George Henry Smith
IN THE IMAGICON
Allegorical short stories are about as out of style these days a the political poem or pamphlet, and who is to say that the world is a better place as a result? Yet, as we have already noted, there is more than a hint of allegory in the best science fiction. Mr. Smith's story is both brief and entertaining so that his allegory can only be accepted as a happy bonus.
Dandor leaned back on the warm silk of the lounge and stretched, letting his eyes wander up to the high ceiling of his palace and then drop down to the blonde who knelt at his feet. She was putting the finishing touches on his carefully manicured toenails while the voluptuous brunette with the mobile hips and the full red mouth leaned forward to pop another grape into his mouth.
He studied the blonde, whose name was Cecily, and thought about the other service she had performed for him last night. That had been nice . . . very nice. But today he felt bored with her, just as he was bored with the brunette whose name he couldn't remember at the moment, and with the cuddly redheaded twins and with...
Dandor yawned. Why were they all so damn worshipful and always so eager to please?
It was almost, he thought with a wry grin, as though they were products of his imagination, or rather and he almost laughed aloudof that greatest of all man's inventions, the Imagicon.
„There now, don't they look nice?“ Cecily said, sitting back to admire his finished pedicure with pride.
Dandor looked at the ten shining objects of her gaze and grimaced. It made him feel pretty silly.
Then Cecily made him feel even sillier by leaning over and kissing his right foot with passionate red lips. „Oh, Dandor! Dandor, I love you so much,“ she murmured.
Dandor resisted the temptation to use one of his newly pampered feet to give her a healthy kick on her round little bottom. He resisted it because even at times like this, when his life with these women began to seem unreal, he tried to be as kind as possible to them. Even when their worship and adoration threatened to bore him to death, he tried to be kind.
So instead of kicking Cecily, he yawned. The effect was almost the same. Her blue eyes widened in fear, and the brunette raised wide eyes from the grape she was peeling, her lips starting to tremble.
„You. . . you're going to leave us, aren't you?“ Cecily asked.
He yawned again and patted her head absentmindedly.
„Just for a little while, darling.“
„Oh, Dandor!“ the brunette wailed. „Don't you love us?“
„Of course I do, but“
„Dandor, please don't go,“ Cecily begged. „We'll do any-thing to make you happy!“
„I know,“ he said, getting to his feet and stretching. „You're both very sweet. But somehow I just feel drawn to“ „Please stay,“ the brunette pleaded, falling at his feet.
„We'll have a party with champagne. Any kind of pleasure you desire. We'll go get the other girls ... I'll dance for you...“
„I'm sorry, Daphne,“ he said, finally remembering her name, „but you girls are beginning to seem unreal to me. And when that happens, I must go.“
„But“ Cecily was crying so hard she could hardly get the words out—„when you leave us . . .it's a-almost . . . as th-though we were . . . turned off.“
Her words saddened him a little because in a way it was true. When he left it was almost like turning them off. But true or not, he couldn't do anything about it because he felt himself being drawn irresistibly toward that other world.
He took one last look around at the incredible luxury of his palatial palace, at the beauty of his women and at the warm sun shining through the windows, and then he was gone.
The first thing he heard when he came out of the Imagicon was the howling of the wind and the first thing he felt was the numbing cold.
The next thing that assaulted his ears was the rasping screech of his wife's voice. „So you finally came out of it, did you?“ Nona was yelling. „It's about time, you good-for-nothing little runt!“
So he was really back on Nestrond, back on the coldest hell of a colonial world in any universe. He had often thought that he would never return. But here he was . . . back on Nestrond and back with Nona.
„You've been gone long enough!“ Nona said. She was a big, rawboned woman with stringy black hair, a broad, flat face with thin lips and uneven, yellowish teeth.
God but she's ugly, he thought as he stared at her. Beside her, Cecily and the others are goddesses.
„It's a good thing you got back 'cause the ice wolves is actin' up and we need frozen ice moss for the fire and . . .“
Dandor just stood there and listened as she went on with the long list of chores that needed doing. Why, he wondered, didn't she get one other boy friends from down at the mines to do these things? He knew without being told that her lovers had been around while he was „gone.“ Nona was as faithless as she was ugly. And since there were twenty men to every woman on this planet, she had plenty of opportunity.
„. . .and the cattleshed needs a new roof,“ she finished. When he didn't answer immediately, she thrust her face close to his. „Did you hear me? I said there's things to be done!“
„Yes, I heard you,“ he said.
„Then don't stand there like an idiot. Sit down and eat your breakfast and then get out and get to work!“
Breakfast was a thick, greasy piece of rancid pork and a bowl of lukewarm grits. Dandor choked on it but finally forced it down. Then he put on his thermal suit and furs and started for the door.
„Here, stupid!“ Nona said, picking up a face mask from a pile of litter on the table and flinging it at him. “You want to freeze your nose off?”
He slapped the mask on quickly so she wouldn't see the anger on his face, opened the door and plunged out. The wind hit him in the face, hurling jagged ice crystals against his mask. Nestrond! My God, why Nestrond? He thought long-ingly of the comparative warmth of the cabin as he stared out at the bleak landscape. He thought of the black box that was the Imagicon. It sat in the one clear corner of the cabin and Was the only way back to . . .
But no, he couldn't go back yet. There were too many things to be done here. So with an axe over his shoulder, he started across the frozen waste to the ancient peat bog where they cut their fuel.
All morning long, with the wind raging at him and the bitter cold making every breath an aching torment in his chest, he cut and stacked the frozen peat. Then when the pale yellow sun peeked through the clouds of ice crystals for a moment and he saw it was almost directly overhead, he tied up a large bundle of the brick-like slabs and hoisted it onto his shoulder for the trip back to the miserable huts of Nestrond.
Nona slapped a bowl of thin soup and a piece of stale bread down in front of him and called it lunch. He ate in silence and then went out behind the cabin to spend the afternoon digging the new cesspool.
This made the work of the morning seem like a rest cure. The ground had been frozen since Nestrond first started to roll around its inadequate sun. By evening, his back and legs and thighs ached tormentingly. With only a foot of ground excavated, he had to give up when night fell and staggered back toward the cabin with only one thought in mind . . . sleep.
The howl that wrenched him from his first troubled slumber seemed to come from the deepest pits of hell.
„Wha . . . what's that?“ he asked.
„Ice wolves, you fool!“ Nona screeched. „They're after the cattleshed! Get out there and stop them!“
Dandor staggered to his feet and fumbled for his clothes as another howl rent the night. He reached for his laser rifle while Nona yelled again. „Hurry up! Those things can rip logs off a shed like it was kindlin'.“