Example: Without knowing it, he generated a strange field of his own. Anyone who came into physical contact with him had his or her I.Q. quadrupled while they remained in contact. He spread temporary genius like a plague. The irony was that he was never infected himself. He was always and forever a nice, slow, intuitive maintenance man.
Her roomie told her about this new freak and she was intrigued. She was a dumbbell and knew it, but it had never bothered her because no one seemed to mind. Yet once, just once, she wanted to experience what it would be like to have the kind of giant intellect that could absorb whole tapes, one after the other, remember them, and talk about them afterward.
She took to dropping in on her roomie for lunch at the Exchange Buffet, and on this forenoon with purply clouds looming in from the west and half the Guff racing to set containers on rooftops, he was already in the Exchange. He had the front fascia of a particularly hysteric IBM modulus removed and was buried half inside, silently soothing it before the storm broke.
She tapped the small of his back for attention and what she thought would be a vampire stare or a thrilling laying-on of hands. There was a lightning flash out in the Guff and a lightning echo inside herself, followed by a strange thunder in her head. She heard her voice murmur, “Vengon’ coprendo l’aer di nero amanto e Lampi, e tuoni ad annuntiarla eletti…”
She was frightened. An alien intruder had taken possession of her mind. All this while her first tap was still on his back. Then: “Sumer is icumen in, lhude sing cuccu! Groweth sed, and bloweth med, and springeth the wude nu—Sing cuccu!”
And: “Not until after artists had exhausted the possibilities of the ukiyo-e portrait did Japanese print designers begin to try their hand at natural scenery.”
And, “In einer Zeit des Professionalismus und des brillanten Orchesterspiele hat die—”
And then he pulled out of the IBM unit and grinned at her. He was entangled with affectionate electric cables and looked like a one-man Laocoön Group: “Laocoön. (lā ok a wän) n. Gk. Legend. A priest of Apollo at Troy who warned against the Trojan Horse and, with his two sons, was killed by serpents sent by Athena…”
He grinned again, pulled her into the IBM with him, and enjoyed her screaming spasms as he introduced himself and the leads of 220 volts into her body. “Volt. A unit of electrical potential difference, abbreviation V or…”
* * *
She saw him just behind her as she walked into Theaterthon for the performance of “Total-Twenty.” He was vivid. “My God!” she thought. “He could play John What’s-His-Name who shot that old president, Abe What’s-His-Name. Fascinating type. Must be an actor.”
She received her cue-bead and plugged it into her ear. First Overture was playing. She didn’t care for music without light and was tempted to unplug the cue-bead, but she was afraid she might have an early entrance, so she suffered. She looked around for another glimpse of the grabby John Wilkes Somebody, but he had disappeared in the crowd. “Full house tonight,” she thought. “Should be an exciting performance. Can’t wait to see the total tape.”
First Overture ended. The cue-bead announced, “Second Overture. Places and beginners, please. Places and beginners, please.” This was in the ancient English tradition and was meaningless. There were no places and no beginners simply because no one in the house knew when his part would begin, and there certainly were no places. There was no stage; just a great soundproofed hall milling with the performing audience, now silent, awaiting their computer cues as “Total-Twenty” began, but still circulating in a gentle minuet, nodding, smiling, murmuring to friends.
She knew that the script dialogue was being spoken by the scattered performing audience. As often as not, an intimate two-scene was being played by audactors separated by a hundred feet and a hundred people. Once there was a shout raised by audactors all over the hall, but she had not been cued for that. There were no sound effects. That and the music was sync’d onto the tape along with the visuals.
The computer spoke sharply through her cue-bead, “Line coming. You are accosted by a flash-gimp. You tell him in level tones. ‘Juck off, geek.’ Repeat. In level tones. ‘Juck off, geek.’ On cue. Three. Two. One…”
The cue-bleep sounded. She delivered the line, wondering who and what she was, who the geek was (that John Wilkes actor?) and what “Total-Twenty” was all about. But that was the fun and games of Theaterthon, that and the delight of discovering what visuals were being sync’d to your voice on the total tape.
She was cued for a confident “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.” Then (passionately): “The show MUST go on!” Then (frightened): “But why are you looking at me like that?” Then a long scream followed by: “Oh, you beast! You BEAST!” Later a groan. Much later (broken-voiced): “It was horrible. I don’t want to talk about it.”
John Wilkes What’s-His-Name came out of the crowd to her. He said nothing, but his vivid actor’s face told her that he had been drawn by the melody of her voice and the perfection of her performance. He smiled and put his hand on her shoulder. She understood what he was saying. She smiled back, magnetically attracted, and put her hand on his.
Then, still silent, still smiling, most theatrically, he ripped her naked. She tried to struggle, to scream, to beg help from the flabbergasted spectators, but he took her, most dramatically, most thoroughly, there on the floor of Theaterthon.
* * *
She had done something worse than criminal; she had done something stupid. This well-bred virgin from one of the best families, easily passed into the Strøget by the cautious guards, tried to shoplift a bijou which she could have bought. It was an exquisite teardrop of limpid amber. Enclosed in it was a tiny, glinting dragonfly. She had never stolen anything in all her life, and the strange surging in her loins was thrilling. She had never stolen anything in all her life, so of course she was clumsy.
The safe system nailed her immediately and she lost her head. She didn’t try to brazen it out, talk her way out, protest that it was a silly mistake, offer to pay. No. She ran. The Strøget guards didn’t bother to chase her. They merely broadcast an alert and her description. She would never be passed out of the boulevard. She would never get out of the criminal courts.
And in her panic she did what comes natural to a well-bred virgin; she took refuge in the Church of Jude, Patron Saint of Impossible Causes. It was empty except for a tall priest in a black gown standing before the altar. He might have been St. Jude himself. He turned as she tore past the nave imagining a hundred armed guards in hot pursuit. She fell to her knees before the priest in prayer for sanctuary and concealment. Jude blessed her with the sign of the cross, lifted the skirt of his cassock, and dropped it over her. Then she discovered that her face was pressed against an enormous nakedness, and her loins surged again.
* * *
The one good thing that the Guff aristocracy had to say for Industry was that it had turned New York’s stepchild, Staten Island, into a free port. It’s true that this had been swindled in order to receive energy conglomerates from the solar with a minimal ripoff by customs, but there were wonderful consumer side benefits. One of them was the Freeport Restaurant offering an exotic cuisine.
There is a frigid Venusian glowworm about the size of an eel. It glows even brighter at Terran temperatures and when poached and served in a mirepoix bordelaise moistened with Pouilly wine, the entire platter emits a frozen light and neon fragrance. Anguille Venerienne tastes like a Siberian snowball.
There is a Martian mold which must be scraped up from below the frostline. (And who was the blessed idiot who first dared taste it?) Terfez Martial is served like caviar and is so fabulous that the Black Sea sturgeons are protesting, and the U.S.Q.R. (formerly the U.S.S.R.) is denouncing Staten Island.