Double Star

by Robert A. Heinlein

“I was going to say that I don’t regard smuggling as a crime.”

  “Who does? Except those who make money off the rest of us by limiting trade. But this is a straight impersonation job, Lorenzo, and you are the man for it. It wasn’t an accident that I ran across you in the bar; there had been a tail on you for two days. As soon as I hit dirt I went where you were.” He frowned. “I wish I could be sure our honorable antagonists had been following me, and not you.”

  “Why?”

  “If they were following me they were trying to find out what I was after—which is okay, as the lines were already drawn; we knew we were mutual enemies. But if they were following you, then they knew what I was after—an actor who could play the role.”

  “But how could they know that? Unless you told them?”

  “Lorenzo, this thing is big, much bigger than you imagine. I don’t see it all myself—and the less you know about it until you must, the better off you are. But I can tell you this: a set of personal characteristics was fed into the big computer at the System Census Bureau at The Hague and the machine compared them with the personal characteristics of every male professional actor alive. It was done as discreetly as possible but somebody might have guessed—and talked. The specifications amounted to identification both of the principal and the actor who could double for him, since the job had to be perfect.”

  “Oh. And the machine told you that I was the man for it?”

  “Yes. You—and one other.”

  This was another good place for me to keep my mouth shut. But I could not have done so if my life had depended on it—which in a way it did. I just had to know who the other actor was who was considered competent to play a role which called for my unique talents. “This other one? Who is he?”

  Dak looked me over; I could see him hesitate. “Mmm—fellow by the name of Orson Trowbridge. Know him?”

  “That ham!” For a moment I was so furious that I forgot my nausea.

  “So? I hear that he is a very good actor.”

  I simply could not help being indignant at the idea that anyone should even think about that oaf Trowbridge for a role for which I was being considered. “That arm-waver! That wordmouther!” I stopped, realizing that it was more dignified to ignore such colleagues—if the word fits. But that popinjay was so conceited that—well, if the role called for him to kiss a lady’s hand, Trowbridge would fake it by kissing his own thumb instead. A narcissist, a poseur, a double fake—how could such a man live a role?

  Yet such is the injustice of fortune that his sawings and rantings had paid him well while real artists went hungry.

  “Dak, I simply cannot see why you considered him for it.”

  “Well, we didn’t want him; he is tied up with some long-term contract that would make his absence conspicuous and awkward. It was lucky for us that you were—uh, ‘at liberty.’ As soon as you agreed to the job I had Jock send word to call off the team that was trying to arrange a deal with Trowbridge.”

  “I should think so!”

  “But—see here, Lorenzo, I’m going to lay it on the line. While you were busy whooping your cookies after Brennschluss I called the Go For Broke and told them to pass the word down to get busy on Trowbridge again.”

  “What?”

  “You asked for it, shipmate. See here, a man in my racket contracts to herd a heap to Ganymede, that means he will pilot that pot to Ganymede or die trying. He doesn’t get fainthearted and try to welsh while the ship is being loaded. You told me you would take this job—no ‘ifs’ or ‘ands’ or ‘buts’—you took the job. A few minutes later there is a fracas; you lose your nerve. Later you try to run out on me at the field. Only ten minutes ago you were screaming to be taken back dirtside. Maybe you are a better actor than Trowbridge. I wouldn’t know. But I know we need a man who can be depended on not to lose his nerve when the time comes. I understand that Trowbridge is that sort of bloke. So if we can get him, well use him instead, pay you off and tell you nothing and ship you back. Understand?”

  Too well I understood. Dak did not use the word—I doubt if he would have understood it—but he was telling me that I was not a trouper. The bitter part about it was that he was justified. I could not be angry; I could only be ashamed. I had been an idiot to accept the contract without knowing more about it—but I had agreed to play the role, without conditions or escape clauses. Now I was trying to back out, like a rank amateur with stage fright.

  “The show must go on” is the oldest tenet of show business. Perhaps it has no philosophical verity, but the things men live by are rarely subject to logical proof. My father had believed it—I had seen him play two acts with a burst appendix and then take his bows before he had let them rush him to a hospital. I could see his face now, looking at me with the contempt of a trouper for a so-called actor who would let an audience down.

  “Dak,” I said humbly, “I am very sorry. I was wrong.”

  He looked at me sharply. “You’ll do the job?”

  “Yes.” I meant it sincerely. Then I suddenly remembered a factor which could make the part as impossible for me as the role of Snow White in The Seven Dwarfs. “That is—well, I want to. But—”

  “But what?” he said scornfully. “More of your damned temperament?”

  “No, no! But you said we were going to Mars. Dak, am I going to be expected to do this impersonation with Martians around me?”

  “Eh? Of course. How else on Mars?”

  “Uh… But, Dak, I can’t stand Martians! They give me the heebie jeebies. I wouldn’t want to—I would try not to—but I might fall right out of the characterization.”

  “Oh. If that is all that is worrying you, forget it.”

  “Huh? But I can’t forget it. I can’t help it. I—”

  “I said, ‘Forget it.’ Old son, we knew you were a peasant in such matters—we know all about you. Lorenzo, your fear of Martians is as childish and irrational as a fear of spiders or snakes. But we had anticipated it and it will be taken care of. So forget it.”

  “Well—all right.” I was not much reassured, but he had flicked me where it hurt. “Peasant”—why, “peasants” were the audience! So I shut up.

  Dak pulled the communicator to him, did not bother to silence his message with the rumble box: “Dandelion to Tumbleweed—cancel Plan Inkblot. We will complete Mardi Gras.”

  “Dak?” I said as he signed off.

  “Later,” he answered. “I’m about to match orbits. The contact may be a little rough, as I am not going to waste time worrying about chuck holes. So pipe down and hang on.”

  And it was rough. By the time we were in the torchship I was glad to be comfortably back in free fall again; surge nausea is even worse than everyday drop-sickness. But we did not stay in free fall more than five minutes; the three men who were to go back in the Can Do were crowding into the transfer lock even as Dak and I floated into the torchship. The next few moments were extremely confused. I suppose I am a ground hog at heart for I disorient very easily when I can’t tell the floor from the ceiling. Someone called out, “Where is he?” Dak replied, “Here!” The same voice replied, “Him?” as if he could not believe his eyes.

  “Yes, yes!” Dak answered. “He’s got make-up on. Never mind, it’s all right. Help me get him into the cider press.”

  A hand grabbed my arm, towed me along a narrow passage and into a compartment. Against one bulkhead and flat to it were two bunks, or “cider presses,” the bathtub-shaped, hydraulic, pressure-distribution tanks used for high acceleration in torchships. I had never seen one before but we had used quite convincing mock-ups in the space opus The Earth Raiders.

  There was a stenciled sign on the bulkhead behind the bunks: WARNING!!! Do Not Take More than Three Gravities without a Gee Suit. By Order of—I rotated slowly out of range of vision before I could finish reading it and someone shoved me into one cider press. Dak and the other men were hurriedly strapping me against it when a horn somewhere near by broke into a horrid hooting. It continued f
or several seconds, then a voice replaced it: “Red warning! Two gravities! Three minutes! Red warning! Two gravities! Three minutes!” Then the hooting started again.

  Through the racket I heard Dak ask urgently, “Is the projector all set? The tapes ready?”

  “Sure, sure!”

  “Got the hypo?” Dak squirmed around in the air and said to me, “Look, shipmate, we’re going to give you a shot. It’s all right. Part of it is Nullgrav, the rest is a stimulant—for you are going to have to stay awake and study your lines. It will make your eyeballs feel hot at first and it may make you itch, but it won’t hurt you.”

  “Wait, Dak, I—”

  “No time! I’ve got to smoke this scrap heap!” He twisted and was out the door before I could protest. The second man pushed up my left sleeve, held an injection gun against the skin, and I had received the dose before I knew it. Then he was gone. The hooting gave way to: “Red warning! Two gravities! Two minutes!”

  I tried to look around but the drug made me even more confused. My eyeballs did feel hot and my teeth as well and I began to feel an almost intolerable itching along my spine—but the safety straps kept me from reaching the tortured area—and perhaps kept me from breaking an arm at acceleration. The hooting stopped again and this time Dak’s self-confident baritone boomed out, “Last red warning! Two gravities! One minute! Knock off those pinochle games and spread your fat carcasses—we’re goin’ to smoke!” The hooting was replaced this time by a recording of Arkezian’s AdAstra, opus 61 in C major. It was the controversial London Symphony version with the 14-cycle “scare” notes buried in the timpani. Battered, bewildered, and doped as I was, they seemed to have no effect on me—you can’t wet a river.

  A mermaid came in the door. No scaly tail, surely, but a mermaid is what she looked like. When my eyes refocused I saw that it was a very likely looking and adequately mammalian young woman in singlet and shorts, swimming along head first in a way that made clear that free fall was no novelty to her. She glanced at me without smiling, placed herself against the other cider press, and took hold of the hand grips—she did not bother with safety belts. The music hit the rolling finale and I felt myself grow very heavy.

  Two gravities is not bad, not when you are floating in a liquid bed. The skin over the top of the cider press pushed up around me, supporting me inch by inch; I simply felt heavy and found it hard to breathe. You hear these stories about pilots torching at ten gravities and ruining themselves and I have no doubt that they are true—but two gravities, taken in the cider press, simply makes one feel languid, unable to move.

  It was some time before I realized that the horn in the ceiling was speaking to me. “Lorenzo! How are you doing, shipmate?”

  “All right.” The effort made me gasp. “How long do we have to put up with this?”

  “About two days.”

  I must have moaned, for Dak laughed at me. “Quit bellyaching, chum! My first trip to Mars took thirty-seven weeks, every minute of it free fall in an elliptical orbit. You’re taking the luxury route, at a mere double gee for a couple of days—with a one-gee rest at turnover, I might add. We ought to charge you for it.”

  I started to tell him what I thought of his humor in scathing green-room idiom, then recalled that there was a lady present. My father had taught me that a woman will forgive any action, up to and including assault with violence, but is easily insulted by language; the lovelier half of our race is symbol-oriented—very strange, in view of their extreme practicality. In any case, I have never let a taboo word pass my lips when it might offend the ears of a lady since the time I last received the back of my father’s hard hand full on my mouth… Father could have given Professor Pavlov pointers in reflex conditioning.

  But Dak was speaking again. “Penny! You there, honey chile?”

  “Yes, Captain,” the young woman with me answered.

  “Okay, start him on his homework. I’ll be down when I have this firetrap settled in its groove.”

  “Very well, Captain.” She turned her head toward me and said in a soft, husky, contralto voice, “Dr. Capek wants you simply to relax and look at movies for several hours. I am here to answer questions as necessary.”

  I sighed. “Thank goodness someone is at last going to answer questions!”

  She did not answer, but raised an arm with some difficulty and passed it over a switch. The lights in the compartment died out and a sound and stereo image built up in front of my eyes. I recognized the central figure—just as any of the billions of citizens of the Empire would have recognized him—and I realized at last how thoroughly and mercilessly Dak Broadbent had tricked me.

  It was Bonforte.

  The Bonforte, I mean—the Right Honorable John Joseph Bonforte, former Supreme Minister, leader of the loyal opposition, and head of the Expansionist coalition—the most loved (and the most hated!) man in the entire Solar System.

  My astonished mind made a standing broad jump and arrived at what seemed a logical certainty. Bonforte had lived through at least three assassination attempts—or so the news reports would have us believe. At least two of his escapes had seemed almost miraculous. Suppose they were not miraculous? Suppose they had all been successful—but dear old Uncle Joe Bonforte had always been somewhere else at the time?

  You could use up a lot of actors that way.

  3

  I had never meddled in politics. My father had warned against it. “Stay out of it, Larry,” he had told me solemnly. “The publicity you get that way is bad publicity. The peasants don’t like it.” I had never voted—not even after the amendment of ‘98 made it easy for the floating population (which includes, of course, most members of the profession) to exercise franchise.

  However, insofar as I had political leanings of any sort, they certainly did not lean toward Bonforte. I considered him a dangerous man and very possibly a traitor to the human race. The idea of standing up and getting killed in his place was—how shall I put it?—distasteful to me.

  But—what a role!

  I had once played the lead in L’Aiglon and I had played Caesar in the only two plays about him worthy of the name. But to play such a role in life—well, it is enough to make one understand how a man could go to the guillotine in another man’s place—just for the chance to play, even for a few moments, the ultimately exacting role, in order to create the supreme, the perfect, work of art.

  I wondered who my colleagues had been who had been unable to resist that temptation on those earlier occasions. They had been artists, that was certain—though their very anonymity was the only tribute to the success of their characterizations. I tried to remember just when the earlier attempts on Bonforte’s life had taken place and which colleagues who might have been capable of the role had died or dropped out of sight at those times. But it was useless. Not only was I not too sure of the details of current political history but also actors simply fade out of view with depressing frequency; it is a chancy profession even for the best of us.

  I found that I had been studying closely the characterization.

  I realized I could play it. Hell, I could play it with one foot in a bucket and a smell of smoke backstage. To begin with, there was no problem of physique; Bonforte and I could have swapped clothes without a wrinkle. These childish conspirators who had shanghaied me had vastly overrated the importance of physical resemblance, since it means nothing if not backed up by art—and need not be at all close if the actor is competent. But I admit that it does help and their silly game with the computer machine had resulted (quite by accident!) in selecting a true artist, as well as one who was in measurements and bony structure the twin of the politician. His profile was much like mine; even his hands were long, narrow, and aristocratic like mine—and hands are harder than faces.

  That limp, supposedly the result of one of the attempts on his life—nothing to it! After watching him for a few minutes I knew that I could get up from that bed (at one gravity, that is) and walk in precisely the same way and
never have to think about it. The way he had of scratching his collarbone and then brushing his chin, the almost imperceptible tic which preceded each of his sentences—such things were no trouble; they soaked into my subconscious like water into sand.

  To be sure, he was fifteen or twenty years older than I was, but it is easier to play a role older than oneself than one younger. In any case, age to an actor is simply a matter of inner attitude; it has nothing to do with the steady march of catabolism.

  I could have played him on boards, or read a speech in his place, within twenty minutes. But this part, as I understood it, would be more than such an interpretation; Dak had hinted that I would have to convince people who knew him well, perhaps in intimate circumstances. This is surpassingly more difficult. Does he take sugar in his coffee? If so, how much? Which hand does he use to strike a cigarette and with what gesture? I got the answer to that one and planted it deep in my mind even as I phrased the question; the simulacrum in front of me struck a cigarette in a fashion that convinced me that he had used matches—and the old-fashioned sort of gasper—for years before he had gone along with the march of so-called progress.

  Worst of all, a man is not a single complexity; he is a different complexity to every person who knows him—which means that, to be successful, an impersonation must change for each “audience”—for each acquaintance of the man being impersonated. This is not merely difficult; it is statistically impossible. Such little things could trip one up. What shared experiences does your principal have with acquaintance John Jones? With a hundred, or a thousand, John Joneses? How could an impersonator possibly know?

  Acting per se, like all art, is a process of abstracting, of retaining only significant detail. But in impersonation any detail can be significant. In time, something as silly as not crunching celery could let the cat out of the bag.

  Then I recalled with glum conviction that my performance probably need be convincing only long enough for a marksman to draw a bead on me.