But Virgil Ackerman could help me, she said to herself as she entered the elevator and touched the b.u.t.ton. I'll go to him; he'll know exactly what I should do. I'll never work with the 'Starmen, addiction or not; I won't cooperate with them about Eric.

But she knew, before long, that she would.

6.

It was during the early afternoon, as she sat in her office at TF&D arranging for the purchase of a 1935 artifact, a reasonably unworn Decca record of the Andrews Sisters singing "Bei Mir Bist Du Schon," that Kathy Sweetscent felt the first withdrawal symptoms.

Her hands became oddly heavy.

With extreme care she put the delicate record down. And there was a physiognomic alteration in the objects around her. While at 45 Avila Street, under the influence of JJ-180, she had experienced the world as consisting of airy, penetrable, and benign ent.i.ties, like so many bubbles; she had found herself able-at least in hallucination-to pa.s.s through them at will. Now, in the familiar environment of her office, she experienced a transformation of reality along the lines of an ominous progression: ordinary things, whichever way she looked, seemed to be gaining density. They were no longer susceptible to being moved or changed, affected in any way, by her.

And, from another viewpoint, she simultaneously experienced the oppressive change as taking place within her own body. From either standpoint the ratio between herself, her physical powers, and the outside world had altered for the worst; she experienced herself as growing progressively more and more helpless in the literal physical sense-there was, with each pa.s.sing moment, less which she could do. The ten-inch Decca record, for instance. It lay within touch of her fingers, but suppose she reached for it? The record would evade her. Her hand, clumsy with unnatural weight, hobbled by the internal gathering of density, would crush or break the record; the concept of performing intricate, skillful actions in reference to the record seemed out of the question. Refinements of motion were no longer a property belonging to her; only gross, sinking ma.s.s remained.

Wisely, she realized that this told her something about JJ-180; it lay in the cla.s.s of thalamic stimulants. And now, in this withdrawal period, she was suffereing a deprivation of thalamic energy; these changes, experienced as taking place in the outside world and in her body, were in actuality minute alterations of the metabolism of her brain. But- This knowledge did not help her. For these changes in herself and her world were not beliefs; they were authentic experiences, reported by the normal sensory channels, imposed on her consciousness against her will. As stimuli they could not be avoided. And-the alteration of the world's physiognomy continued; the end was not in sight. In panic she thought, How far will this go? How much worse can it get? Certainly not much worse ... the impenetrability of even the smallest objects around her now seemed almost infinite; she sat rigidly, unable to move, incapable of thrusting her great body into any new relationship with the crushingly heavy objects that surrounded her and seemed to be pressing nearer and nearer.

And, even as the objects in her office settled ma.s.sively against her, they became, on another level, remote; they receded in a meaningful, terrifying fashion. They were losing, she realized, their animation, their-so to speak-working souls. The animae which inhabited them were departing as her powers of psychological projection deteriorated. The objects had lost their heritage of the familiar; by degrees they became cold, remote, and-hostile. Into the vacuum left by the decline in her relatedness to them the things surrounding her achieved their original isolation from the taming forces which normally emanated from the human mind; they became raw, abrupt, with jagged edges capable of cutting, gashing, inflicting fatal wounds. She did not dare stir. Death, in potentiality, lay inherent in every object; even the hand-wrought bra.s.s ash tray on her desk had become irregular, and in its lack of symmetry it obtained projecting planes, shot out surfaces which, like spines, could tear her open if she was stupid enough to come near.

The combox on her desk buzzed. Lucile Sharp, Virgil Ackerman's secretary, said, "Mrs. Sweetscent, Mr. Ackerman would like to see you in his office. I'd suggest you bring along the new 'Bei Mir Bist Du Schon' record you purchased today; he expressed interest in it."

"Yes," Kathy said, and the effort almost buried her; she ceased breathing and sat with her rib-cage inert, the basic physiological processes slowing under the pressure, dying by degrees. And then, somehow, she breathed one breath; she filled her lungs and then exhaled raggedly, noisily. For the moment she had escaped. But it was all worsening. What next? She rose to her feet, stood. So this is how it feels to be hooked on JJ-180, she thought. She managed to pick up the Decca record. Its dark edges were like knife blades sawing into her hands as she carried it across the office to the door. Its hostility toward her, its inanimate and yet ferocious desire to inflict destruction on her, became overwhelming; she cringed from the disc's touch.

And dropped it.

The record lay on the thick carpet, apparently unbroken. But how to pick it up once more? How to drag it loose from the nape, the backdrop, surrounding it? Because the record no longer seemed separate; it had fused. With the carpet, the floor, the walls, and now everything in the office, it presented a single indivisible, unchangeable surface, without rupture. No one could come or go within this cubelike s.p.a.ciality; every place was already filled, complete-nothing could change because everything was present already.

My G.o.d, Kathy thought as she stood gazing down at the record by her feet. I can't free myself; I'm going to remain here, and they'll find me like this and know something's terribly wrong. This is catalepsy!

She was still standing there when the office door opened and Jonas Ackerman, briskly, with a jovial expression on his smooth, youthful face, entered, strode up to her, saw the record, bent unhinderedly down and gently lifted it up and placed it in her outstretched hands.

"Jonas," she said in a slow, thickened voice, "I-need medical help. I'm sick."

"Sick how?" He stared at her with concern, his face twisted up, wriggling, she thought, like nests of snakes. His emotion overpowered her; it was a sickening, fetid force. "My G.o.d," Jonas said, "what a time you picked-Eric's not here today, he's in Cheyenne, and we haven't got the new man that's replacing him yet. But I could drive you to the Tijuana Government Clinic. What is it?" He gripped her arm, pinching her flesh. "I think you're just blue because Eric's gone."

Take me upstairs," she managed to say. "To Virgil."

"Boy, you do do sound awful," Jonas said. "Yes, I'll be glad to get you upstairs to the old man; maybe he'll know what to do." He guided her toward the office door. "Maybe I better take that record; you look like you're about to drop it again." sound awful," Jonas said. "Yes, I'll be glad to get you upstairs to the old man; maybe he'll know what to do." He guided her toward the office door. "Maybe I better take that record; you look like you're about to drop it again."

It could not have taken more than two minutes to reach Virgil Ackerman's office and yet to her the ordeal consumed a vast interval. When she found herself facing Virgil at last she was exhausted; she panted for breath, unable to speak. It was just too G.o.ddam much for her.

Eyeing her curiously, and then with alarm, Virgil said in his thin, penetrating voice, "Kathy, you better go home today; fix yourself up with an armful of women-type magazines and a drink, propped up in bed-"

"Leave me alone," she heard herself say. "Christ," she said, then, in despair. "Don't "Don't leave me alone, Mr. Ackerman; please!" leave me alone, Mr. Ackerman; please!"

"Well, make up your mind," Virgil said, still scrutinizing her. "I can see that Eric's leaving here and going to Cheyenne to-"

"No," she said. "I'm okay." Now it had worn off a little; she felt as if she had imbibed some strength from him, perhaps because he had so much. "Here's a fine item for Wash-35." She turned to Jonas for the record. "It was one of the most popular tunes of the times. This and 'The Music Goes Round and Round.' " Taking the record, she placed it before him on his big desk. I'm not going to die, she thought; I'm going to get through this and recover my health. "I'll tell you what else I have a line on, Mr. Ackerman." She seated herself in a chair by the desk, wanting to conserve what energy she had. "A private recording which someone made, at the time, of Alexander Woollcott on his program, 'The Town Crier.' So the next time we're up at Wash-35 we'll be able to listen to Woollcott's actual voice. And not an imitation. As we're doing."

" 'The Town Crier'!" Virgil exclaimed in childish joy. "My favorite program!"

"I'm reasonably sure I can get it," Kathy said. "Of course, until I actually pay over the money there could still be a hitch. I have to fly out to Boston to make the final arrangements; the recording is there, in the possession of a rather shrewd spinster-lady named Edith B. Scruggs. It was made on a Packard-Bell Phon-o-cord, she tells me in her correspondence."

"Kathy," Virgil Ackerman said, "if you can actually turn up an authentic recording of the voice of Alexander Woollcott-I'm going to raise your salary, so help me G.o.d. Mrs. Sweetscent, sweetheart, I'm in love with you because of what you do for me. Was Woollcott's radio program over WMAL or WJSV? Research that for me, will you? Go through those '35 copies of the Washington Post Washington Post-and by the way, that reminds me. That American Weekly American Weekly with the article on the Sarga.s.so Sea. I think we'll finally decide to exclude that from Wash-35 because when I was a boy my parents didn't take the Hearst papers; I only saw it when I-" with the article on the Sarga.s.so Sea. I think we'll finally decide to exclude that from Wash-35 because when I was a boy my parents didn't take the Hearst papers; I only saw it when I-"

"Just a moment, Mr. Ackerman," Kathy said, raising her hand.

He c.o.c.ked his head expectantly. "Yes, Kathy?"

"What if I went to Cheyenne and joined Eric?"

"But-" Virgil bleated, gesturing. "I need you!"

"For a while," she said. Maybe that will be enough, she thought. They might not demand any more. "You let him him go," she said, "and he keeps you alive; he's a lot more vital than I am." go," she said, "and he keeps you alive; he's a lot more vital than I am."

"But Molinari needs him. And he doesn't need you; he has no babyland he's building; he's not a bit interested in the past-he's full of gas about the future, like an adolescent." Virgil looked stricken. "I can't spare you, Kathy; losing Eric was bad enough but the deal in his case is that I can send for him any time I get into difficulty. I had had to let him go; it was the patriotic thing, in wartime-I didn't want to; in fact I'm scared as h.e.l.l without him. But not you." His tone became plaintive. "No, that's too much. Eric swore to me when we were at Wash-35 that you wouldn't want to go with him." He shot a mute, appealing glance at Jonas. "Make her stay, Jonas." to let him go; it was the patriotic thing, in wartime-I didn't want to; in fact I'm scared as h.e.l.l without him. But not you." His tone became plaintive. "No, that's too much. Eric swore to me when we were at Wash-35 that you wouldn't want to go with him." He shot a mute, appealing glance at Jonas. "Make her stay, Jonas."

Rubbing his chin thoughtfully, Jonas said to her, "You don't love Eric, Kathy. I've talked to you and to him; you both tell me your domestic woes. You're as far apart from each other as it's possible to be and not commit an outright crime ... I don't get this."

"I believed that," she said, "while he was here. But I kidded myself. Now I know better, and I'm sure he feels the same way."

"Are you sure?" Jonas said acutely. "Call him." He indicated the vidphone on Virgil's desk. "See what he says. Frankly I think you're better off separated, and I have no doubt Eric knows it."

Kathy said, "May I be excused to go? I want to get back down to my office." She felt sick at her stomach and achingly frightened. Her damaged, drug-addicted body yearned for relief and in its thrashings it directed her actions; it was compelling her to follow Eric to Cheyenne. Despite what the Ackermans said. She could not stop, and even now in her confusion she could read the future; she could not escape the drug JJ-180-the 'Starmen had been correct. She would have to go back to them, follow up on the card that Corning had given her. G.o.d, she thought, if I only could tell Virgil. I have to tell someone.

And then she thought, I'll tell Eric. He's a doctor; he'll be able to help me. I'll go to Cheyenne for that, not for them. not for them.

"Will you do me one favor?" Jonas Ackerman was saying to her. "For heaven's sake, Kathy; listen." Again he squeezed her arm.

"I'm listening," she said with irritation. "And let go." She tugged her arm away, stepped back from him, feeling rage. "Don't treat me like this; I can't stand it." She glared at him.

Carefully, in a deliberately calm voice, Jonas said to her, "We'll let you follow your husband to Cheyenne, Kathy, if if you promise to wait twenty-four hours before you go." you promise to wait twenty-four hours before you go."

"Why?" She could not understand.

"So that this initial period of shock at the separation has a chance to wear off," Jonas said. "I'm hoping that in twenty-four hours you'll see your way clear to changing your mind. And meanwhile-" He glanced at Virgil; the old man nodded in agreement. "I'll stay with you," Jonas said to her. "All day and all night, if necessary."

Appalled, she said, "Like h.e.l.l you will. I won't-"

"I know there's something wrong with you," Jonas said quietly. "It's obvious. I don't think you should be left alone. I'm making it my responsibility to see that nothing happens to you." He added in a low voice, "You're too valuable to us to do something terminal." Again, and this time with harsh firmness, he took hold of her arm. "Come on; let's go downstairs to your office-it'll do you good to get wrapped up in your work, and I'll just sit quietly, not interfering. After work tonight I'll fly you up to L. A. to Spingler's for dinner; I know you like sea food." He guided her toward the door of the office.

She thought, I'll get away. You're not that smart, Jonas; sometime today, perhaps tonight, I'll lose you and go to Cheyenne. Or rather, she thought with nausea and an upsurge of her former terror, I'll lose you, dump you, slip away from you in the labyrinth that's the night city of Tijuana, where all kinds of things, some of them terrible, some of them wonderful and full of beauty, happen. Tijuana will be too much for you. It's almost too much for me. And I know it fairly well; I've spent so much of my time, my life, in Tijuana at night. You're not that smart, Jonas; sometime today, perhaps tonight, I'll lose you and go to Cheyenne. Or rather, she thought with nausea and an upsurge of her former terror, I'll lose you, dump you, slip away from you in the labyrinth that's the night city of Tijuana, where all kinds of things, some of them terrible, some of them wonderful and full of beauty, happen. Tijuana will be too much for you. It's almost too much for me. And I know it fairly well; I've spent so much of my time, my life, in Tijuana at night.

And look how it's worked out, she thought bitterly. I wanted to find something pure and mystical in life and instead I wound up spliced to people who hate us, who dominate our race. Our ally, she thought. We ought to be fighting them; it's clear to me now. If I ever get to see Molinari alone at Cheyenne-and maybe I will-I'll tell him that, tell him we have the wrong ally and the wrong enemy.

"Mr. Ackerman," she said, turning urgently to Virgil. "I have to go to Cheyenne to tell the Secretary something. It affects all of us; it has to do with the war effort."

Virgil Ackerman said drily, "Tell me and I'll tell him. There's a better chance that way; you'll never get to see him ... not unless you're one of his bambinos or cousins."

"That's it," she said. "I'm his child." It made perfect sense to her; all of them on Terra were children of the UN Secretary. And they had been expecting their father to lead them to safety. But somehow he had failed.

Unresistingly, she followed Jonas Ackerman. "I know what you're doing," she said to him. "You're using this opportunity, with Eric away and me in this terrible state, to take s.e.xual advantage of me."

Jonas laughed. "Well, we'll see." His laugh, to her, did not sound guilty; it sounded sleekly confident.

"Yes," she agreed, thinking of the 'Star policeman Corning. "We'll see how lucky you are in making out with me. Personally I wouldn't bet on it." She did not bother to remove his big, determined hand from her shoulder; it would only reappear.

"You know," Jonas said, "if I didn't know better, I'd say from the way you've been acting that you're on a substance which we call JJ-180." He added, "But you couldn't be because there's no way you could get hold of it."

Staring at him, Kathy said, "What-" She couldn't go on.

"It's a drug," Jonas said. "Developed by one of our subsidiaries."

"It wasn't developed by the reegs?"

"Frohedadrine, or JJ-180, was developed in Detroit, last year, by a firm which TF&D controls called Hazeltine Corporation. It's a major weapon in the war-or will be when it's in production, which will be later this year."

"Because," she said numbly, "it's so addictive?"

"h.e.l.l no. Many drugs are addictive, starting with the opium derivatives. Because of the nature of the hallucinations it causes its users." He explained, "It's hallucinogenic, as LSD was."

Kathy said, "Tell me about the hallucinations."

"I can't; that's cla.s.sified military information."

Laughing sharply, she said, "Oh G.o.d-so the only way I could find out would be to take it."

"How can you take it? It's not available, and even when it's in production we wouldn't conceivably under any circ.u.mstances allow our own population to use it-the stuff's toxic!" He glared at her. "Don't even talk about using it; every test animal to which it was administered died. Forget I even mentioned it; I thought Eric had probably told you about it-I shouldn't have brought it up, but you have been acting strangely; it made me think of JJ-180 because I'm so scared-we all are-that someone, some way, will get hold of it on the domestic market, one of our own people."

Kathy said, "Let's hope that never happens." She felt like laughing, still; the whole thing was insane. The 'Starmen had obtained the drug on Terra but pretended to have gotten it from the reegs. Poor Terra, she thought. We can't even get credit for this, for this noxious, destructive chemical which destroys the mind-as Jonas says, a potent weapon of war. And who's using it? Our ally. And on whom? On us. The irony is complete; it forms a circle. Certainly cosmic justice that a Terran should be one of the first to become addicted to it.

Frowning, Jonas said, "You asked if JJ-180 hadn't been developed by the enemy; that suggests you have heard of it. So Eric did mention it to you. It's all right; only knowledge of its properties is cla.s.sified, not its existence. The reegs know we've been experimenting with drug warfare for decades, back into the twentieth century. It's one of Terra's specialties." He chuckled.

"Maybe we'll win after all," Kathy said. "That ought to cheer up Gino Molinari. Perhaps he'll be able to stay in office with the a.s.sistance of a few new miracle weapons. Is he counting on this? Does he know?"

"Of course Molinari knows; Hazeltine has kept him informed at every stage of development. But for chrissake don't go and-"

"I won't get you in trouble," Kathy said. I think I'll get you addicted to JJ-180, she said to herself. That's what you deserve; everyone who helped develop it, who knows about it. Stay with me night and day during the next twenty-four hours, she thought. Eat with me, go to bed with me, and by the time it's over you'll be earmarked for death just as I am. And then, she thought, maybe I can get Eric on it. Him most of all.

I'll carry it with me to Cheyenne, Kathy decided. Infect everyone there, the Mole and his entourage. And for a good reason.

They'll be forced to discover a method of breaking the addiction. Their own lives will depend on it, not just mine. And for me alone it wouldn't be worth seeking; even Eric wouldn't have tried, and certainly Corning and his people don't care-no one cares about me, when you get right down to it.

This was probably not at all what Corning and those above him had in mind in sending her to Cheyenne. But that was just too bad; this was what she intended to do.

"It'll go in their water supply," Jonas was explaining. "The Reegs-they maintain huge central water sources, as Mars did once. JJ-180 will be introduced there, carried throughout their planet. I admit it sounds desperate on our part, a-you know. A tour de force. But actually it's very rational and reasonable."

"I'm not criticizing it at all," Kathy said. "In fact I think the idea sounds brilliant."

The elevator arrived; they entered and descended.

"Look what the ordinary citizen of Terra doesn't know," Kathy said. "He goes merrily on about his daily life ... it would never occur to him that his government has developed a drug that in one exposure turns you into a-how would you put it, Jonas? Something less than a robant? Certainly less than human. I wonder where you would place it on the evolutionary ladder."

"I never told you that one exposure to JJ-180 meant addiction," Jonas said. "Eric must have told you that."

"With the lizards of the Jura.s.sic Period," Kathy decided. "Things with tiny brains and immense tails. Creatures with almost no mentalities; just reflex machines acting out the externals of living, going through the motions but not actually there. Right?"

"Well," Jonas said, "it's reegs that'll be receiving the drug; I wouldn't waste any tears on reegs."

"I'd waste a tear on anything," Kathy said, "that got hooked by JJ-180. I hate it; I wish-" She broke off. "Don't mind me; I'm just upset by Eric's leaving. I'll be okay." To herself she wondered when she would have an opportunity to look for Corning. And get more capsules of the drug. It was clear now that she had become an addict. By now she had to face it.

She felt only resignation.

At noon, in the neat, modern, but excessively small conapt provided him by the mystifying workings of the higher governmental authorities of Cheyenne, Dr. Eric Sweetscent finished reading the medical charts on his new patient-referred to throughout the enormous body of writings merely as "Mr. Brown." Mr. Brown, he reflected as he locked the folio back in its unbreakable plastic box, is a sick man, but his sickness simply could not be diagnosed, at least in the customary way. Because-and this was the odd thing, for which Teagarden had not prepared him-the patient had shown, over the years, symptoms of major organic diseases, symptoms not a.s.sociated with psychosomatic disorders. There had been at one time a malignancy in the liver which had metastasized-and yet Mr. Brown had not died. And the malignancy had gone away. Anyhow it was not there now; tests during the last two years proved that. An exploratory operation had even been performed, finally, and Mr. Brown's liver had not even shown the degeneracy antic.i.p.ated in a man of his age.

It was the liver of a youth of nineteen or twenty.

And this oddity had been observed in other organs subjected to acute examination. But Mr. Brown was failing in his overall powers; palpably, he was in the process of declining-he looked considerably older than his chronological age, and the aura around him was one of ill health. It was as if his body on a purely physiological level were growing younger while his essence, his total psychobiological Gestalt Gestalt, aged naturally-in fact failed conspicuously.

Whatever physiological force it was that maintained him organically, Mr. Brown was not receiving any benefit there from, except of course that he had not died of the malignant tumor in his liver or the earlier one detected in his spleen, or the surely fatal cancer of the prostate gland which had gone undetected during his third decade.

Mr. Brown was alive-but just barely so. Throughout, his body was overworked and in a state of deterioration; take his circulatory system, for instance. Brown's blood pressure was 220-despite vasodilators administered orally; already his eyesight had been materially affected. And yet, Eric reflected, Brown would undoubtedly surmount this as he had every other ailment; one day it would simply go away, even though he refused to stay on the prescribed diet and did not respond to reserpine.

The outstanding fact was simply that Mr. Brown had had at one time or another almost every serious disease known, from infarcts in his lungs to hepat.i.tis. He was a perambulating symposium of illness, never well, never functioning properly; at any given time some vital portion of his body was affected. And then- In some fashion he had cured himself. And without the use of artiforgs. It was as if Brown practiced some folk-style, homeopathic medicine, some idiotic herbal remedy which he had never disclosed to his attending physicians. And probably never would.

Brown needed to be sick. His hypochondriasis was real; he did not merely have hysterical symptoms-he had true diseases which usually turned the patient into a terminal case. If this was hysteria, a variety of purely psychological complaint, Eric had never run across it before. And yet, despite this, Eric had the intuition that all these illnesses had existed for a reason; they were engendered from the complexity, the undisclosed depths, of Mr. Brown's psyche. His hypochondriasis was real; he did not merely have hysterical symptoms-he had true diseases which usually turned the patient into a terminal case. If this was hysteria, a variety of purely psychological complaint, Eric had never run across it before. And yet, despite this, Eric had the intuition that all these illnesses had existed for a reason; they were engendered from the complexity, the undisclosed depths, of Mr. Brown's psyche.

Three times in his life Mr. Brown had given himself cancer. But how? And-why?

Perhaps it arose from his death wish. And each time, Mr. Brown halted at the brink, pulled himself back. He needed to be sick-but not to die. The suicide wish, then, was spurious.

This was important to know. If it was so, Mr. Brown would fight to survive-would fight against the very thing he had hired Eric to bring about.

Therefore Mr. Brown would be an exceedingly difficult patient. To say the least. And all this-beyond doubt-functioned at an unconscious level; Mr. Brown was certainly unaware of his twin, opposing drives.

The door chimes of the conapt sounded. He went to answer-and found himself facing an official-looking individual in a natty business suit. Producing identification, the man explained, "Secret Service, Dr. Sweetscent. Secretary Molinari needs you; he's in a good deal of pain so we'd better hurry."

"Of course." Eric dashed to the closet for his coat; a moment later he and the Secret Service man were hiking toward the parked wheel. "More abdominal pains?" Eric asked.

"Now the pains seem to have shifted over to his left side," the Secret Service man said as he piloted the wheel out into traffic. "In the region of his heart."

"He didn't describe them as feeling as if a great hand was pressing down on him, did he?"

"No, he's just lying there groaning. And asking for you." The Secret Service man seemed to take it matter-of-factly; evidently for him this was old and familiar. The Secretary, after all, was always sick.