Дэймон Найт - Orbit 13

Lindsey took the freeway bypass to the west. On his left, the carnival glared and blared, merging his night with others from long before. Neon incandescence, flashing:

CAESAR’S PALACE

TILT-A-WHIRL

THE NUGGET

FREAK SHOW

DUNES HOTEL

COTTON CANDY

Dizzy, Lindsey hunched forward over the wheel and concentrated on the stripes. He heard a chorus of “In the Good Old Summer Time,” as though played by a distant calliope, the sound teasingly distorted by wind. He twisted the knob of the radio, but the radio was already off.

The sound, he realized, was distorted by time.

A sign of soft, reassuring green swept by on the right:

LOS ANGELES 280 MILES

It was an anchor of tangibility; a promise he could grasp.

“Where’s the ashtray in this thing,” said Veach.

“Under the radio.”

“How was the session with the shrink?”

‘That’s, uh—”

“None of my business, right?”

“The psychiatrist was quite pleasant.”

“Crap,” said Veach, “you hated it, right?”

“I didn’t hate it, no.”

Veach exhaled a cloud of smoke. “Don’t obscure your hostilities, chickie. Did you tell him about Mona?”

“He didn’t ask.”

“Stop and let me out,” said Veach. “I can get further with a desert cactus.”

As the road began to climb into the Sierras, Lindsey checked the fuel gauge. The needle rested well below E, so he exited at a station where the floodlit signs assured him ALL NIGHT, LOWEST PRICES, LIVE GILA MONSTERS, and CACTUS CANDY. The attendant told him the live gila monsters were asleep in their pens, not to be disturbed until morning.

On the access road to the highway, Lindsey passed a hitchhiker again. The hitchhiker. Lindsey stared as the hitchhiker put out his thumb. Unaccountably terrified, Lindsey swung wide into the left lane to avoid him and pressed the accelerator to the floor. He looked back in the mirror; there was only darkness.

Lindsey joined the westbound freeway and felt his panic subside. There was nothing frightening about a recurring hitchhiker. It was an anomaly, but nothing sinister. Lindsey concentrated on keeping his lane as the highway wound farther up the Sierra slope. At times traffic from the opposite direction swept down around the curves toward him, headlights strobbing between posts of the divider fence.

He wondered about the time. The luminous dial of his watch read three twenty. A uniformed man at the agricultural check station across the California border gave Lindsey the correct time.

“I have time and money enough to see a psychiatrist,” said Lindsey, “but not the inclination. What for? I know how things are.”

Do you have any citrus fruits, vegetables, or other plants?

Yes I have no bananas, Lindsey indicated. He had heard his mother say that.

Don’t give me a hard time, buddy.

Time, that’s all I want.

“You’ll love him,” said Veach. “His name is Dr. Van der Mark. He’s a pussycat.”

Coasting down the long grade into Barstow, Lindsey looked into the mirror and once again saw a glow. This time it was morning. A reddish sun edged above the mountains and the Mojave instantly turned incinerator. Having no air conditioner, Lindsey rolled his window down and suffered.

Dr. Van der Mark (Veach explained) spent a number of years interned by the Japanese in New Guinea. The experience gave him a profound insight into mankind; a great compassion for humanity. Only a child then, at war’s end he determined to become a psychiatrist.

Lindsey wondered aloud why his experience in the Japanese internment camp hadn’t caused Van der Mark to become a misanthrope.

Maybe he’s crazy, Veach suggested.

So why should I waste my money on a crazy person?

Because he’s a pussycat.

“I will want to see you again in one week,” said Dr. Van der Mark. His voice was precise. He smiled only slightly, allowing his lips little freedom to disturb the meticulously tended Vandyke.

Lindsey silently collected his hat and coat.

“Next week I should like an introduction to Mona.”

“Did Veach—”

“That would be unprofessional,” said Van der Mark.

“Then how—”

Van der Mark carefully touched his Vandyke with one finger. “You talk; I listen.”

The air temperature rose, all the way from Barstow into San Bernardino, where Los Angeles actually seemed to begin. Berdoo—Lindsey dinsinterred the word from a youthful memory of a motorcycle film. Berdoo was palms and lanai apartment buildings, light-to-medium industry spread along the freeway, and air that made Lindsey think of home. His lungs began to smart, his eyes to water. From time to time he glanced sidewise at the roadmap on the seat. The processional rolled past: Riverside, Ontario, Pomona, West Covina. He repeated the place-names, a potent incantation.

Lindsey felt a tangible relaxation, barely short of unconsciousness. The long drive was nearly ended; he was Here. But where was that? His reach and grasp were suddenly equivalent.

“Oh my God, oh my God,” said Lindsey. He wanted to pull over on the side of the highway and be sick or fall asleep, or both. He craned his neck stared out the windows and into the mirrors. There was no way. Lindsey’s Camaro was in the fourth lane from the right of six lanes westbound. Traffic chains of multicolored links bound him on both sides. Lindsey flashed his turn signals first one way, then the other. He pressed on the horn.

Some of the other drivers ignored Lindsey; some cursed him; some laughed.

Veach reached for the lighter. “Well, Lindy, you’re here.” He paused to light his cigarette. “Are you just going to drive indefinitely west in this lane?”

Lindsey looked helplessly across the hood of his car. Traffic in the lane immediately to his left was moving slightly faster than he; cars in the right lane were traveling slower.

“It may take an hour or two,” said Veach, “but you’ll run out of gas. Here you’ll be. Helpless and surrounded.”

“I’ll make it,” said Lindsey. “I’m here. Just give me time.”

“No time, bunny.”

Signs abounded on either side of the freeway and overhead: guidance for the lame and halt, or for strangers.

SAN GABRIEL RIVER FREEWAY

NEXT RIGHT

POMONA FREEWAY NEXT RIGHT

SAN BERNARDINO FREEWAY

LEFT LANES

TO SANTA ANA FREEWAY

KEEP LEFT

YORTY SKYWAY CENTER

LANE

LOS ANGELES LEFT

LANES

“I can help,” said Dr. Van der Mark, “but for me to help you, you must help me.”

“What?” said Lindsey.

“You must help me.” Dr. Van der Mark slumped in the tan leather chair. He was tall and stoop-shouldered, with the unconscious slouch of the tall man who doesn’t wish to intimidate men of shorter stature. “I wonder if you could tell me your goals.”“

The Rorschach inkblots had been easier. Finally Lindsey said, “I don’t know. I’m not sure. I want to be warm and safe.”

“And loved?”

“There’s a difference?”

From interchange to interchange the traffic fragmented and reformed, shifting Lindsey from lane to lane.

“This is scary,” said Lindsey aloud. “I didn’t expect this.” The sun was nearly overhead and he looked at his watch: the hands stood at three twenty. Lindsey turned on the radio.

“—ee-twenty in the afternoon, this is KLA in Pasadena with a Wild Wax Weekend in store—”

He could see Mona, blurred. Hard to focus, Lindsey thought.

Eyes deep in shadow, Dr. Van der Mark regarded him. “It’s not uncommon for a child to invent an imaginary playmate.”

You fool! “ I am twenty-six years old,” said Lindsey.

”Please, I meant no—”