Time Is the Simplest Thing (4 page)

“I take it, Mr. Dalton, you read a lot of history.”

“Yes, Mr. Blaine, I do. I am particularly fond of—”

“Then, perhaps, you've noticed one other thing as well. Ideas and institutions and beliefs in time outlive their usefulness. You'll find it in page after page of all our history—the world evolves and the people and their methods change. Has it ever occurred to you that business as you think of it may have outlived its usefulness? Business has made its contribution and the world moves on. Business is just another dodo.…”

Dalton came straight out of his slump, his hair standing straight on end, the cigar dangling in his mouth.

“By God,” he cried, “I believe you actually mean it. Is that what Fishhook thinks?”

Blaine chuckled dryly. “No, it's what I think. I have no idea what Fishhook may be thinking. I am not in Policy.”

And that was the way it went, Blaine told himself. No matter where you went, that was the way it was. There was always someone who tried to root out a hint, a clue, a tiny secret that might pertain to Fishhook. Like a group of hopping vultures, like a bunch of peeping Toms—athirst to know what was going on, suspecting, perhaps, much more was going on than was actually the case.

The city was a madhouse of intrigue and of whispering and of rumor—filled with representatives and operatives and pseudodiplomats. And this gent in the chair across from him, Blaine speculated, was here to place a formal protest against some new outrage perpetrated upon some proud commercial unit by some new Fishhook enterprise.

Dalton settled back into his chair. He got a fresh and deadly grip upon the big cigar. His hair fell back again, it seemed, into some semblance of once having known a comb.

“You say you're not in Policy,” he said. “I believe you told me you are a traveler.”

Blaine nodded.

“That means that you go out in space and visit other stars.”

“I guess that covers it,” said Blaine.

“You're a parry, then.”

“I suppose you'd call me that. Although I'll tell you frankly it is not a name that is regularly employed in polite society.”

The rebuke was lost on Dalton. He was immune to shame.

“What's it like?” he asked.

“Really, Mr. Dalton, I cannot begin to tell you.”

“You go out all alone?”

“Well, not alone. I take a taper with me.”

“A taper?”

“A machine. It gets things down on tape. It is full of all sorts of instruments, highly miniaturized, of course, and it keeps a record of everything it sees.”

“And this machine goes out with you—”

“No, damn it. I told you. I take it out with me. When I go out, I take it along with me. Like you'd take along a brief case.”

“Your mind and that machine?”

“That's right. My mind and that machine.”

“Think of it!” said Dalton.

Blaine did not bother with an answer.

Dalton took the cigar out of his mouth and examined it intently. The end that had been in his mouth was very badly chewed. The end of it was shredded, and untidy strips hung down. Grunting with concentration, he tucked it back into his mouth, twirling it a bit to wind up the shreds.

“To get back to what we were talking about before,” he announced pontifically. “Fishhook has all these alien things and I suppose it is all right. I understand they test them rather thoroughly before they put them on the market. There'd be no hard feelings—no sir, none at all—if they'd only market them through regular retail channels. But they don't do that. They will allow no one to sell any of these items. They've set up their own retail outlets and, to add insult to injury, they call these outlets Trading Posts. As if, mind you, they were dealing with a bunch of savages.”

Blaine chuckled. “Someone, long ago, in Fishhook must have had a sense of humor. Believe me, Mr. Dalton, it is a hard thing to believe.”

“Item after item,” Dalton raged, “they contrive to ruin us. Year by year they take away or cancel out commodities for which there was demand. It's a process of erosion that wears away at us. There's no vicious threat, there's just the steady chiseling. And I hear now that they may open up their transportation system to the general public. You realize what a blow that would strike at the old commercial setup.”

“I suppose,” said Blaine, “it would put the truckers out of business and a number of the airlines.”

“You know very well it would. There isn't any transportation system that could compete with a teleportive system.”

Blaine said: “It seems to me the answer is for you to develop a teleportive system of your own. You could have done it years ago. You've got a lot of people outside of Fishhook who could show you how it's done.”

“Crackpots,” said Dalton viciously.

“No, Dalton. Not crackpots. Just ordinary people who have the paranormal powers that put Fishhook where it is today—the very powers you admire in Fishhook but deplore in your own people.”

“We wouldn't dare,” said Dalton. “There's the social situation.”

“Yes, I know,” said Blaine. “The social situation. Are the happy little mobs still crucifying them?”

“The moral climate,” conceded Dalton, “is at times confusing.”

“I should imagine so,” said Blaine.

Dalton took the cigar from his mouth and regarded it with something like disgust. One end of it was dead and the other badly frayed. After considering for a moment, he tossed it into a potted plant. It caught on the lower part of the greenery and dangled there obscenely.

Dalton leaned back and clamped his hands across his gut. He stared up at the ceiling.

“Mr. Blaine,” he said.

“Yes?”

“You're a man of great discernment. And of integrity. And of a great impatience with fuddy-duddy thinking. You've brought me up short on a couple of matters and I liked the way you did it.”

“Your servant,” Blaine said, coldly.

“How much do they pay you?”

“Enough,” said Blaine.

“There's no such thing as enough. I never saw a man—”

“If you're trying to buy me, you're out of your ever-loving mind.”

“Not buy you. Hire you. You know the ins and outs of Fishhook. You know a lot of people. In a consultive capacity, you'd be invaluable. We'd be very willing to discuss—”

“Excuse me, sir,” said Blaine, “but I'd be entirely useless to you. Under the present circumstance, I'd be no good at all.”

For he'd been here for an hour and that was much too long. He'd eaten and he'd had a drink and he'd talked with Dalton—he'd wasted a lot of time on Dalton—and he must be getting on. For the word that he was here would filter back to Fishhook and before it did he must be far away.

There was a fabric rustle, and a hand fell on his shoulder.

“Shep,” said Charline Whittier, “it was nice of you to come.”

He rose and faced her.

“It was good of you to ask me.”

She crinkled impish eyes at him. “Did I really ask you?”

“No,” he said. “Leave us be honest. Freddy dragged me in. I hope that you don't mind.”

“You know you're always welcome.” Her hand tightened on his arm. “There's someone you must meet. You'll forgive us, Mr. Dalton.”

“Certainly,” said Dalton.

She led Blaine away.

“You know,” he said, “that was rather rude of you.”

“I was rescuing you,” she told him. “The man's a frightful bore. I can't imagine how he got here. I'm sure I didn't ask him.”

“Just who is he?” asked Blaine. “I'm afraid I never did find out.”

She shrugged bare and dimpled shoulders. “The head of some business delegation. Down here to cry out their broken hearts to Fishhook.”

“He indicated that much. He's irate and most unhappy.”

“You haven't got a drink,” said Charline.

“I just finished one.”

“And you've had something to eat? You're having a good time? I have a new dimensino, the very latest thing.…”

“Maybe,” said Blaine. “Maybe later on.”

“Go and get another drink,” said Charline. “I must say hello to some other of my guests. How about staying after? It's been weeks since I have seen you.”

He shook his head. “I'm more sorry than I can tell you. It was nice of you to ask.”

“Some other time,” she said.

She moved away, but Blaine reached out and stopped her.

“Charline,” he said, “did anyone ever tell you you're an awfully good egg?”

“No one,” she told him. “Absolutely no one.”

She stood on tiptoe to kiss him lightly on the cheek.

“Now run along and play,” she said.

He stood and watched her move away into the crowd.

Inside him the Pinkness stirred, a question mark implicit in its stirring.

Just a while
, Blaine told it, watching the crowd.
Let me handle it a little longer. Then we'll talk it over
.

And he felt the gratitude, the sudden tail-wag of appreciation for being recognized.

We'll get along
, he said.
We've got to get along. We're stuck with one another
.

It curled up again—he could feel it curling up, leaving things to him.

It had been frightened to start with, it might become frightened again, but at the moment it was accepting the situation—and to it the situation, he knew, must seem particularly horrific, for this place was a far and frightening cry from the detachment and serenity of that blue room on the far-off planet.

He drifted aimlessly across the room, skirting the bar, pausing a moment to peer into the room which contained the newly installed dimensino, then heading for the foyer. For he must be getting on. Before morning light he either must be miles away or be well hidden out.

He skirted little jabbering groups and nodded at a few acquaintances who spoke to him or waved across the room.

It might take some time to find a car in which a forgetful driver had left the key. It might be—and the thought came with brutal force—he would fail to find one. And if that were the case, what was there to do? Take to the hills, perhaps, and hide out there for a day or two while he got things figured out. Charline would be willing to help him, but she was a chatterbox, and he would be a whole lot better off if she knew nothing of the matter. There was no one else he could think of immediately who could give him any help. Some of the boys in Fishhook would, but any help they gave him would compromise themselves, and he was not as desperate as all that. And a lot of others, of course, but each of them with an ax to grind in this mad pattern of intrigue and petition which surrounded Fishhook—and you could never know which of them to trust. There were some of them, he was quite aware, who would sell you out in the hope of gaining some concession or some imagined position of advantage.

He gained the entrance of the foyer and it was like coming out of some deep forest onto a wind-swept plain—for here the surflike chatter was no more than a murmuring, and the air seemed clearer and somehow a great deal cleaner. Gone was the feeling of oppression, of the crowding in of bodies and of minds, of the strange pulse beat and crosscurrent of idle opinion and malicious gossip.

The outer door came open, and a woman stepped into the foyer.

“Harriet,” said Blaine, “I might have known you'd come. You never miss Charline's parties, I remember now. You pick up a running history of all that's happened of importance and—”

Her telepathic whisper scorched his brain:
Shep, you utter, perfect fool! What are you doing here?
(
Picture of an ape with a dunce cap on its head, picture of the south end of a horse, picture of a derisive phallic symbol
.)

“But, you—”

Of course. Why not (a row of startled question marks)? Do you think only in Fishhook? Only in yourself? Secret, sure—but I have a right to secrets. How else would a good newspaperman pick up (heaps of blowing dirt, endless flutter of statistics, huge ear with a pair of lips flapping loosely at it
)?

Harriet Quimby said, sweetly, vocally: “I wouldn't miss Charline's parties for anything at all. One meets such stunning people.”

Bad manners
, said Blaine, reprovingly. For it was bad manners. There were only certain times when it was permissible to use telepathy—and never at a social function.

To hell with that
, she said.
Lay bare my soul for you and that is what I get. (A face remarkably like his with a thin, trim hand laid very smartly on it.) It is all over town. They even know you're here. They'll be coming soon—if they're not already here. I came as fast as I could immediately I heard. Vocalize, you fool. Someone will catch on. Us just standing here
.

“You're wasting your time,” said Blaine. “No stunning people here tonight. It's the poorest lot Charline has ever got together.”
Peepers!!!!

Maybe. We have to take our chance. You are on the lam. Just like Stone. Just like all the others. I am here to help you
.

He said: “I was talking to some business lobbyist. He was an awful bore. I just stepped out to get a breath of air.”
Stone! What do you know of Stone?

Never mind right now
. “In that case I'll be going. No use to waste my time.”
My car is down the road, but you can't go out with me. I'll go ahead and have the car out in front and running. You wander around awhile, then duck down into the kitchen (map of house with red guideline leading to the kitchen)
.

I know where the kitchen is
.

Don't muff it. No sudden moves, remember. No grim and awful purpose. Just wander like the average partygoer, almost bored to death. (Cartoon of gent with droopy eyelids and shoulders all bowed down by the weight of a cocktail glass he held limply in his hand, ears puffed out from listening and a frozen smile pasted on his puss.) But wander to the kitchen, then out the side door down the road
.