Immortality, Inc

by Robert Sheckley

  Marie Thorne went into one of the bedrooms. She returned in a high-collared housedress and sat down on a couch opposite him.

  “Well, Blaine, what are your plans?”

  “I thought I'd ask you for a loan.”

  “Certainly.”

  “In that case my plan is to find a hotel room and start looking for a job.”

  “It won't be easy,” she said, “but I know some people who might —”

  “No thanks,” Blaine said. “I hope this doesn't sound too silly, but I'd rather find a job on my own.”

  “No, it doesn't sound silly. I just hope it's possible. How about some dinner?”

  “Fine. Do you cook, too?”

  “I set dials,” she told him. “Let's see. How would you like a genuine Martian meal?”

  “No thanks,” Blaine said. “Martian food is tasty, but it doesn't stick to your ribs. Would you happen to have a steak around the place?”

  Marie set the dials and her auto-chef did the rest, selecting the food from pantry and freezer, peeling, unwrapping, washing and cooking them, and ordering new items to replace those used. The meal was perfect; but Marie seemed oddly embarrassed about it. She apologized to Blaine for the completely mechanical operation. After all, he came from an age in which women had opened their own cans, and done their own tasting; but they'd probably had more leisure time, too.

  The sun had set by the time they finished their coffee. Blaine said, “Thank you very much, Miss Thorne. Now if you could loan me that money, I'll get started.”

  She looked surprised. “At night?”

  “I'll find a hotel room. You've been very kind, but I wouldn't want to presume any further —”

  “That's all right,” she said. “Stay here tonight.”

  “All right,” Blaine said. His mouth was suddenly dry, and his heart was pounding with suspicious rapidity. He knew there was nothing personal in her invitation; but his body didn't seem to understand. It insisted upon reacting hopefully, expectantly even, to the controlled and antiseptic Miss Thorne.

  She gave him a bedroom and a pair of green pajamas. Blaine closed the door when she left, undressed and got into bed. The light went out when he told it to.

  In a little while, just as his body had expected, Miss Thorne came in wearing something white and gossamer, and lay down beside him.

  They lay side by side in silence. Marie Thorne moved closer to him, and Blaine slipped an arm under her head.

  He said, “I thought you weren't attracted to my type.”

  “Not exactly. I said I preferred tall, lean men.”

  “I was once a tall, lean man.”

  “I suspected it.”

  They were both silent. Blaine began to grow uncomfortable and apprehensive. What did this mean? Had she some fondness for him? Or was this simply a custom of the age, a sort of Eskimo hospitality? “Miss Thorne,” he said, “I wonder if —”

  “Oh be quiet!” she said, suddenly turning toward him, her eyes enormous in the shadowy room. “Do you have to question everything, Tom?” Later she said, dreamily, “Under the circumstances, I think you can call me Marie.”

  In the morning Blaine showered, shaved and dressed. Marie dialed a breakfast for them. After they had eaten she gave him a small envelope.

  “I can loan you more when you need it,” she said. “Now about finding a job —”

  “You've helped me very much,” Blaine said. “The rest I'd like to do on my own.”

  “All right. My address and telephone number are on the envelope. Please call me as soon as you have a hotel.”

  “I will,” Blaine said, watching her closely. There was no hint of the Marie of last night. It might have been a different person entirely. But her studied self-possession was reaction enough for Blaine. Enough, at least for the moment.

  At the door she touched his arm. “Tom,” she said, “please be careful. And call me.”

  “I will, Marie,” Blaine said.

  He went into the city happy and refreshed, and intent upon conquering the world.

  12

  Blaine's first idea had been to make a round of the yacht-design offices. But he decided against it simply by picturing a yacht designer from 1806 walking into an office in 1958.

  The quaint old man might be very talented; but how would that help him when he was asked what he knew about metacentric shelf analysis, flow diagrams, centers of effort, and the best locations for RDF and sonar? What company would pay him while he learned the facts about reduction gears, exfoliating paints, tank testing, propeller pitch, heat exchange systems, synthetic sailcloth…

  Not a chance, Blaine decided. He couldn't walk into a design office 152 years behind the times and ask for a job. A job as what? Perhaps he could study and catch up to 2110 technology. But he'd have to do it on his own time.

  Right now, he'd take anything he could get.

  He went to a newsstand and purchased a micro-film New York Times and a viewer. He walked until he found a bench, sat down and turned to the classified ads. Quickly he skipped past the skilled categories, where he couldn't hope to qualify, and came to unskilled labor. He read:

  “Set-up man wanted in auto-cafeteria. Requires only basic knowledge of robotics.”

  “Hull wiper wanted, Mar-Coling liner. Must be Rh positive and fortified anticlaustrophobiac.”

  “List man needed for hi-tensile bearing decay work. Needs simple jenkling knowledge. Meals included.”

  It was apparent to Blaine that even the unskilled labor of 2110 was beyond his present capacity. Turning the page to Employment for Boys, he read:

  “Wanted, young man interested in slic-trug machinery. Good future. Must know basic calculus and have working knowledge Hootean Equations.”

  “Young Men wanted, salesmen's jobs on Venus. Salary plus commission. Knowledge basic French, German, Russian and Ourescz.”

  “Delivery, Magazine, Newspaper boys wanted by Eth-Col agency. Must be able to drive a Sprening. Good knowledge of city required.”

  So — he couldn't even qualify as a newsboy! It was a depressing thought. Finding a job was going to be more difficult than he had imagined. Didn't anyone dig ditches or carry packages in this city? Did robots do all the menial work, or did you need a Ph.D. even to lug a wheelbarrow? What sort of world was this?

  He turned to the front page of the Times for an answer, adjusted his viewer, and read the news of the day:

  A new spacefield was under construction at Oxa, New South Mars.

  A poltergeist was believed responsible for several industrial fires in the Chicago area. Tentative exorcism proceedings were under way.

  Rich copper deposits had been discovered in the Sigma-G sector of the asteroid belt.

  Doppelganger activities had increased in Berlin.

  A new survey was being made of octopi villages in the Mindanao Deep.

  A mob in Spenser, Alabama, lynched and burned the town's two local zombies. Legal action was being taken against the mob leaders.

  A leading anthropologist declared the Tuamoto Archipelago in Oceania to be the last stronghold of 20th century simplicity.

  The Atlantic Fish Herders’ Association was holding its annual convention at the Waldorf.

  A werewolf was unsuccessfully hunted in the Austrian Tyrol. Local villages were warned to keep a twenty-four-hour watch for the beast.

  A bill was introduced into the House of Representatives to outlaw all hunts and gladiatorial events. It was defeated.

  A berserker took four lives in downtown San Diego.

  Helicopter fatalities reached the one million mark for the year.

  Blaine put the newspaper aside, more depressed than ever. Ghosts, doppelgangers, werewolves, poltergeists… He didn't like the sound of those vague, grim, ancient words which today seemed to represent actual phenomena. He had already met a zombie. He didn't want to encounter any more of the dangerous side-effects of the hereafter.

  He started walking again. He went through the theater district, past g
littering marquees, posters advertising the gladiatorial events at Madison Square Garden, billboards heralding solidovision programs and sensory shows, flashing signs proclaiming overtone concerts and Venusian pantomime. Sadly Blaine remembered that he might have been part of this dazzling fairyland if only Reilly hadn't changed his mind. He might be appearing at one of those theaters now, billed as the Man from the Past…

  Of course! A Man from the Past, Blaine suddenly realized, had a unique and indisputable novelty value, an inherent talent. The Rex Corporation had saved his life in 1958 solely in order to use that talent. But they had changed their minds. So what was to prevent him from using his novelty value for himself? And for that matter, what else could he do? Show business looked like the only possible business for him.

  He hurried into a gigantic office building and found six theatrical agents listed on the board. He picked Barnex, Scofield & Styles, and took the elevator to their offices on the 19th floor.

  He entered a luxurious waiting room panelled with gigantic solidographs of smiling actresses. At the far end of the room, a pretty receptionist raised an inquiring eyebrow at him.

  Blaine went up to her desk. “I'd like to see someone about my act,” he told her.

  “I'm so sorry,” she said. “We’re all filled.”

  “This is a very special act.”

  “I'm really terribly sorry. Perhaps next week.”

  “Look,” Blaine said, “My act is really unique. You see, I'm a man from the past.”

  “I don't care if you’re the ghost of Scott Memvale,” she said sweetly. “We’re filled. Try us next week.

  Blaine turned to go. A short, stocky man breezed past him, nodding to the receptionist.

  “Morning, Miss Thatcher.”

  “Morning, Mr. Barnex.”

  Barnex! One of the agents! Blaine hurried after him and grabbed his sleeve.

  Mr. Barnex,“ he said, ”I have an act —“

  “Everybody has an act,” Barnex said wearily.

  “But this act is unique!”

  “Everybody's act is unique,” Barnex said. “Let go my sleeve, friend. Try us next week.”

  “I'm from the past!” Blaine cried, suddenly feeling foolish. Barnex turned and stared at him. He looked at though he might be on the verge of calling the police, or Bellevue. But Blaine plunged recklessly on.

  “I really am!” he said. “I have absolute proof. The Rex Corporation snatched me out of the past. Ask them!”

  “Rex?” Barnex said. “Yeah, I head something about that snatch over at Lindy's… Hmm. Come into my office, Mister —”

  “Blaine, Tom Blaine.” He followed Barnex into a tiny, cluttered cubicle. “Do you think you can use me?” he asked.

  “Maybe,” Barnex said, motioning Blaine to a chair. “It depends. Tell me, Mr. Blaine, what period of the past are you from?”

  “In 1958. I have an intimate knowledge of the nineteen thirties, forties and fifties. By way of stage experience I did some acting in college, and a professional actress friend of mine once told me I had a natural way of —”

  “1958? That's 20th Century?”

  “Yes, that's right.”

  The agent shook his head. “Too bad. Now if you'd been a 6th Century Swede or a 7th Century Jap, I could have found work for you. I've had no difficulty booking appearances for our 1st Century Roman or our 4th Century Saxon, and I could use a couple more like them. But it's damned hard finding anyone from those early centuries, now that time travel is illegal. And B.C. is completely out.”

  “But what about the 20th Century?” Blaine asked.

  “It's filled.”

  “Filled?”

  “Sure. Ben Therler from 1953 gets all the available stage appearances.”

  “I see,” Blaine said, getting slowly to his feet. “Thanks anyhow, Mr. Barnex.”

  “Not at all,” Barnex said, “Wish I could help. If you'd been from any time or place before the 11th Century, I could probably book you. But there's not much interest in recent stuff like the 19th and 20th Centuries… Say, why don't you go see Therler? It isn't likely, but maybe he can use an understudy or something.” He scrawled an address on a piece of paper and handed it to Blaine. Blaine took it, thanked him again, and left. In the street he stood for a moment, cursing his luck. His one unique and indisputable talent, his novelty value, had been usurped by Ben Therler of 1953! Really, he thought, time travel should be kept more exclusive. It just wasn't fair to drop a man here and then ignore him.

  He wondered what sort of man Therler was. Well, he'd find out. Even if Therler didn't need an understudy, it would be a pleasure and relief to talk to someone from home. And Therler, who had lived here longer, might have some ideas on what a 20th century man could do in 2110.

  He flagged a helicab and gave him the address. In fifteen minutes he was in Therler's apartment building, pressing the doorbell.

  The door was opened by a sleek, chubby, complacent-looking man wearing a dressing gown.

  “You the photographer?” he asked. “You’re too early.”

  Blaine shook his head. “Mr. Therler, you've never met me before. I'm from your own century. I'm from 1958.”

  “Is that so?” Therler asked, with obvious suspicion.

  “It's the truth,” Blaine said, “I was snatched by the Rex Corporation. You can check my story with them.”

  Therler shrugged his shoulders. “Well, what is it you want?”

  “I was hoping you might be able to use an understudy or something —”

  “No, no, I never use an understudy,” Therler said, starting to close the door.

  “I didn't think so,” Blaine said. “The real reason I came was just to talk to you. It gets pretty lonely being out of one's century. I wanted to talk to someone from my own age. I thought maybe you'd feel that way, too.”

  “Me? Oh!” Therler said, smiling with sudden stage warmth. “Oh, you mean about the good old twentieth century! I'd love to talk to you about it sometime, pal. Little old New York! The Dodgers and Yankees, the hansoms in the park, the roller-skating rink in Rockefeller Plaza. I sure miss it all! Boy! But I'm afraid I'm a little busy now.”

  “Certainly,” Blaine said. “Some other time.”

  “Fine! I'd really love to!” Therler said, smiling even more brilliantly. “Call my secretary, will you, old man? Schedules, you know. Well have a really great old gab some one of these days. I suppose you could use a spare dollar or two —”

  Blaine shook his head.

  “Then, ‘bye,” Therler said heartily. “And do call soon.”

  Blaine hurried out of the building. It was bad enough being robbed of you novelty value; it was worse being robbed by an out-and-out phony, a temporal fraud who'd never been within a hundred years of 1953. The Rockefeller roller — skating rink! And even that slip hadn't been necessary. Everything about the man screamed counterfeit. But sadly, Blaine was probably the only man in 2110 who could detect the imposture.

  That afternoon Blaine purchased a change of clothing and a shaving kit. He found a room in a cheap hotel on Fifth Avenue. For the next week, he continued looking for work.

  He tried the restaurants, but found that human dishwashers were a thing of the past. At the docks and spaceports, robots were doing most of the heavy work. One day he was tentatively approved for a position as package-wrapping inspector at Gimbel-Macy's. But the personnel department, after carefully studying his personality profile, irritability index and suggestibility rating, vetoed him in favor of a dull-eyed little man from Queens who held a master's degree in package design.

  Blaine was wearily returning to his hotel one evening when he recognized a face in the dense crowd. It was a man he would have known instantly, anywhere. He was about Blaine's age, a compact, redheaded, snub-nosed man with slightly protruding teeth and a small red blotch on his neck. He carried himself with a certain jaunty assurance, the unquenchable confidence of a man for whom something always turns up.

  “Ray!” Blaine shoute
d. “Ray Melhill!” He pushed through the crowd and seized him by the arm, “Ray! How'd you get out?”

  The man pulled his arm away and smoothed the sleeve of his jacket. “My name is not Melhill,” he said.

  “It's not? Are you sure?”

  “Of course I'm sure,” he said, starting to move away.

  Blaine stepped in front of him. “Wait a minute. You look exactly like him, even down to the radiation scar. Are you sure you aren't Ray Melhill, a flow-control man off the spaceship Bremen?”

  “Quite certain,” the man said coldly. “You have confused me with someone else, young man.”

  Blaine stared hard as the man started to walk away. Then he reached out, caught the man by a shoulder and swung him around.

  “You dirty body-thieving bastard!” Blaine shouted, his big right fist shooting out.

  The man who so exactly resembled Melhill was knocked back against a building, and slid groggily to the pavement. Blaine started for him, and people moved quickly out of his way.

  “Berserker!” a woman screamed, and someone else took up the cry. Blaine caught sight of a blue uniform shoving through the crowd toward him.

  A flat-hat! Blaine ducked into the crowd. He turned a corner quickly, then another, slowed to a walk and looked back. The policeman was not in sight. Blaine started walking again to his hotel.

  It had been Melhill's body; but Ray no longer occupied it. There had been no last-minute reprieve for him, no final chance. His body had been taken from him and sold to the old man whose querulous mind wore the jaunty body like a suit of ill-fitting, too-youthful clothes.

  Now he knew his friend was really dead. Blaine drank silently to him in a neighborhood bar before returning to his hotel.

  The clerk stopped him as he passed the desk. “Blaine? Got a message for you. Just a minute.” He went into the office.