Henry Kuttner: Gallegher Plus

Gallegher peered dimly through the window at the place where his back yard should have been and felt his stomach dropping queasily into that ridiculous, unlikely hole gaping there in the earth. It was big, that hole. And deep. Almost deep enough to hold Gallegher’s slightly colossal hangover.

But not quite. Gallegher wondered if he should look at the calendar, and then decided against it. He had a feeling that several thousand years had passed since the beginning of the bulge. Even for a man with his thirst and capacity, it had been one hell of a toot.

“Toot,” Gallegher mourned, crawling toward the couch and collapsing on it. “Binge is far more expressive. Toot makes me think of fire engines and boat whistles, and I’ve got those in my head, anyway—all sounding off at once.” He reached up weakly for the siphon of the liquor organ, hesitated, and communed briefly with his stomach.

GALLEGHER: Just a short one, maybe?

STOMACH: Careful, there!

GALLEGHER: A hair of the dog—

STOMACH: O-O-O-OH!

GALLEGHER: Don’t do that! I need a drink. My back yard’s disappeared.

STOMACH: I wish I could.

At this point the door opened and a robot entered, wheels, cogs, and gadgets moving rapidly under its transparent skin plate. Gallegher took one look and closed his eyes, sweating.

“Get out of here,” he snarled. “I curse the day I ever made you. I hate your revolving guts.”

“You have no appreciation of beauty,” said the robot in a hurt voice. “Here. I’ve brought you some beer.”

“Hm-m-m!” Gallegher took the plastibulb from the robot’s hand and drank thirstily. The cool catnip taste tingled refreshingly against the back of his throat. “A-ah,” he said, sitting up. “That’s a little better. Not much, but—”

“How about a thiamin shot?”

“I’ve become allergic to the stuff,” Gallegher told his robot morosely. “I’m cursed with thirst. Hm-m-m!” He looked at the liquor organ. “Maybe—”

“There’s a policeman to see you.”

“A what?”

“A policeman. He’s been hanging around for quite a while.”

“Oh,” Gallegher said. He stared into a corner by an open window. “What’s that?”

It looked like a machine of some curious sort. Gallegher eyed it with puzzled interest and a touch of amazement. No doubt he had built the damned thing. That was the only way the erratic scientist ever worked. He’d had no technical training, but, for some weird reason, his subconscious mind was gifted with a touch of genius. Conscious, Gallegher was normal enough, though erratic and often drunk. But when his demon subconscious took over, anything was liable to happen. It was in one of these sprees that he had built this robot, spending weeks thereafter trying to figure out the creature’s basic purpose. As it turned out, the purpose wasn’t an especially useful one, but Gallegher kept the robot around, despite its maddening habit of hunting up mirrors and posturing vainly before them, admiring its metallic innards.

“I’ve done it again,” Gallegher thought. Aloud he said, “More beer, stupid. Quick.”

As the robot went out, Gallegher uncoiled his lanky body and wandered across to the machine, examining it curiously. It was not in operation. Through the open window extended some pale, limber cables as thick as his thumb; they dangled a foot or so over the edge of the pit where the back yard should have been. They ended in—Hm-m-m! Gallegher pulled one up and peered at it. They ended in metal-rimmed holes, and were hollow. Odd.

The machine’s over-all length was approximately two yards, and it looked like an animated junk heap. Gallegher had a habit of using makeshifts. If he couldn’t find the right sort of connection, he’d snatch the nearest suitable object—a buttonhook, perhaps, or a coat hanger—and use that. Which meant that a qualitative analysis of an already-assembled machine was none too easy. What, for example, was that fibroid duck doing wrapped around with wires and nestling contentedly on an antique waffle iron?

“This time I’ve gone crazy,” Gallegher pondered. “However, I’m not in trouble as usual. Where’s that beer?”

The robot was before a mirror, staring fascinated at his middle. “Beer? Oh, right here. I paused to steal an admiring little glance at me.”

Gallegher favored the robot with a foul oath, but took the plastibulb. He blinked at the gadget by the window, his long, bony face twisted in a puzzled scowl. The end product—

The ropy hollow tubes emerged from a big feed box. that had once been a wastebasket. It was sealed shut now, though a gooseneck led from it into a tiny convertible dynamo, or its equivalent. “No,” Gallegher thought. “Dynamos are big, aren’t they? Oh, I wish I’d had a technical training. How can I figure this out, anyway?”

There was more, much more, including a square gray metal locker—Gallegher, momentarily off the beam, tried to estimate its contents in cubic feet. He made it four hundred eighty-six, which was obviously wrong, since the box was only eighteen inches by eighteen inches by eighteen inches.

The door of the locker was closed; Gallegher let it pass temporarily and continued his futile investigation. There were more puzzling gadgets. At the very end was a wheel, its rim grooved, diameter four inches.

“End product—what? Hey, Narcissus.”

“My name is not Narcissus,” the robot said reprovingly.

“It’s enough to have to look at you, without trying to remember your name,” Gallegher snarled. “Machines shouldn’t have names, anyhow. Come over here.”

“Well?”

“What is this?”

“A machine,” the robot said, “but by no means as lovely as I.”

“I hope it’s more useful. What does it do?”

“It eats dirt.”

“Oh. That explains the hole in the back yard.”

“There is no back yard,” the robot pointed out accurately.

“There is.”

“A back yard,” said the robot, quoting in a confused manner from Thomas Wolfe, “is not only back yard but the negation of back yard. It is the meeting in Space of back yard and no back yard. A back yard is finite and un-extended dirt, a fact determined by its own denial.”

“Do you know what you’re talking about?” Gallegher demanded, honestly anxious to find out.

“Yes.”

“I see. Well, try and keep the dirt out of your conversation. I want to know why I built this machine.”

“Why ask me? I’ve been turned off for days—weeks, in fact.”

“Oh, yeah. I remember. You were posing before the mirror and wouldn’t let me shave that morning.”

“It was a matter of artistic integrity. The planes of my functional face are far more coherent and dramatic than yours.”

“Listen, Narcissus,” Gallegher said, keeping a grip on himself. “I’m trying to find out something. Can the planes of your blasted functional brain follow that?”

“Certainly,” Narcissus said coldly. “I can’t help you. You turned me on again this morning and fell into a drunken slumber. Trie machine was already finished. It wasn’t in operation. I cleaned house and kindly brought you beer when you woke up with your usual hangover.”

“Then kindly bring me some more and shut up.”

“What about the policeman?”

“Oh, I forgot him. Uh… I’d better see the guy, I suppose.”

Narcissus retreated on softly padding feet. Gallegher shivered, went to the window, and looked out at that incredible hole. Why? How? He ransacked his brain. No use, of course. His subconscious had the answer, but it was locked up there firmly. At any rate, he wouldn’t have built the machine without some good reason. Or would he? His subconscious possessed a peculiar, distorted sort of logic. Narcissus had originally been intended as a super beer-can opener.