored the Senate idea. Washington countered: “Why do you pour your coffee into a saucer?”
“To cool it,” Jefferson replied.
“Even so,” Washington rejoined, “we pour legislation in the Senatorial saucer to cool it.”
In the matter of electing a federal executive, the responsibility went to a hazy group referred to only as “the Electors,” who would be chosen in accordance with the individual states’ internal proceedings. The judicial branch of government would be appointed by the chief executive officer of the federal government, subject to the agreement of the Senate.
So—this nation of free men, as conceived by the framers of the U.S. Constitution, was not so much a government of and by the people as most Americans were led to believe. The first ten amendments to the Constitution, referred to as the Bill of Rights, were officially added three years following adoption of the Constitution by the new nation. These amendments represented, by and large, concessions agreed to during the long battles over ratification of the original Constitution. It was not until May 31, 1913, that United States Senators were elected by the people, a provision of the 17th amendment to the Constitution. And never at any time throughout the history of the nation did the people elect the President and Vice-President. The second article of the Constitution, though amended twice, continued to provide for the selection of the chief executives by a mysterious, little-known and virtually non-existent body of men known as the Electoral College. The manner of selection of federal electors was left entirely to the discretion of the various states, and only two of those states made any legal provisions which bound their appointed electors to an expression of the will of the people as evidenced by a popular election. Actually and legally, most of the electors could cast their Electoral College votes for whomsoever they pleased. In the event of an Electoral College deadlock, where no clear majority of votes could be tabulated for any specific candidate, the selection of the President would then fall upon the House of Representatives, with each state delegation receiving a single vote—and with the resultant possibility that a largely unpopular candidate could be legally declared the President-elect. In such cases, also, the U.S. Senate was given the task of selecting a Vice-President, and under the same ground rules.
Oddly enough, the political processes which grew out of the Constitutional framework were unbelievably effective. On only rare occasions in the nation’s history did a Presidential candidate who had obtained the largest popular vote in the national election fail to receive a majority of the electoral votes, and only twice did selection of the President fall to the U.S. House of Representatives.
So phenomenal, in fact, was the success of this unlikely process that a European observer of the U.S. political scene (Ostrogorski) was moved to remark: “God in His infinite wisdom watches benevolently over drunkards, little children, and the United States of America.”
It had long been a contention, however, that “God helps those who help themselves”—and the hand of God obvi
ously grew tired upon the pulse of America. The Constitutional flaw which contributed to the demise of this great nation had remained undisturbed, untested, and uncorrected for the better part of two hundred fifty years. It must have appeared inevitable, at least in retrospect, to the people of that unhappy time that the times, the man, and circumstance would combine sometime, somehow, and for some reason, to exploit that flaw. And so it was.
Historical Foreword
“The colonists are by the law of nature free-born, as indeed all men are, white or black...It is a clear truth that those who every day barter away other men’s liberty will soon care little for their own.”—James Otis, American patriot, 1764.
“...being with one mind resolved to die free men rather than live slaves.” Thomas Jefferson, July 6,1775.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...”—from the American Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776.
“Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.”
—Thomas Paine, December, 1776.
“Knavery seems to be so much the striking feature of its (Americas) inhabitants that it may not in the end be an evil that they will become aliens to this kingdom.”
—King George III of England, 1782.
“All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and well-born, the other the mass of the people. The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God; and, however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true in fact. The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give, therefore, to the first class a distinct, permanent share in the government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and, as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government. Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy.”—Alexander Hamilton, delegate of the American constitutional convention of 1787.
Don Pendleton's Science Fiction Collection, 3 Books Box Set, (The Guns of Terra 10; The Godmakers; The Olympians) Page 32