“I’ve weighed this a million times, Mark. I’ve come around to your way of thinking: that Roditis has such power already that it would be a grave mistake to let him have Paul. That would set up an extraordinary concentration of ability in one individual, with unpredictable results.”
“Of course.”
“I’ve also taken into account the objections of the Kaufmann family, as voiced through you.”
“Kind of you, Frank. But what will you do with old Paul, then? There can’t be many others around you could safely award him to. I suppose it’s best simply to leave him in storage a few years, until he’s so far out of touch with events that he can be let loose again as someone’s persona. I—”
“Oh, he’ll be transplanted soon, though.”
“To whom?” Kaufmann asked, taken aback.
“We have a rare event scheduled to take place here shortly,” said Santoliquido. “The erasure of a dybbuk who’s guilty not only of ejecting his host but of deliberately causing the discorporation of a young woman.”
“The Tandy Cushing case. Yes, of course. Risa’s given me all the details. But what does this have to do with—”
“Once Claude Villefranche has been obliterated, Mark, we’ll be left with the empty but living body of Martin St. John, a young man of good family and decent health. Have you considered the status of a blanked-out body of that sort?”
“Why,” Kaufmann said, “just take out one of St. John’s own recorded personae and imprint it on his own brain. Isn’t that the logical solution?”
“It’s logical, but it won’t work. That’s called an autoimprint, and autoimprints can’t be made. The brain rejects its own abstracted persona. There are complex reasons for this, partly having to do with the technique of the process, partly with the physiology of the autonomic nervous system, partly with the psychology of the persona. I won’t trouble you with the details. But we can’t put Martin St. John’s persona back into Martin St. John’s body. However, there’s nothing stopping us from installing some other persona in that vacant, healthy body—”
Mark Kaufmann saw where Santoliquido was leading. The impact of comprehension was swift and violent.
“You’ll put Paul in there?”
“Yes,” said Santoliquido smugly.
“But that’ll create an instant dybbuk! It’ll be Paul Kaufmann operating Martin St. John’s body!” Kaufmann cried hoarsely.
“True. However, there’s no specific regulation prohibiting such a transplant. We have blank bodies so infrequently that there are no precedents. Paul himself is something of a precedent-setter, too, since his mind is uniquely dynamic and overbearing, and he’s almost certain to turn any host he gets into a dybbuk. With a few possible exceptions, such as Roditis. And yourself. But we have a moral obligation to return Paul’s persona to carnate form. If we give him an orthodox transplant, and a dybbuk results, the quaestors will insist on mandatory erasure again. If we put him into a wholly empty body, though, so that there’s no charge of an unethical takeover of another intelligence, he won’t be breaking any laws. In effect, your uncle will return to the world as an independent entity, truly reborn.”
Kaufmann was staggered by the idea.
He saw the complacence in Santoliquido’s face, and knew that the Scheffing administrator had engineered this most cunningly, as a way of immobilizing both Roditis and himself. Handing the disputed persona to a third party, a zero, a blank, neatly cut the ground from under both of them. Roditis could storm and rant, but unless he found some legal flaw in the transfer, he could not oppose it. And Mark, having put up a successful battle to keep Paul out of Roditis’ mind, could not now very well presume to interfere with Santoliquido’s further freedom of action.
It was ironic that Risa had provided Santoliquido with the solution to his dilemma. Very conveniently, she had helped to make a blank body available to him at the critical moment. Zip, zip, and Paul Kaufmann would walk the earth again, not merely as a silent persona, nor even as an unlawful dybbuk that had wrested control from a victimized host, but as a true rebirth, given a body of his own with the blessings of the Scheffing Institute!
“What do you say, Mark?” Santoliquido asked coyly.
Shaken, Kaufmann replied, “This is very sudden. It brings up all kinds of complications. What, for example, would be the legal status of this carnate form? Paul’s dead. His estate is going through probate.”
“Legally, the new entity would assume the property and status of Martin St. John,” said Santoliquido. “I’ve already had a ruling on that. He’d be St. John, carrying the Paul Kaufmann persona. Of course, in effect he’d simply be Paul in St. John’s body, but that doesn’t give him any title to Kaufmann status. I assume that you’d accept him into your family circle as Paul and find room for him in your business enterprises, but that’s strictly up to you. You could just as easily let him try to make his way as St. John. Knowing Paul, I think he’d do all right.”
“Yes,” said Kaufmann hollowly. “I think he would.”
“So what do you say? I’ve saved you from the monstrous threat of a Roditis in your bosom! That’s a relief, eh, Mark? Isn’t it? You look a bit uncertain.”
The initial shock was wearing off. Kaufmann had begun to see past his amazement at Santoliquido’s coup to the deeper implications. Paul would return to life, yes, as shrewd and as energetic as ever, and with the extra benefit of residing in the body of a young man. That posed something of a threat to Mark’s own status as head of the Kaufmann clan.
But no Kaufmann could really accept the reborn Paul as a true Kaufmann. The family would draw upon his reserve of experience and wisdom, but could never accord him full status. At best he’d be a secondary focus of power.
I can handle him, Mark thought. After all, what Santoliquido doesn’t know is that I’ll have Paul’s persona myself. That’ll enable me to cope, in case it comes to a showdown between Paul and me. And I should be able to count on Paul’s support in the struggle against Roditis.
Kaufmann envisioned the possibility of a three-cornered rivalry: himself, the new Paul, and Roditis. But in such a conflict he would invariably emerge on top, since he’d be Mark-plus-Paul, and thus at least one notch ahead of Paul alone, and two notches ahead of Roditis.
He said, “Yes. Very clever of you, Frank. I approve. Have you broken the news to Roditis yet?”
“No. I thought I’d wait another day or two, until the transplant has actually been carried out. I’d prefer to present it to him as a fait accompli.”
“That’s probably best,” said Kaufmann. He chuckled. “I imagine Roditis is going to be surprised.”
12
CHARLES NOYES SAID, “YOU won’t like this, John. Elena says that they’ve decided not to give Paul Kaufmann to you. They’ve got some dummy body that a dybbuk was removed from, and they’re putting the persona in that.”
He waited fearfully for Roditis to react.
They were in the midwestern office of Roditis Securities at Evansville, Indiana, on the top floor of a tower overlooking the river. From the broad windows it was possible to see deep into Kentucky. Noyes had flown to Evansville that afternoon, after lunch with Elena. This was too important to convey to Roditis by phone.
Roditis seemed strangely calm. He walked past Noyes to the window and peered out into the blaze of light that was the city across the river. Then, turning slowly, he went to the Anton Kozak sonic sculpture that dominated one wall of his office and carefully recalibrated its pitch so that it produced a gentle hum at about fifty cycles. A horizontal component in the sculpture began to oscillate at such a frequency that it blurred and became barely visible.
Quietly Roditis said, “Did she learn this from Santoliquido?”
“Yes. She spent much of last night with him, and he told her. According to Elena, Santoliquido is quite proud of what he’s arranged, because it thwarts both you and Mark in one stroke.”
“What did Mark want done with the persona?”
“Either to be given to
him or simply kept in cold storage. Since it obviously couldn’t be given to him, Mark preferred that it go to nobody at all. Santoliquido’s manipulated things so that neither one of you gets what he wanted, and yet neither one of you has any recourse from the decision.”
Roditis, still icily calm, fondled the shining rim of the sonic sculpture. Noyes could not understand his employer’s coolness. The man should be raving and shouting. Was Roditis drugged in some way? Up to the eyebrows in pills? System flooded with a chemosterilant to damp down any response?
“Does Kaufmann know of the decision?” Roditis asked.
“Yes,” Noyes said. “Santoliquido phoned and told him about it two days ago.”
“How did he take it?”
“Angrily. Very angrily. But then he gave his agreement. He had no real choice.”
“And when is this transplant supposed to take place?”
Noyes shifted his weight uncertainly from leg to leg. “It was done this afternoon.”
“Paul Kaufmann’s walking around in a body without a controlling mind?”
Noyes nodded.
“Kaufmann’s a dybbuk, then. Without even having to struggle for it.”
“Yes.”
“Dybbuks are illegal.”
“Not this one,” said Noyes. “Santoliquido apparently found some sort of legal loophole. Don’t you see, this was approved on the highest level, meaning Santoliquido. Therefore, by definition, it can’t be illegal. Paul Kaufmann’s back in the world, and he’s got full command of a body.”
“Whose body was it?”
“An Englishman named Martin St. John. One of the younger sons of some lord. He was pushed out of the body by a Frenchman who had earlier murdered a girl at a ski resort, then was killed himself and picked up by St. John as a persona. They tracked him down, erased him after getting a confession under mindpick, and Santoliquido had the bright idea of putting old Kaufmann into the empty body.”
“Very clever of him.”
“You aren’t upset by all this, John?”
“Not at all. I was expecting it, in a way. You can choose not to believe this, but I foresaw some such arrangement down to the actual details. I was braced for it. And I also have a plan of action ready to meet the situation.”
“I knew you would, John. What do you have in mind?”
Roditis smiled. “Where is this St. John body now, do you know?”
“Probably still in New York. That’s where the transplant was performed. I doubt that he’ll do any traveling until he’s achieved physical coordination in the new body.”
“Good. Go to New York. Find St. John, Charles. Find him and kill him.”
“You want me to discorporate—”
“That’s right. Kill him. Destroy the St. John body.”
Noyes sat down abruptly. His head whirled. Within, James Kravchenko gave a mighty leap, battering against Noyes’ defenses. Noyes shivered as the persona assailed him. It was a moment before he could reassert his control over Kravchenko, and another moment before he was able to meet Roditis’ level gaze.
“I can’t do that, John!” Noyes gasped.
“Yes, you can, and you will. Damn it, do you think I’m going to let a dummy walk off with that persona? Look: Santoliquido doesn’t have an infinite supply of empty bodies sitting around ready for Paul Kaufmann to go dybbuk in. Discorporate St. John and you’re actually tossing Paul back into the soul bank, right? The master recording is still there, ready to be used again if something happens to the old man’s current carnate embodiment. Okay. Remove St. John. I reapply for the Kaufmann persona, which is again available. Only this time I put more pressure on Santo than before. I don’t waltz around so diplomatically. I threaten a little. I pound the table. I make it clear to him that I won’t tolerate a second trick of that sort. He’ll have to give in. I’ll get my way at last.”
“But I have to commit a discorporation,” Noyes said in a weak voice. “What if I’m caught? What if I bungle it?”
“You won’t be caught, and you won’t bungle it. Don’t worry, Charles. I’ll arrange everything. As soon as you’ve done it, we’ll whisk you back out here and have you blanked for the hours of the discorporation. We’ll fill in false memories, an alibi that nobody can challenge. You’ll be beyond the reach of mindpicking. Do you really think I’d allow my oldest and closest friend to run any real risks?”
“Still, can’t you hire some thug—program a robot—”
“I need someone I can trust. There’s only one person in the world I can rely on for this, Charles. You’ve been with me on every stage of the operation.”
“But—”
“You’ll do it, Charles.” Roditis came over, standing above Noyes’ chair, and put his hands on Noyes’ shoulders just alongside the clavicles. His thick, powerful fingers dug sharply into the flesh. His eyes, compelling, almost hypnotic, sought for Noyes’ and locked on them. Noyes knew he was being coerced, but he had never been able to resist Roditis’ pressures before, and he doubted that he would succeed this time.
Earnestly Roditis said, “Do you have moral objections?”
“Well, in a way.”
“Look at it this way. You aren’t actually taking life. The real Martin St. John was discorporated long ago. The only intelligent thing in that body is the persona of Paul Kaufmann, which has no right to be there. Kaufmann’s had one life already, one body. That’s all he’s entitled to on an autonomous basis. Now he’s supposed to be riding as a passenger, as a persona. You dispose of the St. John body and Kaufmann reverts to his proper status, minus the illegal nonsense Santoliquido has invented out of cowardice. You’ll actually be performing a pro-social act, Charles. You’ll be canceling out an anomaly. Do you follow that?”
“I think so. I—”
“You can’t kill something that’s already dead. Both Martin St. John and Paul Kaufmann are already dead: one because his persona ejected him, one because his natural span was over. What you’ll be doing is disposing of some superfluous protoplasm. Nothing else. You’ll do it for me, Charles. I know you will.”
“How will I do it?”
Roditis straightened up, went to his desk, ran his fingers over the protruding green studs of a safety cache. The cache door sprang open and he thrust his hand inside, pulling out a lemon-colored box less than an inch in diameter. Roditis popped the box onto his palm and stuck his hand under Noyes’ nose. A touch of his finger and the box fissioned along its vertical axis to reveal a minute capsule containing a few drops of some turquoise fluid.
“This,” said Roditis, “is cyclophosphamide-8. It’s an alkylating agent that has the effect of breaking down the body’s fail-safe system for tolerating its own chemical components. Let a little of this get inside a man and he rejects his own organs, the way he’d reject an organ graft from another person without proper chemical preparation.”
“Some kind of carniphage?” Noyes asked uncertainly.
“Not exactly, but close enough. Your true carniphage causes the cells of the body to destroy themselves through autolysis, through enzyme release. This stuff has the effect of turning the body into a conglomeration of alien components that can’t function homeostatically any more. Gland secretions become poisons; organ coordination ceases; antigens are poured forth to attack the very tissues they ought to be defending. The loveliness of it all is that nothing the medics can do can possibly save the patient. The more they meddle, the more quickly the rate of destruction accelerates. Death comes in less than an hour usually.”
“Carniphage is quicker,” Noyes pointed out.
“But carniphage is too obvious. When a man turns to a puddle of slime inside of fifteen minutes, it’s a clear case of carniphage dosing. But with cyclophosphamide-8, the cause of death remains in doubt. It’s an ambiguous finish.”
“How is the drug administered?”
“In the fine old Borgia fashion. Conceal the box in your palm, like so. Offer your victim a glass of water. Pass your hand over it, squeeze the
muscles together. The box opens, the capsule drops in. It dissolves in a microsecond. The turquoise color is lost upon contact with any other fluid. No taste. No odor. It’s that simple.” Roditis closed the lemon-colored box. He presented it gravely to Noyes. “Get aboard the next flight to New York and find Martin St. John. I’ve never needed your help more, Charlie-lad.”
Dazed, Noyes shortly found himself high above Indiana, eastward bound. One of Roditis’ secretaries had booked the flight for him; he himself seemed incapable of taking any positive action at the moment. He carried the capsule of poison in his lefthand breast pocket. In his righthand breast pocket there nestled, as always, the flask of carniphage with which he proposed to end his own miserable life just as soon as he found the courage to do it.
This would be an excellent moment, Noyes told himself morosely.
He did not want to be a catspaw for John Roditis any longer. He was tired of rushing around compromising himself for the sake of fulfilling the little entrepreneur’s ambitions. Committing murder now. True, true, Roditis had produced a pack of sophistries to persuade him that supping cyclophosphamide-8 into Martin St. John’s drinking water was not murder in any valid sense, and so persuasive was Roditis’ glibness that Noyes had been nearly taken in. Nearly. Yet he knew that the quaestors would take a harder line with him if he were caught before Roditis could blank the crime from his mind. They’d accuse him of deliberate discorporation, and there was no more serious crime. He’d be erased. A small loss, maybe, to the universe and even to himself; but nevertheless humiliating. A man should destroy himself, not allow others to destroy him.
Gulp the carniphage now, he thought. You’ll make a mess in the plane, and the stewardess will throw up, but at least you’ll die an honest death.
His hand stole toward his righthand breast pocket.
—Go on, Kravchenko urged. Why don’t you do it and get it over with? I’m so sick of being stuck in your lousy head, Noyes, you can’t possibly imagine!
The hand halted short of its goal.
Some lingering Puritan sense of obligation assailed him. To kill himself now would be cowardly; he’d be running out on Roditis’ assignment. He had no right to do that. Roditis trusted him; Roditis relied on him. And Roditis had given him employment and a purpose in the world for many years past. Sure, Roditis was overbearing, tyrannical, self-centered, and all the rest. Sure, Roditis had bullied him into compromise after compromise, until at the end he was even crashing parties on the man’s behalf and sleeping with strange women to win a nugget of useful information. Nevertheless, those were the conditions of his employment. He had accepted them. He could not spurn them now. He owed it to Roditis to carry out this final assignment, this meaningless discorporation, this destruction of a body already dead and tenanted by a dead man’s ghost. After that, if he wished, he could swallow his carniphage at last, with even more justification than now. Running out on unfinished business was surely not in the Noyes tradition.