She sat up and fumbled after her clothing. I did the same. The landscapes of our bodies were fiery in the red star’s light.
Minutes later, arms about each other, we entered the lift and plunged earthward. As we passed out of the city she gestured lightly and a sprinkling of stars occurred in the eastern half of the sky. “They figure in the earliest consciousness of the race,” she commented. “Some anthropologists tell us that the earliest myths, with their hopes, fears, and ideals, had their roots in the constellations. Or was it the other way around? No matter. Religion, philosophy, tales of adventure and romance may all go back to the pictures in the sky.” She gestured again and the Big Dipper appeared.
“Uh, how does a dipper figure in religion, philosophy, and romance?” I asked.
She paused, there on the hilltop, and stared at it, wrinkling her nose in a most becoming fashion. “You want to talk principles or you want to talk cases?” she asked.
“Sorry.”
“You want religion and philosophy—romance and adventure, too—there!” She waggled a finger at the western sky and a constellation I had never seen before appeared—a great snaky showpiece twisted into the rough approximation of a figure eight, glowing with a multicolored mass of gemlike stars.
“My God! That’s lovely!” I said.
“From my home world—Serpena—Ouroboros can be seen. And there is God’s Web, from Arachne V.” She indicated its net-like lineaments in the northeast. “… And the Reflected Face.” she said, pushing aside the Dipper to hang a blazing countenance, only vaguely human, at midheaven.
Walking on, discussing life, cosmology, ethics, and the fine structure constant, she continued to rearrange the skies, announcing, periodically, “The Finger of Manu,” “Mother Tree,” and “Heaven’s Staff Car.”
Finally, with great care and explanation, she created some of her own, to demonstrate the complexes of psychological, anthropological, and animistic/philosophical notions which must have colored our primitive ancestors’ thinking when they turned their gaze skyward. Glory’s own constellations were graceful, profound, to the point.
Gathering our picnic supplies, we moved to exit the world she had made, somehow wiser, pleased that our relationship had graduated from the merely physical to higher intellectual levels where we experienced each other’s thought processes with amazing congruity and full agreement as to life’s major values and the ends of philosophy. Reaching for the door to our other reality, I bade the night good night.
Back in our kitchen drinking a cup of coffee, I did a sudden review of my situation: If I were to believe what I had been told, I was a clone, identical to seven guys hanging in the Hellhole. I was also, somehow, from the distant future. For these reasons, Adam had made me a temporary junior executive so that he could keep an eye on me. Medusa, my Glory, may or may not have set out initially to seduce me only to learn what information she could, but now it was for real. Now it was genuine affection we felt for each other. Of course, she had learned everything she could about me along the way… .
I had to admit that I hadn’t thought much lately concerning my ability to defend myself, as the need to do so had not occurred in recent years. Had I really picked all that up on the street, in the old neighborhood? I knew I hadn’t gotten it at Brown.
”Glory,” I said, looking across the room to where she was preparing herself a small ethnic dish I did not wish to scrutinize too closely, “I want to get to the bottom of this thing as badly as you do, so here’s my plan.”
“Yes?” she responded.
“I am going to finish my coffee, throw the Switch, and wish myself to my office at Rigadoon magazine in New York.”
“They may be closed. Hard to say what the time will be.”
I shrugged.
“In that case, I will go to my apartment and call my boss, Jerome Egan. It’s no coincidence that I was given this assignment—not with my clones hanging around in there.” I gestured toward the Hellhole. “I’ve got to find out how it came about, who set it up. I’ve got to learn how I could be the two different people I’d pretty much have to be.”
“And if you can learn that?”
“I’ll come back and tell you, and we can figure out what to do about it.”
“Either that, or it will remind you of your agenda, and when you return we will no longer be friends.”
“Granting that such a thing might happen, you have no way of knowing it for certain.”
She shook her head, a slow undulation.
“Then you shall accompany me, to learn for yourself whatever I learn.”
She tasted the thing in the pan and smiled, then transferred it to a dish.
“And if I learn something terrible shall I kill you?” she asked.
I laughed, a little too tightly.
“We all do what we must,” I said. “Sometimes that includes trust.”
She cut a portion of the fare and ate it. “Very well,” she said then. “I’ll go with you.”
We both laughed. I watched her sharp teeth flash as I finished my coffee.
Looking eminently rested and respectable in the foyer’s small mirror, I moved to the niche and threw the Switch. Then I went to the door and flung it wide. Evening shadows lay upon the Etruscan Forum.
“Morning in New York,” I said. “I think my timing’s good.”
Then my gaze was caught by a wine bottle where before I had seen a bundle of rags. I stooped and retrieved it from the entranceway, held it up, and turned it slowly.
“Strange shape,” Glory remarked.
I passed it to her.
“Classic Klein bottle format,” I said, “the visualization of which was once explained by Isaac Asimov as follows: Imagine a goose that bends its neck forward and begins eating its way downward into its own midsection. After a time, its head emerges from its anus and it opens its beak wide. Quietus. Freeze-frame. This is how these things are done.”
“Fascinating,” she said, setting it atop a sidetable as I secured the door. “And that is the bottle you gave to Urtch?”
“Yes. Ruffino.”
She nodded and took my arm.
“The universe chooses to address us in a typical fashion. Take me to your office, Alf.”
“Indeed, m’lady.”
I adjusted my ascot, visualized, and wished.
A moment later we stood in my office in Manhattan. I cast a quick glance about me. Everything seemed to be where I’d left it.
“They don’t seem to have fired me in my absence,” I said.
I opened my door and stepped into the larger, outer office.
Empty. Still. According to the clock, it should be bustling. I moved to the nearest desk and consulted its day-calendar.
“Sunday,” I announced. “It’s what I get for losing track. Easily remedied, though. We can wish our way back, then have the singularity deliver us two days ago, or tomorrow. …”
“No!” she said. “It’s not good to play with Time in matters which ultimately involve Time.”
“A future superstition?”
“More than that. There are ways for Time to gang up on you.”
“Okay. No problem. I’ll just phone Jerry from here.” I returned to my office, got an outside line, punched his number.
“Jerry,” I said, “it’s me, Alf.”
“Where are you?”
“Here in town. At the office.”
“Was there a story? Or are you writing it off?”
“No story yet, but there’s a lot of interesting material. I just came back for a few things I need. I wanted to ask you something about this assignment, though.”
There followed a silence. Then, “Like what?” he said.
“Oh, how it came to be—just now. Why I got—”
“Alf. Go home.”
“But—”
“Just go home and wait.”
He hung up.
“We’re meeting at my apartment,” I said. “Is it okay to jump back to Rome and then j
ump there, so long as I don’t mess with Time? Or—”
“Take a taxi,” she told me.
Growling, I led her through the offices. How could I have been plotting bizarre plots when I remembered working here for so long?
We descended and walked a couple of blocks before we located a cab. It was easy to be spoiled by the Hellhole.
My place was as I had left it, relatively neat—as the cleaning lady had been by that final morning—and I showed Glory the living room, dining room, kitchen, and den. We entered the bedroom, where she gazed at the king-sized bed, and said, “We really ought to, before we go back.”
“Indeed,” I replied. “It would be a shame—” and the callbox buzzed.
“Alf here, “I said.
“There’s a Mr. Egan wants to see you.”
“Send him up,” I said.
I felt a strong need to empty my bladder.
“Excuse me, Glory,” I said. “Won’t be but a minute.”
After I’d switched on the light and closed the bathroom door behind me, however, I’d a feeling it might be a little more than a minute. It had to do with the way my reflection maintained eye contact while talking to me:
“Alf,” it said, “don’t try to make it a dialogue. Just listen. I am your earlier self, and this message is a post-hypnotic implant. It could only be set off if you were working on the soul-swapper story, had returned for information concerning the assignment, and had a message that your boss was on his way to see you. That triggered the bladder reflex and the present ambience is stimulus for the rest. You must remember that I am Paul Jensen—meaning that you were Paul Jensen. This will self-explain in a few minutes. I have ranged up and down several decades to set this up. The rest should self-explain later. Ask Jerry all the questions you were going to ask him. Then, afterwards, ask him to dowse your apartment. This is very important. We’ve concealed—”
There came a knocking on the door.
“Yes?” I asked.
“I believe your boss is just outside,” she said.
“Wait a minute. Don’t let him in,” I told her. “First, go to the shorter chest of drawers, across the room from the foot of the bed. Third drawer down. Get me a fresh pair of shorts.”
“Sure thing, Alf.”
The post-hypnotic had not included any special relief for the micturition response. Hence, my bladder had decided to take care of itself while I listened to my earlier self, and I hadn’t even noticed till Glory knocked. I’d have to remember that if I ever set up another of these. Too bad about the end of the message, though.
There came a short knock, the door opened a few inches, and a slim hand entered, bearing a pair of my shorts.
“Thanks.”
After cleaning myself and tossing the damp ones into the hamper, I let myself out and followed the voices to the living room.
“Jerry,” I said, “thanks for being so prompt. This is Glory. She works at—”
“Yes, we’ve met,” he responded, wringing my hand more briskly than usual. He took a step toward a chair, paused, and said, “Terribly busy week. You have some problem with the current job?”
“No, no problem,” I said. “Just something concerning how it came about. Sit down and let me get you a cup of coffee—or something stronger, if you’d like.”
He made a show of looking at his watch.
“What the hell. Make it a Scotch and soda,” he said.
“Glory?”
“A tough, dry, red wine.”
“Okay.”
“What’s wrong with this picture?” I said. “I got the soul-changer assignment.”
“It’s your sort of story. You’ve always enjoyed investigating the oddball, off-the-beaten-track sort of thing.”
“Agreed. But this time there was more to it—some directive, some pressure, some caution to secrecy.”
He sighed and stared into his glass. Then he nodded and took a sip.
“Yes, there was a telephone call. From one of the publishing company’s owners. He said he wanted the story covered now. And he wanted you to do it. I was not to mention his name.”
“How about half of his name?” I asked. “Like if I were to say ‘Paul’?”
“And I were to say ‘Jensen’?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Actually, it’s fairly innocuous. We’re related, and it looks like he thought he was doing me some sort of favor. It is my sort of thing, and he knew the place was not all that well-known. I think he wanted to give me an exclusive.”
I took a drink.
“I’d rather you didn’t mention I told you,” he said.
“No, I won’t. Nothing really turns on it now. I just wanted to check on a suspicion.”
“I’ll have to start being nicer to you.”
I laughed. “One more thing,” I said, “and you’re ahead of the game.”
“What’s that?”
“I’d like you to dowse the apartment.”
“Thinking of digging a well?”
“No, but I’ve misplaced something and I’ve heard that you guys can find anything.”
“That’s my old man. I’m rusty.”
“Please.”
“Sure. Get me a wire coathanger.”
I went off to a closet and brought one back for him. He crimped it in the middle and bent both arms downward.
“All right,” he said. “What are we looking for?”
“Give me a thrill and try without knowing/’ I said. “I’ve heard that it doesn’t really matter.”
He rose.
“So long as you don’t do an article about it for someone else.” Holding the hanger by its two arms he strolled the length of the room, entered the dining area, and turned left. “It’s in the bedroom,” he said, as he went in there.
We followed him. The hanger seemed to jerk to his right. Glory licked her lips and followed him toward the taller dresser, standing between the closet and bathroom doors. She followed him on his right, I on his left as he approached it. The wire jerked downward, indicating the second drawer. Glory reached forward and drew it open. Handkerchiefs and shorts to the right, rolled socks to the left…
… and I knew somehow, even before Jerry’s hanger began drifting leftward. I reached forward, plunged my hand in among the socks, and felt around. Glory uttered a brief hiss as I located and withdrew a small, strangely heavy, cheap-looking, cloth-covered box. I flipped it open immediately to reveal a pair of oval, gray metal cuff links inscribed with a Celtic design.
“That what you were looking for, Alf?” Jerry asked.
“Yes. Thank you very much.”
“Hardly anyone wears cuff links these days,” he observed.
“I do have a use for them and these are of particular sentimental value,” I said, suddenly somehow understanding exactly where the value lay, as I withdrew the links from the case and handed them to Glory. “Here. Would you keep these for me?” I said. “Till I need them?”
Her eyes met mine as her fist closed upon the jewelry, and she smiled. I shut the case and moved as if to replace it among the socks. I palmed it as I did so, and after I closed the drawer I slipped it into the side pocket of my jacket.
“Let’s go finish our drinks,” I said.
After Jerry left, Glory came across the room and into my arms.
“Thanks for the show of faith,” she said. “You make it hard to doubt you.”
I held her with my right arm, as I let my left hang to the side to cover the box in my pocket against her quick frisking movements. After all, I could have picked up something else in the bathroom.
“I told you that’s how it would be,” I said.
“What are their significance?” she asked.
“I have no idea. I’ve never seen them before. Didn’t know they were there. You must have ways of testing objects for unusual properties.”
She nodded. “Of course. And what of this Paul Jensen?”
“A great-uncle, well-heeled, somewhat eccentric. Always kindly disp
osed toward me. Haven’t seen him in years, though. It may take a while to run him down and learn his interest in this.”
“Then let’s go test the links,” she said.
Double-wish, and we were in the foyer, facing the living room where one sofa was totally dominated by a crustaceous-looking individual five or six feet in length who, in the claw at the end of one of its many articulated limbs, held a great mug of what looked to be swamp water. Membranous wings of indeterminate outline were draped over the cushions at its back, and its head was covered with a forest of short antennae. The head, which was apple -green, darkened on our appearance. A dull metal, tube-like canister stood upon the floor before it. The side facing me bore a grid, and what appeared to be a small control panel. Its uppermost end was covered by some clear material, and when I moved nearer later I detected within its shadowy recesses contours strongly suggesting those of a human brain.
Adam Maser Macavity, the Kaleideion, stood before it, left foot on an ottoman, left elbow on left knee, left hand supporting his chin. He had on a black suit and a white shirt opened at the neck, and he held a drink in his right hand. He was leaning forward listening to the buzzing noises the creature made. These sounds ceased immediately on its regarding us.
“Why, hello,” Adam stated, smiling, and lowering his left hand. “Allow me to introduce Gomi, the most interesting messenger I’ve ever encountered.” Then, “Gomi, these are my associates, Alf and Medusa. We’re all in this together.”
Gomi nodded his antennae. “It is good to meet the lady who makes men stiff,” he said buzzingly, “and the man who is a sacred river.”
Adam raised his eyebrows. “Sacred river?” he said.
“‘In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree,’” Gomi buzzed, giving me a beat in which to come in and finish, “‘Where Alf the sacred river ran through caverns measureless to man.’”
Adam groaned, while I grinned at Gomi. Glory just stared and said, “That is awful.”
Gomi’s buzzings followed the rhythms of laughter and he raised his brackish-looking drink, sipping off some of the small mushrooms that floated on its surface. Noting Glory’s gaze, “Tastes worse,” he said. “But you wouldn’t want to be in the same room as an alien with turista.”
Psychoshop Page 9
