The Game-Players Of Titan Read online

  "Did you hear that?" Sharp said. "Odd. I listened, too, on the way here from New Mexico. And according to Nats Katz, the time of Luckman's death had still to be established."

  There was silence.

  "It's too bad," Sharp said acidly, "that we can't read your mind, Mrs. McClain, as you can read ours. It might prove somewhat interesting."

  ''That clown Nats Katz," Pat said. "He's not a newscaster anyhow; he's a pop singer and disc jockey. He sometimes is six hours behind in his so-called news briefs." With steady fingers she got out a cigarette and lit up. "Go out and track down a news vendor; get a late edition of the Chronicle. It's probably in that."

  Sharp said, "It doesn't matter. Because in any case you won't testify for my client"

  To Pete, she said, "Forgive me."

  "Hell," Pete said, "if you won't testify you won't" And

  anyhow he tended to believe her about the time of death having been established as late in the day.

  "What sort of extra-legal activity would a pretty woman like you be mixed up in?" Sharp asked her.

  Pat said nothing.

  "It could be noised about," Sharp pointed out to her. "And then the authorities would want to scan you whether you testify in this or not."

  "Let it drop," Pete said to him.

  Sharp glanced his way, shrugged. "Whatever you say."

  "Thank you, Pete," Pat said. She sat smoking silently.

  "I have a request," Sharp said, after a time, "to make of you, Mrs. McClain. As you have probably already gleaned from Mr. Garden's mind, five other members of Pretty Blue Fox have shown up with amnesia regarding the day's activities."

  "Yes," Pat nodded.

  "Undoubtedly they will all be attempting to determine what they did and did not do today in the manner that Pete employed, checking with various Rushmore units and so on. Would you be willing to assist us by scanning these five people in the next day or so to determine what they've learned?"

  "Why?" Joe said. -

  "I don't know why," Sharp answered. "And I won't know until she gives us the information. But," he hesitated, chewing his lower lip and scowling, "I'd like to find out if the paths of these six people intersected at any moment during the day. During the now-forgotten interval."

  "Give us your operational theory," Joe said.

  Sharp said, "It's possible that all six acted in concert, as part of a complicated, far-reaching plan. They may have elaborated it some time in the past and had that removed by electroshock also."

  With a grimace Joe Schilling said, "But they, didn't know until just the other day that Lucky Luckman was coming out here."

  "The death of Luckman may be nothing more than a symptom of a greater strategy," Sharp said. "His presence

  here may have spoiled the effective operation of this larger plan." He eyed Pete. "What do you say to this?"

  "I say you've got a theory much more ornate than the situation itself," Pete said.

  "Possibly," Sharp said. "But evidently it was necessary to mentally blind six people today, when one would expect two or three to be sufficient. Two in addition to the murderer himself would have made prosecution difficult enough, I think. But I could be wrong; whoever is behind this may simply be playing it as cautious as he can."

  "The Master Game-player," Pete said.

  "Pardon?" Sharp said. "Oh yes. Bluff, the game Mrs. McClain can never play because she's too talented. The Game that cost Joe Schilling his status and Luckman his life. Doesn't this homicide make you a trifle less bitter, Mrs. McClain? Maybe you're not so badly off, after all."

  "How did you know that?" Pat asked him. "About what you term my 'bitterness.' I've never seen you before tonight, have I? Or is my 'bitterness' that well-known?"

  "It's all in the briefcase," Sharp said, patting the leather side of it. "The police got it from Pete's mind." He smiled at her. "Now let me ask you something, Mrs. McClain. As a Psi-person, do you have contact with very many other Psi-individuals?"

  "Sometimes," Pat said.

  "Do you know first hand the range of Psionic ability? For instance, we all know about the telepath, the pre-cog, the psycho-kinetic, but what about the rarer talents. For example, is there a subvariety of Psi which deals with the alteration of the contents of other people's psyches? A sort of mental psycho-kinesis?"

  Pat said, "Not—to my knowledge, no."

  "You understand my question."

  "Yes." She nodded. "But to my knowledge, which is limited, no Psi talents exist which could explain the amnesia of the six members of Pretty Blue Fox nor the alteration in Bill Calumine's mind regarding what Pete did or did not say to him."

  "You say your knowledge is limited." Sharp scrutinized

  her as she spoke. "Then it's not impossible that such a talent —and such a Psi-person—could exist."

  "Why would a Psionic individual want to kill Luckman?" Pat asked. I

  "Why would anyone want to?" Sharp said. "Obviously, someone did."

  "But someone in Pretty Blue Fox. They had reasons to."

  Sharp said quietly, "There is nothing in the make-up of the members of Pretty Blue Fox which would account for the capacity to cripple the memories of six people and alter the memory of a seventh."

  "Does such a capacity exist anywhere that you know of?" Pat asked him.

  "Yes," Sharp said. "During the war both sides used techniques of that sort. It goes all the way back to mid-twentieth century Soviet brainwashing procedures."

  "Horrible," Pat said with a shudder. "One of the worst periods in our history."

  At the door of the restaurant an automated news vending machine appeared, with a late edition of the Chronicle. Its Rushmore Effect bleated out, "Special coverage of the Luck-man murder case." The restaurant, except for their party, was empty; the news vending machine, being homotropic, headed toward them, still bleating. "The Chronicle's own circuit investigates and discloses startling new details not found in the Examiner or the News Call-Bulletin." It waved the newspaper in their faces.

  Getting out a coin, Sharp inserted it in the slot of the machine; it at once presented him with a copy of the paper and rolled back out of the restaurant, to hunt for more people.

  "What does it say?" Pat asked, as Sharp read the lead article.

  "You're correct," Sharp said, nodding. "Time of death believed to be late in the afternoon. Not too long before Mrs. Garden found the body in her car. So I owe you an apology."

  Joe Schilling said, "Maybe Pat's also a pre-cog. The news wasn't out yet when she told you that. She previewed this

  edition in advance of its release. How useful she'd be in the newspaper business."

  "Not very funny," Pat said. "That's one of the reasons why Psis become so cynical; we're so mistrusted, no matter what we do."

  "Let's go somewhere that we can get a drink," Joe Schilling said. To Pete, he said, "What's a good bar in the Bay Area? You must know the situation around here; you're a sophisticate, urbane and cosmopolitan."

  Pete said, "We can go to the Blind Lemon in Berkeley. It's almost two centuries old. Or should I stay out of Berkeley?" he asked Sharp.

  "No reason to avoid it," Sharp said. "You're not going to run into Dotty Luckman at a bar; that's certain. You don't have a bad conscience about Berkeley, do you?"

  "No," Pete said.

  "I have to go home," Pat McClain said. "Goodbye." She rose to her feet.

  Accompanying her to her car, Pete said, "Thanks for coming."

  On the dark San Francisco sidewalk she stood by her car, stubbing her cigarette out with the toe of her slipper. "Pete," she said, "even if you did kill Luckman or helped kill him, I—still want to know you better. We were just beginning to become acquainted, this afternoon. I like you a lot." She smiled at him. "What a mess this all is. You crazy Game-players; taking it so seriously. Willing, at least some of you, to kill a human being because of it. Maybe I am glad I had to leave it; maybe I'm better off." She stood on tiptoe, kissed him. "I'll see you. I'll vidphone you when I ca
n."

  He watched her car shoot rapidly into the night sky, its signal lights winking red, on and off.

  What's she mixed up in? He asked himself as he walked back into the restaurant. She'll never tell me. Perhaps I can find out through her children. For some reason it seemed important for him to know.

  "You don't trust her," Joe Schilling said to him, as he sat down once more at the table. "That's too bad. I think she's fundamentally an honest person, but god knows what

  she's got herself involved in. You're probably right to be suspicious."

  "I'm not suspicious," Pete said. "I'm just concerned."

  Sharp said, "Psi-people are different from us. You can't put your finger on exactly what it is—I mean, in addition to their talent. That girl..." He shook his head, "I was sure she was lying. How long has she been your mistress, Garden, did you say?"

  "She's not," Pete said. At least he didn't think so. A shame to forget something like that, not to be certain in that aspect of one's life.

  "I don't know whether to wish you luck or not," Laird Sharp said, thoughtfully.

  "Wish me luck," Pete said. "I can always use it in that area."

  "So to speak," Schilling said, and smiled.

  When he got home to his apartment in San Rafael, Pete Garden found Carol standing at the window, gazing sightlessly out. She barely greeted him; her voice was distant and muted.

  "Sharp got me out on bail," Pete said. "They've got me charged with—"

  "I know." Her arms folded, Carol nodded. "They were here. The two detectives, Hawthorne and Black. Mutt and Jeff, only I can't figure out which is the easy-going one and which is supposed to be tough. They both seem tough."

  "What were they doing here?" he demanded.

  "Searching the apartment. They had a warrant. Hawthorne told me about Pat."

  After a pause, Pete said, "That's a shame."

  "No, I think it's very good. Now we know exactly where we stand, you and I, in relationship to each other. You don't need me in The Game; Joe Schilling does that. And you don't need me here, either. I'm going back to my own group. I've decided.". She pointed toward the bedroom of the apartment and he saw, on the bed, two suitcases. "Maybe you can help carry them downstairs to the car," Carol said.

  "I wish you'd stay," he said.

  "To be jeered at?"

  "Nobody's jeering at you."

  "Of course they are. Everybody in Pretty Blue Fox is, or will be. And it'll be in the papers."

  "Maybe so," he said. He hadn't thought of that.

  "If I hadn't found Luckman's body," Carol said, "I wouldn't know about Pat. And if I didn't know about Pat I would have tried—and possibly succeeded—in being a good wife of yours. So you can blame whoever killed Luckman for destroying our marriage."

  "Maybe that's why they did it," he said. "Killed Luckman."

  "I doubt it. Our marriage is hardly that important. How many wives have you had, in all?"

  "Eighteen."

  Carol nodded. "I've had fifteen husbands. That's thirty-three combinations of male and female. And no luck, as they say, from any of them."

  "When did you last bite into a piece of rabbit-paper?"

  Carol smiled thinly. "Oh, I do all the time. It wouldn't show up from us, yet. It's too early."

  "Not with the new East German kind," Pete said. "I read about it. It records even an impregnation only an hour old."

  "Good grief," Carol said. "Well, I don't have any of the new kind; I didn't even know it existed."

  "I know an all night drugstore," Pete said, "in Berkeley. Let's fly over there and pick up a packet of the new rabbit-paper."

  "Why?"

  "There's always the chance, the possibility. And if we had luck, you wouldn't want to dissolve our relationship."

  "All right," Carol said. "You take my two suitcases down to the car and we'll fly over to the all night drugstore. And if I am pregnant, I'll come back here with you. And If I'm not, then goodbye."

  "Okay," he said. There wasn't much else he could say; he couldn't force her to remain.

  "Do you want me to stay?" Carol asked, as he carried the two heavy suitcases downstairs to her car.

  "Yes," he said.

  "Why?"

  He didn't know why. "Well—" he began.

  "Forget it," Carol said, and got into her car. "You follow me in yours. I don't feel like riding with you, Pete."

  Presently he was in the air over San Rafael, riding on the beam created by her tail lights. He felt melancholy. Damn those cops, he thought. Anything to split the members of the group apart, so they can be picked off one at a time. But it wasn't the two police that he blamed; it was himself. If she hadn't found out this way she would have run onto it by another.

  I let my life become overly complex, he decided. Too much for me to keep straight and handle. Carol has certainly received a bad handful of cards since she came to Pretty Blue Fox. First Luckman arrives; then I bring Schilling in to take her place at the Game-table; then Luckman's body turns up in her car; now this. No wonder she wants to leave.

  Why should she stay? he asked himself. Give me one good reason.

  He couldn't.

  They flew over the Bay and soon they were gliding down to land at the deserted parking lot of the drugstore. Carol, slightly ahead of him, stood waiting as he got out of his car and walked over to her.

  "It's a nice night," she said. "So you used to live here. What a shame you lost it. Just think, Pete; if you hadn't lost it I'd never have met you."

  "Yeah," he said, as they ascended the ramp and entered the drugstore. That and so much else would never have come about.

  The Rushmore Effect of the drugstore greeted them; they were its only customers. "Good evening, sir and madame. How may I assist you, please?" The obedient mechanical" voice issued from a hundred speakers hidden throughout the great lit-up place. The entire structure had focused its attention on the two of them.

  Carol said, "Do you know anything about a new instant rabbit-paper?"

  "Yes madame," the drugstore answered eagerly. "A recent scientific breakthrough, from A. G. Chemie at Bonn. I'll get

  it for you." From an orifice at the end of the glass counter a package tumbled; it slithered to a halt directly before them and Pete picked it up. "The same price as the old."

  He paid the drugstore and then he and Carol walked back out onto the dark, deserted parking lot.

  "All for us," Carol said. "This enormous place with a thousand lights on and that Rushmore circuit clamoring away. It's like a drugstore for the dead. A spectral drugstore."

  "Hell," Pete said, "it's very much for the living. The only problem is, there just aren't enough of the living."

  "Maybe there's one more than there was," Carol said; she removed a strip of rabbit-paper from the pack, unwrapped it, placed it between her even, white teeth and bit. "What color does it turn?" she asked, as she examined it. "Same as the old?"

  "White for non," Pete said. "Green for positive."

  In the dim light of the parking lot it was hard to tell.

  Carol opened her car door; the dome light switched on and she inspected the strip of rabbit-paper by it.

  Carol looked up at him and said, "I'm pregnant. We've had luck." Her voice was bleak; her eyes filled with tears and she looked away. "I'll be goddamned," she said brokenly. "The first time I've ever been in all my whole life. And with a man who's already—" she was silent, breathing with difficulty and staring fixedly past him into the night darkness.

  "This calls for a celebration!" he said.

  "It does?" She turned to face him.

  "We get to go on the radio and broadcast it to the whole world!"

  "Oh," Carol said, nodding. "Yes, that's right; that's the custom. Won't everyone be jealous of us? My!"

  Crawling into her car, Pete snapped on the transmitter of the radio to the emergency all-wave broadcast position. "Hey!" he exclaimed. "You know what? This is Pete Garden of Pretty Blue Fox at Carmel, California. Carol Hol
t Garden and I have only been married a day or so, and tonight we made use of the new type of West German rabbit-paper—"

  "I wish I were dead," Carol said.

  "You what?" He stared at her in disbelief. "You're nuts! This is the most important event of our lives! We've added to the population. This makes up for Luckman's death, it balances it out. Right? He caught hold of her hand and compressed it until she moaned. "Say something into the mike, Mrs. Garden."

  Carol said, "I wish all of you the same luck I've had tonight."

  "You're goddam right!" Pete shouted into the microphone. "Every single one of you listening to me!"

  "So now we stay together," Carol said softly.

  "Yes," Pete agreed. "That's right, that's what we decided."

  "And what about Patricia McClain?"

  "The hell with everybody else in the world except you," Pete said. "Except you and me and the baby."

  Carol smiled a little. "Okay. Let's drive back."

  "Do you think you're able to drive? We'll leave your car here and both go back in mine and I'll drive." Quickly, he carried her suitcases to his own car, then took her by the arm and led her. "Just sit down and take it easy," he said, seating her in his car and fastening the safety belt in place.

  "Pete," she said, "do you realize what this means in terms of The Game?" She had turned pale. "Every deed in the pot belongs to us, automatically. But—there is no Game right now! There aren't any deeds in the pot, because of the police ban. But we must get something. We'll have to look it up in the manual."

  "Okay," he said, only half-listening to her; he was busy carefully guiding his car up into the sky.

  "Pete," she said, "maybe you win back Berkeley."

  "Not a chance. There was at least one Game subsequent to that, the one we played last night."

  "True." She nodded. "We'll have to apply to the Rules Committee in the Jay Satellite for an interpretation, I guess."

  He frankly did not care about The Game at this moment. The idea of a child, a son or daughter ... it obliterated everything connected with Luckman's arrival and death and everything else in his mind, all that had happened of late, the banning of the group.

  Luck, he thought, this late in life. One hundred and

  fifty years. After so many tries; after the failure of so many, many combinations.