Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  “Man is immature,” Ferguson said. “Any naturalist or biologist can prove that. Or any sociologist, for that matter.” He conveniently forgot that his guest owned a degree in sociology. “Our cranial sutures aren’t knit, our habit-patterns aren’t adult, the physical proportions of our bodies—well, we’re built physically like the immature gorilla. And we act that way, too. We’re a social race. We like physical contact, competitive games, horseplay—generally speaking. I’ll-admit that immaturity is what gives us our drive; we’re insecure, so we experiment. The mature gorilla doesn’t need to. He’s perfectly adjusted to his environment—he’s got his feeding-ground and his harem, and about his only real danger is from young bulls who want his harem. He’s bad-tempered and perfectly self-sufficient. Lord knows we’re not, or we wouldn’t throw so many parties!”

  “ILC is trying to mature the race,” Archer said, half-questioningly.

  “Children are a handicap, in our culture,” Ferguson said. “The male gorilla drives his kids away when they begin growing. And they can fend for themselves; they’re equipped to do that, in the jungle. But civilization has made a deadlier jungle. One that only a nominal adult can cope with. No provision was made for the young of the species; that was left as an individual problem. The result was a culture in which the male was dominant and women enslaved. Oh, very roughly—but rearing children in pre-atomic cities was a fulltime job. Wastage!”

  Archer moistened his lips.

  “Have a drink,” Ferguson suggested. “Want to dial me a Scotch and soda, while you’re at it?” He waited, watching the great curved sweep of the window. He gestured, and at the signal the soft rhythm of color-patterns gathered like a folding curtain and ran down like water and was gone, revealing the view beyond. The city was small in population but large in area, and there were a great many parks.

  This is the way it should be, Ferguson thought. This is safe.

  So you had a convalescent world—a basically healthy organism but susceptible to a good many figurative diseases. People with a susceptibility to cancer should avoid continual irritation of tissue. Cancer is uncontrolled pathological cell-growth. Controlled cell-growth is normal and beneficial. Similarly—atomics.

  Avoid irritation.

  People, in fact, lived pretty much as they wanted to under ILC. They couldn’t have everything, naturally. Neuroses couldn’t be eliminated overnight. But the Atomic War was the equivalent of electric shock therapy. En masse, ILC used a palliative plan. Individually—ILC insured.

  Not everything. There are no Utopias. Even supermen would have superproblems. There was an iron hand, but the velvet glove was the textile people loved to touch. The atomic cancer was arrested by drastic surgery; yet it had filtered through the bloodstream. So, in lieu of a real answer, ILC avoided irritation. ILC kept the world-patient from catching other ailments that might cause irritation. Anything could build to a sociological infection which could in turn make the cancer break out again. As long as the race was healthy, it was medium safe.

  That applied to Greg Ferguson, too.

  ILC made certain of that. No irritations would arise for him—the formula said—that couldn’t be adjusted. Ferguson was a crooked peg in a crooked hole. Conceivably he was less mature—or, rather, more immature—than most; conceivably he needed the safety-factor, the stability, the certain security which the symbol of ILC represented to him.

  In fact, he did need that. Badly.

  You can’t rebuild the world in a day. There was plenty of technological knowledge, but not many people. That meant an all-out effort. So ILC cut down the factors that retarded maturation. The group had to be large to support research workers not immediately productive, and if one-half of every couple had to rear a batch of children, the potential manpower was halved. So the children were placed in crêches. The young gorilla can survive in a jungle—young children were given the equivalent of a safe jungle. A crêche—and the parents didn’t have the responsibility, and could continue their maturing process.

  The Federal Bureau of Insurance, Lotteries and Crêches made that possible. It was impossible to finance the crêches by taxation; the government wanted to avoid irritation, not augment it. And the Lotteries helped a great deal, but Insurance was the real answer. It was the place where steam was blown off. It was the answer man. It was where budding neuroses were caught. People take out insurance, by and large, because of neuroses and in the old days they had good reason. Under ILC practically anything was insurable. A man wants insurance against something he’s afraid will happen, or something he wants to happen. Often it is a socially or personally pathological matter.

  The adult gorilla, however, needs no insurance.

  “Here’s a case—potential psychosis of a client.”

  Ferguson shitted a visor screen down. A man’s face appeared. He looked normal.

  Archer raised his eyebrows.

  “He wants insurance against infectious disease,” Ferguson explained. “The premium’s rather high on that, obviously. We still haven’t licked all the mutated bugs, though the race built up strong resistance after the biological battles. But look at his survey and see what you get.”

  Information fled madly across the screen while Archer waited.

  “Well?”

  “I don’t see anything special,” the Fixer said.

  “No? You don’t see why the guy may presently want suicide insurance?”

  “Mm-m. Suicide. Why? He’s well integrated. Useful, happy—”

  “Any unusual purchases? Try the chemist’s list.”

  “Oh. Green soap. Germicides. A UV portal—”

  “Two of ’em, one for his office, one for his home. The guy is working straight toward a lovely case of misophobia. That should mean fear of mice but it means fear of dirt. The rest is routine, for the psych crew. I gather the initial irritant occurred when he was home on a visit from his crêche, as a kid. Spilled some gunk on his sister and hurt her. His parents made the wrong kind of a fuss. He’s got a guilt complex. Eventually he may hear voices from the woodwork telling him he’s sinned. You see?”

  “Ah,” Archer said, “does he get his policy—this potential misophobe?”

  “Of course. Why not? When he gets his final exam is where the gimmick comes in.”

  “The hypnosis . . . oh, yes! I’d like to know more about that.”

  “Well,” Ferguson said, “it’s the reason why this particular client will be a good risk instead of a poor one. We’ll cure him and channel his neuroses at the same time. Barring genuine accident—the percentages will be in our favor. They wouldn’t be otherwise, because of the guy’s submerged death-wish. Eventually he’d purposely expose himself to some contagious disease, without knowing anything about it consciously. He wants to be punished. Misophobia, ha.”

  “Report on Benjamin Lawson,” the televisor announced.

  “Good,” Ferguson said. “Shoot it across.”

  Lawson was twenty-one years and one week old. He was absolutely normal. Even his minor deviations during his training period were merely normal. Had they been absent, that would have been suspicious and worth investigation. All children put frogs in their teachers’ desks, provided the frogs are available. Rodents, insects, or reptiles will do at a pinch.

  On his twenty-first birthday Lawson had had the choice of several jobs for which he was prepared. His field seemed to be general integration; he had studied everything omnivorously but rather casually. However, he had taken advantage of the month-long vacation period optional to all graduates, and stayed home most of the time, visiting his parents, who were mildly pleased to have him. He read a great many newstapes, and he interviewed a government councilor named Hiram Reeve, suggesting that Reeve introduce an immaturity pension bill at the next session. That accounted for Archer’s presence; Archer was Hiram Reeve’s Fixer.

  “Detail,” said the televisor. “Lawson proposed the inverse of an old-age pension. All children would become eligible at birth and continue to draw t
he pension until reaching biological maturity. Councilor Reeve agreed to present such a bill—”

  “But he won’t,” Ferguson said to himself. “Campaign promises, eh?”

  “Within the last two years Lawson has studied these subjects: bioology, mutation, biological time and entropic time, endocrinology, psychology, pathology, sociology, and the philosophy of humor. His studies were intensive rather than casual. There seems to—”

  “Skip to his home life, for the last few days,” Ferguson requested. “What’s he reading there?” He leaned toward the screen, but the instant closeup view made his motion unnecessary. Sprawled languidly in a relaxer, the cheerful Mr. Lawson was immersed in Joe Miller’s Joke Book.

  Some days later, Lawson called at ILC by appointment and this time he saw Greg Ferguson, who had flown in an hour earlier to superintend the final exams. Certain preparations were necessary. In the old days, a company might not issue fire insurance on a tenement until the owner put up fire escapes, so ILC stipulated that psychic fire escapes must he built on every client. Moreover, ILC built them.

  “You understand, Mr. Lawson,” Ferguson said, “the policies become invalidated if at any time you should refuse to return for additional examinations, should we decide they’re necessary.”

  “Oh, sure. That’s all right. But do I get my insurance?”

  “You want a separate policy to cover each contingency?”

  “Yes. If I can afford the premiums on them all.”

  “You’ve got twenty-five policies here,” Ferguson said. “They cover quite a range. The premiums would vary, naturally. It would be a poor risk for us to insure you against turning your ankle—we’d rather insure you against being rained on, since we can control the weather these days. You’ve got quite an extreme range here, everything from orange crop failure in Florida to snakebite. Crops don’t fail, incidentally.”

  “Well, not through climatic conditions,” Lawson said, “but wasn’t there some mutated boll weevils that ruined the cotton in South Carolina a few years ago?”

  Ferguson nodded. “You’re betting on the chance of a similar mutation hitting Florida oranges, then?”

  “I guess I’m betting against chance, in a way. Some of these policies are pretty sure to pay off.”

  “Do you think so?” Ferguson asked. “Remember, you’ll have some heavy premiums to pay—and betting against chance is a dangerous business.”

  “May I—?” Lawson examined the figures Ferguson handed him. He whistled. “That fifth one’s plenty expensive. Why’s that?”

  “Insurance against your purposely giving somebody hay fever? Difficulty of proof, for one thing, but mainly there are too many virus mutations these days. The allergies are tricky. We’ll insure you on that score, of course, but it’ll cost you money. Why do you want to give somebody hay fever?”

  “I want to be insured against doing that, Mr. Ferguson,” Lawson said blandly. “But I don’t think I can afford that one. Still, the other items—” He computed rapidly in his head. “I suppose I could scrape up first premiums.”

  Ferguson watched the young man. By now he knew Ben Lawson, inside and out. He knew his heredity and his habit patterns. He knew how and why the client worked. And there was absolutely nothing suspicious about Lawson, except Archer’s hunch.

  And that wasn’t actionable.

  So he merely said, “Mr. Lawson, I’m bound to give you a warning. If you can pay only the first premiums, you’re going to lose your money and your insurance—unless you take a job and make some more dough.”

  “Nobody has to take a job.”

  “People get hungry if they don’t. Even if they apply for the dole, they work it out in man-hours of labor.”

  “Oh?” Lawson said.

  “The insurance we issue is sound. We underwrite, and we pay, when required. But I want to warn you that our losses are due almost entirely to the laws of uncontrollable chance. When the personal factor enters into the question—we don’t lose. In your case the personal factor applies completely. There’s no way in which you could accidentally put phenylthiourea in the city reservoir.”

  “No way at all?”

  “The chances are astronomical. You haven’t found a way to upset the laws of chance, have you?”

  “Wouldn’t you know it by now if I had? You check pretty thoroughly.”

  Ferguson nodded. “That’s correct. If you get at the reservoir, it’ll be due to your own personal impulse. You know that’s impossible, or it will be.”

  “Impossible?”

  “Nearly so. The hypnosis treatment is more effective than most people realize. We’re going to condition you so you can’t do any of the things you’re insuring against.”

  “Well, that’s fine,” Lawson said. “I certainly wouldn’t want to put phenylthiourea in the city reservoir, would I?”

  Watching the young man, Ferguson had an inexplicable moment of déjà vu; and he stayed motionless and silent, because he didn’t like such things, and let free association—by which is meant selective association—flow through his mind. Presently he had it, though he had to go back to the days of his gauche adolescence. It was very much like the times when he was in an Upper Crêche, immature, facing an adult who made him feel awkward and ignorant—an adult who knew so many more of the rules than he did.

  He studied Lawson. There was nothing overt to account for this—except the equivalent of the curious behavior of the dog in the nighttime. Lawson wasn’t apparently up to anything. Lawson seemed to feel perfectly at ease. And even though the hypnotic treatment was guaranteed, including the inevitable margin for error, Ferguson felt a slight qualm near his liver. His solar plexus. The great nerves gather there, working in harmony with the brain-mechanism that was government per se—and so Ferguson sensed a threat and that hinted at an opening abyss at his feet.

  ILC was the cornerstone. The alternative was the only real personal devil that had ever been created—the threat of uncontrolled atomics. But then sanity and logic, which have betrayed so many people in the past, came back, and he knew that one man couldn’t upset the applecart. Especially this wide-eyed youth.

  Cocky fledgling. He’d just broken the shell of his crêche egg. Naturally he felt competent to cope with anything. He’d always coped with whatever had existed within his eggshell. But that shell had been a barrier, keeping the wrong things out.

  “There is one point,” Ferguson said. “Your dreams.”

  “What about them?”

  “Our experts have queried that angle. Especially the hypnogogic visions. But up to three years ago your recorded dreams followed a regular pattern, with variations. Since then—”

  “They don’t?”

  “Oh, they do. They follow a pattern. But without variations.”

  “That just means I’m a type, doesn’t it? A real norm?”

  Ferguson scowled. “The norm’s an arbitrary figure. Are you trying to kid me?”

  “I’m sorry. I underestimated you. I know the theoretical norm would be pretty much of a monster. It’s a handy semantic term. Even if norms exist, they can’t stay that way under environmental pressures.”

  “So. Either you’ve been lying about your dreams for the last few years, or you haven’t.”

  “Nobody’s complained.”

  “People look for different things, in the crêches they look for one thing. Here we look for another.”

  “If I’m a bad risk, you can turn me down.”

  “Oh, no,” Ferguson said flatly. “We seldom turn down a client. We allow margins; we pay off when necessary. We insure. If we could control the uncertainty factor, we could just charge a flat sum to work miracles. As it is, in the majority of cases we don’t have to pay off. Because we have our hypnotic treatment as extra insurance—our own. But when we do pay, we want to know why. We’ve got a close schedule of statistics, and they have to check. Apparently you’re not antisocial. You’ve no latent criminal tendencies that we can discover. You’re a normal man for
your age.” Ferguson stopped, a curious qualm going through him at his own words. He realized that he didn’t believe what he had just said. He knew, with a flat, impossible conviction, that Lawson was not—normal.

  There was no evidence. Not even the item that had brought Archer in on the case. Suppose, Ferguson thought, he should ask Lawson, “Why did you request Councilor Reeve to back an immaturity pension?” He would get an answer, but not a satisfactory one. For Lawson would not have profited by such a pension. He was legally, mentally, and physically mature. So his plea to the Councilor had been, apparently, simple altruism, and far from logical, since the young of the species already had the equivalent of an immaturity pension under the present system.

  Ferguson listened with detachment to the new note of annoyance in his own voice.

  “Sometimes people think they can swindle ILC,” he said. “They never succeed.”

  It was a key word he had thrown. Ferguson waited. The young man grinned.

  “It seems to me,” he said, “that you take yourselves awfully seriously, if you don’t mind my saying so. If I’d plotted out a solemn method to fake an accident or something, you wouldn’t have bothered.

  As long as life is real and earnest, you don’t object, but one touch of humor and you think I’m going to reach CM and explode in your face.”

  Ferguson tightened his mouth. After a moment he said, “We’ll take a chance. What policies do you want?”

  “Well—I think we’ll forget about these three. The premiums are too high. I’ll take the rest—twenty-two policies, I make it. All right?”

  “You can afford to pay two premiums on each, then—exclusive of the three you’ve thrown out. Why not choose fewer, so you can be sure they won’t lapse before you get a job?”

  Lawson said. “Well, if I picked two or three and they paid off, I couldn’t get the others afterward at the same rate, could I?”