Collected Short Fiction

by C. M. Kornbluth

  Without ado he jumped for a tree and dug his toes into the grooves of the bark, shinning up it as he used to as a child. But there was nothing childlike about it now. With the creature’s flaming breath scorching his heels, he climbed like a monkey, stopping only at the third set of main branches, twenty-five feet from the ground. There he clung, limp and shuddering, and looked down.

  The creature was hopping grotesquely about the base of the tree, its baleful eyes on him. The man’s hand reached for a firmer purchase on the branch, and part came away in his hand. He had picked a sort of coconut—heavy, hard, and with sharp comers. Peter raised his eyebrows. Why not? Carefully noting the path that the creature below took around the trunk, he poised the fruit carefully. Wetting a finger, he adjusted the placing. On a free drop that long you had to allow for windage, he thought.

  Twice more around went the creature, and then its head and the murderous fruit reached the same point at the same time. There was a crunching noise which Peter could hear from where he was, and the insides of its head spilled on the forest sward.

  “Clever,” said a voice beside him on the branch.

  He turned with a cry. The speaker was only faintly visible—the diaphanous shadow of a young girl, not more than eighteen, he thought.

  Calmly it went on, “You must be very mancic to be able to land a fruit so accurately. Did he give you an extra sense?” Her tone was light, but from what he could see of her dim features, they were curled in an angry smile.

  Nearly letting go of the branch in his bewilderment, he answered as calmly as he could, “I don’t know whom you mean. And what is mancic?”

  “Innocent,” she said coldly. “Eh? I could push you off this branch without a second thought. But first you tell me where Almarish got the model for you. I might turn out a few myself. Are you a doppelgaenger or a golem?”

  “Neither,” he spat, bewildered and horrified. “I don’t even know what they are!”

  “Strange,” said the girl. “I can’t read you.” Her eyes squinted prettily and suddenly became solid, luminous wedges in her transparent face. “Well,” she sighed, “let’s get out of this.” She took the man by his elbow and dropped from the branch, hauling him after her. Ready for a sickening impact with the ground, Peter winced as his heels touched it light as a feather. He tried to disengage the girl’s grip, but it was hard as steel.

  “None of that,” she warned him. “I have a blast finger. Or didn’t he tell you?”

  “What’s a blast finger?” demanded the engineer.

  “Just so you won’t try anything,” she commented. “Watch.” Her body solidified then, and she pointed her left index finger at a middling-sized tree. Peter hardly saw what happened, being more interested in the incidental miracle of her face and figure. But his attention was distracted by a flat crash of thunder and sudden glare. And the tree was riven as if by a terrific stroke of lightning. Peter smelled ozone as he looked from the tree to the girl’s finger and back again.

  “No nonsense?” she asked.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “Come on.”

  They passed between two trees, and the vista of forest shimmered and tore, revealing a sort of palace—all white stone and maple timbers.

  “That’s my place,” said the girl.

  2

  “Now,” she said, settling herself into a cane-backed chair.

  Peter looked about the room. It was furnished comfortably with pieces of antique merit, in the best New England tradition. His gaze shifted to the girl, slender and palely luminous, with a half-smile playing about her chiseled features.

  “Do you mind,” he said slowly, “not interrupting until I’m finished with what I have to say?”

  “A message from Almarish? Go on.”

  And at that he completely lost his temper. “Listen, you snip!” he raged. “I don’t know who you are or where I am, but I’d like to tell you that this mystery isn’t funny or even mysterious—just downright rude. Do you get that? Now—my name is Peter Packer. I live in Braintree, Mass. I make my living as a consulting and industrial engineer. This place obviously isn’t Braintree, Mass. Right? Then where is it?”

  “Ellil,” said the girl simply.

  “I saw that on a sign,” said Packer. “It still doesn’t mean anything to me. Where is Ellil?”

  Her face became suddenly grave. “You may be telling the truth,” she said thoughtfully. “I do not know yet. Will you allow me to test you?”

  “Why should I?” he snapped.

  “Remember my blast finger?”

  Packer winced. “Yes,” he said. “What are the tests?”

  “The usual,” she smiled. “Rosemary and garlic, crucifixes and the secret name of Jehovah. If you get through those you’re okay.”

  “Then get on with it,” the man said confusedly.

  “Hold these.” She passed him a flowery sprig and a clove of garlic. He took them, one in each hand.

  “All right?” he asked.

  “Oh, those, yes. Now take the cross and read this name. You can put the vegetables down now.”

  He followed instructions, stammering over the harsh Hebrew word.

  In a cold fury the girl sprang to her feet and leveled her left index finger at him. “Clever,” she blazed. “But you can’t get away with it! I’ll blow you so wide open—”

  “Wait,” he pleaded. “What did I do?” The girl, though sweet-looking, seemed to be absolutely irresponsible.

  “Mispronounced the name,” she snapped. “Because you can’t say it straight without crumbling into dust!”

  He looked at the paper again, and read aloud, slowly and carefully. “Was that right?” he asked.

  Crestfallen, the girl sat down. “Yes,” she said. “I’m sorry. You seem to be okay. A real human. Now what do you want to know?”

  “Well—who are you?”

  “My name’s Millicent.” She smiled deprecatingly. “I’m a—sort of a sorceress.”

  “I can believe that,” grunted the man. “Now, why should you take me for a demon, or whatever you thought I was?”

  “Doppelgaenger,” she corrected him. “I was sure—well, I’d better begin at the beginning.

  “You see, I haven’t been a sorceress very long—only two years. My mother was a witch—a real one, and pretty first class. I’ve heard it said that she brewed the neatest spells in Ellil. All I know I learned from her—never studied it formally. My mother didn’t die a natural sort of death, you see. Almarish got her.”

  “Who’s Almarish?”

  She wrinkled her mouth with disgust. “That thug!” she spat. “He and his gang of half-breed demons are out to get control of Ellil. My mother wouldn’t stand for it—she told him so, right out flat over a multiplex apparition. And after that he was gunning for her steadily—no letup at all. And believe me, there are mighty few witches who can stand up under much of that, but Mother stood him off for fifteen years. They got my father—he wasn’t much good—a little while after I was bom. Vampires.

  “Mother got caught alone in the woods one morning without her tools—unguents, staffs and things—by a whole flock of golems and zombies.” The girl shuddered. “Some of them—well, Mother finished about half before they overwhelmed her and got a stake of myrtle through her heart. That finished her—she lost all her magic, of course, and Almarish sent an ordinary plague of ants against her. Adding insult to injury, I call it!” There were real tears of rage in her eyes.

  “And what’s this Almarish doing now?” asked Peter, fascinated.

  Millicent shrugged. “He’s after me,” she said simply. “The bandur you killed was one of my watchdogs. And I thought he’d sent you. I’m sorry.”

  “I see,” breathed the man slowly. “What powers has he?”

  “The usual, I suppose. But he has no principles about using them. And he has his gang—I can’t afford real retainers. Of course I whip up some simulacra whenever I hold a reception or anything of that sort. Just images to serve an
d take wraps. They can’t fight.”

  Peter tightened his jaw. “You must be in a pretty bad way,” he volunteered diffidently.

  The girl looked him full in the eye, her lip trembling. She choked out, “I’m in such a hell of a spot!” and then the gates opened and she was weeping as if her heart would break.

  The man stared frozenly, wondering how he could comfort a despondent sorceress. “There, there,” he said tentatively.

  She wiped her eyes and looked at him. “I’m sorry,” she said, sniffling. “But it’s seeing a fairly friendly face again after all these years—no callers but leprechauns and things. You don’t know what it’s like.”

  “I wonder,” said Peter, “how you’d like to live in Braintree.”

  “I don’t know,” she said brightly. “But how could I get there?”

  “There should be at least one way,” reflected the man.

  “But why—What was that?” shot out the girl, snatching up a wand.

  “Knock on the door,” said Peter. “Shall I open it?”

  “Please,” said Millicent nervously, holding up the slender staff.

  The man stood aside and swung the door wide. In walked a curious person of mottled red and white coloring. One eye was small and blue, the other large and savagely red. His teeth were quite normal—except that the four canines protruded two inches each out of his mouth. He walked with a limp; one shoe seemed curiously small. And there was a sort of bulge in the trousers that he wore beneath his formal morning coat.

  “May I introduce myself?” said this individual, removing his sleek black topper. “I am Balthazar Pike. You must be Miss Millicent? And this—ah—zombie?” He indicated Peter with a dirty leer.

  “Mr. Packer, Mr. Pike,” said the girl.

  Peter simply stared in horror while the creature murmured, “Enchanted.”

  Millicent drew herself up proudly. “And this, I suppose,” she said, “is the end?”

  “I fear so, Miss Millicent,” said the creature regretfully. “I have my orders. Your house has been surrounded by picked forces; any attempt to use your blast finger or any other weapon of offense will be construed as resistance. Under the laws of civilized warfare we are empowered to reduce you to ashes should such resistance be forthcoming. May I have your reply?”

  The girl surveyed him haughtily, then, with a lightning-like sweep of her wand, seemed to blot out every light in the. room. Peter heard her agitated voice. “We’re in a neutral screen, Mr. Packer. I won’t be able to keep it up for long. Listen! That was one of Almarish’s stinkers—the big cheese. He didn’t expect any trouble from me. He’ll take me captive as soon as they break the screen down. Do you want to help me?”

  “Of course!” exploded the man.

  “Good. Then you find the third oak from the front door on the left and walk widdershins three times. You’ll find out what to do from them.”

  “Walk how?” asked Peter.

  “Widdershins—counterclockwise. Lord, you’re dumb!”

  Then the lights seemed to go on again, and Peter saw that the room was filled with the half-breed creatures. With an expression of injured dignity, the formally attired Balthazar Pike asked, “Are you ready to leave now, Miss Millicent? Quite ready?”

  “Thank you, General, yes,” said the girl coldly. Two of the creatures took her arms and walked her from the room. Peter saw that as they stepped over the threshhold they vanished, all three.

  The last to leave was Pike, who turned and said to the man, “I must remind you, Mister—er—ah—that you are trespassing. This property now belongs to the Almarish Realty Corporation. All offenders will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Good day, Mister—er—ah—” With which he stepped over the doorsill and vanished.

  Hastily Peter followed him across the line, but found himself alone outside the house. For which he was grateful. “Third oak left from the door,” he repeated. Simple enough. Feeling foolish, he walked widdershins three times around and stopped dead, waiting for something.

  What a sweet, brave kid she had been! He hoped nothing would really happen to her—before he got there.

  He felt a sort of tugging at his serge trousers and stepped back in alarm. “Well?” shrilled a small voice. Peter looked down and winced. The dirtiest, most bedraggled little creature he had ever seen was regarding him with tiny, sharp eyes. There were others, too, squatting on pebbles and toadstools.

  “Miss Millicent told me to ask you what I should do,” said Peter. As the little leader of the troop glared at him he added hastily, “If you please.”

  “Likely tale,” piped the voice of the creature. “What’s in it for us?”

  “I dunno,” said the man, bewildered. “What do you want?”

  “Green cloth,” the creature answered promptly. “Lots of it. And if you have any small brass buttons, them, too.”

  Peter hastily conducted an inventory of his person. “I’m sorry,” he said hesitantly. “I haven’t any green. How about blue? I can spare my vest.” He carefully lowered the garment to the ground among the little people.

  “Looks all right,” said the leader. “Jake!” One of the creatures advanced and fingered the cloth. “Hmm—” he said. “Good material.” Then there was a whispered consultation with the leader, who at last shouted up to Peter, “Head east for water. You can’t miss it!”

  “Hey!” said Peter, blinking. But they were already gone.

  And though he widdershin-walked for the next half hour, and even tried a few incantations remembered from his childhood, they did not come back—nor did his vest.

  So, with his back to the sinking sun, he headed east for water.

  3

  The sign said: MAHOORA CITY LIMITS.

  Peter scratched his head and passed it. He had hit the stretch of highway a few miles back, once he had got out of the forest, and it seemed to be leading straight into a city of some kind. There was a glow ahead in the sky—a glow which abruptly became a glare.

  “Jeepers!” the man gasped. “Buildings—skyscrapers!” Before him reared a sort of triple Wall Street with which were combined the most spectacular features of Rockefeller Center. In the sudden way in which things happened in Ellil, he turned a sort of blind comer in the road and found himself in the thick of it.

  A taxi roared past him; with a muttered imprecation he jumped out of the way. The bustling people on the sidewalks ignored him completely. It was about six o’clock; they were probably going home from their offices. There were all sorts of people—women and girls, plain and pretty, men and boys, slim, fat, healthy and dissipated. And there, Peter saw striding along in lordly indifference, was a cop.

  “Excuse me,” said Peter, elbowing his way through the crowd to the member of Mahoora’s finest. “Can you tell me where I can find water?” That was, he realized, putting it a bit crudely. But he was hopelessly confused by the traffic and swarms of pedestrians.

  The cop turned on him with a glassy stare. “Water?” he rumbled. “Would yez be wantin’ tap, ditch, fire—or cologne?”

  The man hesitated. He didn’t know, he realized in a sudden panic. The elves, or whatever they had been, hadn’t specified. Cagily he raised his hand to his brow and muttered, “ ’Scuse me—previous engagement—made the appointment for today—just forgot—” He was edging away from the cop when he felt a hand on his arm.

  “What was that about water?” asked the cop hoarsely, putting his face near Peter’s.

  Desperately the man blurted, “The water I have to find to lick Almarish!” Who could tell? Maybe the cop would help him.

  “What?” thundered M.P.D. Shield No. 2435957607. “And me a loyal supporter of the Mayor Almarish Freedom, Peace and Progress Reform Administration?” He frowned. “You look subversive to me—come on!” He raised his nightstick suggestively, and Peter meekly followed him through the crowds.

  “How’d they get you in here?” asked Peter’s cellmate.

  Peter inspected him. He was a short, dark
sort of person with a pair of disconcertingly bright eyes. “Suspicion,” said Peter evasively. “How about you?”

  “Practicing mancy without a license, theoretically. Actually because I tried to buck the Almarish machine. You know how it is.”

  “Can’t say I do,” answered Peter. “I’m a stranger here.”

  “Yeah? Well—like this. Few years ago we had a neat little hamlet here. Mahoora was the biggest little city in these parts of Ellil, though I say it myself. A little industry—magic chalices for export, sandals of swiftness, invisibility cloaks, invincible weapons—you know?”

  “Urn,” said Peter noncommittally.

  “Well, I had a factory—modest little chemical works. We turned out love philters from my own prescription. It’s what I call a neat dodge—eliminates the balneum mariae entirely from the processing, cuts down drying time—maybe you aren’t familiar with the latest things in the line?”

  “Sorry, no.”

  “Oh—well, then, in came these plugs of Almarish’s. Flying goon squads that wrecked plants and shops on order, labor spies, provocateurs, everything. Soon they’d run out every racketeer in the place and hijacked them lock, stock and barrel. Then they went into politics. There was a little scandal about buying votes with fairy gold—people kicked when it turned into ashes. But they smoothed that over when they got in.

  “And then—! Graft right and left, patronage, unemployment, rotten-food scandals, bribery, inefficiency—everything that’s on the list And this is their fifth term. How do you like that?”

  “Lord,” said Peter, shocked. “But how do they stay in office?”

  “Oh,” grinned his friend. “The first thing they did was to run up some pretty imposing public works—tall buildings, bridges, highways and monuments. Then they let it out that they were partly made of half-stufi. You know what that is?”

  “No,” said Peter. “What is it?”