The Potter of Firsk and Other Stories Read online

  Kelso considered. “Isn’t there any other way, that doesn’t incur any risk?”

  Jean looked hopefully over her shoulder.

  “You name it, we’ll try it.”

  Kelso rubbed his chin. “If we could train a chimpanzee—”

  Don snapped his fingers. “A question we should ask: ‘Are there animals in the after-world?’ Excuse me; what would we train the chimpanzee to do?”

  Kelso shook his head. “Darned if I know.”

  Don turned to Dr. Cogswell. “How long will it take you to set up a new tank?”

  Dr. Cogswell considered. “A month and a half—in that neighborhood.”

  “And allow another two months for testing—say a total of three or four months. Right?”

  Dr. Cogswell nodded.

  “We can put the time to good use,” said Don. “Kelso, maybe you can help us out here.”

  “I’ll be glad to try.”

  “Granting my theory, that the mass unconscious generates an after-world in the matrix of mind-stuff, that the characteristics of a spirit are determined by his reputation; that notoriety and fame strengthen the spirit—conceding all this to be true, it might benefit me to be planted in the public mind as a man of ingenuity and effectiveness.”

  Kelso nodded thoughtfully. “In other words—you want publicity?”

  “Of a certain sort: as much as possible. The public should think of Donald Berwick as efficient, resourceful, insatiably curious, given to traveling to strange places, with a faculty for emerging unscathed. They must think of him as a lucky dare-devil who always wins.”

  “Well, well, well,” said Kelso. He ran his fingers through his hair. “I wouldn’t dare work a hoax.”

  “You wouldn’t need to,” said Jean in a muffled voice. “If you just printed a few facts.”

  “Facts? About the Foundation here? I’d like to. I’ve been kicking myself for not getting pictures of the mass seance—which of course we could re-enact.”

  Jean shook her head. “I’m not referring to the Foundation…Tell him about your escape from the Chinese prison-camp, Don.”

  Don grinned sheepishly. “It’s a long story. It’ll take a while.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “The steaks are done,” Jean said. “We’d better eat first.”

  Over coffee Don self-consciously settled himself in his chair. “I’m warning you, this is wild. At the time it seemed perfectly normal, but now—” he shook his head. “Once in a while I look at the photographs just to convince myself. I’ll just give you the outlines; if you think there’s anything in it, I can fill in the gaps.

  “Toward the end of the Korean War I was captured, and for reasons best known to the Chinese shipped to a camp in Manchuria, near a town called Taoan, along with ten other Americans. We weren’t listed with the Red Cross, and were never repatriated after the war. I think we were intended for super-special brain-washing, with an eye to making secret agents out of us.

  “I was a prisoner for two years. We were brain-washed pretty thoroughly. I knew that if I got bored, I’d be lost, and to protect myself I learned Russian and Chinese. Studied hard at it—nothing else to do. They were glad to help, thinking the brain-wash was taking hold.

  “The two years were tough. Six of the fellows died. Two were killed trying to escape, three from disease and undernourishment, one from a disciplinary beating. One day a Russian colonel visited the camp. He looked a bit like me…To make a long story short, I killed him, hid the body under the barracks, walked out in his uniform. In his jeep I drove to a place called Tsitsihar, on a feeder to the Trans-Siberian Railway.

  “By this time there was hue and cry. I ditched the jeep, bluffed my way aboard a west-bound train. I stayed aboard two days and a night—past Chita, to a place called Ulan Ude, near Lake Baikal. Near Genghis Khan’s Karakorum, as a matter of fact. Here my luck ran out—I was having visions of riding into Moscow and strolling to the American Embassy. I ran into a colleague, and gave him the wrong salute. I jumped off the train, ran through the yards. They were hot on my trail—a Keystone Kops sequence, but not funny. I jumped into the cab of a locomotive, pushed a gun into the engineer’s back, and hid while the search-party ran past. We started back down the line to Chita, the fireman and the engineer convinced they were goners. I knew at Chita I’d be in trouble—but I couldn’t see any way out. Twenty miles out of town I tied the engineer and fireman hand and foot, drove the locomotive into Chita. When we reached the yards I throttled down to about ten miles an hour, jumped out, let the train make its own decision. A hundred yards farther it ran into a yard engine.

  “Here the story gets confused. I’ll merely say I was chased through the streets of Chita. I hid in a bordello, stole a suitcase and some civilian clothes, mingled with a group of eighty Russian engineers, on their way to Harbin in a truck convoy. I couldn’t get away from them; I was put to work installing machinery in a cement plant. I knew nothing about it, but the foreman working under me did. I watched him work for three months, drew pay, then felt the breath getting hot on my neck.

  “I stole a car, drove north to a town near the Siberian border—Kiamusze on the Sungari River. I hid aboard a barge, was taken to Tunkiang on the border. I stole a skiff, paddled across the river into Siberia, and rode a local bus to Khabarovsk. At Khabarovsk, after a month of intrigue, I managed to scrounge air passage to Sakhalinsk on Sakhalin Island. I walked south to Korsakov, sneaked on a fishing boat. When the fisherman appeared, I made him take me south. He set me ashore on Hokkaido at four in the morning. I went to the police station; they took me to an American Army camp. In brief,” said Don, “that’s the story.”

  Kelso asked in a hushed voice: “You’re giving it to me free?”

  “If it’ll do any good. I’ve got a few photographs that I took along the way. It was a Russian camera, not too good, but—they’re pictures.”

  Kelso examined the pictures. “If this doesn’t make the Great Adventure series, my name isn’t Robert Kelso.”

  “Wait till you hear the details,” said Jean. “You’ve just got the outline.”

  Donald Berwick appeared on the cover of Life wearing a Russian colonel’s uniform. He was depicted gazing at a wall-map of East Asia, the path of his escape-route marked in black. His stance suggested capable masculinity; his acute hatchet-faced profile gave the impression of incisive virility. Lucky Don Berwick read the caption. He conspicuously carried a Polaroid camera, an incongruous note on which Kelso had insisted.

  “If there’s anything in this wildest of all schemes,” said Kelso, “I want pictures of it. You’ve got to appear in the after-life wearing a camera. Because I want pictures!”

  “What good are pictures?” argued Head. “He can’t mail ’em back.”

  “He’s got to materialize. I want him to show himself, holding out photographs like a man selling postcards. I’ll have a cameraman ready, and if Henry Luce doesn’t weep for joy, I’ll jump in the ocean.”

  “Will he dare print the pictures?”

  “Could he resist?”

  “Don’t forget to emphasize somewhere that the camera is self-developing,” said Don. “Also, that I always carry it loaded; otherwise it won’t do any good.”

  Jean brought him the issue. “Here—look it over. You’re famous.”

  Don groaned ruefully. “‘Lucky Don Berwick’.”

  “You should read the story.”

  Don turned to the article, read. “Oh, Lord…They make me out a combination of Mr. Moto and Tarzan.”

  “Excellent!” said Jean. “Just what you want.”

  Don looked up with an embarrassed grin. “I suppose it’s what I was asking for. But now—I feel a fool.”

  “You’ve made an impression,” said Jean. “Look. Here’s an article in the Orange City Herald—about ‘Lucky Don Berwick, local hero’!”

  Don read the article, grinning and blushing. “Here I’m a high school athletic prodigy, a war hero, a student who just barely missed a
Rhodes scholarship, a petroleum engineer of uncanny wisdom.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I feel the pressure of this contrived personality…It’s gathering weight!”

  Jean put her hand on his, squeezed. “It’s not really as contrived as you might think. You really are like that.”

  “Rats.”

  “The picture is exaggerated—but it’s you. Also—look at this.” She pointed to a column on the other side of the page. Hugh Bronny’s face stared challengingly forth at Don.

  EVANGELIST ENTERS

  POLITICAL PICTURE

  Bronny Declares for Governorship

  “Christian Crusade” as Third Party

  Hugh Bronny, evangelist, and leader of what he calls the “Christian Crusade”, today announced his candidacy for the governorship of California. At a press conference called at his Orange City headquarters he displayed a petition which he claimed bore the signatures of a million voters—enough to arouse attention and respect from both Democrats and Republicans. “I plan to make old-fashioned Christian principle the basis of government,” declared “Fighting Hugh” Bronny. “The Christian Crusade is marching to bring the nation back to the fundamental idea of God—a clean white American God. We’ll sweep the state this year; in two years we’ll send Christian Crusade Congressmen to Washington and in 1964 we’ll have a Christian Crusade President in the White House!”

  “The man’s off his rocker,” said Don.

  “Surely there can’t be any chance of Hugh becoming governor!” protested Jean.

  Don shook his head. “I imagine there’s still more sane people than lunatics in California.”

  “I keep thinking of Hitler,” said Jean. “How the Germans voted him into power, on something of the same basis.”

  “Yes. It’s a good analogy. Hitler appealed to the worst instincts of the Germans; Hugh does the same for us. ‘Clean white God’!”

  The doorbell sounded. Don went to the window. “Speak of the devil. It’s Hugh!”

  Jean started to the door, then paused. “What on earth can he want?”

  “Let’s find out.”

  Jean opened the door. With a laugh that was half-hysterical, she cried out, “Hugh—you’ve got a new suit!”

  Hugh was wearing a double-breasted black coat with great padded shoulders, gray flannel trousers, long limp black shoes.

  “What of it?” asked Hugh grimly. “I’m the next governor of the State, and I’ve got to look the part.” He swung his eyes suspiciously from Jean to Don. “What’s behind all this publicity you’re getting? War hero! Fantastic saga of escape! It’s dishonest.”

  “You’re wrong,” said Don.

  “You mean to say that all that guff is true?”

  “I mean that the facts speak for themselves.”

  “Come on,” said Hugh scornfully. “Let’s have some details. I’ve known you too long, Don. You can’t pull the wool over my eyes.”

  “It’s the truth,” said Don. “Take it or leave it. Do you think they’d print anything they couldn’t verify?”

  “Humph!” Hugh snorted. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

  “Hugh,” said Jean, “you get crazier every time I see you.”

  Hugh’s eyes glistened. “You’re talking to a very important man, sister dear.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Well—” Hugh hesitated. “As you know, I’m entering politics. I need money—you’ve got money that belongs to me. I want it.”

  “It doesn’t belong to you and you won’t get a cent,” said Jean.

  “What do you do with all the God-given money?”

  “We’re planning to build a laboratory and research center.”

  “For your Foundation of Atheistic Blasphemy?”

  “Call it anything you like.”

  “What are you doing with all those animals at Madrone Place? Dogs, monkeys, apes?”

  Don asked, “How do you know about these things, Hugh?”

  “I keep my eyes open. What are you doing with them?”

  “We are developing a new medical technique.”

  “You’re killing them and bringing them back to life!”

  “How do you know?” Don asked suspiciously.

  “As I said, I keep my eyes open. I want to know why you’re doing this? Are you going to try this unholy game with a man?”

  “Haven’t you asked enough questions?”

  Hugh lowered his great head archly. “Just friendly interest.”

  “You’re no friend of ours.”

  “I’m friend to all men. All God-fearing clean-thinking men.”

  “I don’t fear anyone. So you’re no friend of mine. Perhaps you’ll do us the honor of leaving?”

  Hugh serenely inspected the cuffs of his glossy new white-on-white shirt. “I came to visit my sister and my old home—which is my right. I came here taking valuable time, to get some information.”

  “If it concerns money,” said Don, “you’ve got it. You don’t get any.”

  “I’ll sue.”

  “On what grounds?”

  “You admitted that it was my money.”

  “When was this?”

  “You knew the oil was there. You asked me to accept half of the property, because you knew it was due to me.”

  “How did we know oil was there?” asked Don.

  Hugh looked at him blankly.

  Don said drily, “Evidently you concede that your father’s ghost directed us to continue drilling.”

  “No,” said Hugh without moving a muscle of his face. “Spirits of the departed worship God, or suffer in Hell. They do not concern themselves in earthly affairs. And however you learned of the oil, the money is mine. And now I need it.” Jean said slyly, “Surely a candidate for governor has better things to do than stand on front steps wheedling money from his sister.”

  “It’s my money,” said Hugh doggedly. “If you think you’ll keep it with impunity—you’re wrong. Because I will fight back. Do you think I am called Fighting Hugh Bronny for nothing?” He fixed them in turn with a blue glare, then turned, stalked away.

  Jean watched him go. “He’s a different person, Don…It’s something to do with changing his clothes…He’s important now.”

  Don nodded. “He’s building his own niche in the collective unconscious. Fighting Hugh Bronny…Let’s go over to Madrone Place.”

  They drove across town, to the old frame building. From within came sounds of activity. An electric drill whined, a power-saw rasped through wood.

  Don and Jean entered, walked through a new metal door into a large bare bright room. White-enameled cabinets lined one wall; opposite were oxygen tanks, an iron-lung, high-frequency electrical equipment. Through the floor came pipes, leading to a refrigeration unit in the cellar. A long glass-walled tank rested on a stainless steel box in the center of the room.

  Don nodded to the tank. “There it is. Ferry to the after-world…What did Charon call his boat? Cerberus? No, that was the dog.”

  Jean’s fingers were clenching his arm. Don looked down at her with a wry grimace. “What’s the trouble?”

  “I’m worried.”

  “It’s Hugh. He’s upset you.”

  “He’s a maniac!”

  “I suppose he is…Sometime I’m going to take an hour off and try to visualize the world as he sees it.” He looked through a door into the next room. A man wielding an electric drill at the instrument panel nodded. He was about forty-five, round-bodied but sturdy, with a blond forelock hanging into his eyes. He finished drilling, came into the outer room.

  “Doctor Clark,” said Don, “I didn’t expect to see you installing your own equipment.”

  “Just a small refinement,” said Dr. Clark. “Everything’s working beautifully—better than we had hoped.”

  “Then there’s no danger?” asked Jean anxiously.

  “No fatalities since our first two days. Last night we held a chimpanzee under for an hour and a half. She’s bright as a dime this morn
ing.”

  “Then we’re ready to roll on the big one,” said Don.

  Dr. Clark nodded. “We’re ready to roll.”

  Don peered into the tank. “Make it comfortable, Doctor—I’ve a long way to go.”

  XVI

  The room was the same; the night was two weeks later. Nine men and three women sat or stood in their assigned positions.

  Doctors Clark, Aguilar and Foley stood beside the glass-walled tank. Godfrey Head, Howard Rakowsky, Kelso, Vivian Hallsey and a cameraman sat in chairs to one side of the door; to the other sat Jean and Ivalee Trembath. Doctor James Cogswell stood by the foot of the tank and with him was Donald Berwick.

  Don wore a blue terry-cloth bathrobe. His face was composed but the skin at his jawline shone pale. He turned his head, met Jean’s eyes. He smiled, muttered to Cogswell, crossed the room, took her hand.

  “I can’t help but worry,” she whispered.

  “There’s nothing to fear,” said Don. “The technique has been practiced on dogs and chimpanzees till they can do it in the dark.”

  “I’ve heard that when men return to life, they’re not always—sane.”

  “Nothing like that’s going to happen.”

  “Another thing—that article in today’s paper. Won’t it prejudice some people, alter the archetype?”

  Don shrugged. “Perhaps, perhaps not. It makes the archetype more exactly me. It focuses a lot more attention on me, from people who before paid small attention…”

  At this moment Fighting Hugh Bronny stood in the Orange City Auditorium, reading the article to seventeen thousand rapt followers. He leaned his gaunt body forward over the podium, spoke with the sly breathless relish of a dog stealing garbage. As he read he raised his head to glance across the auditorium. To his eyes the scene appeared as an over-exposed photograph—burnt by glaring lights, marked by shadows and smoky air, and the mosaic of pale faces was blurred, out of focus. He no longer thought of the audience as human beings. They comprised a unique substance, malleable as candle-wax, but with a responsive fiber that stimulated and excited him like a bath-brush on his long bony back.

  Fighting Hugh Bronny read in triumph. He finished the article. The audience was silent; Hugh could sense the seventeen thousand pulsing hearts, the prickle and minuscule multitudinous shine of thirty-four thousand eyes. He felt a great glow of power. These people were waiting for him to tell them, to lead them; he could fix and form their minds, whip them back and forth like a fisherman dry-casting.