The Silver Eggheads

by Fritz Leiber

  The Sons of the Sibyl

  "Here comes Mr. Flaxman now," Joe said, shading his eyes with his hand as he peered down the street through the view faзade. Gaspard shoved the note in his pocket and followed Joe out onto the sidewalk.

  Flaxman's limousine was jogging along on automatic. The publisher must be taking a nap, Gaspard thought.

  The car sensed its destination, nosed over to the curb and stopped beside them. There was nothing lying on the leather-upholstered seats except a note in bold black printing on gray paper.

  Zane Gort! (it read) You may be able to write all the human fiction the solar system can absorb, but you can't get the books on the racks without a publisher. Split the field with us and you can have him back.

  The Angry Young Robots

  Gaspard's first thought was simply that robots must be closer to taking over the world than even alarmists believed, if the two enemy groups should both assume that Zane was the key to the new activities at Rocket House and choose to deal with him alone. Gaspard felt a bit hurt. No one had thought to send him a threatening letter. No one had, as yet, even tried to kidnap him. You'd think that Heloise, at least, in view of their past relationship. . but no, the fickle writrix had kidnapped Cullingham.

  "Whir-hey! I've done it, I've done it!"

  Gaspard was grabbed and whirled around in a mad dance by Zane Gort, who had appeared like a blue streak from God knows where.

  "Stop it, Zane!" Gaspard commanded. "Simmer down. Flaxman and Cullingham have been kidnapped!"

  "I've no time for trifles now," the robot cried, releasing him. "I've done it, I tell you. Eureka!"

  "Miss Blushes has been kidnapped too!" Gaspard bellowed at him. "Here are the ransom notes-addressed to you!"

  "I'll read them later," the robot said, stuffing them into a snap window in his side. "Oh, I've done it, I've done it! Now to check with Cal Tech!" And he sprang into the limousine and sent it hurtling down the street.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  "Judas priest! What's got into that tin screwball?" Joe inquired, tugging at his shaggy white hair as he watched the limousine vanish like a radar blip.

  Scowling, Gaspard went inside and buzzed the Nursery. Nurse Bishop answered. As soon as he started to speak, she cut in with, "It's about time, you loafer! A dozen of the brats are screaming for paper. They say they're getting their best ideas right this minute and can't put them down. We need those rolls!"

  "Look, Bishop, we're in big trouble. The bosses have been kidnapped. No telling who'll be snatched next. And Zane Gort's gone crazy. I want you to-"

  "Oh shut up, Gaspard! All you do is bitch. Get those rolls over here fast!"

  "Right!" Gaspard snarled. "And coffee too." He hung up.

  "You gonna call the po-lice?" Joe demanded.

  "Shut up!" Gaspard barked. The small outburst did nothing to relieve his feelings of scratchy disgust. "Look, Joe, I'm going up to Mr. Cullingham's office and grill Miss Willow-and think things over. If I call the police I'll do it from there. You hold the deck." He stepped on the escalator and pushed the button. "And Joe," he added, pointing and shaking a finger as he lofted, "I don't want to be disturbed."

  Gaspard's first move inside the big office was to doubleelectrolock all the doors from the buttons behind Cullingham's desk. Then, clasping his hands together in selfcongratulation, he turned to Miss Willow, sitting cool and serene.

  "Hel-lo, Mama," he said warmly, luxuriously. "Mama's got a new Poppa."

  Five minutes later he decided that either the femmequin must be triggered by Cullingham's voice alone (in which case he'd have to find a recording of it) or if there were a key word he hadn't hit on it yet.

  Or else-tragedy-the femmequin was simply run down. No, that could hardly be the case, for her magnificent chest was lifting regularly in simulated breathing, her violet eyes blinked every fifteen seconds (he timed it), while once every minute she wet her lips.

  He bent over her. Even this close it was hard to believe she wasn't a real woman, her skin was simulated so perfectly, even to the tiny silver hairs on her forearms. He caught a whiff of the perfume Black Galaxy. He hesitated, then started to unzip her trim black coat.

  Deep down in her chest Miss Willow growled, like a large and dangerous watchdog giving a preliminary warning.

  Gaspard's heel kicked a file folder as he stepped back hastily. It skittered a few feet. On it, in bold letters, was "Miss T. Willow." He picked it up. Any papers it had held must be scattered among the others on the floor, for the folder was empty except for a small sheet with a few lines on it pasted to the inside back.

  The message was so odd that Gaspard read it aloud:

  On a tree by a river a little tom-tit

  Sang 'Willow, titwillow, titwillow!'

  And I said to him, 'Dicky-bird, why do you sit

  Singing-'

  Miss Willow had swayed to her feet and was moving straight toward him.

  "Hello, darling," she said in a sweet, sweet voice. "What can Mama do for Dicky-bird today?"

  Gaspard told her.

  And, as the wild wonderful flurries of imagination began to come, continued to tell her.

  Twenty very interesting but purely preliminary minutes later they were standing by Cullingham's desk locked together among the strewings of their clothes. That is, they had their arms around each other and Miss Willow had her right leg twined around his left, heel against heel, and they had just been kissing passionately, but that was exactly as far as the embrace went, because some ten seconds ago Gaspard had become completely impotent.

  Gaspard knew exactly why, too. It was very simply the oldest and most powerful of male fears: fear of castration. He could not forget that one deadly growl he'd heard. And, although Miss Willow's flesh simulated the real thing in a wizardly way as to texture, temperature and resiliency, not all the structural members he could feel through it corresponded in shape and position to the bones of a human skeleton. Finally, coming very faintly through the Black Galaxy, was just the tiniest reek of machine-oil.

  He knew he could no more take the next crucial step than he could voluntarily thrust his right hand into a sharp-toothed cluster of grinding cog-wheels. Cullingham might be able to, perhaps because of some perfect faith in machinery or else an hypertrophied off-trail death wish, but Gaspard certainly could not.

  "Dicky-bird's lost interest," Miss Willow drawled sensuously, investigating with her fingers. "Mama will fix."

  "No!" Gaspard said sharply. "Don't do that!" Miss Willow's soft cool fingers had abruptly become nothing but steel claws in his imagination.

  "All right," Miss Willow said lightly. "Anything Dicky-bird wants."

  Gaspard almost sighed with relief. "Let's pause for a bit," he suggested, "And you do a dance for me."

  Miss Willow lightly locked her arms around him, tipped back her head and shook it a little as she smiled.

  "Come on, Mama," Gaspard cajoled. "Mama do pretty dance. Dicky-bird watch. Pretty, oh pretty!"

  Miss Willow just shook her head again.

  Gaspard drew back slightly and brought up his hands inside her arms, lightly pressing them apart, as a polite indication that they break, but Miss Wifiow did not respond to the suggestion.

  "Let me go," Gaspard said flatly.

  Continuing to smile, Miss Willow said playfully, "No, no, no. Dicky-bird's not going to get away now."

  Without warning, Gaspard jerked back and simultaneously slammed his wrists sideways. But Miss Willow's arms did not fly apart. Instead they resisted the shock and then with lightning speed tightened around him, not exactly painfully, but very snugly. Lissome evokers of delight a moment ago, they were now like cushioned bands of steel. His left arm was pinioned, his right arm free.

  "Naughty, naughty," Miss Willow cooed. Then pressing her chin in his shoulder she growled horribly in his ear and said in the tone of the growl, "You damage Mama and Mama'll damage you." Then she leaned back and cooed, "Let's play. Don't be scared, Dicky-bird. Mama will be gentle."<
br />
  Gaspard's almost involuntary response to that was another convulsive effort to escape. When it was over, Miss Willow's arms were still locked around him and now her right leg too. They teetered precariously but didn't fall over, due to the femmequin's fine sense of balance.

  "Mama will hug you," Miss Willow growled in his ear. "Mama will keep on hugging you. Every five minutes Mama will hug you a little tighter-until you feed a hundred dollars into Mama you know where."

  Miss Willow's arms tightened. Gaspard heard something inside him creak.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Someone was pounding on the doubly electrolocked door.

  Gaspard did not know how long the pounding had been going on, he had been scrabbling so intently for money through such drawers of Cullingham's desk as he could reach with his free arm. He hadn't found any.

  "Look," he pleaded, "let me bend over so I can reach my pants. I don't think I've a hundred dollars but I have some money and I can write you a check for the rest. And let me feel through the bottom desk drawers-there still may be money there. Where does Cullingham keep his money? You should know."

  But such questions and contingency-based suggestions seemed quite beyond Miss Willow's capacities. She said only, "One hundred bucks cash, Dinky-bird. Mama's hungry."

  The pounding continued. Through it he could hear faintly a woman caffing, "Let me in, Gaspard! Something terrible's happened."

  Gaspard heartily agreed as Miss Willow's grip tightened another notch.

  "You'll kill me," he said, talking in short bursts because there wasn't too much room for air left in his chest. "That won't help. Please. My pants. Or Cullingham's drawers."

  "One hundred bucks," Miss Willow repeated implacably. "No checks."

  Gaspard's free hand found the door buttons. The door to the hall gave slightly under the pounding it was getting, then was pushed open. Miss Jackson lunged in, her blonde hair in disorder and her blouse pulled off one shoulder, as if she'd been through some sort of struggle herself. Gaspard wondered wildly if the whole world were being attacked individually and intimately by femmequins and manikins.

  "Gaspard!" the nurse cried. "They've kidnapped-"

  She saw the tableau beside Cullighain's desk. She froze. Rather slowly, her mouth fell open a little. Then her eyes narrowed as she began to study. After about five seconds she said critically, "Well, really!"

  "I need. . one hundred dollars. . cash," Gaspard got out. "Don't ask. . explain."

  Disregarding these statements, Miss Jackson continued to study them. Finally she asked, "Aren't you ever going to spring apart?"

  "I. . can't," Gaspard explained breathlessly.

  Miss Jackson's brow cleared, her eyebrows went up and she nodded twice with the dawn of a great understanding. "I've heard of such things happening," she said wisely. "They told us about it at nursing school. The man can't withdraw and the couple have to be taken to the hospital on the same stretcher. To think that I'd ever see it."

  She advanced, peering with an expression of horrid fascination.

  "Not that. . at all," Gaspard squeezed out. "Idiot. . Just holding. . arms. Miss Willow. . femme. . robot. Need. . hundred. . bucks."

  "Robots are made of metal," Miss Jackson said dogmatically. "Could be painted, I suppose." She reached out and pinched Miss Willow. "Nope. You're just getting hysterical, Gaspard," she diagnosed confidently, walking around them. "Take hold of yourself. Nobody ever died of shame. I remember now they told us it almost always happened to unmarried couples. The woman's sense of guilt causes the spasm. My walking around and peering at you this way probably just makes it worse."

  The breath Gaspard had gathered for his next appeal was squeezed out of him in a useless little squeak as Miss Willow's arms tightened once more. The room seemed to darken. As if at a great distance he heard Miss Jackson say, "Don't try to bury yourself in him like an ostrich, Miss Willow. This is something you're going to have to live through whether you like it or not. Remember I'm a nurse-you can't shock me. Think of me as a robot. I know you're a proud woman, not to say stuck-up. But maybe this experience will humanize you a bit. Hold onto that thought."

  Through the thickening dark Gaspard was aware of a gleam of dark blue.

  Zane Gort paused for an instant in the door, then strode up to Miss Willow.

  "How much?" he demanded, unlocking with one pincher a little window in his waist, while with the other he deftly lifted Miss Willow's sleek platinum hair, revealing a horizontal slit in the back of her neck.

  "One hundred bucks," growled the femmequin.

  "Liar," Zane Gort said and fed in a fifty.

  Sensors in the femmequin recognized the intricate pattern of magnetic oxide in the bifi. Miss Willow's arms opened. Her leg unclamped.

  Gaspard felt deep relief, was dimly aware of metal arms supporting him, then the small pain of taking a deep breath. The room began to lighten.

  Miss Jackson's mouth fell open all the way.

  "Get dressed," Zane Gort ordered. "You too, Gaspard. Here, put on these."

  Miss Jackson said, "Now I've seen everything."

  "Congratulations," Zane Gort told her. "And now if you would be so kind, my friend would like a drink of water- it's over there. I'll buckle that for you, Gaspard. Don't dawdle, Miss Willow-this isn't a performance. Easy, Gaspard. I'll buzz Madam Pneumo's tomorrow and have them pick up their femmequin-and give those robot procurers a piece of my mind-fun's fun, but one day they're going tokill a customer with their extortionist tricks and then there'll be trouble. Thank you, Miss Jackson. Gaspard, swallow this capsule."

  Miss Jackson watched with a rather envious expression the little odalisque's dance that, despite Zane's admonition, Miss Willow made of getting dressed. After a bit the nurse thought to pull her blouse up over her own exposed shoulder. "Say," she said loudly, "I completely forgot! I got so interested in the little. . er. ." She looked at Gaspard.

  "Circus," he supplied with a feeble snarl.

  ". . er. . performance that was going on, that I forgot why I came here in the first place. Gaspard, Nurse Bishop has been kidnapped!"

  Gaspard pulled away from Zane. "How? Where? Who?" he demanded.

  "We were running down the street," Miss Jackson began in medias res, "and this black-and-white checked zoomer car fell in beside us and this man with the blue chin- just virile beard, I guess-asked if he could help and Nurse Bishop said yes and got in, and this man clapped a pad over her face that must have been soaked in anesthone because she slumped right away. I noticed there was a funny-looking little robot stretched out on the back seat. Then this man said, 'Oh boy, a blonde too, this is too good to miss,' and grabbed at me but I tore away. When he saw he couldn't get me, he laughed and said, 'You don't know what you're missing, sister,' and zoomed off. Rocket House was nearer than the Nursery so I came here."

  Gaspard turned to Zane Gort, who had pulled open a file drawer and was rapidly scanning the contents. "Zane," Gaspard said, "Now you've simply got to get busy on the kidnappings."

  Zane looked up. "Out of the question. I'm on the wind-up of Project El after the major break-through this morning. Cal Tech confirms. Came here only for data-your rescue was incidental. No time for police work now. Later perhaps. Tomorrow say."

  "But Zane, three people have been kidnapped!" Gaspard protested, trying to control the fury he felt. "Your Miss Blushes too. I think I know the roughneck who snatched Nurse Bishop. She's in deadly danger!"

  "Nonsense," the robot said crisply. "You magnify the importance of these things. Anthropocentrism at work. Kidnapping-conducted by qualified non-psychotic persons such as we are obviously dealing with here-is simply a routine element of modern business and political strategy. Ancient too-see Caesar's kidnapping or Richard the First's. Interesting, yes-I too would like to be kidnapped if I could spare the time, it must be a revealing and rewarding experience-one more chance to see another bit of everything, eh, Miss Jackson? Dangerous, no. Tomorrow's time enough. Or day after tomorrow." He bent ag
ain to the files.

  "Well, I guess I'm going to have to handle this all by myself," Gaspard said with a savage shrug, turning to Miss Jackson. "Call in the police, I suppose. But first tell me one thing: why were you and Nurse Bishop running down the street in the first place?"

  "We were chasing the man who'd stolen Half Pint."

  "WHAT!" Zane Gort's voice was a blast. "Did you say Half Pint?"

  "Why, yes. He must have got clean away with him too. A tall thin man in a light gray suit. He told Pop Zangwell he was Dr. Krantz's new assistant. He probably snatched Half Pint because he was the smallest."

  "The fiend," Zane Gort grated, his headlamp glowing dark red. "The cruel, conscienceless, despicable fiend. To lay his filthy hands on that sweet helpless child-death by slow torture's too good for him! Stop gaping, Gaspard, and snap to it! My copter's on the roof. We've got work to do, Old Bone."

  "But-" Gaspard began.

  "No comments! Miss Jackson, when did Half Pint last have a fontanel change? Quick!"

  "About three and a half hours ago. Don't yell at me."

  "It's a case for yelling. How long can he safely go without a fresh one?"

  "I don't know, really. They're always changed every eight hours. Once a nurse was fifty minutes late and all the brains had passed out."

  Zane nodded. "Nurse Jackson," he said crisply, "prepare a wet pack of two fontanels from the supply here. Now! Gaspard, go with her-the instant it's ready bring it to the roof. I'll be there warming up the copter and my equipment. Grab Flaxman's coverall and hood-my copter's open. One moment, Miss Jackson! Will the kidnapper be able to talk to Half Pint?"

  "I think so. Half Pint had a mini-speaker and mini-eye and ear plugged in. They were dangling by their cords behind the kidnapper. Half Pint started to screech and whistle, but the kidnapper threatened to smash him on the sidewalk."