The Golden Age Of Science Fiction Vol V Part 13

"And, by the way," he added, "I hope you like it in Puerto Pacifico. Because there isn't any place to go from here and there isn't any way to get there if there were."

"Pardon me, gentlemen, but I'm Joe Valencia, manager of the hotel. I would be very grateful if you would give me a few minutes of honest criticism."

"Ah, no, not you, too," groaned Spencer. "Look, Joe, what's the gag?"

"You are newcomers, Mr. Spencer," Valencia explained. "You are therefore in an excellent position to point out our faults as you see them."

"Well, so what?" demanded Spencer. "I've got more important things to do than to worry about your troubles. You look okay to me."

"Mr. Valencia," said Pembroke. "I've noticed that you walk with a very slight limp. If you have a bad leg, I should think you would do better to develop a more p.r.o.nounced limp. Otherwise, you may appear to be self-conscious about it."

Spencer opened his mouth to protest, but saw with amazement that it was exactly this that Valencia was seeking. Pembroke was amused at his companion's reaction but observed that Spencer still failed to see the point.

"Also, there is a certain effeminateness in the way in which you speak," said Pembroke. "Try to be a little more direct, a little more brusque. Speak in a monotone. It will make you more acceptable."

"Thank you so much," said the manager. "There is much food for thought in what you have said, Mr. Pembroke. However, Mr. Spencer, your value has failed to prove itself. You have only yourself to blame. Cooperation is all we require of you."

Valencia left. Spencer ordered another martini. Neither he nor Pembroke spoke for several minutes.

"Somebody's crazy around here," the fat man muttered after a few moments. "Is it me, Frank?"

"No. You just don't belong here, in this particular place," said Pembroke thoughtfully. "You're the wrong type. But they couldn't know that ahead of time. The way they operate it's a pretty hit-or-miss operation. But they don't care one bit about us, Spencer. Consider the men who went down with the ship. That was just part of the game."

"What the h.e.l.l are you sayin'?" asked Spencer in disbelief. "You figure they sunk the ship? Valencia and the waitress and the three babes? Ah, come on."

"It's what you think that will determine what you do, Spencer. I suggest you change your att.i.tude; play along with them for a few days till the picture becomes a little clearer to you. We'll talk about it again then."

Pembroke rose and started out of the bar. A policeman entered and walked directly to Spencer's table. Loitering at the juke box, Pembroke overheard the conversation.

"You Spencer?"

"That's right," said the fat man sullenly.

"What don't you like about me? The truth, buddy."

"Ah, h.e.l.l! Nothin' wrong with you at all, and nothin'll make me say there is," said Spencer.

"You're the guy, all right. Too bad, Mac," said the cop.

Pembroke heard the shots as he strolled casually out into the brightness of the hotel lobby. While he waited for the elevator, he saw them carrying the body into the street. How many others, he wondered, had gone out on their backs during their first day in Puerto Pacifico?

Pembroke shaved, showered, and put on the new suit and shirt he had bought. Then he took Mary Ann, the woman he had met on the beach, out to dinner. She would look magnificent even when fully clothed, he decided, and the pale chartreuse gown she wore hardly placed her in that category. Her conversation seemed considerably more normal after the other denizens of Puerto Pacifico Pembroke had listened to that afternoon.

After eating they danced for an hour, had a few more drinks, then went to Pembroke's room. He still knew nothing about her and had almost exhausted his critical capabilities, but not once had she become annoyed with him. She seemed to devour every factual point of imperfection about herself that Pembroke brought to her attention. And, fantastically enough, she actually appeared to have overcome every little imperfection he had been able to communicate to her.

It was in the privacy of his room that Pembroke became aware of just how perfect, physically, Mary Ann was. Too perfect. No freckles or moles anywhere on the visible surface of her brown skin, which was more than a mere sampling. Furthermore, her face and body were meticulously symmetrical. And she seemed to be wholly ambidextrous.

"With so many beautiful women in Puerto Pacifico," said Pembroke probingly, "I find it hard to understand why there are so few children."

"Yes, children are decorative, aren't they," said Mary Ann. "I do wish there were more of them."

"Why not have a couple of your own?" he asked.

"Oh, they're only given to maternal types. I'd never get one. Anyway, I won't ever marry," she said. "I'm the paramour type."

It was obvious that the liquor had been having some effect. Either that, or she had a basic flaw of loquacity that no one else had discovered. Pembroke decided he would have to cover his tracks carefully.

"What type am I?" he asked.

"Silly, you're real. You're not a type at all."

"Mary Ann, I love you very much," Pembroke murmured, gambling everything on this one throw. "When you go to Earth I'll miss you terribly."

"Oh, but you'll be dead by then," she pouted. "So I mustn't fall in love with you. I don't want to be miserable."

"If I pretended I was one of you, if I left on the boat with you, they'd let me go to Earth with you. Wouldn't they?"

"Oh, yes, I'm sure they would."

"Mary Ann, you have two other flaws I feel I should mention."

"Yes? Please tell me."

"In the first place," said Pembroke, "you should be willing to fall in love with me even if it will eventually make you unhappy. How can you be the paramour type if you refuse to fall in love foolishly? And when you have fallen in love, you should be very loyal."

"I'll try," she said unsurely. "What else?"

"The other thing is that, as my mistress, you must never mention me to anyone. It would place me in great danger."

"I'll never tell anyone anything about you," she promised.

"Now try to love me," Pembroke said, drawing her into his arms and kissing with little pleasure the smooth, warm perfection of her tanned cheeks. "Love me my sweet, beautiful, affectionate Mary Ann. My paramour."

Making love to Mary Ann was something short of ecstasy. Not for any obvious reason, but because of subtle little factors that make a woman a woman. Mary Ann had no pulse. Mary Ann did not perspire. Mary Ann did not fatigue gradually but all at once. Mary Ann breathed regularly under all circ.u.mstances. Mary Ann talked and talked and talked. But then, Mary Ann was not a human being.

When she left the hotel at midnight, Pembroke was quite sure that she understood his plan and that she was irrevocably in love with him. Tomorrow might bring his death, but it might also ensure his escape. After forty-two years of searching for a pa.s.sion, for a cause, for a loyalty, Frank Pembroke had at last found his. Earth and the human race that peopled it. And Mary Ann would help him to save it.

The next morning Pembroke talked to Valencia about hunting. He said that he planned to go shooting out on the desert which surrounded the city. Valencia told him that there were no living creatures anywhere but in the city. Pembroke said he was going out anyway.

He picked up Mary Ann at her apartment and together they went to a sporting goods store. As he guessed there was a goodly selection of firearms, despite the fact that there was nothing to hunt and only a single target range within the city. Everything, of course, had to be just like Earth. That, after all, was the purpose of Puerto Pacifico.

By noon they had rented a jeep and were well away from the city. Pembroke and Mary Ann took turns firing at the paper targets they had purchased. At twilight they headed back to the city. On the outskirts, where the sand and soil were mixed and no footprints would be left, Pembroke hopped off. Mary Ann would go straight to the police and report that Pembroke had attacked her and that she had shot him. If necessary, she would conduct the authorities to the place where they had been target shooting, but would be unable to locate the spot where she had buried the body. Why had she buried it? Because at first she was not going to report the incident. She was frightened. It was not airtight, but there would probably be no further investigation. And they certainly would not prosecute Mary Ann for killing an Earthman.

Now Pembroke had himself to worry about. The first step was to enter smoothly into the new life he had planned. It wouldn't be so comfortable as the previous one, but should be considerably safer. He headed slowly for the "old" part of town, aging his clothes against buildings and fences as he walked. He had already torn the collar of the shirt and discarded his belt. By morning his beard would grow to blacken his face. And he would look weary and hungry and aimless. Only the last would be a deception.

Two weeks later Pembroke phoned Mary Ann. The police had accepted her story without even checking. And when, when would she be seeing him again? He had aroused her pa.s.sion and no amount of long-distance love could requite it. Soon, he a.s.sured her, soon.

"Because, after all, you do owe me something," she added.

And that was bad because it sounded as if she had been giving some womanly thought to the situation. A little more of that and she might go to the police again, this time for vengeance.

Twice during his wanderings Pembroke had seen the corpses of Earthmen being carted out of buildings. They had to be Earthmen because they bled. Mary Ann had admitted that she did not. There would be very few Earthmen left in Puerto Pacifico, and it would be simple enough to locate him if he were reported as being on the loose. There was no out but to do away with Mary Ann.

Pembroke headed for the beach. He knew she invariably went there in the afternoon. He loitered around the stalls where hot dogs and soft drinks were sold, leaning against a post in the hot sun, hat pulled down over his forehead. Then he noticed that people all about him were talking excitedly. They were discussing a ship. It was leaving that afternoon. Anyone who could pa.s.s the interview would be sent to Earth.

Pembroke had visited the docks every day, without being able to learn when the great exodus would take place. Yet he was certain the first lap would be by water rather than by s.p.a.ceship, since no one he had talked to in the city had ever heard of s.p.a.ceships. In fact, they knew very little about their masters.

Now the ship had arrived and was to leave shortly. If there was any but the most superficial examination, Pembroke would no doubt be discovered and exterminated. But since no one seemed concerned about anything but his own speech and behavior, he a.s.sumed that they had all qualified in every other respect. The reason for transporting Earth People to this planet was, of course, to apply a corrective to any of the Pacificos' aberrant mannerisms or articulation. This was the polishing up phase.

Pembroke began hobbling toward the docks. Almost at once he found himself face to face with Mary Ann. She smiled happily when she recognized him. That was a good thing.

"It is a sign of poor breeding to smile at tramps," Pembroke admonished her in a whisper. "Walk on ahead."

She obeyed. He followed. The crowd grew thicker. They neared the docks and Pembroke saw that there were now set up on the roped-off wharves small interviewing booths. When it was their turn, he and Mary Ann each went into separate ones. Pembroke found himself alone in the little room.

Then he saw that there was another ent.i.ty in his presence confined beneath a gla.s.s dome. It looked rather like a groundhog and had seven fingers on each of its six limbs. But it was larger and hairier than the gla.s.s one he had seen at the gift store. With four of its limbs it tapped on an intricate keyboard in front of it.

"What is your name?" queried a metallic voice from a speaker on the wall.

"I'm Jerry Newton. Got no middle initial," Pembroke said in a surly voice.

"Occupation?"

"I work a lot o' trades. Fisherman, fruit picker, fightin' range fires, vineyards, car washer. Anything. You name it. Been out of work for a long time now, though. Goin' on five months. These here are hard times, no matter what they say."

"What do you think of the Chinese situation?" the voice inquired.

"Which situation's 'at?"

"Where's Seattle?"

"Seattle? State o' Washington."

And so it went for about five minutes. Then he was told he had qualified as a satisfactory surrogate for a mid-twentieth century American male, itinerant type.

"You understand your mission, Newton?" the voice asked. "You are to establish yourself on Earth. In time you will receive instructions. Then you will attack. You will not see us, your masters, again until the atmosphere has been sufficiently chlorinated. In the meantime, serve us well."

He stumbled out toward the docks, then looked about for Mary Ann. He saw her at last behind the ropes, her lovely face in tears.

Then she saw him. Waving frantically, she called his name several times. Pembroke mingled with the crowd moving toward the ship, ignoring her. But still the woman persisted in her shouting.

Sidling up to a well-dressed man-about-town type, Pembroke winked at him and snickered.

"You Frank?" he asked.

"h.e.l.l, no. But some poor punk's sure red in the face, I'll bet," the man-about-town said with a chuckle. "Those high-strung paramour types always raising a ruckus. They never do pa.s.s the interview. Don't know why they even make 'em."

Suddenly Mary Ann was quiet.

"Ambulance squad," Pembroke's companion explained. "They'll take her off to the buggy house for a few days and bring her out fresh and ignorant as the day she was a.s.sembled. Don't know why they keep making 'em, as I say. But I guess there's a call for that type up there on Earth."

"Yeah, I reckon there is at that," said Pembroke, snickering again as he moved away from the other. "And why not? Hey? Why not?"

Pembroke went right on hating himself, however, till the night he was deposited in a field outside of Ensenada, broke but happy, with two other itinerant types. They separated in San Diego, and it was not long before Pembroke was explaining to the police how he had drifted far from the scene of the sinking of the Elena Mia on a piece of wreckage, and had been picked up by a Chilean trawler. How he had then made his way, with much suffering, up the coast to California. Two days later, his ident.i.ty established and his circ.u.mstances again solvent, he was headed for Los Angeles to begin his save-Earth campaign.

Now, seated at his battered desk in the shabby rented office over Lemark's Liquors, Pembroke gazed without emotion at the two demolished Pacificos that lay sprawled one atop the other in the corner. His watch said one-fifteen. The man from the FBI should arrive soon.

There were footsteps on the stairs for the third time that day. Not the brisk, efficient steps of a federal official, but the hesitant, self-conscious steps of a junior clerk type.

Pembroke rose as the young man appeared at the door. His face was smooth, unpimpled, clean-shaven, without sweat on a warm summer afternoon.

"Are you Dr. Von Schubert?" the newcomer asked, peering into the room. "You see, I've got a problem--"

The four shots from Pembroke's pistol solved his problem effectively. Pembroke tossed his third victim onto the pile, then opened a can of lager, quaffing it appreciatively. Seating himself once more, he leaned back in the chair, both feet upon the desk.

He would be out of business soon, once the FBI agent had got there. Pembroke was only in it to get the proof he would need to convince people of the truth of his tale. But in the meantime he allowed himself to admire the clipping of the newspaper ad he had run in all the Los Angeles papers for the past week. The little ad that had saved mankind from G.o.d-knew-what insidious menace. It read: ARE YOU IMPERFECT?.

LET DR. VON SCHUBERT POINT OUT YOUR FLAWS.

IT IS HIS GOAL TO MAKE YOU THE AVERAGE FOR YOUR TYPE.

FEE--$3.75.

MONEY BACK IF NOT SATISFIED!.

THE END.

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