Bearing an Hourglass

by Piers Anthony

  Gawain popped into sight. "Good notion, Norton! I'll be happy to prove my existence to her!"

  "Good enough. Orlene, he's here. Ask a question."

  "You can see him?" she asked, rising and approaching the doorway.

  "Yes. But don't go into the other room; he'll vanish."

  She stopped at the doorway. "I don't see him."

  "But he can see you," Norton said.

  "Even when you're not looking?"

  "Certainly," Gawain said.

  "He says yes," Norton reported.

  "Very well. Let's try this: you close your eyes and face away from me, and let him tell you what I'm doing."

  "All right." Norton faced the ghost and closed his eyes.

  "She's holding her right hand above her head," Gawain said.

  "He says you're holding your right hand over your head."

  "Now she's writing in the air, script—I can't read it, it's backward."

  Norton relayed that.

  "Oh," Orlene said, startled.

  "Okay, she's turned around," the ghost said. "Now I can read over her shoulder. THIS pause I S pause R I D I C U L O U S."

  "This is ridiculous," Norton repeated.

  She was silent, but he heard rustling.

  "Say!" Gawain exclaimed. "She's stripping!"

  "She is?" Norton asked, startled in his turn.

  "Great galumphing dragons!" the ghost said. "I'm sorry I'm not alive! I had no idea she had architecture like that!"

  "He says you're—undressing," Norton said. "He says you have an excellent figure."

  "Oops, that did it," Gawain said regretfully. "She covered up in a hurry. Man, I wish I was in your shoes!"

  "He says—"

  "I can guess!" Orlene snapped.

  "Well, he is your husband," Norton said. "And since he can't share a room with you, he has not before had an opportunity to see—"

  "Unladylike remark," she said. "What's in that chest by the piano?"

  Norton lowered his hands; he had unconsciously brought them up to cover his closed eyes. "Gawain, will you tell us—"

  The ghost shrugged. "The truth is, I don't remember. I was mostly out slaying dragons. A housekeeper took care of the apartment."

  "He says he doesn't remember," Norton reported.

  "I thought as much!"

  "But I could check," Gawain said. "Let her leave that room, and I'll tally the contents now."

  "He says he'll check now," Norton said, "if you'll just step into the other room."

  Orlene passed him and entered the other room. As she did so, the ghost vanished—and reappeared in the room she had vacated. Gawain walked to the chest and plunged his hand in through the polished wood. "What do you know," he remarked brightly. "My old trophies! Best dragon kill of the year—that sort of thing. These should be up on the mantel on full display!"

  Norton relayed that. "Oh?" Orlene asked. "Let me see." She walked back into the room, switching places with the ghost, and tried to lift the lid. It didn't budge. "It's locked."

  "The key's in my bedroom," Gawain said. "In the left dresser drawer, if the fool maid hasn't moved it."

  Norton told Orlene, who went and fetched the key, then unlocked the chest. Inside were trophies, exactly as described. "It's true!" she said. "You couldn't have known, Norton! I didn't know! Unless you got the key last night and—but no, the chest is undisturbed."

  "Ask anything else," Norton suggested. "I'm sure we can satisfy you."

  "I'll try one other thing," she decided. "What's Gawain's sister's name?"

  "I have no sister," Gawain said.

  "He says he has no—"

  "What's his mother's maiden name?"

  "Thrimbly."

  "Thrimbly," Norton said.

  "When did she get married?"

  "June fourteenth," Gawain said. "Three-thirty in the afternoon, in a private ceremony. The minister was the Reverend Q. Lombard. The wedding cake had a dragon rampant on it, breathing a column of firewater. All the guests got tanked on that water, including my father; he passed out, and my mother didn't speak to him for the first week of the honeymoon. I was lucky to get conceived!"

  Norton repeated the continuing details. Orlene raised her hands in surrender. "You see the ghost! I've got to concede that! Now it's my turn to prove the glow."

  "Just what is the glow?" Norton asked. "Do I light the shadows?"

  "No, not like that. It's—well, have you heard of the animal-spell people? The ones who can shake hands, and the hand of the one they meet feels like the appendage of the animal he most closely resembles? A wolf's paw, a barracuda's fin, or a snake's scale? Actually, that's figurative; animals aren't like that, not with the bad qualities. But with this magic, the person can tell if another is vicious, greedy, sneaky, or whatever. Well, with me it's vision. I can tell who is the perfect companion, for me or for someone else. I see the aura illuminate. I have to set my mind to tune in to one person, then view the others through his situation, if you see what I mean."

  Norton shook his head. "I'm afraid I don't. I know I'm not special; there have to be many better marriage prospects than I."

  "But you aren't a marriage prospect. You're a—"

  "Never mind what I am! I begin to see your point. You actually do need a love-'em-and-leave-'em guy."

  "A nonmarrying guy. And most of those aren't worth much as persons. You are. Of course, if I weren't married, and wanted a husband, my situation would be different. I would want not only a good lover but also a good provider. You might not glow so strongly then."

  "I'm sure I wouldn't! I'm broke!"

  "So it does require some tuning in. When I first saw you, you glowed so brightly I knew you were the one—and I wasn't ready. I thought I might have tuned in inaccurately. I mean, I knew what I had to do, but it was so sudden. I knew my life had changed and that the time to conceive the heir had come. Now I'm getting used to it; I think those hours on the puzzle helped, and soon—"

  "Why don't we take a walk outside, and you can show me how your glow works on others," Norton suggested.

  "All right. Let me get into street clothes." She hurried to her bedroom.

  Gawain reappeared. "Now you're making progress!" the ghost said with satisfaction. "I was able to listen through the wall this time; I can't always do that."

  "Damn it, must you see it as Just that one thing?"

  "Certainly. That's what you're both here for, isn't it? To beget my heir?"

  "I don't know. If I go through with this, I'm afraid I'll leave more than my seed behind."

  "Oh, don't get maudlin about it," Gawain said. "You've probably had almost as many women as I have! Think of it as one more dragon to be slain."

  "She's no dragon!"

  "Oh, I don't know. Women and dragons—I'd call them two of a kind."

  "You don't love her?"

  "Of course not! I'm dead!"

  "I could love her. I don't want to hurt her."

  "Then don't hurt her! Give her what she needs—a son."

  "I had a dream that I destroyed her. I worry about that."

  "You can't hurt her if you leave her after it's done."

  "Some people are hurt worse by being left," Norton muttered.

  "Don't worry. She'll have the very best care money can buy, courtesy of my estate."

  "I wasn't thinking of physical hurt, necessarily. She's a young, vibrant girl. I don't think she can give herself to a man without giving all of herself. She—"

  He paused, for Gawain had vanished. Orlene stood in the doorway. She was dressed in a modest green street skirt with matching jacket and hat and shoes, and now looked very businesslike. Her fair hair was pinned back with green barrettes. Somehow all that green reminded him of the breakfast pancakes, of the park scene in the puzzle, and of the lovely wilderness itself. "The ghost again?" she asked.

  Embarrassed, Norton nodded. "He has only one thing on his mind."

  She cocked her head at him again. "And you don't?"

 
"I have a care for the damage I may do to others."

  "I think that's why you glow so brightly." He shrugged. "Maybe. But maybe I want more than I have a right to want."

  She touched his hand. "I told you before, Norton. You don't have to go after it's done."

  "I think I do. You are a married woman." She looked at him so intently that he became nervous.

  "What are you doing?" he asked.

  "I'm visualizing you as a prospective husband, to compare the glow."

  "Don't do that! I'm not your—can never be your—"

  "That's odd," she said. "That hasn't happened before."

  "What hasn't happened?"

  "The glow seems to have split. Part of it is extremely intense, but part of it is dim. As if you would be both a very good husband and a not-very-good husband."

  "How can that be?"

  "I'm not sure. You see, the glow doesn't figure character per se. It includes the total person, the total situation. How good a person is, how loyal, how effective a provider, how lucky or unlucky—the perfect man might be downgraded because an unfortunate accident will cripple him in five years, making him worse through no fault of his own."

  Norton felt a chill. "I might have an accident?"

  "No. I don't think it's that. Maybe it's that you could be the perfect husband, but you won't be, because I can't marry you. You're too good for the job—overqualified. So you suffer."

  "Overqualified!" Norton exclaimed incredulously.

  "I don't know," she said quickly. "That's just a conjecture. I don't understand all the aspects of the glow. I just see its brightness."

  "Well, stop considering me as—as the impossible. It's time to go out."

  "Of course." She took his arm, and they went out. Travel on the fast belts took them to this floor's nearest mall, where shoppers thronged in the fashion they had done so for millennia at such centers. This could be a market at Babylon or in a medieval city. The stores had changed somewhat in detail in the ensuing interval, however. Today they were holographic images, each in its alcove, the goods being displayed with lifelike realism, each tagged with its price. The shopper had only to touch the image of the item he wanted; it would be shipped directly from the warehouse to his home, and his account as identified by his fingerprint patterns would be debited accordingly. Of course, these were mostly standard items whose details were generally known; the more individual ones required a different type of shopping. Marked containers of food in set units did not need to be physically verified, while specially fitted clothing did. There were booths for fitting via holo imaging, but that still required undressing.

  They stopped at an ice cream stall, where the holograph of a chef stood by a chart of a thousand different flavors and types. Orlene touched the panels for their choices—honey flavor, of course—and the cones snapped into the adjacent holders, to be taken physically. The account of Gawain would be debited. Norton, of course, couldn't order; he had no account. In the vernacular of the day, he was of no account.

  Orlene also saw a popular book that looked interesting, so she touched its holo too; in a moment it was printed for her on the machine's supply of paper. It was a historical novel, set in the fascinating time when people believed in neither magic nor science, so had wretched lives. She put the book in her purse.

  They sat on a bench, licking their cones in nominal fashion, and watched the people passing by. Orlene called out the brightnesses of each one. The problem, she explained, was that any person's suitability as a partner varied greatly, depending on whom he was partnered with. Thus she could get several readings with different matchups.

  Norton was intrigued, but remained uncertain whether the glows she perceived were really magic or only imagination. He wanted to verify some cases, but did not feel right about walking up to strangers and asking how their interpersonal relations were. Orlene surely perceived the glows-but just how accurate were they?

  Then the proof came, abruptly. Orlene called out an older couple, walking hand in hand, evidently still much attached to each other. They were well dressed and handsome for their age. Yet Orlene called out a striking difference in their glows. The woman's glow was strong; she was almost perfect for the man. But his glow was absent. In fact, it was negative: a dark shadow. "He's completely wrong for her!" Orlene whispered.

  "I can't believe that," Norton protested. "Look how well they relate to each other! Even if he has a mistress on the side, he's got to be good for this woman. She's well eared for and contented."

  "The glow is absent," Orlene insisted. "He's bad for her!"

  "That just doesn't make sense!"

  Then they had to be quiet, for the couple was approaching. In fact, they sat down nearby on the bench. Norton wrestled with himself, trying to decide whether to speak to them, to try to resolve the discrepancy.

  "Just a little tired," the man was saying.

  "Yes, of course," the woman agreed.

  Then the man fell off the bench.

  Norton jumped up to help him, for he knew something about emergency aid. But he realized as he saw the man's staring face that he was dead. "Resuscitation unit!" Norton snapped, and a machine burst out of the nearest wall and rolled over to attend to the man.

  It took the machine only a moment to confirm Norton's diagnosis. "Unit failure—beyond repair," it clicked.

  The ambulance unit came and loaded the body aboard, taking also the shocked widow. It was all accomplished so swiftly and neatly that many shoppers never realized anything had happened—which was, of course, the point. People did not like shopping where death occurred, with good reason; sometimes vengeful ghosts remained.

  "Oh, that's so horrible!" Orlene said shudderingly. "Must we stay here?"

  "Of course not." They walked to the moving belt.

  But as they were carried back toward the apartment, Norton realized that the glow had been confirmed. The man had been a poor partner for the woman, not because of any failure of resources or personality or loyalty, but because he was not going to be with her very long and, in fact, had been about to bring her crushing grief. Thus the glow, instead of being absent, was black. The glow had known—before the fact.

  He had to accept the glow; it was legitimate magic. That meant he had to accept its verdict on him: he was right for Orlene. But what, then, of his dream? That suggested he was wrong for her—perhaps in the fashion of the man they had just seen die. Which was he to believe?

  "Your glow is wavering," Orlene murmured. "Are you thinking of leaving me?"

  Norton started guiltily. "I don't know what is right."

  She held his arm tightly. "Oh, please, Norton! I couldn't spend a night alone after seeing—that."

  He realized that she had never been exposed to violence or death, so was not equipped to handle it. Of course she would be severely shaken. This would be the worst time to leave her.

  They arrived at the apartment. As the door closed, Orlene turned to him, flung her arms about him, buried her head in his shoulder, and sobbed. She had been fairly well controlled in public, but now she was letting down. He held her; there was nothing else to do. Norton had always liked to help people and he could not refuse her his companionship and support now. Or was he, he had to ask himself, rationalizing?

  After a time she relaxed. She disengaged and went to the bathroom to put herself in order. "I'll never eat ice cream again," she said as she disappeared.

  Ice cream. Guilt by association. She had eaten it just before the tragedy. An illogical connection, but valid emotionally. He did not feel much appetite for ice cream now himself. Or for shopping mails.

  "You fighting with her?" Gawain demanded, popping into sight. "I heard her crying."

  "Couldn't you see?" Norton demanded irritably.

  "No. You weren't visible from the other room. I can walk through walls, but I can't see through them. All I could do was listen to the muffled sounds."

  "We weren't fighting."

  "What, then?"

  "W
hat business is it of yours?"

  "Listen, mortal, it is my business!" Gawain retorted. "This is my estate, and she's my wife."

  "A wife you never knew in life and don't love now."

  "Well, I'm a ghost! What use to love her?"

  The ghost had a point. Perversely, that made it easier for Norton. Whatever he did with Orlene would not be treading on Gawain's sensibilities. "We saw a man die. That shook her."

  Gawain snorted. "I've seen many men die. I'm dead myself."

  In more than one sense. "I think I see now why she had so much trouble believing in you. She doesn't like death and doesn't want it near her."

  "She should have thought of that before she married me!"

  "It wasn't entirely her choice, any more than it was yours. Men usually marry for sex appeal, but women marry for security. It's the nature of the human species, or of our economy. If women were the prime money earners, they might marry for other reasons, and if men had no better way to gain security than through women, so would they. I'm sure she would have married a living man if that had been feasible."

  "Well, she didn't! And now she has a job to do—and so do you. I don't want to wait in limbo forever. Tell her you won't stay unless she puts out now, today. She'll move it along for sure, since she doesn't want to be alone."

  "I'll do nothing of the kind!" Norton responded angrily. "She's no piece of meat!"

  "She's the breeder for my heir! She's not here to pussyfoot around. She's vulnerable now; you can make her perform in the next hour, if you—"

  "Listen, Gawain, I never pressured a woman in my life! And I would never take advantage of a situation like this!"

  "No, you'd just sit around interminably, sponging off my estate!"

  "To Hell with your estate!" Norton shouted. "You asked me for a favor! I never had any intention of taking anything of yours!"

  "Then do what you came to do and get gone!" the ghost shouted back.

  "I'll get gone right now, if that makes you happier! You can find another man to do your favor!"

  The ghost backed off, literally and figuratively. "I told you, she's choosy. It's got to be you."

  "I am not at all certain of that. In any event, it will be of her choosing, not yours or mine."

  But Gawain was gone again. Orlene stood in the doorway, in a gray housecoat. "Gawain again?"