Carbon Copy

by Clifford D. Simak

  "I'm especially glad to have a chance to see you," Homer told him. "As a matter of fact, I had been thinking of switching my account and…"

  The president's face took on a look of horror. "But why? Certainly you've been told about the tax advantages."

  "I think that the matter got some mention. But, I must confess, I don't understand."

  "Why, Mr. Jackson, it is simple. No mystery at all. So far as the authorities of your country are concerned…"

  "My country?"

  "Well, of course. I think it might logically be argued, even in a court of law, that this place we're in is no longer the United States of America. But even if it should be a part of your great nation—I doubt that such a contention would hold up if put to the decision—why, even so, our records are not available to the agents of your country. Don't tell me you fail to see the implications of a situation such as that."

  "The income tax," Homer said.

  "Correct," said the president, smiling very blandly.

  "That is interesting. Interesting, indeed." Homer rose and held out his hand to the president. "I'll be in again."

  "Thank you," said the president. "Drop in any time you wish."

  On the street outside the bank, the sun was shining brightly.

  The shopping centre stretched along the mall and there were people here and there, walking on the concourse or shopping in the stores. A few cars were parked in the lot and the world of this Second Bank looked exactly like the First Bank's world, and if a man had not known the difference…

  Good Lord, thought Homer, what was the difference? What had really happened? He'd walked through the door and there was the other bank. He'd walked through a door and found the missing people—the people who had not been living in the empty houses of the First Bank's world.

  Because that other world where the houses still stood empty was no more than a show window? It might simply be a street lined with demonstration homes. And here was that second street of houses he'd dreamed up the other night. And beyond this second street, would there be another street and another and another?

  He stumbled along the concourse, shaken, now that he realized there really was that second street of houses. It was an idea that was hard to take in stride. He didn't take it in his stride. His mind balked and shied away from it and he told himself it wasn't true. But it was true and there was no way to rationalize it, to make it go away. There was a second street!

  He walked along and saw that he was near the gate. The gate he saw, was the same as ever, with its expanse of massive iron.

  But there was no gateman.

  And a car was coming up the road, heading directly for the gate, and it was moving fast, as if the driver did not see the gate.

  Homer shouted and the car kept on. He started waving his arms, but the driver paid not the least attention.

  The crazy fool, thought Homer. He'll hit the gate and…

  And the car hit the gate, slammed into it, but there was sound, no crash, no screech of rending metal. There was simply nothing.

  The gate was there, undented. And there was no car. The car had disappeared.

  Homer stalked to the gate. Ten feet away, he stopped.

  The road came up to the gate; beyond it was no road. Beyon the gate was wilderness. The road came up and ended and the wilderness began.

  Cautiously, Homer walked out into the road and peered through the gate.

  Just a few feet away, a giant oak towered into the air and behind it was the forest, wild and hoary and primeval, and from the forest was the happy sound, the abandoned sound of water running in a brook.

  Fish, thought Homer. Maybe that brook is where the trout came from.

  He moved toward the gate for a closer look and reached out his hands to grasp the ironwork. Even as he did, the forest went away and the gate as well as he stood in the old familiar entrance to Happy Acres, with the gate wide open, with the state highway running along the wall and the road from the development running out to meet it.

  "Good morning, sir," said the gateman. "Maybe you ought to move over to one side. A car is apt to hit you."

  "Huh?" Homer asked blankly.

  "A car. This is a road, you know."

  Homer turned around and brushed past the gateman. He hustled down the concourse, aiming for Steen's office.

  But the office was locked. Homer shook the door. He rapped wildly on the glass. He pounded on the frame. Absolutely nothing happened.

  Turning from the door, he stared out across the development with incredulous eyes—the vacant concourse, the empty houses among the trees, the faint patches of shining lake peeking through the clearings.

  He jammed his hands into his pockets and his fingers touched the little radiator ornament. He took it out and looked at it. He'd seen it before—not the little replica, but the ornament itself.

  He had seen it, he remembered, on the new cars parked outside his office by the people seeking leases. He had seen it on the car that had crashed the gate and disappeared.

  He walked slowly to the parking lot and drove home.

  "I don't think I'll go back to the office today," he told Elaine. "I don't feel so good."

  "You've been working too hard," she told him accusingly. "You look all worn out."

  "That's a fact," he admitted.

  "After lunch, you lie down. And see that you get some sleep."

  "Yes, dear," he said.

  So it began to fall into a pattern, he thought, lying on his bed and staring at the ceiling. Finally it was clear enough so a man could begin to make some head and tail of it.

  It was unbelievable, but there was no choice—one could not disbelieve in it. It was there to see. And if one looked at it any other way, it made no sense at all.

  Someone—Steen, perhaps, or maybe someone else for whom Steen was serving as a front—had found out how to build one house, yet have many houses, houses stretching back street after street from the first house, all shadows of the first house, but substantial just the same—substantial enough for families to live in.

  Dimensional extensions of that first house. Or houses stretching into time. Or something else as weird.

  But however they might do it, it was a swell idea. For you could build one house and sell it, or lease it, time and time again. Except that one was crazy to get hold of an idea that was as good as that and then let someone else make all the money from the leasing of the houses.

  And there was no question that Steen was crazy. That idea he had about the shopping centre was completely batty—although, stop to think of it, if one had five thousand houses and leased each of them ten times and had a monopoly on all the shops and stores—why, it would pay off tremendously.

  And the bank president's slant on sovereignty had certain angles, too, that should not be overlooked.

  A new idea in housing, Steen had told him. It was all of that.

  It was a new idea that would apply to many things—to industry and farming and mining and a lot of other ventures. A man could make one car and there would be many others. A man could build a manufacturing plant and he would have many plants.

  It was like a carbon copy, Homer thought—an economic carbon copy. And a man apparently could make as many carbons as he wished. Possibly, he speculated, once you knew the principle, there was no limit to the carbons. Possibly the ghostly parade of Happy Acres houses stretched limitless, forever and forever. There might be no end to them.

  He fell asleep and dreamed of going down a line of ghostly houses, counting them frantically as he ran along, hoping that he'd soon get to the end of them, for he couldn't quit until he did get to the end. But they always stretched ahead of him, as far as he could see, and he could find no end to them.

  He woke, damp with perspiration, his tongue a dry and bitter wad inside a flannel mouth. He crept out of bed and went to the bathroom. He held his head under a cold faucet. It helped, but not much.

  Downstairs, he found a note that Elaine had propped against the radio on
the breakfast table:

  Gone to play bridge at Mabel's.

  Sandwiches in refrigerator.

  It was dark outside. He'd slept the daylight hours away. A wasted day, he berated himself—a completely wasted day. He hadn't done a dollar's worth of work.

  He found some milk and drank it, but left the sandwiches where they were.

  He might as well go to the office and get a little work done, compensate in part for the wasted day. Elaine wouldn't return until almost midnight and there was no sense in staying home alone.

  He got his hat and went out to where he'd parked the car in the driveway. He got into it and sat down on something angular and hard. He hoisted himself wrathfully and searched the seat with a groping hand to find the thing he'd sat on. His fingers closed about it and then he remembered. He'd sat on it on that day Morgan had showed up in answer to the ad. It had been rolling around ever since, unnoticed in the seat.

  It was smooth to the touch and warm—warmer than it should be—as if there were a busy little motor humming away inside it.

  And suddenly it winked.

  He caught his breath and it flashed again.

  Exactly like a signal.

  Instinct told him to get rid of it, to heave it out the window but a voice suddenly spoke out of it—a thick, harsh voice that mouthed a sort of chant he could not recognize.

  "What the hell?" chattered Homer, fearful now. "What's going on?"

  The chanting voice ceased and a heavy silence fell, so thick and frightening that Homer imagined he could feel it closing in on him.

  The voice spoke again. This time, it was one word, slow and laboured, as if the thick, harsh tongue drove itself to create a new and alien sound.

  The silence fell again and there was a sense of waiting. Homer huddled in the seat, cold with fear.

  For now he could guess where the cube had come from.

  Steen had ridden in the car with him and it had fallen from his pocket.

  The voice took up again: "Urrr—urr—urrth—mum!"

  Homer almost screamed.

  Rustling, panting sounds whispered from the cube.

  Earthman? Homer wondered wildly. Was that what it had tried to say?

  And if that was right, if the cube in fact had been lost by Stcen, then it meant that Steen was not a man at all.

  He thought of Steen and the way he wore his shoes and suddenly it became understandable why he might wear his shoes that way. Perhaps, where Steen came from, there was no left or right, maybe not even shoes. No man could expect an alien, a being from some distant star, to get the hang of all Earth's customs—not right away, at least. He recalled the first day Steen had come into the office and the precise way he had talked and how stiffly he'd sat down in the chair. And that other day, six weeks later, when Steen had talked slangily and had sat slouched in his chair, with his feet planted on the desk.

  Learning, Homer thought. Learning all the time. Getting to know his way around, getting the feel of things, like a gawky country youth learning city ways.

  But it sure was a funny thing that he'd never learned about the shoes.

  The cube went on gurgling and panting and the thick voice muttered and spat out alien words. One could sense the tenseness and confusion at the other end.

  Homer sat cold and rigid, with horror seeping into him drop by splashing drop, while the cube blurted over and over a single phrase that meant not a thing to him.

  Then, abruptly, the cube went dead. It lay within his hand, cooling, silent, just a thing that looked and felt like a cliptogether plastic block for children.

  From far off, he heard the roar of a car as it left the curb and sped off in the night. From someone's backyard, a cat meowed for attention. Nearby, a bird cheeped sleepily.

  Homer opened the glove compartment and tossed the cube in among the rags and scraper and the dog-eared road map and the other odds and ends.

  He felt the terror and the loathing and the wild agony begin to drain out of his bones and he sat quietly in the car, trying to readjust his mind to this new situation—that Steen must be an alien.

  He dipped his hand into his pocket and found the replica of the radiator ornament. And that was the key, he knew—not only the key to the many streets of homes, but the key to Steen and the alien world.

  They hadn't meant for him to keep the ornament, of course. If he had returned the way he'd entered the world of the Second Bank, the teller more than likely would have demanded that he give it back. But he'd returned another way, an unexpected way, and it still was in his pocket.

  And the radiator ornament, of course, was the reason that Steen had insisted that anyone who leased a house must also buy a car. For the ornament was a key that bridged one world and another. Although, thought Homer, it was rather drastic to insist that a man should buy a car simply so he'd have the correct radiator ornament.

  But that might be the way, he told himself, that an alien mind would work.

  He was calmer now. The fear still lingered, but pushed back, buried just a little.

  Exactly how is a man supposed to act, he asked himseff, when he learns there are aliens in the land? Run screeching through the streets, rouse all the citizens, alert the law, go baying on the trail? Or does he continue about his business?

  Might he not, he wondered, take advantage of his knowledge, turn it to his own benefit?

  He was the only human being on all of Earth who knew.

  Steen might not like it known that he was an alien. Perhaps it would be worth a lot to Steen not to have it known.

  Homer sat and thought about it. The more he thought, the more reasonable it seemed that Steen might be ready to lay plenty on the line to keep the fact a secret.

  Not that I don't have it coming to me, Homer told himself. Not that he hasn't caused me a heap of worry and trouble.

  He put his hand into his pocket. The miniature ornament was there. There was no need to wait. Now was as good as any time.

  He turned the ignition key and the motor came to life. He backed out of the driveway and took the road to Happy Acres.

  The development was dark and quiet. Even the usual advertising signs were turned off in the shop fronts.

  He parked in front of Steen's office and got out. Opening the trunk, he found the jack handle in the dark.

  He stood staring toward the gate. There was no sign of the gateman. But that was a chance he'd have to take. If the old fool tried to interfere, he could handle him.

  For a moment, in front of the door to Steen's office, he hesitated, trying to reassure himself. Certainly there would be another closet, some way to get to those other worlds, inside the office.

  He struck savagely at the glass in the door with the jack handle. The glass splintered and rained down, with crashing, tinkling sounds.

  Homer waited, tense, listening, watching. Nothing stirred. The old gateman, if he was around, apparently had not heard the crash.

  Carefully, Homer reached through the broken glass and manipulated the night lock. The door swung easily open. He walked inside and closed the door behind him.

  In the empty office, Homer paused until his eyes became accustomed to the deeper darkness. He moved forward, groping with his hands, and found the desk. He could make out the dim bulk of a filing case. There should be a door somewhere. Perhaps not a door into the street, but a door into a hideout—some room where Steen could disappear to eat and rest and sleep; some place that might have a touch of his alien home about it.

  Homer moved from the desk to the filing cabinet and felt along the wall. Almost immediately, he found a door. He took a firmer grip on the jack handle and twisted on the knob. He walked through the door and there was the room, lighted a garish green by a lantern suspended from the ceiling.

  There was sound and the sense of movement. Homer's hair stood straight on end and he felt his skin trying very hard to roll up his back. The hairy monster reached out a paw and grabbed him by the shoulder just as Homer swung around to dive back through the
door.

  The monster's paw was heavy and very strong. It was hairy and it tickled. Homer opened his mouth to scream, but his tongue dried up and his throat closed and he couldn't make a sound. The jack handle slipped from his numb fingers and clattered to the floor.

  For a long moment, he stood there in the grip of the hairy monster and he supposed it had a face, but he could not see the face, for the hair grew all over it and drooped down where its face should be. The monster was a large one, with massive chest and shoulders that tapered down to a slim, athletic waist. Frightened as he was, Homer still could not keep from thinking that it looked a lot like an English sheepdog with a wrestler's body.

  And all the while, there was something rolling on the floor and moaning.

  Then the hairy monster said, in halting, stumbling syllables: "You Mister Jackson, you are not?" Homer made a croaking sound.

  "I apologize," the monster told him. "I very poor at your words. I work on your planet survey, but not so good with words." He motioned at the thing moaning and rolling on the floor. "That was good with words."

  The hairy hand dropped from Homer's shoulder. "That," it said, gesturing at the floor again, "your Mister Steen."

  "What is wrong with him?" Homer blurted out. "Is he sick or something?"

  "He die himself," the monster said.

  "You mean he's dying and you're just standing there…"

  "No, no. He—how do you word it right?—he unlive himself."

  "You mean he's killing himself? Committing suicide?"

  "Yes," the monster said. "He does it very well. Do you no agree?"

  "But you can't…"

  "He take great pride in it. He make spectacular. He jus starting now. He work up to grand finale. You must stay and watch. It be something to remember."

  "No, thank you," Homer said faintly.

  Homer turned to go, but the monster put out a hairy paw an, stopped him. "You must not be afraid of us. I stay half myself, allright? Could change entirely into human, but much trouble. Good enough this way?"

  "It's all tight," said Homer.

  "We owe you debt," the monster said. "This Mister Steen of yours got things all scrambled up."