Complete Fiction

by Hal Annas

  “And my eyes are not particularly expressive. I generally conceal my thoughts.”

  “That, Mr. Cornith, is merely your own opinion. You don’t know what expression you might put into your eyes when you look into the eyes of your soul-mate.”

  “The eyes of my what?”

  “Excuse me, Mr. Cornith. I know you’re not the poetic type. You’re the rugged type, but brainy, realistic. Still, you fit the specifications.”

  “You said there was another sheet to the specifications?”

  “Yes. It won’t be finished until tomorrow. But let me assure you that it fits you. In fact, it describes your every virtue and fault.”

  Cornith glanced round the large room. His brown eyes came to rest on a model of an early Martian rocket ship. He studied it for a space, mentally seeing its interior and its outmoded atomic drive. It reminded him that he should get back to the laboratory and check on those ray-collector tests. This business of dickering over specifications for a wife was a nuisance. His requirements had been on file since he had taken the Levet test at the age of eighteen. Because of his exacting nature they had been hard to fill. Now at twenty-seven he was still unmarried. Not that he cared. But by reason of the fact that he was of the higher mental level, and physically fitted to survive in a complex and expanding civilization, he was urged by the Foundation to marry and beget children.

  THIS was the accepted procedure. Marriage was seldom discouraged, but it was urged only on those who came up to certain specifications. The purpose was to improve mankind in order that man might hold his own in a solar system that was even now reaching out toward the stars. The system had long been in effect on Mars, but owing to the colder climate and the thinner atmosphere, Mars had less than a tenth the population of earth. Selective breeding alone had enabled these to survive.

  “Sorry,” Cornith said. “This Lucy Hollowell fits everything except she is too skinny. I don’t want a bag of bones for a wife.”

  The blonde smiled wryly. “She is only a half-ounce under the specifications, to be exact. Perhaps you have not carefully read your requirements. Let me remind you, Mr. Cornith, the Foundation probed your every thought, conscious and subconscious, your every physical reaction, and they specified merely that the girl must be unusually intelligent, naming the subjects which will fit into your pattern; that she must be beautiful according to your standards; that she must be five-feet four-inches tall and weigh a hundred and twenty-three pounds.

  “Now, Mr. Cornith, there is one little thing which the Foundation has decided that you implanted in your thoughts by suggestion before taking the test. They decided that you were being facetious. I am alluding to the specified requirements that your wife must be able to wiggle her ears, throw her voice and perform sleight-of-hand tricks, among other curious things. The Foundation says that these things may not be essentially required. But they do admit the requirement that she must be eager to please you at all times. And since it is Lucy Hollowell’s nature to be eager to please the man she marries, she is even now practicing ventriloquism and learning how to wiggle her ears. She has a brilliant mind and will have no difficulty learning a number of sleight-of-hand tricks.”

  “But she’s too skinny!”

  “Half an ounce, Mr. Cornith. She weighs a hundred and twenty-two pounds, fifteen, ounces. She could very easily gain that ounce by making an effort, but you specified that there should be no conscious effort to meet physical measurements and weight requirements. She was to be weighed, dripping wet, as she came from under the shower, just before breakfast. We assume that the wetness weighed half an ounce.”

  “I don’t like skinny females.”

  “We have another one, less brilliant, but who meets all physical requirements other than weighing a hundred and twenty-three pounds and four ounces.”

  “Too fat. Can’t stand fat women.”

  “Would you permit Lucy Hollowed to gain half an ounce consciously? She can do it in a few hours. Has a brilliant mind. Can regulate her own glandular flow.”

  “No. I don’t want to marry a woman who is always thinking about her weight, and if she starts now—”

  “You’re very exacting, Mr. Cornith!”

  “Naturally. The requirements of Lucy Hollowed demand an exacting man. At least that’s what the Foundation reports.”

  “Then you are giving her serious thought?”

  “NONE whatever! She’s too skinny. If she just had an ounce more meat on her bones, I’d marry her and not even ask her name. But I don’t want to live the balance of my days with a female who looks like an animated skeleton, who has to stand twice in the same spot to cast a shadow, who has to drink tomato juice to keep you from looking through her.”

  “How about the woman of the same height who weighs a hundred and twenty-three pounds, four ounces.”

  “A beef-trust like that! Count me out. She’d cast her shadow twice. It would take a week to hug her, a little at a time. She’d shake the house down every time she walked across the floor. Impossible to keep her ill clothes. I’d need a nylon and linen factory to supply the material for one outfit. No! I’d rather have a skeleton than a whale.”

  “Then you’ll consider Lucy Hollowell?”

  “I didn’t say that. I wouldn’t mind taking a look at her from a distance, because if she does fit the other specifications she must be something out of a dream. Too bad she has to be built like a rail.”

  “Not like a rail, Mr. Cornith.”

  “A skeleton then.”

  “Not like a skeleton, either. She is Miss Venus of 2190.”

  “What? You mean, this gawky Lucy Hollowell is the same as that gorgeous bundle of curves and pulchritude?”

  “Exactly. And now you’re interested, huh?”

  “No. She doesn’t meet the specifications.”

  “But you’ll let her come over to the laboratory and watch you work, won’t you? After all, you meet her requirements.”

  “No! I don’t want any walking bean-poles around the laboratory.”

  “But maybe she wouldn’t appear just that.”

  “She’s underweight.”

  “According to your requirements—only. Thousands of men think she is perfect. And she’s going to be mighty disappointed if her dream man—”

  “Her what?”

  “Sorry. I forgot you’re not the poetic type. She doesn’t think of you as her dream man, but she does think of you as being everything she wants in a man. You’ll let her come to the laboratory, won’t you?”

  “No.”

  “But she does at least want to see you. Do you know you are the only man out of thousands who exactly meets her requirements? Even to those crinkles in your forehead when you frown. And even to being stubborn about things.”

  “I’ve got to get back and check those ray-collectors—”

  “And you’ll let her go along with you?”

  “No.”

  “But she’s waiting in. the next office, and your requirements call for a woman who has a mind of her own. I think she’s—”

  “Not a mind of her own that makes her determined to have her own way in everything.”

  “Of course not. But I think she’s—”

  “I specified a woman who would not try to wear the pants.”

  “She won’t. That is, not yours, anyway. Though you’re too big for them. But I think she’s going with you to the laboratory.”

  “THAT’S what you think,” Cornith said with finality and stood up. “No long. lean, gawky drink-of-water is going to tag along after Herb Cornith. Especially a female bag of bones. Uh! Excuse me. Who is the lady who just entered without knocking?”

  “Oh! Just a second. Miss Hollowell, Mr. Cornith was just getting ready to come by for you. Miss Hollowed, Mr. Cornith.”

  Cornith drew a deep breath and ran a. finger beneath his collar. He stared, drinking in the beauty of the symmetrical figure beneath the rose-colored dress, the radiance of the smooth features. He had seen her before, but on
ly in a vague dream in which she was far more lovely than the telecast view’s of Miss Venus, but in the dream she had not done to him what she was doing now. She acted upon him much as a single-pole magnet does to a magnet of opposite polarity. More, she seemed stunned herself. Her lips parted slightly, revealing white teeth, and her deep azure eyes seemed to be saying things that only eyes can say.

  “A pleasure,” Cornith said, enclosing her small warm hand in his. “I was just telling Miss—” He gestured toward the girl behind the desk. “I was just telling her that I—er, I, uh.”

  “You’re going to the laboratory,” Lucy Hollowed said, more as a direct reading of his thoughts than as a question.

  Cornith smiled, nodded. “Care to come along?’

  Lucy Hollowell withdrew her hand and a deck of cards materialized from nowhere and spread out fan wise between her small thumb and forefinger. Cornith gaped. In the next instant his attention was attracted to her ears which peeked from beneath silken platinum hair. The ears were wiggling enchantingly.

  Flushed and hot, Cornith reached to his breast pocket for a handkerchief. He was astonished to find a large Spanish rose protruding from the pocket. He held it in his hand and stared at it in stunned silence. Lucy Hollowell extended a small white hand and took the rose from him. She held it against her cheek until he saw that her lips and the rose were the same color. Then she fastened it in her platinum hair where its warm red petals contrasted brilliantly.

  “Er, uh. I was saying—” Cornith began lamely.

  “That she’s a bag of bones,” a voice behind him finished.

  Cornith whirled, and the same voice in a distant part of the room said. “Over here!” Cornith jumped. He puzzled for a moment and then it dawned over him that those small voices had the same deep huskiness that Lucy Hollowell’s voice had. He turned back to her and smiled weakly.

  “You were inviting me to go to the laboratory with you?” Lucy said.

  Cornith nodded. “Thought it might interest—” He broke off abruptly, his mouth hanging open. He could not believe his ears. He was hearing his own voice, or a fair imitation of it, repeating his earlier words, “Gawky . . . beanpole . . . tagging . . .”

  “Stop that!” he said abruptly.

  SILENCE reigned and Lucy Hollowell remained in rigid immobility. And while Cornith stared, her peachblown cheeks became pink, then red. The veins in her lovely neck swelled and throbbed. She turned slowly on tottering legs and gently collapsed into Cornith’s arms.

  “What th—?” He twisted his neck and looked at the blonde in frantic appeal. “What’s the matter with her? Can’t you do something?”

  “Your requirements demand,” the blonde replied unemotionally, “a woman who is very obedient. When you told her to ‘stop that!’ she stopped everything, including breathing.”

  “Oh!” Cornith sighed in relief. ‘So that’s it!”

  “Better tell her to begin breathing again,” the blonde said casually.

  “But the requirements shouldn’t be taken that literally,” Cornith argued.

  “She won’t take everything literally, An understanding between you will straighten that out. But meanwhile, you’d better tell her to breathe again.”

  Cornith looked down at the lively face which had now regained its normal peachblown color. He was astonished to see a tiny bit of deep azure beneath an eyelid that wasn’t quite closed. Instantly the lid closed tightly, quivered a trifle and remained shut. Cornith’s mind worked swiftly, reconstructing events from the beginning, and he recalled the swelling veins, the careful turning to fall into his arms, the flushed cheeks which were not the color that normally precedes fainting. He noticed now the shallow, controlled breathing, and he felt a slight tremor in the soft warm body he held in his arms.

  Drawing her close, Cornith said, “This ought to make her snap out of it,” and pressed his lips firmly against hers.

  “No, no, Mr. Cornith!” the blonde exclaimed. “The requirements say that she is supposed to swoon when you do that.”

  It was true. Lucy Hollowed seemed to revive and then swoon in ecstasy. She slumped limply in Cornith’s arms while a faint tremor ran through her warm body. To make certain the results were mathematically precise, Cornith tried again, kissing her a little more firmly this time. The response was the same. In the interest of science, he tested the matter a third time, and then turned raptly to the blonde.

  “Look! She swoons every time I kiss her.”

  “Naturally, Mr. Cornith,” the blonde commented a trifle bitterly. “Your requirements demand that, even though it is thought by some members of the Foundation that you were in a facetious mood when you took the Levet examination. They suspect that you implanted a large number of suggestions prior to the event, to bias your responses in a manner not in keeping with the seriousness of the occasion. That is not a problem for this department. We have provided you with a woman who fulfills every requirement stated—”

  “She’s underweight,” Cornith insisted.

  “Does she look too thin?”

  “No! She’s perfect. But she lacks an ounce—”

  SMACK! A small white hand struck Cornith’s cheek resoundingly and brought the blood stinging to the surface. He almost dropped the girl. She got her long, slender legs under her and supported her own weight. Smack! Another small hand caught Cornith stingingly on the other cheek. He drew a deep breath, felt his muscles contracting.

  “Now, now, Mr. Cornith!” the blonde warned. “The specifications demand that your wife shall have plenty of fire.”

  “That doesn’t give her a right to knock my head off,” Cornith blustered. “Besides, she’s not my wife!”

  “Are you hurt, darling?” Lucy Hollowell said sympathetically. “I’m sorry! Here! Let me kiss your cheeks and make them well.”

  “What th—?”

  “Now, now, Mr. Cornith! She’s supposed to be sympathetic and understanding and very tender when you need her.”

  “I don’t need that sort of sympathy and understanding.”

  “Look!” Lucy Hollowell cupped his chin in one soft hand and forced him to look at her. “My ears!” They were wiggling again in rhythm with the soft strains of a waltz coming from some hidden source.

  “Stop that! No, no, no! Don’t stop breathing. Just stop wiggling your ears. Don’t faint. Stand still. And stop plucking coins out of the air. And if that’s you making that music, stop that, too.”

  Silence reigned. Lucy Hollowell remained perfectly still. The expression on her lovely features was one of interest and concern. Her ripe lips quivered slightly. “You don’t like me?” she said.

  “I do, too.”

  Instantly the girl was all over Cornith, hugging him and kissing him at the same time and murmuring endearments.

  “Hey!”

  “Now, now, Mr. Cornith. She’s supposed to be very responsive to words of love.”

  “I didn’t say anything about love.”

  “You said you liked her.”

  “I merely said, “ ‘I do, too’.”

  “But she’s supposed to understand even when you don’t put everything in words.”

  “When is she supposed to stop this—this necking?”

  “She will let you alone when you want to be let alone.”

  Lucy Hollowell stepped back, patted her platinum hair and glanced at her image in a small mirror. Then she smiled sweetly at Cornith and returned to his side. “Shall we go?” she said.

  This sudden change in mood and recovery of self-possession, after her demonstration of a moment before, was more than Cornith could readily grasp. The blonde supplied the answer.

  “Her moods change with the situation and needs of the moment.”

  CORNITH scratched his dark head. “I don’t know,” he commented reflectively. “I didn’t think any woman in the world would fit the requirements I put in. At eighteen I thought the whole idea was stupid. I didn’t want to get married.”

  “Of course,” Lucy said understan
ding. “You still think those examinations and tests and specifications are stupid. I understand.

  And you put in a lot of things you didn’t want. But I had to meet the requirements, and my reactions and responses had to be some actual part of me, not ad lib. I can change them in time.”

  “She’s very understanding, Mr. Cornith, and eager to please.”

  “But it’s all nonsense,” Cornith insisted.

  “Of course it is,” Lucy said sympathetically. “It isn’t right for you to have to marry a girl who meets all of the requirements you didn’t want. I know just how you feel, and after we’re married we’ll work together to amend the Foundation regulations.”

  “I didn’t say I’d marry you.”

  “Of course you didn’t. And it isn’t fair for you to have to do it. I know just how you feel. And I’ll comfort you all I can. Here you have a woman on your hands whose reactions are everything you thought was silly. Because you’re a scientist and don’t like nonsense. At least, not too much of it. And you put all those things in, thinking that everybody would see how silly they were. You didn’t think anybody would be stupid enough actually to be like that. I feel so sorry for you, having to marry a woman with all those silly things ingrained in her reactions.”

  “We’re not married yet.”

  “That’s the worst part. It’s that anxiety before an event of doubtful outcome. I’m so sorry, darling!

  Put your head here on my breast and let me comfort you.”

  “Dash it!”

  “Now, now, Mr. Cornith. The specifications . . . a woman of deep feeling . . . ready to comfort.”

  “Dash it! Dash it! Dash it!”

  “Now, now, Mr. Cornith! If you give ’way to your feelings, no telling what might happen. That’s one of the things you didn’t anticipate. There’s nothing in the specifications—”

  “Here!” Lucy opened her handbag and drew out a flask. “You need a drink. Brace up. There are worse things than being married.”

  “I don’t drink.” Cornith seized the flask and tossed off a swallow. “Ah! Martian Vinth! Never touch the stuff.” He took another swallow. “Now I don’t have to marry you. I deliberately specified that my wife should not be a Vinth sot.”