Mind of My Mind (28 page)

Startled, Clay let it fall. At the same instant, he moved to get away from it. He shot about

three feet to one side and into the air. And stayed suspended there, terrified.

Slowly, the terror in his eyes was replaced by understanding. He looked around his

bedroom at Rachel, at Doro, and, finally, at Mary. Mary apparently released him then

from his paralysis, because he began to move his arms and legs now like a human spider

hanging in mid-air from an invisible web. Slowly, deliberately, Clay lowered himself to

the bed. Then he drifted upward again, apparently finding it an easy thing to do. He

looked at Mary, spoke apparently in answer to some thought she had projected to him.

"Are you kidding? I can fly! This is good enough for me."

"You're not a member of the pattern any more," she said. She seemed saddened,

subdued.

"That means I'm free to go, doesn't it?"

"Yes. If you want to."

"And I won't be getting any more mental interference?"

"No. You can't pull it in any more. You're not even an out-of-control telepath. You're

not a telepath at all."

"Lady, you read my mind. You'll see that's no tragedy to me. All that so-called power

ever brought me was grief. Now that I'm free of it, I think I'll go back to Arizona—raise

myself a few cows, maybe a few kids."

"Good luck," said Mary softly.

He drifted close to her, grinned at her. "You wouldn't believe how easy this is." He

lifted her clear of the floor, brought her up to eye level with him. She gazed at him,

unafraid. "What I've got is better than what you've got," he joked.

She smiled at him finally. "No it isn't, man. But I'm glad you think it is. Put me

down."

He lowered both her and himself to the floor as though he had been doing it all his

life. Then he looked at Doro. "Is this something brand-new, or have you seen it before?"

"Psychokinesis," said Doro. "I've seen it before. Seen it several times in your father's

family, in fact, although I've never seen it come about this smoothly before."

"You call that transition smooth?" said Mary.

"Well, with the heart problem, no, I guess not. But it could have been worse. Believe

me, this room could be a shambles, with everyone in it injured or dead. I've seen it

happen."

"My kind throw things," guessed Clay.

"They throw everything," said Doro. "Including some things that are nailed down

securely. Instead of doing that, I think you might have turned your ability inward a little

and caused your own heart to stop."

Clay shook himself. "I could have. I didn't know what I was doing, most of the time."

"A psychokinetic always has a good chance of killing himself before he learns to

control his ability."

"That may be the way it was," said Mary. "But it won't be that way any more."

Doro heard the determination in her voice and sighed to himself. She had just shared

a good portion of Clay's agony as she worked to keep him alive, and immediately she was

committing herself to do it again. She had found her work. She was some sort of mental

queen bee, gathering her workers to her instead of giving birth to them. She would be

totally dedicated, and difficult to reason with or limit. Difficult, or perhaps impossible.

Christine Hanson came through in an ordinary transition, perhaps a little easier than

most. She made more noise than either of the men because pain, even slight pain, terrified

her. She had had a harder time than the others during the pretransition period, too.

Finally, hoarse but otherwise unhurt, Christine completed her transition. She remained a

telepath, like her brother. It was possible that one or both of them might learn to heal, and

it was possible that they, Rachel, and Mary might be very long-lived.

Whatever potential Jamie and Christine had, they accepted their places in the pattern

easily. They were Mary's first grateful pattern members. And their membership brought

an unexpected benefit that Jesse accidentally discovered. Now all the members could

move farther from Mary without discomfort. Suddenly, more people meant more

freedom.

Doro watched and worried silently. The day after Christine's transition, Mary began

pulling in more of her cousins. And Ada, who knew a few of her relatives, began trying

to reach them in Washington. Doro could have helped. He knew the locations of all his

important latent families. But as far as he was concerned, things were moving too quickly

even without his help. He said nothing.

He had decided to give Mary two years to make what she could of her people. That

was enough time for her to begin building the society she envisioned—what she was

already calling a Patternist society. But two years should still leave Doro time to cut his

losses—if it became necessary—without sacrificing too large a percentage of his

breeding stock.

He had admitted to himself that he didn't want to kill Mary. She was easily

controllable in most matters, because she loved him; and she was a success. Or a partial

success. She was giving him a united people, a group finally recognizable as the seeds of

the race he had been working to create. They were a people who belonged to him, since

Mary belonged to him. But they were not a people he could be part of. As Mary's pattern

brought them together, it shut him out. Together, the "Patternists" were growing into

something that he could observe, hamper, or destroy but not something he could join.

They were his goal, half accomplished. He watched them with carefully concealed

emotions of suspicion and envy.

PART THREE

Chapter Nine

EMMA

Emma was at the typewriter in her dining room when Doro arrived. He had not called

to say he was coming, but at least when he walked in without knocking, he was wearing a

body she had seen him in before: the body of a small man, blackhaired, green-eyed, like

Mary. But the hair was straight and this body was white. He threw himself down on

Emma's sofa and waited silently until she finished the page that she was working on.

"What is it?" he asked her when she got up. "Another book?"

She nodded. She was young. She was young most of the time now, because he was

around so much. "I've discovered that I like writing," she said. "I should have tried it

years earlier than I did." She sat down in a chair, because he was sprawled over the length

of the sofa. He lay there frowning.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"Mary's the matter."

Emma grimaced. "I'm not surprised. What's she done?"

"Nothing yet. It's what she's going to do after I talk to her. I'm going to put on the

brakes, Em. The Patternist section of Forsyth is as big as a small town already. She has

enough people."

"If you ask me, she had enough two years ago. But now that you're ready to stop her,

what are you going to do with all those actives—all those Patternists—when she's not

around any more to maintain the Pattern?"

"I'm not out to kill Mary, Em. The Pattern will still be there."

"Will it?"

He hesitated. "You think she'll make me kill her?"

"Yes. And if you're realistic about it, you'll think so too."

He sighed, sat up. "Yes. I don't expect to salvage many of her people, either. Most of

them were animals before she found them. Without her, they'll revert."

"Animals . . . with such power, though."

"I'll have to destroy the worst of them."

Emma winced.

"I thought you'd be more concerned about Mary."

"I was concerned about her. But it's too late for her now. You helped her turn herself

into something too dangerous to live."

He stared at her.

"She's got too much power, Doro. She terrifies me. She's doing exactly what you

always said you wanted to do. But she's doing it, not you. All those people, those fifteen

hundred people in the section, are hers, not yours."

"But she's mine."

"You wouldn't be thinking about killing her if you believed that was enough."

"Em. . . ." He got up and went to sit on the arm of her chair. "What are you afraid of?"

"Your Mary." She leaned against him. "Your ruthless, egotistical, power-hungry little

Mary."

"Your grandchild."

"Your creation! Fifteen hundred actives in two years. They bring each other through

on an assembly line. And how many conscripted servants—ordinary people unfortunate

enough to be taken over by those actives. People forced now to be servants in their own

houses. Servants and worse!"

Her outburst seemed to startle him. He looked down at her silently.

"You're not in control," she said more softly. "You've let them run wild. How many

years do you think it will take at this rate for them to take over the city? How long before

they begin tampering with the state and federal government?"

"They're very provincial people, Em. They honestly don't care what's happening in

Washington or Sacramento or anywhere else as long as they can prevent it from hurting

them. They pay attention to what's going on, but they don't influence it very often."

"I wonder how long that will last."

"Quite a while, even if the Pattern survives. They honestly don't want the burden of

running a whole country full of people. Not when those people can run themselves

reasonably well and the Patternists can reap the benefits of their labor."

"That, they have to have learned from you."

"Of course."

"You mentioned Washington and Sacramento. What about here in Forsyth?"

"This is their home territory, Em. They're interfering too much here to avoid being

noticed by Forsyth city government, half asleep as it is. To avoid trouble, they took over

the city about a year and a half ago."

Emma stared at him, aghast.

"They've completely taken over the best section of town. They did it quietly, but still

Mary thought it safest for them to control key mutes in city hall, in the police department,

in—"

"Mutes!"

He looked annoyed, probably with himself. "It's a convenient term. People without

telepathic voices. Ordinary people."

"I know what it means, Doro. I knew the first time I heard Mary use it. It means

nigger!"

"Em—"

"I tell you, you're out of control, Doro. You're not one of them. You're not a telepath.

And if you don't think they look down on us non-telepaths, us niggers, the whole rest of

humanity, you're not paying attention."

"They don't look down on me."

"They don't look up to you, either. They used to. They used to respect you. Dammit,

they used to love you, the originals. The 'First Family.' " Her tone ridiculed the name that

the original seven actives had adopted.

"Obviously this has been bothering you for a long time," said Doro. "Why haven't

you said anything about it before?"

"It wasn't necessary."