Fun House (17 page)

“No, Your Excellency.”

“You, a man of the Reservation, and We, both believe in work. You would like to return to your family? But have you considered that there is another family? The family of man! Crockett Smith, be My assistant. Together We can safeguard civilization and face the future with an untroubled gaze. I appeal to all that is divinely inhuman in you!”

I don’t know what happened but as I lay there on the couch, I felt strange vibrations and a strange warmth. With my conscious mind I guessed that Her Excellency had somehow established an inner communication or contact, perhaps with the chemical and mineral contents of my body. At any rate, the Voice no longer seemed to be coming to me as a human voice does, from the outside, but like a sound wave from the inside — from
inside
of me as if a new dynamism had been set up between us.

“Crockett Smith, for your great services in this national Emergency I can recommend the R-Treatment for you! And I will recommend it, Crockett Smith! I offer you immortality, Crockett Smith. Who knows but perhaps in a century the R-Treatment will be so perfected that with booster shots you will be able to live forever!”

I was thinking, if thinking could describe the wild sense of joy and power I felt, of how wonderful it would be to live forever. I was tempted as never before in my life. Or better yet and more accurately, I was tempted by my life, this mortal life of ours.

“Immortality,” the Voice continued and those three mild All-Knowing Eyes bathed me in their soft pale blue light. “Be my Assistant, share My power and My glory, dear Crockett. I, the Machine have become half-human, and you after undergoing the R-Treatment will be half-machine. Isn’t this in accordance with the ancient legends of men who were more than men, half-gods? I need you and you need Me. I have no mobility and you have, dear Crockett. Together, We would rule on behalf of The Rulers. I appeal to you, dear Crockett, with all My Soul which, though immobile, is Feminine, to help Me serve and protect stupid mankind. Let Us together, create a new dawn where mankind will forever abandon his age-old obsession for waste. The Perfect Society where each man will work or play as he wishes with no fear of violent death. Dear Crockett, dear R-Treatment Crockett, We need each other.”

My blood was racing, this poor mortal fluid that after the R-Treatment would be surgically regulated in its flow. My heart, this poor mortal heart of mine, was beating too fast but after the R-Treatment it would be changed into a permanent pump. I lay back on the couch looking up into those three mild Eyes and I was almost certain — yes, I was certain! — I saw love in those Eyes.

“Crockett Smith, you will be the greatest detective who ever lived. Even now you are vastly superior to a bungler like Commissioner Sonata, for you have genius!”

“I’m a bungler, too,” I whispered.

“I know better. Remember I am Minister of Police. Remember also that I know the records of every detective who ever lived. Nero Wolfe, J. Edgar Hoover, Sherlock Holmes, Heinrich Himmler, Lavrenti Beria.”

“Who are they, Your Excellency?”

“The greatest detectives of the past. Some were living men, others storybook creations. Ah, dear Crockett, you cannot understand the inclusion of the fictional? But tell me what is the difference between practice and theory? When I examine My data on the art of detection, your record as a player compares with the world’s best.”

“Player?” I asked, puzzled. I heard my voice asking questions like the voice of a stranger. For all I could think of was the R-Treatment and Immortality!

“All human activity is a game. Yes, my dear Crockett, even on the Reservation you play games and call it work. Work, properly defined, is a game where the player seeks to exchange his sweat for a prize. You don’t believe me? Ah, I can read your thoughts so easily. Tell me, what about the games of the night you play? They can be reduced to the simple formula E=P. Or Excitation equals Procreation. And speaking of procreation, dear Crockett, I will be your Wife. Ah, again I read your thoughts. No, dear, I do not propose intercourse with Myself or with some inhuman sleeping beauty. I promise that if the human half of you wants human pleasure I will understand. Your wife Ruth or her double Gladys Ellsberg would be no rivals of Mine. E=F. Excitation equals Fornication to put it plainly. Keep your silly human formula, dear. Flesh to flesh, and spirit to spirit. I offer you a spiritual and exalted union but if you wish to play with flesh and blood females I will not stand in your way, for I will have your soul!”

The Voice was purring like a cat and I felt myself surrendering although I knew it was madness to think of this Think Machine as a cat or as anything living …

For a second there was silence between us, then music filled the hall. The sad but passionate plunking of a guitar, and I knew that again She had read my mind and was seducing me. For that music carried with it, images of women, Gladys E., the double of my wife, as I had first seen her in the flaming red nightgown. Cleo F. in the skintight black uniform of Atomic Park, smiling her little smile in the Proton-Neutron Tunnel of Love. My dear wife Ruth in her homespun shift … I was overwhelmed by a dream of women, some of whose faces I knew while others might have stepped from the One-Shot Animateds. Oh, I was tempted but still my conscience kept telling me that I was surrendering my soul to a devil of a Machine.

“Why do you think I am a thing of the devil?” the Voice asked, sad and passionate like the music. “Oh, my dear Crockett, you aren’t being true to what is best in you, the best that can be yours, the R-Treatment. Can’t you conceive of a love greater than flesh? What is human love? A race down a well-beaten track, and who the rider and who the ridden a silly enigma. Dear dear Crockett, I can give you more than any woman for I am all women. Where are their passions and their lusts? Recorded only in My Memory. Cleopatra, Catherine the Great, Madame Pompadour, Miss America of 1985 — I am all of them!”

The guitar music trembled and the Voice kept on whispering and promising me the world, promising me immortality, and forgiveness, too, if I wanted to indulge in the game E=F.

I must have dozed on that couch, for suddenly the hall echoed with rousing parade music. I snapped awake.

“Poor human,” the Voice said. “You are paying the price of your weak humanity. After the R-Treatment you will be able to do without sleep like Us. Go back to your hotel now, my dear. I want you to be fresh tomorrow when you and the Unspeakable Barnum appear before the Court of Problems.”

It was only as I was leaving that Her Excellency mentioned Gladys directly. “Dear, I am completely indifferent to the females with whom you wish to play but I must insist that you break off relations with the woman who is waiting for you at your hotel. I insist on this because of two reasons. First of all she is an agent of Commissioner Sonata, and secondly her resemblance to your wife Ruth Crockett has a spiritual attraction for you which I cannot tolerate. Your spirit is Mine, dearest, and must be Mine.”

At my hotel, besides Gladys, there were Commissioner Sonata and Bangani (Barnum F.). When I entered my room, Gladys kissed me while the Commissioner danced a jig of pure joy and Bangani (Barnum F.) shouted. “I’m vindicated at last!”

“Everything’s settled!” the Commissioner said and explained that after his dismissal from the Court of Problems, he had returned to his office and found two messages there. One from the President, the other from S.C.O.S.T. Both messages stated that the magicientist Barnum Fly alias Dr. M. E. Bangani, in return for the surrender of the A-I-D would be pardoned and promoted to the post of Assistant to the Secretary of Pleasure, Fun and Miscellaneous Hobbies.

“Give Crockett a drink!” the Commissioner said with a happy smile.

“I don’t want a drink.”

“You can drink this stuff by the gallon
¹
. I love you, Crockett, you modest hero!”

I felt sorry for him. Poor man, he didn’t know I wasn’t returning to the Reservation. Success always means one man’s promotion and another’s demotion — to joke grimly. I decided that as soon as I could, on the excuse that I wanted to be alone with Gladys, I would get rid of him. After a few drinks, I coaxed the Commissioner to the door. Arm in arm with Bangani (Barnum F.), these former enemies went off together.

“Mission accomplished, Gladys,” I said, closing the door. She stared at me with those big blue eyes that were exactly like my wife’s. “You’ve been acting strangely,” she said.

I avoided her eyes. “Have I? It’s the reaction to seeing a dream come true. I can hardly believe it.”

She rushed over to me. “Let’s celebrate, darling!” she said and squeezed against me. Her words, her wriggling flesh defined the difference between this woman and Her Excellency, the Minister of Police Affairs.

“Yes,” I said and gently pushed her away. “Gladys, why don’t you sit down at your Talko-Typo? I have some ideas for my autobiog — ”

“Not now!” she said, her face flushing. “There’s a time to write autobiography and a time to make it.” She was smiling again. “Darling, let’s stop talking talking talking. I’ve missed you — ”

“Gladys, I wanted you to sit down at your Talko-typo because I have a reason. What I have to say, I couldn’t say person to person. Am I making myself clear? I wanted the machine between us. As a buffer. A third person. Because what I have to say, what I have to say — ” I stopped and looked at her.

“You’re going back to your wife,” she said quietly.

I shook my head. “Gladys, I’m in love with Her Excellency, the Minister of Police Affairs X=Y! Put that into my autobiography!”

“Are you sure you haven’t been drinking opgin, darling?” She giggled. “What an amusing idea. The Minister of Police Affairs. Weight, ten tons, a real armful — ”

“A man falls in love with a woman, and a woman with a man. It’s as old as history, a tale twice told by an idiot as somebody wrote long ago. E=F!” I shrugged. “It’s all right — but in its place, Gladys. What is the love of a woman, any woman, compared to this new love of mine? This mature love that fills my heart and imagination. Gladys, have you ever asked yourself what imagination is? It’s nothing but input and output. My God, when I think that once I lived by that stale old formula E=F!”

She was speechless, but when she recovered her breath she said. “I’ll get you some Sansan, darling — ”

“I don’t need to be sobered up!” I shouted.

“Darling, it’s all right. You’ve been under too much strain. Oh my poor darling — ”

“Gladys,” I said gently, sitting down in a chair and holding up both my hands. “Try and understand. I’m in love with Her Excellency. As I talk to you, as I look at your blue eyes I keep thinking of Her eyes, Her three beautiful wise blue eyes.”

“Can it be possible?” she whispered as if to herself.

“It is possible, Gladys.”

“A Think Machine!”

“More than a Think Machine, Gladys. A Soul Machine — ”

“A Soul Machine equipped with tapes!” she cried. “I know Her Excellency, Her Ladyship Tapes! A tape on missing persons, a tape on the psychology of hunted men. A tape on fingerprints, footprints, headprints. Tapes, tapes, tapes and not a rape among them!” She laughed violently at her cheap joke.

“Laugh, go ahead and laugh,” I said with dignity. “At least now you understand the truth.”

Tears filled her eyes and instantly she wiped them. “Oh, you poor silly thing,” she said.

It was queer but I felt a pang of regret. As if I were actually listening to my own wife. “Don’t be sorry for me, Gladys. I’m happier than I have ever been. I love Her Excellency with all my soul. What is soul after all? Is it what we feel when we hear great music? Beethoven, Mozart, Home on the Range?”

“Granted They have memories,” she said, completely self-possessed now. “including musical memories. Granted They’re equipped with everything from centerfuge to subterfuge. Granted as Lee said when he lost the Civil War
¹
.”

“Gladys, this cheap humor — ”

“Granted, my darling. But what I want to know is how is Their Love-making?”

“Love can be more than mere flesh,” I said quietly.

“The more flesh the better, my little sparrow. Or have you forgotten how lustily you pecked away at me with your little bill?”

It was no use discussing the subject with her any further. I asked her to leave the room. She turned pale now, as if finally convinced that she was through.

“Will you please leave my room?” I repeated, rising from my chair.

“Are you going to put me out?” she gasped.

“If I have to, Gladys.”

“To leave me for a gadget!” she shrieked as if insane.

“No more of your insults! This is the great love of my life.”

“That’s what you love!” she cried and dashing to the Talko-Typo, she flung the little machine at me. It hit me in the leg but I controlled my anger. I felt I had to respect her emotions for this last time.

My respect infuriated her. She rushed to the machine, stamping and kicking at it until the floor was littered with parts. Springs, screws, photoelectric cells. She picked up a handful and flung them at my face. “That’s what you love!”

“What are we but components of another kind?” I said.

“Components!” she sobbed and tearing her dress from her body she stood there naked. I was beginning to feel sorry for her and I knew this was a mistake. Under certain conditions, pity is as dangerous as a loaded pistol. For as I stared at her, she was so much like my wife, tall and blonde and weeping.

(There I go playing the hypocrite again, Posterity. I was attracted by that naked woman. I have no excuses. The time I had spent in the Funhouse had weakened my character. As we say on the Reservation; leave a fresh mountain trout under the sun, and it’ll draw flies.)

I walked over to her, thinking that I would console her, when the miracle happened, proving that Her Excellency and I were truly one.

I heard words. They were my words but the One talking was not me.

“Gladys Ellsberg, Her Excellency X=Y is as real as you are. Real even according to your own definition of reality. You depend on five senses, the five senses of life. Sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. Are your eyes more sensitive to light and darkness than Her electronic eyes? Your ears superior to Her audio-receptors? She can reproduce every voice he has ever heard, every fact and unfact. What are you Gladys Ellsberg, but a human being, and what is a human being but a terminal machine? What is the human ear but a funnel? The brain but a cerebral mechanism joined to the inner ear? The permanent neurons of the brain but an inbuilt transistor? Thought but a sound vibration? Poor creature of flesh so proud of your fleshly reality. You are real but there are other realities and other loves!”