The Demolished Man Part 23

"I'll bet you don't."

She turned, trotted up and posed again at the top step. "Dear Mr. Powell, what a scatter-brain you must think me..." She began the grand descent. "You must re-evaluate your opinion of me. I am no longer the mere child I was yesterday. I am ages and ages older. You must regard me as an adult from now on." She negotiated the bottom step and regarded him intently. "Re-evaluate? Is that right?"

"Revaluate is sometimes preferred, dear."

"I thought it had an extra sound" Suddenly she laughed, pushed him into a chair, and plumped down on his lap. Powell groaned.

"Gently, Barbara. You're ages older and pounds heavier."

"Listen," she said. "What ever made me think you was... Were? Were my father?"

"What's the matter with me as a father?"

"Let's be frank. Real frank."

"Sure."

"Do you feel like a father toward me? Because I don't feel like a daughter toward you."

"Oh? How do you feel?"

"I asked first, so you go first."

"My feelings toward you are those of a loving and dutiful son."

"No. Be serious."

"I have resolved to be a trustworthy son to all women until Vulcan a.s.sumes its rightful place is the Community of Planets."

She flushed angrily and got up from his lap. "I wanted you to be serious, because I need advice. But if you---"

"I'm sorry, Barbara. What is it?"

She knelt alongside him and took his hand. "I'm all mixed up about you."

She looked into his eyes with the alarming directness of the young. "You know."

After a pause, he nodded. "Yes. I know."

"And you're all mixed up about me, too. I know."

"Yes, Barbara. That's true. I am."

"Is it wrong?"

Powell heaved up from the chair and began pacing unhappily. "No, Barbara, it isn't wrong. It's... mistimed."

"I want you to tell me about it."

"Tell you...? Yes, I suppose I'd better. I... I'll put it this way, Barbara. The two of us are four people. There's two of you, and two of me."

"Why?"

"You've been sick, dear. So we had to turn you into a baby and let you grow up again. That's why you're two people. The grown-up Barbara inside, and the baby outside."

"And you?"

"I'm two grown-up people. One of them is me... Powell... The other is a member of the governing Council of the Esper Guild."

"What's that?"

"It doesn't need explaining. It's the part of me that's got me mixed up... G.o.d knows, maybe it's the baby part. I don't know."

She considered earnestly, then said slowly. "When I don't feel like a daughter to you... which me feels like that?"

"I don't know, Barbara."

"You do know. Why won't you say?" She came to him and put her arms around his neck... a grown-up woman with the manner of a child. "If it isn't wrong, why won't you say? If I love you---"

"Who said anything about love!"

"It's what we're talking about, isn't it? lsn't it? I love you and you love me. Isn't that it?"

"All right," Powell thought desperately. "Here it is. What are you going to do? Admit the truth?"

"Yes!" From the stairs. Mary was descending with a travelling case in her hand. "Admit the truth."

"She isn't a peeper."

"Forget that. She's a woman and she's in love with you. You're in love with her. Please, Linc, give yourselves a chance."

"A chance for what? An affair if I get out of this Reich mess alive? That's all it could be. You know the Guild won't let us marry normals."

"She'll settle for that. She'll be grateful to settle for that. Ask me. I know."

"And if I don't come out alive? She'll have nothing... Nothing but half a memory of half a love."

"No, Barbara," he said. "That isn't it at all."

"It is," she insisted. "It is!"

"No. It's the baby part of you talking. The baby thinks she's in love with me. The woman is not."

"She'll grow up into the woman."

"And she'll forget all about me."

"You'll make her remember."

"Why should I, Barbara?"

"Because you feel that way about me, too. I know you do."

Powell laughed. "Baby! Baby! Baby! What makes you think I'm in love with you that way? I'm not. I've never been."

"You are!"

"Open your eyes, Barbara. Look at me. Look at Mary. You're ages older, aren't you? Can't you understand? Do I have to explain the obvious?"

"For G.o.d's sake, Linc!"

"Sorry, Mary. Got to use you."

"I'm getting ready to say goodbye... Maybe for good... Do I have to endure this? Isn't it bad enough for me already?"

"Shhhhh. Gently, dear..."

Barbara stared at Mary, then at Powell. She shook her head slowly. "You're lying."

"Am I? Look at me." He put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her face. Dishonest Abe came to his a.s.sistance. His expression was kind, tolerant, amused, patronizing. "Look at me, Barbara."

"No!" she cried. "Your face is lying. It's... It's hateful! I---" She burst into tears and sobbed: "Oh go away. Why don't you go away?"

"We're going away, Barbara." Mary said. She came forward, took the girl's arm and led her to the door.

"There's a Jumper waiting, Mary."

"There's me waiting, Linc. For you. Always. And the Chervils & @kins & Jordans &&&&&&&---"

"I know. I know. I love you all. Kisses. x.x.xx.x.x. Blessings..."

Image of four-leaf clover, rabbits' feet, horseshoes...

Bawdy response of Powell emerging from slok covered with diamonds.

Faint laughter.

Farewell.

He stood in the doorway whistling a crooked, plaintive tune, watching the Jumper disappear into the steel-blue sky boring north toward KingstonHospital. He was exhausted. A little proud of himself for having made the sacrifice. Intensely ashamed of himself for feeling proud. Clearly melancholic. Should he take a grain of Pota.s.sium Niacate and kick himself up into the manic curve? What the h.e.l.l was the use? Look at that great foul city of seventeen and one half million souls and not one soul for him. Look at--- The first impulse came. A thin trickle of latent energy. He felt it distinctly and glanced at his watch. Ten-twenty. So soon? So quickly? Good. He'd better get ready.

He turned into the house and darted up the stairs to his dressing room. The impulses came pattering... like the preliminary raindrops before a storm. His psyche began to throb and vibrate as he reached out and absorbed those tiny streams of latent energy. He changed his clothes, dressed for all weather, and--- And what? The pattering had become a drizzle, washing over him, filling his consciousness with ague... with grinding emotional flashes... with---Yes, nutrient capsules. Hold on to that. Nutrient. Nutrient. Nutrient! He tumbled down the stairs into the kitchen. Found the plastic bulb, cracked it and swallowed a dozen capsules.

The energy came in torrents now. From each Esper in the city, a trickle of latent power that merged and merged into a stream, a river, a swirling sea of Ma.s.s Cathexis directed toward Powell, tuned to Powell. He opened all blocks and absorbed it all. His nervous system superheterodyned and screamed and a turbine in his mind whirled faster and faster with a mounting intolerable whine.

He was out of the house, wandering through the streets, blind, deaf, senseless, immersed in that boiling ma.s.s of latent energy... like a ship with sails caught in the nexus of a typhoon, fighting to convert a whirlpool of wind into the motive power that would lead to safety... S. Powell fought to absorb that fearful torrent, to Capitalize that latent energy, to Cathectize and direct it toward the Demolition of Reich before it was too late, too late, too late, too late, too late...

CHAPTER 16

ABOLISH THE LABYRINTH.

DESTROY THE MAZE.

DELETE THE PUZZLE.

(x Yd! s.p.a.ce/d! Time) DISBAND.

(OPERATIONS, EXPRESSIONS, FACTORS, FRACTIONS, POWERS, EXPONENTS, RADICALS, IDENt.i.tIES, EQUATIONS, PROGRESSIONS, VARIATIONS, PERMUTATIONS, DETERMINANTS, AND SOLUTIONS) EFFACE.

(ELECTRON, PROTON, NEUTRON, MESON AND PHOTON) ERASE.

(CAYLEY, HENSON, LILLIENTHAL, CHANUTE, LANGLEY, WRIGHT, TURNBUL AND S&ERSON) EXPUNGE.

(NEBULAE, Cl.u.s.tERS, STREAMS, BINARIES, GIANTS, MAIN SEQUENCE, AND WHITE DWARFS) DISPERSE.

(PISCES, AMPHIBIAN, BIRDS, MAMMALS, AND MAN) ABOLISH.

DESTROY, DELETE.

DISBAND.

ERASE ALL EQUATIONS.

INFINITY EQUALS ZERO.

THERE IS NO--- "---there is no what?" Reich shouted. "There is no what?" He struggled upward, fighting the bedclothes and the restraining hands. "There is no what?"

"No more nightmares," Duffy Wyg& said.

"Who's that?"

"Me. Duffy."

Reich opened his eyes. He was in a frilly bedroom in a frilly bed with old-fashioned linen and blankets. Duffy Wyg&, starched and fresh, had her hands against his shoulders. Once again she tried to thrust him back against the pillows.

"I'm asleep," Reich said. "I want to wake up."

"You say the nicest things. Lie down and the dream will continue."

Reich fell back. "I was awake," he said somberly. "I was wide awake for the first time in my life. I heard... I don't know what I heard. Infinity and zero. Important things. Reality. Then I fell asleep and I'm here."