Stranger in a Strange Land (14 page)

“It's all right,” Jill said quickly. “These are friends.”

“Friends?”

“All of them are your friends. Don't worry—and don't go away again. Everything is all right.”

He lay quiet with eyes open, staring at everything. He seemed as content as a cat in a lap.

Twenty-five minutes later both patients were in bed. Jill had told Harshaw, before the pill he gave her took hold, enough to let him know that he had a bear by the tail. He looked at the utility car Jill had arrived in. Lettered across it was: READING RENTALS—Permapowered Ground Equipment—“Deal with the Dutchman!”

“Larry, is the fence hot?”

“No.”

“Switch it on. Then polish every fingerprint off that heap. When it gets dark, drive over the other side of Reading—better go almost to Lancaster—and leave it in a ditch. Then go to Philadelphia, catch the Scranton shuttle, come home from there.”

“Sure thing, Jubal. Say—is he
really
the Man from Mars?”

“Better hope not. If he is and they catch you before you dump that wagon and connect you with him, they'll quiz you with a blow torch. I think he is.”

“I scan it. Should I rob a bank on the way back?”

“Probably the safest thing you can do.”

“Okay, Boss.” Larry hesitated. “Mind if I stay over night in Philly?”

“Suit yourself. But what in God's name can a man do at night in Philadelphia?” Harshaw turned away. “Front!”

Jill slept until dinner, awoke refreshed and alert. She sniffed the air from the grille overhead and surmised that the doctor had offset the hypnotic with a stimulant. While she slept someone had removed her dirty torn clothes and had left a dinner dress and sandals. The dress was a fair fit; Jill concluded that it must belong to the one called Miriam. She bathed and painted and combed and went down to the living room feeling like a new woman.

Dorcas was curled in a chair, doing needle point; she nodded as if Jill were part of the family, turned back to her fancy work. Harshaw was stirring a mixture in a frosty pitcher. “Drink?” he said.

“Uh, yes, thank you.”

He poured large cocktail glasses to their brims, handed her one. “What is it?” she asked.

“My own recipe. One third vodka, one third muriatic acid, one third battery water—two pinches of salt and add pickled beetle.”

“Better have a highball,” Dorcas advised.

“Mind your business,” Harshaw said. “Hydrochloric acid aids digestion; the beetle adds vitamins and protein.” He raised his glass and said solemnly, “Here's to our noble selves! There are damned few of us left.” He emptied it.

Jill took a sip, then a bigger one. Whatever the ingredients it seemed to be what she needed; well-being spread from her center toward her extremities. She drank about half, let Harshaw add a dividend. “Look in on our patient?” he asked.

“No, sir. I didn't know where he was.”

“I checked a few minutes ago. Sleeping like a baby—I think I'll rename him Lazarus. Would he like to come down to dinner?”

Jill looked thoughtful. “Doctor, I don't know.”

“Well, if he wakes I'll know it. He can join us, or have a tray. This is Freedom Hall, my dear. Everyone does as he pleases . . . then if he does something I don't like, I kick him the hell out. Which reminds me: I don't like to be called ‘Doctor.' ”

“Sir?”

“Oh, I'm not offended. But when they began handing out doctorates for comparative folk dancing and advanced flyfishing, I became too stinkin' proud to use the title. I won't touch watered whiskey and take no pride in watered-down degrees. Call me Jubal.”

“Oh. But the degree in medicine hasn't been watered down.”

“Time they called it something else, so as not to confuse it with playground supervisors. Little girl, what is your interest in this patient?”

“Eh? I told you, Doct—Jubal.”

“You told me what happened; you didn't tell me why. Jill, I saw the way you spoke to him. Are you in love with him?”

Jill gasped. “Why, that's preposterous!”

“Not at all. You're a girl; he's a boy—that's a nice setup.”

“But—No, Jubal, it's not that. I . . . well, he was a prisoner and I thought—or Ben thought—that he was in danger. We wanted to see him get his rights.”

“Mmm . . . my dear, I'm suspicious of a disinterested interest. You look as if you had normal glandular balance, so it's my guess that it is either Ben, or this poor boy from Mars. You had better examine your motives, then judge which way you are going. In the meantime, what do you want
me
to do?”

The scope of the question made it hard to answer. From the time Jill crossed her Rubicon she had thought of nothing but escape. She had no plans. “I don't know.”

“I thought not. On the assumption that you might wish to protect your license, I took the liberty of having a message sent from Montreal to your Chief of Nursing. You asked for leave because of illness in your family. Okay?”

Jill felt sudden relief. She had buried all worry about her own welfare; nevertheless down inside was a heavy lump caused by what she had done to her professional standing. “Oh, Jubal, thank you!” She added, “I'm not delinquent in watch standing yet; today was my day off.”

“Good. What do you want to do?”

“I haven't had time to think. Uh, I should get in touch with my bank and get some money—” She paused, trying to recall her balance. It was never large and sometimes she forgot to—

Jubal cut in. “If you do, you will have cops pouring out of your ears. Hadn't you better stay here until things level off?”

“Uh, Jubal, I wouldn't want to impose on you.”

“You already have. Don't worry, child; there are always freeloaders around here. Nobody imposes on me against my will, so relax. Now our patient: you said you wanted him to get his ‘rights.' You expected my help?”

“Well . . . Ben said—Ben seemed to think you would help.”

“Ben does not speak for me. I am not interested in this lad's so-called rights. His claim to Mars is lawyers' hogwash; as a lawyer myself I need not respect it. As for the wealth that is supposed to be his, the situation results from other people's passions and our odd tribal customs; he has earned none of it. He would be lucky if they bilked him of it—but I would not scan a newspaper to find out. If Ben expected me to fight for Smith's ‘rights' you have come to the wrong house.”

“Oh.” Jill felt forlorn. “I had better arrange to move him.”

“Oh, no! Not unless you wish.”

“But you said—”

“I said I was not interested in legal fictions. But a guest under my roof is another matter. He can stay, if he likes. I just wanted to make clear that I had no intention of meddling with politics to suit romantic notions you or Ben Caxton may have. My dear, I used to think I was serving humanity . . . and I pleasured in the thought. Then I discovered that humanity does not want to be served; on the contrary it resents any attempt to serve it. So now I do what pleases Jubal Harshaw.” He turned away. “Time for dinner, isn't it, Dorcas? Is anyone doing anything?”

“Miriam.” She put down her needle point and stood up.

“I've never figured out how these girls divide up the work.”

“Boss, how would you know?—you never do any.” Dorcas patted him on the stomach. “But you never miss any meals.”

A gong sounded, they went in to eat. If Miriam had cooked dinner, she had done so with modern shortcuts; she was seated at the foot of the table and looked cool and beautiful. In addition to the secretaries there was a man slightly older than Larry called “Duke” who treated Jill as if she always lived there. Service was by non-android machines, keyed from Miriam's end of the table. The food was excellent and, so far as Jill could tell, none was syntho.

But it did not suit Harshaw. He complained that his knife was dull, the meat was tough; he accused Miriam of serving leftovers. No one seemed to hear him but Jill was becoming embarrassed on Miriam's account when Anne put down her fork. “He mentioned his mother's cooking,” she stated.

“He is beginning to think he is boss again,” agreed Dorcas.

“How long has it been?”

“About ten days.”

“Too long.” Anne gathered Dorcas and Miriam by eye; they stood up. Duke went on eating.

Harshaw said hastily, “Girls, not at meals! Wait until—” They moved toward him; a machine scurried out of the way. Anne took his feet, each of the others an arm; French doors slid aside; they carried him out, squawking.

The squaws ended in a splash.

The women returned, not noticeably mussed. Miriam sat down and turned to Jill. “More salad, Jill?”

Harshaw returned in pajamas and robe instead of evening jacket. A machine had covered his plate as he was dragged away; it now uncovered it, he went on eating. “As I was saying,” he remarked, “a woman who can't cook is a waste of skin. If I don't start having service I'm going to swap you all for a dog and shoot the dog. What's dessert, Miriam?”

“Strawberry shortcake.”

“That's more like it. You are all reprieved till Wednesday.”

After dinner Jill went into the living room intending to view a news stereocast, being anxious to find out if she played a part in it. She could find no receiver, nor anything which could conceal a tank. Thinking about it, she could not recall having seen one. Nor any newspapers, although there were plenty of books and magazines.

No one joined her. She began to wonder what time it was. She had left her watch upstairs, so she looked around for a clock. She failed to find one, then searched her memory and could not remember seeing clock or calendar in any room she had been in. She decided that she might as well go to bed. One wall was filled with books; she found a spool of Kipling's
Just So Stories
and took it happily upstairs.

The bed in her room was as modern as next week, with automassage, coffee dispenser, weather control, reading machine, etc.—but the alarm circuit was missing. Jill decided that she would probably not oversleep, crawled into bed, slid the spool into the reading machine, lay back and scanned the words streaming across the ceiling. Presently the control slipped from relaxed fingers, lights went out, she slept.

Jubal Harshaw did not get to sleep as easily; he was vexed with himself. His interest had cooled and reaction set in. Half a century earlier he had sworn a mighty oath never again to pick up a stray cat—and now, so help him, by the multiple paps of Venus Genetrix he had picked up two at once . . . no, three, if he counted Caxton.

That he had broken his oath more times than there were years intervening did not trouble him; he was not hobbled by consistency. Nor did two more pensioners under his roof bother him; pinching pennies was not in him. In most of a century of gusty living he had been broke many times, had often been wealthier than he now was; he regarded both as shifts in the weather and never counted his change.

But the foofooraw that was bound to ensue when the busies caught up with these children disgruntled him. He considered it certain that catch up they would; that naive Gillian infant would leave a trail like a club-footed cow!

Whereupon people would barge into his sanctuary, asking questions, making demands . . . and he would have to make decisions and take action. He was convinced that all action was futile, the prospect irritated him.

He did not expect reasonable conduct from human beings; most people were candidates for protective restraint. He simply wished they would leave him alone!—all but the few he chose for playmates. He was convinced that, left to himself, he would have long since achieved nirvana . . . dived into his belly button and disappeared from view, like those Hindu jokers. Why couldn't they leave a man
alone?

Around midnight he put out his twenty-seventh cigarette and sat up; lights came on. “Front!” he shouted at a microphone.

Dorcas came in, dressed in robe and slippers. She yawned and said, “Yes, Boss?”

“Dorcas, the last twenty or thirty years I've been a worthless, no-good parasite.”

She yawned again. “Everybody knows that.”

“Never mind the flattery. There comes a time in every man's life when he has to stop being sensible—a time to stand up and be counted—strike a blow for liberty—smite the wicked.”

“Ummm . . .”

“So quit yawning, the time has come.”

She glanced down. “Maybe I had better get dressed.”

“Yes. Get the other girls up, too; we're going to be busy. Throw a bucket of water over Duke and tell him to dust off the babble machine and hook it up in the study. I want the news.”

Dorcas looked startled. “You want
stereovision?”

“You heard me. Tell Duke, if it's out of order, to pick a direction and start walking. Now git; we've got a busy night.”

“All right,” Dorcas agreed doubtfully, “but I ought to take your temperature first.”

“Peace, woman!”

Duke had Harshaw's receiver hooked up in time to let Jubal see a rebroadcast of the second phony interview with the “Man from Mars.” The commentary included a rumor about moving Smith to the Andes. Jubal put two and two together, after which he was calling people until morning. At dawn Dorcas brought him breakfast, six eggs beaten into brandy. He slurped them while reflecting that one advantage of a long life was that eventually a man knew almost everybody of importance—and could call on them in a pinch.

Harshaw had prepared a bomb but did not intend to trigger it until the powers-that-be forced him. He realized that the government could haul Smith back into captivity on grounds that he was incompetent. His snap opinion was that Smith was legally insane and medically psychopathic by normal standards, the victim of a double-barreled situational psychosis of unique and monumental extent, first from being raised by non-humans and second from being pitched into another alien society.