Philip Dick - The Man in the High Castle

“No,” Mr. Baynes said.

No? Mr. Tagomi thought. “Sir,” he said, “I am not well today. I had a grievous incident; it was my hope to confide it to you.”

“I’m sorry,” Mr. Baynes said. “I’ll ring you back later.” The phone clicked. He had abruptly hung up.

I offended him, Mr. Tagomi thought. He must have gathered correctly that I tardily failed to inform my staff about the old gentleman. But it is a trifle; he pressed the intercom button and said, “Mr. Ramsey, please come into my office.” I can correct that immediately. More is involved, he decided. The Bormann death has shaken him.

A trifle—and yet indicative of my foolish and feckless attitude. Mr. Tagomi felt guilt. This is not a good day. I should have consulted the oracle, discovered what Moment it is. I have drifted far from the Tao; that is obvious.

Which of the sixty-four hexagrams, he wondered, am I laboring under? Opening his desk drawer he brought out the I Ching and laid the two volumes on the desk. So much to ask the sages. So many questions inside me which I can barely articulate…

When Mr. Ramsey entered the office, he had already obtained the hexagram. “Look, Mr. Ramsey.” He showed him the book.

The hexagram was Forty-Seven. Oppression—Exhaustion.

“A bad omen, generally,” Mr. Ramsey said. “What is your question, sir? If I’m not offending you to ask.”

“I inquired as to the Moment,” Mr. Tagomi said. “The Moment for us all. No moving lines. A static hexagram.” He shut the book.

At three o’clock that afternoon, Frank Frink, still waiting with his business partner for Wyndam-Matson’s decision about the money, decided to consult the oracle. How are things going to turn out? he asked, and threw the coins.

The hexagram was Forty-seven. He obtained one moving line, Nine in the fifth place.

His nose and feet are cut off.

Oppression at the hands of the man with the purple knee bands.

Joy comes softly.

It furthers one to make offerings and libations.

For a long time—at least half an hour—he studied the line and the material connected with it, trying to figure out what it might mean. The hexagram, and especially the moving line, disturbed him. At last he concluded reluctantly that the money would not be forthcoming.

“You rely on that thing too much,” Ed McCarthy said.

At four o’clock, a messenger from W-M Corporation appeared and handed Frink and McCarthy a manila envelope. When they opened it they found inside a certified check for two thousand dollars.

“So you were wrong,” McCarthy said.

Frink thought, Then the oracle must refer to some future consequence of this. That is the trouble; later on, when it has happened, you can look back and see exactly what it meant. But now–

“We can start setting up the shop,” McCarthy said. “Today? Right now?” He felt weary.

“Why not? We’ve got our orders made out; all we have to do is stick them in the mail. The sooner the better. And the stuff we can get locally we’ll pick up ourselves.” Putting on his jacket. Ed moved to the door of Frink’s room.

They had talked Frink’s landlord into renting them the basement of the building. Now it was used for storage. Once the cartons were out, they could build their bench, put in wiring, lights, begin to mount their motors and belts. They had drawn up sketches, specifications, parts lists. So they had actually already begun.

We’re in business, Frank Frink realized. They had even agreed on a name.

“The most I can see today,” he said, “is buying the wood for the bench, and maybe electrical parts. But no jewelry supplies.”

They went, then, to a lumber supply yard in south San Francisco. By the end of an hour they had their wood.

“What’s bothering you?” Ed McCarthy said as they entered a hardware store that dealt on a wholesale basis.

“The money. It gets me down. To finance things that way.”

“Old W-M understands,” McCarthy said.

I know, Frink thought. That’s why it gets me down. We have entered the world. We’re like him. Is that a pleasant thought?

“Don’t look back,” McCarthy said. “Look ahead. To the business.”

I am looking ahead, Frink thought. He thought of the hexagram. What offerings and libations can I make? And to whom?

The handsome young Japanese couple who had visited Robert Childan’s store, the Kasouras, telephoned him toward the end of the week and requested that he come to their apartment for dinner. He had been waiting for some further word from them, and he was delighted.

A little early he shut up American Artistic Handcrafts Inc. and took a pedecab to the exclusive district where the Kasouras lived. He knew the district, although no white people lived there. As the pedecab carried him along the winding streets with their lawns and willow trees, Childan gazed up at the modern apartment buildings and marveled at the grace of the designs. The wrought-iron balconies, the soaring yet modern columns, the pastel colors, the uses of varied textures… it all made up a work of art. He could remember when this had been nothing but rubble from the war.

The small Japanese children out playing watched him without comment, then returned to their football or baseball. But, he thought, not so the adults; the well-dressed young Japanese, parking their cars or entering the apartment buildings, noticed him with greater interest. Did he live here? they were perhaps wondering. Young Japanese businessmen coming home from their offices… even the heads of Trade Missions lived here. He noticed parked Cadillacs. As the pedecab took him closer to his destination, he became increasingly nervous.

Very shortly, as he ascended the stairs to the Kasouras’ apartment, he thought, Here I am, not invited in a business context, but a dinner guest. He had of course taken special pains with his attire; at least he could be confident of his appearance. My appearance, he thought. Yes, that is it. How do I appear? There is no deceiving anyone; I do not belong here. On this land that white men cleared and built one of their finest cities. I am an outsider in my own country.

He came to the proper door along the carpeted hall, rang the bell. Presently the door opened. There stood young Mrs. Kasoura, in a silk kimono and obi, her long black hair in shining tangle down her neck, smiling in welcome. Behind her in the living room, her husband, with drink in hand, nodding.

“Mr. Childan. Enter.”

Bowing, he entered.

Tasteful in the extreme. And—so ascetic. Few pieces. A lamp here, table, bookcase, print on the wall. The incredible Japanese sense of wabi . It could not be thought in English. The ability to find in simple objects a beauty beyond that of the elaborate or ornate. Something to do with the arrangement.

“A drink?” Mr. Kasoura asked. “Scotch and soda?”

“Mr. Kasoura—” he began.

“Paul,” the young Japanese said. Indicating his wife. “Betty. And you are—”

Mr. Childan murmured, “Robert.”

Seated on the soft carpet with their drinks, they listened to a recording of koto, Japanese thirteen-string harp. It was newly released by Japanese HMV, and quite popular. Childan noticed that all parts of the phonograph were concealed, even the speaker. He could not tell where the sound came from.

“Not knowing your appetites in dining,” Betty said, “we have played safe. In kitchen electric oven is broiling T-bone steak. Along with this, baked potato with sauce of sour cream and chives. Maxim utters: no one can err in serving steak to new-found guest first time.”

“Very gratifying,” Childan said. “Quite fond of steak.” And that certainly was so. He rarely had it. The great stockyards from the Middle West did not send out much to the West Coast any more. He could not recall when he had last had a good steak.