Traitor to the Living

by Philip José Farmer

  Emerson may have thought that Carfax was a crackpot, but he did agree to meet him in four days in the new Pieter Stuyvesant Hotel. And he would mention the call to only one other person.

  "His son-in-law is Roger Langer, the senator from New York," Carfax told Patricia. "If we can convince Langer, we have a very influential man on our side. He and the president are bitter enemies, but the president will listen to him. And, for once, they'll have something in common. Before that happens, we have to get a lot more evidence. Mifflon's case by itself isn't enough to convince the president."

  "But if you tell Langer that we killed Mifflon, won't he have to turn us in to the police?"

  "No. This is far above any mere legalities."

  He refrained from telling her that he thought their chances of survival were very small. Western would have no trouble finding assassins who would not care whether or not they were killed after completing their mission. Western could bring them back to life in another body. He was, in many ways, another Old Man of the Mountain. He had the advantage over the original in that he could fulfill his promise to give his assassins immortality.

  Carfax wanted to induce Pat to take cover in a faroff place and have nothing more to do with him for a long time. But he also did not want to see her go. He loved her. And he knew that she would refuse to go. So why make her even more worried than she was?

  He turned on the TV just in time to hear the tail end of a report on Western. Only an hour before. Western had announced that a new MEDIUM had been built in the Megistus complex and it was open for business.

  Carfax heard the complete report during the 21:00 news. In addition to the machine at Megistus, new mediums would be installed in all the large cities of North America. Negotiations were being made to install them in many foreign cities.

  This was followed by a brief interview with Senator Gray of Louisiana.

  Interviewer: "What is your opinion of Western's plans for the building of many new mediums?"

  Senator Gray: "MEDIUM will still be restricted to the very wealthy. This is, as I have said on many occasions, a blatant injustice. The common man has every right to communicate with his beloved departed ones, and lack of the requisite money should be no obstacle.

  Every man should have his chance at MEDIUM, even if he has to be federally subsidized. But I have a better idea than that, one which will not cause the federal debt to become even heavier. I am for placing MEDIUM under federal regulations and under federal control and reducing the price for the use of MEDIUM. There is no reason why such exorbitant fees should be charged. Western can't plead that the power requirements force him to make such high charges. By his own admission, the MEDIUM can be operated with no cost whatsoever, exclusive of the money needed to pay for the requisite personnel, maintenance, and other related expenses."

  Interviewer: "That brings up another much more controversial issue. Senator. If MEDIUM can supply free electrical power, as Mr. Western claims, won't the government be forced to control its use? And what about the impact of free power on the economy?"

  Senator Gray: "Mr. Western has yet to validate his claims about so-called free power. Nothing is free, you know. But if MEDIUM can supply almost free, let's call it very cheap, power, then the federal and state governments will bring such a commodity under its regulations. As for the impact, I'm not prepared to make a statement at this moment. My committee is studying its possible influence, and the report will be issued within a few months. Of course, all this is highly speculative." Interviewer: "There have been rumors that the federal government might advocate nationalizing the electrical power industry if MEDIUM can do what Mr. Western claims it can do. In the power field, that is."

  Senator Gray: "You hear many rumors, many of them fantastic. However, on a global basis, the impact will be tremendous. Underdeveloped nations will have unlimited power, and this would solve many of their problems. America would be at a definite disadvantage if it continued to use a system based on the burning of fossil fuels or on nuclear reactors. We couldn't permit that."

  "Do you plan on telling Gray about Mifflon?" Patricia said.

  "He ought to be sounded out," Carfax said. "He may be the next president."

  Two days later. Carfax and Patricia were ushered into a suite in the Pieter Stuyvesant. It was midnight, and the two had walked down from the sixteenth floor to the fifteenth. There a guard admitted them and escorted them to Richard Emerson. There were other armed men standing around, making sure that no unauthorized persons got onto the floor, every room of which had been rented by Emerson.

  Emerson was a tall portly man with a high forehead and a thin mouth. Carfax recognized Senator Langer, a man of thirty-seven, standing six feet seven and built like a basketball center, his thick hair a flaming red.

  They were introduced under the name of Ramus, though both Emerson and Langer knew by now then- real identities. Carfax accepted a bourbon and a cigar and then proceeded to tell all he thought relevant. The two men examined his documents while he talked.

  There was a long silence from men who were not accustomed to being silent.

  Senator Langer was the first to speak. "I believe you're telling the truth. The evidence here is enough to convince me. But we must get much more before we can make a public case out of it. I'll get to work on it at once. This is the most dangerous thing that mankind has ever been threatened with. We have a record of every client of Western's, in fact, of everyone who has been admitted to the room in which MEDIUM is kept."

  "I'd suggest that you investigate those men whose records show a discrepancy between the number of times they've actually had sessions with MEDIUM and the number of times they've paid for sessions," Carfax said. "They'll be the men paying for repossession insurance."

  "Well also investigate most thoroughly the men who've inherited the property of those clients who've died," Emerson said. "If there is anything irregular about such cases, if the inheritors were not the natural inheritors, if they were obscure men who should not have inherited, then we know something's fishy."

  "There must be some who were forcibly possessed, like Mifflon," Carfax said. "They'll be difficult to detect, but if you can get speech records and compare them, and if they suddenly develop behavior patterns which they lacked before ..."

  "Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs," Langer said.

  "I'm just trying to help," Carfax said. Langer was a whirlwind, a good man to have on your side, but he was also an egomaniac.

  "That's all right," Langer said, waving his hand. "I wonder, didn't Governor Simons have a few sessions with MEDIUM?"

  It was obviously a rhetorical question so Carfax did not answer.

  "He's a possible candidate for the presidency," Langer added.

  Emerson looked pale, and he said, "You don't think that he's been possessed?"

  "I don't know," Langer said. "As far as I know, he's still the same man. Certainly no one without experience could do his job so well that nobody would notice."

  "Yes, but what if the possessor happened to be a politician?"

  Carfax said. "If Western were to place a semb in Simons, he certainly wouldn't put a politically inexperienced man in him."

  Emerson said, "I understand that you maintain the sembs aren't the dead, that they're nonhuman creatures?"

  "Yes, but the point is that they act as if they're human. So it's only natural to think of them as if they are human."

  "Whatever they are. Western is a traitor to the living," Langer said. "And I'll see to it that he gets the punishment befitting a traitor. The Judas!"

  "We don't even have any laws for this situation," Carfax said.

  "Then, by all that's holy, we'll make the laws! Then we will hang him!"

  Patricia looked startled. Carfax felt a little uncomfortable, but he was not surprised. Langer was regarded, rightly, as the foremost proponent of civil rights in the legislature. But he was also a human being faced with an ancient terror, one which had its roots in the Old Stone
Age. He must think of this coming conflict >as one in which the rules of war applied. If you have to kill your enemy to defeat him, then the sooner the better. And there was no doubt that Western was using the same philosophy.

  Nevertheless, he didn't like it, and it was evident that Patricia was horrified.

  Emerson said, "You two must stay out of sight until you are needed. You can't do anything while Western is looking for you. So I suggest that you take a long trip, say, Europe or South America."

  Carfax looked at Patricia and said, "We don't have the money."

  Emerson dismissed this with a wave of his cigar.

  "You're on my payroll. A thousand a week apiece and all fares paid."

  "But we wouldn't be doing anything to earn all that money!" she said.

  "You'll be earning every penny of it when the time comes."

  "We'd like to be useful," Carfax said. "We both are personally involved. And Patricia has a valid claim to MEDIUM."

  "You don't know that she has," Emerson said. "Oh, not that I doubt that she's the rightful owner. But as long as her father says she isn't, what can be done about it?"

  "I don't think he's in the embu any longer," Carfax said slowly.

  Patricia gasped, and Emerson said, "What?"

  "The only way Western could have gotten my uncle to lie for him would have been to promise him a body.

  He may be working for Western right now--some place."

  Langer said, "Then you're thinking of letting Patricia's whereabouts be known? That way, there might be a chance that her father would try to get in touch with her?"

  "You're very perceptive," Carfax said. "But I wasn't going to bring this up unless I was forced to. And it needs study. Would it be fair for Patricia to expose herself to danger just to be a decoy?"

  "And would Patricia do it?" Patricia said. "You three are talking as if I weren't here! Why don't you ask me?"

  "All right," Carfax said. "Would you?"

  "Certainly. If I thought I could see my father again ... only I wouldn't actually be seeing him, would I?

  He'd be in a different body."

  "You've got something there, Gordon," Langer said.

  "I don't know why I didn't think of that. Patricia's father may have gone along with Western so he could rejoin the living. But he must hate Western. And he'll surely do anything he can to expose Western."

  "I suppose that's true," Carfax said. "On the other hand. Western must know that, and he'll be keeping a close watch on my uncle. If he steps out of line, bang, he's dead again."

  "Maybe Western didn't keep his promise," Emerson said.

  "That's possible. But there's only one way to find out," Carfax said. "Besides, I think Western could use my uncle in the technological and scientific end.

  Western doesn't really know much about that, and my uncle, as the inventor, would be invaluable. For all I know, it may have been his idea to use MEDIUM as a power source."

  Emerson said, "Very well. We won't send you abroad. And you two have just had a raise. Three thousand a week apiece, and your traveling expenses. O.K.?"

  "It's O.K. with me if it's O.K. with Patricia," Carfax said.

  "I'm ready to start work," she said.

  "Here's what we'll do," Langer said.

  Carfax listened, but he was thinking that he had been happier when he was the boss.

  18.

  The Carfaxes were driven that morning to Guilford, where they were given a house near the estate of Emerson. Three men were assigned to guard them every eight-hour shift. The following day, they went to see a lawyer, Arthur Smigly, whom Emerson recommended and whose fee Emerson would pay. A week later, Smigly filed suit against Western.

  "We don't have a chance, but that's not the point," Smigly told the Carfaxes. "This is just the warning shot across their bows. Their attention is attracted now." Smigly knew something of their plans, but he did not know that Rufton Carfax might be alive again. Nobody outside a very select group was to know. If Western had the slightest suspicion that old Carfax was thought to be wedded to the flesh again, he would make sure that Carfax has a quick divorce.

  In a meeting in Emerson's home a few days after, Langer told them that his agent in Megistus was checking out all the major personnel. "He's got a full description of your father's habits and personal idiosyncrasies.

  He's also recording all voices so we can match them against your father's."

  "How long have you had that agent in Western's employ?" Carfax said.

  "The first one died when Houvelle blew the house up," Langer said. "She was Mrs. Morris, Western's secretary. The other one was sent in after we found out about Megistus. It wasn't easy. Western has a security system second to none."

  "And how do we know that he doesn't have an agent in your organization?" Carfax said.

  "We don't. That's why this particular project is known to only us four."

  "Four? But the agent makes a fifth."

  "He doesn't know who he's checking out. He just has a list of specifications."

  "That's playing it close to the chest," Carfax said.

  "How are the other cases coming along?"

  "We've got one certain and three possibles. Two months ago a millionaire, Gerold Grebski, a client of Western's, collapsed during a session. My man saw him carried out on a stretcher. He was put in the Megistus hospital for overnight observation, under a close guard,

  I might add. The next day he was up and about but did not go home. He stayed in an apartment in the complex and not much was seen of him for a week. My agent managed to find out that Grebski had been suffering from dizziness and uncoordination of legs and arms. He also seemed to be suffering from a speech defect.

  "My agent reported that as a matter of routine, since at that time we had no idea that possession was possible. But when I found out about it, I remembered the report. So I put some men on Grebski, and they report that he's in fine shape now; in fact, he went home after a week in Megistus."

  "Like Mimon," Carfax said. "He spent about a week in Megistus, too."

  Langer frowned at the interruption. "Yes. It's no coincidence.

  Apparently possession requires some time for the semb to integrate with the new body, to learn to drive it, as it were. Anyway, the voice and habits of the new Grebski have been checked against the old. And he is definitely not the Gerold Grebski who went into Megistus. The reports on the other three, two women and a man, aren't complete yet."

  "And when will we get the report on my father?" >Patricia said.

  "As soon as the agent can get it out. He's only allowed out on weekends, and he's frisked before and after.

  However, that doesn't mean that the next batch of data will match against your father's specifications. My man is only able to smuggle out a little at a time. And he hasn't checked everybody out."

  "Don't get your hopes too high," Carfax said. "We don't know that your father was given a body, and even if he was, he may have been sent elsewhere."

  And it's probably not your father, anyway. Carfax thought. It's some thing that is posing as him. There was another thing that Patricia had not thought of. Or, if she had, she was keeping it to herself.

  When, or if, this business came to an end, what would happen to Rufton Carfax? He'd be owner of a body in which he had no right to be. Would he then be forced to unpossess? It would almost be like killing him to force it, but it would have to be done. Or what if it turned out that the semb was not merely superimposed on the original owner, but that the original had traded places with the semb7 It seemed logical that if the switch could be made in the first place, then a reswitch could be effected. Yet nothing was known of the mechanics of semb possession. At least, nobody but Western knew, and he wasn't telling. What if a switch could only be done once? What happened to the semb? Would he be jailed? As Langer had said, new laws would have to be made. And what good would it do to imprison the offender? The penal system was supposed to be for rehabilitation, not punishment.

  Th
e conversation was short, since Senator Langer was a very busy man. Gordon and Patricia wandered around the house and the gardens for a while, but they knew none of the guests, all very important people.

  Their three guards trailed them and then, when the Carfaxes decided to go home, closed in around them.

  One of the guards, Szentes, drove. Jardine sat beside him; Gordon and Patricia were in the rear with the third guard, Brecht. Another car containing three men pulled out after them as they drove onto the narrow county highway. This car always followed them when they were traveling between their house and Emerson's.

  It was a pleasant afternoon, the sun was shining, the corn in the fields along the road were green pygmy soldiers on parade, and two redbirds flew across the road ahead of them. At another time, Carfax would have exclaimed with pleasure at seeing them. But today he felt dull and dispirited. He wasn't really doing anything useful, and he missed his Bush-is friends. He and Patricia had been cut off too long from a normal life. Their guards were not communicative and probably had little to interest them, anyway. He and Patricia were getting edgy from too close contact. If they could get away from each other for a few hours a day, they would enjoy each other's company more. If only he could get an assignment from Langer ...

  The car traveled around a curve at a speed of fifty kilometers per hour, and there, less than a quarter of a kilometer ahead, was a huge steam truck and trailer. It was across the road, blocking it and both shoulders of the road. By it stood two men, the driver and his partner, apparently. Szentes swore and pressed on the brake, and the tires of the automobile behind squealed as it slowed to keep from running into their rear end.

  "Stop!" Carfax said. "It may be a trap!"

  He took out his 7.92mm.; Jardine lifted from the floor a mini-submachine gun, and Brecht held a 9mm. automatic. Patricia carried a 6mm. automatic in her handbag, but she made no move to get it. She seemed paralyzed.