Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  Strangely he could not remember the lovely, futuristic New York he had just seen. He could not picture it. Instead he recalled how the lake in Central Park had looked at twilight, with the skyscrapers clifflike to the south, and a girl’s face turned up to the sky as she watched the sunset. Sick with hopeless longing, Dawson dropped upon the grass and buried his face in his hands.

  THE sun was high when Stephen Dawson reached Washington. He set down his plane in the stretch of greensward he remembered, and got out, looking up at the great block of stone that was the Capitol. His face was grim and harsh.

  The chief problem was—what to ask the Council? Demand a solution of the mystery; that was easy to say. But, after all, just what was the mystery? A false note here, a suspicion there, all building up to a convincing whole; yet there was actually nothing definite. For all Dawson knew, the whole set-up might be on the level. And, somehow, that was the most sinister touch of all. For he sensed, quite certainly, that something was terribly wrong with this world.

  The same guide he had met before came to meet him.

  “You were not summoned . . . Oh, you’re—let’s see—Stephen Dawson.”

  “Tell the Council I want an audience,” Dawson said.

  The other shrugged.

  “It’s unprecedented. An exception was made when you first came, Dawson. But I’ll ask. Come along.”

  Presently Dawson was brought before the Council. The panel closed behind him.

  Nothing was altered. Five men and a woman—Laurena San—sat on the low bench, facing him. Involuntarily Dawson felt his heart contract at sight of the heart-shaped face, the cool gray eyes.

  Fered was there, too, his face without expression.

  “How can we help you, Stephen Dawson?” one of the older men said.

  “I’d like to ask a few questions.”

  There was silence.

  “It was at the request of Laurena San that we consented to see you,” the man said, after a pause. “But we serve the world, and have little time to spare. You must be brief.” Dawson nodded, stealing a glance at his wrist-chronometer. He looked up in time to see Laurena’s gaze fixed upon him intently. A wave of uneasiness touched him. There was something definitely sinister about this barren, ascetic room.

  “You needn’t answer,” he said, “and in your place, I know I wouldn’t.”

  “Why should we not answer your questions?”

  “Why should you? What do you care about one man when you rule the world?”

  “We do not rule. We administer. And every individual on Earth deserves happiness.”

  Dawson let his gaze move along the row of stolid, impassive faces. He stopped at Fered.

  “First—have you altered Fered Yolath’s mind or character?”

  “You mean by mechanical means, don’t you? No. He has acquired certain knowledge not given to ordinary men. His whole attitude toward life was altered by this new understanding.”

  “That is true,” Fered said quietly, his voice calm.

  Something drew Dawson’s eyes to Laurena’s lovely face. In it he seemed to sense puzzlement, and a very vague sort of amused mockery. Briefly it seemed to him that he confronted six blind masks, impassive and cryptic.

  “Is that why members of the Council are so different from other men?”

  “We cannot take part in ordinary life and administer it, too.”

  Dawson made a gesture.

  “This room—the whole Capitol—you’re ascetics. Is it because beauty no longer means anything to you? Or is it because you don’t wish to arouse envy?”

  Laurena San spoke.

  “Perhaps it is that we now have a different concept of beauty. As for envy, why should anyone envy us? There is no man or woman on Earth who is forbidden to become a member of the Council.”

  And that, of course, was true. That damnable electorate! It was the weakest link in Dawson’s chain of evidence. He went on grimly.

  “Humanity has changed since my time. You, the Council, have lost touch entirely with it, I think. Man has become degenerate.”

  Laurena’s expression was grave.

  “No, you are wrong. Mentally and physically man is nearly perfect.”

  “He has lost initiative.”

  Suddenly Dawson was conscious of an inexplicable tension in the air. Yet the six faces before him did not change. Laurena broke the silence.

  “To you, from the twentieth century, initiative must seem very important,” she said coolly. “Yet it is an acquired trait. Man lost his appendix and his wisdom teeth when they were no longer needed. Since primeval times, the law has been that of the survival of the fittest. Man was essentially hedonistic. Self-preservation and preservation of the species were the great driving instincts. Unless one had initiative—which is a form of selfishness—he did not survive. Do you agree?”

  DAWSON was forced to nod.

  “So. Now, today, we have an almost perfect administration, socially and politically. Six specialized humans sacrifice themselves, as you would say, to serve the race. In these six all the necessary traits are highly developed. Mankind does not need them any more. There is no longer a battle for survival. There is no crime, no jealousy, no greed—happiness is everyone’s prerogative. Thus initiative became unnecessary, and died out of the race. In your time the appendix was a useless organ, yet many died because of its survival. If initiative existed today—”

  She did not finish, there was no need. The parallel was obvious. And it was all damnably convincing.

  He went off on a tangent.

  “Why hasn’t space-travel been developed?”

  “We do not need it for our happiness.”

  “You don’t have any explorers, either. You’re stagnant. You can’t realize the thrill of going somewhere no one else has ever been—into an ocean deep, up a Himalayan peak, or into space.”

  “That is merely compensation,” Laurena argued, “the result of a psychic unbalance, an inferiority complex. Self-glorification is not needed today. The individual is healthy mentally as well as physically.”

  Dawson blinked, feeling like an insect under a microscope.

  “Sure,” he said. “You can rationalize anything. Love is just a glandular unbalance—” The woman’s lips parted.

  “Love—” she murmured, frowning. “Maybe that’s one of the things you forgot when you joined the Council. But it’s a primal impulse, and so is initiative. What’s wrong with self-preservation?”

  “It is not necessary today.”

  “And man has degenerated,” Dawson argued. “The human race is a race of fighters, always has been. You can’t breed out a heritage that goes back to beyond the Jurassic without causing weakness. Something’s lacking in men today—”

  “What do you wish?” Laurena said suddenly.

  A wry, ironic amusement at his own audacity took hold of Dawson as he stood up, facing the Council.

  “I want you to abdicate—resign, if you prefer.”

  There was silence. And it struck Dawson as rather shockingly strange that no one laughed.

  Laurena rose, without a word, and went out through a panel that opened at her approach.

  “You ask us to send man back five hundred years, into a life-pattern for which he is no longer suited?” one of the older men said.

  “GOOD Lord! Was this fantastic group seriously considering his demand? He felt a shock of amazed incredulity.

  “Man can adapt himself,” he pursued. “He can get back his initiative—”

  “And many would die. It is not for the best that this be done. We must refuse. And, for your own safety, we must put you under observation until you have achieved happiness. We shall do all that we can to help you.”

  “I don’t want opiates,” Dawson snapped. He saw that Laurena was coming back. She took her place quietly on the bench, watching him with odd intentness.

  “You must understand our situation,” the Council member went on. “You are a false note in this world of ours. No tro
uble has arisen for years. We want you to adjust yourself.”

  Dawson looked at his chronometer. “That’s your last word?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that this is an ultimatum. I give you just thirty secs to change your minds.” The man started to speak, but Laurena held up her hand, halting him. She looked at Dawson, and again he sensed the subtle mockery in her gray eyes. She said nothing to him.

  There was silence, filling the room like water, motionless and oppressive. Dawson could feel the secs sliding past. It would be high noon very soon now—deadline. The planes would attack.

  He sat down and waited, folding his arms.

  There was no sound. The eyes of the Council were impassive, inscrutable. They seemed to have taken their cue from Laurena.

  THEN, without warning, it happened.

  A tingling shock rippled through every cell of Dawson’s body. Abruptly the life seemed to be draining from him. The movement of air through his nostrils ceased. He had stopped breathing.

  Nothing else was changed. The Council sat motionless. They were frozen into stasis by the ray that was flooding the Capitol building. The molecular movement of their bodies was halted.

  It was like paralysis.

  Dawson tried to move, and found that he could not. He tried to look away from Laurena’s face, and that, too, was impossible. There was no means of judging time. He could only sit there, helpless, realizing that this identical thing must have happened to everyone within reach of the vibratory ray.

  He felt triumph. Coup d’etat—and, soon, coup de grace!

  It seemed to him that he heard footsteps approaching. No, that was illusion. His senses were no longer working. He was numb, deaf—though not blind. Or perhaps his brain simply retained the last impression the optic nerves had sent up to it.

  Mentally he pictured the scene above. One of the planes was landing on the cube’s roof, disgorging men in protective armor. They would find their way down, disarm and capture the Council—though no armament was apparent on those lightly-clad bodies. Then the ray would be shut off . . .

  Abruptly the paralysis was gone. Dawson did not entirely realize it at first. When he did, he stood up, his body tingling. Yet no member of the Council had moved. He felt uneasiness, the nearness of danger.

  A voice from nowhere spoke in rapid, clicking audio-shorthand. Dawson could not understand. He looked around, searching for the armored men who should be here now.

  The voice stopped.

  “The attacking planes have been destroyed, Stephen Dawson,” Laurena said lightly.

  Startled, Dawson could not realize the significance of what she had said. He stared at her, seeing no hint of emotion in the small, regular features, the level gray eyes.

  “Sit down,” she said. And Dawson obeyed, every sense alert, feeling trapped and helpless.

  “You were wrong to underestimate the intelligence of the Council,” Laurena went on quietly. “When you asked us to—abdicate—I realized that you must have some weapon, for you are not a fool, regardless of what the psychographs said. I left the room to set certain robot machinery into operation. When your ray bathed the Capitol and paralyzed it, the robot guns sent forth radio-propelled torpedoes, aerial-torps, which were attracted by the electrical and magnetic apparatus in your planes overhead. Those planes were destroyed, and the ray ceased to operate.”

  “My—my men—” Dawson whispered, his throat dry and tight.

  “All dead. And now we have some questions to ask.”

  “Questions!” The man almost laughed in bitter mockery. “There must be a wall around!”

  “I do not understand.”

  “Stand me up against it—shoot me. It’s the unusual thing, isn’t it?”

  “Not in this day,” Laurena told him. “You are a false note in our world, but a false note may be tuned aright. You will be taken to the laboratories again and re-tested. First there will be some questioning. But you will not be killed.”

  WAS Dawson wrong in thinking that a ripple of surprise passed through the Council—even Fered? He could not be sure. However, no one spoke as Laurena went on. “Explain your motives,” she demanded. Dawson glanced at Fered. He was remembering Bethya Dorn, back in Dasonee, waiting for the outcome of the abortive attack. At all costs, he’d have to protect her—for, somehow, he knew that not even Fered would show the girl mercy if he betrayed her part in the conspiracy. She might not be murdered, but the subtle psychology of the Council was more deadly than poisoned fangs.

  He sat down, assuming a sullen air and crossing his arms.

  “All right. This isn’t my world. Where I come from, people fought. I’ve always had to fight for what I wanted.”

  “There was no need, here.”

  He grinned savagely.

  “No? You don’t know what it means to have power—power of life and death! Hell, of course you do!”

  “We serve,” Laurena said simply.

  “Well, so what? I’ve always wanted to be top dog. Never had a chance in my own time. When I saw this race of weaklings, I figured I could make myself the big shot—the ruler.” He went on, trying hard to make the Council believe him. And, very gradually, he sensed that he was succeeding.

  “Call it a psychic unbalance,” he said angrily. “Or an inferiority complex. I’m not one of these sheep you rule.”

  “Who were your assistants—your helpers?” Dawson named them frankly, taking care to mention only those who had died in the destroyed planes.

  “There were no others?”

  “No. I didn’t think I’d need an army.”

  “Not even an army could conquer the Capitol,” Laurena told him. “Very well. You will go through the lab tests—”

  “You’ll let me live?” In spite of himself, Dawson let amazement creep into his voice.

  “We must have no discords. The whole world knows about you, that you came from the past. If you died, many would ask questions, and their happiness would be menaced. As yet, you cannot be allowed to mingle with others. You will be our guest here, incommunicado, until such time as your mental cure is complete. Then you will be released.”

  Dawson shivered. There was menace in those words. Mental cure . . . He did not fear guns or fists or death-rays, but he did fear the unknown powers of this world. Looking at Fered’s blank, expressionless face, he remembered how the youngster had changed.

  A “guest” of the Council! And would he, too—change?

  CHAPTER VII

  Dangerous Captive

  THEN began a strange time for Dawson.

  He was never harmed, and everything was done for his comfort. But he was a prisoner within the vast block of the Capitol, never allowed to emerge. Not that he was barred from the fresh air, for the gardens on the roof were open to him.

  Only the private quarters of the Council were barred, and it was a strictly enforced rule that no man was ever to enter these. They were kept locked by devices to which only the members possessed keys—tiny electro-oscillatory gadgets they wore at all times on their persons. More than once Dawson speculated on what lay beyond those eternally guarded doors.

  He was given almost luxurious private quarters high up in the dome. Though there had seemed to be no windows, the touch of a button made part of the wall transparent as glass, so that he could see for miles over the rolling green countryside. Sometimes a plane would take off or arrive. That was his only contact with the outer world, save for a one-way televisor that would not permit him to send out calls.

  There were perhaps a thousand men and women working in the Capitol, trained scientific experts who spent a few months in each year there. For the rest, they were free to go where they chose, with ample amounts of work-units at their command. Yet over all ruled the Council. There were no guards, save for nominal ones armed with paralytic needle-guns. Everything Dawson wanted, almost, was given freely to him. He wandered about the Capitol, his eyes open, trying to understand everything he saw. He was free—but a p
risoner.

  He saw much strange science, and saw, too, the great libraries where secrets of centuries were kept hidden away for time of need. If this knowledge could be thrown open to the world, he thought, a new era would dawn. Barriers would fall, and so many avenues of exploration would open up. Men would again search, with scientific zeal, for solutions of mysteries. They would delve deep into the Earth and the sea, and go out to the planets—perhaps even beyond them. If only he could disseminate this secret lore!

  Mysteries were all around him. There was so much he did not understand. Why, for example, had the Council not yet effected the “mental cure” they had promised? They seemed to have forgotten Dawson’s existence.

  No—not all of them. More and more Laurena San sought out his company. He learned much from her, though always he was conscious that she carefully guarded her tongue. Laurena spent many longsecs with Dawson. She could not understand why he loved to walk in the open-air gardens on the roof, but she went there with him often, and they talked. Nor did Dawson draw back from the contact.

  CURIOUSLY enough, he realized that, as time went on, he found himself thinking less and less of Marian. The familiar features of her remembered face had changed. Whenever Dawson tried to recall them, he saw instead the face of Laurena. And, at first, this was bitter to him, though soon he realized the futility of faithfulness to dust. Besides—so he told himself, perhaps not with complete honesty—the more he encouraged Laurena’s companionship, the more he could learn from her. And that information might come in handy—some day.

  Would that day ever come? Time slipped past, idly and slothfully, and Dawson found himself almost submerged in a slough of pleasant idleness.

  It was so easy to do nothing, to have every wish granted, provided he forgot the existence of the outside world.

  One thing kept him from forgetting entirely. That was Fered. Seeing Fered, he remembered Bethya, and much else.

  So he walked with Laurena in the flaming, exotic gardens, far above ground level, with the cool winds blowing upon him, and learned from her . . .