The Divine Invasion Part 19

"Shall I tell you your name?" he said to her. She smiled, the lovely dancing smile, but no mischief shone in her eyes; instead, love glimmered at him, vast extents of love.

Nicholas Bulkowsky, wearing his red army uniform, prepared to address a crowd of the Party faithful at the main square of Bogota, Colombia, where recruiting efforts had of late been highly successful. If the Party could swing Colombia into the anti- fascist camp the disastrous loss of Cuba would be somewhat offset. However, a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church had re- cently put in an appearance-not a local person, but an Ameri- can, dispatched by the Vatican to interfere with CP activities. Why must they meddle? Bulkowsky asked himself. Bulkowsky. He had discarded that name; now he was known as General Gomez. To his Colombian advisor he said, "Give me the psychologi- cal profile on this Cardinal Harms."

"Yes, Comrade General." Ms. Reiz pa.s.sed him the file on the American troublemaker. Studying the file, Bulkowsky said, "His head is up his a.s.s. He's a spinner of theology. The Vatican picked the wrong per- son." We will tie Harms into knots, he said to himself, pleased.

"Sir," Ms. Reiz said, "Cardinal Harms is said to have cha- risma. He attracts crowds wherever he goes."

"He will attract a lead pipe to the head," Bulkowsky said, "if he shows up in Colombia."

As a distinguished guest of an afternoon TV talkshow, the Roman Catholic Cardinal Fulton Statler Harms had lapsed into his usual sententious prose. The moderator, hoping to interrupt at some point, in order to achieve a much-needed commercial information dump, looked ill at ease.

"Their policies," Harms declared, "inspire disorder. which they capitalize on. Social unrest is the cornerstone of atheistic communism. Let me give you an example."

"We'll be back in just a moment," the moderator said, as the camera panned up on his bland features. "But first these mes- sages." Cut to a spraycan of Yardguard. To the moderator-since for a moment they were off camera -Fulton Harms said, "What's the real estate market like, here in Detroit? I have some funds I want to invest, and office buildings, I've discovered, are about the soundest investments of all."

"You had better consult-" The moderator received a visual signal from the show's producer; immediately he composed his face into its normal look of sagacity and said, in his informal but professional tone, "We're talking today with Cardinal Fulton Harmer-"

"Harms," Harms said.

"-Harms of the Diocese of-"

"Archdiocese," Harms said, miffed.

"-of Detroit," the moderator continued. Cardinal, isn't it a fact that in most Catholic countries, especially those in the Third World, no substantial middle cla.s.s exists? That you tend to find a very wealthy elite and a poverty-stricken population with little or no education and little or no hope of bettering them- selves? Is there some kind of correlation between the Church and this deplorable situation?"

"Well," Harms said, at a loss.

"Let me put it to you this way," the moderator continued; he was perfectly relaxed, perfectly in control of the situation. "Hasn't the Church held back economic and social progress for centuries upon centuries? Isn't the Church in fact a reactionary inst.i.tution devoted to the betterment of a few and the exploitation of the many, trading on human credulity? Would that be a fair statement, Cardinal, sir?"

"The Church," Harms said feebly, "looks after the spiritual welfare of man; it is responsible for his soul."

"But not his body."

"The communists enslave man's body and man's soul," Harms said. "The Church-"

"I'm sorry, Cardinal Fulton Harms," the moderator broke in, "but that's all the time we have. We've been talking with-"

"Frees man from original sin," Harms said. The moderator glanced at him.

"Man is born in sin," Harms said, totally unable to gather his train of thought together.

"Thank you Cardinal Fulton Statler Harms," the moderator said. "And now this."

More commercials. Harms, within himself, groaned. Some- how, he ruminated as he rose from the luxurious chair in which they had seated him, somehow I feel as if I've known better days. He could not put his finger on it, but the feeling was there. And now I have to go to that little rat's a.s.s country Colombia, he reflected. Again; I've been there once, as briefly as possible, and now I have to fly back this afternoon. They have me on a string and they just plain jerk me around this way and that. Off to Colombia, back home to Detroit, over to Baltimore, then back to Colombia; I'm a cardinal and I have to put up with this? I feel like stepping down. This is not the best of all possible worlds, he said to himself as he made his way to the elevator. And TV hosts of daytime talk shows abuse me. Libera me Domine, he declared to himself, and it was a mute appeal; save me, G.o.d. Why doesn't he listen to me? Harms won- dered as he stood waiting for the elevator. Maybe there is no G.o.d; maybe the communists are right. If there is a G.o.d he cer- tainly doesn't do anything for me. Before I leave Detroit, he decided, I'll check with my invest- ment broker about office buildings. If I have the time.

Rybys Rommey-Asher, plodding listlessly into the living room of their apartment, said, "I'm back." She shut the front door and took off her coat. "The doctor says it's an ulcer. A pyloric ulcer, it's called. I have to take phen.o.barb for it and drink Maalox."

"Does it still hurt?" Herb Asher said; he had been going through his tape collection, searching for the Mahler Second Symphony.

"Could you pour me some milk?" Rybys threw herself down on the couch. "I'm exhausted." Her face, puffy and dark, seemed to him to be swollen. "And don't play any loud music. I can't take any noise right now. Why aren't you at the shop?"

"It's my day off." He found the tape of the Mahler Second. "I'll put on the earspeakers," he said. "So it won't bother you. Rybys said, "I want to tell you about my ulcer. I learned some interesting facts about ulcers-I stopped off at the library. Here." She held out a manila folder. "I got a printout of a recent article. There's this theory that-"

"I'm going to listen to the Mahler Second," he said.

"Fine." Her tone was bitter and sardonic. "You go ahead."

"There's nothing I can do about your ulcer," he said.

"You can listen to me. Herb Asher said, "I'll bring you the milk." He walked into the kitchen and he thought, Must it be like this? If I could hear the Second, he thought, I'd feel okay. The only symphony scored for many pieces of rattan, he mused. A Ruthe, which looks like a small broom; they use it to play the ba.s.s drum. Too bad Mahler never saw a Morley wah-wah pedal, he thought, or he would have scored it into one of his longer works. Returning to the living room he handed his wife her gla.s.s of milk.

"What have you been doing?" she said. "I notice you haven't picked up or cleaned up or anything."

"I've been on the fone to New York," he said.

"Linda Fox," Rybys said.

"Yes. Ordering her audio components."

"When are you going back to see her?"

"I'll be supervising the installation. I want to check the sys- tem over when it's all set up.

"You really like her," Rybys said.

"It's a good sale."

"No, I mean personally. You like her." She paused and then said, "I think, Herb, I'm going to divorce you."

He said, "Are you serious?"

"Very."

"Because of Linda Fox?"

"Because I'm sick and tired of this place being a sty. I'm sick and tired of doing dishes for you and your friends. I'm especially sick and tired of Elias; he's always showing up unexpectedly; he never fones before he comes over. He acts like he lives here. Half the money we spend on food goes for him and his needs. He's like some kind of beggar. He looks like a beggar. And that nutty religious c.r.a.p of his, that 'The world is coming to an end' stuff. . . I can't take any more of it." She fell silent and then, in pain, she grimaced.

"Your ulcer?" he asked.

"My ulcer, yes. The ulcer I got worrying about-"

"I'm going to the shop," he said; he made his way to the door. "Good-bye."

"Good-bye, Herb Asher," Rybys said. "Leave me here and go stand around talking to pretty lady customers and listening to high-performance new audio components that'll knock your socks off, for half a million dollars."

He shut the door after him, and, a moment later, rose up into the sky in his flycar.

Later in the day, when no customers wandered around the store checking out the new equipment, he seated himself in the listening room with his business partner. 'Elias," he said, "I think Rybys and I have come to the end."

Elias said, "What are you going to do instead? You're used to living with her; it's a basic part of you, taking care of her. Satisfying her wants."

"Psychologically," Herb said, "she is very sick."

"You knew that when you married her."

"She can't focus her attention. She's scattered. That's the technical term for it. That's what the tests showed. That's why she's so messy; she can't think and she can't act and she can't concentrate." The Spirit of Futile Effort, he said to himself.

"What you need," Elias said, "is a son. I saw how much affection you have for Manny, that woman s little brother. Why don't you-" He broke off. "It's none of my business."

"If I got mixed up with anybody else," Herb said, "I know who it would be. But she'd never give me a tumble."

"That singer?"

"Yes," he said.

"Try," Elias said.

"It's beyond my reach."

"n.o.body knows what's beyond his reach. G.o.d decides what's beyond a person's reach"

"She's going to be galaxy-famous."

Elias said, "But she isn't yet. If you're going to make a move toward her, do it now.

"The Fox," Herb Asher said. "That's how I think of her." A phrase popped into his mind: You are with the Fox, and the Fox is with you!

Not Linda Fox singing but Linda Fox speaking. He wondered where the notion came from, that she would be saying that. Again vague memories, compounded of-he did not know what. A more aggressive Linda Fox; more professional and dynamic. And yet remote. As if from millions of miles off. A signal from a star. In both senses of the word. From the distant stars, he thought. Music and the sound of bells.

"Maybe," he said, "I'll emigrate to a colony world."

"Rybys is too ill for that."

"I'll go alone," Herb said. Elias said, "You'd be better off dating Linda Fox. If you can swing it. You'll be seeing her again. Don't give up yet. Make a try. The basis of life is trying."

"OK," Herb Asher said. "I will try."

CHAPTER 17.

Hand in hand, Emmanuel walked with Zina through the dark woods of Stanley Park. "You are myself," he said. "You are the Shckhina, the immanent Presence who never left the world." He thought, The female side of G.o.d. Known to the Jews and only to the Jews. When the primordial fall took place, the G.o.dhead split into a transcendent part separated from the world; that was En Sof. But the other part, the female immanent part, remained with the fallen world, remained with Israel. These two portions of the G.o.dhead, he thought, have been detached from each other for millennia. But now we have come together again, the male half of the G.o.dhead and the female half. While I was away the Shekhina intervened in the lives of human beings, to a.s.sist them. Here and there, sporadically, the Sliekhina remained. So G.o.d never truly left mankind.

"We are each other," Zina said, "and we have found each other again, and again are one. The split is healed."

"Through all your veils," Emmanuel said, "beneath all your forms, there lay this . . . my own self. And I did not recognize you, until you reminded me."

"How did I accomplish that?" Zina said, and then she said, "But I know. My love of games. That is your love, your secret joy: to play like a child. To be not serious. I appealed to that; I woke you up and you remembered: you recognized me.

"Such a difficult process," he said. "For me to remember. I thank you." She had abased herself in the fallen world all this time, while he had left; the greater heroism was hers. Staying with man in all man's inglorious conditions . . . down into the prison with him, Emmanuel thought. Man's beautiful companion. At his side as she is now at mine.

"But you are back," Zina said. "You have returned."

"That is so," he said. "Returned to you. I had forgotten that you existed. I only recalled the world." You the kind side, he thought; the compa.s.sionate side. And I the terrible side that arouses fear and trembling. Together we form a unity. Separated, we are not whole; we are not, individually, enough.

"Clues," Zina said. "I kept giving you clues. But it was up to you to recognize me. Emmanuel said, "I did not know who I was for a time, and I did not know who you were. Two mysteries confronted me, and they had a single answer."

"Let's go look at the wolves," Zina said. "They are such beautiful animals. And we can ride the little train. We can visit all the animals."

"And let them free," Emmanuel said.

"Yes," she said. "And let them, all of them, free."

"Will Egypt always exist?" he said. "Will slavery always exist?"

"Yes," Zina said. "And so will we. As they approached the Stanley Park Zoo, Emmanuel said, "The animals will be surprised by their freedom. At first they won't know what to do."

"Then we will teach them," Zina said. "As we always have. What they know they have learned from us; we are their guide."

"So be it," he said, and placed his hand on the first metal cage. Within it a small animal peered at him hesitantly. Emman- uel said, "Come out of your cage."

The animal, trembling, came to him, and he took it in his arms.

From his audio store Herb Asher called Linda at her Sherman Oaks home. It took a little while-two robot secretaries held him up temporarily-but at last he got through.

"h.e.l.lo," he said when he had her on the line.

"How's my sound system coming?" She blinked rapidly and put her finger to her eye. "My contact lens is slipping; just a second." Her face disappeared from the screen. "I'm back," she said. "I owe you a dinner. Right? Do you want to fly out to California? I'm still at the Golden Hind; I will be for another week. We're getting good audiences; I'm trying out a whole lot of new material. I want your reaction to it."

"Fine," he said, enormously pleased.

"So can we get together, then?" Linda said. "Out here?"

"Sure," he said. "You name a time."

"What about tomorrow night? It'll have to be before I go to work, if we're going to have dinner."

"Fine," he said. "Around 6 P.M. California time?"

She nodded. "Herb," she said, "you can stay at my place if you want; I've got a big house. Plenty of room."

"I'd love to," he said.