Dangerous Visions (84 page)

"All right," I said. "Let's go."

A gas main had once exploded along this street, she explained to me, a gushing road of fire as far as the docks, overhot and over-quick. It had been put out within minutes, no building had fallen, but the charred facias glittered. "This is sort of an artist and student quarter." We crossed the cobbles. "Yuri Pasha, number fourteen. In case you're ever in Istanbul again." Her door was covered with black scales, the gutter was thick with garbage.

"A lot of artists and professional people are frelks," I said, trying to be inane.

"So are lots of other people." She walked inside and held the door. "We're just more flamboyant about it."

On the landing there was a portrait of Ataturk. Her room was on the second floor. "Just a moment while I get my key—"

Marsscapes! Moonscapes! On her easel was a six-foot canvas showing the sunrise flaring on a crater's rim! There were copies of the original Observer pictures of the moon pinned to the wall, and pictures of every smooth-faced general in the International Spacer Corps.

On one corner of her desk was a pile of those photo magazines about spacers that you can find in most kiosks all over the world: I've seriously heard people say they were printed for adventurous-minded high school children. They've never seen the Danish ones. She had a few of those too. There was a shelf of art books, art history texts. Above them were six feet of cheap paper-covered space operas:
Sin on Space Station #12, Rocket Rake, Savage Orbit
.

"Arrack?" she asked. "Ouzo or pernod? You've got your choice. But I may pour them all from the same bottle." She set out glasses on the desk, then opened a waist-high cabinet that turned out to be an icebox. She stood up with a tray of lovelies: fruit puddings, Turkish delight, braised meats.

"What's this?"

"Dolmades. Grape leaves filled with rice and pignolias."

"Say it again?"

"Dolmades. Comes from the same Turkish word as 'dolmush.' They both mean 'stuffed.'" She put the tray beside the glasses. "Sit down."

I sat on the studio-couch-that-becomes-bed. Under the brocade I felt the deep, fluid resilience of a glycogel mattress. They've got the idea that it approximates the feeling of free fall. "Comfortable? Would you excuse me for a moment? I have some friends down the hall. I want to see them for a moment." She winked. "They like spacers."

"Are you going to take up a collection for me?" I asked. "Or do you want them to line up outside the door and wait their turn?"

She sucked a breath. "Actually I was going to suggest both." Suddenly she shook her head. "Oh, what do you want!"

"What will you give me? I want something," I said. "That's why I came. I'm lonely. Maybe I want to find out how far it goes. I don't know yet."

"It goes as far as you will. Me? I study, I read, paint, talk with my friends"—she came over to the bed, sat down on the floor—"go to the theater, look at spacers who pass me on the street, till one looks back; I am lonely too." She put her head on my knee. "I want something. But," and after a minute neither of us had moved, "you are not the one who will give it to me."

"You're not going to pay me for it," I countered. "You're not, are you?"

On my knee her head shook. After a while she said, all breath and no voice, "Don't you think you . . .should leave?"

"Okay," I said, and stood up.

She sat back on the hem of her coat. She hadn't taken it off yet.

I went to the door.

"Incidentally." She folded her hands in her lap. "There is a place in New City you might find what you're looking for, called the Flower Passage—"

I turned toward her, angry. "The frelk hangout? Look, I don't
need
money! I said
any
thing would do! I don't want—"

She had begun to shake her head, laughing quietly. Now she lay her cheek on the wrinkled place where I had sat. "Do you persist in misunderstanding? It is a spacer hangout. When you leave, I am going to visit my friends and talk about . . .ah, yes, the beautiful one that got away. I thought you might find . . .perhaps someone you know."

With anger, it ended.

"Oh," I said. "Oh, it's a spacer hangout. Yeah. Well, thanks."

And went out. And found the Flower Passage, and Kelly and Lou and Bo and Muse. Kelly was buying beer so we all got drunk, and ate fried fish and fried clams and fried sausage, and Kelly was waving the money around, saying, "You should have seen him! The changes I put that frelk through, you should have
seen
him! Eighty lira is the going rate here, and he gave me a hundred and fifty!" and drank more beer. And went up.

Afterword:

What goes into an s-f story—this s-f story?

One high old month in Paris, a summer of shrimp fishing on the Texas Gulf, another month spent broke in Istanbul. In still another city I overheard two women at a cocktail party discussing the latest astronaut:

" . . .so antiseptic, so inhuman, almost asexual!"

"Oh no! He's perfectly gorgeous!"

Why put all this in an s-f story? I sincerely feel the medium is the best in which to integrate clearly the disparate and technical with the desperate and human.

Someone asked of this particular story, "But what can they
do
with one another?"

At the risk of pulling my punch, let me say that this is basically a horror story. There is nothing they can do. Except go up and down.

FOREWORD: YEAR 2002

by Michael Moorcock

Introduction to
EVENSONG:
EVENSONG

by Lester del Rey

Introduction to
FLIES:
FLIES

by Robert Silverberg

Introduction to
THE DAY AFTER THE DAY THE MARTIANS CAME:
THE DAY AFTER THE DAY THE MARTIANS CAME

by Frederik Pohl

Introduction to
RIDERS OF THE PURPLE WAGE:
RIDERS OF THE PURPLE WAGE
or The Great Gavage

by Philip José Farmer

Introduction to
THE MALLEY SYSTEM:
THE MALLEY SYSTEM

by Miriam Allen deFord

Introduction to
A TOY FOR JULIETTE:
A TOY FOR JULIETTE

by Robert Bloch

Introduction to
THE PROWLER IN THE CITY AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD:
THE PROWLER IN THE CITY AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD

by Harlan Ellison

Introduction to
THE NIGHT THAT ALL TIME BROKE OUT:
THE NIGHT THAT ALL TIME BROKE OUT

by Brian W. Aldiss

Introduction to
THE MAN WHO WENT TO THE MOON—TWICE:
THE MAN WHO WENT TO THE MOON—TWICE

by Howard Rodman

Introduction to
FAITH OF OUR FATHERS:
FAITH OF OUR FATHERS

by Philip K. Dick

Introduction to
THE JIGSAW MAN:
THE JIGSAW MAN

by Larry Niven

Introduction to
GONNA ROLL THE BONES:
GONNA ROLL THE BONES

by Fritz Leiber

Introduction to
LORD RANDY, MY SON:
LORD RANDY, MY SON

by Joe L. Hensley

Introduction to
EUTOPIA:
EUTOPIA

by Poul Anderson

Introduction to
A PAIR OF BUNCH:
INCIDENT IN MODERAN

by David R. Bunch

THE ESCAPING

by David R. Bunch

Introduction to
THE DOLL-HOUSE:
THE DOLL-HOUSE

by James Cross

Introduction to
SEX AND/OR MR. MORRISON:
SEX AND/OR MR. MORRISON

by Carol Emshwiller

Introduction to
SHALL THE DUST PRAISE THEE?:
SHALL THE DUST PRAISE THEE?

by Damon Knight

Introduction to
IF ALL MEN WERE BROTHERS, WOULD YOU LET ONE MARRY YOUR SISTER?:
IF ALL MEN WERE BROTHERS, WOULD YOU LET ONE MARRY YOUR SISTER?

by Theodore Sturgeon

Introduction to
WHAT HAPPENED TO AUGUSTE CLAROT?:
WHAT HAPPENED TO AUGUSTE CLAROT?

by Larry Eisenberg

Introduction to
ERSATZ:
ERSATZ

by Henry Slesar

Introduction to
GO, GO, GO, SAID THE BIRD:
GO, GO, GO, SAID THE BIRD

by Sonya Dorman

Introduction to
THE HAPPY BREED:
THE HAPPY BREED

by John T. Sladek

Introduction to
ENCOUNTER WITH A HICK:
ENCOUNTER WITH A HICK

by Jonathan Brand

Introduction to
FROM THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE:
FROM THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

by Kris Neville

Introduction to
LAND OF THE GREAT HORSES:
LAND OF THE GREAT HORSES

by R. A. Lafferty

Introduction to
THE RECOGNITION:
THE RECOGNITION

by J. G. Ballard

Introduction to
JUDAS:
JUDAS

by John Brunner

Introduction to
TEST TO DESTRUCTION:
TEST TO DESTRUCTION

by Keith Laumer

Introduction to
CARCINOMA ANGELS:
CARCINOMA ANGELS

by Norman Spinrad

Introduction to
AUTO-DA-FÉ:
AUTO-DA-FÉ

by Roger Zelazny

Introduction to
AYE, AND GOMORRAH . . .:
AYE, AND GOMORRAH . . .

by Samuel R. Delany