The Call-Girls

by Arthur Koestler

  But nobody was to know the end of the sentence. This was altogether too much for Miss Carey. She had been the centre of attention and then forgotten in her chair. All those horrid people were criticizing and attacking her doctor instead of kissing the saviour’s hands. The reference to pin-cushions and zombies was the last straw. Miss Carey jumped out of her chair, improbably brandishing her knitting needle. With her other hand she grabbed the wrist-watch which the doctor had left on the conference table after the demonstration. Thus armed, she lunged not at Halder, but at innocent Claire, who so much reminded her of her sister, queening it at the tape-recorder.

  The whole action went off so fast that afterwards everybody remembered a different version of it. There was an ugly mess on Claire’s arm where the knitting needle had gone in and been torn out again, but she had not uttered a sound. Miss Carey herself, struggling and screaming, was effectively restrained by the athletic Halder, who had been the first to get at her, and to pin her elbows behind her back; while Valenti, white-faced, forced open her fists to retrieve the needle and watch. But that delicate gadget, submitted to such brutal treatment, had lost its magic. Miss Carey had to be half dragged, half carried to her room, uttering vile words of protest and intermittent shrieks, until Valenti, after another painful struggle, managed to put her to sleep with an injection. The proceedings were watched wide-eyed by Hansie and Mitzie, the impassive Gustav, and by three members of the voluntary fire-brigade who had been drinking beer in the Kongresshaus kitchen. However, by the time the ambulance arrived from the valley there was no need for it, as Miss Carey was fast asleep, smiling like the saintly nun she would no doubt have become but for some schizo-physiological malformation in her caudate nucleus.

  3

  After a hurried lunch of soup grown cold under a greasy film, of goulash that had disintegrated in the oven, and fruit salad out of tins from the American army surplus, the call-girls assembled once more in the conference room for the closing session. According to the agenda, it was to be devoted to the summing up by Professor Solovief, followed by the General Discussion, and the drafting of the Resolution or Message. Niko’s idea of an ‘action committee’ had been quietly dropped somewhere along the line.

  They were in a chastened, almost solemn mood – a gang of rowdies attending Sunday school. All had their dossiers, pads and pencils neatly laid out in front of them on the table of polished pine. Claire, ear-phones over her smooth chestnut hair, was again in charge of the tape-recorder. She had a neat bandage over her arm, and had been given a shot of penicillin in spite of her protest against the unnecessary fuss – in fact she was quite glad about it, as the idea of having any trace of Miss Carey’s knitting needle in her blood filled her with an irrational horror. Miss Carey herself was still under sedation in her room.

  Before Solovief could start on his summary, Valenti got up and made a handsome apology to all those who had witnessed that painful scene, and in particular ‘to our charming hostess, who was in danger of becoming a martyr to science’. The joke did not go down very well. He had regained his composure, but they had all noticed during the morning session the brittleness of his elegant façade, the hair-line cracks in his self-assurance. He took full responsibility for the incident, explaining that for the last two years Miss Carey, had been under complete control, and had participated in a number of similar demonstrations without a single hitch. The morning’s incident had been due to a minute fault in the apparatus which, fortunately, had now been put right. He concluded with his repeated apologies, and the rather unnecessary request that everybody should be nice to Miss Carey when she emerged from her slumbers, and act as if nothing had happened. She herself would in all probability regard the incident as just a bit of ‘silly behaviour’ – and feel no emotion, nor remorse.

  Valenti’s statement was received in silence. Solovief thanked him rather drily and immediately launched into the onerous task of summing up the proceedings of the conference.

  He reminded his listeners of his opening address in which he had set out some of the considerations – known to them all – which made the survival of homo sapiens a questionable proposition. In those opening remarks he had suggested that the task of the conference should be to inquire into the causes of man’s predicament, to formulate a tentative diagnosis, and to suggest possible remedies.

  As regards the first point, several causative factors had been suggested by various participants, which might complement each other, but as yet hardly provided a coherent synthesis. Thus, for instance, Dr Wyndham had hinted at the possibility that man’s troubles began with the pre-natal squeeze on the embryo in the womb, the trauma of a clumsily laborious birth, and, above all, the protracted helplessness and suggestibility of the human infant. Another theory put the blame on the dramatic increase of mutual dependence and tribal solidarity during the critical period when man’s hominid ancestors emerged from the forests onto the plains and – in a first outburst of hubris – took to hunting prey faster and stronger than themselves. Both factors taken together may have moulded man into the worshipful, frightened and fanatical creature that he became. Other primate societies were also held together by social forces, but the family bonds did not grow into neurotic attachments; the cohesive forces within the group did not attain the intensity and fervour of tribal feelings; and occasional tensions between groups did not result in war and genocide. As Dr Epsom had pointed out, these fratricidal tendencies were enhanced, instead of being diminished, by the acquisition of language, with its power to erect intra-specific barriers, to promote dogmatic beliefs, and formulate explosive battle slogans. A fourth factor was the simultaneous acceptance of death by the intellect, and its rejection by instinct, which implanted the sinister double helix of anxiety and guilt into the collective mind. Lastly, Dr Valenti had attempted to define the physiological malfunction underlying the paranoid streak reflected in man’s history – the chronic conflict between emotion and reason, instinct and intelligence; the compulsion to live, die and kill for irrational beliefs which were unaffected by logic, and overrode the instinct of self-preservation.

  Niko paused. He kept glancing sideways at Claire, worried about the possibility of an infection. She on her side was achingly aware of how tired he looked. He kept clearing his throat, which was not his habit.

  ‘So much, then,’ he continued, ‘for the pathogenic factors which seem to have made us into what we are. I realize that I have left out much of what was said on this subject – but we have the tape-recordings which will put that right in the printed version of the proceedings.’

  This was no doubt correct; but it did not prevent several participants – Halder and Burch in particular – from resenting not having been so far mentioned by name. The main function of a Chairman winding up a symposium is to hand out chocolates.

  But Niko would have none of it. If this was a circus, he was still the ringmaster. He had to make a last effort, and try to make them face up to their responsibilities. He lowered his head, recovering his former bellicosity, and his voice regained its resonance.

  He declared himself in essential agreement with the view that man was an evolutionary misfit – a glorious freak who built cathedrals and composed symphonies, but still a freak, with built-in compulsions which drove him towards ultimate self-destruction. Von Halder had reminded them that social animals fought harmless duels for mating partners and territorial possession; man did the reverse – he fought for mirages with liquid phosphorus, fought for slogans with nuclear bombs.

  Dr Kaletski had repeatedly warned the conference against taking a catastrophic view of recent developments. Niko recommended the opposite attitude as the only realistic approach to a situation without precedent in history. In all previous generations man had had to come to terms with the prospect of his death as an individual; the present generation was the first to face the prospect of the death of the species. Homo sapiens had arrived on the stage about a hundred thousand years ago – which was but the blinking of an eye on
the evolutionary time-scale. If he were to vanish now, his rise and fall would have been a brief episode, unsung and unlamented. Other planets in the vastness of space were no doubt humming with life; that brief episode would never come to their notice…

  ‘Mr Chairman,’ Halder interrupted in a mock-distressed voice, ‘what is this – a summary or a requiem?’

  ‘It’s a summary,’ Niko said drily, ‘leading to my last point: the remedies we are meant to propose. If we presume to call ourselves men of science, we must work up the courage to propose the radical remedies which might give humanity a chance of survival. We cannot wait for another hundred thousand years, hoping for a favourable mutation to remedy our ills. We must engineer that mutation ourselves, by biological methods which are already within our reach – or soon will be…’

  ‘What do you mean by “biological methods”?’ shouted Halder. ‘Valenti’s needles? Librium in the tap-water? Tampering with the chromosomes?’

  Solovief gave him a cold stare. His shaggy brows seemed to bristle: ‘Not exactly that, but something on those lines. I am aware that it sounds frightening, but we should be even more frightened of doing nothing and letting predictable events take their course.’

  Blood asked in an unusually quiet voice: ‘Would you put anti-fertility agents into the water supply of the Indians?’

  Solovief made a visible effort to break down some inner resistance before he answered.

  ‘I would.’

  ‘I am with you there,’ snapped Burch. John D. John seconded: ‘So am I.’ The others were silent. Claire was reminded of that old soldier’s quip: ‘With my enemies I can cope, but God preserve me from my allies.’

  Blood said, reverting to his usual manner: ‘It’s all right with me. I hate brats anyway.’

  Wyndham turned to Niko. He did not giggle or titter; even the dimples seemed to have vanished:

  ‘Do you suggest including this in the recommendations of the conference? In that case, I am sorry to say, you would have to count me out.’

  ‘I do,’ Niko said slowly, ‘with some essential qualifications. All governments should be invited to make a last, all-out effort to stop the explosion by appeals to voluntary birth-control. If the appeals fail – as they have before and no doubt will again – they should be asked to impose nonvoluntary controls to prevent the catastrophe. I mean all nations, regardless of their birth-rate, as a gesture of solidarity. Experts should be appointed to work out a plan for moratoriums on birth, for fixed periods at fixed intervals, until the explosion is brought under control. After that one could revert to voluntary control for a trial period, perhaps with better results.’

  ‘Or the opposite,’ said Harriet. ‘After the moratorium, everybody will be mad for babies.’

  ‘Could be. In that case, the periods of enforced infertility – call them Lent-years – would have to be imposed as a more or less permanent feature of human existence – a sort of social calendar to complement the biological calendar imposed by nature.’

  ‘And the unborn millions will be grateful to us for being spared death by starvation,’ said Blood; it was impossible to decide whether he meant it ironically or in earnest.

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ said Niko. ‘But has any expert, aware of the situation, proposed an alternative?’

  ‘No!’ shouted Halder. ‘And you know why? Because anthropologists and sociologists have respect for human rights and human freedom. You are a physicist, accustomed to smashing atoms.’

  Niko shrugged. He thought that Otto von Halder as a champion of freedom was a good illustration of what Valenti called schizophysiology. But Valenti himself had been oddly silent during the discussion. Then a possible reason for this occurred to Niko, and he smiled: it was an even better illustration…

  He squared his shoulders and proceeded to the next point in his notes, which he knew would be even more difficult to put across. Already on the less dangerous subject of imposed fertility-control his old friend Wyndham had ratted on him, and Harriet had been unusually non-committal. Now he had to handle real dynamite: the problem of imposing aggressivity-controls … He had no hope of persuading them; but he had to go through with it. He took up the thread where Valenti had left off with his remarks about biochemical controls. It was not a problem to be left to the future, because such means of control were already in existence …

  ‘The accumulation of knowledge cannot be stopped, and as man’s understanding of his brain increases, new techniques of controlling its functions will be developed at an accelerating pace. The question is no longer whether we like it or not, but how to make the best use of this development with its unlimited possibilities. Nerve gases and hallucinogenic agents to induce mass psychosis are already in existence. Yet any suggestion of putting this new alchemy to benevolent uses is received with horrified outcries and accusations of tampering with human nature. The same outcry greeted Jenner when he introduced vaccination against small-pox…’

  ‘By all means tamper with bacilli, but not with this – not with this!’ grunted Blood, hammering his skull with his fist.

  Niko copied his gesture. ‘But this is precisely where our troubles reside. This is where evolution slipped up.’

  ‘And this,’ said Valenti, who had regained his smiling composure, pointing at the region of the thyroid gland in his neck, ‘is where the tendency to cretinism and goitre resides. So the authorities fortify your table salt with iodine without asking your permission.’

  ‘I maintain,’ said Wyndham, ‘that these are false analogies. Curing or preventing disease is one thing, interference with the mind – if Burch will pardon my expression – is quite another.’

  ‘But what if the disease is endemic in the mind of the species? I thought that was our point of departure.’ Solovief abruptly squashed his cigar in the ashtray. ‘May I remind you that this is not a discussion of an abstract, academic subject – read today’s newspaper headlines, for God’s sake.’ He was almost shouting.

  ‘Emotionalism won’t get us anywhere,’ Halder remarked with judicious glee.

  ‘Rot,’ said Harriet. ‘What Niko and Valenti are saying is that emotionalism is all to the good so long as it is in harmony with reason. But they say that there is a fault in the circuitry here’ – tapping one’s skull seemed to have become infectious – ‘which puts emotion at loggerheads with reason…’

  ‘So you will put some hormones or enzymes into the tap-water and we shall all become like lambs – castrated lambs…’

  ‘Contrariwise,’ remarked Blood, ‘we might become Centaurs – creatures in which the wisdom of a Greek sage is married to a steed’s passion.’

  The vision of Blood transformed into a stallion made Niko relax.

  ‘It seems,’ he said, ‘that Halder’s emotional references to the tap-water are a modern version of the archetypal well-poisoning scare. Valenti reminded us that we would have succumbed to epidemics long ago if we had not put chlorine and other stuffs into it. At the same time, we have most effectively polluted our rivers and lakes with mercury, sulphur, cadmium, DDT, and other poisons. But mention the possibility of adding a benevolent ingredient to the list – not a tranquillizer, but a mental stabilizer – and you are all up in arms …’

  ‘Would you consult the population before engaging in a gamble of this kind?’ asked Wyndham in an unusually sharp voice.

  ‘Do we consult them before declaring war? Or before suing for peace? Do we consult children before giving them vitamin pills?’

  Wyndham shook his head without replying. He was saddened by Niko’s frivolity – or the depth of his despair. Or both.

  Blood was enjoying himself. ‘I see that we are in for a sermon on Democracy. Pray let me remind you that in 1932 the nation of Hölderlin and Rilke voted, by perfectly democratic means, Adolf Hitler into power. Democracy is too serious a matter to be left to the electorate.’

  Burch was impressed. ‘Who said that?’ he inquired.

  ‘I say it,’ trumpeted Blood. ‘Howe
ver, I am willing to grant you that it’s the lesser evil compared with other alternatives. So long as you don’t make a fetish of it.’

  ‘Anyway,’ Niko went on impatiently, ‘you are skipping several stages. Nobody suggests that we should start tomorrow adding mental stabilizers to the salt – or the water – though I do believe it will come to that, whether we recommend it or not. The first stage has to be experimenting on a large number of volunteers. Last night Valenti told me of a pilot project he had in mind. Perhaps he will explain …’

  Valenti got up, adjusting his bow tie:

  ‘It is quite simple, my dear colleagues. You collect a thousand volunteers. You pay them. You do not tell them what the experiment is about. You tell them the pills are for having nice dreams while you sleep. During the treatment you arrange for various incidents to occur. The office boss is unpleasant to the subject. He is pushed in the subway by an agent provocateur. His wife starts flirting with his best friend. A varied menu of situations designed to provoke aggression and violence. Also one or two femmes fatales to invite infatuation, and a prayer meeting in the ashram of a Californian guru. If the subjects pass all these tests with stoic fortitude, the product can be put on the market. When its effects are shown on television, the use of the product will spread very quickly. It will also spread across the Iron Curtain and the Chinese Wall. Then the tampering, as you say, can be done with public approval. Otherwise it will have to be done anyway.’

  ‘Are you talking seriously?’ asked Harriet.

  Valenti directed the full radiance of his smile at her. ‘Perhaps it does not sound so, but it is the traditional way of testing a new treatment – the so-called double-blind method. There are controls who are given dummy pills. Neither doctor nor subject knows who gets what.’

  Suddenly Petitjacques, who had followed the proceedings in silence, with at most a contemptuous grin, spoke up: ‘This idea I like very much. It is surrealiste, it is absurd, and therefore it is good.’