Eternity Lost

by Clifford D. Simak

  He had assumed they had disappeared because they had got an illegal continuation. But that was sheer wishful thinking. There was no foundation for it, no fact that would support it.

  There could be other reasons, he told himself, many other reasons why a man would disappear and seek to cover up his tracks with a death report.

  But it had tied in so neatly!

  They were continuators whose applications had not been renewed. Exactly as he was a continuator whose application would not be renewed.

  They had dropped out of sight. Exactly as he would have to drop from sight once he gained another lease on life.

  It had tied in so neatly—and it had been all wrong.

  “I tried every way I knew,” said Norton. “I canvassed every source that might advance your name for continuation and they laughed at me. It’s been tried before, you see, and there’s not a chance of getting it put through. Once your original sponsor drops you, you’re automatically cancelled out.

  “I tried to sound out technicians who might take a chance, but they’re incorruptible. They get paid off in added years for loyalty and they’re not taking any chance of trading years for dollars.”

  “I guess that settles it,” the senator said wearily. “I should have known.”

  He heaved himself to his feet and faced Norton squarely. “You are telling me the truth,” he pleaded. “You aren’t just trying to jack up the price a bit.”

  Norton stared at him, almost unbelieving. “Jack up the price! Senator, if I had put this through, I’d have taken your last penny. Want to know how much you’re worth? I can tell you within a thousand dollars.”

  He waved a hand at a row of filing cases ranged along the wall.

  “It’s all there, senator. You and all the other big shots. Complete files on every one of you. When a man comes to me with a deal like yours, I look in the files and strip him to the bone.”

  “I don’t suppose there’s any use of asking for some of my money back?”

  Norton shook his head. “Not a ghost. You took your gamble, senator. You can’t even prove you paid me. And, beside, you still have plenty left to last you the few years you have to live.”

  The senator took a step toward the door, then turned back.

  “Look, Norton, I can’t die! Not now. Just one more continua-tion and I’d be—”

  The look on Norton’s face stopped him in his tracks. The look he’d glimpsed on other faces at other times, but only glimpsed. Now he stared at it—at the naked hatred of a man whose life is short for the man whose life is long.

  “Sure, you can die,” said Norton. “You’re going to. You can’t live forever. Who do you think you are!”

  The senator reached out a hand and clutched the desk.

  “But you don’t understand.”

  “You’ve already lived ten times as long as I have lived,” said Norton, coldly, measuring each word, “and I hate your guts for it. Get out of here, you sniveling old fool, before I throw you out.”

  * * *

  Dr. Barton: You may think that you would confer a boon on humanity with life continuation, but I tell you, sir, that it would be a curse. Life would lose its value and its meaning if it went on forever, and if you have life continuation now, you eventually must stumble on immortality. And when that happens, sir, you will be compelled to set up boards of review to grant the boon of death. The people, tired of life, will storm your hearing rooms to plead for death.

  Chairman Leonard: It would banish uncertainty and fear.

  Dr. Barton: You are talking of the fear of death. The fear of death, sir, is infantile.

  Chairman Leonard: But there are benefits—

  Dr. Barton: Benefits, yes. The benefit of allowing a scientist the extra years he needs to complete a piece of research; a composer an additional lifetime to complete a symphony. Once the novelty wore off, men in general would accept added life only under protest, only as a duty.

  Chairman Leonard: You’re not very practical-minded, doctor.

  Dr. Barton: But I am. Extremely practical and down to earth. Man must have newness. Man cannot be bored and live. How much do you think there would be left to look for-ward to after the millionth woman, the billionth piece of pumpkin pie?

  From the Records of the hearing before the science subcommittee of the public policy committee of the World House of Representatives.

  * * *

  So Norton hated him.

  As all people of normal lives must hate, deep within their souls, the lucky ones whose lives went on and on.

  A hatred deep and buried, most of the time buried. But sometimes breaking out, as it had broken out of Norton.

  Resentment, tolerated because of the gently, skillfully fos-tered hope that those whose lives went on might some day make it possible that the lives of all, barring violence or accident or incurable disease, might go on as long as one would wish.

  I can understand it now, thought the senator, for I am one of them. I am one of those whose lives will not continue to go on, and I have even fewer years than the most of them.

  He stood before the window in the deepening dusk and saw the lights come out and the day die above the unbelievably blue waters of the far-famed lake.

  Beauty came to him as he stood there watching, beauty that had gone unnoticed through all the later years. A beauty and a softness and a feeling of being one with the city lights and the last faint gleam of day above the darkening waters.

  Fear? The senator admitted it.

  Bitterness? Of course.

  Yet, despite the fear and bitterness, the window held him with the scene it framed.

  Earth and sky and water, he thought. I am one with them. Death has made me one with them. For death brings one back to the elementals, to the soil and trees, to the clouds and sky and the sun dying in the welter of its blood in the crimson west.

  This is the price we pay, he thought, that the race must pay, for its life eternal—that we may not be able to assess in their true value the things that should be dearest to us; for a thing that has no ending, a thing that goes on forever, must have decreas-ing value.

  Rationalization, he accused himself. Of course, you’re rationalizing. You want another hundred years as badly as you ever did. You want a chance at immortality. But you can’t have it and you trade eternal life for a sunset seen across a lake and it is well you can. It is a blessing that you can.

  The senator made a rasping sound within his throat.

  Behind him the telephone came to sudden life and he swung around. It chirred at him again. Feet pattered down the hall and the senator called out: “I’ll get it, Otto.”

  He lifted the receiver. “New York calling,” said the operator. “Senator Leonard, please.”

  “This is Leonard.”

  Another voice broke in. “Senator, this is Gibbs.”

  “Yes,” said the senator. “The executioner.”

  “I called you,” said Gibbs, “to talk about the election.”

  “What election?”

  “The one here in North America. The one you’re running in. Remember?”

  “I am an old man,” said the senator, “and I’m about to die. I’m not interested in elections.”

  Gibbs practically chattered. “But you have to be. What’s the matter with you, senator? You have to do something. Make some speeches, make a statement, come home and stump the country. The party can’t do it all alone. You have to do some of it yourself.”

  “I will do something,” declared the senator. “Yes, I think that finally I’ll do something.”

  He hung up and walked to the writing desk, snapped on the light. He got paper out of a drawer and took a pen out of his pocket.

  The telephone went insane and he paid it no attention. It rang on and on and finally Otto came and answered.

  “New York calling, sir,” he said.

  The senator shook his head and he heard Otto talking softly and the phone did not ring again.

  The senator w
rote:

  To Whom It May Concern:

  Then crossed it out.

  He wrote:

  A Statement to the World:

  And crossed it out.

  He wrote:

  A Statement by Senator Homer Leonard:

  He crossed that out, too.

  He wrote:

  Five centuries ago the people of the world gave into the hands of a few trusted men and women the gift of continued life in the hope and belief that they would work to advance the day when longer life spans might be made possible for the entire population.

  From time to time, life continuation has been granted additional men and women, always with the implied understanding that the gift was made under the same conditions—that the persons so favored should work against the day when each inhabitant of the entire world might enter upon a heritage of near-eternity.

  Through the years some of us have carried that trust forward and have lived with it and cherished it and bent every effort toward its fulfillment.

  Some of us have not.

  Upon due consideration and searching examination of my own status in this regard, I have at length decided that I no longer can accept farther extension of the gift.

  Human dignity requires that I be able to meet my fellow man upon the street or in the byways of the world without flinching from him. This I could not do should I continue to accept a gift to which I have no claim and which is denied to other men.

  The senator signed his name, neatly, carefully, without the usual flourish.

  “There,” he said, speaking aloud in the silence of the night-filled room, “that will hold them for a while.”

  Feet padded and he turned around.

  “It’s long past your usual bedtime, sir,” said Otto.

  The senator rose clumsily and his aching bones protested. Old, he thought. Growing old again. And it would be so easy to start over, to regain his youth and live another lifetime. Just the nod of some-one’s head, just a single pen stroke and he would be young again.

  “This statement, Otto,” he said. “Please give it to the press.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Otto. He took the paper, held it gingerly.

  “Tonight,” said the senator.

  “Tonight, sir? It is rather late.”

  “Nevertheless, I want to issue it tonight.”

  “It must be important, sir.”

  “It’s my resignation,” said the senator.

  “Your resignation! From the senate, sir!”

  “No,” said the senator. “From life.”

  * * *

  Mr. Michaelson: As a churchman, I cannot think otherwise than that the proposal now before you gentlemen constitutes a perversion of God’s law. It is not within the province of man to say a man may live beyond his allotted time.

  Chairman Leonard: I might ask you this: How is one to know when a man’s allotted time has come to an end? Medicine has prolonged the lives of many persons. Would you call a physician a perverter of God’s law?

  Mr. Michaelson: It has become apparent through the testimony given here that the eventual aim of continuing research is immortality. Surely you can see that physical immortality does not square with the Christian concept. I tell you this, sir: You can’t fool God and get away with it.

  From the Records of a hearing before the science subcommittee of the public policy committee of the World House of Representatives.

  * * *

  Chess is a game of logic.

  But likewise a game of ethics.

  You do not shout and you do not whistle, nor bang the pieces on the board, nor twiddle your thumbs, nor move a piece then take it back again. When you’re beaten, you admit it. You do not force your opponent to carry on the game to absurd lengths. You resign and start another game if there is time to play one. Otherwise, you just resign and you do it with all the good grace possible. You do not knock all the pieces to the floor in anger. You do not get up abruptly and stalk out of the room. You do not reach across the board and punch your opponent in the nose.

  When you play chess you are, or you are supposed to be, a gentleman.

  The senator lay wide-awake, staring at the ceiling.

  You do not reach across the board and punch your opponent in the nose. You do not knock the pieces to the floor.

  But this isn’t chess, he told himself, arguing with himself. This isn’t chess; this is life and death. A dying thing is not a gentleman. It does not curl up quietly and die of the hurt inflicted. It backs into a corner and it fights, it lashes back and does all the hurt it can.

  And I am hurt. I am hurt to death.

  And I have lashed back. I have lashed back, most horribly.

  They’ll not be able to walk down the street again, not ever again, those gentlemen who passed the sentence on me. For they have no more claim to continued life than I and the people now will know it. And the people will see to it that they do not get it.

  I will die, but when I go down I’ll pull the others with me. They’ll know I pulled them down, down with me into the pit of death. That’s the sweetest part of all—they’ll know who pulled them down and they won’t be able to say a word about it. They can’t even contradict the noble things I said.

  Someone in the corner said, some voice from some other time and place: You’re no gentleman, senator. You fight a dirty fight.

  Sure I do, said the senator. They fought dirty first. And politics always was a dirty game.

  Remember all that fine talk you dished out to Lee the other day?

  That was the other day, snapped the senator.

  You’ll never be able to look a chessman in the face again, said the voice in the corner.

  I’ll be able to look my fellow men in the face, however, said the senator.

  Will you? asked the voice.

  And that, of course, was the question. Would he?

  I don’t care, the senator cried desperately. I don’t care what happens. They played a lousy trick on me. They can’t get away with it. I’ll fix their clocks for them. I’ll—

  Sure, you will, said the voice, mocking.

  Go away, shrieked the senator. Go away and leave me. Let me be alone.

  You are alone, said the thing in the comer. You are more alone than any man has ever been before.

  * * *

  Chairman Leonard: You represent an insurance company, do you not, Mr. Markely? A big insurance company.

  Mr. Markely: That is correct.

  Chairman Leonard: And every time a person dies, it costs your company money?

  Mr. Markely: Well, you might put it that way if you wished, although it is scarcely the case—

  Chairman Leonard: You do have to pay out benefits on deaths, don’t you?

  Mr. Markely: Why, yes, of course we do.

  Chairman Leonard: Then I can’t understand your opposition to life continuation. If there were fewer deaths, you’d have to pay fewer benefits.

  Mr. Markely: All very true, sir. But if people had reason to believe they would live virtually forever, they’d buy no life insurance.

  Chairman Leonard: Oh, I see. So that’s the way it is.

  From the Records of a hearing before the science subcommittee of the public policy committee of the World House of Representatives.

  * * *

  The senator awoke. He had not been dreaming, but it was almost as if he had awakened from a bad dream—or awakened to a bad dream—and he struggled to go back to sleep again, to gain the Nirvana of unawareness, to shut out the harsh reality of existence, to dodge the shame of knowing who and what he was.

  But there was someone stirring in the room, and someone spoke to him and he sat upright in bed, stung to wakefulness by the happiness and something else that was almost worship which the voice held.

  “It’s wonderful, sir,” said Otto. “There have been phone calls all night long. And the telegrams and radiograms still are stacking up.”

  The senator rubbed his eyes with pudgy fists.

  “Ph
one calls, Otto? People sore at me?”

  “Some of them were, sir. Terribly angry, sir. But not too many of them. Most of them were happy and wanted to tell you what a great thing you’d done. But I told them you were tired and I could not waken you.”

  “Great thing?” said the senator. “What great thing have I done?”

  “Why, sir, giving up life continuation. One man said to tell you it was the greatest example of moral courage the world had ever known. He said all the common people would bless you for it. Those were his very words. He was very solemn, sir.”

  The senator swung his feet to the floor, sat on the edge of the bed, scratching at his ribs.

  It was strange, he told himself, how a thing would turn out sometimes. A heel at bedtime and a hero in the morning.

  “Don’t you see, sir,” said Otto, “you have made yourself one of the common people, one of the short-lived people. No one has ever done a thing like that before.”

  “I was one of the common people,” said the senator, “long before I wrote that statement. And I didn’t make myself one of them. I was forced to become one of them, much against my will.”

  But Otto, in his excitement, didn’t seem to hear.

  He rattled on: “The newspapers are full of it, sir. It’s the biggest news in years. The political writers are chuckling over it. They’re calling it the smartest political move that was ever pulled. They say that before you made the announcement you didn’t have a chance of being re-elected senator and now, they say, you can be elected president if you just say the word.”

  The senator sighed. “Otto,” he said, “please hand me my pants. It is cold in here.”

  Otto handed him his trousers. “There’s a newspaperman wait-ing in the study, sir. I held all the others off, but this one sneaked in the back way. You know him, sir, so I let him wait. He is Mr. Lee.”