Dr. Bloodmoney, or How We Got Along after the Bomb

XIV

Orion Stroud, seated in the center of the Foresters’ Hall where he could clearly be heard by everyone, rapped for order and said:

“Mrs. Keller and Doctor Stockstill asked that the West Marin Official Jury and also the West Marin Governing Citizens’ Council convene to hear a piece of vital news regarding a killing that just took place today.”

Around him, Mrs. Tallman and Cas Stone and Fred Quinn and Mrs. Lully and Andrew Gill and Earl Colvig and Miss Costigan—he glanced from one to the next, satisfied that everyone was present. They all watched with fixed attention, knowing that this was really important. Nothing like this had ever happened in their community before. This was not a killing like that of the glasses man or of Mr. Austurias.

“I understand,” Stroud said, “that it was discovered that Mr. Jack Tree who’s been living among us—”

From the audience a voice said, “He was Bluthgeld.”

“Right,” Stroud said, nodding. “But he’s dead now so there’s nothing to worry about; you have to get that through your heads. And it was Hoppy that done it. Did it, I mean.” He glanced at Paul Dietz apologetically. “Have to use proper grammar,” he said, “because this is all going to be in News & Views–right Paul?”

“A special edition,” Paul said, nodding in agreement.

“Now you understand, we’re not here to decide if Hoppy ought to be punished for what he did. There’s no problem there because Bluthgeld was a noted war criminal and what’s more he was beginning to use his magical powers to restart some of the old war. I guess everybody in this room knows that, because you all saw the explosions. Now—” He glanced toward Gill. “There’s a newcomer, here, a Negro named Stuart McConchie, and ordinarily I have to admit we don’t welcome darkies to West Marin, but I understand that McConchie was tracking down Bluthgeld, so he’s going to be allowed to settle in West Marin if he so desires.”

The audience rustled with approval.

“Mainly what we’re here for,” Stroud continued, “is to vote some sort of reward to Hoppy to show our appreciation. We probably would all have been killed, due to Bluthgeld’s magical powers. So we owe him a real debt of gratitude. I see he isn’t here, because he’s busy at work in his house, fixing things; after all, he’s our handy and that’s a pretty big responsibility, right there. Anyhow, has anybody got an idea of how the people here can express their appreciation for Hoppy’s timely killing of Doctor Bluthgeld?” Stroud looked around questioningly.

Rising to his feet, Andrew Gill cleared his throat and said, “I think it’s appropriate for me to say a few words. First, I want to thank Mr. Stroud and this community for welcoming my new business associate, Mr. McConchie. And then I want to offer one reward that might be appropriate regarding Hoppy’s great service to this community and to the world at large. I’d like to contribute a hundred special deluxe Gold Label cigarettes.” He paused, starting to reseat himself, and then added, “And a case of Gill’s Five Star.”

The audience applauded, whistled, stamped in approval.

“Well,” Stroud said, smiling, “that’s really something I guess Mr. Gill is aware of what Hoppy’s action spared us all. There’s a whole lot of oak trees knocked over along Bear Valley Ranch Road, from the concussion of the blasts Bluthgeld was setting off. Also, as you may know, I understand that he was beginning to turn his attemtion south toward San Francisco—”

“That’s correct,” Bonny Keller spoke up.

“So,” Stroud said, “Maybe those poeple down there will want to pitch in and contribute something to Hoppy as a token of appreciation. I guess the best we can do, and it’s good but I wish there was more, is turn over Mr. Gill’s gift of the hundred special deluxe Gold Label cigarettes and the case of brandy… Hoppy will appreciate that, but I was actually thinking of something more in the line of a memorial, like a statue or a park or at least a plaque of some sort. And—I’d be willing to donate the land, and I know Cas Stone would, too.”

“Right,” Gas Stone declared emphatically.

“Anybody else got an idea?” Stroud asked. “You, Mrs. Tallman; I’d like to hear from you.”

Mrs. Tallman said, “It would be fitting to elect Mr. Harrington to an honorary public office, such as President of the West Marin Governing Citizens’ Council for instance, or as clerk of the School Trustees Board, That, of course, in addition to the park or memorial and the brandy and cigarettes.”

“Good idea,” Stroud said. “Well? Anybody else? Because let’s be realistic, folks; Hoppy saved our lives. That Bluthgeld had gone out of his mind, as everybody who was at the reading last night knows… he would have put us right back where we were seven years ago, and all our hard work in rebuilding would have gone for nothing. Nothing at all.”

The audience murmured its agreement.

“When you have magic like he had,” Stroud said, a physicist like Bluthgeld with all that knowledge… the world never was in such danger before; am I right? It’s just lucky Hoppy can move objects at a distance; it’s lucky for us that Hoppy’s been practicing that all these years now because nothing else would have reached out like that, over all that distance, and mashed that Bluthgeld like it did.”

Fred Quinn spoke up, “I talked to Edie Keller who witnessed it and she tells me that Bluthgeld got flung right up into the air before Hoppy mashed him; tossed all around.”

“I know,” Stroud said. “I interviewed Edie about it.” He looked around the room, at all the people. “If anybody wants details, I’m sure Edie would give them. Right, Mrs. Keller?”

Bonny, seated stiffly, her face pale, nodded.

“You still scared, Bonny?” Stroud asked.

“It was terrible,” Bonny said quietly.

“Sure it was,” Stroud said, “but Hoppy got him.” And then he thought to himself, That makes Hoppy pretty formidable, doesn’t it? Maybe that’s what Bonny’s thinking. Maybe that’s why she’s so quiet.

“I think the best thing to do,” Cas Stone said, “is to go right to Hoppy and say, ‘Hoppy, what do you want that sye can do for you in token of our appreciation?’ We’ll put it right to him. Maybe there’s something he wants very badly that we don’t know about.”

Yes, Stroud thought to himself. You have quite a point there, Cas. Maybe he wants many things we don’t know about, and maybe one day—not too far off—he’ll want to get them. Whether we form a delegation and go inquire after that or not.

“Bonny,” he said to Mrs. Keller, “I wish you’d speak up; you’re sitting there so quiet.”

Bonny Keller murmured, “I’m just tired.”

“Did you know Jack Tree was Bluthgeld?”

Silently, she nodded.

“Was it you, then,” Stroud asked, “who told Hoppy?”

“No,” she said. “I intended to; I was on my way. But it had already happened. He knew.”

I wonder how he knew, Stroud asked himself.

“That Hoppy,” Mrs. Lully said in a quavering voice, “he seems to be able to do almost anything… why, he’s even more powerful than that Mr. Bluthgeld, evidently.”

“Right,” Stroud agreed.

The audience murmured nervously.

“But he’s put all his abilities to use for the welfare ot our community,” Andrew Gill said. “Remember that. Remember he’s our handy and he helps bring in Dangerfield when the signal’s weak, and he does tricks for us, and imitations when we can’t get Dangerfield at all—he does a whole lot of things, including saving our lives from another nuclear holocaust. So I say, God bless Hoppy and his abilities. I think we should thank God that we have a funny here like him.”

“Right,” Cas Stone said.

“I agree,” Stroud said, with caution. “But I think we ought to sort of put it to Hoppy that maybe from now on—” He hesitated. “Our killings should be like with Austurias, done legally, by our Jury. I mean, Hoppy did right and he had to act quickly and all . .. but the Jury is the legal body that’s supposed to decide. And Earl, here should do the actual act. In the future, I mean. That doesn’t include Bluthgeld because having all That magic he was different.” You can’t kill a man with powers like that through the ordinary methods, he realized. Like Hoppy, for instance… suppose someone tried to kill him; it would be next to impossible.

He shivered.

“What’s the matter, Orion?” Cas Stone asked, acutely.

“Nothing,” Orion Stroud said. “Just thinking what we can do to reward Hoppy to show our appreciation; it’s a weighty problem because we owe him so much.”

The audience murmured, as the individual members discussed with one another how to reward Hoppy.

George Keller, noticing his wife’s pale, drawn features, said, “Are you okay?” He put his hand on her shoulder but she leaned away.

“Just tired,” she said. “I ran for a mile, I think, when those explosions began. Trying to reach Hoppy’s house.”

“How did you know Hoppy could do it?” he asked.

“Oh,” she said, “we all know that; we all surely know he’s the only one of us who has anything remotely resembling that kind of strength. It came into our—” She corrected herself. “My mind right away, as soon as I saw the explosions.” She glanced at her husband.

“Who were you with?” he said.

“Barnes. We were hunting chanterelle mushrooms under the oaks along Bear Valley Ranch Road.”

George Keller said, “Personally I’m afraid of Hoppy. Look—he isn’t even here. He has a sort of contempt for us all. He’s always late getting to the Hall; do you know what I mean? Do you sense it? And it gets more true all the time, perhaps as he sharpens his abilities.”

“Perhaps,” Bonny murmured.

“What do you think will happen to us now?” George asked her. “Now that we’ve killed BluthgeldP We’re better off, a lot safer. It’s a load off everybody’s mind. Someone should notify Dangerfleld so he can broadcast it from the satellite.”

“Hoppy could do that,” Bonny said in a remote voice. “He can do anything. Almost anything.”

In the speaker’s chafr, Orion Stroud rapped for order. “Who wants to be in the delegation that goes down to Hoppy’s house and confers the reward and notification of honor on him?” He looked all around the room. “Somebody start to volunteer.”

“I’ll go,” Andrew Gill spoke up.

“Me, too,” Fred Quinn said.

Bonny said, “I’ll go.”

To her, George said, “Do you feel well enought to?”

“Sure.” She nodded listlessly. “I’m fine, now. Except for the gash on my head.” Automatically she touched the bandage.

“How about you, Mrs. Tallman?” Stroud was saying.

“Yes, I’ll go,” Mrs. Taliman answered, but her voice trembled.

“Afraid?” Stroud asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“Why?”

Mrs. Taliman hesitated. “I—don’t know, Orion.”

“I’ll go, too,” Orion Stroud announced. “That’s five of us, three men and two women; that’s just about right. We’ll take the brandy and the cigaboos along and announce the rest—about the plaque, and him being President of the Council and clerk and all that.”

“Maybe,” Bonny said in a low voice, “we ought to send a delegation there that will stone him to death.”

George Keller sucked in his breath and said, “For God’s sake, Bonny.”

“I mean it,” she said.

“You’re behaving in an incredible way,” he said, furious and surprised; he did not understand her. “What’s the matter?”

“But of course it wouldn’t do any good,” she said. “He’d mash us before we got near his house. Maybe he’ll mash me now.” She smiled. “For saying that.”

“Then shut up!” He stared at her in great fear.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll be quiet. I don’t want to be flung up into the air and then dropped all the way to the ground, the way Jack was.”

“I should think not.” He was trembling.

“You’re a coward,” she said mildly. “Aren’t you? I wonder why I in all this time didn’t realize it before. Maybe that’s why I feel the way I do about you.”

“And what way’s that?”

Bonny smiled. And did not answer. It was a hard, hateful and rigidly cold smile and he did not understand it; he glanced away, wondering once again if all the rumors he had heard about his wife, over the years, could be true after all. She was so cold, so independent. George Keller felt miserable.

“Christ,” he said, “you call me a coward because I don’t want to see my wife mashed flat.”

“It’s my body and my existence,” Bonny said. “I’ll do with it what I want. I’m not afraid of Hoppy; actually I am, but I don’t intend to act afraid, if you can comprehend the difference. I’ll go down there to that tar-paper house of his and face him honestly. I’ll thank him but I think I’ll tell him that he must be more careful in the future. We insist on it.”

He couldn’t help admiring her. “Do that,” he urged. “It would be a good thing, dear. He should understand that, how we feel.”

“Thank you,” she said remotely. “Thanks a lot, George, for your encouragement.” She turned away, then, listening to Orion Stroud.

George Keller felt more miserable than ever.

First it was necessary to visit Andrew Gill’s factory to pick up the special deluxe Gold Label cigarettes and the Five Star brandy; Bonny, along with Orion Stroud and Gill, left the Foresters’ Hall and walked up the road together, all of them conscious of the gravity of their task.

“What’s this business relationship you’re going into with McConchie?” Bonny asked Andrew Gill.

Gill said, “Stuart is going to bring automation to my factory.”

Not believing him she said, “And you’re going to advertise over the satellite, I suppose. Singing commercials, as they used to be called. How will they go? Can I compose one for you?”

“Sure,” he said, “if it’ll help business.”

“Are you serious, about this automation?” It occurred to her now that perhaps he actually was.

Gill said, “I’ll know more when I’ve visited Stuart’s boss in Berkeley. Stuart and I are going to make the trip very shortly. I haven’t seen Berkeley in years. Stuart says it’s building up again—not as it was before, of course. But even that may eventually come some day.”

“I doubt that,” Bonny said. “But I don’t care anyhow; it wasn’t so good as all that. Just so it builds back some.”

Glancing about to make sure that Orion could not hear him, Gill said to her, “Bonny, why don’t you come along with Stuart and me?”

Astonished, she said, “Why?”

“It would do you good to break with George. And maybe you could manage to make the break with him final. You should, for his sake and yours.”

Nodding, she said, “But—” It seemed to her out of the question; it went too far. Appearances would not be maintained. “Then everyone would know,” she said. “Don’t you think?”

Gill said, “Bon, they know already.”

“Oh.” Chastened, she nodded meekly. “Well, what a surprise. I’ve been living under a delusion, evidently.”

“Come to Berkeley with us,” Gill said, “and start over. In a sense that’s what I’m going to be doing; it marks the end of rolling cigarettes by band, one at a time, on a little cloth and rod machine. It means I’ll have a true factory in the old sense, the pre-war sense.”

“‘The pre-war sense,’” she echoed. “Is that good?”

“Yes,” Gill said. “I’m damn sick and tired of rolling them by hand. I’ve been trying to free myself for years; Stuart has shown me the way. At least, I hope so.” He crossed his fingers.

They reached his factory, and there were the men at work in the rear, rollins away. Bonny thought, So this portion of our lives is soon to be over with forever. I must be sentimental because I cling to it. But Andrew is right. This is no way to produce goods; it’s too tedious, too slow. And too few cigarettes are made, really, when you get right down to it. With authentic machinery, Andrew can supply the entire country—assuming that the transportation, the means of delivery, is there.

Among the workmen Stuart McConchie crouched by a barrel of Gill’s fine ersatz tobacco, inspecting it. Well, Bonny thought, he either has Andrew’s special deluxe formula by now or he isn’t interested in it. “Hello,” she said to him. “Can you sell his cigarettes once they start rolling off the assembly line in quantity? Have you worked that part out?”.

“Yes,” McConchie said. “We’ve set up plans for distribution on a mass basis. My employer, Mr. Hardy—”

“Don’t give me a big sales pitch,” she interrupted. “I believe you if you say so; I was just curious.” She eyed him critically. “Andy wants me to travel to Berkeley with you. What do you say?”

“Sure,” he said vaguely.

“I could be your receptionist,” Bonny said. “At your central offices. Right in the center of the city. Correct?” She laughed, but neither Stuart McConchie nor Gill joined her. “Is this sacred?” she asked. “Am I treading on holy topics when I joke? I apologize, if I am.”

“It’s okay,” McConchie said. “We’re just concerned; there’re still a number of details to work out.”

“Maybe I will go along,” Bonny said. “Maybe it’ll solve my problems, finally.”

Now it was McConchie’s turn to scrutinize her. “What problems do you have? This seems a nice environment here, to bring up your daughter in; and your old man being principal of—”

“Please,” she said. “I don’t care to hear a summary of my blessings. Spare me.” She walked off, to join Gill who was packaging cigarettes in a metal box for presentation to the phocomelus.

The world is so innocent, she thought to herself. Even yet, even after all that’s happened to us. Gill wants to cure me of my—restlessness. Stuart McConchie can’t imagine what I could wish for that I don’t have right here. But maybe they’re right and I’m wrong. Maybe I’ve made my life unduly complicated… maybe there’s a machine in Berkeley that will save me, too. Perhaps my problems can be automated out of existence.

Off in a corner, Orion Stroud was writing out a speech which he intended to deliver to Hoppy. Bonny smiled, thinking of the solemnity of it all. Would Hoppy be impressed? Would he perhaps be amused or even filled with bitter contempt? No, she thought; he will like it—I have an intuition. It is just the sort of display that he yearns for. Recognition of him; that will please him terribly.

Is Hoppy preparing to receive us? she wondered. Has he washed his face, shaved, put on an especially clean suit… is he waiting expectantly for us to arrive? Is this the achievement of his life, the pinnacle?

She tried to imagine the phocomelus at this moment. Hoppy had, a few hours ago, killed a man, and she knew from what Edie said the people all believed he had killed the glasses man. The town rat catcher, she said to herself, and shivered. Who will be next? And will he get a presentation next time—for each one, from now on?

Maybe we will be returning again and again to make one presentation after another, she thought. And she thought, I will go to Berkeley; I want to get as far away from here as possible.

And, she thought, as soon as possible. Today, if I can. Right now. Hands in her coat pockets, she walked quickly back to join Stuart McConchie and Gill; they were conferring, now, and she stood as close to them as she could, listening to their words with complete raptness.

Doubtfully, Doctor Stockstill said to the phocomelus, “Are you sure he can hear me? This definitely transmits all the way to the satellite?” He touched the mike button again, experimentally.

“I can’t possibly assure you that he can hear you,” Hoppy said with a snigger. “I can only assure you that this is a five hundred watt transmitter; that’s not very much by the old standards but it’s enough to reach him. I’ve reached him with it a number of times.” He grinned his sharp, alert grin, his intelligent gray eyes alive with splinters of light. “Go ahead. Does he have a couch up there, or can that be skipped?” The phocomelus laughed, then.

Doctor Stockstill said, “The couch can be skipped.” He pressed the mike button and said, “Mr. Dangerfield, this is a—doctor, down below here in West Marin. I’m concerned with your condition. Naturally. Everyone down here is. I, urn, thought maybe I could help you.”

“Tell him the truth,” Hoppy said. “Tell him you’re an analyst.”

Cautiously, Stockstill said into the microphone, “Formerly I was an analyst, a psychiatrist. Of course, now I’m a G.P. Can you hear me?” He listened to the loudspeaker mounted in the corner but heard only static. “He’s not picking me up,” he said to Hoppy, feeling discouragement.

“It takes time to establish contact,” floppy said. “Try again.” He giggled. “So you think it’s just in his mind. Hypochondria. Are you so sure? Well, you might as well assume that because if it’s not, there is practically nothing you can do anyhow.”

Doctor Stockstill pressed the mike button and said, “Mr. Dangerfield, this is Stockstill, speaking from Marin County, California; I’m a doctor.” It seemed to him absolutely hopeless; why go on? But on the other hand—

“Tell him about Bluthgeld,” Hoppy said suddenly.

“Okay,” Stockstill said. “I will.”

“You can tell him my name,” floppy said. “Tell him I did it; listen, Doctor—this is how he’ll sound when he tells it.” The phocomelus assumed a peculiar expression and from his mouth, as before, issued the voice of Walt Dangerfield. “Well, friends, I have a bit of good, good news here… I think you’ll all enjoy this. Seems as if—” The phocomelus broke off, because from the speaker came a faint sound.

“… hello, Doctor. This is Walt Dangerfield.”

Doctor Stockstill said instantly into the microphone, “Good. Dangerfield, what I want to talk to you about is the pains you’ve been having. Now, do you have a paper bag up there in the satellite? We’re going to try a little carbon dioxide therapy, you and I. I want you to take the paper bag and blow into it. You keep blowing into it and inhaling from it, so that you’re finally inhaling pure carbon dioxide. Do you understand? It’s just a little idea, but it has a sound basis behind it. You see, too much oxygen triggers off certain diencephalic responses which set up a vicious cycle in the autonomic nervous system. One of the systems of a too-active autonomic nervous system is hyperperistalsis, and you may be suffering from that. Fundamentally, it’s an anxiety symptom.”

The phocomelus shook his head, turned and rolled away.

“I’m sorry…” the voice from the speaker came faintly. “I don’t understand, Doctor. You say breathe into a paper bag? What about a polyethylene container? Couldn’t asphyxiation result?” The voice, querulous and unreasonable, stumbled uncertainly on, “Is there any way I can synthesize phenobarbital out of the constituents available to me up here? I’ll give you an inventory list and possibly—” Static interrupted Dangerfield; when he next was audible he was talking about something else. Perhaps, Doctor Stockstill thought, the man’s faculties were wandering.

“Isolation in space,” Stockstill broke in, “breeds its own disruptive phenomena, similar to what once was termed ‘cabin fever.’ Specific to this is the feedback of free-floating anxiety so that it assumes a somatic consequence.” He felt, as he talked, that he was doing it all wrong; that he had failed already. The phocomelus had retired, too disgusted to listen—he was off somewhere else entirely, puttering. “Mr. Dangerfield,” Stockstill said, “what I want to do is interrupt this feedback and the carbon dioxide trit’k might do just that. Then when tension symptoms have eased, we can begin a form of psychotherapy; including recall of forgotten traumatic material.”

The disc jockey said drily, “My traumatic material isn’t forgotten, Doctor; I’m experiencing it right now. It’s all around me. It’s a form of claustrophobia and I have it very, very bad.”

“Claustrophobia,” Doctor Stockstill said, “is a phobia lireetly traceable to the diencephalon in that it’s a disturbance of the sense of spaciality. It’s connected with the panic reaction to the presence or the imagined presence of danger; it’s a repressed desire to flee.”

Dangerfield said, “Well, where can I flee to, Doctor? Let’s be realistic. What in Christ’s name can psychoanalysis do for me? I’m a sick man; I need an operation, not the crap you’re giving me.”

“Are you sure?” Stockstill asked, feeling ineffective and foolish. “Now, this will admittedly take time, but you and I have at least established basic contact; you know I’m down here trying to help you and I know that you’re listening.” You are listening, aren’t you? he asked silently. “So I think we’ve accomplished something already.”

He waited. There was only silence.

“Hello, Dangerfield?” he said into the microphone.

Silence.

From behind him the phocomelus said, “He’s either cut himself off or the satellite’s too far, now. Do you think you’re helping him?”

“I don’t know,” Stockstill said. “But I know it’s worth trying.”

“If you had started a year ago—”

“But nobody knew.” We took Dangerfield for granted, like the sun, Stockstill realized. And now, as Hoppy says, it’s a little late.

“Better luck tomorrow afternoon,” Hoppy said, with a faint—almost sneering—smile. And yet Stockstill felt in it a deep sadness. Was Hoppy sorry for him, for his futile efforts? Or for the man in the satellite passing above them? It was difficult to tell.

“I’ll keep trying,” Stockstill said.

There was a knock at the door.

floppy said, “That will be the official delegation.” A broad, pleased smile appeared on his pinched features; his face seemed to swell, to fill with warmth. “Excuse me.” He wheeled his ‘mobile to the door, extended a manual extensor, and flung the door open.

There stood Orion Stroud, Andrew Gill, Cas Stone, Bonny Keller and Mrs. Taliman, all looking nervous and ill-at-ease. “Harrington,” Stroud said, “we. have something for you, a little gift.”

“Fine,” Hoppy said, grinning back at Stockstill. “See?” he said to the doctor. “Didn’t I tell you? It’s their appreciation.” To the delegation he said, “Come on in; I’ve been waiting.” He held the door wide and they passed on inside his house.

“What have you been doing?” Bonny asked Doctor Stockstill, seeing him standing by the transmitter and microphone.

Stockstill said, “Trying to reach Dangerfield.”

“Therapy?” she said.

“Yes.” He nodded.

“No luck, though.”

“We’ll try again tomorrow,” Stockstill said.

Orion Stroud, his presentation momentarily forgotten, said to Doctor Stockstill, “That’s right; you used to be a psychiatrist.”

Impatiently, Hoppy said, “Well, what did you bring me?” He peered past Stroud, at Gill; he made out the sight of the container of cigarettes and the case of brandy. “Are those mine?”

“Yes,” Gill said. “In appreciation.”

The container and the case were lifted from his hands; he blinked as they sailed toward the phoce and came to rest on the floor directly in front of the ‘mobile. Avidly, Hoppy plucked them open with his extensors.

“Uh,” Stroud said, disconcerted, “we have a statement to make. Is it okay to do so now, Hoppy?” He eyed the phocomelus with apprehension.

“Anything else?” Hoppy demanded, the boxes open, now. “What else did you bring me to pay me back?”

To herself as she watched the scene Bonny thought, I had no idea he was so childish. Just a little child… we should have brought much more and it should have been wrapped gaily, with ribbons and cards, with as much color as possible. He must not be disappointed, she realized. Our lives depend on it, on his being—placated.

“Isn’t there more?” Hoppy was saying peevishly.

“Not yet,” Stroud said. “But there will be.” He shot a swift, flickering glance at the others in the delegation. “Your real presents, Hoppy, have to be prepared with care. This is just a beginning.”

“I see,” the phocomelus said. But he did not sound convinced.

“Honest,” Stroud said. “It’s the truth, floppy.”

“I don’t smoke,” Hoppy said, surveying the cigarettes; he picked up a handful and crushed them, letting the bits drop. “It causes cancer.”

“Well,” Gill began, “there’re two sides to that. Now—”

The phocomelus sniggered. “I think that’s all you’re going to give me,” he said.

“No, there will certainly be more,” Stroud said.

The room was silent, except for the static coming from the speaker.

Off in the corner an object, a transmitter tube, rose and sailed through the air, burst loudly against the wall, sprinkling them all with fragments of broken glass.

“‘More,’” Hoppy mimicked, in Stroud’s deep, portentous voice. “‘There will certainly be more.’”