Ballroom of the Skies (12 page)

Molly sat in a straight chair, her fists propped rigid atop her thighs, her ankles neatly together, the black hair
drawn back tightly, sheening oiled blue and green in the lamplight. Her eyes would flick toward Dake, slide uneasily away.

“It seems,” the doctor said, “to be a form of hysteria. It may help the diagnosis, Mr. Lorin, if you would tell me the apparent cause.”

“I was only here a few moments before it happened, Doctor. I flew down from New York this evening, and taxied out here.”

“When you first saw her did she seem upset in any way?”

Dake was laughing inwardly. It was unpleasant laughter. Try to tell this neat fussy little man the truth and he would have you wrapped up and labeled for delivery to one of the state institutions, despite the shortage of beds and treatment for the insane. The spiraling curve of psychosis during the past fifteen years had altered the admission requirements. Potential violence seemed to be the only remaining criterion. The milder species of manic-depressive, psychopathic personalities, schizos, paranoids—all roamed the streets, lost in their ritualistic fantasies. There had been a rebirth of that dark ages belief that to give money to the mad is one of the doorways to grace. Membership in the most marginal cults was, to many, an accepted release for obsession.

“She did not seem upset,” Dake said. “It seemed to happen quickly.”

The doctor turned to Molly. “Has she been herself lately?”

“Yes, sir.” Soft voice that trembled.

He looked at the maid and knew she would say nothing. The doctor sighed and looked at his watch again. “You aren’t much help, either of you. Miss Togelson has always impressed me as a very strong personality. This is rather … shocking, from a personal point of view. Neither of you know what she meant with all that babbling about skulls?”

Dake saw the maid shudder. He said, “Sorry, no.”

“I’ll be off then.”

“Could you give me a lift, Doctor, if you’re heading downtown?”

“Come along.”

As they went onto the porch Dake heard the maid slide the locks on the big door. As they got into the car he saw the lights coming on in room after room. Molly would want a lot of light around her. She would want the night to be like day.

The doctor drove with reckless casual impatience. “Where are you going, Mr. Lorin?”

“I checked luggage at the CIJ downtown terminal.”

“I’ll drop you at the door.”

“Can I phone you tomorrow to find out about Miss Togelson?”

“In the afternoon.”

The doctor let him out and started up almost before Dake had slammed the car door. He went into the brightly lighted terminal. Two large groups of Indian tourists were chatting, laughing. Their women wore saris heavily worked with gold and silver. They gave him a quick incurious glance. They came from a hard, driving, ambitious and wealthy land. It was fashionable to tour the bungling rattle-trap Western world. So quaint, my dear. But the people! So incredibly lethargic. And so excitingly vulgar. Naturally we owe them a debt—I mean this is the country where modern mass production methods originated, you know. In fact, we used to import their technicians, send our young people to their engineering schools. Think of it! But of course we’ve improved tremendously on all of their techniques. Tata set up the first completely automated steel mill. I suppose the war
did
exhaust these people terribly. We don’t know how lucky we are that Pak-India has never been a bomb target. And we’re strong enough so that it never will be. You heard President Lahl’s latest speech, of course. Any overt act will be punished a thousandfold. That made Garva and Chu and Fahdi sit up and take notice.

Dake took his luggage to a nearby hotel, registered, had a
late supper and went up to his room. He was unpacking his toilet articles when the bellhop arrived with the typewriter.

“It doesn’t look like much, sir, but the assistant manager says it’s in good shape.” He carried it over to the desk by the window and set it down.

“I didn’t order a typewriter sent up.”

The bellhop was a chinless and earnest young man. He gave Dake an uneasy smile. “I suppose that’s some kind of a joke, Mr. Lorin. I guess I don’t get it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I was in here ten minutes ago when you sent for a boy, and you told me you wanted a typewriter. I mean, if it’s a gag, I don’t get it.”

Before the episode with Patrice, Dake knew he would have objected strenuously. He would have phoned the manager and asked if this was a new method of gouging the guests. He would have demanded that the typewriter be taken away.

But the world was altering in some obscure way. A brassy little wench had talked imaginatively of the delusion of reality. Half a death’s head in a mirror. A woman mad from fright. A fingernail. Fundamentally he was a man of curiosity. A reporter. He could not ignore the objective questions triggered by subjective experience.

He tipped the boy. “Not a very good joke, I guess.”

The boy sighed. “Thanks, sir. You had me worried there for a minute. I wondered if I was going nuts. Good night, sir.”

The boy closed the door after him. Dake stood in the middle of the room, rubbing his chin. This, like every other damnable thing that had happened, had two aspects. The other side of the coin was that he
had
requested a typewriter. Insanity. Delusion. But Molly and Patrice had seen something. Could that be objective proof? Only, he thought, if he could prove to himself that he had gone to her house and what he imagined had happened had actually happened. He went quickly to the phone. It took twenty minutes to get the hospital. Phone service had changed over the years from a convenience to an annoying irritant.

The girl at the hospital switchboard answered at last. “Do you have a patient there, recently admitted? A Miss Patrice Togelson?”

“Just a moment, sir. I’ll check.”

He waited. She came back on the line and said, “Yes sir. She was admitted about three hours ago. She is resting comfortably, sir.”

“Thank you.”

He hung up, sat on the edge of the bed, lit a cigarette. All right. Take it another step. How do I prove I made that call, and prove I talked to the girl at the hospital switchboard? The call will appear on my bill. Yet, when I see it noted on the bill, how do I know I am actually seeing it?

There was a stabbing pain centered behind his eyes, a pain so sudden and intense that it blinded him. He closed his eyes and opened them again, aware of an abrupt transition, aware that time had passed. Instead of being seated on the bed, he was seated in front of the desk. A dingy sheet of hotel stationery was rolled into the typewriter. Several lines had been typed.

Dake read them mechanically. “To whom it may concern: When Darwin Branson died I saw that I could use his death to my own advantage. I saw a way I could put myself back in the public eye. I had worked for Darwin Branson for a full year, but his assigned task had been to make a detailed survey of State Department policy decisions.
He was not engaged in any way in secret negotiations.

“The article I wrote for the
Times-News
was a ruse. No such agreements were made. I had the plan of writing the article in order to help promote world unity. I realize now that it was a delusion of grandeur. I realize now that the article will have the reverse effect from what I had planned. I feel that at the time I wrote the article I was not responsible for my actions.

“The only way I can make amends is to write this full confession and then proceed to …”

It stopped there. The sudden time transition seemed to leave him numbed, unable to comprehend. The words seemed meaningless. He moved his lips as he read it again, much like a child trying to comprehend an obscure lesson in a textbook.

“No!” he said thickly.

The pain again focused behind his eyes, but not as intensely as before. It was almost as though it were coming to him through some shielding substance. It made his vision swim, but it did not black him out entirely. There was a pulsating quality to it, a strength that increased and diminished, as though in conflict.

He tried to keep his hands at his sides, but they lifted irresistibly to the keys of the typewriter. A new word. “… take …”

He held his hands rigid. Sweat ran down the side of his throat. Two hard clacks as his fingers hit the keys. “… my …”

The feeling of combat in his mind, of entities battling for control, was sharp and clear. He did not feel that he was fighting with any strength. He was something limp, helpless, being pushed and pulled at the same time.

“… own …”

His hands flexed, the knuckles crackling.

“… life.”

And again, without temporal hiatus, his pen was in his hand, his signature already scrawled at the foot of the sheet, the sheet out of the typewriter. Blackout, and he was at the window, one long leg over the sill, the window
flung high, sharp October night breathing against his face, an enclosed court far below, a few lighted windows across from him, like watchful eyes.

Conflict crescendoed in his mind and was suddenly gone. Emptiness. He straddled the sill, motionless. No more pushing and pulling. Easy now to let go. Easier than trying to find answers to problems. Easier than fighting insanity. Let go and spin slowly down through the whispering night, down by the lighted windows, down to that final answer. He heard himself make a sniggling sound, a drunken giggle. He sensed the impending rupture of his brain. A bursting of tissues. His hand tightened on the sill. Come now, God of darkness. Take your tired child. Find the dark land father, hanging in the stone cell of eternity, turning slowly with blackened face. Find the wife who one instant was warmth, and now lives forever in the heart of the whiteness hotter than the sun.

But … WHY?

Drop with question unanswered? Fall to the smash of bone on stone and never know why?

His mind wheeled for one insane instant and focused on WHY. Big letters, the color of flame, written on the black night. Never knowing was more horrid than continuing the conflict, the distortion of reality.

He released his hold and fell into the room, fell with a slack-muscled helplessness, his head thudding on the rug. He lay on his back and grasped his hard thighs with long-fingered hands, sensing the fibrous nerves, meaty tissues, churn of blood. He tasted his aliveness with his hands, content not to think for a little while. The drapery moved with the night wind. The wind cooled the sweat on his face. He heard the faraway city sound. Not like the roaring burly sounds of the old days. The cities had thinner sounds now. A lost and lonely scream was a part of each night.

Dake sat up slowly, feeling as though hallucination had drained his strength. He hitched closer to the window wanting to close it. The sash was out of his reach, yet he did not quite dare stand to reach it. He hitched over, stood up, leaning against the wall. He reached one hand
over, blindly, slid the sash down with a shattering bang. He turned his heavy shoulders against the wall.

In front of him was an evanescence, the faintest silvery shimmer. It was much like that first warning flicker of migraine, dread shining blindness.

And Karen Voss stood there, brown hair tousled, thumb tucked pertly in the wide belt, luminous gray eyes full of pale concern and sassy arrogance. He drew his lips back flat against his teeth and made a small sick sound in his throat and tried to reassure himself by passing his hard arm through the vision. His wrist struck the warm roundness of her shoulder, staggering her.

“Don’t try to explain things to yourself,” she said quickly. Her voice was tense. “Got to get you out of here.” She stepped quickly to the desk, snatched up the typed confession, ripped it quickly. She looked over her shoulder at him. “I hate to think of how many credits I’m losing. Start drooling and babbling and prove I’m wrong.”

Dake straightened his shoulders. “Go straight to hell,” he said thickly.

She studied him for a moment, head tilted to one side. She took his wrist, warm fingers tightening, pulling him toward the door. “I remember how you must feel. I’ll break some more rules, now that I’ve started. You’re expected to go mad, my friend. Just keep remembering that. And don’t.”

At the door she paused. “Now do exactly as I say. Without question. I kept you from going out that window.”

“What do you want?”

“We’re going to try to get out of here. The competition is temporarily … kaput. If we get separated, go to Miguel. You understand? As quickly as you can.”

He felt her tenseness as they went down all the flights of stairs to the lobby, went out into the night. “Now walk fast,” she said.

Down the block, around the corner, over to Market. She pulled him into a dark shallow doorway.

“What are we …”

“Be still.” She stood very quietly. In the faint light of a
distant streetlamp he could see that her eyes were half shut.

Suddenly she sighed. “The competition is no longer kaput, Dake. They’ve got an idea of direction.”

An ancient car meandered down the potholed street, springs banging, engine making panting sounds. It swerved suddenly and came over to the curb and stopped. A gaunt, raw-looking man stepped out, moving like a puppet with an amateur handling the strings. He went off down the sidewalk, lifting his feet high with each step.

“Get in and drive it,” Karen said, pushing impatiently at him. He cramped his long legs under the wheel. She got in beside him. He drove down the street, hearing behand them the frantic yawp of the dispossessed driver.

She called the turns. They entered an area of power failure, as dark as one of the abandoned cities.

“Stop here and we’ll leave the car,” she said.

They walked down the dark street. She stepped into an almost invisible alley mouth. “Wait,” she said.

Once again she was still. He heard her long sigh. “Nothing in range, Dake. Come on. North Seventh is a couple of blocks over. Bright lights. Crowds. That’s the best place.”

“It’s a bad place to go. For a couple.”

“We’re safe, Dake.”

“What did you do to that man in the car?”