Philip Dick - We Can Build You

"Fear of jail, you mean." She opened the car door and got in, to sit behind the wheel. "What you ought to have done, what a real man would have done, would be to grab me by the wrist, carry me to the bed and without paying any attention to what I had to say--"

"If I had done that, you would never have stopped complaining, first to me, then to Maury, then to a lawyer, then to the police, then in a court of law to the world at large."

We were both silent, then.

"Anyhow," I said, "I got to kiss you."

"Only on the cheek."

"On the mouth," I said.

"That's a lie."

"I remember it as on the mouth," I said, and shut the car door after her.

Rolling down her window she said, "So that's going to be your story, that you got to take liberties with me."

"I'll remember it and treasure it, too," I said. "In my heart." I put my hand to my chest.

Pris started up the motor, switched on the lights and drove away.

I stood for a moment and then I walked back down the path to my motel room. We're cracking up, I said to myself. We're so tired, so demoralized, that we're at the end. Tomorrow we've got to get rid of Barrows. Pris--poor Pris is getting it the worst. And it was shutting off the Lincoln that did it. The turning point came there.

Hands in my pockets I stumbled back to my open door.

The next morning there was plenty of warm sunlight, and I felt a good deal better without even getting up from my bed. And then, after I had gotten up and shaved, had breakfast at the motel cafe of hotcakes and bacon and coffee and orange juice and had read the newspaper, I felt as good as new. Really recovered.

It shows what breakfast does, I said to myself. Healed, maybe? I'm back in there a whole, well man again?

No. We're better but not healed. Because we weren't well in the first place, and you can't restore health where there wasn't any health to begin with. _What is this sickness?_

Pris has had it almost to the point of death. And it has touched me, moved into me and lodged there. And Maury and Barrows and after him all the rest of us until my father; my father has it the least.

Dad! I had forgotten; he was coming over.

Hurrying outside, I hailed a taxi.

I was the first to reach the office of MASA ASSOCIATES. A moment later, from the office window, I saw my Chevrolet Magic Fire parking. Out stepped Pris. Today she wore a blue cotton dress and a long-sleeved blouse; her hair was tied up and her face was scrubbed and shiny.

As she entered the office she smiled at me. "I'm sorry I used the wrong word last night. Maybe next time. No harm done."

"No harm done," I said.

"Do you mean that, Louis?"

"No," I said, returning her smile.

The office door opened and Maury entered. "I got a good night's rest. By god, buddy boy, we'll take this nogoodnik Barrows for every last cent he's got."

Behind him came my dad, in his dark, striped, trainconductur's suit. He greeted Pris gravely, then turned to Maury and me. "Is he here, yet?"

"No, Dad," I said. "Any time now."

Pris said, "I think we should turn the Lincoln back on. We shouldn't be afraid of Barrows."

"I agree," I said.

"No," Maury said, "and I'll tell you why. It whets Barrows' appetite. Isn't that so? Think about it."

After a time I said, "Maury's right. We'll leave it off. Barrows can kick it and pound it, but let's not turn it back on. It's greed that motivates him." And, I thought, it's fear that motivates us; so much of what we've done of late has been inspired by fear, not by common sense .

There was a knock at the door.

"He's here," Maury said, and cast a flickering glance at me.

The door opened. There stood Sam K. Barrows, David Blunk, Mrs. Nild, and with them stood the somber, dark figure of Edwin M. Stanton.

"We met it down the street," Dave Blunk boomed cheerfully. "It was coming here and we gave it a lift in our cab."

The Stanton simulacrum looked sourly at all of us.

Good lord, I said to myself. We hadn't expected this-- does this make a difference? Are we hurt and if so how bad?

I did not know. But in any case we had to go on, and this time to a showdown. One way or the other.

Barrows said amiably, "We parked down a little ways and had a talk with Stanton, here. We've come to what we seem to feel is an understanding, at least of sorts."

"Oh?" I said. Beside me, Maury had assumed a set, harsh expression. Pris shuddered visibly.

Holding out his hand my dad said, "I am Jerome Rosen, owner of the Rosen spinet and electronic organ plant of Boise, Idaho. Do I have the honor of meeting Mr. Samuel Barrows?"

So we each have a surprise for the other side, I said to myself. You managed, sometime during the night, to round up the Stanton; we for our part--if it's roughly equivalent-- managed to obtain my dad.

That Stanton. As the Britannica had said: he had connived with the enemy for his own personal advantage. The skunk! And the idea swept over me: _probably he was with Barrows the entire time in Seattle; he had not gone off at all to open a law office or see the sights_. They had no doubt been talking terms from the start.

We had been sold out--by our first simulacrum.

A shocking omen it was.

At any rate, the Lincoln would never do that. And, realizing that, I felt a good deal better.

We had better get the Lincoln back on again, I said to myself.

To Maury I said, "Go ask Lincoln to come up here, will you?"

He raised his eyebrow.

"We need him," I said.

"We do," Pris agreed.

"Okay." Nodding, Maury went off.

We had begun. But begun what?

Barrows said, "When we first ran into Stanton, here, we treated it as a mechanical contraption. But then Mr. Blunk reminded me that you maintain it to be alive. I'd be curious to know what you pay the Stanton fellow, here."

_Pay_, I thought wildly.

"There are peonage laws," Blunk said.

I gaped at him.

"Do you have a work contract with Mr. Stanton?" Blunk asked. "And if you do I hope it meets the Minimum Wage law's requirements. Actually we've been discussing this with Stanton and he doesn't recall signing any contract. I therefore see no objection to Mr. Barrows hiring him at say six dollars an hour. That's a more than fair wage, you'll agree. On that basis Mr. Stanton has agreed to return with us to Seattle."

We remained silent.

The door opened and Maury entered. With him shambled the tall, hunched, dark-bearded figure of the Lincoln simulacrum.

Pris said, "I think we should accept his offer."

"What offer?" Maury said. "I haven't heard any offer." To me he said, "Have you heard any offer?"

I shook my head.

"Pris," Maury said, "have you been talking with Barrows?"

Barrows said, "Here's my offer. We'll let MASA be assessed at a worth of seventy-five thousand dollars. I'll put up--"

"Have you two been talking?" Maury interrupted.

Neither Pris nor Barrows said anything. But it was clear to me and to Maury, clear to all of us.

"I'll put up one hundred and fifty thousand," Barrows said. "And I'll naturally have a controlling interest."

Maury shook his head no.

"May we discuss this among ourselves?" Pris said to Barrows.

"Surely," Barrows said.

We withdrew to a small supply room across the hall.

"We're lost," Maury said, his face gray. "Ruined."

Pris said nothing. But her face was tight.

After a long time my father said, "Avoid this Barrows. Don't be part of a corporation in which he holds control; this I know."

I turned to the Lincoln, who stood there quietly listening to us. "You're an attorney--in the name of god, help us."

The Lincoln said, "Louis, Mr. Barrows and his compatriots hold a position of strength. No deception lies in his acts... he is the stronger party." The simulacrum reflected, then it turned and walked to the window to look out at the street below. All at once it swung back toward us; the heavy lips twisted and it said, with pain in its face but a spark glowing in its eyes, "Sam Barrows is a businessman but so are you. Sell MASA ASSOCIATES, your small firm, to Mr. Jerome Rosen, here, for a dollar. Thereby it becomes the property of the Rosen spinet and organ factory, which has great assets. To obtain it, Sam Barrows must buy the entire establishment, including the factory, and he is not prepared to do that. As to Stanton, I can tell you this; Stanton will not cooperate with them much further. I can speak to him, and he will be persuaded to return. Stanton is temperamental, but a good man. I have known him for many years; he was in the Buchanan Administration, and against much protest I elected to keep him on, despite his machinations. Although quick-tempered and concerned with his own position, he is honest. He will not, in the end, consort with rascals. He does not want to open a law office and return to his law practice; he wishes a position of public power, and in that he is responsible--he makes a good public servant. I will tell him that you wish to make him Chairman of your Board of Directors, and he will stay."