Virtual Unrealities: The Short Fiction of Alfred Bester

by Alfred Bester

  Mr. Solon Aquila nodded his head emphatically, took out a cigarette, took out a lighter, then paused, deep in thought. After a long moment, he nodded again, this time with decision, and did an astonishing thing. He returned the lighter to his pocket, took out another, glanced around quickly and lit it under Mr. Derelict’s nose.

  Mr. Derelict appeared not to notice. Mr. Derelict appeared, in one instant, to be frozen. Allowing the lighter to burn, Mr. Aquila placed it carefully on a ledge in front of the art dealer who stood before it without moving. The orange flame gleamed on his glassy eyeballs.

  Aquila darted out into the shop, searched and found a rare Chinese crystal globe. He took it from its case, warmed it against his heart, and peered into it. He mumbled. He nodded. He returned the globe to the case, went to the cashier’s desk, took a pad and pencil and began ciphering in symbols that bore no relationship to any language or any graphology. He nodded again, tore up the sheet of paper, and took out his wallet.

  From the wallet he removed a dollar bill. He placed the bill on the glass counter, took an assortment of fountain pens from his vest pocket, selected one and unscrewed it. Carefully shielding his eyes, he allowed one drop to fall from the pen point onto the bill. There was a blinding flash of light. There was a humming vibration that slowly died.

  Mr. Aquila returned the pens to his pocket, carefully picked up the bill by a corner, and ran back into the picture gallery where the art dealer still stood staring glassily at the orange flame. Aquila fluttered the bill before the sightless eyes.

  “Listen, my ancient,” Aquila whispered. “You will visit Jeffrey Halsyon this afternoon. N’est-ce-pas? You will give him this very own coin of the realm when he asks for drawing materials. Eh? God damn.” He removed Mr. Derelict’s wallet from his pocket, placed the bill inside and returned the wallet.

  “And this is why you make the visit,” Aquila continued. “It is because you have had an inspiration from le Diable Boiteux. Nolens volens, the lame devil has inspired you with a plan for healing Jeffrey Halsyon. God damn. You will show him samples of his great art of the past to bring him to his senses. Memory is the all-mother. HimmelHerrGott! You hear me, big boy? You do what I say. Go today and devil take the hindmost.”

  Mr. Aquila picked up the burning lighter, lit his cigarette and permitted the flame to go out. As he did so, he said: “No, my holy of holies! Jeffrey Halsyon is too great an artist to languish in durance vile. He must be returned to this world. He must be returned to me. È sempre l’ora. I will not be disappointed. You hear me, Jimmy? I will not!”

  “Perhaps there’s hope, Mr. Aquila,” James Derelict said. “Something’s just occurred to me while you were talking … a way to bring Jeff back to sanity. I’m going to try it this afternoon.”

  As he drew the face of the Faraway Fiend over George Washington’s portrait on a bill, Jeffrey Halsyon dictated his autobiography to nobody.

  “Like Cellini,” he recited. “Line and literature simultaneously. Hand in hand, although all art is one art, holy brothers in barbiturate, near ones and dear ones in Nembutal. Very well. I commence: I was born. I am dead. Baby wants a dollar. No—”

  He arose from the padded floor and raged from padded wall to padded wall, envisioning anger as a deep purple fury running into the pale lavenders of recrimination by the magic of his brushwork, his chiaroscuro, by the clever blending of oil, pigment, light, and the stolen genius of Jeffrey Halsyon torn from him by the Faraway Fiend whose hideous face—

  “Begin anew,” he muttered. “We darken the highlights. Start with the underpainting …” He squatted on the floor again, picked up the quill drawing pen whose point was warranted harmless, dipped it into carbon ink whose contents were warranted poisonless, and applied himself to the monstrous face of the Faraway Fiend which was replacing the first President on the dollar.

  “I was born,” he dictated to space while his cunning hand wrought beauty and horror on the banknote paper. “I had peace. I had hope. I had art. I had peace. Mama. Papa. Kin I have a glass a water? Oooo! There was a big bad bogey man who gave me a bad look; and now baby’s afraid. Mama! Baby wantsa make pretty pictures onna pretty paper for Mama and Papa. Look, Mama. Baby makin’ a picture of the bad bogey man with a mean look, a black look with his black eyes like pools of hell, like cold fires of terror, like faraway fiends from faraway fears—Who’s that!”

  The cell door unbolted. Halsyon leaped into a corner and cowered, naked and squalling, as the door was opened for the Faraway Fiend to enter. But it was only the medicine man in his white jacket and a stranger-man in black suit, black homburg, carrying a black portfolio with the initials J.D. lettered on it in a bastard gold Gothic with ludicrous overtones of Goudy and Baskerville.

  “Well, Jeffrey?” the medicine man inquired heartily.

  “Dollar?” Halsyon whined. “Kin baby have a dollar?”

  “I’ve brought an old friend, Jeffrey. You remember Mr. Derelict?”

  “Dollar,” Halsyon whined. “Baby wants a dollar.”

  “What happened to the last one, Jeffrey? You haven’t finished it yet, have you?”

  Halsyon sat on the bill to conceal it, but the medicine man was too quick for him. He snatched it up and he and the stranger-man examined it.

  “As great as all the rest,” Derelict sighed. “Greater! What a magnificent talent wasting away …”

  Halsyon began to weep. “Baby wants a dollar!” he cried.

  The stranger-man took out his wallet, selected a dollar bill and handed it to Halsyon. As soon as Halsyon touched it, he heard it sing and he tried to sing with it, but it was singing him a private song so he had to listen.

  It was a lovely dollar; smooth but not too new, with a faintly matte surface that would take ink like kisses. George Washington looked reproachful but resigned, as though he was used to the treatment in store for him. And indeed he might well be, for he was much older on this dollar. Much older than on any other, for his serial number was 5,271,009 which made him 5,000,000 years old and more, and the oldest he had ever been before was 2,000,000.

  As Halsyon squatted contentedly on the floor and dipped his pen in the ink as the dollar told him to, he heard the medicine man say, “I don’t think I should leave you alone, Mr. Derelict.”

  “No, we must be alone together, doctor. Jeff always was shy about his work. He could only discuss it with me privately.”

  “How much time would you need?”

  “Give me an hour.”

  “I doubt very much whether it’ll do any good.”

  “But there’s no harm trying?”

  “I suppose not. All right, Mr. Derelict. Call the nurse when you’re through.”

  The door opened; the door closed. The stranger-man named Derelict put his hand on Halsyon’s shoulder in a friendly, intimate way. Halsyon looked up at him and grinned cleverly, meanwhile waiting for the sound of the bolt in the door. It came; like a shot, like a final nail in a coffin.

  “Jeff, I’ve brought some of your old work with me,” Derelict said, in a voice that was only approximately casual. “I thought you might like to look it over with me.”

  “Have you got a watch on you?” Halsyon asked.

  Restraining his start of surprise at Halsyon’s normal tone, the art dealer took out his pocket watch and displayed it.

  “Lend it to me for a minute.”

  Derelict unchained the watch and handed it over. Halsyon took it carefully and said, “All right. Go ahead with the pictures.”

  “Jeff!” Derelict exclaimed. “This is you again, isn’t it? This is the way you always—”

  “Thirty,” Halsyon interrupted. “Thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, ONE.” He concentrated on the flicking second hand with rapt expectation.

  “No, I guess it isn’t,” the dealer muttered. “I only imagined you sounded—Oh well.” He opened the portfolio and began sorting mounted drawings.

  “Forty, forty-five, fifty-five, TWO.”

  “Here’s one
of your earliest, Jeff. Remember when you came into the gallery with the roughs and we thought you were the new polisher from the agency? Took you months to forgive us. You always claimed we bought your first picture just to apologize. Do you still think so?”

  “Forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, THREE.”

  “Here’s that tempera that gave you so many heartaches. I was wondering if you’d care to try another? I really don’t think tempera is as inflexible as you claim, and I’d be interested to have you try again now that your technique’s so much more mature. What do you say?”

  “Forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, FOUR.” .

  “Jeff, put down that watch.”

  “Ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five …”

  “What the devil’s the point of counting minutes?”

  “Well,” Halsyon said reasonably, “sometimes they lock the door and go away. Other times they lock up and stay and spy on you. But they never spy longer than three minutes, so I’m giving them five just to make sure. FIVE.”

  Halsyon gripped the small pocket watch in his big fist and drove the fist cleanly into Derelict’s jaw. The dealer dropped without a sound. Halsyon dragged him to the wall, stripped him naked, dressed himself in his clothes, repacked the portfolio, and closed it. He picked up the dollar bill and pocketed it. He picked up the bottle of carbon ink warranted nonpoisonous and smeared the contents over his face.

  Choking and shouting, he brought the nurse to the door.

  “Let me out of here,” Halsyon cried in a muffled voice. “That maniac tried to drown me. Threw ink in my face. I want out!”

  The door was unbolted and opened. Halsyon shoved past the nurse-man, cunningly mopping his blackened face with a hand that only masked it more. As the nurse-man started to enter the cell, Halsyon said, “Never mind Halsyon. He’s all right. Get me a towel or something. Hurry!

  The nurse-man locked the door again, turned and ran down the corridor. Halsyon waited until he disappeared into a supply room, then turned and ran in the opposite direction. He went through the heavy doors to the main wing corridor, still cleverly mopping, still sputtering with cunning indignation. He reached the main building. He was halfway out and still no alarm. He knew those brazen bells. They tested them every Wednesday noon.

  It’s like a game, he told himself. It’s fun. It’s nothing to be scared of. It’s being safely, sanely, joyously a kid again and when we quit playing I’m going home to mama and dinner and papa reading me the funnies and I’m a kid again, really a kid again, forever.

  There still was no hue and cry when he reached the main floor. He complained about his indignity to the receptionist. He complained to the protection guards as he forged James Derelict’s name in the visitor’s book, and his inky hand smeared such a mess on the page that the forgery went undetected. The guard buzzed the final gate open. Halsyon passed through into the street, and as he started away he heard the brass of the bells begin a clattering that terrified him.

  He ran. He stopped. He tried to stroll. He could not. He lurched down the street until he heard the guards shouting. He darted around a corner, and another, tore up endless streets, heard cars behind him, sirens, bells, shouts, commands. It was a ghastly Catherine wheel of flight. Searching desperately for a hiding place, Halsyon darted into the hallway of a desolate tenement.

  Halsyon began to climb the stairs. He went up three at a clip, then two, then struggled step by step as his strength failed and panic paralyzed him. He stumbled at a landing and fell against a door. The door opened. The Faraway Fiend stood within, smiling briskly, rubbing his hands.

  “Glückliche Reise,” he said. “On the dot. God damn. You twenty-three skidooed, eh? Enter, my old. I’m expecting you. Be it never so humble …”

  Halsyon screamed.

  “No, no, no! No Sturm und Drang, my beauty.” Mr. Aquila clapped a hand over Halsyon’s mouth, heaved him up, dragged him through the doorway and slammed the door.

  “Presto-chango,” he laughed. “Exit Jeffrey Halsyon from mortal ken. Dieu vous garde.”

  Halsyon freed his mouth, screamed again and fought hysterically, biting and kicking. Mr. Aquila made a clucking noise, dipped into his pocket and brought out a package of cigarettes. He flipped one out of the pack expertly and broke it under Halsyon’s nose. The artist at once subsided and suffered himself to be led to a couch, where Aquila cleansed the ink from his face and hands.

  “Better, eh?” Mr. Aquila chuckled. “Non habit-forming. God damn. Drinks now called for.”

  He filled a shot glass from a decanter, added a tiny cube of purple ice from a fuming bucket, and placed the drink in Halsyon’s hand. Compelled by a gesture from Aquila, the artist drank it off. It made his brain buzz. He stared around, breathing heavily. He was in what appeared to be the luxurious waiting room of a Park Avenue physician. Queen Anne furniture. Axminster rug. Two Hogarths and a Copley on the wall in gilt frames. They were genuine, Halsyon realized with amazement. Then, with even more amazement, he realized that he was thinking with coherence, with continuity. His mind was quite clear.

  He passed a heavy hand over his forehead. “What’s happened?” he asked faintly. “There’s like … something like a fever behind me. Nightmares.”

  “You have been sick,” Aquila replied. “I am blunt, my old. This is a temporary return to sanity. It is no feat, God damn. Any doctor can do it. Niacin plus carbon dioxide. Id genus omne. Only temporary. We must search for something more permanent.”

  “What’s this place?”

  “Here? My office. Anteroom without. Consultation room within. Laboratory to left. In God we trust.”

  “I know you,” Halsyon mumbled. “I know you from somewhere. I know your face.”

  “Oui. You have drawn and redrawn me in your fever. Ecce homo. But you have the advantage, Halsyon. Where have we met? I ask myself.” Aquila put on a brilliant speculum, tilted it over his left eye and let it shine into Halsyon’s face. “Now I ask you. Where have we met?”

  Hypnotized by the light, Halsyon answered dreamily. “At the Beaux Arts Ball… . A long time ago… . Before the fever… .”

  “Ah? Sí. It was one half year ago. I was there. An unfortunate night.”

  “No. A glorious night… . Gay, happy fun… . Like a school dance… . Like a prom in costume… .”

  “Always back to childhood, eh?” Mr. Aquila murmured. “We must attend to that. Cetera desunt, young Lochinvar. Continue.”

  “I was with Judy… . We realized we were in love that night. We realized how wonderful life was going to be. And then you passed and looked at me… . Just once. You looked at me. It was horrible.”

  “Tsk!” Mr. Aquila clicked his tongue in vexation. “Now I remember said incident. I was unguarded. Bad news from home. A pox on both my houses.”

  “You passed in red and black… . Satanic. Wearing no mask. You looked at me… . A red and black look I never forgot. A look from black eyes like pools of hell, like cold fires of terror. And with that look you robbed me of everything … of joy, of hope, of love, of life… .”

  “No, no!” Mr. Aquila said sharply. “Let us understand ourselves. My carelessness was the key that unlocked the door. But you fell into a chasm of your own making. Nevertheless, old beer and skittles, we must alter same.” He removed the speculum and shook his finger at Halsyon. “We must bring you back to the land of the living. Auxilium ab alto. Jeez. That is for why I have arranged this meeting. What I have done I will undone, eh? But you must climb out of your own chasm. Knit up the ravelled sleave of care. Come inside.”

  He took Halsyon’s arm, led him down a paneled hall, past a neat office and into a spanking white laboratory. It was all tile and glass with shelves of reagent bottles, porcelain filters, an electric oven, stock jars of acids, bins of raw materials. There was a small round elevation in the center of the floor, a sort of dais. Mr. Aquila placed a stool on the dais, placed Halsyon on the stool, got into a white lab coat and began to assemble apparatus.

  �
�You,” he chatted, “are an artist of the utmost. I do not dorer la pilule. When Jimmy Derelict told me you were no longer at work. God damn! We must return him to his muttons, I said. Solon Aquila must own many canvases of Jeffrey Halsyon. We shall cure him. Hoc age.”

  “You’re a doctor?” Halsyon asked.

  “No. Let us say a warlock. Strictly speaking a witch-pathologist. Very high class. No nostrums. Strictly modern magic. Black magic and white magic are passé, n’est-ce pas? I cover entire spectrum, specializing mostly in the 15,000 angstrom band.”

  “You’re a witch doctor? Never!”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “In this kind of place?”

  “Ah-ha? You too are deceived, eh? It is our camouflage. Many a modern laboratory you think concerns itself with toothpaste is devoted to magic. But we are scientific too. Parbleu! We move with the times, we warlocks. Witch’s Brew now complies with Pure Food and Drug Act. Familiars one hundred percent sterile. Sanitary brooms. Cellophane-wrapped curses. Father Satan in rubber gloves. Thanks to Lord Lister; or is it Pasteur? My idol.”

  The witch-pathologist gathered raw materials, consulted an ephemeris, ran off some calculations on an electronic computer and continued to chat.

  “Fugit hora,” Aquila said. “Your trouble, my old, is loss of sanity. Oui? Lost in one damn flight from reality and one damn desperate search for peace brought on by one unguarded look from me to you. Hélas! I apologize for that, R.S.V.P.” With what looked like a miniature tennis linemarker, he rolled a circle around Halsyon on the dais. “But your trouble is, to wit: You search for the peace of infancy. You should be fighting to acquire the peace of maturity, n’est-ce pas? Jeez.”

  Aquila drew circles and pentagons with a glittering compass and rule, weighed out powders on a micro-beam balance, dropped various liquids into crucibles from calibrated burettes, and continued: “Many warlocks do brisk trade in potions from Fountains of Youths. Oh yes. Are many youths and many fountains; but none for you. No. Youth is not for artists. Age is the cure. We must purge your youth and grow you up, nicht wahr?”

  “No,” Halsyon argued. “No. Youth is the art. Youth is the dream. Youth is the blessing.”