Frederik Pohl - The Cool War

But to what? To this endless ordeal of squirming in a shag velour armchair, while beautiful women kept bringing drinks he didn’t want? Hake had the Munich feeling, the conviction that a script was being played out that he had had no part in writing, and in which he did not know his lines. In Germany the feeling had been uncertain and only occasional—until that woman, what’s her name, Leota, had turned up and made it all concrete. Here it was real enough, but he did not understand what was going on.

Yosper was back on the subject of the emperor Tiberius, and growing argumentative. It was not the drink. He had been drinking three Perrier waters for each brandy, Hake had observed, but he was warming to his subject. Or subjects. All of them. “Come right down to it,” he declaimed, “old Tiberius was right about the fisherman. Asshole had no business coming into a restricted area, right? You can’t exercise power without discipline. Can’t enforce discipline without a little, what you might call, cruelty. Study history! Especially around here, where it all happened. When the Christians and the Turks fought naval battles over this part of the world they didn’t fool around with compassion. Turk caught a Christian, like enough they’d stick him ass-down on a sharpened stake by the helm, to keep the steersman company. Christians caught a Turk, same thing. And you know, those poor impaled buggers used to laugh and joke with the helmsmen while they were dying! Now, that’s what I call good morale.”

Mario staggered to his feet. “Excuse me,” he said, heading for the men’s room. Yosper laughed.

“Good kid,” he said, “but he has a little trouble confronting reality now and then. Symptom of the times. We all get taught that it’s bad to hurt anybody. ‘S what’s wrong with the world today, you want my opinion.”

“What’s wrong with the World tonight,” Hake said recklessly, “is I’m really tired of this place. Can’t we go?”

Yosper nodded approvingly and signaled for another round. “You’re impatient,” he said. “That’s the same as eager, and that’s a good thing. But you have got to learn, Hake, that sometimes the best thing you can do is just sit and wait. There’s always a reason, you know. Maybe we don’t know it, but it’s there.”

“Are you talking about God or Curmudgeon?”

“Both, Hake. More than that. I’m talking about duty. My family’s duty-oriented. It’s what I’m proudest of. We paid our bills. My Dad, he was gassed at Verdun, did you know that? Burned him right out. After that it took him twelve years of trying before he could knock Mom up, so I could be born. But he made it. I’m right proud of Dad. No, listen to me, Hake, what I’m saying’s important. It’s duty. That means you have to pay your dues on demand. Maybe it’s a Roman short-sword in the guts, or an English cloth-yard arrow at Crecy. Molten lead. Pungee pits. Flame throwers—you’d be amazed how much fat’ll come out of a human body. Why, when they opened the shelters in Dresden after the firestorm, there was an inch of tallow on the floor all around.”

“Or maybe,” snarled Hake, “it’s just sitting in a gin-mill on the Isle of Capri, listening to somebody trying to turn your stomach.”

Yosper grinned approvingly. “You’ve got it, Hake. That’s duty. Doing what you’re told.”

He held up, while the cocktail waitress brought them their new drinks. Behind her was another woman, slim and tanned, wearing an assortment of mood jewelry and not much else. “Speak English?” she inquired. When Yosper nodded she handed them each a card, then gracefully displayed her wares. She was more interesting than the things she had to sell; they were out of any sex shop in America. Marriage ring, divorce ring, open marriage ring; a “try it on” mood brooch in the shape of a bunny’s head, eyes dilated when the wearer was available, contracted when not; vasectomy badge, laparoscopy bow-knot choker, fertile period locket; gay shoulder-knots and SM leather wristlets. There were very few sexual interests you could not be outfitted for from her selection. She showed them all before leaving with a smile and a trail of familiar perfume.

” ‘Spalducci’s Bottega,’ ” Yosper read from the card. “Works of the devil, those places, but I have to admit the girl herself has the look of something from a better Maker. Oh, I’m not one of your religious bigots, Hake. I can understand temptation for the sins of the flesh. Didn’t Our Lord Himself stand on that mountain, while the Devil offered him all the treasures of the earth? And He was tempted. And—”

His voice stopped. He sat up straight, peering across the tables. Mario was hurrying toward them, buttoning and zipping as he came, his face agitated. As soon as he was in earshot he called something in Italian, tapping his silver bracelet; Yosper asked a sharp question in the same language, and the two of them sped for the doors.

Hake sat there, watching them go. When they were out of sight he turned his card over. There was a message penciled on the back:

Meet me Blue Grotto 0800 tomorrow.

It was no more than he had expected when he saw that the model had been the girl from Munich and Maryland, Leota Pauket.

It was three a.m. before he got back to his hotel. Yosper and Mario, sitting grim-faced and silent next to him, refused to answer questions, curtly ordering him to stay put until called for. He didn’t need answers, or at least not from them.

And he did not stay put. He set his alarm and by six wafc on his way down to the waterfront.

The only words Hake had to discuss his intentions were “Blue Grotto” and quanto costa. They would have to serve. There was no difficulty finding the right quayside. All quaysides were right. Wherever he looked were signs in every language, urging tourists to the Blue Grotto. The difficulties were the weather, which was wet and gray, and the time of day, which was a lot too early for your average Capri boatman to be ready for a customer. The big party boats inshore were still under canvas, and deserted. Farther out on the catwalk were a cluster of smaller ones, propelled by the stored kinetic energy of flywheels; a few of them had people working around them, but none seemed up to speed. If the signore would wait just an hour, perhaps at most two… If the signore could only defer his desires until the time when the tour buses began to arrive… But Hake did not dare wait. If Leota wanted to see him in private, she would be gone by the time the traffic grew heavy.

It took time and patience. But Sergio suggested Em-anuele, who thought Francesco could help, who directed Hake to Luigi, and at the end of the list Ugo had just unclutched his flywheel. They were off.

The diamond-shaped craft whirred down the coastline, with surf pounding the base of the cliffs a few hundred yards to their left. The flat flywheel amidships was not merely the power source for the screw. It served as a sort of gyroscope as well, leveling out some of the rock and pitch of the waves. That was not altogether a good thing, as Hake perceived as soon as the first chops began to splash over the coaming. By the time they turned in toward the steep cliffs around the Grotto, he was drenched with salt water and a fairly high amount of floating oil.

Ugo explained, by signs and gestures, that as the only entrance was by sea they would now moor the power vessel to a buoy and transfer to the rubber raft they had been towing behind. “No, Ugo, not so fast,” said Hake, and began signs and gestures of his own.

When the boatman realized what Hake wanted, he exploded into Neapolitan fury. Hake did not need to understand a word of Italian to comprehend both the premises and the conclusion of his syllogism perfectly. Major premise, timing the waves and judging the currents at the cave entrance required every bit of the skill and training of a master boatman, such as himself. Minor premise, the turista clearly didn’t have the skill to navigate soap out of a bathtub. Conclusion, the best that could come of this mad proposal was that he would lose fee, tip and an extremely valuable rubber boat. The worst was that he would be sentenced for cold-blooded murder. And the whole thing was out of the question. But money talked. Hake handed over enough lire to arrange for the boatman to expect him in an hour, and he entered the rubber boat.