“I’ll do a little of both,” Quellen said.
“This is the realtime jack, and this—”
“I know. I’ve used the equipment before.”
The technician colored and went scuttering away. Quellen jacked himself into the realtime circuit, and abruptly jacked himself out again. His brother-in-law was performing natural bodily functions. Quellen bit his lip. With quick, edgy manipulation he activated the reserve spools and tuned in on what Norm Pomrath had been up to since Brogg had planted the Ear on him.
Quellen could not allow himself a one-to-one realtime correlation, of course, with Pomrath’s activities. He had to be selective. Skimming along the tape, he found remarkably little conversation recorded. Pomrath had been to a snifferpalace last night. Then he had gone home. He had quarrelled with Helaine. Quellen listened.
POMRATH:I don’t give a damn. I need my relaxation.
HELAINE:But we’ve waited dinner for you. And here you are all full of drugs. You don’t even have an appetite!
POMRATH:What of it? I’m here. Put out the dinner. You program, I’ll eat!
There was more of it, all relentlessly domestic and dreadfully dull. Quellen skipped ahead fifteen minutes and found the quarrel still going on, punctuated now by the snuffing sound of his nephew’s tears and the annoyed comments of little Marina. It pained Quellen that the family disputes of the Pomraths should be so commonplace. He moved the tape on a short distance. The Ear had picked up different sounds. Harsh breathing sounds.
HELAINE:put your hand there again.
POMRATH:Oh, honey, you know I will.
HELAINE:Right there. Oh! Oh, Norm!
POMRATH:Are you ready yet?
HELAINE:A little while. Give me time. This is so nice, Norm.
Quellen stared shamefully at the floor. A faintly incestuous pleasure went through him as he eavesdropped on the lovemaking of the Pomraths. He reached for the dial, hesitated, listened to sudden pangs of ecstasy, clenched his jaws together as the words on the tape became more intimate and then dissolved into a rush of gasping sighs.
I ought to erase this section, Quellen thought. I ought at least not to listen to it myself. How disgustingly curious we can get sometimes!
With a quick jerky motion he sped the dial ahead. Nothing-but sleep-sounds now. Then morning-sounds. Children pattering around. Pomrath under the molecular bath. Helaine yawning, asking about the breakfast menu.
POMRATH:I’m going out early today.
HELAINE:You think you have a line on that job opportunity?
POMRATH:What job opportunity?
HELAINE:You know, the minislip you were carrying. About the man to see if you’re out of work.
POMRATH:Oh. Him.
Quellen waited for more. The telemetry showed unusual excitement in Pomrath, a surge of pulse intensity, a rise in skin temperature. Nevertheless, the conversation was truncated without any word about Lanoy. Quellen skimmed again. The timer told him that he was approaching realtime levels now. Quellen jacked in once more.
POMRATH:You can take me to Lanoy, can’t you?
The monitor was programmed to trip an alarm when the name “Lanoy” was mentioned. There was an imperceptible lag while the computer analyzed the wave forms of Pomrath’s speech, and then the alarm went off. A red light began to glow on the control panel of the monitor system. Signals blared around the room. A warning bell sounded. Pong. Pong.
Three technicians came running toward the instrument.
Pong.
Quellen said, “It’s all right. I’ll monitor it. Just shut off these damned alarms.”
Pong. Pong.
Quellen leaned forward, and sweat poured down the palms of his hands as he listened to his brother-in-law commit the ultimate betrayal of his family.
Pomrath had traveled a considerable distance that morning, unaware, of course, that his motions were being transmitted to the headquarters of the Secretariat of Crime and that his words and even his heartbeats were being recorded.
In the past several days he had asked many questions, mostly prior to the mounting of the Ear in his flesh. The minislips advertising Lanoy’s services were widely distributed. Information about the actual whereabouts of Lanoy was not so easily had. But Pomrath had persistence.
He was determined to leave, now.
He had had all he could take. It was too bad about Helaine, of course, and the kids. He’d miss them. Yet he was fed up, and he sensed that he was on the edge of psychotic collapse. Words were losing their meaning for him. He’d stare up at a faxtape for half an hour, trying to puzzle out the significance of the rows of symbols on the yellow sheet. They had become squirming microbes to him. KLOOFMAN. UNEMPLOYMENT. TAX RATE. DANTON. MANKLOOF. LOYPMEMUNTNE. TONDAN. XAT RAET. KL. OOF. PLOYM. AX R. Dancing animalcules. EMPL. FMAN. Time to get away, ANTO. UNEM, THEM. FLOOK. FLOOK! FLOOK! FLOOK!
KLOOF!
A simpler world, that’s what he needed. To hop to a place not yet this fouled with humanity—yes. Yes. Lanoy was the answer. Pomrath’s head throbbed. It seemed to him that his frontal lobes were swelling, pushing against his forehead dangerously forward. “Can you direct me to Lanoy?” His head might burst, spewing brains all over the street. “I’m out of work. I want to see Lanoy.” FLOOK! XAT RAET! “Lanoy?”
A squat, flabby-faced man with a row of natural teeth on top and a single seamless chopper below said, “I’ll get you to Lanoy. Four pieces, huh?”
Pomrath paid him. “Where do I go? What do I do?”
“Quickboat. Number Sixteen Line.”
“Where do I get off?”
“Just get on, that’s all.”
EMPL! FMAN! Pomrath headed for the quickboat ramp. He filed obediently aboard. It seemed a pleasant coincidence that someone would have been so conveniently available to tell him how to reach the elusive Lanoy, Norm thought. But a moment’s reflection led him to think it was no coincidence at all. The flabby-faced man had probably been an agent of Lanoy, haunting him, ready to guide him in the right direction when the critical moment approached. Of course. His eyes were aching. Something coarse and gritty was in the air, a special eyeball-abrasive gas, perhaps, released by order of the High Government to bring about universal polishing of proletarian corneas. MANK! NOTD! Pomrath huddled in a corner of the quickboat. A cowled figure came up to him, a girl with shaven scalp, jutting cheekbones, no lips at all. “For Lanoy?” she asked.
“Why not?”
“Transfer to the Northpass Line.”
“If you say so.”
“It’s the only way.” She smiled at him. Her skin seemed to change color, cycling attractively through the spectrum from infragreen to ultralemon. PLOYM! XAT! Pomrath trembled. He wondered what Helaine would say when she knew. Would she weep? How soon would she remarry? Would his children bear his name? The line of Pomraths extinct? Yes. Yes. For he would have to bear some other name back there. FMANK! What if he called himself Kloofman? Sublime irony: my great-grandchild a member of the High Government. Some chance.
Pomrath got off the quickboat. The cowled girl remained aboard. How did they know who he was andwhere he was bound? He felt frightened. The world was full of specters. Pray for the repose of my soul, he thought. I’m so tired. OOF! TON!
He waited at the ramp. Around him the spires of ugly buildings of the previous century stabbed holes in the sky. He was out of the central slum-clearance zone now. Who knew what stinking warren he was heading toward? A new quickboat arrived. Pomrath boarded it unquestioningly. I am in your hands, he thought. LANOY! YONAL! Anyone. Anyone. Just get me out of here.
Out!
He journeyed northward. Was this still Appalachia? The sky was dark here. Programmed for rain, perhaps. A clean flush to purify the streets. What if Danton recommended a rain of sulfuric acid? The pavement hissing and smoking, citizens running to and fro as their flesh dissolved. The ultimate population control. Death from the skies. Serve you right for going outdoors. The quickboat halted. Pomrath got out and waited on the ramp. Rain was falling here, pocking against the sidewalk.