The Simulacra (13 page)

“Chic!” Maury Frauenzimmer yelled, when his image appeared. He beamed, expansive and younger-looking with a radiant, triumphant joy that Chic had never witnessed before. “Boy, am I glad you finally called! Come on back here, for chrissakes and—”

“What’s happened?” Chic said. “What’s up, Maury?”

“I can’t tell you. We got a big order; that’s all I can say over the phone. I’m taking on men right and left. I need you back; I need everybody! This is it, Chic, what we’ve been waiting for all these goddam years!” Maury seemed almost on the verge of tears. “How soon can you get back here?”

Muddled, Chic answered, “Very soon. I guess.”

“Also,” Maury said, “your brother Vince called. Trying to get hold of you. He wants a job. Karp fired him or he quit or something—anyhow he’s looking everywhere for you. He wants to get on here, situationwise, alongside of you. And I told him if you recommended him—”

“Oh sure,” Chic said absently, “Vince is a first rate ersatz technician. Listen, Maury. What is this order you’ve got?”

A slow, secretive expression appeared on Maury’s wide face. “I’ll tell you when you get here; don’t you understand? So hurry!”

Chic said, “I was going to emigrate.”

“Emigrate, shmemigrate. With this you don’t have to, now. We’re set up for life; take my word for it—you, me, your brother, everybody! I’ll see you.” Maury abruptly cut the connection at his end; the screen died.

It must be a government contract, Chic said to himself. And whatever it is, Karp’s lost it. That’s why Vince is out of a job. And that’s why Vince wants to work for Maury;
he knows
.

We’re now a
Ge
outfit, Chic said to himself with exultation. We’re at last, long last, on the inside.

Thank god, he thought, that I didn’t emigrate. I drew back just on the brink, just in the nick of time.

Finally luck, he realized, is with me.

This was absolutely the best—and most decisive—day of his life. A day, in fact, which he would never forget as long as he lived. Like his boss Maury Frauenzimmer, he was all at once thoroughly, completely happy.

Later on, he was to look back to this day . . .

But he did not know that now.

After all, he did not have access to von Lessinger equipment.

TWELVE

Chic Strikerock leaned back against his seat and said expansively, “I just don’t know, Vince. Maybe I can get you a job with Maury, maybe not.” He was thoroughly enjoying the situation.

They were on their way together, he and Vince, up the autobahn by car, heading toward Frauenzimmer Associates. Their centrally controlled but private vehicle spun along, expertly guided; they had nothing to worry about in that department and it left them free for more important considerations.

“But you’re hiring all sorts of people,” Vince pointed out.

“I’m not the boss, though,” Chic said.

“Do what you can,” Vince said. “Okay? I really would appreciate it. After all, Karp is going to be methodically ruined, now. That’s obvious.” He had a peculiar, miserable, hangdog expression which Chic had never seen before. “Of course, anything you say is all right by me,” he murmured. “I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”

Pondering the matter, Chic said, “I think also we should settle this business about Julie. This is as good a time as any.”

His brother’s head jerked; Vince stared at him, his face twisting. “What do you mean?”

“Call it a tie-in deal,” Chic said.

After a long pause Vince said wooden, “I see.”

Chic said, “Why don’t I keep her for a while?”

“But”—Vince shuddered—“I mean, you said yourself—”

“The most I’ve ever said is that she makes me nervous. But I feel a lot more psychologically secure, now. After all, I was about to be fired. That’s all changed; I’m part of an expanding, growing company. And we both know it. I’m on the inside and that means a lot. Now I think I can handle Julie. In fact I
ought
to have a wife. It helps insure status.”

“You mean you intend to formally marry her?”

Chic nodded.

“All right,” Vince said, at last. “Keep her. Frankly I don’t give a damn about it. It’s your business. Just as long as you get me on at Maury Frauenzimmer’s place; that’s all I care about.”

Strange, Chic thought. He had never known his brother to be that concerned with his career, to the exclusion of any other topic. He made a mental note of it; perhaps it meant something.

“I can offer Frauenzimmer a lot,” Vince said. “For example, I happen to know the name of the new der Alte. I picked up some scuttlebutt at Karp’s, before I left. You want to know it?”

Chic said, “What? The new
what?
”

“The new der Alte. Or don’t you understand what this contract is that your boss has gotten away from Karp?”

Shrugging, Chic said, “Sure. I know. I was just startled.” His ears rang from shock. “Listen,” he managed to say, “I don’t care if it’s going to be called Adolf Hitler van Beethoven.” The der Alte; so it was a sim. He felt really good, knowing that. This world, Earth, was a fine place to live in, at long last, and he meant to make the most of it. Now that he was truly a
Ge
.

“Its name is going to be Dieter Hogben,” Vince said.

“I’m sure Maury knows what it’ll be,” Chic said nonchalantly, but inside he was still nonplussed. Utterly.

Bending, his brother turned on the car radio. “There’s some news about it already.”

“I doubt if there would be so soon,” Chic said.

“Quiet!” His brother turned up the volume. He had a news bulletin. So everyone, throughout the USEA, would be hearing it, now. Chic felt a little disappointed.

“. . . a mild heart attack which doctors revealed occurred at approximately three A.M. and which has given rise to widely-held fears that Herr Kalbfleisch may not live to serve out his term of office. The condition of der Alte’s heart and circulatory system is the subject of speculation, and this unexpected cardiac arrest comes at a time when—” The radio droned on. Vince and Chic exchanged glances and then suddenly both of them burst into laughter. Knowingly and intimately.

“It won’t be long,” Chic said. The old man was on his way out; the first of a series of public announcements had now been made. The process ran a regular course, easily predictable. First the mild, initial heart attack, coming out of the blue, thought at first to be merely indigestion; this shocked everyone but at the same time it prepared them, got them used to the idea. The
Bes
had to be approached in this manner; it was a tradition. And it functioned smoothly, effectively. As it had each time before.

Everything’s settled, Chic said to himself. The disposal of der Alte, who gets Julie, what firm my brother and I are working for . . . there are no loose ends, troublesome and incomplete.

And yet—

Suppose he had emigrated. Where would he be now? What would his life consist of? He and Richard Kongrosian . . . colonists in a distant land. But there was no use thinking about that because he had turned that down; he had
not
emigrated and now the moment of choice had passed. He shoved the thought aside and turned back to the matter at hand.

“You’re going to find it a lot different, working for a small outfit,” he said to Vince, “instead of a cartel. The anonymity, the impersonal bureaucratic—”

“Be quiet!” Vince interrupted. “There’s another bulletin.” Again he turned up the car radio.

“. . . duties, because of his illness, have been assumed by the Vice President, and it is understood that a special election is to be announced shortly. Dr. Rudi Kalbfleisch’s condition meanwhile remains—”

“They’re not going to give us much time,” Vince said, frowning nervously and chewing on his lower lip.

“We can do it,” Chic said. He was not worried. Maury would find a way; his boss would come through, now that he’d been given his chance.

Failure, now that the big break had arrived, simply was not possible. For any of them.

God, suppose he started worrying about that!

Seated in the big blue easychair, the Reichsmarschall pondered Nicole’s proposition. Nicole, sipping iced tea, silently waited, in her authentic Directorate chair at the far end of the Lotus Room of the White House.

“What you’re asking,” Goering said at last, “is nothing less than that we repudiate our oaths to Adolf Hitler. Is it that you don’t comprehend the Führer Prinzip, the Leader Principle? Possibly I can explain it to you. For example, imagine a ship in which—”

“I don’t want a lecture,” Nicole snapped. “I want a decision. Or can’t you decide? Have you lost that capacity?”

“But if we do this,” Goering said, “we’re no better than the July Bomb Plotters. In fact we would have to plant a bomb, exactly as they did or will do, however one expresses it.” He rubbed his forehead wearily. “I find this singularly difficult. Why is there such urgency?”

“Because I want it settled,” Nicole said.

Goering sighed. “You know, our greatest mistake in Nazi Germany was our failure to harness the abilities of women properly. We relegated them to the kitchen and bedroom. They were not really utilized in the war effort, in administration or production or within the apparatus of the Party. Observing you I can see what a dreadful mistake we made.”

“If you have not decided within the next six hours,” Nicole said, “I will have the von Lessinger technicians return you to the Age of Barbarism and any deal which we might make—” She gestured a sharp cutting-motion that Goering watched with apprehension. “It’s all over.”

“I simply do not have the authority,” Goering began.

“Listen,” she leaned toward him, “you better have. What did you think, what thoughts passed through your mind, when you saw your great bloated corpse lying in the jail cell at Nuremberg? You have a choice:
that
, or assuming the authority to negotiate with me.” She sat back, then, and sipped more iced tea.

Goering said hoarsely, “I—will think further about it. During the next few hours. Thank you for the extension of time. Personally, I have nothing against the Jews. I’d be quite willing to—”

“Then do so.” Nicole rose to her feet. The Reichsmarschall sat slumped over broodingly, evidently unaware that she had risen. She walked from the room, leaving him. What a dismal, contemptible individual, she thought. Emasculated by the power-arrangement of the Third Reich; unable to do anything on his own, as a unique individual—no wonder they lost the war. And to think that in World War One he was a gallant, brave ace, a member of Richtofen’s Flying Circus, flying one of those tiny, flimsy, wire and wood airplanes. Hard to believe it is the same man . . .

Through a window of the White House she saw crowds outside the gates. The curious, here because of Rudi’s “illness.” Nicole smiled momentarily. The watchers at the gate . . . keeping the vigil. They would be there from now on, day and night, as if waiting for World Series seat tickets, until Kalbfleisch “died.” And then they would silently drift off.

Heaven knew what they came for. Didn’t they have anything else to do? She had wondered about them many times before, at the previous occasions. Were they always the same people? Interesting speculation.

She turned a corner—and found herself facing Bertold Goltz.

“I hurried here as soon as I heard,” Goltz said, lazily. “So the old man’s strutted his little period and now is to be hustled off. He didn’t last very long, this one. And Herr Hogben will replace him, a certain mythical, nonexistent construct with that apt appellation. I was over at the Frauenzimmer
Werke
; they’re going great guns, there.”

“What do you want here?” Nicole demanded.

Goltz shrugged. “Conversation, perhaps. I eternally enjoy chatting with you. Actually, however, I have a distinct purpose: to warn you. Karp und Sohnen has an agent in the Frauenzimmer Werke already.”

“I’m aware of that,” Nicole said. “And don’t refer to the Frauenzimmer firm as a ‘Werke.’ They’re too small to be a cartel.”

“A cartel can be small in size. What matters is that they hold a monopoly; there’s no competition—Frauenzimmer has it all. Now, Nicole, you had better listen to me; better have your von Lessinger technicians preview events vis-à-vis the Frauenzimmer people. For the next two months or so at the very least. I think you’ll be surprised. Karp is not going to give up that easily; you should have thought of that.”

“We keep the situation in—”

“No you don’t,” Goltz said. “You have
nothing
under control. Look ahead and you’ll see. You’re becoming complacent, like a big fat cat.” He saw her touch the emergency button at her throat and he smiled broadly. “The alarm, Nicky? Because of
me?
Well, I guess I’ll stroll on. By the way: congratulations on stopping Kongrosian before he could emigrate. That was a genuine coup on your part. However—you don’t know it yet, but your snaring of Kongrosian has dragged a little more than you anticipated into existence. Please make use of your von Lessinger equipment; it’s so uniquely valuable in situations like this.”

Two gray-clad NP men appeared at the end of the corridor. Nicole signaled brusquely to them and they scrambled to get out their guns.

Yawning, Goltz vanished.

“He’s gone,” Nicole said to the NP men, accusingly. Of course Goltz was gone; she had expected it. But at least this had terminated the conversation; she was rid of his presence.

We ought to go back, Nicole thought, to Goltz’s babyhood and destroy him then. But Goltz had anticipated them. He was long since back there, at the time of his birth and onward into childhood. Guarding himself, training himself, crooning over his child-self; through the von Lessinger principle Bertold Goltz had become, in effect, his own parent. He was his own constant companion, his own Aristotle, for the initial fifteen years of his life, and for that reason the younger Goltz could not be surprised.

Surprise. That was the element which von Lessinger had nearly banished from politics. Everything now was pure cause and effect. At least, so she hoped.

“Mrs. Thibodeaux,” one of the NP men said, very respectfully, “there is a man from A.G. Chemie to see you. A Mr. Merrill Judd. We brought him up.”

“Oh yes,” Nicole said, nodding. She had an appointment with him; Judd had some fresh ideas as to how to go about curing Richard Kongrosian. The psych-chemist had approached the White House as soon as he had learned that Kongrosian had been found. “Thank you,” she said, and started toward the California Poppy Room where she was to meet with Judd.

Damn those Karps, Anton and Felix, she thought as she hurried along the carpeted corridor, the two NP men following behind her. Suppose they attempt to sabotage the Dieter Hogben Project—perhaps Goltz is right:
perhaps we’ve got to act
against them!
But they were so strong. And so resourceful. The Karps, father and son, were old pros at this business, even more so than she herself.

I wonder what Goltz meant exactly, she thought. About our having dragged more than we anticipated into existence when we regained possession of Richard Kongrosian. Something to do with Loony Luke? There was another one, as bad as the Karps or Goltz; another pirate and nihilist, out for himself at the expense of the state. How complicated everything had become, and still there was the unfinished, nagging business deal with Goering hanging over everything else. The Reichsmarschall simply could not decide and would not, would never finalize, and his indecision was stopping the wheels, keeping her attention fixed there, and at far too great a cost. If Goering did not decide by tonight—

He would be, as she had assured him, back in his own time by eight this evening. Involved in a losing war which would eventually—and he would be acutely aware of it—cost him his fat life.

I’ll see that Goering gets exactly what’s due him, she said savagely to herself. And Goltz and the Karps, too. All of them, including Loony Luke. But it must be done carefully, with each matter handled in sequence. Right now she had a more pressing problem, that of Kongrosian.

Swiftly she entered the California Poppy Room and greeted the A.G. Chemie psych-chemist, Merrill Judd.

In his sleep Ian Duncan had a terrible dream. A hideous old woman with greenish, wrinkled claws scrabbled at him, whining for him to do something—he did not understand what it was because her voice, her words, blurred into indistinction, swallowed by her broken-toothed mouth, lost in the twisting thread of saliva which found its way to her chin. He struggled to free himself, to wake from his nap, to escape from her. . . .