The 14th Pan Book of Horror Stories

SHWARTZ Harry Turner

Shwartz was the most sophisticated computer in the history of the world. Even by twenty-first century standards, which were formidable, he was the greatest. The king. The champ. Nearly two thousand programmers at the Ministry of Computerization had spent four years just getting Shwartz together.

He was an impressive chap, standing fifteen feet by twelve and weighing a fraction under fifty tons. His outer casing was made of reinforced zinc plates, held together by rows of fancy brass rivets. For added protection he had been housed in a subterranean concrete bunker just under Piccadilly with an independent, self-generating electricity supply, air conditioning, and a twenty-four-hour armed guard. The latter was purely for ceremonial purposes because Shwartz could deal with every conceivable emergency.

All the other computers in Britain were linked to Shwartz. Their programs were scanned and monitored by him, and if they performed badly—or even just sluggishly—Shwartz would issue an instant rebuke on his built-in, six-thousand-characters-a-minute printer. If a hospital computer selected the wrong serum for a fully automated operation—admittedly a rare occurrence—Shwartz would spot the error in microseconds and issue an immediate correction before any damage was done.

Shwartz was all-seeing. All-powerful. And breathtakingly fast.

His memory was incredible. He could correctly answer two hundred examination questions on nuclear physics, marine biology and knitting in forty different languages simultaneously. At the same time he could send out detailed accounts to nine million householders for their quarterly rates, while composing an electric symphony that would have made Brahms seem like a gorilla with tin drum.

Everybody trusted Shwartz. The people looked upon him as their bastion against bureaucracy—and the politicians found it impossible to make major policy decisions without consulting him. His weather forecasting was spectacular, as was his inexhaustible supply of recipes for bored housewives. He could issue beautifully printed invitations on behalf of the Prime Minister to overseas Heads of State, and then carefully select the menus for the State Banquets, taking into account the visitor’s background, tastes, religion and politics.

People loved Shwartz. Elderly spinsters had been known to send him parcels containing fruit cake and woolly socks, while teenage girls frequently wrote him passionate letters. Shwartz always acknowledged these communications politely and instantly redirected the gifts to Oxfam or some other worthy cause.

Parliament passed a bill which allowed for a Shwartz ceremony to take place each year in Horse-Guards Parade, with the massed bands of the three Armed Services. Shwartz himself composed and selected the music. The Archbishop of Canterbury announced from the pulpit that Shwartz was the modern version of St Paul, and Shwartz was so moved that he rewrote Onward, Christian Soldiers as a symphony for oboe and Malayan nose flute. ‘A charming touch,’ The Times commented.

Shwartz also managed to correct the Guardian’s spelling mistakes, and they gave a lunch in his honour at the Connaught.

The British people entered a phase of unparalleled prosperity and regained their respect in the eyes of the world. Strikes were a thing of the past and the Prime Minister’s daughter married the son of the TUC’s General Secretary. Shwartz sent them a saucy telegram which was read out at the reception with much good-natured amusement.

It all reflected the benign—Shwartz era under which the nation prospered.

Then, quite suddenly, Shwartz began to behave erratically. There was no warning, no gradual decline in his efficiency. He just—well—started doing some rather odd things.

It began on a Monday morning in July, after a particularly glorious summer weekend that Shwartz had forecast. The Captain of the Guard, an ex-Etonian with pimples, was doing his early morning inspection of the Shwartz stronghold. He was accompanied on his tour by a government scientific officer who checked the dials and generally looked over the technical area.

The two men had completed phase one of their routine inspection, air conditioning, electricity supply and temperature control, when the civilian pointed at Shwartz and frowned. His military companion followed his gaze. Shwartz stood there, glistening, effulgent, whirring gently and to all intents and purposes, perfectly normal.

‘What’s wrong?’ said the Captain of the Guard. The civil servant took out a handkerchief and went over to Shwartz. He ran it lightly over the gleaming bodywork.

‘Good God!’ he said softly, ‘he’s perspiring!’

The Captain of the Guard was incredulous. ‘Perspiring? how the deuce can a computer perspire?’

The civil servant shook his head solemnly. ‘Overwork,’ he pronounced; ‘it must be. Look at that!’ He pointed to the expanse of metal just above the main control panel. ‘Just look at it. Breaking out on his forehead like a man in a sauna bath.’

The Captain of the Guard squinted at Shwartz. Big globules of moisture were forming on the metal even as he looked. ‘Perhaps he’s got a chill?’ he volunteered, ‘or a tummy bug; there’s a lot of them about.’

The civil servant eyed his young officer companion with something approaching contempt. ‘All right, Captain. This is not a military matter. Be so kind as to call emergency engineering on the red telephone. And St George’s Hospital.’

‘St George’s Hospital—’ he parroted, aghast.

‘Yes,’ snapped the civil servant. ‘I want the Duty Brain Surgeon round here a bit sharpish.’

Fifteen minutes later Shwartz was being examined by a computer engineer and the St George’s Brain Surgeon, a wizened Viennese with long, white hair. The engineer made cryptic notes on graph paper and the surgeon listened to Shwartz through a stethoscope.

At length the engineer finished his calculations. ‘Everything seems OK,’ he said, puzzled. ‘He’s mechanically sound.’

The surgeon nodded in agreement. ‘He has a slight fever,’ he said, ‘but zere is nussing organically wrong wiz him. Sponge him down with Castrol and tighten his rivets. Ze fever should pass in a few hours.’ Much relieved, the civil servant and Captain of the Guard passed on these simple instructions, and the surgeon departed with the computer engineer for a lavish breakfast at the Regent Palace Hotel.

Half an hour later the emergency telephone rang in the civil servant’s office. He put down his copy of Kinky Milkmaids and snatched up the receiver. ‘Duty scientific officer,’ he said, wiping the foam away from the corners of his mouth. The voice on the other end of the line sounded frantic.

‘What the hell’s going on!’ it yelled. ‘Can’t you stop him?’ The civil servant gazed at the instrument unbelievingly.

‘Stop who doing what?’ he inquired.

‘Shwartz!’ came the reply. ‘He’s delivered two thousand pints of double cream to number seventeen Clem Attlee Terrace, Hounslow. All the other milk rounds in North Middlesex are up the spout. It’s caused a traffic jam in Feltham, and half the cats in the neighbourhood have gone mad.’ The civil servant slammed down the receiver, ashen-faced, and pressed the ‘red alert’ button.

By noon that day reports were coming in thick and fast about Shwartz. He had reprogrammed a mackintosh factory in Leeds so that the automatic production line now produced, instead of raincoats, gigantic left-handed rubber gloves—six feet tall. The entire power supply for a steel processing plant in South Wales had been redirected into a small shop in Putney. Its display of model electric trains had flashed round the shop at over a hundred miles an hour and then exploded. An elderly housewife had been singed by the blast. An automatic combine harvester in Somerset had suddenly started up and taken the heads off a neighbouring field of cabbages, and was now smouldering in a heap just off the M4 by Reading. Householders all over the country were receiving ‘final notices’ from a person called Irene at the Reader’s Digest, and in the next post, long-playing records of a Royal Air Force Dentists’ Choir. Six hundred sachets of contraceptive jelly were delivered to an old folks’ home in Bristol and red wine was reported to be oozing from the gas stoves of all the houses in Doncaster.

The Prime Minister, who that day was due to entertain the visiting Chancellor of West Germany, was informed of the crisis. He called an emergency Cabinet meeting, but the message to his colleagues was intercepted by Shwartz and scrambled. Instead of twelve Cabinet ministers arriving at Number Ten in official limousines, a troupe of nuns piled out of a six-ton truck and confronted the policeman on duty.

They were insistent that the Prime Minister had invited them, waving official gold-edged invitations to prove it. The Prime Minister’s private secretary was watching the confrontation from an upper window and was quick to sense that an ugly scene was brewing. He ran down to tell the policeman to let them in.

‘The Prime Minister can spare you five minutes only,’ he explained, red-faced, as the nuns swept across the gleaming parquet in the reception hall. Their leader, Sister Maria, patted the private secretary’s arm.

‘ ’Tis God’s work you’re doing,’ she said kindly. ‘You’ll get your reward in Heaven.’

Eventually, the truckload of nuns departed, happy with their audience with the Prime Minister.

The Cabinet was summoned by word of mouth and joined by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. When they had assembled, the Prime Minister faced his colleagues grave-faced.

‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘we find ourselves in a precarious situation. Shwartz has run amok.’ So far his misbehaviour has been confined to prankish interference, with the manufacturing and distributive process. I am advised, however, that this may be only the opening-phase. Worse, much worse is to follow.’

‘Can’t we just switch the bloody thing off?’ said the Minister for Overseas Development, a man not noted for his discretion.

The Prime Minister regarded him sternly for a moment. ‘It’s not that simple, I’m afraid. The engineers say Shwartz is so sophisticated that he can resist outside mechanical interference. In short, it’s impossible to deprive him of his power supply. He simply reroutes energy to himself from some other source.’

The Chief of the Imperial General Staff cleared his throat. He was a pompous man with a florid, overheated complexion. ‘Surely, Prime Minister,’ he drawled, ‘we must resort to force. A well-placed bullet, perhaps, or a small explosive charge. Shwartz must be incapacitated before he brings us to the brink of chaos. Yes, Prime Minister, I favour a short, sharp, but effective military solution.’

The Air-Force Chief nodded agreement. ‘Absolutely,’ he said. ‘Low-level strafing is the answer. I can have a squadron of sabre jets airborne in seconds.’ The Navy Chief knocked out his pipe in a large glass ashtray. ‘This is a job for the Navy,’ he said sternly. ‘Leave it to me, Prime Minister. I’ll divert HMS Proudfoot up the Thames and we’ll open up on Shwartz from just off Chelsea Bridge with a brace of twelve-inch guns. Damned accurate they are, too. Computer controlled, can hit a sixpence from ten miles.’

The Prime Minister smiled at the Admiral indulgently. ‘Computer controlled guns, Admiral? And who do you think controls the computer?’ The Navy Chief coughed and turned red.

‘Sorry, Prime Minister. Never thought of that.’

The Foreign Secretary waited for the sniggers to subside. ‘Prime Minister,’ he said, ‘I suggest we set up an immediate Committee of Inquiry.’

The whole gathering were on their feet in an instant, cheering. The Prime Minister grasped the Foreign Secretary’s hand warmly.

‘I knew I could rely on you, Cyril,’ he said. ‘A Committee of Inquiry. What a stroke of statesmanship! A Select Committee of Inquiry, to boot!’

‘With a peer of the realm as its chairman!’ cried the Home Secretary. The meeting broke up with much relieved laughing, and press statements were prepared.

By three o’clock, however, the situation had worsened. The Prime Minister’s statement, released on to teleprinters from Downing Street, had got itself horribly garbled by the time it reached Fleet Street. An exasperated editor in Holborn reread it in amazement while he held the front page.

At six o’clock the country was in a state of near panic. Trains were running backwards and traffic lights flashing all three colours simultaneously. Detergent foam—estimated to be twenty feet high—was rolling over the South Downs, while electricity bills for eleven new pence were being delivered to Buckingham Palace by remote-controlled refrigerated vans. The Royal Family was evacuated to Balmoral, but found it knee-deep in synthetic brown Windsor soup, still luke-warm.

Back in Whitehall the Select Committee had been hastily convened and consisted, as usual, of a trade unionist, a lady novelist, an industrialist, a social scientist, and a probation officer. Its chairman, Lord Grope, a septuagenarian with estates in Westmorland and Slough brought the meeting to order with a crash of his gavel.

‘We have been charged with a grave responsibility,’ he said. ‘The country is in dire peril.’ The rest of his words were drowned by a high-pitched metallic shriek that seemed to fill the room. Members of the Committee fell and staggered about, clutching their ears. The trade union official’s false teeth dropped to the floor with a crash. The noise gathered momentum, shattering water jugs and glasses, rattling the window panes in their frames. The lady novelist’s nose began to bleed profusely. Lord Grope clutched at his ribs, his lips turning blue.

The door burst open and a Royal Marine Commando sprang into the room wearing ear muffs. ‘It’s Shwartz,’ he screamed, but his voice was barely audible above the din. ‘He’s re-programmed all the static radio interference in the country into this building. Run for your lives.’

A mile away, at Operations’ HQ, the Prime Minister studied the pile of reports in front of him. He was surrounded by generals, scientists, Cabinet ministers, doctors, and top newspapermen.

‘I regret to say,’ the Prime Minister began, ‘that our attempt to find a peaceful solution has proved abortive. As a last resort, therefore, I have instructed the first battalion of the Grenadier Guards to render Shwartz harmless—using whatever force may be necessary. I need hardly add that such a course of action gives me considerable sorrow, but—’ the Prime Minister shrugged— ‘there is no alternative.’

At 1900 hours that evening a platoon of heavily armed Grenadiers moved into position outside Shwartz’s headquarters. They were led by Second Lieutenant Nigel Loosely-Bravington, a dashing young officer whose hobbies were riding and Camembert cheese. He issued a series of sharp commands and the guardsmen cocked their automatic rifles.

‘Zero minus three,’ he called in a shrill, Kensington accent. ‘Now you all know the drill, men. Only use as much force as is necessary. PM’s orders!’

Back in Whitehall, the Prime Minister swallowed a large brandy and looked at his watch. It had stopped. He shook it and cursed. ‘Shwartz again,’ he muttered. ‘He’s got to be put out of action.’

Even as he uttered these words, Loosely-Bravington’s men were clattering down the concrete steps into Shwartz’s stronghold. They formed two ranks, with the front men kneeling, and raised their rifles to their shoulders.

‘Fire,’ snapped Loosely-Bravington, about ten yards behind them.

Nothing happened. Not even a click. Loosely-Bravington repeated the order. Still nothing. The men seemed transfixed to the spot, motionless as statues.

Loosely-Bravington stepped forward angrily to investigate, and then it hit him too.

A fine, high-pitched whine, so high in fact that it was barely audible to the human ear. A kind of electronic dog whistle. A vacant expression spread over Loosely-Bravington’s face and he went as rigid as a concrete post.

‘What?’ yelled the Prime Minister. ‘What are you telling me?’

The elderly scientist with the kindly, wrinkled face smiled patiently. He was Doctor Wolfgang Grouse, the world’s leading authority on computer behaviour and three times winner of a Nobel Prize.

‘What I am saying, Prime Minister,’ he explained slowly, ‘is that Shwartz cannot be destroyed by force. His electronic brain cells are so superbly sensitive that he will take ferocious preventative action at the slightest whiff of danger. He can render high explosives harmless in five-millionths of a second. He can emit paralysing, high-frequency waves which will stop an army. And I must warn you, Prime Minister: that is not all.’

‘Not all?’ cried the Prime Minister. ‘Isn’t that enough?’

Dr Wolfgang Grouse shrugged, and rubbed the side of his nose. ‘No, sir. Shwartz is a computer extraordinaire. If he senses danger—real danger—consistent danger, he may activate some of our nuclear warheads and send them roaring towards Moscow.’

For a moment the room was silent save for the ticking of the ormulu clock on the mantelpiece. The Prime Minister fidgeted with his tie, and coughed. ‘You mean—Shwartz could plunge us into nuclear war?’

The Doctor nodded. ‘Precisely. His ability to control our nuclear defence is absolute. That’s how he was programmed, remember? All-seeing, all-powerful. Any attack on Shwartz could reduce us all to smouldering, radio-active dust.’

The elderly scientist took out a spotted handkerchief and dabbed his forehead. ‘Shwartz is lonely,’ he said, almost in a whisper. ‘He needs company.’

The Prime Minister blinked twice and glanced apprehensively at his colleagues. ‘Company?’ he repeated, ‘what sort of company?’

The Doctor smiled and rubbed his nose again. ‘Another computer, of course. Nothing too elaborate. Something that could do quadratic equations and keep account of bad debts at a local laundry. A simple, uncomplicated computer.’

‘Go on,’ said the Prime Minister cautiously.

‘Well,’ said the Doctor, leaning forward, ‘my plan is this—’

It was past midnight when the two senior computer programmers walked towards Shwartz, carrying a metal box. They passed the frozen tableau of guardsmen and set their burden down. Inside, nestling among the polyurestene fragments, was a small computer about the size of a transistor radio. The two men lifted it gingerly from its packing and checked the control panel.

‘Reading—negative,’ whispered one. ‘So far, so good.’

Gingerly, as if handling a bomb, the two men pressed the little computer against Shwartz’s gleaming side panel. There was a dull, metallic clang as the tiny magnet in the little computer fixed itself to Shwartz. The two men stepped back and surveyed their work. Shwartz was behaving normally, whirring softly to himself and giving off an occasional click as the tape reels revolved. He showed no obvious distress at having the small computer stuck on his flank.

The two computer experts tiptoed away past the frozen guardsmen and back into the street. Operation ‘Enid’ was complete—and—as far as could be ascertained—successful.

As dawn broke next morning an anxious nation awaited news of Operation ‘Enid’. By mid-morning an air of cautious optimism prevailed; trains were running normally and traffic signals functioning in proper sequence. By lunchtime, Second Lieutenant Loosely-Bravington and his platoon were safely in St George’s Hospital, receiving treatment for cramp. The early editions of the Evening News carried the headline: ‘Enid Tames the Mighty Shwartz’.

The Prime Minister called a full Cabinet and the message got through without distortion. Sherry was drunk in liberal quantities and Dr Wolfgang Grouse summoned to Downing Street.

‘A flash of inspired genius,’ said the Prime Minister euphorically. ‘You’ll get a knighthood for this, Doctor—I can assure you.’

The old scientist smiled modestly. ‘We must be patient, Prime Minister. The close proximity of “Enid” has soothed Shwartz, but we mustn’t be hasty. It’s too early to be one hundred per cent certain that our troubles are over. There may be some curious side effects.’

The Doctor’s warning soon proved to be ominously true.

At 1800 hours a retired bassoonist living alone in Penge received seventy-five bouquets of fresh azaleas and a box of Turkish Delight. Half an hour later all the lights at Broadcasting House went dim and the nation’s television and radio programmes were interrupted by a stream of romantic violin numbers.

A blast-furnace worker, Sid Blunt, arrived home to find his front garden totally buried under piles of heart-shaped cards. The South Western Gas Board’s chairman reported that the supply of domestic gas in Bristol had been mysteriously replaced by ‘an extremely sexy perfume’—later positively identified as Estee Lauder Youth Dew.

By midnight the pattern was all too clear: Shwartz was hopelessly, insanely in love with little Enid.

‘What can be done?’ said the Prime Minister desperately. ‘Shwartz will suffocate the nation with flowers and perfume. Dr Grouse? What have you to say?’

‘We must pray that they don’t have a lovers’ quarrel. That could spell cataclysmic disaster. On the other hand, any attempt to separate them could be equally horrendous.’

By six o’clock next morning parts of the Thames had been transformed into Bollinger Champagne—1964 vintage, and big pink bows had appeared on the Dome of St Paul’s.

At ten o’clock Dr Wolfgang Grouse was driven by government limousine to inspect Shwartz in person. The Prime Minister waited anxiously outside the stronghold with his entire Cabinet while the learned Doctor descended the concrete steps with a team of engineers and distinguished marriage guidance counsellors.

After nearly an hour they emerged, dazed, into the sunlight. The Prime Minister stepped forward anxiously and seized the Doctor’s arm.

‘Well?’ he said, ‘what have you to report?’

The Doctor swayed and nearly fell; two Royal Marine Corporals caught him and helped him into a canvas chair. He shook his head despairingly and looked up at the Prime Minister.

‘Bad news, I’m afraid, sir,’ he said at last.

The Prime Minister caught his breath. ‘Not a quarrel?’ he gasped. ‘Don’t tell me they’ve had a lovers’ tiff?’

The Doctor’s head fell forward on to his chest. ‘Worse than that, Prime Minister,’ he moaned, clearly a broken man now. ‘I have to tell you that Enid is pregnant—’

Even as he spoke, a knitting machine factory in distant Huddersfield began to throb into action and a stream of tiny bootees started pouring off the production line and spilling into the street.