He was in a small round room, walled and ceilinged in midnight velvet. The floor was transparent crystal, and gave a clear uninterrupted view of a boudoir on the floor below. It was Chooka's Voyeur Chamber.
In the boudoir, Quizzard sat in a deep chair, his blind eyes glazing. The D'Courtney girl was perched on his lap wearing an astonishing slit gown of sequins. She sat quietly, her yellow hair smooth, her deep dark eyes staring placidly into space, while Quizzard fondled her brutally.
"How does she look?" Quizzard's sour voice came distinctly. "How does she feel?"
He was speaking to a small faded woman who stood across the boudoir from him with her back against the wall and an incredible expression of agony on her face. It was Quizzard's wife.
"How does she look?" the blind man repeated.
"She doesn't know what's happening," the woman answered.
"She knows," Quizzard shouted. "She isn't that far gone. Don't tell me she don't know what's happening. Christ! If I only had my eyes!"
The woman said: "I'm your eyes, Keno."
"Then look for me. Tell me!"
Reich cursed and aimed the scrambler, at Quizzard's head. It could kill through the crystal floor. It could kill through anything. It was going to kill now. Then Powell entered the boudoir.
The woman saw him at once. She emitted a bloodcurdling scream: "Run, Keno! Run!" She thrust herself from the wall and darted toward Powell, her hands clawing at his eyes. Then she tripped and fell prone. Apparently, the fall knocked her unconscious for she never moved. As Quizzard surged up from the chair with the girl in his arms, his blind eyes staring, Reich came to the appalled conclusion that the woman's fall was no accident; for Quizzard suddenly dropped in his tracks. The girl tumbled out of his arms and fell into the chair.
There was no doubt that Powell had accomplished this on a TP level, and for the first time in their war, Reich was afraid of Powell... physically afraid. Again he aimed the scrambler, this time at Powell's head as the peeper walked to the chair.
Powell said: "Good evening. Miss D'Courtney."
Reich muttered: "Goodbye, Mr. Powell," and tried to hold his trembling hand steady on Powell's skull.
Powell said: "Are you all right. Miss D'Courtney?" When the girl failed to answer, be bent down and stared into her blank placid face. He touched her arm and repeated: "Are you all right, Miss D'Courtney? Miss D'Courtney! Do you need help?"
At the word "help" the girl whipped upright in the chair in a listening attitude. Then she thrust out her legs and leaped from the chair. She ran past Powell in a straight line, stopped abruptly and reached out as though grasping a doorknob. She turned the knob, thrust an imaginary door open and burst forward, yellow hair flying, dark eyes wide with alarm... A lightning flash of wild beauty.
"Father!" she screamed. "For God's sake! Father!" She ran forward, then stopped short and backed away as though eluding someone. She darted to the left and ran in a half circle, screaming wildly, her eyes fixed.
"No!" she cried. "No! For the love of Christ! Father!"
She ran again, then stopped and struggled with imaginary arms that held her. She fought and screamed, her eyes still fixed, then stiffened and clapped her hands to her ears as though a violent sound had pierced them. She fell forward to her knees and crawled across the floor, moaning in pain. Then she stopped, snatched at something on the floor, and remained crouched on her knees, her face once again placid, doll-like and dead.
With sickening certainty, Reich knew what the girl had just done. She had relived the death of her father. She had relived it for Powell. And if he had peeped her...
Powell went to the girl and raised her from the floor. She arose as gracefully as a dancer, as serenely as a somnambulist. The peeper put his arm around her and took her to the door. Reich followed him all the way with the muzzle of the scrambler, waiting for the best shooting angle. He was invisible. His unsuspecting enemies were below him, easy targets for the death-notch. He could win safety with a shot. Powell opened the door, then suddenly swung the girl around, held her close to him and looked up. Reich caught his breath.
"Go ahead," Powell called. "Here we are. An easy shot. One for the both of us. Go ahead!" His lean face was suffused with anger. The heavy jet brows scowled over the dark eyes. For half a minute he stared up at the invisible Reich, waiting, hating, daring. At last Reich lowered his eyes and turned his face away from the man who could not see him.
Then Powell took the docile girl through the door and closed it quietly behind him, and Reich knew he had permitted safety to slip through his fingers. He was halfway to Demolition.
10
CONCEIVE OF A CAMERA WITH a lens distorted into wild astigmatism so that it can only photograph the same picture over and over — the scene that twisted it into shock. Conceive of a bit of recording crystal, traumatically warped so that it can only reproduce the same fragment of music over and over, the one terrifying phrase it cannot forget.
"She's in a state of Hysterical Recall," Dr. Jeems of Kingston Hospital explained to Powell and Mary Noyes in the living room of Powell's house. "She responds to the key word 'help' and relives one terrifying experience..."
"The death of her father," Powell said.
"Oh? I see. Outside of that... Catatonia."
"Permanent?" Mary Noyes asked.
Young Doctor Jeems looked surprised and indignant. He was one of the brighter young men of Kingston Hospital despite the fact that he was not a peeper, and was fanatically devoted to his work. "In this day and age? Nothing is permanent except physical death, Miss Noyes, and up at Kingston we've started working on that. Investigating death from the symptomatic point of view, we've actually—"
"Later, Doctor," Powell interrupted. "No lectures tonight. We've got work. Can I use the girl?"
"Use her how?"
"Peep her."
Jeems considered. "No reason why not. I gave her the Déjà Èprouvé Series for catatonia. That shouldn't get in the way."
"The Déjà Èprouvé Series?" Mary asked.
"A great new treatment," Jeems said excitedly. "Developed by Gart... one of your peepers. Patient goes into catatonia. It's an escape. Flight from reality. The conscious mind cannot face the conflict between the external world and its own unconscious. It wishes it had never been born. It attempts to revert back to the foetal stage. You understand?"
Mary nodded. "So far."
"All right. Déjà Èprouvé is an old XIXth Century psychiatric term. Literally, it means: 'something already experienced, already tried.' Many patients wish for something so strongly that finally the wish makes them imagine that the act or the experience in which they never engaged has already happened. Get it?"
"Wait a minute," Mary began slowly. "You mean I—"
"Put it this way," Jeems interrupted briskly. "Pretend you had a burning wish to... oh, say, to be married to Powell and have a family. Right?"
Mary flushed. In a rigid voice she said: "Right." For a moment Powell yearned to blast this well-meaning clumsy young normal.
"Well," Jeems continued in blithe ignorance. "If you lost your balance you might come to believe that you'd married Powell and had three children. That would be Déjà Èprouvé. Now what we do is synthesize an artificial Déjà Èprouvé for the patient. We make the catatonic wish to escape come true. We make the experience they desire actually happen. We dissociate the mind from the lower levels, send it back to the womb, and let it pretend it's being born to a new life all over again. Got that?"
"Got it." Mary tried to smile as her control returned.
"On the surface of the mind... in the conscious level... the patient goes through development all over again at an accelerated rate. Infancy, childhood, adolescence, and finally maturity."
"You mean Barbara D'Courtney is going to be a baby... learn to speak... walk... ?"
"Right. Right. Right. Takes about three weeks. By the time she catches up with herself, she'll be ready to accept the reality she's trying to escape. She'll hav
e grown up to it, so to speak. Like I said, this is only on the conscious level. Below that, she won't be touched. You can peep her all you like. Only trouble is... she must be pretty scared down there. Mixed up. You'll have trouble getting what you want. Of course, that's your specialty. You'll know what to do."
Jeems stood up abruptly. "Got to get back to the shop." He made for the front door. "Delighted to be of service. Always delighted to be called in by peepers. I can't understand the recent hostility toward you people..." He was gone.
"Ummm. That was a significant parting note."
"What'd he mean, Linc?"
"Our great & good friend, Ben Reich. Reich's been backing an Anti-Esper campaign. You know... peepers are clannish, can't be trusted, never become patriots. Interplanetary conspirators, eat little Normal babies, &c."
"Ugh! And he's supporting the League of Patriots too. He's a disgusting, dangerous man."
"Dangerous but not disgusting, Mary. He's got charm. That's what makes him doubly dangerous. People always expect villains to look villainous. Well, maybe we can take care of Reich before it's too late. Bring Barbara down, Mary."
Mary brought the girl downstairs and seated her on the low dais. Barbara sat like a calm statue. Mary had dressed her in blue leotards and combed her blonde hair back, tying it into a fox-tail with blue ribbon. Barbara was polished and shining; a lovely waxwork doll.
"Lovely outside; mangled inside. Damn Reich!"
"What about him?"
"I told you, Mary. I was so mad at Chooka Frood's coop, I handed it to that red slug Quizzard and his wife... And when I peeped Reich upstairs, I threw it in his teeth. I—"
"What did you do to Quizzard?"
"Basic Neuro-Shock. Come up to the Lab sometime and we'll show you. It's new. If you make 1st we'll teach you. It's like the scrambler but psychogenic."
"Fatal?"
"Forgotten the Pledge? Of course not."
"And you peeped Reich through the floor? How?"
"TP reflection. The Voyeur Chamber wasn't wired for sound. It had open acoustical ducts. Reich's mistake. He was transmitting down the channel and I swear I was hoping he had the guts to shoot. I was going to blast him with a Basic that would have made Case History."
"Why didn't he shoot?"
"I don't know, Mary. I don't know. He thought he had every reason to kill us. He thought he was safe... Didn't know about the Basic, even though Quizzard's Decline & Fall jolted him... But he couldn't."
"Afraid?"
"Reich's no coward. He wasn't afraid. He just couldn't. I don't know why. Maybe next time it'll be different. That's why I'm keeping Barbara D'Courtney in my house. She'll be safe here."
"She'll be safe in Kingston Hospital."
"But not quiet enough for the work I've go to do."
"?"
"She's got the detailed picture of the murder locked up in her hysteria. I've got to get at it... piece by piece. When I've got it, I've got Reich."
Mary arose. "Exit Mary Noyes."
"Sit down, peeper! Why d'you think I called you? You're staying here with the girl. She can't be left alone. You two can have my bedroom. I'll convert the study for myself."
"Choke it, Linc. Don't jet off like that. You're embarrassed. Let's see if I can't maybe thread-needle through that mind block."
"Listen—"
"No you don't, Mr. Powell."
Mary burst into laughter. "So that's it. You want me for a chaperone. Victorian word, isn't? So are you, Linc. Positively atavistic."
"I brand that as a lie. In toffy circles I'm known as the most progressive—"
"And what's that image? Oh. Knights of the Round Table. Sir Galahad Powell. And there's something underneath that. I—"
Suddenly she stopped laughing and turned pale.
"What'd you dig?"
"Forget it."
"Oh, come on, Mary."
"Forget it, Linc. And don't peep me for it. If you can't reach it yourself, you'd better not get it secondhand. Especially from me."
He looked at her curiously for a moment, then shrugged. "All right, Mary. Then we'd better go to work."
To Barbara D'Courtney he said: "Help, Barbara."
Instantly she whipped upright on the dais in a listening attitude, and he probed delicately... Sensation of bedclothes... Voice calling dimly... Whose voice, Barbara?
Deep in the preconscious she answered: "Who is that?"
A friend, Barbara.
"There's no one. No one. I'm alone."
And she was alone, racing down a corridor to thrust a door open and burst into an orchid room to see—
"What, Barbara?"
"A man. Two men."
Who?
"Go away. Please go away. I don't like voices. There's a voice screaming. Screaming in my ears..."
And she was screaming while instincts of terror made her dodge from a dim figure that clutched at her to keep her from her father. She turned and circled...
"What is your father doing, Barbara?"
"He— No. You don't belong here. There's only the three of us. Father and me and—"
And the dim figure caught her. A flash of his face. No more.
"Look again, Barbara. Sleek head. Wide eyes. Small chiselled nose. Small sensitive mouth. Like a scar. Is that the man? Look at the picture. Is that the man?"
"Yes. Yes. Yes." And then all was gone.
And she was kneeling again, placid, doll-like, dead.
Powell wiped perspiration from his face and took the girl back to the dais. He was badly shaken... worse than Barbara D'Courtney. Hysteria cushioned the emotional impact for her. He had nothing. He was reliving her terror, her horror, her torture, naked and unprotected.
"It was Ben Reich, Mary. Did you get the picture, too?"
"Couldn't stay in long enough, Linc. Had to run for cover."
"It was Reich; all right. Only question is, how in hell did he kill her father? What did he use? Why didn't old D'Courtney put up a fight to defend himself? Have to try again. I hate to do this to her..."
"I hate you to do this to yourself."
"Have to."
He took a deep breath and said: "Help, Barbara."
Again she whipped upright on the dais in a listening attitude. He slipped in quickly. "Gently, dear. Not so fast. There's plenty of time."
"You again?"
"Remember, me, Barbara?"
"No, No, I don't know you. Get out."
"But I'm part of you, Barbara. We're running down the corridor together. See? We're opening the door together. It's so much easier, together. We help each other."
"We?"
"Yes, Barbara, you and I."
"But why don't you help me now?"
"How can I, Barbara?"
"Look at father! Help me stop him. Stop him. Stop him. Help me scream. Help me! For pity's sake, help me!"
She knelt again, placid, doll-like, dead.
Powell felt a hand under his arm and realized he was not supposed to be kneeling too. The body before him slowly disappeared; the orchid room disappeared, and Mary Noyes was straining to raise him.
"You first this time," she said grimly.
He shook his head and tried to help Barbara D'Courtney. He fell to the floor.
"All right, Sir Galahad. Cool a while."
Mary raised the girl and led her to the dais. Then she returned to Powell. "Ready for help now, or don't you think it's manly?"
"The word is virile. Don't waste your time trying to help me up. I need brain power. We're in trouble."
"What'd you peep?"
"D'Courtney wanted to be murdered."
"No!"
"Yep. He wanted to die. For all I know he may have committed suicide in front of Reich. Barbara's recall is confused. That point's got to be cleared up. I'll have to see D'Courtney's physician."
"That's Sam @kins. He and Sally went back to Venus last week."
"Then I'll have to make the trip. Do I have time to catch the ten o'clock rocket? Call Idlewild.
"
* * *
Sam @kins, E.M.D. 1, received Cr. 1,000 per hour of analysis. The public knew that Sam earned two million credits per year, but it did not know that Sam was efficiently killing himself with charity work. @kins was one of the burning lights of the Guild long-range education plan, and leader of the Environment Clique which believed that telepathic ability was not a congenital characteristic, but rather a latent quality of every living organism which could be developed by suitable training.
As a result, Sam's desert house in the brilliant arid Mesa outside Venusburg was overrun by charity cases. He invited everyone in the low income brackets to trek their problems out to him, and while he was solving them, he was carefully attempting to foster telepathy in his patients. Sam's reasoning was quite simple. If, say, peeping were a question of developing unused muscles, it might well be that the majority of people had been too lazy or lacked opportunity to do so. But when a man is caught up in the press of a crisis, he can not afford to be lazy; and Sam was there to offer opportunity and training. So far, his results had been the discovery of 2% Latent Espers, which was under the average of the Guild Institute interviews. Sam remained undiscouraged.
Powell found him charging through the rock garden of his desert home vigorously destroying desert flowers under the impression that he was cultivating, and conducting simultaneous conversations with a score of depressed people who followed him about like puppies. The perpetual clouds of Venus radiated dazzling light. Sam's bald head was burned pink. He was snorting and shouting at plants and patients alike.
"Damn it! Don't you tell me that's a Glow-wart. It's a weed. Don't I know a weed when I see it? Hand me the rake, Bernard."
A small man in black handed him the rake and said: "My name is Walter, Dr. @kins."
"And that's your whole trouble," @kins grunted, tearing out a clump of rubbery red. It changed colors in prismatic hysteria and emitted a plaintive wail which proved it was neither weed nor Glow-wart but the disconcerting Pussy-Willow of Venus.
@kins eyed it with disfavor, watching the collapsing air-bladders cry. Then he glared at the small man. "Semantic escape, Bernard. You live in terms of the label, not the object. It's your escape from reality. What are you running away from, Bernard?"