Eye in the Sky (1957) (15 page)

Hamilton removed his coat and then
picked up the telephone. “Get over here,” he said, when Bill Laws
finally answered. “And round up all of the group you
can. Joan Reiss, that woman and her son, McFeyffe
if you
can find him.”

“Edith Pritchet and her son are
still at the hospital,” Laws told him. “God knows where some of the
others are. Does it have to be now?” He explained, “I have a sort of
hangover.”

“This evening, then.”

“Make
it tomorrow,” Laws said. “Sunday’s soon
enough. What’s
up?”

“I think I’ve got this business
figured out.”

“Just when I was beginning to
enjoy it.” Ironically, Laws continued: “And tomorrow’s the big day in
this hear place. Lordy, Lordy. We’uns am sho’ gwan to hab’ ourselfs a
ball.”

“What’s
wrong with you?”

“Nuthin”, suh.” Laws
chuckled humorlessly. “Nuthin’ at all.”

“I’ll see you Sunday,
then.” Hamilton hung up and turned toward the bedroom. “Come on
out,” he called sharply to his wife.

“I won’t,” Marsha said
with stubborn determination. “You can’t look at me. I’ve made up my
mind.”

Standing in the entrance of the
bedroom, Hamilton fumbled for his cigarettes. They were gone; he had left them
with Silky. He wondered if she were still sitting in his Ford coupe, parked
across the street from Father O’Farrel’s Non-Babiist Church. Perhaps she had
seen him and McFeyffe rise to Paradise. But she was a sophisticated girl; she
wouldn’t be surprised. So no harm was done—except that it might be a while
before he got his car back.

“Come on, baby,” he said
to his wife. “I’m hungry for some breakfast. And if it’s what I think it
is—”

“It’s awful.” Loathing and
pain shuddered through Marsha’s voice. “I was going to kill myself.
Why?
What have I done? What’s it punishment for?”

“It’s not punishment,” he
told her gently. “And it’ll go
away.”

“Really?” Slim hope
touched her. “Are you positive?”

“If we handle this situation
right. I’ll go sit in the living room with Ninny; well be waiting.”

“He’s seen, already,”
Marsha said, in a strained, choked voice. “He’s disgusted.”

“Cats disgust easily.”
Returning to the living room, Hamilton threw himself down on the couch and
waited patiently. For a time nothing stirred. Then, from the
dark bedroom, came the first sounds of ponderous
movement. A shape, awkward and clumsy, was making its way
forward. A pang of compassion rose in Hamilton’s
breast.
The poor darn creature … and not to understand it.

At the doorway, a figure emerged.
Gross, squat, it stood facing him. Forewarned as he was, the shock overwhelmed
him. The resemblance to Marsha was only slight. Was this tubby, bloated
monstrosity his wife?

Tears leaked down her coarse cheeks.
“What—” she whispered. “What’ll I do?”

Getting up, he came rapidly toward
her. “It won’t last long. And you’re not the only one. Laws shuffles. And
talks in dialect”

“I don’t care about Laws. I
care about
me.”

The change had touched every part of
her. What had once been soft brown hair was now dirty, stringy fibers hanging
over her neck and shoulders, an unclean tangle of twisted strands. Her skin was
gray and pebbled, broken out with acne. Her body was a lumpy pudding, shapeless,
grotesque. Her hands were immense, the nails chipped and blackened. Her legs
were two white, furry columns that ended in massive flat feet Instead of her
usual chic dress she wore a coarse wool sweater, stained tweed skirt, tennis
shoes—and wrinkled bobby
socks.

Hamilton walked critically around
her. “It makes
sense.”

“Is this God’s—”

“This has nothing to do with
God. This has to do
with an old war veteran
named Arthur Silvester. A crack
pot old soldier who believes in his
religious cult and his stereotyped ideas. To him, people like you are dangerous
radicals. And he has a very clear idea what a rad
ical—a young radical woman—looks like.”

Marsha’s coarse features twisted
painfully. “I look l
ike—like a
cartoon.”

“You’re what Silvester imagines
a young radical college woman would look like. And he thinks all Negroes
shuffle. This is going to be tough on all of us
…
unless we get out of Silvester’s world pretty damn soon,
it’s going to be our finish.”

VIII

ON SUNDAY
morning, Hamilton was awakened at the crack of dawn by a
frenzied yammering that filled the house. As he crept stiffly from bed, he
recalled that Bill Laws had predicted some dire event in the early hours of the
Lord’s Day.

The blaring, screeching racket came
from the living room. Entering, Hamilton found that the television set had
miraculously turned itself on; the screen was alive with animation. Turgid
blurs drifted and pulsed; the entire picture was an angry swirl of dangerous
reds and purples. From the hi-fi speaker system came deafening thunder,
relentless and impassioned, a genuine hellfire-and-damnation roar.

This, he realized, was a Sunday
morning sermon. And the sermon was being delivered by (Tetragrammaton)
Himself.

Turning the set down, he padded back
to the bedroom to dress. In the bed, Marsha lay huddled in an unhappy heap,
trying to evade the bright glare of sunlight filtering through the window.
“Time to get up,” he informed her. “Don’t you hear the Almighty
bellowing in
the living room?”

“What’s He saying?” Marsha
murmured crossly.

“Nothing in particular. Repent
or suffer eternal damnation. The usual tribal tub-thumping.”

“Don’t watch me,” Marsha
begged. “Turn your back while I dress. Good God, I’m a
monster.”

In the living room, the television
set had turned itself up full-blast again; nobody was going to interfere with
the weekly harangue. Trying his best not to hear, Hamilton padded into the
bathroom and went through the timeless routine of washing and shaving. He was
back in the bedroom, getting on his clothes, when the door chimes rang.

“They’re here,” he said to
Marsha.

Marsha,
now dressed and struggling with her hair, gave
an agonized wail. “I
can’t face them. Make them go
away.”

“Darling,” he told her
firmly, lacing up his shoes, “if
you
hope to get your old self back—”

“You-all home?” Bill Laws’
voice came. “Ah jes’ push open de’ do’ an’ wahk raht in.”

Hamilton hurried into the living
room. There was Laws, graduate student in advanced physics. Arms dangling at
his sides, white eyeballs popping, knees bent, body lank and shambling, he
grotesquely swiveled his way over to Hamilton.

“You-all looka yhar,” he
told Hamilton. “Look, man,
how Ah bin
done in. This yhar goddam wuhl’ done kick
me square in de ass.”

“Are
you doing this on purpose?” Hamilton demanded,
not sure whether to be amused or outraged.

“Puhpus?” The Negro gazed
vacantly at him. “What
you-all mean,
Massah Hamilton?”

“You’re
either completely in Silvester’s hands, or you’re
the most cynical man I’ve ever met.”

Suddenly
Laws’ eyes flickered. “Silvester’s hands?
What do you mean?”
His dialect was gone; instantly he was alert, tense. “I thought it was His
Everlasting Maj
esty.”

“The dialect was an act,
then?”

Laws’ eyes gleamed. “I’m
beating it, Hamilton. The
pull
is there—I can feel it slipping in. But
I’m going it one better.” At that moment he caught sight of Marsha.
“Who’s that?”

Lamely, Hamilton explained, “My
wife. This thing has hold of her.”

“Jesus,”
Laws said softly. “What are we going to do?”

The door chimes sounded again. With
a wail, Marsha disappeared back into the bedroom. This time it was Miss Reiss.
Brisk and severe, she strode into the living room, dressed in a strict gray
business suit, low heels, horn-rimmed glasses. “Good morning,” she
said, in a
clipped staccato. “Mr. Laws
told me there is—” She broke
off, surprised. “That
racket.” She indicated the yammer and din of the television set.
“It’s on yours, too?”

“Of course. He’s giving
everybody the works.”

Noticeably, Miss Reiss relaxed.
“I thought it was just me He had singled out”

Through the half-open front door
came the pain-wracked shape of Charley McFeyffe. “Greetings,” he muttered.
His now violently swollen jaw was bandaged. A white cloth was wrapped around
his neck, pushed down inside his collar. Picking his way with care, he crossed
the living room toward Hamilton.

“Can’t you beat it?”
Hamilton asked sympathetically.

McFeyffe
glumly shook his head. “Can’t.”

“What’s this all about?”
Miss Reiss wanted to know.
“Mr. Laws
said you have something to tell us. Something
about this peculiar
conspiracy going on.”

“Conspiracy?” Hamilton
eyed her uneasily. “That’s hardly the term for it.”

“I agree,” Miss Reiss said
fervently, misunderstanding him. “It goes far beyond any mere
conspiracy.”

Hamilton gave up. Going to the
closed bedroom door he knocked urgently. “Come on out, sweetheart. Time to
head for the hospital.”

After a tormented interval, Marsha
emerged. She had put on a heavy overcoat and jeans, and in an attempt to
conceal her ratty hair, she had tied it up in a red kerchief. She wore no
make-up; it would have been a waste of time. “All right,” she said
wanly. “I’m ready.”

* * * *
*

Hamilton parked McFeyffe’s Plymouth
in the hospital lot. As the five of them trooped across the gravel toward the
hospital buildings, Bill Laws said, “Silvester is the key to all
this?”

“Silvester
is
all
this,” Hamilton said. “The dream you and Marsha had is the key. And
various other facts-such as your shuffling, and her altered appearance. The
status of the Second Babiists. This whole geocentric universe. I get the
feeling that I know Arthur Silvester inside and out Mostly inside.”

“Are you positive?” Laws
said doubtfully.

“All eight of us dropped into
the proton beam of the Bevatron. During the interval there was only one
consciousness, one frame of reference, for the eight of us.
Silvester never lost consciousness.”

“Then,”
Laws said practically, “we’re not actually
here.”

“Physically, we’re stretched
out on the floor of the Bevatron. But mentally, we’re here. The free energy of
the beam turned Silvester’s personal world into a
public universe. We’re subject to the logic of a religious crank,
an old man who picked up a screwball cult in
Chicago in
the ‘thirties. We’re in
his universe, where all his ignorant
and pious superstitions function.
We’re in the man’s
head.”
He gestured. “This landscape. This
terrain. The
convolutions of a brain; the hills
and valleys of Silvester’s
mind.”

“Oh,
dear,” Miss Reiss whispered. “We’re in his power.
He’s trying
to destroy us.”

“I doubt if he’s aware of
what’s happened. That’s the irony of it. Silvester probably sees nothing odd
about
this world. Why should he? It’s the
private fantasy-world
he’s lived in all his life.”

They entered the hospital building.
Nobody was in sight; from all rooms boomed the aggressive roar of
(Tetragrammaton)’s Sunday morning sermon.

“That’s
right,” Hamilton admitted. “I forgot about that. We’ll have to be
careful.”

The information desk was untended.
Probably the
whole staff was off watching
the sermon. Examining the
mechanical directory, Hamilton found
Silvester’s room number. A moment later they were ascending in the
silent hydraulic elevator.

The door to Arthur Silvester’s room
was wide open. Inside sat the thin, upright old man, intently facing his
television set. With him were Mrs. Edith Pritchet and her son David. Mrs.
Pritchet and David fidgeted uneasily; with a sigh of weak relief they greeted
the group as it filed into the room. Silvester, however, did
not stir. Relentlessly, with fanatic sternness,
he sat facing
his God, absorbed in the angry swirl of bellicose,
chest-beating sentiments that poured out into the room.

Clearly, Arthur Silvester was not
surprised to find himself addressed by his Maker. It was obviously a part of
his Sunday routine. On Sunday morning he ingested his week’s supply of
spiritual nourishment.

David Pritchet strolled peevishly
over to Hamilton. “Who the heck is that?” he demanded, pointing at
the screen. “I can’t get with it.”

His mother, plump, middle-aged, sat
daintily gnawing on a cored apple, her bland face devoid of comprehension.
Except for a nebulous aversion to the dinning blare, she was indifferent to the
phenomenon on the screen.

“It’s hard to explain,”
Hamilton told the boy. “You probably never ran into Him before.”

The aged, bony skull of Arthur
Silvester turned slight
ly; two harsh and
uncompromising gray eyes fixed them
selves on Hamilton. “No
talking,” he said, in a voice that chilled Hamilton. Without another word,
he turned back to the screen.

This
was the man whose world they had got themselves
into. For the first time
since the accident, Hamilton felt authentic and unmistakable fear.

“Ah guess,” Laws muttered,
out of the side of his mouth, “we-all am gwan tub heb’ tub listen tub this
yhar speechifyin’.”