All at once his vehicle shuddered. Staggering, he caught hold of the wall nearest him; a concussion, series of shock waves, passing through. Objects fell and collided and burst; he looked around amazed.
Meteor? he wondered.
It seemed to him almost as if someone were attacking him.
He shut off the B Minor Mass and stood, listening and waiting. Far off through the window he saw another dull explosion and he thought, they may get me. But why? It won’t be long anyhow before I’m finished … why not wait? And then the thought came to him, But damn it, I’m alive now, and I better act alive; I’m not utterly dead yet.
He snapped on his transmitter and said into the mike, “Sorry for the pause, folks. But I sure felt giddy there for a while; I had to lie down and I didn’t notice the tape had ended. Anyhow—“
Laughing his laugh, he watched through the window of the satellite for more of the strange explosions. There was one, faint and farther off … he felt a measure of relief. Maybe they wouldn’t get him after all; they seemed to be losing track of the range, as if his location were a mystery to them.
I’ll play the corniest record I can think of, he decided, as an act of defiance. “Bei Mir Bist Du Schon”; that ought to do it. Whistling in the dark, as they say, and he laughed again, thinking about it; what an act of defiance it was, by God. It would certainly come as a surprise to whoever was trying to eradicate him—if that was in fact what they wanted to do.
Maybe they’re just plain tired of my corny talk and my corny readings, Dangerfield conjectured. Well, if so—this will fix them.
“I’m back,” he said into his mike. “At least for a while. Now, what was I about to do? Does anybody remember?”
There were no more concussions. He had a feeling that, for the time being, they had ceased.
“Wait,” he said, “I’ve got a red light on; somebody’s calling me from below. Hold on.”
From his tape library he selected the proper tape, carried it to the transport and placed it on the spindle.
“I’ve got a request for ‘Bei Mir Bist Du Schön,’ “ he said, with grim relish, thinking of their dismay down below. “Can you beat that?” No, you can’t, he said to himself. And—by the Andrews Sisters. Dangerfield is striking back. Grinning, he started the tape into motion.
Edie Keller, with a delicious shiver of exultation, watched the angle worm crawling slowly across the ground and new with certitude that her brother was in it.
For inside her, down in her abdomen, the mentality of the worm now resided; she heard its monotonous voice. “Boom, boom, boom,” it went, in echo of its nondescript biological processes.
“Get out of me, worm,” she said, and giggled. What did the worm think about its new existence? Was it as dumbfounded as Bill probably was? I have to keep my eye on him, she realized, meaning the creature wriggling across the ground. For he might get lost. “Bill,” she said, bending over him, “you look funny. You’re all red and long; did you know that?” And then she thought, What I should have done was put him in the body of another human being. Why didn’t I do that? Then it would be like it ought to be; I would have a real brother, outside of me, who I could play with.
But, on the other hand, she would have a strange, new person inside her. And that did not sound like much fun.
Who would do? she asked herself. One of the kids at school? An adult? I bet Bill would like to be in an adult. Mr. Barnes, maybe. Or Hoppy Harrington, who was afraid of Bill anyhow. Or—she screeched with delight, Mama. It would be so easy; I could snuggle up close to her, lay against her … and Bill could switch, and I’d have my own mama inside me—and wouldn’t that be wonderful? I could make her do anything I wanted. And she couldn’t tell me what to do.
And Edie thought, She couldn’t do any more unmentionable things with Mr. Barnes any more, or with anybody else. I’d see to that. I know Bill wouldn’t behave that way; he was as shocked as I was.
“Bill,” she said, kneeling down and carefully picking up the angleworm; she held it in the palm of her hand. “Wait until you hear my plan—you know what? We’re going to fix Mama for the bad things she does.” She held the worm against her side, where the hard lump within lay. “Get back inside now. You don’t want to be a worm anyhow; it’s no fun.”
Her brother’s voice once more came to her. “You pooh-pooh; I hate you, I’ll never forgive you. You put me in a blind thing with no legs or nothing; all I could do was drag myself around!”
“I know,” she said, rocking back and forth, cupping the now-useless worm in her hand still. “Listen, did you hear me? You want to do that, Bill, what I said? Shall I get Mama to let me lie against her so you can do you-know-what? You’d have eyes and ears; you’d be a full-grown person.”
Nervously, Bill said, “I don’t know. I don’t think I want to walk around being Mama; it sort of scares me.”
“Sissy,” Edie said. “You better do it or you may never get out ever again. Well, who do you want to be if not Mama? Tell me and I’ll fix it up; I cross my heart and promise to fall down black and hard.”
“I’ll see,” Bill said. “I’ll talk to the dead people and see what they say about it. Anyhow I don’t know if it’ll work; I had trouble getting out into that little thing, that worm.”
“You’re afraid to try,” she laughed; she tossed the worm away, into the bushes at the end of the school grounds. “Sissy! My brother is a big baby sissy!”
There was no answer from Bill; he had turned his thoughts away from her and her world, into the regions which only he could reach. Talking to those old crummy, sticky dead, Edie said to herself. Those empty pooh-pooh dead that never have, any fun or nothing.
And then a really stunning idea came to her. I’ll fix it so he gets out and into that crazy man Mr. Tree who they’re all talking about right now, she decided. Mr. Tree stood up in the Foresters’ Hall last night and said those dumb religious things about repenting, and so if Bill acts funny and doesn’t know what to do or say, nobody will pay any attention.
Yet, that posed the awful problem of her finding herself containing a crazy man. Maybe I could take poison like I’m always saying, she decided. I could swallow a lot of oleander leaves or castor beans or something and get rid of him; he’d be helpless, he couldn’t stop me.
Still, it was a problem; she did not relish the idea of having that Mr. Tree-she had seen him often enough not to like him—inside herself. He had a nice dog, and that was about all … .
Terry, the dog. That was it. She could lie down against Terry and Bill could get out and into the dog and everything would be fine.
But dogs had a short life. And Terry was already seven years old; according to her mother and father. He had been born the same time almost as she and Bill.
Darn it, she thought. It’s hard to decide; it’s a real problem, what to do with Bill who wants so bad to get out and see and hear things. And then she thought, Who of all the people I know would I like most to have living inside my stomach? And the answer was: her father.
“You want to walk around as Daddy?” she asked Bill. But Bill did not answer; he was still turned away, conversing with the great majority beneath the ground.
I think, she decided, that Mr. Tree would be the best because he lives out in the country with sheep and doesn’t see too many people, and it would be easier on Bill that way because he wouldn’t have to know very much about talking. He’d just have Terry out there and all the sheep, and then with Mr. Tree being crazy now it’s really perfect. Bill could do a lot better with Mr. Tree’s body than Mr. Tree is doing, I bet, and all I have to worry about really is chewing the right number of poisonous oleander leaves—enough to kill him but not me. Maybe two would do. Three at the most, I guess.
Mr. Tree went crazy at the perfect time, she decided. He doesn’t know it, though. But wait’ll he finds out; won’t he be surprised. I might let him live for a while inside me, just so he’d realize what happened; I think that would be fun. I never liked him, even though Mama does, or says she does. He’s creepy. Edie shuddered.