Adventures of the Artificial Woman by Thomas Berger Page A

networks the next evening, and the print media soon followed. Phyllis was interviewed many times, but her reluctance to provide much personal information frustrated the news weeklies and celebrity mags, for neither could they track her through other sources. She was therefore portrayed as a mysterious personage who had come from nowhere. Added to the allure of this were professional notoriety, physical beauty, and, except as concerned her personal life, a refreshing candor in interviews. (For example, Q: “Are you using sex to sell Shakespeare?” A: “Of course.” Q: “Do you feel that cheapens Shakespeare?” A: “Being real, the art of William Shakespeare cannot be cheapened by sex that is simulated.” Q: “Do you yourself have a sex life?” A: “I’m not sure I have a life.”)
    The last response was taken to be modesty, whether actual or phony; columnists differed. Appearing on a TV talk show, the host of which asked questions only to interrupt every answer with a quip or another question as soon as she began to speak, Phyllis said, “My function here is to provide you with straight lines.”
    â€œWell,” said the host, mugging at the camera, “I’m notoriously straight.”
    â€œThen play with yourself,” said Phyllis, who unhooked her lapel mike and left the set. This sequence was replayed endlessly on the entertainment-news shows of rival networks.
    In short order, and without further effort, Phyllis acquired an agent, a personal manager, a public-relations director, and a contract for the leading female role in a big-budget motion picture.
    A fortnight after her departure from the cast, the audiences for Macbeth had diminished to the degree that the production was asked to leave the school auditorium. Having returned to the little theater from which it had come, the play closed within the month. When the scales fell from their eyes, its former local promoters agreed with the resuscitated prudes that the show was filth and admitted they had been blinded, though perhaps justifiably, by the superb artistry of Phyllis Pierce.
    Meanwhile, Ellery Pierce, her onlie begetter, had fallen into such a state of degradation as to be totally unaware of the success of his creation.

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    B efore long Pierce had exhausted his severance payment, and having spent every cent over the years on the development of Phyllis, he had no savings. He was forced to sell his apartment at a low price in a depressed market, and most of the money was claimed by the bank that held the loan. His credit cards were canceled when the respective balances reached their limits.
    He exiled himself for a time at his country hideaway, which he owned outright, but he was haunted by memories of Phyllis, whom he had assembled there in the garage workshop. He was almost relieved when a sudden rise in the real-estate taxes forced him to sell that, too, for a song.
    Eventually he found himself obliged to make a nightly choice between the streets and a homeless shelter. His clothes were tattered; in daylight his skin was swarthy with dirt but it looked ghostly pale under streetlights after dark. He started to beg. His manner was whinily importunate, but if refused a handout he could turn surly with passersby. After too many such incidents he was picked up by the cops and not arrested but worked over and dropped off in the next precinct, where after some losing encounters with other derelicts jealous of their turf, he finally acquired enough street wisdom not merely to survive but to prosper relative to his fellows in that mean milieu, having learned to disregard rather than compete with them. His early mistake had been to boast about who he used to be, for they all had their own stories, according to which he had fallen amidst ex-generals, former tycoons, and at least one defrocked cardinal.
    Ever in need of a female connection, Pierce befriended a runaway teen, who responded to the genteel