The Crack in Space

  ‘You don’t like this,’ Myra said.

  Tito shrugged. ‘I don’t have to like it. That doesn’t matter.’

  ‘But you think I’m treading on dangerous ground.’

  ‘I know you are. Even if it’s true that Lurton Sands . . .’

  ‘Don’t say "even if". He’s a fanatic and you know it; he identifies so fully with his public image as a savior of lives that he’s simply had to make a psychological break with reality. Probably he started in a small way, with what he told himself was a unique situation, an exception; he had to have a particular organ and he took it. And the next time . . .’ She shrugged. ‘It was easier. And so on.’

  ‘I see,’ Tito said.

  ‘I think I see what we’re going to have to do,’ Myra said. ‘What you’re going to have to do. Get started on this. Find out from your contact at the UN exactly what organ the bank lacks at this time. Then deliberately set up another emergency situation; have someone in a hospital somewhere apply to Lurton for that particular transplant. I realize that it’ll cost one hell of a lot of money, but I’m willing to underwrite the expense. Do you see?’

  ‘I see,’ Tito said. In other words, trap Lurton Sands. Play on the man’s determination to save the life of a dying person . . . make his humanitarianism the instrument of his destruction. What a way to earn a living, Tito thought to himself. Another day, another dollar . . . it’s hardly that. Not when you get involved in something like this.

  ‘I know you can arrange it,’ Myra said to him fervently. ‘You’re good; you’re experienced. Aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Sands,’ Tito said. ‘I’m experienced. Yes, possibly I can trap the guy. Lead him by the nose. It shouldn’t be too hard.’

  ‘Make sure your "patient" offers him plenty,’ Myra said in a bitter, taut voice. ‘Lurton will bite if he senses a good financial return; that’s what interests him—in spite of what you and the darn public may or may not imagine. I ought to know; I’ve lived with him a good many years, shared his most intimate thoughts.’ She smiled, briefly. ‘It seems a shame I have to tell you how to go about your business, but obviously I have to.’ Her smile returned, cold and exceedingly hard.

  ‘I appreciate your assistance,’ Tito said woodenly.

  ‘No you don’t. You think I’m trying to do something wicked. Something out of mere spite.’

  Tito said, ‘I don’t think anything; I’m just hungry. Maybe you don’t eat until eight-thirty or nine, but I have pyloric spasms and I have to eat by seven. Will you excuse me?’ He rose to his feet, pushing his desk chair back. ‘I want to close up shop.’ He did not renew his offer to take her out to dinner.

  Gathering up her coat and purse, Myra Sands said, ‘Have you located Cally Vale and if so where?’

  ‘No luck,’ Tito said, and felt uncomfortable.

  Staring at him, Myra said, ‘But why can’t you locate her? She must be somewhere!’ She looked as if she could not believe her ears.

  ‘The court process servers can’t find her either,’ Tito pointed out. ‘But I’m sure she’ll turn up by trial time.’ He, too, had been wondering why his staff had been unable to locate Lurton Sands’ mistress; after all, there were only a limited number of places a person could hide, and detection and tracing devices, especially during the last two decades, had improved to an almost supernatural accuracy.

  Myra said, ‘I’m beginning to think you’re just not any good. I wonder if I shouldn’t put my business in somebody else’s hands.’

  ‘That’s your privilege,’ Tito said. His stomach ached, a series of spasms of his pyloric valve. He wondered if he was ever going to get an opportunity to eat tonight.

  ‘You must find Miss Vale,’ Myra said. ‘She knows all the details of his activity; that’s why he’s got her hidden—in fact she’s pumping blood with a heart he procured for her.’

  ‘Okay, Mrs Sands,’ Tito agreed, and inwardly winced at the growing pain . . .

  FOUR

  The black-haired, extremely dark youth said shyly, ‘We came to you, Mrs Sands, because we read about you in the homeopape. It said you were very good and also you take people without too much money.’ He added, ‘We don’t have any money at all right now, but maybe we can pay you later.’

  Brusquely, Myra Sands said, ‘Don’t worry about that now.’ She surveyed the boy and girl. ‘Let’s see. Your names are Art and Rachael Chaffy. Sit down, both of you, and let’s talk, all right?’ She smiled at them, her professional smile of greeting and warmth; it was reserved for her clients, given to no one else, not even to her husband—or, as she thought of Lurton now, her former husband.

  In a soft voice the girl, Rachael, said ‘We tried to get them to let us become bibs but they said we should consult an advisor first.’ She explained, ‘I’m—well, you see, somehow I got to be preg. I’m sorry.’ She ducked her head fearfully, with shame, her cheeks flushing deep scarlet. ‘It’s too bad they don’t just let you kill yourself, like they did a few years ago,’ she murmured. ‘Because that would solve it.’

  ‘That law,’ Myra said firmly, ‘was a bad idea. However imperfect deep-sleep is, it’s certainly preferable to the old form of self-destruction undertaken on an individual basis. How far advanced is your pregnancy, dear?’

  ‘About a month and a half,’ Rachael Chaffy said, lifting her head a trifle. She managed to meet Myra’s gaze; for a moment, at least.

  ‘Then abort-processing presents no difficulty,’ Myra said. ‘It’s routine. We can arrange for it by noon today and have it done by six tonight. At any one of several free government abort clinics here in the area. Just a moment.’ Her secretary had opened the door to the office and was trying to catch her attention. ‘What is it, Tina?’

  ‘An urgent phone call for you, Mrs Sands.’

  Myra clicked on her desk vid-phone. On the screen Tito Cravelli’s features formed in replica, puffy with agitation.

  ‘Mrs Sands,’ Tito said, ‘sorry to bother you at your office so early this morning. But a number of tracking devices we’ve been employing here have wound up their term of service and have come home. I thought you’d want to know. Cally Vale is nowhere on Earth. That’s absolutely been determined; that’s definite.’ He was silent, then, waiting for her to say something.

  ‘Then she emigrated,’ Myra said, trying to picture the dainty and rather nauseatingly fragile Miss Vale in the rugged environment of Mars or Ganymede.

  ‘No,’ Tito Cravelli said emphatically, shaking his head. ‘We’ve checked on that, of course. Cally Vale did not emigrate. It doesn’t make sense, but there it is. No wonder we’re making no headway; we’re faced with an impossible situation.’ He did not appear very happy about it. His features sagged glumly.

  Myra said, ‘She’s not on Earth and she didn’t emigrate. Then she must . . .’ It was obvious to her; why hadn’t they thought of it right away, when Cally originally vanished from sight? ‘She’s entered a government warehouse. Cally’s a bib.’ It was the only possibility left.

  ‘We’re looking into that,’ Tito said, but without enthusiasm. ‘I admit it’s possible but frankly I just don’t buy it Personally, I think they’ve thought up something new, something original; I’d stake my job on it, everything I have.’ Tito’s tone was insistent, now. No longer hesitant. ‘But we’ll check all the Dept. of SPW warehouses, all ninety-four of them. That’ll take a couple of days at least. Meanwhile—’ He caught sight of the young couple, the Chaffys, waiting silently. ‘Perhaps I’d better discuss it with you later; there’s no urgency.’

  Maybe what the homeopapes are hinting at actually did take place, Myra thought to herself. Perhaps Lurton has actually killed her. So she can’t be subpoenaed by Frank Fenner at the trial.

  ‘Do you believe Cally Vale is dead?’ Myra said to Tito bluntly. She ignored the young couple seated opposite her; they did not at the moment matter: this was far too important.

  ‘I’m in no position . . .’ Tito began. Myra cut him off; she broke the connection, and
the screen faded. I’m in no position to say, she finished for him. But who is? Lurton? Maybe even he doesn’t know where Cally is. She might have run out on him. Gone to the Golden Door Moments of Bliss satellite and joined the army of girls there, under an assumed name. With relish, Myra pondered that, picturing her former husband’s mistress as one of Thisbe’s creatures, sexless and mechanical and automatic. Which will it be, Cally? One, two, three or four? Only, the choice isn’t yours. It’s theirs. Every time. Myra laughed. It’s where you ought to be, Cally, she thought. For the rest of your life, for the next two hundred years.

  ‘Please forgive the interruption,’ Myra said to the young couple seated opposite her. ‘And do go on.’

  ‘Well,’ the girl Rachael said awkwardly, ‘Art and I felt that—we thought over the abortion and we just don’t want to do it. I don’t know why, Mrs Sands. I know we should. But we can’t.’

  There was silence, then.

  ‘I don’t see what you came to me for,’ Myra said. ‘If you’ve made up your minds against it already. Obviously, from a practical standpoint you should go through with it; you’re probably frightened . . . after all, you are very young. But I’m not trying to talk you into it. A decision of this sort has to be your own.’

  In a low voice Art said, ‘We’re not scared, Mrs Sands. That’s not it. We—well, we’d like to have the baby. That’s all.’

  Myra Sands did not know what to say. She had never, in her practice, run into anything quite like this; it baffled her.

  She could see already that this was going to be a bad day. Between this and Tito’s phonecall—it was too much. And so early. It was not yet even nine a.m.

  In the basement of Pethel Jiff-scuttler Sales & Service, the repairman Rick Erickson prepared, for the second day in a row, to enter the defective ‘scuttler of Dr Lurton Sands, Jr. He still had not found what he was searching for.

  However, he did not intend to give up. He felt, on an intuitive level, that he was very close. It would not be long now.

  From behind him a voice said, ‘What are you doing, Rick?’

  Startled, Erickson jumped, glanced around. At the door of the repair department stood his employer, Darius Pethel, heavy-set in the wrinkled dark-brown old-fashioned jerry-type wool suit which he customarily wore.

  ‘Listen,’ Erickson said. ‘This is Dr Sands’ ‘scuttler. You can laugh, but I think he’s got his mistress in here, somewhere.’

  ‘What?’ Pethel laughed.

  ‘I mean it. I don’t think she’s dead, even though I talked to Sands long enough to know he could do it if he felt it was necessary—he’s that kind of guy. Anyhow nobody’s found her, even Mrs Sands. Naturally they can’t find her, because Lurton’s got his ‘scuttler in here with us, out of sight. He knows it’s here, but they don’t. And he doesn’t want it back, no matter what he says; he wants it stuck down here, right in this basement.’

  Staring at him Pethel said, ‘Great fud. Is this what you’ve been doing on my time? Working out detective theories?’

  Erickson said, ‘This is important! Even if it doesn’t mean any money for you. Hell, maybe it does; if I’m lucky and find her, maybe you can sell her back to Mrs Sands.’

  After a pause Darius Pethel shrugged in a philosophical way. ‘Okay. So look. If you do find her—’

  Beside Pethel the salesman of the firm, Stuart Hadley, appeared. He said breezily, ‘What’s up, Dar?’ As always cheerful and interested.

  ‘Rick’s searching for Dr Sands’ mistress,’ Pethel said. He jerked his thumb at the ‘scuttler.

  ‘Is she pretty?’ Hadley asked. ‘Well started?’ He looked hungry.

  ‘You’ve seen her pics in the homeopapes,’ Pethel said. ‘She’s cute. Otherwise why do you suppose the doctor risked his marriage, if she wasn’t something exceptional? Come on, Hadley; I need you upstairs on the floor. We can’t all three be down here—someone’ll walk away with the register.’ He started up the stairs.

  ‘And she’s in there?’ Hadley said, looking puzzled as he bent to peer into the ‘scuttler. ‘I don’t see her, Dar.’

  Darius Pethel gaffawed. ‘Neither do I. Neither does Rick, but he’s still searching—and on my time, goddam it! Listen, Rick; if you find her she’s my mistress, because you’re on my time, working for me.’

  All three of them laughed at that.

  ‘Okay,’ Rick agreed, on his hands and knees, scraping the surface of the ‘scuttler tube with the blade of a screwdriver. ‘You can laugh and I admit it’s funny. But I’m not stopping.

  Obviously, the rent isn’t visible; if it was, Doc Sands wouldn’t have dared leave it here. He may think I’m dumb, but not that dumb—he’s got it concealed and real well.’

  “Rent,” Pethel echoed. He frowned, starting back a few steps down the stairs and into the basement once more. ‘You mean like Henry Ellis found, years ago? That rupture in the tube-wall that led to ancient Israel?’

  ‘Israel is right,’ Rick said briefly, as he scraped. His keen, thoroughly-trained eye saw all at once in the surface near at hand a slight irregularity, a distortion. Leaning forward, he reached out his hand . . .

  His groping fingers passed through the wall of the tube and disappeared.

  ‘Jesus,’ Rick said. He raised his invisible fingers, felt nothing at first, and then touched the upper edge of the rent. ‘I found it,’ he said. He looked around, but Pethel had gone. ‘Darius!’ he yelled, but there was no answer. ‘Damn him!’ he said in fury to Hadley.

  ‘You found what?’ Hadley asked, starting cautiously into the tube. ‘You mean you found the Vale woman? Cally Vale?’

  Headfirst, Rick Erickson crept into the rent.

  He sprawled, snatching for support; falling, he struck hard ground and cursed. Opening his eyes, he saw, above, a pale blue sky with a few meager clouds. And, around him, a meadow. Bees, or what looked something more or less like bees, buzzed in tall-stemmed white flowers as large as saucers. The air smelled of sweetness, as if the flowers had impregnated the atmosphere itself.

  I’m there, he said to himself. I got through; this is where Doc Sands hid his mistress to keep her from testifying for Mrs Sands at the trial or hearing or whatever it’s called. He stood up, cautiously. Behind him he made out a hazy shimmer: the nexus with the tube of the Jiffi-scuttler back in the store’s basement in Kansas City. I want to keep my bearings, he said to himself warily. If I get lost, I may not be able to get back again and that might be bad.

  Where is this? he asked himself. Must work that out—now.

  Gravity like Earth’s. Must be Earth, then, he decided. Long time ago? Long time in the future? Think what this is worth; the hell with the man’s mistress, the hell with him and his personal problems—that’s nothing. He looked wildly around for some sign of habitation, for something animal-like, or human; something to tell him what epoch this was, past or future. Saber-tooth tiger, maybe. Or trilobite. No, too late for the trilobite already; look at those bees. This is the break Terran Development has been trying to uncover for thirty years now, he said to himself. And the rat that found it used it for his own sneaky goings-on, as a place merely to hide his doxie. What a world! Erickson began slowly to walk, step by step . . .

  Far off, a figure moved.

  Shading his eyes against the glare of the sky, Rick-Erickson tried to make out what it was. Primitive man? Cro-Magnon or some such thing? Big-domed inhabitant of the future, perhaps? He squinted—it was a woman; he could tell by her hair. She wore slacks and she was running toward him. Cally, he thought. Doc Sands’ mistress, hurrying toward me. Must think I’m Sands. In panic, he halted; what’ll I do? he wondered. Maybe I better go back, think this out. He started to turn in the direction he had come.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw the girl’s arm come up swiftly.

  No, he thought. Don’t.

  He stumbled as he snatched at the hazy, small loop which connected the two environments, entrance to the ‘scuttler tube.

  The red glow of an a
imed laser-beam passed over his head.

  You missed me, he thought in terror. But—he clawed for the entrance, found it, began to struggle back through. But next time. Next time!

  ‘Stop,’ he shouted at her without looking at her. His voice echoed in the bee-zooming plain of flowers.

  The second laser-beam caught him in the back.

  He put his hand out, saw it pass through the haze and disappear beyond. It was safe, but he was not. She had killed him; it was too late, now, too late to get away from her. Why didn’t she wait? he asked himself. Find out who I was? Must have been afraid.

  Again the laser-beam flicked. It touched the back of his head and that was that. There was no returning for him, no reentry into the safety of the tube.

  Rick Erickson was dead.

  Standing on the far side, in the tube of Dr Sands’ Jiffi-scuttler, Stuart Hadley waited nervously, then saw Rick Erickson’s fingers jerk through the wall near the floor; the fingers writhed, and Hadley stooped down and grabbed Erickson by the wrist. Trying to get back, he realized, and pulled Erickson by the arm with all his strength.

  It was a corpse that he drew into the tube beside him.

  Horrified, Hadley rose unsteadily to his feet; he saw the two clean holes and knew that Erickson had been killed with a laser rifle, probably from a distance. Stumbling down the tube, Hadley reached the controls of the ‘scuttler and cut the power off; the shimmer of the entrance hoop at once vanished, and he knew or hoped—that now they, whoever they were who had murdered Rick Erickson, could not follow him through.

  ‘Pethel!’ he shouted. ‘Come down here!’ He ran to Erickson’s work bench and the intercom. ‘Mr Pethel,’ he said, ‘come back down here to the basement right away. Erickson’s dead.’

  The next he knew, Darius Pethel stood beside him, examining the body of the repairman. ‘He must have found it,’ Pethel muttered, ashen-faced and trembling. ‘Well, he got paid for his nosiness; he sure got paid.’