Image of the Beast / Blown

by Philip José Farmer

  Now Colben was dead and Budler could be in the hands

  of the same people who had taken Colben—although there

  was no evidence to indicate so. But Budler and Colben

  had disappeared the same night, and Colben had been

  tailing Budler.

  The film had been mailed from a Torrance post office

  three days ago. Colben and Budler had been missing for

  fourteen days.

  Childe stopped at the tobacco stand and bought a morn-

  ing Times. At any other time, the Colben case would have

  been headline material. Not today. It was, however, a

  feature on the front page. Childe, hating to go outside,

  leaned against the wall and read the story. It had been

  considerably bowdlerized by the reporters who had seen

  the film. They had not been present at either of the show-

  ings he had witnessed, but Bruin had told him they were at

  a special running. Bruin had laughed like a bear with a

  sore throat, and described how at least half of them had

  thrown up or been close to throwing up.

  "Some of them been in battles and seen men with their

  guts blowed inside out!" Bruin had said. "You was in the

  Korean action and you was an officer, right? Yet you got

  sick! How come?"

  "Didn't you feel your cock drawing up in your belly?"

  Childe had said.

  "Naw."

  "Maybe you don't have one," Childe had said. Bruin

  thought that was funny, too.

  The whole story was in two columns, and it covered

  most of what Childe knew except for the details of the

  film. Colben's car had been found in a parking lot behind

  a trust and security building on Wilshire Boulevard in Bev-

  erly Hills. Colben had been trailing Benjamin Budler, a

  wealthy Beverly Hills lawyer. Budler had been stepping

  out on his wife, not to mention his regular mistress. The

  wife had hired Childe & Colben, Private Investigators, to

  get enough evidence for her to file for divorce.

  Colben, using the tape recorder in his car, had described

  Budler's moves. Budler had picked up a lovely brunette

  (described in detail but unidentified) on the corner of

  Olympic and Veteran. The traffic light had been green,

  but Budler had held up a long line of cars, horns blaring,

  while he opened the door and let the woman in. She was

  well-dressed. Colben had surmised that her car was parked

  somewhere close; she did not look as if she would live in

  this neighborhood.

  Budler's Rolls-Royce had turned right on Veteran and

  gone to Santa Monica, where it had turned left and trav-

  eled down Santa Monica until it stopped a block from a

  quiet and expensive restaurant. Here Budler had let the

  woman off and driven to a parking place on a side street.

  He had walked to the restaurant where they had dined and

  wined (presumably) for three hours. Though they went

  in separately, they came out together. Budler was red-

  faced, talking loudly and laughing much. The woman

  laughed much also but she walked steadily. His balance

  was a little uncertain; he stumbled when he started across

  the street and almost fell.

  They had taken the Rolls-Royce (with Budler driving

  too swiftly and weaving in and out of traffic) up Santa

  Monica and turned left at Bedford Drive to go north.

  The tape was wiped clean from this point on.

  Colben had stated that he had gotten some long-range

  pictures of the woman when Budler had picked her up.

  The camera was in the car but the film had been removed.

  The car had been thoroughly cleaned; there was not a

  single fingerprint. Some dirt particles, presumably from the

  shoes of whoever had driven the car to the parking lot,

  were on the mat, but an analysis had shown only that the

  dirt could have come from anywhere in the area. There

  were some fibers; these had been rubbed off the rag used

  to wipe the seats.

  Budler's Rolls-Royce was also missing.

  The police had not discovered that Budler had dropped

  out of his normal pattern of life until two days after Colben

  was reported missing. His wife had known that he was

  gone, but she had not bothered to report this. Why should

  she? He often did not come home for two to four days.

  As soon as she was informed that her husband might

  have been kidnapped or murdered, that his disappearance

  was connected with that of Colben's (or seemed likely to

  be connected), she had told Childe that he was no longer

  employed by her.

  "I hope they find the son of a bitch dead! And soon!"

  she had screamed over the phone. "I don't want his money

  tied up forever! I need it now! It's just like him to never

  be found and tie me up with litigation and red tape and

  all that shit! Just like him! I hate him!" and so on.

  "I'll send you my bill," Childe had replied. "It was nice

  working for you," and he had hung up.

  His bill would be delivered, but how soon he would be

  paid was doubtful. Even if a check was sent by Mrs. Bud-

  ler by return mail, it might not be cashable for some time.

  The newspapers reported that the authorities were discuss-

  ing closing down all banks until the crisis was over. Many

  people were protesting against this, but it would not make

  much difference for the protesters if the banks did stay

  open. What good did that do if most of the customers

  could not get to their bank unless they were within walking

  distance or wanted to stand in line for hours to take the

  infrequent bus?

  He looked up from the paper. Two uniformed, gas-

  masked men were bringing in a tall dark man between

  them. He held up handcuffed hands as if to demonstrate

  his martyrdom to the world. One cop carried a third gas

  mask, and by this Childe knew that the arrested man had

  probably been using a mask while holding up a store or

  robbing a loan company or doing something which required

  concealing his face.

  Childe wondered why the cops were bringing him in

  through this entrance. Perhaps they had caught him just

  down the street and were taking the short cut.

  The situation was advantageous for criminals in one re-

  spect. Men wearing gas masks or water-soaked cloths over

  their faces were not uncommon. On the other hand, any-

  one abroad was likely to be stopped and questioned. One

  thing balances out another.

  The cops and the arrestee were coughing. The man be-

  hind the tobacco counter was coughing. Childe felt a tick-

  ling in his throat. He could not smell the smog, but the

  thought of smelling it evoked the ghost of a cough.

  He checked his I.D. cards and permit. He did not want

  to be caught without them, as he had been yesterday. He

  had lost about an hour because, even after the cops had

  called in and validated his reasons for being out, he had

  been required to go home and pick up his papers, and he

  had been stopped again before he could get home.

  He tucked the paper under his arm, walked to
the door,

  looked through the glass, shuddered, wished he had

  lightweight scuba diver's equipment, opened the door and

  plunged in.

  3

  It was like walking at the bottom of a sea of very thin

  bile.

  There were no clouds between the sun and the sea.

  The sun shone brightly as if it were trying to burn a path

  through the sea. The August sun burned fiercely and the

  more it burned, the more it cut with its yellow machetes,

  the thicker and more poisonous grew the gray-green

  foliage.

  (Childe knew he was mixing metaphors. So what? The

  Cosmos was a mixed metaphor in the mind of God. The

  left mind of God did not know what the right mind of

  God was doing. Or did not care. God was a schizo-

  phrenic? Herald Childe, creature of God, image of God,

  certainly was schizophrenic. Levorotatory image?)

  Eyes burned like heretics at the stake. Sinuses were

  scourged; fire ran along the delicate bones; spermaticky

  fluid collected to till the chambers of the sinuses and

  dripped, waiting for the explosion of air voluntarily or

  involuntarily set off to discharge the stuff with the mildest

  of orgasms.

  Not a twitch of wind. The air had been unmoving for a

  day and a night and half a day, as if the atmosphere had

  died and was rotting.

  The gray-green stuff hung in sheets. Or seemed to. The

  book of judgment was being read and the pages, the

  gray-green sheets, were being turned as the eye read and

  more and more pages were being piled toward the front

  of the book. How far to read before the end?

  Childe could see no further than one hundred and ten

  feet, if that. He had walked this path from the door to the

  parking lot so many times that he could not get lost. But

  there were those who did not know where they were. A

  woman, screaming, ran by him, and was lost in the

  greenishness. He stopped. His heart was pounding. Faintly,

  he could hear a car horn. A siren wailed somewhere. He

  turned slowly, trying to see or hear the woman or her

  pursuer, if any, but there was none. She ran; no one

  pursued.

  He began to trot. He sweated. His eyes smarted and

  flowed tears, and little flames seemed to be creeping

  down his throat toward his lungs. He wanted to get to

  the car, which held his gas mask. He forced himself to

  walk. There was panic hanging in the air, the same

  panic that came to a man when he felt hands squeezing

  his neck and thumbs pressing in on his windpipe.

  A car emerged from the cloud. It was not his. He

  passed by it and, ten parking spaces on, found his 1970

  Oldsmobile. He put the mask on, started the motor, winc-

  ing a little at the thought of the poisons shooting out of

  the exhaust, turned his lights on and drove out of the lot.

  The street held more moving bright lights than he had

  expected. He turned on the radio and found out why.

  Those who had some place to go outside the area of smog

  were going whether or not the authorities gave permis-

  sion, and so the authorities were giving permission. Many

  who had no place to go, but were going anyway, were also

  driving out. The flood had started. The streets weren't

  jammed as yet, but they soon would be.

  Childe cursed. He had planned on easy drives to his

  various destinations that day because, although he could

  not drive swiftly, he could drive unimpeded by traffic.

  The voice of the governor issued from the speaker.

  The governor pleaded for restraint and calm. Everybody

  should continue to stay home—if they were able to do

  so. However, those who had to get out for health reasons

  (which would include the entire population now, Childe

  thought) should drive carefully and should realize that

  there just were not enough accommodations for them out-

  side the Los Angeles-Orange County area in this state.

  Nevada and Arizona had been notified of the invasion,

  and Utah and New Mexico were readying themselves.

  Troops were being moved into the area but only to act

  as traffic policemen and to assist the hospitals. There

  was no martial law; there was no need for it. There was

  an upswing in crimes of passion, theft, and robbery, but

  there had been no riots.

  No wonder, thought Childe. There was something

  irritating about smog; it did eat the skin off the nerves,

  but people did not like to get out in it, and people did not

  collect in large numbers. To every man, others looked

  like ghosts coming toward him out of the gray-greenness

  or like strange fish appearing suddenly from the shadows.

  Strange fish could be sharks.

  He passed a car with three goggled, snouted monstros-

  ities in it. Their heads swiveled, the cyclopean eyes stared

  blindly, the noses seemed to sniff. He sped away from

  them until their headlights were muffled and then

  slowed down. Once, a car suddenly appeared behind him,

  and a red light flashed. He looked through the rear view

  mirror before he stopped; there were fake prowl cars

  stopping motorists and robbing, beating, or even killing

  them on the streets during daylight, within twenty feet

  of passers-by. He decided to pull over, eased the car

  gently toward the dimly visible curb, and stopped. He

  kept the motor running and peered at the car and the

  cop getting out of it on the right side. If he did not like

  the looks of them he could still get out of the right side

  of his car and take off into the dimness. But he rec-

  ognized the cop, although he did not know his name,

  and stayed behind the wheel. He flipped open his coat and

  slowly reached within it so that the cop would not get

  the impression he was reaching for a gun. He had a

  license for a gun but it was at home.

  The cops had stopped too many to make him get out

  of the car and assume the stance of the friskee. Besides,

  there were many legitimate drivers, and within a short

  time, there would be so many cars on the streets that

  they might as well give up, except for obvious cases.

  Childe established his identity quickly enough. They

  knew of him by hearsay and had also read the papers.

  One, Chominshi, wanted to discuss the case, but the

  other was coughing, and Childe started to cough, so they

  let him go. He continued up Third toward West Los

  Angeles. His apartment and his office were a few blocks

  away from Beverly Hills. He planned to go straight home

  and do some thinking.

  If he could think. He was in a mild state of shock. His

  reflexes seemed to be slow as if he had been drugged or

  was recovering from being knocked out. He felt a slight

  sense of detachment, as if he had been disengaged some-

  what from reality, no doubt to soften the effects of the

  film. The smog did not help him keep an anchor on

  things; it induced a feeling of slippage of self.

  He was not burning with lust for revenge on those<
br />
  who had killed Colben. He had not liked Colben, and

  he knew that Colben had done some things which were

  criminal but he had escaped without (as far as Childe

  knew) even the punishment of conscience. He had

  knocked up a teenager and kicked her out, and the girl

  had taken sleeping pills and died. There were others,

  although none had ended in death for the girls. But some

  would have been better off dead. And there was the wife

  of a client who had been found beaten and would always

  be an idiot. Childe had had no basis for suspicion of

  Colben, but he had felt that Colben might have done the

  beating for the client, especially after he had discovered

  that Colben was going to bed with the woman. He could

  prove nothing; he could not even make an accusation

  which would not sound stupid, because he lacked any

  evidence. That Colben was neglecting the business, how-

  ever, was reason enough to get rid of him. Childe did not

  have enough money to buy Colben out; he had meant to

  make it so unpleasant for Colben that he would be glad

  to dissolve the partnership.

  Nevertheless, no man deserved to die as Colben had.

  Or did he? The horror was more in the viewers' minds

  than in Colben's. He had been hurt very much, but only

  briefly, and had died quickly.

  That did not matter. Childe intended to find out all he

  could, although he suspected that he would find out very

  little. And soon enough the need to pay bills would take

  him off the case; he would only be able to work on it

  during his leisure moments. Which meant that, in effect,

  he would be able to accomplish almost nothing.

  But he had nothing else to do, and he certainly did

  not intend to sit still in his apartment and breathe in

  poison gas. He had to do something to keep going. He

  could not even read comfortably because of the burning

  and the tears. He was like a shark that has to keep moving

  to allow water to flow through the gills. Once

  he

  stopped, he would suffocate.

  But a shark can breathe and also stand still if the

  water is moving. Sybil could be his flowingness. Sybil

  was a name that sounded like running brooks and sun-