She looked embarrassed.
There were rules. You were never told them, any more than you were told that things dropped when you let go of them. They were just there .
But the Alderman was unbudgeable in a sullen kind of way.
“At least I’m going to have a look around. Check out my old haunts,” he muttered.
“Haunts?” said William Stickers.
“Check out?” said Mrs. Liberty.
“That’s modern talk for—” William Stickers began.
“I’m sure I don’t want to know!” Mrs. Liberty stood up. “The very idea!”
“There’s a world out there, and we helped to make it, and now I want to find out what it’s like,” said the Alderman sulkily.
“Besides,” said Mr. Vicenti, “if we stick together, no one will forget who they are, and we’ll all go farther.”
Mrs. Liberty shook her head.
“Well, if you insist on going, then I suppose someone with some Sense should accompany you,” she said.
The dead marched off in, as it were, a body, down the canal path and toward the town center. That left only Mr. Einstein and Mr. Fletcher, still sitting happily beside their television.
“What’s got into them?” said Mr. Fletcher. “They’re acting almost alive .”
“It is disgusting,” said Mr. Grimm, but somehow in a triumphant tone of voice, as if seeing people acting badly was very satisfying.
“Solomon here says that space is a delusion,” said Mr. Fletcher. “Therefore, it is impossible to go anywhere. Or to be anywhere, either.”
Einstein spat on his hands and tried to smooth down his hair.
“On ze other hand—” he said, “there vas a nice little pub in Cable Street.”
“You wouldn’t get a drink, Solly,” said Mr. Fletcher. “They don’t serve spirits.”
“I used to like it in there,” said Einstein wistfully. “After a hard day stuffing foxes, it vass nice to relax of an evenink.”
“You did say space was a delusion,” said Mr. Fletcher. “Anyway, I thought we were going to do somemore work on the television. You said there was no theoretical reason why we shouldn’t be able to make—”
“I zink,” said Mr. Einstein carefully, “I would like to fool myself a little.”
And then there was only Mr. Grimm.
He turned back, still smiling in a glassy kind of way, and settled down and waited for them to return.
SEVEN
T he Frank W. Arnold Civic Center meeting room was about half full.
It smelled of chlorine from the swimming pool, and of dust, and floor polish, and wooden chairs. Occasionally people would wander in thinking the meeting was the AGM of the bowling club, and then try to wander out again, pushing on the bar on the door marked “Pull” and then glaring at it as if only an idiot would put “Pull” on a door you pulled. The speakers spent a lot of the time asking people at the back if they could hear, and then holding the microphone too close to the loudspeakers, and then someone tried to make the PA system work properly, and blew a fuse, and went to find the caretaker, pushing on the door for a while like a hamster trying to find the way out of its treadmill.
In fact, it was like every other public meetingJohnny had ever attended. Probably on Jupiter seven-legged aliens had meetings in icy halls smelling of chlorine, he thought, with the microphones howling, and creatures franticallying at doors clearly marked
There were one or two of his teachers in the audience. That was amazing. You never really thought of them doing anything after school. You never knew about people, like you never knew how deep a pond was because all you saw was the top. And he recognized one or two people he’d seen in the cemetery walking their dogs or just sitting on the seats. They looked out of place.
There were a couple of people from United Amalgamated Consolidated Holdings, and a man from the Council planning office, and the chairman of Blackbury Municipal Authority, who looked a lot like Mrs. Liberty and turned out to be a Miss Liberty. (Johnny wondered if Mrs.
There were rules. You were never told them, any more than you were told that things dropped when you let go of them. They were just there .
But the Alderman was unbudgeable in a sullen kind of way.
“At least I’m going to have a look around. Check out my old haunts,” he muttered.
“Haunts?” said William Stickers.
“Check out?” said Mrs. Liberty.
“That’s modern talk for—” William Stickers began.
“I’m sure I don’t want to know!” Mrs. Liberty stood up. “The very idea!”
“There’s a world out there, and we helped to make it, and now I want to find out what it’s like,” said the Alderman sulkily.
“Besides,” said Mr. Vicenti, “if we stick together, no one will forget who they are, and we’ll all go farther.”
Mrs. Liberty shook her head.
“Well, if you insist on going, then I suppose someone with some Sense should accompany you,” she said.
The dead marched off in, as it were, a body, down the canal path and toward the town center. That left only Mr. Einstein and Mr. Fletcher, still sitting happily beside their television.
“What’s got into them?” said Mr. Fletcher. “They’re acting almost alive .”
“It is disgusting,” said Mr. Grimm, but somehow in a triumphant tone of voice, as if seeing people acting badly was very satisfying.
“Solomon here says that space is a delusion,” said Mr. Fletcher. “Therefore, it is impossible to go anywhere. Or to be anywhere, either.”
Einstein spat on his hands and tried to smooth down his hair.
“On ze other hand—” he said, “there vas a nice little pub in Cable Street.”
“You wouldn’t get a drink, Solly,” said Mr. Fletcher. “They don’t serve spirits.”
“I used to like it in there,” said Einstein wistfully. “After a hard day stuffing foxes, it vass nice to relax of an evenink.”
“You did say space was a delusion,” said Mr. Fletcher. “Anyway, I thought we were going to do somemore work on the television. You said there was no theoretical reason why we shouldn’t be able to make—”
“I zink,” said Mr. Einstein carefully, “I would like to fool myself a little.”
And then there was only Mr. Grimm.
He turned back, still smiling in a glassy kind of way, and settled down and waited for them to return.
SEVEN
T he Frank W. Arnold Civic Center meeting room was about half full.
It smelled of chlorine from the swimming pool, and of dust, and floor polish, and wooden chairs. Occasionally people would wander in thinking the meeting was the AGM of the bowling club, and then try to wander out again, pushing on the bar on the door marked “Pull” and then glaring at it as if only an idiot would put “Pull” on a door you pulled. The speakers spent a lot of the time asking people at the back if they could hear, and then holding the microphone too close to the loudspeakers, and then someone tried to make the PA system work properly, and blew a fuse, and went to find the caretaker, pushing on the door for a while like a hamster trying to find the way out of its treadmill.
In fact, it was like every other public meetingJohnny had ever attended. Probably on Jupiter seven-legged aliens had meetings in icy halls smelling of chlorine, he thought, with the microphones howling, and creatures franticallying at doors clearly marked
There were one or two of his teachers in the audience. That was amazing. You never really thought of them doing anything after school. You never knew about people, like you never knew how deep a pond was because all you saw was the top. And he recognized one or two people he’d seen in the cemetery walking their dogs or just sitting on the seats. They looked out of place.
There were a couple of people from United Amalgamated Consolidated Holdings, and a man from the Council planning office, and the chairman of Blackbury Municipal Authority, who looked a lot like Mrs. Liberty and turned out to be a Miss Liberty. (Johnny wondered if Mrs.
Similar Books
