The Demolished Man Part 24

"Correction," Duffy smiled. "Just for the record. You awoke."

"I'm asleep!" Reich shouted. He sat up. "Have you got a shot? Anything... opium, hemp, somnar, lethettes... I've got to wake up, Duffy. I've got to get back to reality."

Duffy bent over him and kissed him hard on the mouth. "How about this? Real?"

"You don't understand. It's all been delusions... hallucinations... everything. I've got to readjust, reorientate, reorganize... Before it's too late, Duffy. Before it's too late, too late, too late..."

Duffy threw up her hands. "What the h.e.l.l's happened to medicine!" she exclaimed. "First that d.a.m.ned doctor scares you into a faint. Then he swears you're patched up... and now look at you. Psychotic!" She knelt on the bed and shook a finger against Reich's nose. "One more word out of you and I call Kingston."

"What? Who?"

"Kingston, as in hospital. Where they send people like you."

"No. Who did you say scared me into a faint?"

"A doctor friend."

"In the square in front of police headquarters?"

"X marks the spot."

"Sure?"

"I was with him, looking for you. Your valet told me about the explosion and I was worried. We got to the rescue just in time."

"Did you see his face?"

"See it? I've kissed it."

"What's it look like?"

"It's a face. Two eyes. Two lips. Two ears. One nose. Three chins. Listen, Ben, if this is some more of the awaken-asleep-reality-infinity lyrics... it ain't commercial."

"And you brought me here?"

"Sure. How could I pa.s.s up the opportunity? It's the only way I can get you into my bed."

Reich grinned. He relaxed and said: "Duffy, you may now kiss me."

"Mr. Reich, you have already been kissed. Or was that when you were still awake?"

"Forget that. Nightmares. Plain nightmares." Reich burst into laughter. "Why the h.e.l.l should I worry about having nightmares? I have the rest of the world in my hands. I'll take the dreams too. Didn't you once ask to be dragged through the gutter, Duffy?"

"That was a childish whim. I thought I could meet a better cla.s.s of people."

"You name the gutter and you can have it, Duffy. Gold gutters... Jewelled gutters. You want a gutter from here to Mars? You'll have it. You want me to turn the System into a gutter? I'll do it. Christ! I can turn the Galaxy into a gutter if you want it." He jabbed his chest with his thumb. "Want to look at G.o.d? Here I am. Go ahead and look."

"Dear man. So modest and so hung-over."

"Drunk? Sure, I'm drunk." Reich thrust his legs out of the bed and stood up, reeling slightly. Duffy came to him at once and he put his arm around her waist for support. "Why shouldn't I be drunk? I've licked D'Courtney. I've licked Powell. I'm forty years old. I've got sixty years of owning the whole world ahead of me. Yes. Duffy... the whole d.a.m.ned world!" He began walking around the room with Duffy. It was like a stroll through her ebullient erotic mind. A peeper decorator had reproduced Duffy's psyche perfectly in the decor.

"How'd you like to start a dynasty with me, Duffy?"

"I wouldn't know about starting dynasties."

"You start with Ben Reich. First you marry him. Then---"

"That's enough. When do I start?"

"Then you have children. Boys. Dozens of boys..."

"Girls. And only three."

"And you watch Ben Reich take over D'Courtney and merge it with Monarch. You watch the enemies go down... like this!" In full stride, Reich kicked the leg of a busty vanity table. It toppled and crashed a score of crystal bottles to the floor.

"After Monarch and D'Courtney become Reich, Incorporated, you watch me eat up the rest... the small ones... the fleas. Case and Umbrel on Venus. Eaten!" Reich brought his fist down on a torso-shaped side table and smashed it. "United Transaction on Mars. Mashed and eaten!" He crushed a delicate chair. "The GCI Combine on Ganymede, Callisto, and Io... t.i.tan Chemical & Atomics... And then the smaller lice: the backbiters, the haters, the Guild of Peepers, the moralists, the patriots... Eaten! Eaten! Eaten!" He pounded his palm against a marble nude until it toppled from its pedestal and shattered.

"Clever-up, dog," Duffy hung on his neck. "Why waste all that dear violence? Punch me around a little."

He lifted her in his arms and shook her until she squealed. "And parts of the world will taste sweet... like you, Duffy; and parts will stink to high heaven ... but I'll gobble them all." He laughed and crushed her against him. "I don't know much about the G.o.d business, but I know what I like. We'll tear it all down, Duffy, and we'll build it all up to suit us... You and me and the dynasty."

He carried her to the window, tore away the drapes and kicked open the sashes with a mighty jangle of smashed gla.s.s. Outside, the city was in velvet darkness. Only the skyways and streets twinkled with lights, and the scarlet eyes of an occasional Jumper popped up over the jet skyline. The rain had stopped and a slender moon hung pale in the sky. The night wind came whispering in, cutting through the cloy of the spilled perfume.

"You out there!" Reich roared. "Can you hear me! All of you... sleeping and dreaming. You'll dream my dreams from now on! You'll---"

Abruptly he was silent. He relaxed his hold on Duffy and permitted her to slide to the floor alongside him. He seized the sides of the window and poked his head far out into the night, twisting his neck to stare up. When he drew his head back into the room, his face wore a bewildered expression.

"The stars," he mumbled. "Where are the stars?"

"Where are the what?" Duffy wanted to know.

"The stars," Reich repeated. He gestured timidly toward the sky. "The stars. They're gone."

Duffy looked at him curiously. "The what are gone?"

"The stars!" Reich cried. "Look up at the sky. The stars are gone. The constellations are gone! The Great Bear... The Little Bear... Ca.s.siopeia... Draco... Pegasus... They're all gone! There's nothing but the moon! Look!"

"It's the way it always is," Duffy said.

"It is not! Where are the stars?"

"What stars?"

"I don't know their names... Polaris and... Vega... and... How the h.e.l.l should I know their names? I'm not an astronomer. What's happened to us? What's happened to the stars?"

"What are stars?" Duffy asked.

Reich seized her savagely. "Suns... Boiling and blazing with light. Thousands of them. Billions of them... s.h.i.+ning through the night. What the h.e.l.l's the matter with you? Don't you understand? There's been a catastrophe in s.p.a.ce, the stars are gone!"

Duffy shook her head. Her face was terrified. "I don't know what you're talking about, Ben. I don't know what you're talking about."

He shoved her away, turned and ran to the bathroom, and locked himself in. While he was hurriedly bathing and dressing, Duffy pounded on the door and pleaded with him. Finally, she broke off, and seconds later he heard her calling KingstonHospital, using a guarded voice.

"Let her start explaining about the stars," Reich muttered, halfway between anger and terror. He finished his toilette and came out into the bedroom.

Duffy cut the phone off hastily and turned to him.

"Ben," she began.

"Wait here for me," he growled. "I'm going to find out."

"Find out about what?"

"About the stars!" he yelled. "The Christ almighty missing stars!"

He flung out of the apartment and rushed down to the street. On the empty footway, he paused and stared up again. There was the moon. There was one brilliant red point of light... Mars. There was another... Jupiter. There was nothing else. Blackness. Blackness. Blackness. I hung over his head, enigmatic, unrelieved, terrifying. It pressed downward, by some trick of the eye, oppressive, stifling, deadly.

He began to run, still staring upward. He turned a corner of the footway and collided with a woman, knocking her flat. He pulled her to her feet.

"You clumsy b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" she screamed, adjusting her feathers. Then in an oily voice: "Lookin' for a good time, pilot?"

Reich held her arm. He pointed up. "Look. The stars are gone. Have you noticed? The stars are gone."

"What's gone?"

"The stars. Don't you see? They're gone."

"I don't know what you're talking about, pilot. Cmon. Let's have us a ball."

He tore himself away from her claws and ran. Halfway down the footway was a public v-phone alcove. He stepped in and dialed information. The screen lit and a robot voice spoke: "Question?"

"What's happened to the stars?" Reich asked. "When did it happen? It must have been noticed by now. What's the explanation?"

There was a click, a pause, then another click. "Will you spell the word, please."

"Star!" Reich roared. "S-T-A-R. Star!"

Click, pause, click. "Noun or verb?"

"G.o.d d.a.m.n you! Noun!"

Click, pause, click. "There is no information listed under that heading," the canned voice announced.

Reich swore, then fought to control himself. "Where's the nearest Observatory to the city?"

"Kindly specify city."

"This city. New York."

Click, pause, click. "The Lunar Observatory at CrotonPark is situated thirty miles north. It may be reached by Jumper Route North Coordinate 227. The Lunar Observatory was endowed in the year two thousand---"

Reich slammed down the phone. "No information listed under that heading! My G.o.d! Are they all crazy?" He ran out into the streets, searching for a Public Jumper. A piloted machine cruised past and Reich signalled. It swooped to pick him up.

"Northco 227," he snapped as he stepped into the cabin. "Thirty miles. The Lunar Observatory."

"Premium trip," the driver said.

"I'll pay it. Jet!"

The cab jetted. Reich restrained himself for five minutes, then began casually: "Notice the sky?"

"Why, mister?"

"The stars are gone."

Sycophantic laugh.

"It's not supposed to be a joke," Reich said. "The stars are gone."

"If it ain't a joke, it needs explaining," the driver said. "What the h.e.l.l are stars?"

A blasting reply trembled on Reich's lips. Before it could erupt, the cab landed him on the observatory grounds close to the domed roof. He snapped: "Wait for me," and ran across the lawns to the small stone entrance.

The door was ajar. He entered the observatory and heard the low whine of the dome mechanism and the quiet click of the observatory clock. Except for the low glow of the clock-light, the room was in darkness. The twelve-inch refractor was in operation. He could see the observer, a dim outline, crouched over the eyepiece of the guiding telescope.

Reich walked toward him, nervous, strained, flinching at the loud clack of his footsteps in the silence. There was a chill in the air.

"Listen," Reich began in a low voice. "Sorry to bother you but you must have noticed. You're in the star business. You have noticed, haven't you? The stars. They're gone. All of them. What's happened? Why hasn't there been any alarm? Why's everybody pretending? My G.o.d! The stars! We always take them for granted. And now they're gone. What's happened? Where are the stars?"

The figure straightened slowly and turned toward Reich. "There are no stars," it said.

It was the Man With No Face.

Reich cried out. He turned and ran. He flew out of the door, down the steps and across the lawn to the waiting cab. He blundered against the crystal cabin wall with a crack that dropped him to his knees.

The driver pulled him to his feet. "You all right, Mac?"

"I don't know," Reich groaned. "I wish I did."

"None of my business," the driver said, "but I think you ought to see a peeper. You're talkin' crazy."

"About the stars?"

"Yeah."

Reich gripped the man. "I'm Ben Reich," he said, "Ben Reich of Monarch."

"Yeah, Mac. I recognized you."