Уолтер Тевис - The Man Who Fell to Earth

Bryce nodded. They walked silently through the crowd and then out the doors. The cold air was a relief.

The car was waiting for them, with a uniformed chauffeur. When they were inside and comfortable, Bryce said, “How do you like Chicago?” Newton looked at him for a moment and said, “I had forgotten about all the people.” And then, with a tight smile, he quoted Dante, “‘I had not thought death had undone so many.’” Bryce thought, If you’re Dante, among the damned—and you probably are—then I’m Virgil.

After lunch in their hotel room they took the elevator to the lobby, where the delegates were milling about, trying to look happy and important and at ease. The lobby was filled with aluminum and mahogany furniture in the Japanese modern style that was the current substitute for elegance. They spent several hours talking to people whom Bryce was fairly acquainted with—and most of whom he did not like—and found three who seemed interested in coming to work for Newton. They made appointments. Newton himself said little. He would nod and smile when introduced, and occasionally make a remark. He attracted some attention—once the word got around who he was—but he seemed not to notice. Bryce got the distinct impression that he was under a considerable strain, yet his face remained as placid as ever.

They were invited to a cocktail party in one of the suites, a tax-deductible affair being given by an engineering firm, and Newton accepted for them. The weasel-faced man who invited them seemed delighted by the acceptance, and said, looking up at Newton, who was a head taller than he, “It’ll be a real honor, Mr. Newton. A real honor to have a chance to talk with you.”

“Thank you,” Newton said, smiling his unvarying smile. Then, when the man was gone, he said to Bryce, “I’d like to take a walk outside now. Would you come along?”

Bryce nodded, relieved. “I’ll get my coat.”

On his way toward the elevator he passed a group of three men, all well dressed in business suits, talking importantly and loudly. One of them said, as Bryce walked by, “…not just in Washington. Why, you can’t tell me there’s no future in chemical warfare. It’s a field that needs new men.

Even though it was Christmas there were stores open. The streets were crowded with people. Most of them had their eyes fixed directly in front of them, their features set. Newton seemed nervous now. He appeared to respond to the presence of people as though they were a wave, or a palpable energy field like that of a thousand electromagnets, about to engulf him. It appeared to require an effort for him to keep moving.

They went into several stores and were assaulted by bright overhead lights and sticky heat. “I think I should buy a gift for Betty Jo,” Newton said. Finally, in a jewelry store, he bought her a delicate little clock made of white marble and gold. Bryce carried it back to the hotel for him, in a brightly wrapped box.

“Do you think she’ll like it?” Newton said.

Bryce shrugged. “Of course she’ll like it.”

It was beginning to snow….

There were a great number of meetings during the afternoon and evening, but Newton made no mention of them, and Bryce was relieved that he did not have to go to any. He had never had any use for that kind of silliness—discussions of “challenges and “practicable concepts.” They spent the rest of the afternoon interviewing the three men who had shown interest in working for World Enterprises. Two of them accepted jobs to begin in the spring—as well they might, considering the salaries that Newton was paying. One of them would work with coolants for the vehicle’s engines; the other, a very bright, affable young man, would work under Bryce. He was a specialist in corrosion. Newton seemed pleased enough to get the two men, but it was also evident that he did not really care. Throughout the interviews he was distracted, vague, and Bryce was forced to do most of the talking. When it was all over Newton seemed relieved. But it was very hard to tell precisely how he felt about anything. It would be interesting to know what went on in that strange, alien mind, and what that automatic smile—that slight, wise, wistful smile—concealed.

The cocktail party was in the penthouse. They entered from the short hallway into a broad, blue-carpeted room, filled with soft-spoken people, mostly men. One wall of the room was made entirely of glass, and lights from the city were spread across its surface as if painted there in some sort of elaborate molecular diagram. The furniture was entirely Louis Quinze, which Bryce liked. The pictures on the wall were good. A baroque fugue, soft but clear, came from a speaker somewhere; Bryce did not know the piece, but he liked it. Bach? Vivaldi? He liked the room and felt more willing to weather the party for the sake of being in it. Still, there was something incongruous about that glass wall, with Chicago flickering on its surface.

A man detached himself from a group and came to greet them, smiling engagingly. With a start Bryce realized that he was the chemical warfare man from the lobby. He was wearing an excellently tailored black suit, and seemed pleasantly high. “Welcome to our refuge from suburbia,” he said, extending his hand. “I’m Fred Benedict. The bar’s in there.” He nodded conspiratorially toward a doorway.

Bryce took his hand, somewhat annoyed by the calculated firm grip, and introduced himself and Newton.

Benedict was visibly impressed. “Thomas Newton!” he said. “My God. I was hoping you’d come up. You know you’ve quite a reputation as a…” he seemed momentarily embarrassed, “a hermit.” He laughed. Newton looked down at him with the same placid smile. Benedict went on, his discomfiture now gone. “Thomas J. Newton—you know it’s hard to believe you really exist? My outfit leases seven processes from you—or from World, that is—and the only mental image I’ve ever had of you has been of some kind of computer.”

“Maybe I am a computing machine,” Newton said. And then, “What is your outfit, Mr. Benedict?”

Benedict looked for a moment as if he were afraid he was being mocked. Which, Bryce thought, he probably was.

“I’m with Futures Unlimited. Chemical warfare mostly, although we do some work with plastics—containers and such.” He bowed slightly from the waist, in an attempt to be amusing. “Your hosts.”

Newton said, “Thank you.” He took a step toward the doorway to the bar. “You have a lovely place here.”

“We think so. And all deductible.” As Newton started to break away, he said, “Let me get your drinks, Mr. Newton. I’d like you to meet some of our guests.” He looked as though he wasn’t certain what to do with this tall and peculiar man, but was afraid to let him get away.

“Don’t bother. Mr. Benedict,” Newton said. “We’ll rejoin you after a while.”

Benedict did not seem pleased, but he made no protest.

Entering the bar room. Bryce said. “I didn’t know you were so famous. When I tried to find you, a year ago, no one had ever heard of you.”

“You can’t keep a secret forever.” Newton said, not smiling now.

The room was smaller than the other, but just as elegant. Over the polished bar hung Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’herbe . The bartender was white-haired, elderly, and even more distinguished-looking than the scientists and businessmen in the other room. Sitting at the bar Bryce became aware of the shabbiness of his own gray suit, bought at a department store four years before. His shirt, too, he knew, was frayed at the collar, and the sleeves were too long.

He ordered a martini, and Newton ordered plain water with no ice. While the bartender was fixing the drinks, Bryce looked around the room and said, “You know, sometimes I think I should have taken a job with a firm like theirs when I got my doctorate.” He laughed dryly. “I could be making eighty thousand a year now and be living like this.” He waved his hand out toward the room, letting his eye dwell, for a moment, on a gorgeously dressed, middle-aged woman, with a calculatedly preserved figure and a face that suggested money and pleasure. Green eye shadow, and a mouth for sex. “I could have developed a new kind of plastic for kewpie dolls, or lubricants for outboard motors….”