Уильям Макгиверн - Summitt

Selby said, “Make those calls, Mr. Komoto. I’m not interested in your philosophy. You’re making me impatient.”

“That wasn’t bad,” Wilger nodded approvingly as Komoto hurried into his office. “Kind of gentlemanly shit, but you’re big enough to make it go down.”

The Hell for Leather shop sprawled through four ground-floor rooms of an ancient building that was within walking distance of Wanamaker’s famed department store and the Old Reading Terminal. The two rooms fronting the street were lined with glass shelving and counters which displayed dildoes of various sizes, along with inflated, multicolored condoms stuffed into vases like flowers. Jars and tubes of creams and jellies were heaped in pyramids on shelves, some containing alleged aphrodisiacs, others mingled with properties guaranteed to cause itching or burning or numbing sensations.

“Jesus Christ,” Wilger said, looking at life-sized rubber dolls that stood about like pink, blank-eyed spectators, fully equipped with male and female genitalia.

The rear rooms were walled with shelves of tapes, film and cassette sets. Neatly lettered signs, like something in the public library, Selby thought, were thumbtacked to the shelf edges to identify various categories: Disciplines, Fetishes, Bondage, Group Activities, Aphrodisiacs. In some cases there were subheadings — Corporal Punishment, Girls’ Schools, Gloves, Shoes and Slippers, All-Men, All-Women; Stimulants (Friction, Drugs, Alcohol, etc.).

At the end of the corridor, a half dozen screening rooms were furnished with couches and chairs. All were scruffed and dusty and in need of cleaning. In each screening room was a projector that could be operated from inside the booth, but the activating tokens had to be purchased from Komoto at the main cash register to run the machines for half-hour interludes.

“Otherwise,” Komoto had explained, “the kinks would stay all night.”

On the drive over, he had already told them as much as he knew about Earl Thomson. But Komoto’s information had only outlined the dimensions of the problem; it hadn’t solved it.

Thomson had rented a film cassette from the files titled Knots and Lashes — “very pretty porn, pirate ladies in G-strings, captured, tied to riggings, flogged” — but Earl and his friend, the army officer, hadn’t screened that film because, as Komoto explained, it was new and the seal on it hadn’t been broken.

They’d rented a private booth, paid for one activating token and looked at other footage, a film Earl had brought out of the booth with him later, a cassette with the name of a city on it... Summitt City, Komoto remembered the words stenciled on the brown plastic cover in block capitals.

Komoto returned from his office. “My clerks will take the morning off, but it will cost me a lot, you know.”

“Cheaper than Encarna’s swimming lessons,” Wilger said. He looked at Selby. “You believe this character? Or should we try some of those tickle whips on his yellow ass?”

Selby said, “I told him to name his price for that film. If he knew where it was, he’d be interested. He’s a businessman.”

Komoto smiled gratefully at Selby. “Precisely. It’s buying and selling, nothing more. Would you care for coffee while you look around? It’s a chicory blend. I obtain it cheaply from sailors up from Panama. They keep me supplied.”

“Stuff your coffee,” Wilger said. “Let’s go to work, Harry.”

Earl Thomson, according to Komoto, had asked if he could leave his cassette in the files at Hell for Leather. He’d paid for that, naturally, a storage fee. But Komoto had no idea where Thomson had put it.

“The shop was very crowded, you know that.” He glanced accusingly at Wilger. “You were parked across the street watching. You saw the people, sailors, a florists’ convention was in town, a man tried to take a live chicken into a screening booth. It was that kind of day. Very much business. I don’t know what Mr. Thomson did with it.”

He gestured at the shelves of cassettes. “I can’t help you.” He laughed showing strong, white teeth. “You would have to tear the place apart to find it.”

Wilger removed his coat and folded it neatly over a rack of kid porn magazines. “You said that, Bento, we didn’t.”

Selby said, “You start with A to N . I’ll cover the rest of it.”

“That gives me assholes to nookie . Bento, you wanna help?”

“Most certainly, sir. This is only a business matter. But please handle these items with care. Many of them are irreplaceable.”

Wilger smiled grimly. “I’m very glad to hear that, you kinky little bastard.”

A cool light spread across Summitt City’s blue lake, and the green belts glistened under sprinklers. Miniature rainbows formed brilliant arches within the crystal water cones.

When Correll was informed that directions to the screening room had been left at the north gate for Harry Selby, he drove directly to the theater.

The cameras on the buildings were motionless, their slim barrels fixed on the horizons. The shopping mall was empty and silent, but golfers were already on the course, tiny figures dotting the fairways.

The theater was a stone-colored, windowless structure landscaped with firs and spreading shrubs. Correll parked and went inside.

Wall clocks in the auditorium recorded the time in New York and a dozen world capitals. An electronic island contained projection equipment and a control panel with rheostats, speakers and microphones. Clear light streamed from panels in the acoustically treated ceiling.

A cassette of film had been inserted in the projector. Correll snapped a switch, and twin beams illuminated the large screen. Music sounded and scenes of Summitt City appeared in smooth sequences: children playing baseball, passengers getting off electric buses, homes with colorful gardens, window boxes bright with flowers. The film had been shot in clear fall sunlight, a brilliant day in October. Correll had watched it at Camp Saliaris with Jennifer, surrounded by the world delegates chosen to participate in the Ancilia Four program. On that occasion, General Taggart’s sardonic voice had counterpointed the images on the screen.

Correll stood alone now, watching residents of Summitt City in their plants and shop and recreational areas. A baseball game was featured, then couples in drifting canoes. Sailboats skimmed along the water, dissolving into shots of the shopping arcade. This was what he had created, Correll thought, a prosperous community, with a controlled, industrious and harmless population. But now everything was at risk.

His suspicions had hardened to conviction. From the start he was resigned to some degree of personal failure, but that genetic despair had been flawed by unrealistic hope, an unreasoning optimism that his own inevitable defeats would result in a victory for his species. Until now he was blinded to the betrayal he had intuitively been certain of. A vacuum had always existed... an emptiness, rather, of love, of confidence, of warmth and esteem between himself and the world, himself and Jennifer, and a darkness had rushed in to fill it.

Ledge had been informed by their Philadelphia intelligence that Harry Selby was on his way to Summitt City. A pass from Lee Crowley was waiting for him at the north gate. And in the screening room the crucial record, the film itself, had been inserted in the projector, waiting only for the touch of Selby’s fingers on a switch. The stage was set, the curtain had risen... but where was Harry Selby?

On the big white screen, the film cutting had become sharper and faster but the effect remained harmonious. Ducks bobbing on water, children splashing in a pool. People entering a church, quiet hospital rooms and bright sun porches. An American flag strained splendidly above the administration building.