Don't Look Now by Leonard Rubin (ebook and pdf reader .TXT) 📗

bathrobe," she said. "Black for me."

"One day soon," he muttered, "they'll build him a mushroom he'll never see the end of. Sandwich? Anything?"

"No." She took the warm plastic cup and sipped. It was bad coffee. Far below, a snort of traffic echoed down First Avenue. "I've only been here once before. I'm a bit lower-echelon for the Administrative roof."

"Who isn't?"

She looked past the white-on-red Emergency Exit sign to a wrought-iron gate in the hedge facing the river. "Look, the Silvertongue factory is all lit up. Every single window on the top floor."

"I should think so. You mean you don't know?"

"Know what?"

"My heavens, the fate of man's grasp on reality is being decided tonight! Congress was still in special session at five A.M.—still is, as far as I know."

"Session over what? Don't tell me the bombs have started."

"Visual interference by radio wave compression. Yesterday the Royalty called an immediate special session. There is at present no law to prevent the Christian E. Lodge Corporation from buying the right to tamper with light waves in the home, for advertising purposes or—God knows what other kinds of control."

"I didn't know. I was on duty with Mr. Barger and then no one told me."

"Barger was against it," said Dr. Brooks. "He sold them the device with a set of conditions on its use, but now they're buying the patent outright."

"But—don't they have to wait for him? Barger Electronics is his company."

"No. He's chairman of the board, but any three or more directors can sell the patent. Once it's sold, there will be nothing Congress can do."

"Why?" asked Miss Knox, staring out over the water. Some of the Silvertongue windows had winked out. The others vanished together, leaving only a pale vertical row to mark the fire stairs.

Three bells sounded.

"Your attention please!"—a piping male voice.

Brooks said, "I'll bet it's the Director himself."

"In a moment," shrilled the voice, "we will tune in the broadcast direct from Washington so that all personnel can hear history in the making. After the congressional vote, Dr. Hamilton, our director, will honor us with a few words here in the hospital, which he will repeat later for the benefit of the day shift."

There was a ringing tone, growling in volume like the approach of motorskates.

"I told you," Brooks shouted over the noise. "His family has stock in Silvertongue."

"... been informed that a purchase has been completed of full rights to the Barger Radiocompressor. I warn you that this device will be used indiscriminately against the public interest." The voice was strong but unsteady. "Barger engineers have been withdrawn. There are no controls—"

"Too late," said Brooks. "That's Thorpe of Louisiana."

"Bear with me now. I do not doubt that visual interference is already being used to disrupt this session of Congress. Do you understand? I have a blinding headache, brought about externally, I am quite certain. I can no longer read the notes in front of me. If what I say is still sense, I insist I want a vote, immediate vote, to make this thing illegal—illegal, and let the New York City police or the Militia or the Army—the Army...."

In sudden silence, she clung to Brooks' sleeve.

"Ladies and gentlemen," said the piping voice from within the hospital, "the House of Representatives is still far from approaching a vote. We will tune in debate on the Senate floor, being broadcast by another network."

"... alleged that Patent Number 90,732,440B has something to do with national safety. I assure you, gentlemen—ladies and gentlemen—that American business ethics will prevent such dangerous use of technology now as in the past, and that any weapons application will be confined strictly to that sphere where weapons are themselves a safety factor—the sphere of national defense against foreign aggressors.

"It has further been alleged that there is some connection between Patent Number 90,732,440B and the hospitalization of Mr. William Barger of Barger Electronics Company, Incorporated, who is currently afflicted with"—the Senator breathed a chuckle—"laryngitis.

"It has even been supposed by certain Senators that the non-fatal stabbing of Nathan Bonaparte, a part-time employee...."

Silence.

"Ladies and gentlemen," the voice from within the hospital said, "we will tune in again when the matter is brought to a vote. And now—Dr. Hamilton."

A long pause filled with buzzing.

"People," said the Director, and the buzzing ended. "There is no war. Let me repeat: there is no atomic war going on." He paused.

"Now there has been a lot of fuss over a steel tower on a factory across the river. I want to make it clear that no advertising gimmicks will change our job here. All hospitals—public, like ours, or even our esteemed allies, the private hospitals—are bound by medical and staff ethics to pay no official attention to the world of advertising.

"I am especially amazed by rumors that Nat Bonaparte, or 'Boney,' who does clean-up work here from time to time, was silenced because he 'knew something' about this wonderful advertising gimmick. Nothing can be sillier. It just happens that the fellow left my office shortly before he must have been wounded by delinquents from the nearby slums. He was giving me 'inside information,' as he called it, about light-ray guns, and mechanical hypnotism, and plots against the patients. These, apparently, are the things which Boney 'knew,' and he has been talking endlessly about them since I first came into office, and presumably before."

Brooks struck two cigarettes against his pack and handed one to Miss Knox. Their first puff obscured his puzzled frown.

"This fuss I am talking about," continued the Director, "has been taken as grounds for wild infringement of any and all regulations by personnel of this hospital. I want it made perfectly clear that motorbeds not in official use should be stored in the proper supply rooms, according to the chart in the Commissary office. We are setting up a daily check-in system—"

"Let's get out of here," said Miss Knox.

"—to prevent further misuse of this equipment."

"Get on the bed," said Dr. Brooks. "If they saw you go up to Boney, we can't leave it here."

"Furthermore, any private or unauthorized use of this or other hospital equipment may be punished by immediate dismissal—"

Miss Knox took a step toward the motorbed. "I'd like to look in on Mr. Barger."

"—with particular application to the young woman who used a motorbed tonight to visit a sick friend."

Miss Knox stood feet apart, hands on hips. "The dirty son of a bitch," she said.

Miss Erwin came running across the Mushroom, white pumps clacketing half off her feet. "Oh!" she said, and stopped, panting. "Has the world really been taken over by admen?"

Brooks stopped the motorbed. "Just America," he said, "and only a few admen." He helped Miss Knox down and they all walked toward the emergency rooms.

"Boney is fine, Dr. Brooks," said Miss Erwin. "He just went back to sleep. But Mr. Barger is not feeling well."

"Is Mr. Barger awake?"

"Oh, no, Doctor, but he was moaning. A sort of breath-moan, with his eyes still shut. Dr. Feld took a mutape and said he wasn't getting regular delirium patterns at all."

"Has Dr. Gesner been here?"

"We've tried and tried to reach him, but he left no word with his office or at home. His nurses are terribly worried about him, and his wife—oh, Miss Knox, do you suppose he drinks?" Miss Erwin's forehead grew a splotch of pink. "Oh, I'm sorry, Doctor! I'm terribly upset."

"Go home, Hilda," said Miss Knox. "I can handle things—I go on in less than an hour, anyway. Let's foul up Hamilton's schedule."

"Oh, Miss Knox!"

"Just one more thing—before you go to bed, get a uniform from my room and give it to Miss Kelly, to bring with her when she comes up for day shift. If my door is open, close it."

"Here's a key." Dr. Brooks said. "Give it to one of the attendants in the dining room. If no one's eating breakfast yet, leave it with Old Man Mackey. Say that I want some linens and a suit—any suit—brought up for me when the shift changes. Not before."

"What color socks, Doctor?"

"Any color."

"Thanks so much," said Miss Erwin, backing toward the escalator.

Brooks muttered, "The Mushroom doesn't suit her looks."

"She's too young," said Miss Knox. "What's-his-name who designed it—you know, the one who did the museums—was ninety-four."

"He's still designing," said Brooks.

"Can I do anything for you? Preferably against regulations." She watched him lock the door and close the viewplate, and rummage in the manila folder at the foot of the bed.

"I don't know what's wrong with these people," Dr. Brooks muttered.

"What is it?" she asked over his shoulder.

"They've gotten their tapes crossed! That idiot Feld must have had this in his machine when he came. It's some accident victim's tape—one hundred per cent unverbalized pain, and the victim was wide awake when he made it. It might be Boney's tape. This man here has been in coma since this—since yesterday morning, thank heaven."

"Poor Boney," said Miss Knox, adjusting Mr. Barger's covers and her own loose hair. As though in answer, Mr. Barger stirred feebly, raising his arm.

"Honey, there isn't much we can do," said Dr. Brooks.

"You're right." She glanced down and plucked at the bathrobe around her smooth lace-bordered throat. "Can't save the world in my old nightgown."

He took her by the shoulders and bent his head toward the palpitating muscle in her throat.

Leaning back against the edge of the bed, she held him at arm's length. She wet her lips and said, "Did I tell you I'm supposed to wear glasses?"

He sprawled forward into her embrace. Her dark mane tumbled thickly over Mr. Barger. They twisted and pulled each other down to the floor, freeing loose strands of hair from the blanket's electricity.

She opened her eyes and saw a flat briefcase with a coil antenna sticking out.

"What's the matter?" whispered Dr. Brooks.

"On the bottom of the bed!"

He pressed his cheek to the floor and examined the under-carriage of Mr. Barger's motorbed.

"Projector!" He reached in and tugged at the object, bracing his other hand against the driveshaft. "Help me, quick!"

She grasped smooth leather and pulled, her nails making scars, as he slid under the bed and hammered with his fist. "It's hooked on the other way," she said. He pulled, and the briefcase fell heavily to the floor.

Dr. Brooks rolled to his feet, kicking the object into the light, and yanked at its buckles and straps. "My bag is somewhere near the chair. Get the mutape on him, fast!"

She found his black satchel on the floor, plugged into the computer outlet and spread the apparatus over Mr. Barger's bed. She made a trembling fist around the Broca cup, and watched the dormant pink cheeks and eyelids as she lowered the cup toward his skull.

The rubber rim thudded against empty air, pleating like a horse's muzzle as she pushed. The sleeping Barger face remained a picture glowing out of reach inches beneath her straining fist, behind a smell of blood. A hand from under the covers grasped her wrist....