To Live Again

Chapter 3

Charles Noyes awoke slowly, reluctantly, fighting the return to the waking world. He lay alone in a bed that was just barely long enough for his lanky body. His arms twitched; his eyelids fluttered. Morning was here. Time to rise, time to toil. He fought it.

—Come on, you cowardly bastard, said James Kravchenko within his mind. Wake up!

Noyes moaned. He jammed his eyelids together. “Let me alone.”

—Up, up, up! Greet the morning’s glow. “You aren’t supposed to talk to me, Kravchenko. You’re just supposed to be there.”

—Look, I didn’t ask to be pushed into your brain. Anytime you’d like to let me out, you know where to go.

“You don’t mean that. You’re only bluffing. You want to stay right where you are, Kravchenko. Until you can take me over entirely, and run me like a puppet”

Kravchenko did not reply. Several minutes passed, and the persona remained silent. Once again Noyes considered getting out of bed, but waited, convinced that Kravchenko would nag him again, and willing to arise only when nagged. But in the continued silence he knew the onus was on him to get their shared body up. He pushed back the covers and disconnected the night monitor.

Beside his bed lay the deadly flask of carniphage. Noyes eyed it tenderly. His first thought upon arising, like his last at night, was of suicide. No. Duicide. When he went he would take Kravchenko with him. He picked up the flask and cradled it in his hand, stroking it with affection.

Within the fragile container lay a lethal quantity of beta-13 viral DNA, a replicative molecule whose action it was to persuade the cells of the body to release autolytic enzymes, certain acid hydrolases, from the lysosomes or “suicide bags” within themselves. Moments after ingestion, the carniphage created such a cascading wave of autolysis that the body literally fell apart; cell death was general and consecutive, and as each cell in turn succumbed to the flow of fatality, the carniphage devoured it. It was a swift but unusually agonizing way to die, since the body turned to slime from the digestive tract outward, and as much as eight or ten minutes might pass before the nerve centers were no longer able to register the pain of dissolution. But the splendor of the poison lay in its total irreversibility. There was no known antidote, nor even a conceivable one; neither could a stomach pump or any sort of similar device halt the process once it had begun to affect even a few cells. Let that cascade of destruction begin, and the victim was irrevocably doomed. Noyes sometimes thought of it as the Humpty Dumpty effect.

He set the carniphage down. — Go on, gulp it, why don’t you! “Very funny, Kravchenko.” — I mean it. Do you think you frighten me, waving that suicide juice around? I’ll get a new body soon enough, once you’re gone. Maybe you’ll be right in there with me, when I’m transplanted the second time.

Noyes reached for the flask. — Just put it to your lips and go crunch. It’s easy. “No, damn you! I’ll do it when I want to. Not to amuse you!” It seemed to him that he heard Kravchenko’s ghostly laughter. Putting the flask aside again, Noyes shed his nightclothes and began his morning rituals.

Religious observance. He reached for the Bardo. Untold generations of Episcopalian ancestors whirred like turbines in their New England tombs as the last and least scion of the Noyeses opened the barbarous Tibetan holy book. He turned, as usual, to the Bardo of the dying, the early section, before the demons appear, when nirvana is still within reach. In a low voice he read:

O nobly-born, listen. Now thou art experiencing the Radiance of the Clear Light of Pure Reality. Recognize it. O nobly-born, thy present intellect, in real nature void, not formed into anything as regards characteristics or color, naturally void, is the very Reality, the All-Good. Thine own intellect, which is now voidness, yet not to be regarded as the voidness of nothingness, but as being the intellect itself, unobstructed, shining, thrilling, and blissful, is the very consciousness, the All-good Buddha.

Cleanliness. He stood in the vibrator field for a minute.

Nutrition. He programed an austere breakfast.

Bodily hygiene. Grunting a bit, he performed the eleven stretchings and the seven bendings.

He ate. He dressed. The time was ten in the morning. He had returned with Roditis from San Francisco the night before, and he was still living on Pacific Standard Time, which made his awakening even more difficult than it normally was. Activating the screen, Noyes saw that the outer world looked cheerful and sunny, and the sunlight was the yielding light of April, not the harsh winter light that had engulfed this part of the world so long. He lived in a small apartment in the Wallingford district of Greater Hartford, Connecticut, close enough both to Manhattan and to his ancestral Boston. He tried to keep away from Massachusetts, but old compulsions drew him there periodically. One, at least, was external: at Roditis’ insistence, the two of them attended their Harvard class reunion each year. That was painful.

Any window into the past was a source of pain. Anything that reminded him of a time when he had been young, with prospects before him: a legal career, a fruitful marriage, a fine home, the joys of tradition. He had flunked out of law school. Flunked out of marriage, too. Today he was a wealthy man, but only because Roditis had picked him up from the junkheap and stuffed money in his pockets, as the price of his soul. Noyes’ credit balance was high, but he spent little and lived in a kind of genteel poverty, not out of miserliness but merely because he refused to believe that the largesse Roditis had showered upon him was real.

“Charles! Charles, are you up yet?” — His master’s voice, said Kravchenko slyly. “I’m here, John,” Noyes called into the other room, while sending a subliminal shout of fury at his persona. “I’m coming!” One entire wall of the sitting room bore a viewscreen that was hooked into Roditis’ master communications circuit. No matter where Roditis was, at any station along the territory of his farflung empire, he could activate that circuit and introduce himself, life-size, three dimensions, into Noyes’ apartment. Noyes presented himself before the screen and confronted the blocky figure of his friend and employer. The furniture surrounding Roditis was that of his office in Jersey City: stock tickers, computer banks, data filters, the huge green eye of an analysis machine. Roditis looked wide awake. He said, “Feeling better?”

“Passable, John.”

“You were in lousy shape when we got back last night I was worried about you.”

“A night’s sleep, that’s all I needed.”

“The acknowledgment on the lamasery gift just came in. Want to see what the guru’s got to say?”

“I suppose.” Roditis gestured. His image shattered and vanished, and for a moment a cloudy blueness filled the screen; then came the sharp snap of a message flake being thrust into a holder, followed by the appearance in Noyes’ sitting room of the holy man from San Francisco. Noyes had the illusion that he smelled incense. The guru, all smiles, poured forth a honeyed stream of praise and gratitude for Roditis’ generous gift. Noyes sat through it impatiently, wondering why Roditis was bothering to inflict these few minutes of fatuity on him. Of course the guru was going to sound grateful, after having been handed a million dollars; of course he was going to say that Roditis was blessed among men in wisdom, and worthy of many rebirths. Noyes had the uneasy suspicion that Roditis genuinely believed what the guru was saying — that he felt it was praise earned through merit, not merely bought for cash. It was something like a sonic sculptor who bribed the Times critic to give him a rave, then called up all his friends and proudly read them the glowing review. Not a day passed on which Noyes failed to rediscover the core of naпvetй that lay within John Roditis’ energetic, shrewd, ruthless spirit.

The guru reached his peroration and vanished from the screen. Roditis returned, beaming.

“What did you think of that?”

“Fine, John. Wonderful.”

“He really sounded happy about the gift”

“I’m sure he was. It was very handsome.”

“Yes,” said Roditis. “I’ll give him some more, by and by. I’ll make them name a whole damn wing of that place after me. The John Roditis Soul Bank for Departed Lamas, or something. Onward and upward, yes? Om mani padme hum, fella.”

Noyes said nothing. Kravchenko seemed to chuckle; Noyes felt it as a tickling in his frontal lobes.

Then, as though experiencing some inner shifting of gears, Roditis lost his look of jovial self-satisfaction, and a glimmer of strain showed through his carefully abstract expression. He said, “Mark Kaufmann is giving a party Saturday at his Dominica estate.”

“He’s coming out of mourning, then?”

“Yes. This is the first social thing he’s done since old Paul was gathered to repose. It’s going to be a big, noisy, expensive affair.”

“Are you invited?” Noyes asked. Roditis looked scornful. “Me? The filthy little nouveau riche with delusions of grandeur? No, of course I’m not invited! It’s mainly going to be a party for various Kaufmanns and their Jewish banking relatives.”

“John, you know you shouldn’t use that phrase.”

“Why? Does it make me seem a bigot? You know I’ve got nothing against Jews. Can I help it if the Kaufmanns are related to the other big Jewish bankers?”

“When you say it, somehow, it comes out like a sneer,” Noyes dared to tell him.

“Well, I don’t mean it as a sneer. You don’t sneer at a social and cultural elite. What you hear in my voice isn’t anti-Semitism, Charles, it’s simple envy without any neurotic irrational manifestations attached. There’ll be a mess of Lehmans and Loebs at that party. There won’t be any John Roditis. Frank Santoliquido is going to be there, too.”

“He’s not Jewish.” Roditis looked annoyed. “No, dolt, he isn’t! But he’s important, and he’s socially well-placed besides, and Mark Kaufmann is trying to buy his support in this business of the old man’s persona. Santoliquido and his girl friend are flying down on Mark’s own jet; that’s how tight things are getting. And you can bet that Mark is going to spend the whole day letting Santo know how important it is to keep Uncle Paul out of my clutches. That’s got to be counteracted somehow. Which is why you’re going to go to the party, too.”

“Me? But I’m not invited!”

“Get yourself invited.”

“Impossible, John. Kaufmann knows I’m connected to your organization, and if you’re on the dead list, you can bet that I—”

“You’re also connected to the Loebs, aren’t you?”

“Well, my sister married a Loeb, yes.”

“Damn right, she did. Won’t she be at the party?”

“I suppose she’s been invited, at any rate.”

“I know she has. I’ve got the complete guest list right here. Mr. and Mrs. David Loeb. That’s your sister, right?”

“Right.”

“Fine. Now, what happens if she phones Kaufmann and says she’s in the air over Cuba, say, and she’ll be landing in five minutes, and she’s happened to bring her kid brother Charlie along for the party? Is Kaufmann going to say no, send the scoundrel home?”

“He’ll be furious, John.”

“Let him be furious, then. He’ll have to maintain decorum, though. It’s not the sort of formal party where one extra guest throws the whole thing out of balance, and he can’t very well refuse you permission to attend with your sister. You’ll be admitted. The worst that’ll happen is you’ll get a few sour stares from Kaufmann. But socially you’ll be among your equals, and everybody else will be glad to see you, and there’ll be no hard feelings.”

Noyes’ fingers began to tremble. Kravchenko scrabbled derisively against the walls of his cranium. Carefully, Noyes reached to his left, out of the range of the sensors relaying his image to Roditis, and scooped a drink capsule from a tray. He activated the capsule and let the fluid flow into his arm. That was better. But not good enough. He felt sick. The idea of muscling his way into a party like this, parlaying his own tattered status and his sister’s connections by marriage into Roditis’ advantage, chilled and saddened him.

He said, “Assuming I succeed in crashing the party, John, what’s the purpose of my going there?”

“Mainly to get next to Santoliquido and work on him.”

“About the Paul Kaufmann persona?”

“What else? You can be subtle. You can be indirect. He’s going to make up his mind about the transplant any day now. I want it so bad I can taste it, Charles. Do you realize what I could do with Paul Kaufmann inside my head? The doors that would open for me, the plans I could bring off? And it’s all up to Santo. He’ll be down there, relaxed, out in the sunshine, drinking too much.

And you can work on him. Use the old charm. That’s what I pay you for, the old Episcopalian Anglo-Saxon charm. Turn it on!”

“All right,” Noyes muttered. “And even if you don’t get anywhere immediately with him, perhaps you can find a plan of action. Some vulnerable spot in his makeup. Some opening wedge that we can get leverage on.”

Appalled, Noyes said, “Are you thinking of blackmailing Santoliquido into approving your request?”

“Now, did I say that? What a terribly crude suggestion, Charles! I expect more finesse from you.” Roditis laughed heavily. “Call your sister. Get everything set up. Oh — Charles? How’s Jimmyboy?”

“Kravchenko? I think he’s asleep.”

“I’m sure he’ll appreciate going to the party too. He’ll see many of his old friends there. Call your sister, Charles.”

The screen darkened. Noyes looked at the floor. He knelt and dug his fingers into the carpet, trying to steady himself. His head seemed to be splitting into segments.

—Call your sister, Charles. Didn’t you hear the man? “I won’t!” — You’d better. You don’t dare defy him. “It’s filthiness! To crash a party so he can use me to suck up to Santoliquido—”

—He wants the old Kaufmann persona, doesn’t he? It’s his ticket to social respectability. Your job is to help him get what he wants.

“Not at the cost of my integrity.” — You got rid of that a long time ago. Come on, Chuck. He’s right: I want to go to that party. At least three of my wives ought to be there. I’d love to see how they’re aging.

“I’ll kill myself first!” — If you had the guts, I suppose you would. Pick up the phone. Call your sister.

Noyes heard mocking laughter in his skull.

He returned to the bedroom and eyed the carniphage flask. But, as ever, it was only a dramatic gesture, fooling neither himself nor the demonic persona he harbored. Defeat dragged at his muscles. He seized the phone and jabbed out the numbers. Moments later, his sister’s privacy code appeared on the little gray screen. She’s taking her morning bath, Noyes thought. He said, “It’s me, Gloria, just Charlie. Your wombmate.”

The screen cleared, and the face and shoulders of Gloria Loeb appeared. She wore some sort of flimsy wrap, and her cheeks and forehead were glossy with whatever mystic preparation she favored to keep her complexion eternally young. She was three years older than Noyes, and looked at least a dozen years younger. They had never liked one another. Her marriage to David Loeb had been a stunning social event sixteen years ago, a grandiose blowout, as was appropriate for the union of old New England aristocracy with old Jewish aristocracy. That was the fashionable sort of marriage these days, rapidly creating a tribe of AngloSaxon Hebrews whose formidable bloodlines linked them securely to Plantagenets on one hand, Solomon and David on the other, an unbeatable combination. Noyes had become very drunk at his sister’s wedding; in a way, his decline and fall had begun that evening, a few weeks after he had turned twenty-one.

She said coolly, “How good to hear from you again, Charles. You look well.”

“That’s a polite lie. I look terrible, and you can feel free to let me know about it.”

Her lips quirked impatiently. “Is something the matter? Are you all right?”

Noyes took a deep breath and said, “I need a tiny favor, Gloria.”