Ten From Infinity, Paul W. Fairman [intellectual books to read txt] 📗

only by watching one of the creatures in action." Entman sighed. "If we only had other facts."

"What facts?"

Entman's smile was almost patronizing. "You're tired, aren't you, son? You're not thinking very well."

"Goddamn it! Quit treating me like a cretin!"

"Temper, temper! Look at it analytically, son, analytically. Suppose we knew who these people are. What distances have they covered in arriving here? What is their method of conveyance?"

"The distance? Light years, I would assume. The conveyance? A spaceship, or a projectile along basic lines but farther advanced."

"All right. We know they've sent ten creatures to our planet from infinity—that's as good a word to use as any. The next question is, why?"

"Damnit, that question is obvious."

"And from my point of view, the answer is obvious."

"Then I wish to hell you'd give it to me."

"Logic, man, logic! A race as far advanced as this one could certainly move in and occupy us without trouble. Wouldn't you think?"

"Certainly. That's what bothers me. Why all the pussy-footing around with synthetic men who keep dropping dead?"

"I think it's because they themselves are unable to exist in the climatic and atmospheric conditions existent on our planet."

Brent Taber's eyes opened as Entman went on. "They[Pg 56] plan to occupy us, certainly—this we must assume—so they're trying to create an entity through which they can do it. The process is really no different, even though a little more dramatic, than our science creating a mechanical unit that functions to the best efficiency under specified conditions."

Taber's finger snapped up. He pointed at Entman's desk. "They'd like to know why their androids died. Maybe they weren't alike—at least, not exactly alike. Maybe there were differences you haven't found yet—maybe they turned out ten models and they want to know which one worked the best."

"You get the point," Entman beamed.

"They'd like the data you're assembling—those reports you've got in front of you."

"I imagine they'd find them quite interesting."

"Do you think we can assume the tenth android died also?"

"Perhaps. We have no proof that it killed the one found slain in Greenwich Village."

"I'm satisfied to assume that. But I'm wondering just what contact those 'people,' as you call them, had with their androids. Could a part of the brain have been a sending and receiving device?"

"It would be difficult to tell. I delved in far enough to find a mechanical device, if there had been one. It did not exist in those I dissected. There is another possibility though, except that we often make the mistake of assuming that what we humans on earth can't do, can't be done. Consider telepathy. Who's to say they were not made capable of communicating in that way—at whatever distance?" He paused for a moment, deep in thought, before going on. "Has it occurred to you that the tenth android might be a supervisor, the boss, the captain? If he is still alive, why haven't you found him? You have the men and facilities at your command."

Brent Taber sprang to his feet. "Doctor," he answered, scowling, "Did you ever hear of a project so secret that it couldn't even be given enough personnel to make it work?"

Entman smiled sympathetically. "Washington is a[Pg 57] strange place in some ways, son. Usually it's the other way around. You get so much help they get in each other's way. I'm glad I'm not involved in those phases of it."

Brent paced the floor, occupied with his own thoughts. It was more than mere frustration. It went deeper. There was his resentment of the dressing-down he'd taken from Authority; the subtle coolness that had begun to permeate his relations with those upstairs.

He jerked his mind away from such thoughts. Nerves. That was it. He was tense. He was imagining things. They were certainly too well aware of the gravity of this situation to let petty politics interfere.

Or were they?

"Okay, Doc," Brent said crisply. "Thanks for letting me pick your brain."

"Good luck, son."

Entman went back to his work and Taber left. As he walked down the corridor, he analyzed the cheerful tone of Entman's voice and told himself that even Entman didn't really believe it. Entman had the evidence before his eyes but he still couldn't get the concept of alien creatures from space really taking us over. It was too unbelievable.

Am I the only one who really believes it? He asked himself this question as he hailed a cab in the street and watched a fat man in a bowler hat slip in and take it away from him.

"You're slipping, Taber," he muttered. "You're definitely slipping."

The bell rang. Rhoda Kane opened the door. The man standing there was not extraordinary in any way. He appeared just short of middle age. He wore a blue suit and a blue necktie. The word for him was quiet. He was a man who did not stand out.

"My name is John Dennis," he said. "I would like to speak to you."

The abrupt demand annoyed Rhoda. She frowned and was about to retort just as peremptorily, but an odd bemusement tempered her mood. The man was uncivil[Pg 58] enough to be interesting. She said, "I'm busy now," but instead of closing the door, she stepped back into the room. The man came in and it was he who closed the door.

"I don't wish to alarm you, Miss Kane."

"I'm not in the least alarmed."

As she spoke, Rhoda wondered if this was true. But the wondering itself was on such an impersonal basis that it didn't seem to make much difference.

Also, she was noticing that John Dennis was not quite as he'd first appeared. He was much younger than middle-aged, really—somewhere in his thirties. He was quiet, yes, but handsome, too. There was a rugged individuality about him that was easily missed at first glance. A definite attractiveness.

"I want to ask you about a friend of yours. Frank Corson."

This seemed like a logical request. It definitely seemed that way but, at the same time, Rhoda was confused as to why it should appear to be. A man came and knocked on the door and entered and asked a question like that. It shouldn't have been all right, but it was. He probably had the right, she told herself, else he would not have asked.

"What do you wish to know?"

"Tell me about him."

"He is a doctor. Frank is an intern at Park Hill Hospital. After he finishes there he will go into practice. I guess that's about all there is to it."

"He had a patient named William Matson."

"William Matson? I don't know. He doesn't discuss his work with me."

"This was a patient with a broken leg who was taken to the hospital night before last."

"He did mention one man. I don't know his name, though. A man Frank said had two hearts."

"What else did he tell you about this man?"

"Nothing else. Frank had the case in Emergency. We came home—came here—and then Frank was bothered. He went back and examined the man and came out and said he had two hearts."[Pg 59]

"That was all he said?"

"Nothing else."

John Dennis looked around. Then, when Rhoda stirred and passed a hand quickly through her hair, he brought his eyes back to bear on hers. Rhoda lowered her hand.

"Does Frank Corson live here?"

"No. This is my home. Frank lives in the Village."

"What Village?"

"Greenwich Village. It's a part of New York. Are you a stranger?"

John Dennis did not answer. "Why doesn't he live here with you?"

"Why—why, we're not married. We are only engaged."

"That means you will get married later?"

"I hope to."

"Does he hope to?"

"Yes—I'm sure he does."

"Then he will live here with you?"

"I don't know. We may find another place."

"What's wrong with this one?"

"Why, nothing—nothing at all—"

Such strange questions, Rhoda thought. Why was he asking them? No doubt he had a reason. It somehow did not occur to her to wonder why she was answering. Her own thoughts on the matter did not seem important.

"He lives here with you sometimes, doesn't he?"

"He stays over once in a while."

"Why doesn't he stay over all the time?"

"Because we're not married."

"What do you do when he stays over?"

"We—talk."

"Is that all?"

"We make love."

"How do you do that?"

Rhoda hesitated for the first time. "We—haven't you ever made love?"

His words came a little sharper. "How do you make love?"

"We lie in each other's arms. We show affection for each other."[Pg 60]

"You lie in the same bed together?"

"Yes. Of course."

"If you were married, what would you do?"

"I said—we would live together."

"Would you make love?"

"Yes."

"Would you lie in the same bed together?"

"Yes."

"Is there anything you would do if you were married that you don't do now?"

"Of course. We would live together. We would be man and wife. It would be—well, legal."

"It is not legal to make love and lie in the same bed together now?"

"No—well, yes—you see—"

He was joking, of course. Rhoda was sure of this. She wanted to explain it all to him but he suddenly lost interest.

"Frank Corson knew nothing else about William Matson?"

"The man with two hearts?"

"Only that?"

"It was all he told me."

"I think he knows more. I want you to ask him. Then I will come and ask you."

"I'll ask him if he knows anything more than what he told me."

"Ask him if he knows of any other men with two hearts. I want to know where they are and what happened to them."

"I'll try to find out."

"You must find out."

"Will you come back soon?"

"I will come back. You must do as I tell you."

"I will do as you tell me."

John Dennis had been sitting by the window so that Rhoda had to stare into the light. He got up and approached her. She stood up and waited for him, motionless. He came close and looked at her curiously. His eyes went up and down her body. He laid a hand on her left breast and pressed gently. She did not move.[Pg 61]

"I will come back. You will not tell anyone I have been here or that we talked." He left without saying good-bye.

After he was gone, Rhoda stood where she was, motionless, for several minutes. Her mind was on the place he had touched her. She had never before experienced such a reaction. Never before had a man's hand, even on her bare flesh, produced such thrill and excitement. Desperately, her common sense struggled with this new thing. She dismissed with annoyance the callow, schoolgirl thought that this was the way love finally came—in the door, unannounced, to take over a woman's heart and soul and body. Ridiculous.

The intellectual Rhoda agreed, but the emotional Rhoda continued to toy with the idea, finding it a fascination, a joy. But there was something more than the intellectual and the emotional; a deeper, frightening numbness; a strange paralysis of mind she could not come to grips with; it kept eluding her even as she reached out for it.

Fear? She wondered.

But mainly she thought of John Dennis, the strange man who had walked in her door and to whom she had surrendered without a struggle.

My God. What happened to me? What happened to Rhoda Kane?

Abruptly she dropped the thought—it did not seem important.

Senator Crane sat in the dining room of the Mayflower Hotel. His guest was Matthew Porter, a mystery man, also, of the Brent Taber type, but a little more clearly defined in that he had a title and a department of government. But far more important to Crane, he outranked Taber.

One other point of importance: Matthew Porter was, in the terms even Senator Crane used, "something of a fathead."

"Maybe I am a Senator," Crane said jovially, "and maybe we boys up there think we have a hand in direct[Pg 62]ing you fellows—still I'm flattered that you could find time to lunch with me."

Porter had a thin, aristocratic face, delicate features. His expression was usually benign, but there was steel behind it. He could scowl and hurl righteous invective, for instance, when a policeman questioned his right to park by a fireplug in spite of his official license plates.

But mainly he was a shy person who nursed his inferiority complex in secret.

"That's very flattering, Senator. But the truth is quite the opposite. It's we fellows who are honored to put ourselves at your beck and call. After all, you're the ones the people elect to office."

The flattery boomeranged nicely and put Porter one up on Crane.

"The people must be served, of course," Crane said, "and that's one of the things I want to talk to you about. The people's interests."

Matthew Porter cocked an alarmed eye as he bit into a roll. "Have their interests