The Immortals

by James Gunn

  Beyond Locke was an entire wall of one-way glass. From here the director of the Institute could watch the copy room or, if he wished, switch to indirect observation of the other rooms and offices of the windowless building. Locke was talking to someone on his private phone.

  “Patience is our greatest asset,” he said. “After all, Ponce de León . . .”

  Sibert turned his head quickly, but he caught only a glimpse of a face that great age had unsexed. It was wrinkled and gray and dead except for the eyes that still burned with life and desire.

  “Interruption,” Locke said smoothly. “Call you back.” The screen set into the wall opposite him went dark as he touched the arm of his executive chair. “Sibert,” he said, “you’re fired.”

  Locke was no youngster himself, Sibert thought. He was pushing ninety, surely, though he looked fit and vigorous. Medical care had kept his body healthy; geriatrics and hormone injections had kept his shoulders broad, his muscles firm and unwithered. Perhaps surgery had replaced his old heart and several other organs, but they could not rejuvenate his aging arteries and his dying cells.

  “Right,” Sibert said briskly, another man than the one who had spoken to the secretary in the outer office. “Then you won’t be interested in my information—”

  “Maybe I was hasty,” Locke said. His lips framed the unfamiliar words awkwardly. “If your information is important, I might reconsider.”

  “And a bonus, too?” Sibert prompted.

  “Maybe,” Locke growled, his eyes small. “Now, what’s so earth-shattering that it can’t come through channels?”

  Sibert studied Locke’s face. It had not spent all its days in an office. There were scars around the eyes and a long one down one cheek almost to the point of the jaw; the nose had been broken at least once. Locke was an old bear. He must be careful, Sibert thought, not to tease him too much.

  “I think I’ve found one of Marshall Cartwright’s children.”

  Locke’s face writhed for a moment before he got it back under control. “Where? What name is he using? What’s he—”

  “Slow down,” Sibert said calmly. He deposited his lean young body in the upholstered chair beside the desk and leisurely lit a cigarette. “I’ve been working in the dark for five years. Before I give anything away, I want to know what I’ve got.”

  “You’re well paid,” Locke said coldly. “If this pans out, you’ll never have to worry about money. But don’t try to cut yourself into the game, Sibert. It’s too big for you.”

  “That’s what I keep thinking about,” Sibert mused. “A few hundred thousand bucks—what’s that to an organization that spends at least one hundred million a year? Fifty years of that is five billion dollars. Just to find somebody’s kids.”

  “We can get the information out of you.”

  “Not in time. And time is what you don’t have. I left a letter. If I don’t get back soon, the letter gets delivered. And Cartwright’s kid is warned that he is being hunted. . . .”

  “Let me check that statement with truth serum.”

  “No. Not because it isn’t true. You might ask other questions. And it would take too long. That’s why I couldn’t wait for an appointment. Try to squeeze the information out if you want to.” He lifted his right hand out of his jacket pocket; a tiny, ten-shot plastic automatic was in it. “But it might take too long. And you might lose everything just when everything is within your grasp. You might die. Or I might die.”

  Locke sighed heavily and let his heavy shoulders relax. “What do you want to know?”

  “What’s so important about Cartwright’s kids?”

  “Barring accidents, they’ll live forever.”

  * * *

  The middle-aged man walked slowly through the station, his face preoccupied, his hands thrust deep in his jacket pockets. He retrieved an overnight bag from a locker and took it to the nearest washroom, where he rented a booth. He never came out of the washroom. A reservation on the Talgo express to Toronto was never picked up.

  A young man with a floppy hat and a conquistador beard caught a taxi outside the station and left it in the middle of a traffic jam in the business section, walked quickly between the immovable cars until he reached the adjacent street, where he caught a second taxi going in the opposite direction. At the airport, he picked up a no-show reservation on the first outgoing flight.

  At Detroit he caught a jet to St. Louis. There he changed to a slow, two-dozen-seat transport to Wichita. There he hired an old, two-seater jet, filed a flight plan, and proceeded to ignore it. Two hours later he set down at Kansas City’s nearly deserted International Airport and caught a decrepit bus down the old interstate and across the crumbling New Hannibal Bridge to the downtown shopping district.

  The section was decaying. Business had followed the middle class into the suburbs. Buildings and shops had not been repaired for a decade. Only a few people were on the street, but the young man with the beard did the best he could, ducking through arcades, waiting in doorways, and finally edging into a department-store elevator just before the doors closed. The car creaked upward. When it reached the fifth floor, only the young man was left. The young man walked swiftly through the floor to the men’s room.

  Two minutes later he flushed an ugly, black mass of hair down the toilet, buried a hat under a heap of paper towels, and grinned at his reflection in the mirror. “Greetings, Mister Sibert,” he said gaily. “What was it Locke said to you?”

  “You were an actor, weren’t you, Sibert?”

  “Once. Not a very good one, I’m afraid.”

  “What made you quit?”

  “It couldn’t give me what I want.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If your psychologists didn’t find out, I won’t tell them. That would make your job too easy.”

  “Your mistake, Sibert. A live actor—even a poor one—is better than a dead adventurer. That’s what you’ll be if you try to set up something on your own. We’ve got you, Sibert—trapped in plastic, like that solidograph, and in measurements and film and ink. Wherever you try to hide, we’ll dig you out. . . .”

  “If you can find me, Locke,” Sibert said to the mirror. “And you’ve lost me for the moment.”

  He raced down the firestairs to the Main Street entrance, went through the used-clothing stores, up the escalators, down the stairs, and out a side entrance onto Twelfth Street. As an eastbound bus elevated itself on its pads and pulled away from the stop, Sibert slid between the closing doors. A mile past City Hall he got off, ran through two alleys, and swung into a cruising taxi.

  “Head west. I’ll tell you when to stop,” he said, a bit breathlessly.

  The cabby gave him a quick, sharp glance in the rearview screen, swung the creaky ’44 Mercedes around on a forward wheel, and started west. In that glance Sibert compared the man’s features with the picture in the rear seat’s holographic projection. For whatever assurance it brought, they matched.

  When he dismissed the taxi, he waited until it rolled out of sight before he turned north. The street was deserted; the sky was clear. He walked the five blocks briskly, feeling a sick excitement grow as the apartment buildings of Quality Towers grew tall in front of him. He couldn’t see the Y where the Kansas River flowed into the Missouri. Smoke from the industrialized Bottoms veiled the valley.

  In the early days of the city, the bluff of Quality Hill had been a neighborhood of fine homes, but it had made the cycle of birth and death twice. As the city had grown out, the homes here had degenerated into slums. They had been razed to provide space for Quality Towers, but fifty years of neglect and declining revenues and irresponsible tenants had done their work. It was time to begin again, but there would be no new beginning. A wave of smog drifted up over the bluff and sent Sibert into a fit of coughing.

  Money was leaving the city. Those who could afford it were seeking a cleaner, healthier air and the better life in the suburbs, leaving the city to those who could not escape. They co
uld die together.

  Sibert turned in the doorway and looked back the way he had come. There was no one behind him, no one visible for blocks. His eyes lifted to the hill rising beyond the trafficway. The only new construction in all the city was there; it had been that way for years.

  Hospital Hill was becoming a great complex. In the midst of the general decay, it was shiny and new. It reached out and out to engulf the gray slums and convert them into fine, bright magnesium-and-glass walls, markets of health and life.

  It would never stop until all the city was hospital. Life was all. Without it, everything was meaningless. The people would never stint medicine and the hospitals, no matter what else was lost. And yet, in spite of the money contributed and the great advances of the science of health and life in the last century, it was becoming increasingly more expensive to stay as healthy as a man thought he ought to be.

  Perhaps some day it would take more than a man could earn. That was why men wanted Cartwright’s children. That—and the unquenchable thirst for life, the unbearable fear of death—was why men hunted those fabulous creatures.

  Men are like children, Sibert thought, afraid of the long dark. All of us.

  He shivered and pushed quickly through the doorway.

  The elevator was out of order as usual. Sibert climbed the stairs quickly. He stopped at the fifth floor for breath, thankful that he had to go no higher. Stair-climbing was dangerous, heart-straining work, even for a young man.

  But what made his heart turn in his chest was the sight of the woman standing in front of a nearby door and the long, white envelope she held in her hands.

  A moment later Sibert leaned past her and gently detached the envelope from her fingers. “This wasn’t to be delivered until six, Missus Gentry,” he chided softly, “and it’s only five.”

  “I got a whole building to take care of,” she complained in an offended whine. “I got more to do than run up and down stairs all day delivering messages. I was up here, so I was delivering it, like you said.”

  “If it hadn’t been important, I wouldn’t have asked.”

  “Well”—the thin, old face grudgingly yielded a smile—”I’m sorry. No harm done.”

  “None. Good night, Missus Gentry.”

  As the landlady’s footsteps faded down the uncarpeted, odorous hallway, lighted only by a single bulb over the stairwell, he turned to study the name printed on the door: Barbara McFarland.

  He added a mental classification: Immortal.

  * * *

  The quick, sharp footsteps came toward the door and stopped. Fingers fumbled with locks. Sibert considered retreat and discarded the notion. The door opened.

  “Eddy!” The young woman’s voice was soft, surprised, and pleased. “I didn’t know you were back.”

  She was not beautiful, Sibert thought analytically. Her features were ordinary, her coloring neutral. With her mouse-brown hair and her light brown eyes, the kindest description was “attractive.” And yet she looked healthy, glowing. Even radiant. That was the word. Or was that only a subjective reflection of his new knowledge?

  “Bobs,” he said fondly, and took her in his arms. “Just got in. Couldn’t wait to see if you were all right.”

  “Silly,” she said tremulously, seeming to enjoy the attention but showing a self-conscious necessity to minimize it. “What could happen to me?” She drew back a little, smiling up into his eyes.

  His gaze dropped momentarily, then locked with hers. “I don’t know, and I don’t want to find out. Pack as much as you can get in one bag. We’re leaving.”

  “I can’t just pick up and walk out,” she said quickly, her eyes puzzled. “What’s the—”

  “If you love me, Bobs,” he said in a low, tight voice, “you’ll do as I ask, and no questions. I’ll be back in half an hour at the latest. I want you to be packed and ready. I’ll explain everything then.”

  “All right, Eddy.”

  He rewarded her submission with a tender smile. “Get busy, then. Lock your door. Don’t open it for anybody but me.” He pushed her gently through the doorway and pulled the door shut between them and waited until he heard a bolt shot home.

  His room was at the end of the hall. Inside, a tidal wave of weariness crashed over him. He let himself slump into a chair, relaxing completely. Five minutes later he pulled himself upright and ripped open the letter he had retrieved from Mrs. Gentry. It began:

  Dear Bobs:

  If I am right—and you will not receive this letter unless I am—you are the object of the greatest manhunt ever undertaken in the history of the world. . . .

  He glanced through it hastily, ripped it to shreds, and burned them in the ashtray. He crushed the ashes into irretrievable flecks, and sat down in front of the desk and a portable computer. His fingers danced over the keys and a series of words formed on the screen:

  Near this nation’s capital, in a seven-story bombproof building, is the headquarters of an organization which spends $100,000,000 a year and has not produced a single product of value. It has been spending for fifty years. It will continue for fifty more if it does not achieve its purpose before then.

  It is hunting for something.

  It is hunting for immortality.

  If you have read this far, you are the third man besides the founders of this corporation to know the secret. Let it be a secret no more.

  The organization is the National Research Institute. It is hunting for the children of Marshall Cartwright.

  Why should Cartwright’s children be worth a search that has already cost $5,000,000,000?

  Marshall Cartwright is immortal. It is believed that his children have inherited his immunity.

  This fact alone would be unimportant were it not for the additional fact that the immunity factor is carried in the bloodstream. It is one of the gamma globulins which resist disease. Cartwright’s body manufactures antibodies against death itself. His circulatory system is kept constantly rejuvenated; with abundant food, his remaining cells never die.

  In the bloodstream. And blood can be transfused; gamma globulin can be injected. The result: new youth for the aged. Unfortunately, like all gamma globulins, these provide only a passive immunity which lasts only as long as the proteins remain in the bloodstream—thirty to forty days.

  For a man to remain young forever, like Cartwright, he would need a transfusion from Cartwright every month. This might well be fatal to Cartwright. Certainly it would be unhealthful. And it would be necessary to imprison him to make certain that he was always available.

  Fifty years ago, through an accidental transfusion, Cartwright learned of his immortality. He ran for his life. He changed his name. He hid. And it is believed that he obeyed the Biblical injunction to be fruitful and replenish the earth.

  This was his goal: to spread his seed so widely that it could not be destroyed. This was his hope: that the human race might eventually become immortal.

  In no other way could he hope to survive for more than a few centuries. Because he could be killed by accident or by man’s greed. If he were ever discovered, his fate was certain.

  Cartwright has disappeared completely, although his path has been traced up to twenty years ago. In the Institute office there is a map on which glows the haphazard wanderings of a fugitive from mankind’s terrible fear of death. Agents have worked and reworked that path for children that Cartwright may have fathered.

  If one is found, he will be bled—judiciously—but his primary function will be to father more children so that there will eventually be enough gamma globulin to rejuvenate almost fifty men.

  Once there were one hundred. They were the wealthiest men in the world. Now over half of them have died, their estates going—by mutual arrangement—to the Institute for the search.

  Already these men are exercising a vast influence over the governments of the world. They are afraid of nothing—except death. If they succeed, it will not matter if Man becomes immortal.

  He will have not
hing to live for.

  * * *

  Sibert read it over, making a few corrections, and grinned. He pushed a key and a printed version rolled out of the computer. He folded the sheets in half and then twice in the opposite direction. On a small envelope he wrote in ink: I entrust this to you, your conscience, and your honor, as a journalist. Do not open this envelope for thirty days. If I send for it before that time—verifying my request by repeating this message—I will expect you to return it unopened. I trust you.

  He sealed the typewritten sheets inside the envelope. On a larger one he wrote: MANAGING EDITOR, KANSAS CITY STAR.

  There was no use trusting public servants anymore. It was not just that they could be bought, but that they were on the open market. Perhaps newspapers and their staffs could be bought, too, but purchasers had to know which of them had information worth the buying.

  * * *

  He checked the tiny automatic to make sure that the chamber was full and the safety was off, then slipped it back into his jacket pocket. Cautiously he opened the door, inspected the dark hallway, and frowned. The single light over the stairwell had gone out.

  He slipped into the hall, the stamped envelope in his hand held under his jacket to shield the whiteness. At the top of the stairs he hesitated and then turned to the mail chute. He fished a coin out of his pocket and dropped it into the slot. For a few seconds it clanked against the side of the chute as it fell.

  The chute was clear. With a gesture of finality, Sibert shoved the letter through the slot.

  “Insurance, Eddy?”

  Sibert whirled, his hand thrust deep into his jacket pocket. Slowly he relaxed against the wall as a shadow detached itself from the shadows beside the stairs and moved toward him, resolving into a lean, dark-faced man with thin lips curling in a gently deprecatory smile.

  “That’s what it is, Les,” Sibert said easily. “What are you doing up here?”

  “Now, Eddy,” Les protested mildly, “let’s not play games. You know what I want. The kid, Eddy.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Les.”