The Watch Below

by James White

  It was no great effort to remember the dramatic incident's in one's life, so the main interest and fun of the Game was in bringing up the normal, ordinary events: such as Dickson's memory of the twelfth of April, 1935, between four and five in the afternoon, when he had arrived home from school. Margaret had played his mother talking to his father, the doctor, while Wallis had played his younger brother and Jenny, who was an extremely good mimic, had been the radio going in the living room. Sometimes they went over funny or pleasant easy-to-remember incidents merely for the sake of entertainment. Occasionally the doctor would get off on his own pet project of trying to make them remember, word for word, some of the books they had read. They had all considered this to be impossible, at first, but when Wallis found himself reciting long sequences from Alice in Wonderland they began to have second thoughts.

  It was almost frightening how good their memories had become, and how much the Game had come to mean to them.

  December came and the water lost the last of its stored summer heat. With Alice complete the doctor was digging happily into the minds of Dickson and Wallis for Julius Caesar , in which they both had had parts when they were at school. Meanwhile they were simultaneously squeezing Madame Butterfly out of Margaret. It was also the time when, in the words of Dickson, his wife was more beautiful than ever but definitely pear-shaped, and it was the time when the second biological clock stopped.

  When Wallis told him about it the doctor swore horribly and would not speak to anyone for the rest of the day.

  XIV

  "There is absolutely no reason for you to worry," said Hellahar, when they were alone together between examinations. The healer went on, "You must know, sir, that the ship has all the necessary medical and surgical resources, in this field especially. After all, the fleet is basically a colonization project, even though there will be no mother world when the colony is planted, and the medical problems attached to giving birth have received special attention."

  "I know," said Deslann.

  "There is also the fact," Hellahar went on, "which if I were a modest person I would not mention, that I am an unusually able healer. You must remember this is a natural, if rather painful, process and the danger to the mother and child is minimal."

  "I know that, too," said Deslann. "There is no logical reason for my concern, much less for me to be tying my tail in knots over it. The process has been going on for millions of years. I've nothing to worry about. But suppose it was your child about to be born instead of mine, what then?"

  "When that time comes," the healer replied gravely, "I would appreciate it if you would tell me all the things I'm now telling you, and try just as hard to make me believe them. . . ."

  On Gulf Trader there was ability and knowledge but the medical resources were practically nonexistent. There wasn't even an adequate supply of hot water. What little there was had been produced by Wallis inserting the flame of the oxyacetylene welder into buckets of sea water (the garden was doing so well that they could afford to burn a little oxygen) and holding it there until the water boiled. But mostly he worked on the generator. In fact, all, with the exception of the expectant mother and the doctor, worked on the generator longer and harder than they had ever done before. They desperately needed the light.

  It was a long and difficult confinement, Radford admitted later, although at the time and to Jenny he swore himself blind that everything was in all respects normal. But their troubles were not over even when the baby was finally detached from its mother and had had the soles of her feet slapped until she complained loudly about it. In the special crib they had rigged, which was kept warm with improvised hot-water bottles and heated further (and almost burned in places) by Wallis waving his acetylene torch along the blankets, the baby started to turn blue and had to be given oxygen. They had to use one of the tanks from the welder and in the confusion nearly gave it acetylene by mistake. By the time the baby was taken care of, its mother needed oxygen as well and was going into shock.

  She was so slow to respond that that night Dickson and Margaret slept on either side of Jenny with their arms around her and their bodies pressed close to give her warmth. It was the doctor's suggestion, and if Dickson thought of making any cracks about sleeping with two women at the same time, for once he kept them to himself.

  Much later, when Jenny and her baby were as comfortable as circumstances permitted and Wallis and the doctor were sitting shivering in the darkness a short distance away, an odd, low-voiced conversation started up. The surgeon lieutenant seemed to be afflicted with a fit of the verbal shakes and could not stop talking, while Wallis tried to thank and compliment him for what he had done. But he was so cold and tense himself that he did not make a very good job of it.

  "You were very good, Doctor," he said quickly, during a break. "I . . . I was surprised how . . . how messy it was. I had no idea . . ."

  "Of course not," said Radford. "Wouldn't expect it. But there's nothing for you to worry about. Except that you might ask Margaret to think about kangaroos. She designed these coveralls and they're very good. Papoose carriers, I mean. And slung in front instead of at the back. For ease of feeding, you understand, as well as warmth. The place is too damned cold to leave a baby lying around. And we'll have to excuse Jenny from the generator for a while. Margaret, too, she's getting heavy. Any twins in your family?"

  "No," said Wallis, "but . . ."

  "Don't worry, anyway," said the doctor. "This was a bad one, it would have been tricky even in a hospital. Yours should come much more easily. Especially as we have a better idea of the drill, now. Don't worry, the next one will be comparatively easy."

  "You sound," said Wallis, "as if you're looking forward to it."

  Radford was silent for a long time, but when he spoke again his tone and manner were back to normal. He said, "I didn't mean to give that impression, sir. If I did it's because I've been hanging on to my bedside manner for so long that I've forgotten to let go even with you. But this has been a difficult birth, so much so that your wife would have to be very unfortunate indeed to have one as bad. This is fact based on examination and what medical history there is available, not just a pep-talk for a worried parent-to-be. And in any event I will do everything possible to -- "

  "We know you will, Doctor," said Wallis. "Believe me, we're not worried about that . . . ."

  "Perhaps not," said the doctor grimly, "but I am worried. More accurately, I'm scared stiff. And I'll be doing my best for more than the usual reasons -- Hippocratic oath, medical ethics, and so on. The truth is that I can't allow anyone to die on me. The very thought of it gives me nightmares. In this place, what could we do with the body?"

  Wallis was unable to answer the question then or later, when the doctor had fallen into an exhausted sleep sitting up, or even when he thought about it during odd moments in the weeks which followed. It was not a nice question, and trying to think of an answer started a train of thought which was usually too horrible to be completed. Especially when it involved Margaret. The thought of her being dead was bad enough. But for her to be dead and close by all the time, with the processes of decay going on. They would probably put her in some out-of-the-way corner of a tank, in a tool locker, perhaps, with cargo piled around it to mask off the smell. But she would still be there and everyone would know it. For Wallis it would be a parting which was not a parting and he did not think that he could stand it.

  Like the doctor, Wallis had quite a few nightmares and woke with Margaret holding him tightly and stroking his head as if he were a baby. She wanted to know what was the matter and he could not tell her; all he could do was hold her as tightly as she was holding him. Again like the doctor, he learned how not to think about it and to pretend that it could never happen.

  The Game suffered because Jenny wanted them to be quiet so as to let the baby sleep, and their own sleep was interrupted because the baby decided to wake up again at the wrong time. Despite himself it made Wallis furious. Getting to sleep was diffi
cult at the best of times and he looked on it as a most desirable condition, since it was only during sleep that he could forget the cold metal of their prison with its deadly monotony of unwarmed food and pedaling the generator and trying not to go insane from sheer boredom. During sleep he could dream of things like eating porridge and hot stew or just drinking tea all night long. It was odd how the dishes never were fancy or exotic, they were simply warm. And when the waiings and whimperings of the recently arrived Geraldine Elizabeth Dickson started up, Wallis gritted his teeth and tried vainly to hang onto his lovely warm dreams and felt like murder.

  The care and feeding of the new arrival was a complicated business in many ways.

  "Basically it's a problem of keeping the thing warm without smothering it to death," the doctor said on an occasion when the men were in the generator room together, "especially when it's being changed -- which brings up another point. We've given it all the blankets and slapped the squares of sacking in use for nappies . . ."

  "Diapers," said Dickson.

  ". . . against the plating until they are not only dry but nearly as soft as cotton wool. But this doesn't satisfy the maternal instinct. The girls insist that the nappies are damp and harsh against its skin. I keep telling them what the Spartans used to do with babies, but . . ."

  "They are things you put on your lap in a restaurant, Doctor," said Dickson firmly, "or tuck into your collar if you're uncouth."

  ". . . it doesn't get me anywhere," Radford went on, disregarding him. "Admittedly there is some chafing of the skin, but all things considered it is a very healthy child and there's no need for all the complaining. About the only thing they don't complain about is the feeding of the child. That particular process is the same here as anywhere else and is relatively uncomplicated."

  "So far, Doctor," said Dickson, grinning; "what bothers me is how we are going to wean it off mother's milk and onto cold powdered-egg soup -- "

  "This is serious!" Wallis broke in irritably. "There is too much complaining and too much fuss generally about the baby. Morale is suffering. We're being too damned quiet for our own good and thinking too much about all the wrong things! With respect to your daughter, Dickson, I think she should learn to sleep with a certain amount of talk going on around her. I myself have a nephew who can sleep for hours in the same room as a wireless going full blast -- "

  "Radio," corrected Dickson automatically.

  "It's a good idea, sir," Radford said quickly, seeing the commander's expression. Wallis had very little sense of humor these days, and even less patience, as Margaret's time came steadily nearer. The doctor added, "We've all missed playing the Game, sir. Even the girls . . ."

  The nursery on the flagship was a small compartment whose water was maintained at close to blood temperature and whose walls, ceiling, and floor, except for the small area covered by the transparent observation panel, were lined with soft, spongy plastic so that the two tiny beings darting about the interior with nearly mindless violence would not injure themselves.

  "Look at him go!" said Hellahar excitedly. "Did you ever see such a healthy child! You know, without wishing to seem boastful, and making due allowance for paternal pride, I really do think that he is one of the nicest and most physically perfect male young 'uns that ever was born!"

  "I agree," said Deslann, "provided you admit that mine is one of the nicest females. . . ."

  Above and beyond Gulf Trader the war was over, conventionally in Europe and then a little later in Japan in such a fashion that the world would never feel completely safe again. But inside the ship they very rarely talked about the war. They had been withdrawn from it at a very critical period and, while they hoped and believed their side would win, they had no way of knowing for sure. Another reason was that three years or more of the Game had so developed their faculties for recalling sights and sounds and people that they did not even want to think about it, because there was very little in the wartime memories of any of them which was pleasant.

  During this period the improvements in the comfort and appearance of the tanks were minor, inasmuch as there was only a limited amount of insulating and building material and as the doctor did not want them to use too much of the paint supply because of the danger from the fumes in the confined space. They heard ships passing, but in the distance and not very often, so they gradually stopped signaling. Banging with crowbars against the hull plating, besides frightening the children, made them all start thinking about the wrong things again, even though everyone knew that the right things were the current Game project of ways to improve the Game itself.

  With nothing to do for three-quarters of each and every day except sleep and talk and think -- and sleeping did not seem to take up as much time as it ought -- they should have gone stark staring mad during the first six months out of sheer boredom. Wallis had encountered a character in a science fiction story once who had said that if a person were to study one single fact or object for a long enough period of time the complete structure of the Universe could eventually be deduced from it. In Gulf Trader they had time and many facts and occasionally they even discussed the nature of the Universe, but the big thing was that they had been left very much to their own mental devices and had not gone mad. If anything, the doctor affirmed, they were going steadily more sane -- although just recently he himself was not behaving in any sort of adult, logical manner.

  Currently they were engaged in digging for French, the idea being that when the data from all their school-days memories, sayings, and snippets of overheard conversations and so on were assembled they would speak only French to each other for a few weeks, just as they had done with Latin a few months back. The children were building things with empty powdered-egg tins and knocking them down again, but they were three tanks away so that the noise was not distracting, and the doctor was pedaling silently while the others talked. Perhaps unconsciously they had been digging around in the memories of French grammar and pronunciation and similar school-days material, so that it was not a surprise to anyone when they wandered off the subject, as often happened, and onto another which would eventually form a future Game project -- that of educating the children.

  Except for the doctor, who had the breath to speak if he wanted to despite the pedaling, they all had a great deal to say about the subject. But it was Wallis who pointed out an aspect of it which had not yet been considered, that of religious education.

  "How much of it we teach," Wallis offered, "and the form it takes rather depends on what we ourselves feel about it. We might teach only the basics without going too deeply into any particular religion. But it's a touchy subject. Does anyone here have strong feelings in the matter?"

  The doctor held some strong views on this subject, although he did not as a rule try to ram his own beliefs down anyone else's throat; so the question should have roused him if anything would, but he continued pedaling in silence. It was Margaret who spoke first.

  "I haven't read all the Bible," she said, "but there are the Commandments, everybody believes in them -- "

  "And the opening questions and answers in the Children's Catechism," Jenny broke in. "I can remember most of them without digging, even. It starts like this. Question: Who made the world?"

  "Answer," said her husband. "The Brooklyn Navy Yard."

  "Dickson," said the doctor sharply, breaking a silence which had lasted since the moment two days ago when he discovered that both of his biological clocks had stopped again, "don't be so blasted irreverent!"

  XV

  In another corner of the same ocean records were being broken and great deeds were being done. One of the new nuclear submarines, bigger and more powerful and capable of diving to a greater depth than any conventional submarine, had astonished the world by running submerged and completely cut off from all contact with the surface for two whole months. Had they known about this the inhabitants of Gulf Trader might have felt a certain amount of justifiable smugness. But they did not know, and while the crew of th
at fantastic vessel were being given the freedom of the city for their exploit and already beginning to talk in terms of circumnavigating the world submerged and/or sailing under the North Pole as an encore, the people in Trader were relaxing after a stiff session of the Game by talking about anything at all which came into their heads.

  "It was nice of you two," said the doctor, looking at Dickson and Wallis, "to arrange your families the way you did. A boy and a girl each. Considerate."

  "Think nothing of it," said Wallis.

  "It was a pleasure," said Dickson.

  "If you hadn't been so thoughtful," Radford went on, "we might have had polygamy raising its ugly head, or that other thing where there are more men than women -- "

  "A fate worse than death," murmured Dickson.

  ". . . but even as things stand," the doctor went on, ignoring him, "we will have to do some thinking about our respective medical histories. All of us here have passed the Service entrance medicals so we know that we are reasonably healthy specimens, but I'm more interested in the ailments of our ancestors -- especially in hereditary diseases they may have suffered, like hemophilia or leukemia, or TB or . . ." he looked pointedly at Dickson ". . . insanity. The coming generation is all right, but with the next one there will be inbreeding to consider.