Why Do Birds

CHAPTER 25

Stone was at the Inter-Continental this time, in a suite decorated in Roman style: red walls and drapes, white leather furniture. The beds were swan boats. Late at night Lavalle woke up and saw that there was a square place in the middle of the room where the carpet had been cut away, and the floor beneath it too, apparently, because she could see some pieces of cardboard that had been put down there to fill the hole; but the cardboard was moving slowly, up and down, as if it were breathing, and when the pieces separated she could see darkness. And the bed was tipping toward it, but if she held on tight ...

She woke up trembling, turned on the light and smoked a cigarette. After a while she took a pill and went back to sleep.

She woke up again late in the morning, and when she wandered into the living room he was there, dressed, watching something on the flatscreen. He turned off the sound and put his arm around her.

"You ever see this guy?" On the screen, a bearded man was holding a sheet of paper with Hebrew letters on it. He was speaking earnestly.

"No, who's he?"

"He's dead now, I guess; I found this in a catalog under 'secret messages.' See, he was a Hebrew scholar, and he found out that if you took every forty-ninth letter of the Torah-that's what the Jews call the Bible-the first five letters spell 'Torah.' "

"Every forty-ninth letter? Why?"

"Beats me. Anyway, I thought I'd try it on the magazine. Forty-nine didn't work, but here's what I got when I tried twelve. Computer, give me the Moon message."

The bearded man vanished. Letters appeared on the screen:

dih PLOT oeodedhsdsiarlfhheit BEWRA fnrcprhwtfleteg estsveaaslcaahis I AM CAEGE YEA OOH sfavireaiueehee sgedgtaeruydfrcnftgf TIDY ik RED ralworo ISLE EH ioea thnwresn SEND nahtwluddenukfceohdeamsthhdrsn BOAT FROW rdeaen YAY ryddtaieodmborhmetaslnhonskai EH idodntedseliisd TAO CULT hmlisltsedn ...

"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked.

"Well, maybe nothing, but it says 'plot,' okay, and then 'bewra,' that might be 'beware.' Then the next part, that could be 'I am caged.' It sounds like he's asking for help. 'Send boat, frow.' Frau is German for wife, right?"

"Right. Back up a little. Who are you talking about when you say 'he'?"

"The author, Charles W. Diffin. He was up there in a spaceship, like me, and he used this code to get his message out."

"Wait a minute. He's up there in the spaceship, and he writes this story and sends it to a magazine? How could he do that?"

"I don't have any idea. One thing that's suspicious, though, the last story he had in a magazine was in nineteen thirty-five. After that, nobody seems to know what happened to him."

After a moment she said, "What's all that tao business?"

"I don't know. Some kind of conspiracy? One of the other runs, I used eleven letters, and I got something that could have been 'sect Egypt.' And it said 'lemonhead,' too. You think that could be just coincidence? And look here." He picked up the Astounding Stories from the end table, opened it and pointed to a page. June twentieth, nineteen seventy-three.' That's when the tidal wave comes in and floods the land he's just bought. Why that date? It isn't important to the story. That has to mean something. "

"That was thirty years ago."

"Right, so it has to be code. I was thinking, ought six, twenty, seventy-three-if you rearranged the numbers, you'd get seven, six, twenty ought three. July sixth next year. "

"You're making all this up."

"No, I'm not. One reason I think there has to be a code, he wrote it in plain English right here-'Harkness did not at once grasp the meaning of the thing. ' Harkness, that's me. He's telling me there's a hidden message."

"How is that you?"

"I'm the hero. See, and you're Diane Vernier. Well, she has another name, but they're both French, and she's Harkness's sweetheart. And Frank is Harkness's best friend, Chet Bullard, he's the pilot. But I haven't figured out who Schwartzmann is."

She said, "You know what I think?"

"Sure, you think I'm crazy. And I am, but that doesn't mean I have to be wrong.''

Later that day Stone was channel-hopping and got a skin sim: Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable jerking and throbbing together on rumpled sheets, while Shirley Temple watched from a doorway with one finger in her mouth, and Groucho Marx, standing behind her, bent to slide his hand into her panties. Gable's shlong, in close-up like a giant bratwurst, slowly penetrated Monroe's hairy berliner. Stone winced and turned it off.

"You don't like that?"

"No, it makes me sick. I've seen these places on Broadway where you watch stuff like that ana put your weenie in a machine. I think that's disgusting. My idea of something sexy is Ginger Rogers dancing in front of a window with a skirt you can see her legs through."

"Is she your ideal woman?"

"Oh, yeah. Well, I like Myrna Loy, too, and Carole Lombard. They don't have actresses like that anymore, or actors either. The new stuff knocks your eye out, you can see anybody doing anything, it's color and three-D, but where's the acting?"

"Listen, I thought your idea of something sexy was me."

"What, are you jealous of Ginger Rogers?" He grinned. "I never knew a dame like you."

"A dame, huh?"

"Well, what do you want me to call you, a girl?"

"I'm not a girl, I'm a woman. Another thing, I heard you refer to the night clerk as a Negro. They're African Americans now."

"They are?"

"Well, why not? We have German Americans, Japanese Americans."

"I never heard of those. Listen, where did all these Japs come from? I thought we beat them in the war, the krauts too."

"We did, and then we helped them get back on their feet. Don't call them japs and krauts."

"Jeest. All right. They're Japanese, right, and the krauts are Germans."

"Now you're getting it."

"Okay, what about the sheenies? Are they Hebrew Americans?"

"No, they're Jews, but don't call them sheenies or kikes."

"Honestly, what's the difference?"

"You use words like that, you're going to make somebody feel humiliated. That's what they're for. You're a kraut yourself, aren't you?"

"What makes you think so?"

"Just a hunch. What was your grandfather's name?"

"Stein. Maybe I'm a Jew, come to think of it."

"Does it make any difference?"

"Not to me. See, you're right, this is one way things are better now-not so much trouble between the races, more mixing. I'm for it, but then all this other stuff, the atom bombs, the pollution-it looks to me like we're heading for another world war, like we didn't learn anything from the last two, or else some kind of catastrophe, and we just have to sit here and watch it happen."

"In a hundred years it won't matter."

"We haven't got a hundred years. Sometimes I think people are too dumb to live."

In the silence, the computer cleared its throat and said, "Call from the desk. "

Stone said, "Okay, put it through."

The face of a deskperson appeared in the tube. "A Dr. Wellafield is here to see Mr. Stone, and there are some reporters in the lobby."

"Oh, hell. No reporters, but send Dr. Wellafield up."

"Yes, sir." The image in the tube dwindled to a multicolored marble and vanished.

"Who's this now?" she asked.

"He's the head doc at the place they put me in Trenton that time. I sent him a fax from Washington, but I didn't think he'd come."

"You want me to disappear?"

"No, I want you to meet him, he's a great guy."

The doorbell chimed; the tube lit up with the plump face of a man with a gray mustache. "Open," Stone said.

The man who entered was portly and not very tall, dressed in a red coat and a plaid sports jacket that bulged at his chest. "Doc!" said Stone, advancing to meet him. "Hey, it's great to see you-come on in. This is Linda Lavalle. I told her all about you."

"Nothing too bad, I hope," said Wellafield roguishly. They shook hands. "Well, Ed, how have you been?"

''Just great, Doc. Sit down, take off your coat, make yourself at home. You want some coffee?"

"That would be fine."

They sat at the table under the window; Wellafield removed his coat and jacket and draped them over a chair. Clipped to his shirt pocket was an impressive-looking device in a matte black case; a flesh-colored wire ran from it and disappeared somewhere at the back of his head.

"Hey, what've you got there?" Stone asked.

"The latest thing, Ed. We've had great success with patients, and I'm trying it out myself, as you see."

"What does it do?"

"It detects aberrant thought patterns and delivers a mild shock to the brain. I use it because I keep thinking about killing my wife- Woops. Unh!'' His face contorted briefly, then cleared.

Stone got a cup, poured coffee from the carafe. "Cream, sugar?"

"Yes, please."

"And it really helps?" Lavalle asked.

"Oh, yes, definitely. It wakes me up at night, though. Now, Ed-" He cleared his throat. "I've been following your career in the newspapers and TV, of course, and I was wondering if there's a place for me on your staff. I have some administrative skills, you know."

"What about the hospital?"

"I'm thinking about taking an early retirement, and perhaps a trial separation. My wife doesn't- Unh! Of course, if you don't think it would work out-"

"No, hey, Doc, I was just thinking, they probably don't want me to tell them what to do in Washington, but suppose you could travel with me and be my doctor?"

"Your personal physician, Ed? Why, that would be fine."

"Hey, excuse me for asking, but you're a real doctor, aren't you?"

"Oh, yes, yes."

"He means an M.D.," said Lavalle.

"Yes, I know." Wellafield beamed at them both. "I am a real doctor, Ed. I went into mental disorders years ago, of course, but I've still got my little black bag put away somewhere, and, ah, I can brush up, of course."

"Well, swell. Do you think you could move to New York sometime soon? Have you got a passport?"

"I certainly can. And I'll get a passport." He took Stone's hand in both of his. His eyes were moist. "I knew you wouldn't let me down. Well, I'd better go now and leave you two to get on with-uh, whatever. Are you going to be in town Monday?"

"No, I have to go back to Washington, and then Wednesday I'm flying to Europe."

"Well, you'll know where to reach me." He stood up and put on his jacket and coat. "It was nice to meet you, Ms. Lavalle."

"You too."

After he was gone, Stone said, "You like him?"

"Yes, I think he's sweet. But I'm glad you got rid of him."