The Works of Clifford D. Simak Volume Two

by Clifford D. Simak

  Standing underneath it was an easel, and stacked against the wall were blank canvases. There would be paint and brushes, he knew, and everything else that he might need. Whoever or whatever had sucked him into this place would do everything up brown; nothing would be overlooked.

  It was unthinkable, he told himself, that it could have happened. Standing now, in the center of the room, he still could not believe it. He tried to work out the sequence of events that had led him to this house, the steps by which he had been lured into the trap, if trap it was—and on the face of the evidence, it had to be a trap. There had been the realtor in Boston who had told him of the house in Wyalusing. “It’s the kind of place you are looking for,” he had said. “No near neighbors, isolated. The little village a couple of miles down the road. If you need a woman to come in a couple of times a week to keep the place in order, just ask in the village. There’s bound to be someone you could hire. The place is surrounded by old fields that haven’t been farmed in years and are going back to brush and thickets. The coast is only half a mile distant. If you like to do some shooting, come fall there’ll be quail and grouse. Fishing, too, if you want to do it.”

  “I might drive up and have a look at it,” he had told the agent, who had then proceeded to give him the wrong directions, putting him on the road that would take him past this place. Or had he? Had it, perhaps, been his own muddleheadedness that had put him on the wrong road? Thinking about it, Latimer could not be absolutely certain. The agent had given him directions, but had they been the wrong directions? In the present situation, he knew that he had the tendency to view all prior circumstances with suspicion. Yet, certainly, there had been some psychological pressure brought, some misdirection employed to bring him to this house. It could not have been simple happenstance that had brought him here, to a house that trapped practitioners of the arts. A poet, a musician, a novelist, and a philosopher—although, come to think of it, a philosopher did not seem to exactly fit the pattern. Maybe the pattern was more apparent, he told himself, than it actually was. He still did not know the professions of Underwood, Charlie, and Jane. Maybe, once he did know, the pattern would be broken.

  A bed stood in one corner of the room, a bedside table and a lamp beside it. In another corner three comfortable chairs were grouped, and along a short section of the wall stood shelves that were filled with books. On the wall beside the shelves hung a painting. It was only after staring at it for several minutes that he recognized it. It was one of his own, done several years ago.

  He moved across the carpeted floor to confront the painting. It was one of those to which he had taken a special liking—one that, in fact, he had been somewhat reluctant to let go, would not have sold it if he had not stood so much in need of money.

  The subject sat on the back stoop of a tumbledown house. Beside him, where he had dropped it, was a newspaper folded to the ‘Help Wanted’ ads. From the breast pocket of his painfully clean, but worn, work shirt an envelope stuck out, the gray envelope in which welfare checks were issued. The man’s work-scarred hands lay listlessly in his lap, the forearms resting on the thighs, which were clad in ragged denims. He had not shaved for several days and the graying whiskers lent a deathly gray cast to his face. His hair, in need of barbering, was a tangled rat’s nest, and his eyes, deep-set beneath heavy, scraggly brows, held a sense of helplessness. A scrawny cat sat at one corner of the house, a broken bicycle leaned against the basement wall. The man was looking out over a backyard filled with various kinds of litter, and beyond it the open countryside, a dingy gray and brown, seared by drought and lack of care, while on the horizon was the hint of industrial chimneys, gaunt and stark, with faint wisps of smoke trailing from them.

  The painting was framed in heavy gilt—not the best choice, he thought, for such a piece. The bronze title tag was there, but he did not bend to look at it. He knew what it would say:

  UNEMPLOYED

  David Lloyd Latimer

  How long ago? he wondered. Five years, or was it six? A man by the name of Johnny Brown, he remembered, had been the model. Johnny was a good man and he had used him several times. Later on, when he had tried to find him, he had been unable to locate him. He had not been seen for months in his old haunts along the waterfront and no one seemed to know where he had gone.

  Five years ago, six years ago—sold to put bread into his belly, although that was silly, for when did he ever paint other than for bread? And here it was. He tried to recall the purchaser, but was unable to.

  There was a closet, and when he opened it, he found a row of brand-new clothes, boots and shoes lined up on the floor, hats ranged neatly on the shelf. And all of them would fit—he was sure they would. The setters and the baiters of this trap would have seen to that. In the highboy next to the bed would be underwear, shirts, sock, sweaters—the kind that he would buy.

  “We are taken care of,” Enid had told him, sitting on the sofa with him before the flaring fire. There could be, he told himself, no doubt of that. No harm was intended them. They, in fact, were coddled.

  And the question: Why? Why a few hand-picked people selected from many millions?

  He walked to a window and stood looking out of it. The room was in the back of the house so that he looked down across the grove of ghostly birch. The moon had risen and hung like a milk-glass globe above the dark blur of the ocean. High as he stood, he could see the whiteness of the spray breaking on the boulders.

  He had to have time to think, he told himself, time to sort it out, to get straight in his mind all the things that had happened in the last few hours. There was no sense in going to bed; tense as he was, he’d never get to sleep. He could not think in this room, nor, perhaps, in the house. He had to go some place that was uncluttered. Perhaps if he went outside and walked for an hour or so, if no more than up and down the driveway, he could get himself straightened out.

  The blaze in the fireplace in the drawing room was little more than a glimmer in the coals when he went past the door.

  A voice called to him: “David, is that you?”

  He spun around and went back to the door. A dark figure was huddled on the sofa in front of the fireplace.

  “Jonathon?” Latimer asked.

  “Yes, it is. Why don’t you keep me company. I’m an old night owl and, in consequence, spend many lonely hours. There’s coffee on the table if you want it.”

  Latimer walked to the sofa and sat down. Cups and a carafe of coffee were on the table. He poured himself a cup.

  “You want a refill?” he asked Jonathon.

  “If you please.” The older man held out his cup and Latimer filled it. “I drink a sinful amount of this stuff.” said Jonathon. “There’s liquor in the cabinet. A dash of brandy in the coffee, perhaps.”

  “That sounds fine,” said Latimer. He crossed the room and found the brandy, brought it back, pouring a dollop into both cups.

  They settled down and looked at one another. A nearly burned log in the fireplace collapsed into a mound of coals. In the flare of its collapse, Latimer saw the face of the other man—beard beginning to turn gray, an angular yet refined face, eyebrows that were sharp exclamation points.

  “You’re a confused young man,” said Jonathon.

  “Extremely so,” Latimer confessed. “I keep asking all the time why and who.”

  Jonathon nodded. “Most of us still do, I suppose. It’s worst when you first come here, but you never quit. You keep on asking questions. You’re frustrated and depressed when there are no answers. As time goes on, you come more and more to accept the situation and do less fretting about it. After all, life is pleasant here. All our needs are supplied, nothing is expected of us. We do much as we please. You, no doubt, have heard of Enid’s theory that we are under observation by an alien race that has penned us here in order to study us.”

  “Enid told me,” said Latimer, “that she did not necessari
ly believe the theory, but regarded it as a nice idea, a neat and dramatic explanation of what is going on.”

  “It is that, of course,” said Jonathon, “but it doesn’t stand up. How would aliens be able to employ the staff that takes such good care of us?”

  “The staff worries me,” said Latimer. “Are its members trapped here along with us?”

  “No, they’re not trapped,” said Jonathon. “I’m certain they are employed, perhaps at very handsome salaries. The staff changes from time to time, one member leaving to be replaced by someone else. How this is accomplished we do not know. We’ve kept a sharp watch in the hope that we might learn and thus obtain a clue as to how we could get out of here, but it all comes to nothing. We try on occasions, not too obviously, to talk with the staff, but beyond normal civility, they will not talk with us. I have a sneaking suspicion, too, that there are some of us, perhaps including myself, who no longer try too hard. Once one has been here long enough to make peace with himself, the ease of our life grows upon us. It would be something we would be reluctant to part with. I can’t imagine, personally, what I would do if I were turned out of here, back into the world that I have virtually forgotten. That is the vicious part of it—that our captivity is so attractive, we are inclined to fall in love with it.”

  “But certainly in some cases there were people left behind—wives, husbands, children, friends. In my own case, no wife and only a few friends.”

  “Strangely enough,” said Jonathon, “where such ties existed, they were not too strong.”

  “You mean only people without strong ties were picked?”

  “No, I doubt that would have been the case. Perhaps among the kind of people who are here, there is no tendency to develop such strong ties.”

  “Tell me what kind of people. You told me you are a philosopher and I know some of the others. What about Underwood?”

  “A playwright. And a rather successful one before he came here.”

  “Charlie? Jane?”

  “Charlie is a cartoonist, Jane an essayist.”

  “Essayist?”

  “Yes, high social consciousness. She wrote rather telling articles for some of the so-called little magazines, even a few for more prestigious publications. Charlie was big in the Middle West. Worked for a small daily, hut his cartoons were widely reprinted. He was building a reputation and probably would have been moving on to more important fields.”

  “Then we’re not all from around here. Not all from New England.”

  “No. Some of us, of course. Myself and you. The others are from other parts of the country.”

  “All of us from what can be roughly called the arts. And from a wide area. How in the world would they—whoever they may be—have managed to lure all these people to this house? Because I gather we had to come ourselves, that none of us was seized and brought here.”

  “I think you are right. I can’t imagine how it was managed. Psychological management of some sort, I would assume, but I have no idea how it might be done.”

  “You say you are a philosopher. Does that mean you taught philosophy?”

  “I did at one time. But it was not a satisfactory job. Teaching those old dead philosophies to a group of youngsters who paid but slight attention was no bargain, I can tell you. Although, I shouldn’t blame them, I suppose. Philosophy today is largely dead. It’s primitive, outdated, the most of it. What we need is a new philosophy that will enable us to cope with the present world.”

  “And you are writing such a philosophy?”

  “Writing at it. I find that as time goes on, I get less and less done. I haven’t the drive any longer. This life of ease, I suppose. Something’s gone out of me. The anger, maybe. Maybe the loss of contact with the world I knew. No longer exposed to that world’s conditions, I have lost the feel for it. I don’t feel the need of protest, I’ve lost my sense of outrage, and the need for a new philosophy has become remote.”

  “This business about the staff. You say that from time to time it changes.”

  “It may be fairly simple to explain. I told you that we watch, but we can’t have a watcher posted all the time. The staff, on the other hand, can keep track of us. Old staff members leave, others come in when we are somewhere else.”

  “And supplies. They have to bring in supplies. That would not be as simple.”

  Jonathon chuckled. “You’ve really got your teeth in this.”

  “I’m interested, dammit. There are questions about how the operation works and I want to know. How about the basement? Tunnels, maybe. Could they bring in staff and supplies through tunnels in the basement? I know that sounds cloak-and-dagger, but …”

  “I suppose they could. If they did, we’d never know. The basement is used to store supplies and we’re not welcome there. One of the staff, a burly brute who is a deaf-mute, or pretends to be, has charge of the basement. He lives down there, eats and sleeps down there, takes care of supplies.”

  “It could be possible, then?”

  “Yes,” said Jonathon. “It could be possible.”

  The fire had died down; only a few coals still blinked in the ash. In the silence that came upon them, Latimer heard the wind in the trees outside.

  “One thing you don’t know,” said Jonathon. “You will find great auks down on the beach.”

  “Great auks? That’s impossible. They’ve been …”

  “Yes, I know. Extinct for more than a hundred years. Also whales. Sometimes you can sight a dozen a day. Occasionally a polar bear.”

  “Then that must mean …”

  Jonathon nodded. “We are somewhere in prehistoric North America. I would guess several thousand years into the past. We hear and, occasionally, see moose. There are a number of deer, once in a while woodland caribou. The bird life, especially the wildfowl, are here in incredible numbers. Good shooting if you ever have the urge. We have guns and ammunition.”

  Dawn was beginning to break when Latimer went back to his room. He was bone-tired and now he could sleep. But before going to bed he stood for a time in front of the window overlooking the birch grove and the shore. A thin fog had moved off the water and everything had a faery, unrealistic cast.

  Prehistoric North America, the philosopher had said, and if that was the case, there was little possibility of escape back to the world he knew. Unless one had the secret—or the technology—one did not move in time. Who, he wondered, could have cracked the technique of time transferral? And who, having cracked it, would use it for the ridiculous purpose of caging people in it?

  There had been a man at MIT, he recalled, who had spent twenty years or more in an attempt to define time and gain some understanding of it. But that had been some years ago and he had dropped out of sight, or at least out of the news. From time to time there had been news stories (written for the most part with tongue firmly in cheek) about the study. Although, Latimer told himself, it need not have been the MIT man; there might have been other people engaged in similar studies who had escaped, quite happily, the attention of the press.

  Thinking of it, he felt an excitement rising in him at the prospect of being in primitive North America, of being able to see the land as it had existed before white explorers had come—before the Norsemen or the Cabots or Cartier or any the others. Although there must be Indians about—it was funny that Jonathon had not mentioned Indians.

  Without realizing that he had been doing so, he found that he had been staring at a certain birch clump. Two of the birch trees grew opposite off another, slightly behind but on opposite sides of a large boulder that he estimated at standing five feet high or so. And beyond the boulder, positioned slightly down the slope, but between the other two birch trees, was a third. It was not an unusual situation, he knew; birch trees often grew in clumps of three. There must have been some feature of the clump that had riveted his attention on it, but if that had been the c
ase, he no longer was aware of it and it was not apparent now. Nevertheless, he remained staring at it, puzzled at what he had seen, if he had seen anything at all.

  As he watched, a bird flew down from somewhere to light on the boulder. A songbird, but too far away for identification. Idly he watched the bird until it flew off the rock and disappeared.

  Without bothering to undress, simply kicking off his shoes, he crossed the room to the bed and fell upon it, asleep almost before he came to rest upon it.

  It was almost noon before he woke. He washed his face and combed his hair, not bothering to shave, and went stumbling down the stairs, still groggy from the befuddlement of having slept so soundly. No one else was in the house, but in the dining room a place was set and covered dishes remained upon the sideboard. He chose kidneys and scrambled eggs, poured a cup of coffee, and went back to the table. The smell of food triggered hunger, and after gobbling the plate of food, he went back for seconds and another cup of coffee.

  When he went out through the rear door, there was no one in sight. The slope of birch stretched toward the coast. Off to his left, he heard two reports that sounded like shotguns. Perhaps someone out shooting duck or quail. Jonathon had said there was good hunting here.

  He had to wend his way carefully through a confused tangle of boulders to reach the shore, with pebbles grating underneath his feet. A hundred yards away the inrolling breakers shattered themselves upon randomly scattered rocks, and even where he stood he felt the thin mist of spray upon his face.

  Among the pebbles he saw a faint gleam and bent to see what it was. Closer to it, he saw that it was an agate—tennis-ball size, its fractured edge, wet with spray, giving off a waxy, translucent glint. He picked it up and polished it, rubbing off the clinging bits of sand, remembering how as a boy he had hunted agates in abandoned gravel pits. Just beyond the one he had picked up lay another one, and a bit to one side of it, a third. Crouched, he hunched forward and picked up both of them. One was bigger than the first, the second slightly smaller. Crouched there, he looked at them, admiring the texture of them, feeling once again, after many years, the thrill he had felt as a boy at finding agates. When he had left home to go to college, he remembered there had been a bag full of them still cached away in one corner of the garage. He wondered what might have become of them.