The Ninth Wave (38 page)

"Mr. Appleton, what did you do before you retired?" Mike asked.
"I was a carpenter. Journeyman carpenter. Iowa first and then California.
Good one too. Laid three thousand feet of oak flooring in . . . " he
stopped slowly and glanced at Mike. "I was a carpenter."
Mike poured a glass full of beer. He did it slowly. He poured the
beer down the side of the glass and watched the thin collar of foam
climb slowly up the side. He turned the glass upright just as it was
perfectly full. He took a bite of a sandwich and then pushed a handful
of potato chips in his mouth. The sound of the chips being crushed was
the loudest noise in the room. Mike wiped his hand across his mouth and
smiled at Mr. Appleton.
"Mr. Appleton, have you got a minute to spare so I can tell you a little
story?" Mike asked. "It's a very short story. Very short."
Mr. Appleton's bright birdlike eyes swept over Mike with a look of
hard pity. His hands uncurled and he tapped his fingertips together;
the five fingers of one hand gently bouncing off the five fingers of
the other hand.
"A minute, Mr. Freesmith? I've got lots of minutes," he said and cackled
shrilly; a harsh arrogant sound; chickenlike and hard; utterly confident.
"Sure. I've got a minute."
"You see, Mr. Appleton, we know a little bit about how our eider citizens,
our senior citizens, were treated in other societies," Mike said in a
soft voice. He looked relaxed and powerless. Sweat marked his armpits
and blotched the front of his shirt. His eyes were half closed against
the heat and the glare of the sun that came in the venetian blinds. "We
know; Mr. Appleton, from anthropology and sociology that every society
tends to protect its most productive members . . . the men and women
who can work the hardest, reproduce, fight wars, invent things, expend
energy. In tough times the entire society will instinctively protect
its strongest members. An old Eskimo will make up his mind one day and
wander off into a storm and die if the food supply gets low enough. He
does that because he knows that if he doesn't the younger people might
force him out into the storm. And so he goes by himself."
"Mr. Freesmith, my people are waiting for me back in the Convention Hall,"
Mr. Appleton said and his upper lip was drawn thin. "They want to know what
Cromwell stands for. They don't want to hear horror stories."
"Sure, sure. Just a minute," Mike said. He took another drink of beer. He
put more potato chips in his mouth, crunched them loudly. "Just hear me
out. Let me tell you about one society and the way it took care of its
older people. This was a society that was hard pressed by its enemies
. . . pretty much the way the United States is today. They began to
worry, wonder if they could stand the pressure, argue about how they'd
do in a war. They worried about whether they were strong enough and what
they ought to do to keep strong. What they finally did was have all
the citizens take off their clothes once a year . . . all at the same
time. Then they would all gather naked in the public square and march
in front of a committee of wise men. It was pretty clever really. All
the young bucks would see girls they were interested in and it would
become obvious that they were interested and, even more important;
that they were capable of doing something about it."
Mike paused and looked at Mr. Appleton. Mr. Appleton was looking straight
ahead, but his eyes were a deeper color and they had lost their hard
suspicious look. His tongue licked at the corners of his dry old lips
and he almost smiled.
"Round and round the public square they'd march," Mike went on. "Everyone
buck-assed naked. And slowly they'd pair off. The strong young men would
pick the strong young women they liked and the committee of selection would
let them leave the square and wander off into a grove of trees nearby. Then
what would be left would be old people who obviously couldn't do what was
necessary. Thin old geezers with skin hanging around their waist and
knock-kneed; fat old men with pot bellies and double chins. Old hags; no
corsets or girdles to hide them. Just their white old ruined childless
flesh for everyone to see. No muscles left; no energy, no nothing.
Understand?"
Mr. Appleton was still sitting very straight, but his eyes were unfocused
and vague. His face seemed slightly dissolved. He crossed his arms across
his chest and rocked back and forth.
"Understand, Mr. Appleton?" Mike asked."No energy, no nothing?"
Mr. Appleton's eyes roamed around the room and then fastened fiercely
on Mike. He nodded savagely.
"Finally the only ones left in the square would be the old people," Mike
said. "They'd walk around and around, the old naked men and the old naked
women . . . with the committee giving them a cold eye. Waiting to see if
the old men still had it in 'em. Or if anyone wanted the old women. The
committee didn't say a thing. They didn't do anything. But after a while
the old men and women would disappear. They would wander off. Not into
the grove but out into the countryside and far away from the town. Out
of the society altogether. Gone. Gone forever. Some of the stronger ones
became slaves or shepherds, but none of them hung around." Mike paused
a minute and took another sip of beer. His teeth, when he bit into the
sandwich, looked very white and strong and he looked up with a grin.
Mr. Appleton twisted in his chair. Mrs. Sweeton sobbed distantly and
fumbled for the beer glass with her hand. Hank handed it to her and
she drank deeply and then wiped off her lips with the back of her hand.
There was a smear of mayonnaise on her chin. Mr. Appleton was trying to
smile, but his teeth made a thin, chalky sound as they ground together
in a desperate effort to keep his chin from gaping and wagging.
"You're . . . you're . . . you're . . . a savage," Mr. Appleton said
finally and snapped his mouth shut. Saliva ran from the corner of
his mouth and in a bright silvery streak down his chin. He leaned far
back in the chair. Suddenly he looked very frail and small; almost
childlike. Some thin strong certitude had snapped and his jaw hung open
and showed the false pinkness of his dentures and the real pinkness of
his tongue.
"No. I'm not savage," Mike said softly. "I'm just trying to tell you
the facts of life. The story is true. It happened in Sparta and the man
who wrote it down Was Lycurgus. Go to the public library and check it
out. Read it. It really happened."
"Well, it's uncivilized~" Appleton said, but his voice lacked
conviction. His tongue clacked softly against his false teeth.
"You have to realize that America's in a crisis today," Mike went on.
"Just like Sparta was. Russia is looking down our throat. Pretty soon
there's going to be a war. And people will get scared. They'll wonder if
we're strong enough to win. And they'll take a cold look at who can help
in the fight and who can't. Every society does it, Mr. Appleton. Every
single society that's under pressure does exactly that. When we take
that cold look we might decide that our senior citizens are a liability;
a handicap."
"It's not so," Mrs. Sweeton said. There were tears in her eyes, but
her face was not anguished, it was frightened. "No one thinks that
in America."
"Look, Mrs. Sweeton," Mike said. "Did you ever hear of euthanasia until
recently? Of course not. It's a polite term for murdering people who
don't have any good reason for living anymore. Right now euthanasia would
only be applied to congenital idiots, incurable cancer and things like
that. But let things get really tough; let the battle really begin, and
that will change. Someday soon someone is going to suggest that maybe
euthanasia be applied to people over a certain age . . . everyone over
a certain age would get the works. It's in people's minds already; you
can see it stirring around; just waiting to be said. You don't see many
young people anymore, but they're talking about it; gnawing away at the
idea. Worries 'em. And the word euthanasia keeps popping up."
"You shut up. You're a god damn liar," Mr. Appleton said. He was crouched
in the chair, like a tiny defensive monkey. His old splayed carpenter's
hands were held out in front of him. "You're lying. That's what you're
doing." -
"Mike, my God, don't talk like that," Georgia said. She looked at Hank,
but he was staring at Mike. Her voice was thin; at the shatter point.
"Even if it's true don't say it."
"But it's true," 'Mike said. "I have to say it. If these people are
going into politics they better find out the facts." Mike reached out
and shuffled through the papers on the coffee table. He picked up a
sheet. "Now, look at this report. It's from UNESCO. It's a survey of
what age groups suffered most in Russia and Germany during World War
Two. Do you know that the old people, people over fifty-five, just about
disappeared from those two countries? No one knows just how, but they
did. They just vanished away; Starved, maybe, or sent off to Siberia
or killed from overwork or something. But they're gone. Just as if the
Germans and the Russians decided that the old people had to go first."
Mr. Appleton moved his bent, tough carpenter's hands, but no words
accompanied them: only a sound like a muted sustained yelp.
"The point is, Mr. Appleton, you don't want to press a society too
hard," Mike said. "Those slick young men down in Long Beach that run your
organizations tell you you can get anything you want if you just push hard
enough. But maybe you'll get more than you bargained for. Maybe America
is saving up a surprise to hand you. Maybe you'd better protect yourself."
Mrs. Sweeton stood up as if she were going to leave the room. She stood
hesitantly and then Mike looked up at her. He did not smile and for a
few moments they looked at one another. Then she saw the sandwiches and
the broken look left her face; she went soft with desire. She picked up
a sandwich, pushed it savagely into her mouth, roughly jabbed the bits
of chicken past her lips. Little bits of lettuce fell unnoticed on her
neat black bosom.
"What should we do?" Appleton asked. His voice was thick and mechanical;
as if the words were made only by the false teeth.
"The first thing is to forget all that stuff about calling yourselves
senior citizens or the deserving elderly or any other term like that,"
Mike said. "Just face the facts. You're old, marginal, used-up, surplus.
All right. How do you protect yourselves?"
Mike picked up a folder. He opened it and spread the paper on the table.
The top item was an architect's sketch of what looked like a great
sprawling army camp with Quonset huts and barracks neatly arranged
in blocks.
"Now the worst problem that old people face is adequate housing," Mike
said. "Cromwell is prepared to undertake a state program of old-age
camps where everyone past a certain age could have an individual room,
adequate food and an issue of clothing. The camps would be out in the
country. They would be nicely built. It wouldn't be luxurious, but it
would be safe. Now the thing the old people have to do is . . . "
When Mr. Appleton and Mrs. Sweeton looked up, their eyes were bright and
clear like the eyes of very trusting and loyal children. They watched Mike's
lips move, but they scarcely heard his words. They nodded endlessly.
When the old people left, Mike stood up. He walked to the bathroom
door. He turned.
Hank spoke very slow, with careful deliberation, reaching measuredly
for the words.
"Mike, you dirty, dirty, dirty bastard, you deliberately . . . "
And then he stopped. For a grin was spreading over Mike's face. It was
not a hard grin or without pity. But it was certain; absolutely sure.
Mike waited, but Hank did not speak. Mike turned and went into the
bathroom.
CHAPTER 23
An Honest Man
There was a knock on the door and Notestein came in. He wore a large hat
that came almost to his ears and hung just over his eyebrows. It was an
expensive and subdued hat and he wore an expensive and subdued suit. He
took a few steps into the room and stopped, peering out at them. He
smiled, almost pluckishly; like a person expected to be clownish. Without
speaking, he took the hat off. The hat was too large, the suit tailored
too abundantly, as if to show that he could afford plenty of excellent
material. His hands manipulated the expensive hat as something to be
valued, to be viewed, to be appreciated. He wanted it big. He moved his
feet, calling attention to his shoes. They were two-toned, brown and
white. The white inserts were made of linen lattice that was worked into
the initials T.N. Mike came out of the bathroom and Notestein smiled at
him, took a few steps toward Georgia.
"Good morning, Miss Blenner," Notestein said. He held the hat a few inches
in front of his belt and turned it slowly with his hands. "Ve never met,
but you I recognize from der picture in society page. Dis man I never met,
but it is a pleasure."
"Shake hands with Hank Moore," Mike said. "Hank, this is the only really
honest man in California."
Notestein rolled his eyes modestly.
"He jokes," Notestein said. "California is full mit honest men. Lots I
meet every day. An honest man is not so hard to find."
"No, Terence is really honest," Mike said. "He represents all sorts of
people on all sorts of things and never has a contract. He just gives his
word and says how much it will cost to do a certain thing and he does it.
Absolutely trustworthy. Never betrays a confidence."
Notestein sat down. His suit wrinkled and the motion forced the tips of
six Bering Ambassadors, in aluminum tubes, out of his breast pocket. He
glanced down and picked one out. Neatly and quickly he opened the tube,
took out the cigar, threw the debris in the wastebasket, bit off the
end of the long cigar and lit it.
"I von't offer you cigar," he said quietly to Hank. "I never giff or
accept little giffs. Or big giffs for dat matter. Only exactly vot was
agreed. Giffs can be misunderstood. Look, dis crazy investigation in
England. A big government man is persecuted because he takes a bottle
whisky and a toikey from a friend who vants a license or something. And
the toikey only weighed seven pounds. Dey should make toikeys that
little? You can nefer tell ven dey'll vant to know if you took any
favors from Terence Notestein. Now you can say no. But if you took
a cigar from Notestein and someday dey put you on de vitness stand,
dey vould keep screaming about dat cigar and vould discover it vas an
expensive cigar. Ver der are expensive cigars people vill think der is
expensive booze and ver booze is der might be girls and ver girls der
might be big money. Now I don't giff you a cigar and you can say no,
I never took a ting from Terence Notestein."