Alfred Bester - The Demolished Man

"To hell with that. I'll cure him. Where is he?"

"Go through the west arch. Turn right. Up stairs. Through overpass. Turn right. Picture Gallery. Door between paintings of the Rape of Lucrece and the Rape of the Sabine Women..."

"Sounds typical."

"Open the door. Up a flight of steps to an anteroom. Two guards in the anteroom. D'Courtney's inside. It's the old wedding suite her grandfather built."

"By God! I'll use that suite again. I'll marry him to murder. And I'll get away with it, little Gus. Don't think I won't."

The Gilt Corpse began to clamor for attention. Flushed and shining with perspiration, standing in the glare of a pink light on the dais between the two fountains, Maria clapped her hands for silence. Her moist palms beat together, and the echoes roared in Reich's ears: Death. Death. Death.

"Darlings! Darlings! Darlings!" she cried. "We're going to have so much fun tonight. We're going to provide our own entertainment." A subdued groan went up from the guests and a drunken voice shouted: "I'm just one of the tourists."

Through the laughter, Maria said: "Naughty lovers, don't be disappointed. We're going to play a wonderful old game; and we're going to play it in the dark."

The company cheered up as the overhead lights began to dim and disappear. The dais still blazed, and in the light, Maria produced a

tattered volume. Reich's gift.

Tension...

Maria turned the pages slowly, blinking at the unaccustomed print.

Apprehension...

"It's a game," Maria cried, "called `Sardine.' Isn't that too adorable?"

She took the bait. She's on the hook. In three minutes I'll be invisible. Reich felt his pockets. The gun. The Rhodopsin. Tension, apprehension, and dissension have begun.

"One player," Maria read, "is selected to be It. That's going to be me. All the lights are extinguished and the It hides anywhere in the house." As Maria struggled through the directions, the great hall was reduced to pitch darkness with the exception of the single pink beam on the stage.

"Successively each player finding the Sardine joins them until all are hidden in one place, and the last player, who is the loser, is left to wander alone in the dark." Maria closed the book. "And darlings, we're all going to feel sorry for the loser because we're going to play this funny old game in a darling new way."

As the last light on the dais melted away, Maria stripped off her gown and displayed the astonishing nude body that was a miracle of pneumatic surgery. "We're going to play Sardine like this!" she cried. The last light biinked out. There was a roar of exultant laughter and applause, followed by a multiple whisper of cloth drawn across skin. Occasionally there came the sound of a rip, then muttered exclamations and more laughter.

Reich was invisible at last. He had half an hour to slip up into the house, find and kill D'Courtney, and then return to the game. Tate was committed to pinning the peeper secretaries out of the line of his attack. It was safe. It was foolproof except for the Chervil boy. He had to take that chance.

He crossed the main hall and jostled into bodies at the west arch. He went through the arch into the music room and turned right, groping for the stairs.

At the foot of the stairs he was forced to climb over a barrier of bodies with octopus arms that tried to pull him down. He ascended the stairs, seventeen eternal steps, and felt his way through a close tunnel overpass papered with velour. Suddenly he was seized and a woman crushed herself against him.

"Hello, Sardine," she whispered in his ear. Then her skin became aware of his clothes. "Owww!" she exclaimed, and felt the hard outlines of the gun in his breast pocket. "What's that?" He slapped her hand away. "Clever-up, Sardine," she giggled. "Get out of the can."

He divested himself of her and bruised his nose against the dead-end of the overpass. He turned right, opened a door and found himself in a vaulted gallery over fifty feet long. The lights were extinguished here too, but the luminescent paintings, glowing under ultra-violet spotlights, filled the gallery with a virulent glow. It was empty.

Between a livid Lucrece and a horde of Sabine Women was a flush door of polished bronze. Reich stopped before it, removed the tiny Rhodopsin Ionizer from bis back pocket and attempted to poise the copper cube between his thumbnail and forefinger. His hands were trembling violently. Rage and hatred boiled inside him, and his death-lust shot image after image of an agonized D'Courtney through his mind's eye.

"Christ!" he cried. "He'd do it to me. He's tearing at my throat. I'm fighting for survival." He made his orisons in fanatical multiples of three and nine.

"Stand by me, dear Christ! Today, tomorrow, and yesterday. Stand by me! Stand by me! Stand by me!"

His fingers steadied. He poised the Rhodospin cap, then thrust open the bronze door, revealing nine steps mounting to an anteroom. Reich snapped his thumb-nail against the copper cube as though he were trying to flip a penny to the moon. As the Rhodopsin cap flew up into the anteroom, Reich averted his eyes.

There was a cold purplish flash. Reich leaped up the stairs like a tiger. The two Beaumont House guards were seated on the bench where he had caught them. Their faces were sagging, their vision destroyed, their time sense abolished.

If anyone entered and found the guards before he was finished, he was on the road to Demolition. If the guards revived before he was finished, he was on the road to Demolition. No matter what happened, it was a final gamble with Demolition. Leaving the last of his sanity behind him, Reich pushed open a jewelled door and entered the wedding suite.

Reich found himself in a spherical room designed as the heart of a giant orchid. The walls were curling orchid petals, the floor was a golden calyx; the chairs, tables and couches were orchid and gold. But the room was old. The petals were faded and peeling; the golden tile floor was ancient and the tesselations were splitting. There was an old man lying on the couch, musty and wilted, like a dried weed. It was D'Courtney, stretched out like a corpse.

Reich slammed the door in rage. "You're not dead already, you bastard," he exploded. "You can't be dead."

The faded man started up, stared, then arose painfully from the couch, his face breaking into a smile.

"Still alive," Reich cried exultantly.

D'Courtney stepped toward Reich, smiling, his arms outstretched as though welcoming a prodigal son.

Alarmed again, Reich growled: "Are you deaf?"

The old man shook his head.

"You speak English," Reich shouted. "You can hear me. You can't understand me. I'm Reich. Ben Reich of Monarch."

D'Courtney nodded, still smiling. His mouth worked soundlessly. His eyes glistened with sudden tears.

"What the hell is the matter with you? I'm Ben Reich! Ben Reich! Do you know me? Answer me."

D'Courtney shook his head and tapped his throat. His mouth worked again. Rusty sounds came; then words as faint as dust: "Ben... Dear Ben...

Waited so long. Now... Can't talk. My throat... Can't talk." Again he attempted to embrace Reich.

"Arrgh! Keep off, you crazy idiot." Bristling, Reich stepped around D'Courtney like an animal, his hackles raised, the murder boiling in his blood.

D'Courtney's mouth formed the words: "Dear Ben..."

"You know why I'm here. What are you trying to do? Make love to me?" Reich laughed. "You crafty old pimp. Am I supposed to turn soft for your chewing?" His hand lashed out. The old man reeled back from the slap and fell into an orchid chair that looked like a wound.

"Listen to me---" Reich followed D'Courtney and stood over him. He began to shout incoherently. "This payoff's been on the fire for years. And you want to rob me with a Judas kiss. Does murder turn the other cheek? If it does, embrace me, brother killer. Kiss death! Teach death love. Teach Godliness and shame and blood and---No. Wait. I---" He stopped short and shook his head like a bull trying to cast off a halter of delirum.