The Mammoth Book of 20th Century SF II (99 page)

He approached the house. The front door was open. Elizabeth came to look out at him in surprise. “That was a quick day’s work!”

Duray said lamely, “The rig is down for repairs. I thought I’d catch up on some paper work. You go ahead with whatever you were doing.”

Elizabeth looked at him curiously. “I wasn’t doing anything in particular.”

He followed Elizabeth into the house. She wore soft black slacks and an old gray jacket; Duray tried to remember what his own Elizabeth had worn, but the garments had been so familiar that he
could summon no recollection.

Elizabeth poured coffee into a pair of stoneware mugs, and Duray took a seat at the kitchen table, trying to decide how this Elizabeth differed from his own – if she did. This Elizabeth
seemed more subdued and meditative; her mouth might have been a trifle softer. “Why are you looking at me so strangely?” she asked suddenly.

Duray laughed. “I was merely thinking what a beautiful girl you are.”

Elizabeth came to sit in his lap and kissed him, and Duray’s blood began to flow warm. He restrained himself; this was not his wife; he wanted no complications. And if he yielded to
temptations of the moment, might not another Gilbert Duray visiting his own Elizabeth do the same . . . He scowled.

Elizabeth, finding no surge of ardor, went to sit in the chair opposite. For a moment she sipped her coffee in silence. Then she said, “Just as soon as you left, Bob called
through.”

“Oh?” Duray was at once attentive. “What did he want?”

“That foolish party of his – the Rubble-menders or some such thing. He wants us to come.”

“I’ve already told him no three times.”

“I told him no again. His parties are always so peculiar. He said he wanted us to come for a very special reason, but he wouldn’t tell me the reason. I told him, ‘Thank you but
no.’”

Duray looked around the room. “Did he leave any books?”

“No. Why should he leave me books?”

“I wish I knew.”

“Gilbert,” said Elizabeth, “you’re acting rather oddly.”

“Yes, I suppose I am.” For a fact Duray’s mind was whirling. Suppose now he went to the school passway, brought the girls home from school, then closed off all the passways, so
that once again he had an Elizabeth and three daughters, more or less his own; then the conditions he had encountered would be satisfied. And another Gilbert Duray, now happily destroying the tract
houses of Cupertino, would find himself bereft . . . Duray recalled the hostile conduct of the previous Elizabeth. The passways in that particular world had certainly not been closed off by an
intruding Duray . . . A startling possibility came to his mind. Suppose a Duray had come to the house and, succumbing to temptation, had closed off all passways except that one communicating with
his own world; suppose then that Elizabeth, discovering the imposture, had killed him . . . The theory had a grim plausibility and totally extinguished whatever inclination Duray might have had for
making the world his home.

Elizabeth said, “Gilbert, why are you looking at me with that strange expression?”

Duray managed a feeble grin. “I guess I’m just in a bad mood this morning. Don’t mind me. I’ll go make out my report.” He went into the wide cool living room, at
once familiar and strange, and brought out the work-records of the other Gilbert Duray . . . He studied the handwriting: like his own, firm and decisive, but in some indefinable way different
– perhaps a trifle more harsh and angular. The three Elizabeths were not identical, nor were the Gilbert Durays.

An hour passed. Elizabeth occupied herself in the kitchen; Duray pretended to write a report.

A bell sounded. “Somebody at the passway,” said Elizabeth.

Duray said, “I’ll take care of it.”

He went to the passage room, stepped through the passway, looked through the peephole – into the large, bland sun-tanned face of Bob Robertson.

Duray opened the door. For a moment he and Bob Robertson confronted each other. Bob Robertson’s eyes narrowed. “Why, hello, Gilbert. What are you doing home?”

Duray pointed to the parcel Bob Robertson carried. “What do you have there?”

“Oh, these?” Bob Robertson looked down at the parcel as if he had forgotten it. “Just some books for Elizabeth.”

Duray found it hard to control his voice. “You’re up to some mischief, you and your Rumfuddlers. Listen, Bob. Keep away from me and Elizabeth. Don’t call here, and don’t
bring around any books. Is this definite enough?”

Bob raised his sun-bleached eyebrows. “Very definite, very explicit. But why the sudden rage? I’m just friendly old Uncle Bob.”

“I don’t care what you call yourself; stay away from us.”

“Just as you like, of course. But do you mind explaining this sudden decree of banishment?”

“The reason is simple enough. We want to be left alone.”

Bob made a gesture of mock despair. “All this over a simple invitation to a simple little party, which I’d really like you to come to.”

“Don’t expect us. We won’t be there.”

Bob’s face suddenly went pink. “You’re coming a very high horse over me, my lad, and it’s a poor policy. You might just get hauled up with a jerk. Matters aren’t
all the way you think they are.”

“I don’t care a rap one way or another,” said Duray. “Good-bye.” He closed the locker door and backed through the passway. He returned into the living room.

Elizabeth called from the kitchen. “Who was it, dear?”

“Bob Robertson, with some books.”

“Books? Why books?”

“I didn’t trouble to find out. I told him to stay away. After this, if he’s at the passway, don’t open it.”

Elizabeth looked at him intently. “Gil – you’re so strange today! There’s something about you that almost scares me.”

“Your imagination is working too hard.”

“Why should Bob trouble to bring me books? What sort of books? Did you see?”

“Demonology. Black magic. That sort of thing.”

“Mmf. Interesting – but not all
that
interesting . . . I wonder if a world like ours, where no one has ever lived, would have things like goblins and ghosts?”

“I suspect not,” said Duray. He looked toward the door. There was nothing more to be accomplished here, and it was time to return to his own Earth. He wondered how to make a graceful
departure. And what would occur when the Gilbert Duray now working his rig came home?

Duray said, “Elizabeth, sit down in this chair here.”

Elizabeth slowly slid into the chair at the kitchen table and watched him with a puzzled gaze.

“This may come as a shock,” he said. “I am Gilbert Duray, but not your personal Gilbert Duray. I’m his cognate.”

Elizabeth’s eyes widened to lustrous dark pools.

Duray said, “On my own world Bob Robertson caused me and my Elizabeth trouble. I came here to find out what he had done and why and to stop him from doing it again.”

Elizabeth asked, “What has he done?”

“I still don’t know. He probably won’t bother you again. You can tell your personal Gilbert Duray whatever you think best, or even complain to Alan.”

“I’m bewildered by all this!”

“No more so than I.” He went to the door. “I’ve got to leave now. Goodbye.”

Elizabeth jumped to her feet and came impulsively forward. “Don’t say goodbye. It was such a lonesome sound, coming from you . . . It’s like my own Gilbert saying
good-bye.”

“There’s nothing else to do. Certainly I can’t follow my inclinations and move in with you. What good are two Gilberts? Who’d get to sit at the head of the
table?”

“We could have a round table,” said Elizabeth. “Room for six or seven. I like my Gilberts.”

“Your Gilberts like their Elizabeths.” Duray sighed and said, “I’d better go now.”

Elizabeth held out her hand. “Good-bye, cognate Gilbert.”

From
Memoirs and Reflections:

The Oriental world-view differs from our own – specifically my own – in many respects, and I was early confronted with a whole set of dilemmas. I reflected upon
Asiatic apathy and its obverse, despotism; warlords and brain-laundries: indifference to disease, filth, and suffering; sacred apes and irresponsible fecundity
.

I also took note of my resolve to use my machine in the service of all men
.

In the end I decided to make the “mistake” of many before me; I proceeded to impose my own ethical point of view upon the Oriental lifestyle
.

Since this was precisely what was expected of me, since I would have been regarded as a fool and a mooncalf had I done otherwise, since the rewards of cooperation far exceeded the
gratifications of obduracy and scorn, my programs are a wonderful success, at least to the moment of writing
.

Duray walked along the riverbank toward Alan Robertson’s boat. A breeze sent twinkling cat’s-paws across the water and bellied the sails that Alan Robertson had
raised to air; the boat tugged at the mooring lines.

Alan Robertson, wearing white shorts and a white hat with a loose, flapping brim, looked up from the eye he had been splicing at the end of a halyard. “Aha, Gil! You’re back. Come
aboard and have a bottle of beer.”

Duray seated himself in the shade of the sail and drank half the beer at a gulp. “I still don’t know what’s going on – except that one way or another Bob is responsible.
He came while I was there. I told him to clear out. He didn’t like it.”

Alan Robertson heaved a melancholy sigh. “I realize that Bob has the capacity for mischief.”

“I still can’t understand how he persuaded Elizabeth to close the passways. He brought out some books, but what effect could they have?”

Alan Robertson was instantly interested. “What were the books?”

“Something about satanism, black magic; I couldn’t tell you much else.”

“Indeed, indeed!” muttered Alan Robertson. “Is Elizabeth interested in the subject?”

“I don’t think so. She’s afraid of such things.”

“Rightly so. Well, well, that’s disturbing.” Alan Robertson cleared his throat and made a delicate gesture, as if beseeching Duray to geniality and tolerance. “Still, you
mustn’t be too irritated with Bob. He’s prone to his little mischiefs, but – ”

“‘Little mischiefs’!” roared Duray. “Like locking me out of my home and marooning my wife and children? That’s going beyond mischief!”

Alan Robertson smiled. “Here, have another beer; cool off a bit. Let’s reflect. First, the probabilities. I doubt if Bob has really marooned Elizabeth and the girls or caused
Elizabeth to do so.”

“Then why are all the passways broken?”

“That’s susceptible to explanation. He has access to the vaults; he might have substituted a blank for your master orifice. There’s one possibility, at least.”

Duray could hardly speak for rage. At last he cried out: “He has no right to do this!”

“Quite right, in the largest sense. I suspect that he only wants to induce you to his Rumfuddle.”

“And I don’t want to go, expecially when he’s trying to put pressure on me.”

“You’re a stubborn man, Gil. The easy way, of course, would be to relax and look in on the occasion. You might even enjoy yourself.”

Duray glared at Alan Robertson. “Are you suggesting that I attend the affair?”

“Well – no. I merely proposed a possible course of action.”

Duray drank more beer and glowered out across the river. Alan Robertson said, “In a day or so, when this business is clarified, I think that we – all of us – should go off on a
lazy cruise, out there among the islands. Nothing to worry us, no bothers, no upsets. The girls would love such a cruise.”

Duray grunted. “I’d like to see them again before I plan any cruises. What goes on at these Rumfuddler events?”

“I’ve never attended. The members laugh and joke and eat and drink and gossip about the worlds they’ve visited and show each other movies: that sort of thing. Why don’t
we look in on last year’s party? I’d be interested myself.”

Duray hesitated. “What do you have in mind?”

“We’ll set the dials to a year-old cognate to Bob’s world, Fancy, and see precisely what goes on. What do you say?”

“I suppose it can’t do any harm,” said Duray grudgingly.

Alan Robertson rose to his feet. “Help me get these sails in.”

From
Memoirs and Reflections:

The problems that long have harassed historians have now been resolved. Who were the Cro-Magnons; where did they evolve? Who were the Etruscans? Where were the legendary
cities of the proto-Sumerians before they migrated to Mesopotamia? Why the identity between the ideographs of Easter Island and Mohenjo Daro? All these fascinating questions have now been settled
and reveal to us the full scope of our early history. We have preserved the library at old Alexandria from the Mohammedans and the Inca codices from the Christians. The Guanches of the Canaries,
the Ainu of Hokkaido, the Mandans of Missouri, the blond Kaffirs of Bhutan: All are now known to us. We can chart the development of every language syllable by syllable, from the earliest
formulation to the present. We have identified the Hellenic heroes, and I myself have searched the haunted forests of the ancient North and, in their own stone keeps, met face to face those mighty
men who generated the Norse myths
.

Standing before his machine, Alan Robertson spoke in a voice of humorous self-deprecation. “I’m not as trusting and forthright as I would like to be; in fact I
sometimes feel shame for my petty subterfuges, and now I speak in reference to Bob. We all have our small faults, and Bob certainly does not lack his share. His imagination is perhaps his greatest
curse: He is easily bored and sometimes tends to overreach himself. So while I deny him nothing, I also make sure that I am in a position to counsel or even remonstrate, if need be. Whenever I open
a passway to one of his formulae, I unobstrusively strike a duplicate which I keep in my private file. We will find no difficulty in visiting a cognate to Fancy.”

Duray and Alan Robertson stood in the dusk, at the end of a pale white beach. Behind them rose a low basalt cliff. To their right, the ocean reflected the afterglow and a
glitter from the waning moon; to the left, palms stood black against the sky. A hundred yards along the beach dozens of fairy lamps had been strung between the trees to illuminate a long table
laden with fruit, confections, punch in crystal bowls. Around the table stood several dozen men and women in animated conversation; music and the sounds of gaiety came down the beach to Duray and
Alan Robertson.