“Well, I have been working on some of your affairs here in the house. Uh, Joan Eunice, as your guardian, I had to take over management of your household.”
“Hasn’t Cunningham saved you from such picayune worries? I must speak to him.”
“Well…yes, he has and I’ve let him go on as before; I’ve made no changes. But I have had to look over the household books and authorize charges and confound it, they’re stealing you blind. Cunningham especially.”
“Good!”
“What’s good about it?”
“Jake, you told me that it was impossible to spend my income. If my butler is black-marketing two-thirds of what he buys for me and pocketing the proceeds—and he always has—then he’s anxious to keep his job. Which means that he has to please me. Jake, can you think of a cheaper way to buy the nearest thing to loyalty that can be bought? Let him steal. Do not bind the mouths of the kine who tread the grain. The good horse must always get his lump of sugar.”
“Bad precedent. Corrupts the country.”
“The country is corrupt. But ‘it is the only game in town’; we have no choice. The problem is always how to live in a decadent society. Jake, I want you to live here. I hope you will live here. It will make me feel happy and safe for you to be under the same roof. But don’t worry about my reputation—and Winnie is here to protect yours. Most certainly don’t think about such trivia as household expenses; just close your eyes and sign. But don’t hesitate to chew out Cunningham if the service is less than perfect; that’s the price he must pay for the privilege of swindling. me. By the way, my chief guard steals, too; I think he has a fifty-fifty split with Cunningham. I’ve never tried to find out the arrangement; it would embarrass them.”
Salomon smiled. “Joan Eunice, for a young—and beautiful—woman, you sound remarkably like a cynical old man I used to know.”
“Do I, Jake dear? I must learn not to sound that way. I must now leave the ‘cynical old man’ things to you and try to behave like a lady. If I can. But please don’t disrupt a smooth household by trying to reform it—or it will wind up like a reform administration: less efficient and still more expensive. Didn’t your servants steal from you?”
The lawyer looked sheepish. “Well…yes. But I had the best cook in Safe Harbor enclave. If I had fired her, I might have wound up with one just as expensive—who put sugar in gravy. I think I was groused that they were stealing from you—when you were helpless. But I didn’t want to tamper with your household while there was any chance that you might recover. Wanted to hand it back as it was. And I have. Or shall.”
“Thank you, Jake. At the moment, while I may not yet be a lady, I feel not at all like a cynical old man. I find that I feel like a woman who has been ill and is not yet fully recovered. I had best go to bed. Will you help me?”
“Uh, I’ll call the nurse.”
“Jake, Jake—this is the body I have; we must quit being jumpy about it. Here, lend me your arm. I can stand if you’ll help me…and walk to the bed if you’ll let me lean on you.”
Salomon gave up, offered her both hands to help her out of the chair, steadied her with his arm to the bed. Joan Eunice got into it quickly, slid her negligee off as she slid under the sheet. “Thank you, Jake.”
“My pleasure—Joan Eunice.”
“Will you have breakfast with me? Or lunch if you want to sleep late?”
“Uh…lunch.”
“I’m looking forward to it.” She put out her hand. He took it, bowed over it—hesitated only slightly and kissed it firmly.
Joan Eunice kept his hand and pulled. “Come closer, Jake dear.” She reached up, took his face between her palms. “You loved her.”
“Yes.”
“I loved her.”
“I know.”
“Say my name. My new name.”
“Joan—Joan Eunice.”
“Thank you, Jake.” Unhurriedly, she pulled his face down, kissed him softly on the lips. “Good night, dear friend.”
“Good night—Joan Eunice.” He left quickly.
(Joan you bitch, you’re pushing him too hard.) (I am not!) (The hell you aren’t. For a second I thought you were going to drag him right into bed.) (Ridiculous!) (And you’re pushing yourself too hard, too.) (Eunice, quit crabbing. I could have backed out up to the last split second. I found that I did not mind it. After all, there are many cultures in which men kiss men, as a gesture of friendship.)
(In case you haven’t noticed, you are no longer a man—you’re a mixed-up chick.) (I’ve noticed. Look, snoopy, it was a necessary symbol. I had to show Jake that he could touch me, even kiss me good-night…and not have it be tragic. And it wasn’t. Reminded me of my father kissing me good-night…which he did until I was a big boy.)
(Well…perhaps Jake is going to settle for being fatherly. But don’t count on it, Joan. Let me warn you, Sis—Jake can kiss much better than that. He can kiss so well that your insides melt down, starting at your belly button and spreading in all directions.) (A possibility. A remote one. Now will you shut up, and let us sleep? I really am tired.) (Love me, Boss?) (I’ve never stopped loving you dear—and never will.) (Me, too—and wish I could kiss you good-night. Sleep, Boss—everything’s going to be all right.)
Before she could get to sleep, Winifred. came in, in robe and slippers. “Miss Joan?” she said softly.
“Yes, dear? Put the floor lights on.”
“Mr. Salomon said that you had gone to bed—”
“And you look as if you had. Did he wake you?”
“Oh, no. I was chatting with Mrs. Sloan; she’s on watch. But Dr. Garcia left word that your bed was to be all the way down—and I see that it isn’t. How do I put it down?”
“I do it myself, right from the bed—down, like that—or back up, like that. I wasn’t asleep yet. It’s all right, I’ll put it all the way down before you leave…and you can tell Doctor that I was a good girl.”
“Fine! You can have this capsule if you want it. You don’t have to take it, Mrs. Sloan says that Doctor says.”
“I’ll take it; I want to go right to sleep. If you’ll hand me the water there…and kiss me good-night. If you won’t, I’ll sulk and ring for Mrs. Sloan and ask her to kiss me good-night.”
The little nurse grinned. “I’ll force myself.”
Winifred left about sixty seconds later. (Well, Eunice? How did that one stack up?) (Quite well, Butch. Say eighty percent as well as Jake can do.) (You’re teasing.) (You’ll find out. Winnie is sweet—but Jake has had years more practice. I’m not chucking asparagus at Winnie. I thought you were going to drag her right in with us.) (With Mrs. Sloan outside and watching our heart rate? What do you think I am? A fool?) (Yes.) (Oh, go to sleep!)
12
Peace Negotiations, both in Paris and in Montevideo, continued as before. Fighting continued on a token basis, and the dead did not complain. Harvard’s new president was dismissed by the student government, which then adjourned without appointing a successor. The Secretary of H.E.W. announced a plan to increase the water content of San Francisco Bay to 37%; the Rivers & Harbors Commission denied that H.E.W. had jurisdiction. In Alma-Ata a Morale Corps sergeant gave birth to a healthy two-headed boy by Caesarean section; it was watched worldwide and on Luna, via satellite, to a specially arranged chorus of the Thoughts of Chairman Lu. In Washington the I.R.S., acting under Budget Executive Order (Emergency) of ’87, announced an additional temporary surtax of 7%. In Miami Miss Universe (Miss Ghana—42-22-38), speaking through her press secretary & interpreter, revealed that she intended to be the first starship commander and had been studying neo-Einsteinian ballistics under hypnosis for two years. The General Secretary of the People’s Fraternal Society of Cosmonauts, Astronauts, & Space Engineers (A.F.L.-C.I.O.) wondered publicly as to Miss Universe’s ability to do simple arithmetic with her shoes on. Madam President of the Federated Women’s Clubs of the World stated that the Honorable Secretary was a counterrevolutionary rat-fink and a typical example of male a
rrogance. In Los Angeles smog deaths were down 3% under emergency pollution-abatement measures and a brisk west wind.
In a big, ugly, ornate, old house Miss Joan Eunice Smith sat in Lotus on a mat in her dressing room near a large mirror and facing her nurse-companion-maid, also in Lotus. “Comfortable, Winnie dear?”
“Very.”
“I think you’re even more limber than I am. All right, let’s get into the mood for exercise. You start it.”
“All right. But, Miss Joan? What does it mean? Oh, I like it; it’s very relaxing. But what jewel in what lotus, and why?”
“It means nothing. And everything. If you must have words, it means peace and love and understanding and anything that you think of as good. But it’s not for thinking, dear; it’s for being. Let yourself be open to it, don’t think. Don’t even try not to think. Be.”
“All right.”
“Start us. Remember the breathing. I’ll get in step.”
“Om Mani Padme Hum.”
(Om Mani Padme Hum. See that aura round her, Boss? She must have had quite a night.) (Shut up, Eunice; these prayers were your idea.) “Om Mani Padme Hum.”
“Om Mani Padme Hum.” (Om Mani Padme Hum.) “Om Mani Padme Hum.” “Om Mani...........”
(That’s enough, Joan.) (So short, beloved? Clock says only twenty minutes.) (I use a different clock. We’re warm all through, we’re ready. Winnie is more than ready; you’ll have to call her back.)
“Om Mani Padme Hum. Winifred. Winnie darling, hear me. The sun is rising and so must we.”
The little redhead was still perfectly in Lotus, soles of her feet turned upward on her thighs, hands in her lap, palms upward. She was still intoning, with her breathing paced exactly with her prayers. But her eyes had turned up; only the whites showed. “Come back, Winnie. Time.”
The girl’s eyes turned down to normal; she looked puzzled, then smiled. “Already? Seems like only a moment. I must have fallen asleep.”
“Happens. Are you ready? Warm and loose and your muscles soft as cotton?”
“Uh…yes, I am.”
“Then let’s try some singles.” Joan Eunice flowed upward from the mat like a flower unfolding and was standing. “You criticize me and I’ll criticize you. Then we can have companion exercises for dessert.” Joan looked at herself in the long glass. “I think my belly is firmer every day. I keep telling myself.”
“It’s perfect and you know it.” The redhead got up more slowly, caught herself in a yawn.
“Still sleepy, dear? No pleasant dreams last night?”
The girl barely blushed, then shrugged and smiled. “Pleasant all right but not enough hours. I hope we didn’t disturb you.”
“Didn’t hear a sound. Wouldn’t have guessed if you hadn’t told me when you came in to kiss me good-night. Dear, if you’re short on sleep, maybe you’d rather just criticize.”
“Oh, no, I’m getting more out of our exercises than you are—don’t want to miss a day. But—yes, I’m short on sleep. Paul—Oh, dear! But I didn’t say his last name.”
“Didn’t hear you, I was rubbing my ears.”
“Fibber. He didn’t leave until half past two. So I did lose sleep. Not that I minded!”
“I’m sure you didn’t. Winnie dear, I did not mean to snoop. Oh, normal curiosity—being a virgin myself.”
The nurse looked startled, said, “But—” and shut up.
Joan Eunice smiled. “Sho’, sho’, hon, I know what that ‘But’ means. Mrs. Branca was married…and Johann Smith was married four times, not to mention jumping out of windows. But Joan Eunice is a virgin—dig me, doll baby?”
“Well, looked at that way—”
“Only way I can look at it. So I’m curious as a Girl Scout. But telling me would still leave me knowing nothing, even if you wanted to tell, which I’m sure you don’t. Someday—no hurry—I suppose I’ll find out for myself. So don’t you dare blush again and let’s get on with our exercises. I’ll run through the Tortoise variations and you push me if I need it.”
After an hour of twisting and stretching and posing Joan Eunice said, “Enough. Much more and we’d be sweating instead of glowing. Ready for gruesome twosomes?”
The high note of the outer door sounded in the bath-dressing room. “Damn,” said Joan. “I mean a ladylike ‘dam.’ Damn. Into your tights, dear, and I’ll drop your smock over your head. Tell ’em ‘No ice today.’”
“Right away.” Dressed in seconds, the girl left.
(How’d we look today, Eunice? Tits beginning to suit you?) (We’re more than halfway there, Joan; in another week you can cut the time down.) (Not anxious to; it’s the most fun of the day…except when our lord and guardian deigns to dine with us. Tell me, hon—have you been fretting about those negative reports?) (No, you have been fretting; they were what I expected. Nobody knows how memory works except that everyone is sure he knows and thinks all the others are fools.) (I’ve been thinking about those flatworms. If you can chop up a trained flatworm and feed it to another flatworm and then the second one seems to remember what the first one learned, then—) (Boss! I keep telling you, I am not a flatworm! I told you a long time ago that the body remembers, and—let’s table it; here comes the fuzz.)
“Miss Joan, it’s Dr. Garcia and Mr. Salomon.”
“Oh. Well, I’m not going to dress; we’ve still to finish. Grab me a negligee—not that plate-glass job. The London Fog is suitable, don’t you think?”
“I guess. Makes you look only half naked instead of bare.”
“Who taught me to dress that way, winsome Winnie?” (I did.) (Sure, Eunice—but she thinks she bosses me. I’m her good baby who always does what Mama says…until we get dear Doctor out of our hair.) “Please tell the gentlemen that I will be right out.”
Miss Smith stopped to apply lipstick, decided that her face could get along with no other renewals, took a brush-comb and teased her too-short locks into fluffiness, stepped into stilt-high mules, put on the negligee and looked at herself in the long glass.
She decided that the selective opacity of the robe was just right—except that the upper part was a little too modest. So she delayed long enough to apply lipstick to areolae.
Now satisfied with her appearance—(Boss, we look like a high-priced pooka.) (Very high-priced, I hope. Were you criticizing?) (Not at all, I was applauding.)—she went out into her boudoir. “Good morning, Doctor. Hi, Jake dear. Won’t you sit down? Coffee? Or we can find some Old Kentucky Rat Poison, bottled in the barn.”
“Coffee,” agreed Salomon. “You look charming, my dear.”
“Snake charming. I’ve been exercising and smell like a horse.”
“Not more than a small pony. I’ll turn up the ventilation. Joan Eunice, Dr. Garcia wants to check you over.”
“Really? What’s wrong? I feel fine. Aside from these cold prison bars all around me, and my head on a pillow of stone.”
“Dr. Garcia thinks we can do something about those cold prison bars. Joan Eunice, we agreed that it was not smart to go into court until you were discharged as well in all respects. He thinks it may be possible, now.”
“Oh. Oh! How about that platoon of psychiatrists?”
“We’ll have them. We may never need them. But we’ll be ready to offset their expert witnesses. You will have to put up with long searching interviews; our own experts must go into court prepared.” (Prepared to justify their fancy fees. Don’t worry, Boss; I’ll hide under a rock whenever a shrink is around.)
“That’s okay. I’m delighted that Dr. Garcia thinks I’m well. Shall we step into my dressing room, Doctor? Come along, Winnie. Jake, the Wall Street Journal is over there.”
Once she was alone with her doctor and nurse Miss Smith said, “Well, Doctor? Shall I stretch out on the massage table?”
“No, this examination is pro forma, to allow me to log that I gave you a physical on the day I discharged you. I’ll listen with a stethoscope and make you say ‘Ah!’—things like that. If you’ll sit do
wn at your dressing table and drop the top of your robe, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
She kept quiet while he passed the stethoscope here and there, coughed when she was told to, inhaled sharply and sighed noisily as directed. Once she said, “Wups! Sorry, I’m ticklish,” and asked, “What does that tell you?”
“Just palpating for lumps. Again, pro forma—although it’s been some time since this was done.” (Enjoying it, kiddo?) (Maybe you are, Eunice; I’m not. I’d rather be approached more romantic-like.) (Don’t kid your grandmother; you enjoy it.)
The doctor stepped back and looked at her thoughtfully. Joan Eunice said, “Anything more, sir? G-Y-N?”
“Not unless you ask for it. Trouble?”
“Not a bit. I feel healthy enough to whup a grizzly bear.”
“And you check out that healthy, too. Nevertheless your case worries me.”
“Why, Doctor?”
“Because your case is unique. I know almost as little about it as you do. Joan, when you left this house—as Mr. Smith—I never expected to see you alive again. When you were brought back, I did not expect you to regain consciousness. When you regained consciousness, I felt sorry for you…as I never expected you to be other than paralyzed from the neck down. Yet here you are, well and healthy. Apparently.”
“Why only ‘apparently,’ Doctor?”
“I don’t know. We know little enough about any transplant—and nothing about a brain transplant other than what we have learned from you. Joan, for the past two weeks there has been no reason—other than caution—why you needed more supervision than any other young woman in good health. Say Winifred here, for example.”
He shrugged. “Of the two you seem to be somewhat more ruggedly healthy than she is. Nevertheless I would bet that Winifred, barring accidents, will live out her normal span…whereas you don’t fit any curve; you’re unique. Please, I’m not trying to frighten you, but only a fool makes predictions based on ignorance; I am not that sort of fool.”