Science Fiction Originals Vol 3 Part 27

Rebecca does not know what vagueness is. She could not be vague if she tried. Her stories shine and flash like knives. He glances at her eyes. They will not close. They will not close. His bludgeon hand is numb, he is so tired. But still he reads.

"...But most astounded of all were Basistov and Natalya. Basistov could scarcely draw breath; he sat all the while open-mouthed and pop-eyed-and listened, listened, as he had never listened to anyone in his whole life, and Natalya's face was covered in a crimson flush and her gaze, directly fixed at Rudin, both darkened and glittered in turn..."

"Tomorrow," he says to her, when at last he can read no more, "let us go for a walk. Where would you like to go?"

"To the banks of the Alde and the Ore," she says, "where Hadmuhaddera's nephew lost his shoe, and the last man in Orford once fished."

Deprived of records, she remembers everything as a story. Because everything is a story, she remembers everything.Tonight, in the dark, as he sprawls, formless and helpless beside her, she tells him a story of a beach she has heard tell of, a beach she doesn't know, called Chesil.

"Chesil Beach is a high shingle bank, cut free of the coast by small, brackish waters," she says.

"Like here," he says.

"Like here," she agrees, "but the waters aren't rivers, and the bank that parts them from the sea is much bigger, and made all of stones."

She tells him: "You could spend your whole day among the dunes and never see the sea. Yet you hear its constant stirring, endlessly, and soon in your mind comes the image of this bank, this barrow-mound, put before you like a dike, to keep the sea from roaring in upon you. The land behind you is melted and steep, and before you the pebbles grind, a vast mill, and you wonder how high the sea water is now. You wonder how high the tide comes, relative to the land. You wonder how long it will take, for the sea to eat through the bank..."

In the morning, as you are eating breakfast, she comes down the stairs. She is wearing a red dress. It is a dress you recognise. It belongs to the girl you so recently left. It belongs to your mistress in Paris.

Even her hair is arranged in the way that your mistress's hair was arranged.

You say nothing. How can you? You can hardly breathe.

"Let's go for our walk, then," she says.

So you go for your walk, down the track, past the gate, into lane after lane, and all around stand the apple trees, line upon line. The gravel slides wetly under your feet as you walk, and the leaves of the apple trees whisper and rattle. She scents the air, and you wonder what she finds there to smell, what symptom of weather or season or time of day. She tosses her hair in the breeze. Her hair is crunched and pinned and high, and the fold of it that you so treasured is gone, the fold of gold-brown that once hid her eye.

Your orchards fan east to the banks of the Alde and the Ore. The rivers run wide and muddy and dark, and seabirds pick over them, combing for the blind, simple foods of the seash.o.r.e.

The rivers, slow, rich and mud-laden, evacuate themselves into each other through a maze of ditches and channels, some natural, and some cut by hand through the furze. On the far banks, where the land is too narrow for tillage, an old fenland persists, all jetties and rotten boardwalks and old broken-down walls, and everything is choked by high, concealing reeds.

She turns away from you where you settle, shapeless in the gra.s.s. She bends, and the red dress rides up her calves, and you begin to ask her where the dress comes from, and what has she done to her hair? But all that comes out is: "I- I- I-".

She takes off her shoes.

"What are you going to do?"

"Paddle." She lifts the edges of her dress and unrolls her stockings, peeling them down her brown smooth legs.

The tide is out, the mud is thick and brown like chocolate.

"There are terrible quicksands," you tell her, knowing that she knows.

Absently, she traces her toe through the yielding mud.

"If I don't come back," she says, "you'll know I'm swimming."

"No," you tell her, agitated. "Don't do that! It's dangerous. Don't do that."

You stand and watch her as she walks slowly upstream, in the shallow edge of the water. Swishing her feet. When she is gone, you wander to the water's edge, and you study the thing she has drawn in the mud.

Qit eah t A line from a book comes to you: a book by Marshall McLuhan: Terror is the normal state of any oral society, for in it everything affects everything all the time.

When the rifle shot comes out from the reeds in the far bank, and hits you full in the chest, you do not fall.

The suddenness of it seems to freeze the world, to undo the physical constraints that hold you and your kind and her kind and all kinds to worlds that are never quite alien, never quite home.

You do not even stagger.

You stand, watching old abandoned windmills, listening to the rushes, their susurration clear against rustling of the leaves of the apple trees. You watch the distant figure with the rifle leap from cover behind an old ruined wall and disappear between the reeds.

You choke, and fall backwards. As you lie there, she comes running.

She has taken off the red dress. She has let down her hair. You follow the line of it, and find that it hasreturned to itself, a fold of gold-brown over one eye. Terrified, you follow the fold of her hair to her neck, to her breast. Blood bubbles in your throat as you try to speak.

She puts her arms about you, holding you upright for a few seconds longer. "Try not to move," she says.

She is crying in the soft, calm manner of her people.

When your eyes close, she begins to sing. "I hate you," she sings. "I hate you. Oh, how I hate you!"

Singing, or weeping. You cannot tell the difference.

You come from too far away.

Jeffrey Ford

FLOATING IN LINDRETHOOL.

1.

"Your profession, gentlemen, has a long and distinguished lineage," was what the section boss had said when he stopped the bus, opened the door and let them all out on the east side of Lindrethool. Eight men in black rain coats, white shirts and ties, and the company issued, indicative, derbies. They fanned out across the grim industrial cityscape, the soot falling like black snow around them. Each carried a valise in one hand and a large case with a handle in the other. Each walked away, mumbling his respective spiel, all of which included at some point the words, "for a limited time only." In three weeks, the bus would be waiting at the west end to collect them.

Slackwell sat now, tieless, hatless, pantless, at a small scarred table in his hotel room, sipping straight bourbon from a smudged tumbler. "A distinguished lineage," he said aloud to the window pane that beyond his reflection gave a view of the night and the myriad lights of Lindrethool. Every light stood in his mind for a potential customer. All he needed was one to part with forty thousand dollars in easy monthly payments spread over ten years and he would have fulfilled his minimal quota for the year. On that first day, he had covered three apartment buildings, lugging his case from floor to floor. "Not even a smell," as his colleague Merk might say.

He couldn't imagine the door-to-door salesmen of the previous century, doing what he did but having nothing better to offer than brushes, or vacuum cleaners, encyclopedias, bibles. At least he had a real wonder in his case, a value that could change the lives of his customers. That's exactly what he told them while cajoling, reasoning, even threatening if necessary. While in training, he had practiced again and again like a martial artist the techniques of wedging a foot between the door jamb and door, following through with the shoulder and then achieving a look of homicide thinly veiled by a determination to please. The studies had shown that the novelty of face-to-face sales was what the consumer wanted. In the waning economy that had taken a nose dive ten years into the new century, people did not want to shop online or by phone for big ticket items anymore. Or at least that was what they had told him during his training.

He hadn't had a sale in two months, and he had been told by the section boss that the company was thinking of letting him go. "You're too tired looking Slackwell," the boss had said. "Your complexion is as gray as your hair and your spiel, though rabid enough, has all the allure of a drooping erection. Wrinkles are no comfort to our customers, it is power they want. You are selling status. And, please, your after-shave is rancid."

Slackwell cringed into his bourbon, thinking about how he had pleaded, whined actually, to be allowed one more chance. The boss took pity on him, and not only allowed him another shot at it, but also issued him the latest model to hawk in Lindrethool. "If you can't sell that," the boss had said, "you can sell yourself to the devil."

Slackwell lit a cigarette. With the b.u.t.t jutting from the corner of his mouth, he stood and unlatched the case that sat next to the bottle of bourbon. The black metal carrier bulged at the sides as if it housed an oversized bowling ball. The front panel opened on hinges, and he reached in and brought forth a large gla.s.s globe with a circular metal base. The base had dials and b.u.t.tons on it, two jacks, a small speaker, and, in the back, a wound up thin electrical cord was attached. Thinktank, the name of the company was written across the metal in red letters and after it the model number 256-B. The globe above was filled with clear liquid and suspended at its center was a human brain.

The bourbon, having gotten the better of him, made him weave a little as he stepped back to view the ill.u.s.trious product. He took the cigarette out of his mouth, and with the two fingers it was wedged between pointed at the globe. "Now that's a floater," he said with a cloud of smoke. A floater was what the sales force of Thinktank called the organic center of their merchandise.

"Organic computing, the wave of the future," Slackwell slurred, practicing his spiel. "Consider this-a human mind, unfettered by physical concerns, using not the customary piddling ten percent used by your Joe Blow from Kokomo, not even fifty or seventy or eighty percent, but a full 95.7 percent of its total cogitative potential. The limitations of microchips have long since been reached. The computing power of a human brainis vast. This baby can run your household appliances from your apartment's master control box, your lights, your phone. It can easily increase the power of your home computer 300 times, give you television from around the globe, all at a fraction of your present cost. Set it to pay your bills once and it will do so, on time, every month-it learns what you like, what you want, what you need. And the speed with which it runs will make your parallel processing seem like..."

Slackwell couldn't remember what bit of hyperbole came next. All he could think of was the boss's "...a drooping erection." He took a drag on his cigarette and sat down to stare in at the gray, spongy fist of convolutions. There was something both awe inspiring and lurid about the fact that an individual's consciousness was trapped inside that insanely winding maze of matter, an island lolling in a crystal bubble.

Once, a few weeks earlier Slackwell's thoughts took a dangerous detour, and he briefly glimpsed the a.n.a.logy to his own existence-trapped, trapped, and trapped again.

This new model, though, this 256-B, had a feature that set it above all of the others. There was a b.u.t.ton on the base that when pushed would rouse the brain into consciousness. The customer could talk to it and the apparatus would break the spoken language down into an electrical impulse, send it to the floater by way of a remote transmitter in the base, and the brain would hear in thoughts. Then its response, sent out by the brain's language centers as its own electrical impulse of thought, would be picked up by another device which would translate it into spoken language. The voice that came from the speakers wasn't a stiff, robotic barking of words. The Thinktank technicians had patented a new development that allowed the device to emulate the tonality, resonance, inflection, and even accent of the original donor's voice.

The corporation had cut deals with certain indigent families, and there were a lot of them these days, to allow their loved one's brains to be extracted before actual clinical death set in. The legalization of certain types of euthanasia had opened the door to more liberal organ donation practices. Hence, the individual personality of the brain was kept intact. These deals involved cash in rewarding quant.i.ties and the promise that the dying family member would live on, remaining a useful member of society and a catalyst for change in the new economy that was ever on the verge of dawning. Slackwell wondered which, the cash or the promise, was the more comforting to the bereaved.

The only member of the sales force who had had an opportunity to sell one of these new models was Merk, and he had told Slackwell and the others, "One thing to remember: you can demonstrate the floater's sentience for the customer but, whatever you do, don't engage it in conversation on your own. It'll give you the yips." They had asked Merk if he was speaking from experience or just relating what he had been told by the researchers at Thinktank. The veteran salesman gave no reply.

2.

Although the concept of home was now no more than some vague memory, Slackwell never got used to waking in a strange hotel room. One second he would be dreaming of the old days, back in the house on the bay, a spring breeze pa.s.sing through the willows just outside the screened window. He would roll over in bed to put an arm around his wife, Ella, and then, like a light suddenly switched on, the nausea of his hangover would lodge like a green feather at the base of his throat. His mouth would go instantly dry, and the pain would begin behind his eyes. That peaceful dream of the past would vanish and he would wake alone and disoriented.

Of late, his hands had begun to shake in the mornings, and it was all he could do to steady the bottle in order to pour the first of three shots that would get him through the h.e.l.lish shower, the donning of his Thinktank uniform and to his first cup of coffee. Sometimes aspirin would be called for, sometimes, when he had it, a joint. Whatever it took, he would be on the street sharply at eight fifteen, staggering along, case in hand.

On this, the morning of his second day in Lindrethool, he met Merk at a diner around the corner from his hotel. They sat at a booth by the window, facing each other, but neither spoke until the first cup of coffee had been drained and the waitress had come with refills.

"How many units did you fob off on the witless citizenry yesterday?" asked Slackwell.

Merk shook his head. "This place is drier than my ex-wife."

"I had a guy who wanted to buy my hat," said Slackwell.

"There you go," said Merk. "I walked in on the middle of a domestic dispute. The woman had a shiner and the old man was seething, but still he made me demonstrate the Tank for them. I had one hand on that revolver I keep in my jacket pocket and used the other to flip the switches and turn the k.n.o.bs. I got the floater to sing them a song, No Business Like Show Business. You know, it's a sentient model, and whoever the unlucky sap is who wound up under the gla.s.s can really belt out a tune. No sale, though. No sale."

"I'm packing a 256-B myself," said Slackwell, trying to impress his senior colleague with the fact that the company had entrusted one of its top of the line models to him. "But I still haven't let the thing talk for itself yet. I had a near miss on a sale yesterday. A woman with a kid. She had me do the f.u.c.king kid's homeworkon it and print it out-a report on mummies. The whole time the little monster kept smearing his greasy fingers all over the globe, trying to get at the meat inside. Finally, I told his old lady she should teach him some manners. That iced it."

"You gotta watch that anger. The customer's always right," said Merk.

"The customer's hardly ever right," said Slackwell.

They had a few more cups of coffee and Merk had a plate of runny eggs. There was a little discussion of the new guy Johnny, who Merk said hung himself in the shower stall of his hotel room.

"Did the company get there in time?" asked Slackwell.

"You kidding me?" said Merk. "The implant tipped them off that he was going south before he even put the belt around his neck. I was called over there last night at around nine to witness the operation. They always call me for that s.h.i.t. I get a bonus. They opened his head like a can of peaches and whipped his sponge out faster than you can say "limited time only."

"Won't his brain be screwed up?"

"They have ways to revive them," said Merk. "Besides, when they cut him down, I'm not sure he was all dead, if you know what I mean."

"He seemed a little too sensitive for the work," said Slackwell.

"That poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d was born to be a floater," said Merk. "Some of us drift in the liquid and some on the sidewalk." He gave a rare smile, almost a wince, and shook his head. "Last I saw the kid alive, he had a stunned look on his face like he didn't know whether to s.h.i.t or go blind. You know, I've seen that look before."

"Where?"

"Every morning in the bathroom mirror since the old lady left me."

"So make another face," said Slackwell. "What would it take?"

"Courage or insanity, and I haven't got the juice to muster either. When the bell rings, I drool, but I'm good at it."

"Yeah," said Slackwell, "my chin's damp more often than not."

They each had a cigarette and then stood, lifted their cases and exited the diner. Out on the windy street corner, they tipped their respective hats to each other, gave the parting Thinktank sales force salutation, "Lose a brain, brother," and set out on their separate paths.

By noon, Slackwell was no longer staggering. Instead, he was limping. On the last call before lunch, after covering two entire apartment buildings, a woman took a hammer she had apparently just happened to be holding and smashed the foot he had artfully wedged between door and door jamb. "Scat," she had yelled as if he had been some kind of bothersome vermin.

As he moved slowly along the street, he could feel the foot swelling in his shoe. The pain was moderate-worse than the time an old woman had brought him a cup of steaming hot coffee after an hour and a half of hard sell and accidentally spilled it in his lap, and not quite as bad as the time a mad man had taken his pen on the pretense of signing an agreement and jabbed him in the wrist with it. At times like this, he considered it a good thing that he did not carry a revolver like Merk.

He spotted the next address on his list and its newness, its cleanliness and name-Thornwood Arms-made him decide to skip lunch. Everything about this place suggested affluence. These were the apartments of those who had wound up on the right side of the perpetually widening divide between the haves and have-nots.

He entered the front of the building and made for the elevator, but before he could so much as press the b.u.t.ton, a security guard had a hand on his shoulder.

"Whom are you here to see?" asked the tall young man dressed in what appeared to be a ship captain's uniform.

Slackwell retrieved a business card from his coat pocket and handed it to the guard. "I am here to bring the future to your residents."

"Sorry, sir, but there is no solicitation allowed here."

"This is not solicitation. This is demonstration," said Slackwell.

"Either way," said the young man, "you'll have to leave."

"Luddite," Slackwell yelled as he exited through the revolving door.

Once out on the street, he immediately ducked down an alleyway next to the building. "There's no way this fool is going to deny me contact with a public in need of innovation," he thought, "especially a public with plenty of cash."

At the back of the huge building, he found an empty loading platform. Lifting the case onto it, he then scrabbled up himself. The tall, sliding aluminum gate directly in front of him was shut tight, but off to the far left and far right of the platform there were doors that gave access to the building. He chose the left, walked over to try the k.n.o.b and found he had chosen correctly. The door swung open, and he felt something in his solar plexus, either a m.u.f.fled gasp of excitement or a jab of indigestion. He entered, and following a short hallway, soon came in view of a freight elevator. Glancing around to make sure that he was alone, he pressed the b.u.t.ton on the elevator and waited for the door to open. He knew better than to gloat in his victory, but he could not help a brief smile. The door slid back and he stepped into the wide, shiny box. "Which floor?" he wondered, staring at the row of b.u.t.tons. Out of the thirty possibilities, he chose number 11. The door closed. He leaned back against the metal wall as the car lurched into its ascent. Sweat rolled down across his face from under his hat brim, his heart was pounding, his hands shook from need of a drink and his foot throbbed.

It was a quick decision, but he felt as if he might keel over if he didn't soothe his nerves. When the elevator reached somewhere between the fifth and sixth floors, he hit the Stop b.u.t.ton. Reaching into his shirt pocket, he pulled out a joint. His hands shook violently and he had a hard time working the lighter.

Eventually, he got the thing lit and took five short tokes on it. The car quickly filled with smoke. Before he stubbed out the weed and started the elevator again, he could already feel his tension level beginning to drop.