Philip Dick - Prominent Author

Ellis was dumbfounded. “But why?”

“Why indeed! Because it’s defective. Because it doesn’t work. That’s why.” Miller’s eyes blazed with technological outrage. “The inspection crew found a leak a mile wide in it.” His lip curled. “As if you didn’t know.”

Ellis’ heart sank. “Leak?” he croaked apprehensively.

“Leak. It’s a damn good thing I authorized a periodic inspection. If we depended on people like you to—”

“Are you sure? It seemed all right to me. That is, it got me here without any trouble.” Ellis floundered. “Certainly no complaints from my end.”

“No. No complaints from your end. That’s exactly why you’re not getting another one. That’s why you’re taking the monojet transport back home tonight. Because you didn’t report the leak! And if you ever try to put something over on this office again—”

“How do you know I was aware of the—defect?”

Miller sank down in his chair, overcome with fury. “Because,” he said carefully, “of your daily pil- grimmage to the Linguistics Machine. With your alleged letter from your grandmother on Betelgeuse II Which wasn’t any such thing. Which was an utter fraud. Which you got through the leak in the Jiffi-scuttler!”

“How do you know?” Ellis squeaked boldly, driven to the wall. “So maybe there was a defect. But you can’t prove there’s any connection between your badly constructed Jiffi-scuttler and my—” “Your missive,” Miller stated, “which you foisted on our Linguistics Machine, was not a non- Terran script. It was not from Centaurus VI. It was not from any nonTerran system. It was ancient Hebrew. And there’s only one place you could have got it, Ellis. So don’t try to kid me.”

“Hebrew!” Ellis exclaimed, startled. He turned white as a sheet. “Good Lord. The other continum ■—The fourth dimension. Time, of course.” He trembled. “And the expanding universe. That would explain their size. And it explains why a new group, a new generation—”

“We’re taking enough of a chance as it is, with these Jiffi-scut- tlers. Warping a tunnel through other space-time continua.” Miller shook his head wearily. “You meddler! You knew you were supposed to report any defect.”

“I don’t think I did any harm, did I?” Ellis was suddenly terribly nervous. “They seemed pleased, even grateful. Gosh, I’m sure I didn’t cause any trouble.”

Miller shrieked in insane rage. For a time he danced around the room. Finally he threw something down on his desk, directly in front of Ellis. “No trouble. No, none. Look at this. I got this from the Ancient Artifacts Archives.”

“What is it?”

“Look at it! I compared one of your question sheets to this. The same. Exactly the same. All your sheets, questions and answers, every one of them’s in here. You multilegged Ganymedian mange beetle!” Ellis picked up the book and opened it. As he read the pages a strange look came slowly over his face. “Good Heavens. So they kept a record of what I gave them. They put it all together in a book. Every word of it. And some commentaries, too. It’s all here— Every single word. It did have an effect, then. They passed it on. Wrote all of it down.”

“Go back to your office. I’m through looking at you for today. I’m through looking at you forever. Your severance check will come though regular channels.”

In a trance, his face flushed with a strange excitement, Ellis gripped the book and moved dazedly toward the door. “Say, Mr. Miller.

Can I have this? Can I take it along?”

“Sure,” Miller said wearily. “Sure, you can take it. You can read it on your way home tonight. On the public monojet transport.”

"HENRY has something to show you,” Mary Ellis whispered excitedly, gripping Mrs. Lawrence’s arm. “Make sure you say the right thing.”

“The right thing?” Mrs. Lawrence faltered nervously, a trifle uneasy. “What is it? Nothing alive, I hope.”

“No, no.” Mary pushed her toward the study door. “Just smile.” She raised her voice. “Henry, Dorothy Lawrence is here.”

Henry Ellis appeared at the door of his study. He bowed slightly, a dignified figure in silk dressing gown, pipe in his mouth, fountain pen in one hand. “Good evening, Dorothy,” he said in a low, well- modulated voice. “Care to step into my study a moment?”

“Study?” Mrs. Lawrence came hesitantly in. “What do you study? I mean, Mary says you’ve been doing something very interesting recently, now that you’re not with— I mean, now that you’re home more. She didn’t give me any idea what it was, though.”

Mrs. Lawrence’s eyes roved curiously around the study. The study was full of reference volumes, charts, a huge mahogany desk, an atlas globe, leather chairs, an unbelievably ancient electric typewriter.

“Good heavens!” she exclaimed. “How odd. All these old things.”

Ellis lifted something carefully from the book case and held it out to her casually. “By the way—you might glance at this.”

“What is it? A book?” Mrs. Lawrence took the book and examined it eagerly. “My goodness. Heavy, isn’t it?” She read the back, her lips moving. “What does it mean? It looks old. What strange letters! I’ve never seen anything like it. Holy Bible ” She glanced up brightly. “What is this?”

Ellis smiled faintly. “Well—”

A light dawned. Mrs. Lawrence gasped in revelation. “Good Heavens! You didn’t write this, did you?”

Ellis’ smile broadened into a depreciating blush. A dignified hue of modesty. “Just a little thing I threw together,” he murmured indifferently. “My first, as a matter of fact.” Thoughtfully, he fingered his fountain pen. “And now, if you’ll excuse me, I really should be getting back to my work . . .”

• • • THE END