Clifford Simak - Eternity Lost

But likewise a game of ethics.

You do not shout and you do not whistle, nor bang the pieces on the board, nor twiddle your thumbs, nor move a piece then take it back again. When you’re beaten, you admit it. You do not force your opponent to carry on the game to absurd lengths. You resign and start another game if there is time to play one. Otherwise, you just resign and you do it with all the good grace possible. You do not knock all the pieces to the floor in anger. You do not get up abruptly and stalk out of the room. You do not reach across the board and punch your opponent in the nose.

When you play chess you are, or you are supposed to be, a gentleman.

The senator lay wide-awake, staring at the ceiling.

You do not reach across the board and punch your opponent in the nose. You do not knock the pieces to the floor.

But this isn’t chess, he told himself, arguing with himself. This isn’t chess; this is life and death. A dying thing is not a gentleman. It does not curl up quietly and die of the hurt inflicted. It backs into a corner and it fights, it lashes back and does all the hurt it can.

And I am hurt. I am hurt to death.

And I have lashed back. I have lashed back, most horribly.

They’ll not be able to walk down the street again, not ever again, those gentlemen who passed the sentence on me. For they have no more claim to continued life than I and the people now will know it. And the people will see to it that they do not get it.

I will die, but when I go down I’ll pull the others with me. They’ll know I pulled them down, down with me into the pit of death. That’s the sweetest part of all—they’ll know who pulled them down and they won’t be able to say a word about it. They can’t even contradict the noble things I said.

Someone in the corner said, some voice from some other time and place: You’re no gentleman, senator. You fight a dirty fight.

Sure I do, said the senator. They fought dirty first. And politics always was a dirty game.

Remember all that fine talk you dished out to Lee the other day?

That was the other day, snapped the senator.

You’ll never be able to look a chessman in the face again, said the voice in the corner.

I’ll be able to look my fellow men in the face, however, said the senator.

Will you? asked the voice.

And that, of course, was the question. Would he?

I don’t care, the senator cried desperately. I don’t care what happens. They played a lousy trick on me. They can’t get away with it. I’ll fix their clocks for them. I’ll—

Sure, you will, said the voice, mocking.

Go away, shrieked the senator. Go away and leave me. Let me be alone.

You are alone, said the thing in the comer. You are more alone than any man has ever been before.

Chairman Leonard:You represent an insurance company, do you not, Mr. Markely? A big insurance company.

Mr. Markely:That is correct.

Chairman Leonard:And every time a person dies, it costs your company money?

Mr. Markely:Well, you might put it that way if you wished, although it is scarcely the case—

Chairman Leonard:You do have to pay out benefits on deaths, don’t you?

Mr. Markely:Why, yes, of course we do.

Chairman Leonard:Then I can’t understand your opposition to life continuation. If there were fewer deaths, you’d have to pay fewer benefits.

Mr. Markely:All very true, sir. But if people had reason to believe they would live virtually forever, they’d buy no life insurance.

Chairman Leonard:Oh, I see. So that’s the way it is.

The senator awoke. He had not been dreaming, but it was almost as if he had awakened from a bad dream—or awakened to a bad dream—and he struggled to go back to sleep again, to gain the Nirvana of unawareness, to shut out the harsh reality of existence, to dodge the shame of knowing who and what he was.

But there was someone stirring in the room, and someone spoke to him and he sat upright in bed, stung to wakefulness by the happiness and something else that was almost worship which the voice held.

“It’s wonderful, sir,” said Otto. “There have been phone calls all night long. And the telegrams and radiograms still are stacking up.”

The senator rubbed his eyes with pudgy fists.

“Phone calls, Otto? People sore at me?”

“Some of them were, sir. Terribly angry, sir. But not too many of them. Most of them were happy and wanted to tell you what a great thing you’d done. But I told them you were tired and I could not waken you.”

“Great thing?” said the senator. “What great thing have I done?”

“Why, sir, giving up life continuation. One man said to tell you it was the greatest example of moral courage the world had ever known. He said all the common people would bless you for it. Those were his very words. He was very solemn, sir.”

The senator swung his feet to the floor, sat on the edge of the bed, scratching at his ribs.

It was strange, he told himself, how a thing would turn out sometimes. A heel at bedtime and a hero in the morning.

“Don’t you see, sir,” said Otto, “you have made yourself one of the common people, one of the short-lived people. No one has ever done a thing like that before.”

“I was one of the common people,” said the senator, “long before I wrote that statement. And I didn’t make myself one of them. I was forced to become one of them, much against my will.”

But Otto, in his excitement, didn’t seem to hear.

He rattled on: “The newspapers are full of it, sir. It’s the biggest news in years. The political writers are chuckling over it. They’re calling it the smartest political move that was ever pulled. They say that before you made the announcement you didn’t have a chance of being re-elected senator and now, they say, you can be elected president if you just say the word.”

The senator sighed. “Otto,” he said, “please hand me my pants. It is cold in here.”

Otto handed him his trousers. “There’s a newspaperman wait-ing in the study, sir. I held all the others off, but this one sneaked in the back way. You know him, sir, so I let him wait. He is Mr. Lee.”

“I’ll see him,” said the senator.

So it was a smart political move, was it? Well, maybe so, but after a day or so, even the surprised political experts would begin to wonder about the logic of a man literally giving up his life to be re-elected to a senate seat.

Of course the common herd would love it, but he had not done it for applause. Although, so long as the people insisted upon thinking of him as great and noble, it was all right to let them go on thinking so.

The senator jerked his tie straight and buttoned his coat. He went into the study and Lee was waiting for him.

“I suppose you want an interview,” said the senator. “Want to know why I did this thing.”

Lee shook his head. “No, senator, I have something else. Something you should know about. Remember our talk last week? About the disappearances.”

The senator nodded.

“Well, I have something else. You wouldn’t tell me anything last week, but maybe now you will. I’ve checked, senator, and I’ve found this—the health winners are disappearing, too. More than eighty percent of those who participated in the finals of the last ten years have disappeared.”

“I don’t understand,” said the senator.