Dark Benediction

by Walter M. Miller

  He chuckled and drove on. A couple who failed the genetic requirements, who could have no children of their own, could get quite attached to a Cat-Q-5, but the cats were emotionally safer than any of the quasi-human chimp-K models called "neutroids." The death of a neutroid could strike a family as hard as the death of a child, while most couples could endure the loss of a cat-Q or a dog-F. A couple with a genetic "C" rating were permitted to own one neutroid, or two non-humanized models of daily food intake less than four hundred calories each. Most psychologists regarded the neutroids as emotional dynamite, and advised attaching affections to some tail-wagger with a lower love-demand potential.

  Norris suddenly lost his vestigial smile. What about Anne? What outlet would she choose for her maternal needs?—for his own Social Security card was stamped "Genetic-C"—and Anne loved kids. He had been thinking in terms of the kennel animals, how she might direct her energies toward helping him take care of them, but now that her hostility was evident . . . well .. . suppose she wanted a pseudoparty and a neutroid of her own? Of this, he disapproved.

  He shuddered slightly, fumbled in his pocket, and brought out a slightly battered invitation card that had come in yesterday's mail:

  You are cordially invited

  to attend the pseudoparturition

  and ensuing cocktail hour

  to celebrate the arrival of

  HONEY BLOSSOM

  Blessed event to occur on

  Twelveweek's Sixday of 2063

  at 19:30 hours

  Reception Room, Rockabye Hours Clinic

  R.s.v.p. Mr. & Mrs. John Hanley Slade

  The invitation had come late, the party would be tonight. He had meant to call Slade today and say that he and Anne would probably drop in for cocktails, but would be unable to get there in time for the delivery. But now that she had reacted so hostilely to the nastier aspects of his job, perhaps he had better keep her away from sentimental occasions involving neutroids.

  The battered card reminded him to stop in Sherman III Community Center for his mail. He turned onto the shopping street that paralleled the great highway and drove past several blocks of commercial buildings that served the surrounding suburbs. At the down-ramp he gave the attendant a four-bit bill and sent the truck down to be parked under the street, then went to the message office. When he dropped his code-disk in the slot, the feedway under his box number chattered out a yard of paper tape at him. He scanned it slowly from end to end—note from Aunt Maye, bill from SynZhamilk Products, letter from Anne's mother. The only thing of importance was the memo from the chief, a troublesome tidbit that he had been expecting for days:

  Attention All District Inspectors: Subject: Deviant Neutroid.

  You will immediately begin a systematic and thorough survey of all animals whose serial numbers fall in the Bermuda-K-99 series for birth dates during weeks 26 to 32 of year 2062. This is in connection with the Delmont Negligency case. Seize all animals in this category, impound, and run applicable sections of normalcy tests. Watch for signs of endocrinal deviation and non-standard response patterns. Delmont has confessed to passing only one non-standard model, but there may have been others. He disclaims memory of deviant's serial number. This could be a ruse to bring a stop to investigation when one animal is found. Be thorough.

  If allowed to reach age-set or adulthood, such a deviant could be dangerous to its owner or to others. Hold all seized K-99s who exhibit the slightest departure from standard in the normalcy tests. Forward these to Central Lab. Return standard models to their owners. Accomplish entire survey project within seven days.

  C. Franklin

  "Seven days!" he hissed irritably, wadded the tape in his pocket, stalked out to get the truck.

  His district covered two hundred square miles. With a replacement quota of seventy-five neutroids a week, the district would have probably picked up about forty K-99s from the Bermuda factory influx during the six-week period last year. Could he round them up in a week? Doubtful. And there were only eleven empty cages in the kennel. The other forty-nine were occupied by the previous inspector's "unclaimed" inventory—awaiting destruction. The crematorium behind the kennels would have a busy week. Anne would love that.

  He was halfway to Wylo City when the radiophone buzzed on the dashboard. He pulled into the slow lane and answered quickly, hoping for Anne's voice. A polite professional purr came instead.

  "Inspector Norris? Doctor Georges."

  Norris made a sour mouth, managed a jovial greeting.

  "Are you extremely busy at the moment?" Georges asked. He paused. Georges usually wanted a favor for some wealthy patient, or for some wealthy patient's tail-wagger.

  "Extremely," he grunted.

  "Eh? Oh well, this won't take long. One of my patients—a Mrs. Sarah Glubbes—called a while ago and said her baby was sick."

  "So?"

  "No baby. I must be getting absent minded, because I forgot she's class C until I got there."

  "I'll guess," Norris muttered. "Turned out to be a neutroid."

  "Of course, of course."

  "Why tell me?"

  "It's dying. Eighteenth order virus. Naturally, I can't get it admitted to a hospital."

  "Ever hear of vets?"

  "You don't understand. She insists it's her baby, believes it's her own. How can I send it to a vet?"

  "That's your worry. Is this an old patient of yours?"

  "Why, yes, I've known Sarah since—"

  "Since you presided at her pseudopart?"

  "How did you know?"

  "Just a guess. If you put her through pseudopart, then you deserve all the trouble you get."

  "I take it you're a prohibitionist."

  "Skip it. What did you want from me?"

  "A replacement neutroid. From the kennel."

  "Baloney. You couldn't fool her. If she's blind, she'd still know the difference."

  "I'll have to take the chance. Listen, Norris, it's pathetic. She knows the disease can be cured—in humans—with hospitalization and expensive treatment that I can't get for a neutroid. No vet could get the drug either. Scarce. It's pathetic."

  "I'm crying all over the steering wheel."

  The doctor hesitated. "Sorry, Norris, I thought you were human."

  "Not to the extent of doing quasi-legal favors that won't be appreciated for some rich neurotic dame and a doc who practices pseudopart."

  "One correction," Georges said stiffly. "Sarah's not rich. She's a middle-aged widow and couldn't pay for treatment if she could get it."

  "Oh—"

  "Thanks anyway, Norris."

  "Hold it," he grunted. "What's the chimp's series?" "It's a K-48, a five-year-old with a three-year age set." Norris thought for a moment. It was a dirty deal, and it wouldn't work.

  "I think I've got one in the kennel that's fairly close," he offered doubtfully.

  "Good, good, I'll have Fred go over and—"

  "Wait, now. This one'll be spooky, won't know her, and the serial number will be different."

  "I know, I know," Georges sighed. "But it seems worth a try. An attack of V-i8 can cause mild amnesia in humans; that might explain why it won't know her. About the serial number—"

  "Don't try changing it," Norris growled.

  "How about obliterating—"

  "Don't, and I'll check on it a couple of weeks from now to make damn sure you didn't. That's a felony, Georges."

  "All right, all right, I'll just have to take the chance that she won't notice it. When can I pick it up?"

  "Call my wife in fifteen minutes. I'll speak to her first."

  "Uh, yes . . . Mrs. Norris. Uh, very well, thanks, Inspector." Georges hung up quickly.

  Norris lit a cigaret, steeled himself, called Anne. Her voice was dull, depressed, but no longer angry.

  "All right, Terry," she said tonelessly. "I'll go out to the kennel and get the one in cage thirty-one, and give it to Georges when he comes."

  "Thanks, babe."

  He he
ard her mutter, "And then I'll go take a bath," just before the circuit clicked off.

  He flipped off the auto-driver, took control of the truck, slipped into the fast lane and drove furiously toward Wylo City and the district wholesale offices of Anthropos Incorporated to begin tracing down the suspected Bermuda K-99s in accordance with Franklin's memo. He would have to check through all incoming model files for the six week period, go over the present inventory, then run down the Bermuda serial numbers in a mountain of invoices covering a thirty-week period, find the pet shops and retail dealers that had taken the doubtful models, and finally survey the retail dealers to trace the models to their present owners. With cooperation from wholesaler and dealers, he might get it down to the retail level by mid-afternoon, but getting the models away from their owners would be the nasty part of the job. He was feeling pretty nasty himself, he decided. The spat with Anne, the distasteful thoughts associated with Slade's pseudoparty, the gnawing remorse about collaborating with Dr. Georges in a doubtful maneuver to pacify one Sarah Glubbes, a grim week's work ahead, plus his usual charge of suppressed resentment toward Chief Franklin—it all added up to a mood that could turn either black or vicious, depending on circumstance.

  If some doting Mama gave him trouble about impounding her darling tail-wagger, he was, he decided, in the right kind of mood to get a warrant and turn the job over to the sheriff.

  The gasping neutroid lay on the examining table under the glaring light. The torso quivered and twitched as muscles contracted spasmodically, but the short legs were already limp and paralyzed, allowing the chubby man in the white coat to lift them easily by the ankles and retrieve the rectal thermometer. The neutroid wheezed and chattered plaintively as the nurse drew the blanket across its small body again.

  "A hundred and nine," grunted the chubby man, his voice muffled by the gauze mask. His eyes probed the nurse's eyes for a moment. He jerked his head toward the door. "She still out there?"

  The nurse nodded.

  The doctor stared absently at the thermometer stem for a moment, looked up again, spoke quietly. "Get a hypo—necrofine." She turned toward the sterilizer, paused briefly. "Three c.c.s?" she asked.

  "Twelve," he corrected.

  Their eyes locked with his for several seconds; then she nodded and went to the sterilizer.

  "May I leave first?" she asked tonelessly while filling the syringe.

  "Certainly."

  "What'll I say to Mrs. Glubbes?" She crossed to the table again and handed him the hypo.

  "Nothing. Use the back way. Go tell Fred to run over to the kennels and pick up the substitute. I've called Mrs. Norris. Oh yeah, and tell Fred to stop in here first. I'll have something for him to take out."

  The nurse glanced down at the squirming, whimpering newt, shivered slightly, and left the room. When the door closed, Georges bent over the table with the hypo. When the door opened again, Georges looked up to see his son looking in.

  "Take this along," he grunted, and handed Fred the bundle wrapped in newspapers.

  "What'll I do with it?" the youth asked.

  "Chuck it in Norris's incinerator."

  Fred glanced at the empty examining table and nodded indifferently. "Can Miss Laskell come back now?" he asked in going.

  "Tell her yeah. And hurry with that other neut."

  "Sure, Pop. See you later."

  The nurse looked in uncertainly before entering.

  "Get cleaned up," he told her. "And go sit with Mrs. Glubbes."

  "What'll I say?"

  "The 'baby' will recover. She can take it home late this afternoon if she gets some rest first."

  "What're you going to do?—about the substitute."

  "Give it a shot to put it to sleep, give her some codeine to feed it."

  "Why?"

  "So it'll be too groggy for a few days to even notice her, so it'll get addicted and attached to her because she gives it the coedine."

  "The serial number?"

  "I'll put the tattooed foot in a cast. V-18 paralysis—you know."

  "Smart," she muttered, but there was no approval in her voice.

  When she had changed clothes in the anteroom, she unlocked the door to the office, but paused before passing on into the reception room. The door was ajar, and she gazed through the crack at the woman who sat on the sofa.

  Sarah Glubbes was gray and gaunt and rigid as stone. She sat with her hands clenched in her lap, her wide empty eyes—dull blue spots on yellowed marble orbs—staring ceilingward while the colorless lips of a knife-slash mouth moved tautly in earnest prayer. The nurse's throat felt tight. She rubbed it for a moment. After all, the thing was only an animal.

  She straightened her shoulders, put on a cheerful smile, and marched on into the reception room. The yellowed orbs snapped demandingly toward her.

  "Everything's all right, Mrs. Glubbes," she began.

  "Finished," Norris grunted at three o'clock that afternoon.

  "Thirty-six K-99s," murmured the Anthropos file-clerk, gazing over Norris's shoulder at the clip-board with the list of doubtful neuts and the dealers to whom they had been sent. "Lots of owners may be hard to locate."

  "Yeah. Thanks, Andy, and you too, Mabel."

  The girl smiled and handed him a slip of paper. "Here's a list of owners for thirteen of them. I called the two local shops for you. Most of them live here close."

  He glanced at the names, felt tension gathering in his stomach. It wasn't going to be easy. What could he say to them?

  Howdy, Ma'am, excuse me, but I've come to take your little boy away to jail ... Oh, yes ma'am, he'll have a place to stay—in a little steel cage with a forkful of straw, and he'll get vitaminized mush every day. What's that? His sleepy-time stories and his pink honey-crumbles? Sorry, ma'am, your little boy is only a mutated chimpanzee, you know, and not really human at all.

  "That'll go over great," he grumbled, staring absently at the window.

  "Beg pardon, sir?" answered the clerk.

  "Nothing, Andy, nothing." He thanked them again and strode out into the late afternoon sunlight. Still a couple of hours working time left, and plenty of things to do. Checking with the other retail dealers would be the least unpleasant task, but there was no use saving the worst until last. He glanced at the list Mabel had given him, checked it for the nearest address, then squared his shoulders and headed for the kennel truck.

  Anne met him at the door when he came home at six. He stood on the porch for a moment, smiling at her weakly. The smile was not returned.

  "Doctor Georges' boy came," she told him. "He signed for the—"

  She stopped to stare at him, then opened the screen, reached up quickly to brush light fingertips over his cheek.

  "Terry! Those welts! What happened—get scratched by a cat-Q?"

  "No, by a human-F," he grumbled, and stepped past her into the hall; Anne followed, eyeing him curiously while he reached for the phone and dialed.

  "Who're you calling?" she asked.

  "Society's Watchdog," he answered as the receiver buzzed in his ear.

  "Your eye, Terry—it's all puffy. Will it turn black?"

  "Maybe."

  "Did the human-F do that too?"

  "Uh-uh. Human-M—name of Pete Klusky ...

  The phone croaked at him suddenly. "This is the record-voice of Sheriff Yates. I'll be out from five to seven. If it's urgent, call your constable."

  He hung up briefly, then irritably dialed the locator service. "Mnemonic register, trail calls, and official locations," grated a mechanical voice. "Your business, please."

  "This is T. Norris, Sherman-9-4566-78B, Official rating B, Priority B, code XT-88-U-Bio. Get Sheriff Yates for me." "Nature of the call?"

  "Offish biz."

  "I shall record the call."

  He waited. The robot found Yates on the first probability-trial attempt—in the local pool-hall.

  "I'm getting to hate that infernal gadget," Yates snapped. "Acts like it's got me psyched. Whattaya
want, Norris?"

  "Cooperation. I'm mailing you three letters charging three Wylo citizens with resisting a federal official—namely me—and charging one of them with assault. I tried to pick up their neutroids for a pound inspection, and—"

  Yates bellowed lusty laughter in his ear.

  "Not funny," he growled. "I've got to get those neutroids. It's connected with the Delmont case."

  Yates stopped laughing. "Oh? Well . . . I'll take care of it."

  "Rush order, Sheriff. Can you get the warrants tonight and pick up the animals in the morning?"

  "Easy on those warrants, boy. Judge Charleman can't be bothered just any time. I can get the newts to you by noon, I guess, provided we don't have to get a helicopter posse to chase down the mothers."

  "Well, okay—but listen—I want the charges dropped if they cooperate with you. And don't shake the warrants at them unless you have to. Just get those newts, that's all I want."

  "Okay, boy. Give me the dope."

  Norris read him the names and addresses of the three unwilling owners, and a precise account of what happened in each case. As soon as he hung up, Anne muttered "Sit still," perched on his knees, and began stroking chilly ointment across his burning cheek. He watched her cool eyes flicker from his cheek to his own eyes and down again. She was no longer angry, but only gloomy and withdrawn from him. He touched her arm. She seemed not to notice it.

  "Hard day, Terry?"

  "Slightly. I picked up nine newts out of thirteen, anyhow. They're in the truck now."

  "Good thing you didn't get them all. There are only twelve empty cages."

  "Twelve?—oh, Georges picked one up, didn't he?"

  "And sent a package," she said, eyeing him soberly.

  "Package? Where is it?"

  "In the crematorium. The boy took it back there." He swallowed a tight spot in his throat, said nothing.

  "Oh, and darling—Mrs. Slade called. Why didn't you tell me we're going out tonight?"

  "Going—out?" It sounded a little weak.