And then the phocomelus thought, Maybe Stockstill is a perpetual imitation, brought into existence the day the first bomb fell on the Bay Area; that was the day Bill was conceived, wasn’t it?
That Bonny Keller, he thought; it all emanates from her. All the trouble in the community … the Austurias situation, which almost wrecked us, divided us into two hostile camps. She saw to it that Austurias was killed, and actually it should have been that degenerate, that Jack Tree up there with his sheep; he’s the one who should have been shot, not the former school teacher.
That was a good man, a kindly person, the phoce thought, thinking of Mr. Austurias. And hardly anyone—except me— supported him openly at his so-called trial.
To the phoce, Doctor Stockstill said tartly, “Be more careful with that ’mobile of yours, Hoppy. As a personal favor to me.”
“I said I was sorry,” Hoppy answered.
“What are you afraid of?” the doctor said.
“Nothing,” Hoppy said. “I’m afraid of nothing in the entire world.” And then he remembered the incident at the Foresters’ Hall, how he had behaved. And it was all over town; Doctor Stockstill knew about it even though he had not been present. “I have a phobia,” he admitted, on impulse. “Is that in your line, or have you given that up? It has to do with being trapped. I was trapped once in a basement, the day the first bomb fell. It saved my life, but—” he shrugged.
Stockstill said, “I see.”
“Have you ever examined the little Keller girl?” Hoppy said.
“Yes,” Stockstill said.
With acuity, Hoppy said, “Then you know. There’s not just one child but two. They’re combined somehow; you probably know exactly how, but I don’t—and I don’t care. That’s a funny person, that child, or rather she and her brother; isn’t that so?” His bitterness spilled out. “They don’t look funny. So they get by. People just go on externals, don’t they? Haven’t you discovered that in your practice?”
Stockstill said, “By and large, yes.”
“I heard,” Hoppy said, “that according to State law, all funny minors, all children who are in any way funny, either feral or not, have to be turned over to Sacramento, to the authorities.”
There was no response from the doctor; Stockstill eyed him silently.
“You’re aiding the Kellers in breaking the law,” Hoppy said.
After a pause, Stockstill said, “What do you want, Hoppy?” His voice was low and steady.
“N-nothing,” Hoppy stammered. “Just justice, I mean; I want to see the law obeyed. Is that wrong? I keep the law. I’m registered with the U.S. Eugenics Service as a—” He choked on the word. “As a biological sport. That’s a dreadful thing to do, but I do it; I comply.”
“Hoppy,” the doctor said quietly, “what did you do to the glasses man from Bolinas?”
Spinning his ’mobile, Hoppy glided swiftly off, leaving the doctor standing there.
What did I do to him, Hoppy thought. I killed him; you know that. Why do you ask? What do you care? The man was from outside this area; he didn’t count, and we all know that. And June Raub says he wanted to nap me, and that’s good enough for most people—it’s good enough for Earl Colvig and Orion Stroud and Cas Stone, and they run this community, along with Mrs. Tallman and the Kellers and June Raub.
He knows I killed Blaine, he realized. He knows a lot about me, even though I’ve never let him examine me physically; he knows I can perform action at a distance … but everyone knows that. Yet, perhaps he’s the only one who understands what it signifies. He’s an educated man.
If I see that imitation of Stuart McConchie, he thought suddenly, I will reach out and squeeze it to death. I have to.
But I hope I don’t see it again, he thought. I can’t stand the dead; my phobia is about that, the grave: I was buried down in the grave with the part of Fergesson that was not disintegrated, and it was awful. For two weeks, with half of a man who had consideration for me, more so than anyone else I ever knew. What would you say, Stockstill, if you had me on your analyst’s couch? Would that sort of traumatic incident interest you, or have there been too many like it in the last seven years?
That Bill-thing with Edie Keller lives somehow with the dead, Hoppy said to himself. Half in our world, half in the other. He laughed bitterly, thinking of the time he had imagined that he himself could contact the other world. It was quite a joke on me, he thought. I fooled myself more than anybody else. And they never knew. Stuart McConchie and the rat, Stuart sitting there munching with relish…
And then he understood. That meant that Stuart survived; he had not been killed in the Emergency, at least not at first, as Fergesson had. So this perhaps was not an imitation that he had seen just now.
Trembling, he halted his ’mobile and sat rapidly thinking.
Does he know anything about me? he asked himself. Can he get me into any trouble? No, he decided, because in those days—what was I? Just a helpless creature on a Government-built cart who was glad of any job he could find, any scrap tossed to him. A lot has changed. Now I am vital to the entire West Marin area, he told himself; I am a top-notch handy.
Rolling back the way he had come he emerged once more on the main street and searched about for Stuart McConchie. Sure enough, there he was, heading in the direction of Andrew Gill’s tobacco and liquor factory. The phoce started to wheel after him, and then an idea came to him.
He caused McConchie to stumble.
Seated within his ’mobile he grinned to himself as he saw the Negro trip, half-fall, then regain his footing. McConchie peered down at the pavement, scowling. Then he continued on, more slowly now, picking his way over the broken cement and around the tufts of weeds with care.
The phoce wheeled after him and when he was a pace or so behind he said, “Stuart McConcbie, the TV salesman who eats raw rats.”
As if struck the Negro tottered. He did not turn; he simply stood, his arms extended, fingers apart.
“How are you enjoying the afterlife?” Hoppy said.
After a moment the Negro said in a hoarse voice, “Fine.” He turned, now. “So you got by.” He looked the phoce and his ’mobile up and down.
“Yes,” the phoce said, “I did. And not by eating rats.”
“I suppose you’re the handy here,” Stuart said.
“Yes,” Hoppy said. “No-hands Handy Hoppy; that’s me. What are you doing?”
“I’m—in the homeostatic vermin trap business,” Stuart said.
The phoce giggled.
“Is that so goddam funny?” Stuart said.
“No,” the phoce said. “Sorry. I’m glad you survived. Who else did? That psychiatrist across from Modern—he’s here. Stockstill. Fergesson was killed.”
They both were silent then.
“Lightheiser was killed,” Stuart said. “So was Bob Rubenstein. So were Connie the waitress and Tony; you remember them.”
“Yes,” the phoce said, nodding.
“Did you know Mr. Crody, the jeweler?”
“No,” the phoce said, “afraid not.”
“He was maimed. Lost both arms and was blinded. But he’s alive in a Government hospital in Hayward.”
“Why are you up here?” the phoce said.
“On business.”
“Did you come to steal Andrew Gill’s formula for his special deluxe Gold Label cigarette?” Again the phoce giggled, but he thought, It’s true. Everyone who comes sneaking up here from outside has a plan to murder or steal; look at Eldon Blaine the glasses man, and he came from Bolinas, a much closer place.
Stuart said woodenly, “My business compels me to travel; I get all around Northern California.” After a pause he added. “That was especially true when I had Edward Prince of Wales. Now I have a second-rate horse to pull my car, and it takes a lot longer to get somewhere.”
“Listen,” Hoppy said, “don’t tell anyone you know me from before, because if you do I’ll get very upset; do you understand? I’ve been a vital part of
this community for many years and I don’t want anything to come along and change it. Maybe I can help you with your business and then you can leave. How about that?”
“Okay,” Stuart said. “I’ll leave as soon as I can.” He studied the phoce with such intensity that Hoppy felt himself squirm with self-consciousness. “So you found a place for yourself,” Stuart said. “Good for you.”
Hoppy said, “I’ll introduce you to Gill; that’s what I’ll do for you. I’m a good friend of his, naturally.”
Nodding, Stuart said, “Fine. I’d appreciate that.”
“And don’t you do anything, you hear?” The phoce heard his voice rise shrilly; he could not control it. “Don’t you nap or do any other crime, or terrible things will happen to you—understand?”
The Negro nodded somberly. But he did not appear to be frightened; he did not cringe, and the phoce felt more and more apprehensive. I wish you would go, the phoce thought to himself. Get out of here; don’t make trouble for me. I wish I didn’t know you; I wish I didn’t know anyone from outside, from before the Emergency. I don’t want even to think about that.
“I hid in the sidewalk,” Stuart said suddenly. “When the first big bomb fell. I got down through the grating; it was a real good shelter.”
“Why do you bring up that?” the phoce squealed.
“I don’t know. I thought you’d be interested.”
“I’m not,” the phoce squealed; he clapped his manual extensors over his ears. “I don’t want to hear or think any more about those times.”
“Well,” Stuart said, plucking meditatively at his lower lip, “then let’s go see this Andrew Gill.”
“If you knew what I could do to you,” the phoce said, “you’d be afraid. I can do—” He broke off; he had been about to mention Eldon Blaine the glasses man. “I can move things,” he said. “From a long way off. It’s a form of magic; I’m a magician!”
Stuart said, “That’s not magic.” His voice was toneless. “We call that freak-tapping.” He smiled.
“N-no,” Hoppy stammered. “What’s that mean? ‘Freak-tapping,’ I never heard that word. Like table-tapping?”
“Yes, but with freaks. With funny people.”
He’s not afraid of me, Hoppy realized. It’s because he knew me in the old days when I wasn’t anything. It was hopeless; the Negro was too stupid to understand that everything had changed—he was almost as he had been before, seven years ago, when Hoppy had last seen him. He was inert, like a rock.
Hoppy thought of the satellite, then. “You wait,” he said breathlessly to Stuart. “Pretty soon even you city people will know about me; everyone in the world will, just like they do around here. It won’t be long now; I’m almost ready!”
Grinning tolerantly, Stuart said, “First impress me by introducing me to the tobacco man.”
“You know what I could do?” Hoppy said. “I could whisk Andrew Gill’s formula right out of his safe or wherever he keeps it and plunk it down in your hands. What do you say to that?” He laughed.
“Just let me meet him,” Stuart repeated. “That’s all I want; I’m not interested in his tobacco-formula.” He looked weary.
Trembling with anxiety and rage, the phoce turned his ’mobile in the direction of Andrew Gill’s little factory and led the way.
Andrew Gill glanced up from his task of rolling cigarettes to see Hoppy Harrington—whom he did not like—entering the factory with a Negro—whom he did not know. At once Gill felt uneasy. He set down his tobacco paper and rose to his feet. Beside him at the long bench the other rollers, his employees, continued at their work.
He employed, in all, eight men, and this was in the tobacco division alone. The distillery, which produced brandy, employed another twelve men, but they were north, in Sonoma County. They were not local people. His was the largest commercial enterprise in West Marin, not counting the farming interests such as Orion Stroud or Jack Tree’s sheep ranch, and he sold his products all over Northern California; his cigarettes traveled, in slow stages, from one town to another and a few, he understood, had even gotten back to the East Coast and were known there.
“Yes?” he said to Hoppy. He placed himself in front of the phoce’s cart, halting him at a distance from the work-area. Once, this had been the town’s bakery; being made of cement, it had survived the bomb blasts and made an ideal place for him. And of course he paid his employees almost nothing; they were glad to have jobs at any salary.
Hoppy stammered, “This m-man came up from Berkeley to see you, Mr. Gill; he’s an important businessman, he says. Isn’t that right?” The phoce turned toward the Negro. “That’s what you said to me, isn’t it?”
Holding out his hand, the Negro said to Gill, “I represent the Hardy Homeostatic Vermin Trap Corporation of Berkeley, California. I’m here to acquaint you with an amazing proposition that could well mean tripling your profits with six months.” His dark eyes blazed.
There was silence.
Gill repressed the impulse to laugh aloud. “I see,” he said, nodding and putting his hands in his pockets; he assumed a serious stance. “Very interesting, Mr.—” He glanced questioningly at the Negro.
“Stuart McConchie,” the Negro said.
They shook hands.
“My employer, Mr. Hardy,” Stuart said, “has empowered me to describe to you in detail the design of a fully automated cigarette-making machine. We at Hardy Homeostatic are well aware that your cigarettes are rolled entirely in the old-fashioned way, by hand.” He pointed toward the employees working in the rear of the factory. “Such a method is a hundred years out of date, Mr. Gill. You’ve achieved superb quality in your special deluxe Gold Label cigarettes—”
“Which I intend to maintain,” Gill said quietly.
Mr. McConchie said, “Our automated electronic equipment will in no way sacrifice quality for quantity. In fact—”
“Wait,” Gill said. “I don’t want to discuss this now.” He glanced toward the phoce, who was parked close by, listening. The phoce flushed and at once spun his ’mobile away.
“I’m going,” Hoppy said. “This doesn’t interest me; goodbye.” He wheeled through the open door of the factory, out onto the street. The two of them watched him go until he disappeared.
“Our handy,” Gill said.
McConchie started to speak, then changed his mind, cleared his throat and strolled a few steps away, surveying the factory and the men at their work. “Nice place you have here, Gill. I want to state right now how much I admire your product; it’s first in its field, no doubt of that.”
I haven’t heard talk like that, Gill realized, in seven years. It was difficult to believe that it still existed in the world; so much had changed and yet here, in this man McConchie, it remained intact. Gill felt a glow of pleasure. It reminded him of happier times, this salesman’s line of chatter. He felt amiably inclined toward the man.
“Thank you,” he said, and meant it. Perhaps the world, at last, was really beginning to regain some of its old forms, its civilities and customs and preoccupations, all that had gone into it to make it what it was. This, he thought, this talk by McConchie; it’s authentic. It’s a survival, not a simulation; this man has somehow managed to preserve his viewpoint, his enthusiasm, through all that has happened—he is still planning, cogitating, bullshitting … nothing can or will stop him.
He is, Gill realized, simply a good salesman. He has not let even a hydrogen war and the collapse of society dissuade him.
“How about a cup of coffee?” Gill said. “I’ll take a break for ten or fifteen minutes and you can tell me more about this automated machine or whatever it is.”
“Real coffee?” McConchie said, and the pleasant, optimistic mask slid for an instant from his face; he gaped at Gill with naked, eager hunger.
“Sorry,” Gill said. “It’s a substitute, but not bad; I think you’ll like it. Better than what’s sold in the city at those so-called ‘coffee’ stands.” He went to get the pot of water.
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“Quite a place you have here,” McConchie said, as they waited for the coffee to heat. “Very impressive and industrious.”
“Thank you,” Gill said.
“Coming here is a long-time dream fulfilled,” McConchie went on. “It took me a week to make the trip and I’d been thinking about it ever since I smoked my first special deluxe Gold Label. It’s—” He groped for words to express his thought. “An island of civilization in these barbaric times.”
Gill said, “What do you think of the country, as such? A small town like this, compared to life in the city … it’s very different.”
“I just got here,” McConchie said. “I came straight to you; I didn’t take time to explore. My horse needed a new right front shoe and I left him at the first stable as you cross the little metal bridge.”
“Oh yes,” Gill said. “That belongs to Stroud; I know where you mean. His blacksmith’ll do a good job.”
McConchie said, “Life seems much more peaceful here. In the city if you leave your horse—well, a while ago I left my horse to go across the Bay and when I got back someone had eaten it, and it’s things like that that make you disgusted with the city and want to move on.”
“I know,” Gill said, nodding in agreement. “It’s brutal in the city because there’re still so many homeless and destitute people.”
“I really loved that horse,” McConchie said, looking doleful.
“Well,” Gill said, “in the country you’re faced constantly with the death of animals; that’s always been one of the basic unpleasant verities of rural life. When the bombs fell, thousands of animals up here were horribly injured; sheep and cattle … but that can’t compare of course to the injury to human life down where you come from. You must have seen a good deal of human misery, since E Day.”
The Negro nodded. “That and the sporting. The freaks both as regards animals and people. Now Hoppy—”
“Hoppy isn’t originally from this area,” Gill said. “He showed up here after the war in response to our advertising for a handyman. I’m not from here, either; I was traveling through the day the bomb fell, and I elected to remain.”