Why Do Birds

CHAPTER 23

She saw the airplane droning ahead under the stars, and the meteor coming in from outer space. The motions were very slow, like a display on a monitor. She could see the airplane inching ahead on its path, and the meteor converging, and she tried to call out but her voice didn't seem to work.

Then the meteor was so close that she could see the glow of superheated air around it, and then it collided and turned soundlessly into a ball of orange flame, and the twisted skeleton of the airplane went down toward the earth.

After he came back from Japan, Stone was in Washington for a week; when he turned up in New York again, he looked tired. "Rough time in Washington?" Lavalle asked him.

"Ah, you know, everybody wants to invite me out." He rubbed his belly. "This used to be flatter," he said ruefully. "And it's the same thing in New York. You remember that little dinner party that your boss invited me to before I left? It turned out to be thirty people, and they all wanted to invite me to dinner and lunch. I've got to cut down, but I don't want to hurt people's feelings."

"Just say no."

"Right. Something else, you know I've been getting fan mail? They showed me two sacks of it. I just brought along a few to show you. Here's one."

She looked at it. It was a folded sheet of cream-colored stationery; the writing, in purple ink, was large and round.

Dere Ed Stone,

I saw you on Holovison, I think you are supper. Plese tel me ar you Maryd. I woud like to Mary you.

Your Freind

EARLENE SMITH

"Sounds like a child," she said.

"No, here's a picture." He passed it over; it was a holoprint of a plump woman who appeared to be in her early fifties.

"Some of them are pretty steamy," Stone said. He picked up another letter and sniffed it. "Lavender," he said, and rolled his eyes.

"Do you know that cartoon characters get fan mail too?"

"What do you mean, like Popeye?"

"No, more like Dong the Barb arian, but it's the same thing. People even send them presents-flowers, cakes."

"Why do you suppose that is?"

"I guess they haven't got anything better to do."

After breakfast, Stone was looking at a simulated globe of the Earth in the holo; he tapped a key, making national boundaries appear and disappear. Red dots of light marked the cities where he had been. He tapped another key, creating yellow lines like a spiderweb.

"My folks want us to come out to Rye for Christmas," she said. "Do you want to?"

"Do you?"

"Yeah, I'd like you to meet them."

"You would, huh? What are they like?"

"Well, my mother is kind of dippy. My stepfather, Geoffrey Nero, is very smart. He's in a wheelchair, though."

"Uh-huh. Are we supposed to bring presents?"

"It wouldn't hurt."

"Okay."

Stone picked her up in a hired Cadillac Saturday morning, and they drove up the Major Deegan Expressway in brown sunlight. The Cadillac had its own air regenerator, and they kept the windows closed.

"I don't get this about Christmas," he said. "It's still the twenty-sixth, but it always falls on a weekend?"

"It's simple, they just drop a few days of the week. Like in this case, Christmas would have been on a Wednesday, and that's the dumps. You have to go back to work on Thursday? Thick. So now we make Saturday the next day after Tuesday, and then it comes out even."

"It still doesn't seem right. What happens to Wednesday, Thursday and Friday?"

"We put them back in after Christmas."

"So then you've got two Wednesdays, two Thursdays, and two Fridays?"

"Sure, and that's the dumps too, but you can't have everything."

They were driving past a golf course. "We're almost there," she said.

"Your stepfather is a golfer?"

"He used to be, but he's in a wheelchair now. Don't offer to shake hands with him, okay? His joints are very sensitive. Here we are."

The butler appeared as they were getting out of the car. "Good to see you again, Miss Linda. Why don't you go right in? I'll bring the luggage."

"That's fine." Lavalle dropped the card into his hand. "Henry, this is my friend Ed Stone. We'll share a room."

"How do you do, sir?" said Henry.

"Nice to meet you." Stone put out his hand, and after the barest hesitation Henry took it. Then he busied himself opening the trunk and pulling out luggage.

Lavalle led Stone into the foyer, where she dropped her coat and hat on the chest. She motioned for him to bend closer. "You're not supposed to shake hands with servants," she said in his ear.

He straightened up. "No, huh?"

"No. Come and meet my mother. "

"Can I shake hands with her?"

"Idiot."

"Wench." He put his hand on her buttock and squeezed.

"None of that," she said, pulling away. "Let's have a little dignity here. I want them to like you." She took his hand to keep it occupied, and led him into the sunny living room.

Her mother, who had been standing near her stepfather's wheelchair, came forward with an eager smile. "Linda, how nice to see you. And this is your young man?"

"This is Ed, Sherri. He's the one who was kidnapped by aliens."

"Yes, I know, dear. Linda, I probably ought to tell you that I've put a sword in your bed."

"You what?"

"Yes, like the knights of old, don't you remember? They put a sword between them in the bed and lay there all night long, perfectly chaste and pure. It's your great-grandfather's cavalry sword, and it isn't very sharp, but I'd be careful anyway."

"Sherri-"

"Don't you remember what happened the last time you had a young man here, dear? Enough said." She drew them toward the bay window, where Geoffrey sat crooked and smiling in his wheelchair.

"Geoffrey, this is Ed Stone, the one I told you about," said Lavalle.

"Well, Ed, we've heard a lot about you," said Nero, clacking his jaws. "Excuse me for not shaking hands. Sit down, sit down, both of you. You'd probably like a drink, wouldn't you, Ed, or a smoke? We don't drink or smoke here, but if you want to, go right ahead."

"Uh, no, that's okay," said Stone.

"Darling, the children would probably like an opportunity to freshen up, wouldn't you, dears? Linda, it's your old room at the end of the hall. Lunch will be ready in half an hour."

"Holy crap, she really did it," said Stone, looking at the sword in the bed.

"Well, take it out."

He tugged. "I can't. Oh, boy-it looks like it's chained down at both ends. Is she crazy, or what?"

"She's been a little strange since my father died. We can wrap a blanket around it or something."

"What did she mean about the last time?"

"Well, if you must know, I got pregnant when Julian was here."

"And?"

"Well, I had an abortion."

"This trip is a barrel of laughs," Stone said.

The dining area table was covered by a linen cloth and set with china and crystal, but the knives and forks were aluminum. Geoffrey pulled his wheelchair up to the window side of the table, with the broad green expanse of the first fairway behind him.

"Now, Ed," he said, "tell me about these aliens. What sort of critters are they?" His smile exposed his gray back teeth.

"They're about the size of rats. They ride around in the heads of robots."

"Is that right! Well, well. And they told you the world is coming to an end?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you believed them, of course. Well, I can understand that. Sherri, this pork is pretty tough-I can't even cut it up, much less chew it."

"Let me help you, dear."

"No, it's all right. I'll just have some more mashed potatoes. Ed," he said, "just between us, Marilyn, our cook-she's been with us seven years and we love her, but she can't cook pork. Mashed potatoes, yes. She makes the best mashed potatoes in the world. Turkey? Well, you wait and see. Pork, no. Pass me a little gravy, would you, dear?"

"Ow!" he said.

"What's the matter now?"

"The goddamn thing is electrified."

A pause.

"We could try the floor."

"No, the hell with it. Let's get some sleep."

After breakfast, when Stone was out of the room, Geoffrey beckoned her over. "Sweetheart, you know I'm just concerned about your best interests," he said.

"And you don't approve of Ed."

"Well, the man's a lunatic, isn't he?"

"Sometimes he thinks he is."

"He does, eh? That's a bad sign. Linda, you know he might actually be dangerous."

"To me? No."

"But you'd agree that he's dangerous to the world at large?"

"Oh, sure."

"Well, you know what you're doing, I suppose. Your mother is very disappointed, you know, but of course she's always disappointed."

On the way home, Stone asked, "What did your stepfather give you?"

"Some stock certificates. Gentech. If I sold them at the market, I wouldn't have to work for a year. "

"He's rich, huh."

"He's done all right. He doesn't even go to board meetings anymore, because of his heart, but he's an operator. What were you talking about in his study all that time?"

"He wanted to know what I thought about the value of real estate when we start loading the Cube. He thinks it'll go down, but not all the way. He offered to take me into a syndicate to sell it and then buy it back."

"Did you go for it?"

"No, I'd have to borrow the money, and I haven't got time anyway. I don't even think that was what was really on his mind."

"I don't either."

"He's deep, is he?"

"Deep and tricky. He sounds dumb sometimes, but don't ever believe that."