The Common Man Part 2

Dr. Braun abruptly ceased the pacing he had begun and found a chair. He absently stuck a hand into a coat pocket, pulled out a crumbled piece of paper, stared at it for a moment, as though he had never seen it before, grunted, and returned it to the pocket. He looked at Patricia O'Gara.

"We felt that on completely unknown territory he would feel less constrained, don't you remember? In his home town, his conscience would be more apt to restrict him."

Something suddenly came to her. She looked at her older companion suspiciously. "That newscast. Was there anything else on it? Don't look innocent, you know what I mean."

"Well, there was one item."

"Out with it," she demanded.

"The Hotel Belefonte threatens to sue that French movie star, Brigette whatever-her-name is."

"Brigette Loren," Patricia said, staring. "What's that got to do with Donald Crowley?"

The good doctor was embarra.s.sed. "It seems that she came running out of her suite, umah, semi-dressed and screaming that the hotel was haunted."

"Good heavens," Patricia said with sudden vision. "That's one aspect I hadn't thought of."

"Evidently Crowley did."

Patricia O'Gara said definitely, "My point's been proven. Our average man is a slob. Give him the opportunity to exercise unlimited freedom without danger of consequence and he becomes an undisciplined and dangerous lout."

Ross Wooley had come in, scowling, just in time to catch most of that.

He tossed his hat onto a table and fished in his pockets for pipe and tobacco. "Nuts, Pat," he said. "In fact, just the opposite's been proven. Don's just on a fun binge. Like a kid in a candy shop. He hasn't done anything serious. Went into a fancy restaurant and ate some expensive food. Sneaked into the hotel room of the world's most famous s.e.x-symbol and got a close-up look." He grinned suddenly. "I wish I had thought of that."

"Ha!" Patricia snorted. "Our engagement is off, you Peeping Tom."

"Children, children," Braun chuckled. "I'll admit, though, I think Ross is correct. Don's done little we three didn't when first given the robe of invisibility. We experimented, largely playfully, even childishly."

Patricia bit out, "This experiment is ridiculous, anyway, and I don't know why I ever agreed to it. Scientific? Nonsense. Where are our controls? For it to make any sense we'd have to work with scores of subjects. Suppose we do agree that the manner in which Don Crowley has reacted is quite harmless. Does that mean we can release this discovery to the world? Certainly not."

Ross said sullenly, "But you agreed that we'd go by the results of this...."

"I agreed to no such thing, Rossie Wooley, you overgrown lug. All I agreed to do was consider the results. I was, and am, of the opinion that if the person our politicians so lovingly call the Common Man was released of the restrictions inhibiting him, he'd go hog wild and destroy both society and himself. What is to prevent murder, robbery, rape and a score of other crimes, given invisibility for anyone who has a couple of dollars with which to go into a drugstore and purchase our serum?"

Her fiance sighed deeply, jamming tobacco fiercely into the bowl of his briar. He growled, "Look, you seem to think that the only thing that restricts man is the fear of being punished. There are other things, you know."

"Good heavens," she said sarcastically. "Name _one_."

"There is the ethical code in which he was raised, based on religion or otherwise. There is the fact that man is fundamentally good, to use a trite term, given the opportunity."

"My education has evidently been neglected," Patricia said, still argumentatively. "I've never seen evidence to support your claim."

"I'm not saying individuals don't react negatively, given opportunity to be antisocial," he all but snarled. "I'm just saying people in general, common, little people, trend toward decency, desire the right thing."

"Individuals my ... my neck," Patricia snapped back. "Did you ever hear of Rome and the games? Here a whole people, millions of them, were given the opportunity to indulge in s.a.d.i.s.tic spectacles to their heart's desire. How many of them stayed home from the games?" She laughed in ridicule.

Ross flushed. "Some of them did, confound it."

Dr. Braun had been taking in their debate, uncomfortably. As though in spite of himself, he said now, "Very few, I am afraid."

"Religious ethic," Patricia pursued, relentlessly. "The greatest of the commandments is Thou Shalt Not Kill, but comes along a war in which killing becomes not only permissible but an absolute virtue and all our good Christians, Jews, Mohammedans and even Buddhists, who supposedly are not even allowed to kill mosquitoes, wade in with sheer happiness."

"War releases abnormal pa.s.sions," Ross said grudgingly.

"You don't need a war. Look at the Germans, supposedly one of our most highly civilized people. When the n.a.z.i government released all restraints on persecution of the Jews, gypsies and others, you know what happened. This began in peace time, not in war."

Dr. Braun s.h.i.+fted in his chair. He said, his voice low, "We needn't look beyond our own borders. The manner in which our people conducted themselves against the Amerinds from the very beginning of the white occupation of North America was quite shocking."

Ross said to him, "I thought you were on my side. The Indian wars were a long time ago. We're more advanced now."

Dr. Braun said softly, "My father fought against Geronimo in Arizona. It wasn't so long ago as all that."

Ross Wooley felt the argument going against him and lashed back. "We've been over and over this, what's your point?"

Patricia said doggedly, "The same point I tried to make from the beginning. This discovery must not be generally released. We'll simply have to suppress it."

The door opened behind them. They turned. Nothing was there. Ross, scowling, lumbered to his feet to walk over and close it.

"Hey, take it easy," a voice laughed. "Don't walk right into a guy."

Ross stopped, startled.

Dr. Braun and Patricia stood up and stared, too.

Crowley laughed. "You all look like you're seeing a ghost."

Ross rumbled a grudging chuckle. "It'd be all right if we _saw_ the ghost, it's not seeing you that's disconcerting."

The air began to s.h.i.+mmer, somewhat like heat on the desert's face.

Crowley said, "Hey, the stuff's wearing off. Where're my clothes?"

"Where you left them. There in that bedroom," Ross said. "We'll wait for you." He went back and rejoined his a.s.sociates. The door to the bedroom opened, there was a s.h.i.+mmering, more obvious now, and then the door closed behind it.

"He rejoined us just in time," Dr. Braun murmured. "Another ten minutes and he would have ... umah ... _materialized_ down on the street."

Ross hadn't finished the discussion. He said, his face in all but pout, "What you don't realize, Pat, is the world has gone beyond the point where scientific discoveries can be suppressed. If we try to keep the lid on this today, the Russians or Chinese, or somebody, will hit on it tomorrow."

Patricia said impatiently, "Good heavens, let's don't bring the Cold War into it."

Ross opened his mouth to snap something back at her, closed it again and shrugged his bulky shoulders angrily.

In a matter of less than ten minutes the bedroom door reopened and this time a grinning Crowley emerged, fully dressed. He said, "Man, that was a devil of an experience!"

They saw him to a chair and had him talk it all through. He was candid enough, bubbling over with it all.