Short Fiction · An Artist’s Life (2/3)

“I must ask you to excuse me, but my lawyer wishes to see me at once⁠—a small but important matter about my estate. I am most unhappy to leave now. We must continue our talk another time. Please do not leave on my account, Mr. Dalgreen⁠—my house is at your service.”

When her husband left, Brent and Marie Di Costa talked idly on irrelevant topics, they had to, since he had no idea of what might be relevant. You couldn’t walk up to a girl whom you’d met for the first time and ask, “Madam, does your husband paint monsters? Or perhaps you dabble in witchcraft! Is that the secret?”

A quick glance at his watch convinced him it was time to go, before he wore out his welcome.

Turning to light a cigarette his eyes fell on the mantle clock. He registered surprise.

“Why, it’s three-thirty already! I’m afraid I’ll have to be leaving.”

She rose, smiling. “You have been a most delightful guest,” she laughed. “I know I speak for Arthur as well as myself when I say I hope to see you again.”

“I may take you up on that,” Brent said.

Their forward progress was suddenly impeded as the elevator swung open to discharge a small bundle of screaming humanity. Dazed, Brent realized it was a young girl as she swept past. The child collapsed on Marie Di Costa’s shoulder, her golden hair shaking with muffled sobs. A plastic doll with a shattered head gave mute evidence of the source of the disturbance.

Brent stood by self-consciously until the crying was soothed. Marie flashed him an understanding smile while she convinced the child at least to say hello to the visitor. He was rewarded with the sight of the red, tear-stained face.

“Dotty, I want you to meet Mr. Dalgreen.”

“How do you do, Mr. Dalgreen⁠ ⁠… but Mommy the boy stepped on the doll and he laughed when it broke and⁠ ⁠…” The thought was once again too much to bear⁠—the tears began to course again through the well-used waterways.

“Cheer up, Dotty. You wouldn’t want your father to see you like this,” Brent suggested.

These seemingly innocent words, while having no affect on the little girl, had a marked affect on her mother. Her face whitened.

“Arthur is not Dotty’s father, Mr. Dalgreen. You see, this is my second marriage. He⁠ ⁠… I mean we cannot have children.” She spoke the words as if they were a pain, heavy within her.

Brent was slightly embarrassed⁠—yet elated at the same time. This was the first crack in the façade of normality that concealed the occupants of the house. Her sudden change of expression could only mean that there was something troubling her⁠—something he would give his last tube of oil paint to find out. Perhaps it wasn’t the secret hidden in the painting, but there must be a relationship somewhere. He was determined to search it out.

Apartment lights were out all over the city, the daytime world was asleep. Brent stirred in the large chair and reached out for the glass of sparkling Burgundy that was slowly dying on the end table. A little flat⁠—but still very good. It was one of the luxuries he allowed himself. A luxury that might really be called a necessity to one who lived by selling his emotional responses, translated into color.

The wine was going flat, but the view of the city never would. New York, the eternal wonder city. The soft lights of his studio threw no reflections on the window, and his sight travelled easily over the architectural fairyland. Sparkling search-beams swept across the sky, throwing an occasional glint as they slid across a jetcar or a stratoplane. A thousand lights of a thousand hues twinkled in the city below. Even here on the one-hundred-eightieth floor he could hear the throbbing roar of its ceaseless activity. This was the foremost of the cities of man, yet somewhere in that city was a man who was⁠ ⁠… not quite human.

Brent had the partial answer, he was sure of that. He had found the missing factor in one of his own paintings. It was the only one he was even slightly pleased with. He had turned it out in nine solid hours of work, one of the “dangerous exposures” the doctors talked about. He had it propped on the video console, a stark vista of Mare Imbrium in the afternoon⁠—moon time. It was a canvas touched with the raw grandeur of eternal space. It had a burning quality that reacted on human sight. An alien landscape seen through a human eye. Just as the Di Costa canvases were human scenes seen through a different eye. Perhaps not totally foreign to earth⁠—they weren’t that obvious. Now that he understood, though; the influence was unmistakable.

He also had substantiating evidence. The Law was the Law and genes would always be genes. Man and ape are warm-blooded mammals, close relatives among the anthropoids. Yet even with this close heritage, there could be no interbreeding. Offspring were out of the question; they were a genetic impossibility.

It followed that alienness meant just that. A man who wasn’t Man⁠—Homo sapiens⁠—could never have children with a human wife. Marie Di Costa was human, and had a real tear-soaked human daughter to prove it. Arthur Di Costa had no children.

Brent pressed the window release and it sank into the casement with a soft sigh. The city noises washed in along with the fresh smell of growing things. The light breeze carried the fragrance in from the Jersey woodlands. It seemed a little out of place here above the gleaming city.

Leaning out slightly, he could see the moon riding through the thin clouds and the morning star, Venus, just clearing the eastern horizon. He had been there on the moon. He had watched them assembling the first Venus rocket. Man, the erect biped, was the only sentient life form he had ever seen. If there were others, they were still out there among the stars. All, that is, except one⁠ ⁠… or could there possibly be others here on Earth?

This was useless thinking though. Don’t invent more monsters until you’ve caught your first. A night’s sleep first. After that, he could start setting his traps out tomorrow.

For the tenth time, Brent threw a half-eaten candy bar into the receptacle and started down the street. Being a private eye was so easy in the teleshows⁠—but how different the reality was! He had been shadowing Arthur Di Costa for three days now, and it was ruining his digestion. Whenever his quarry stopped, he stopped⁠—often on the crowded city streets. Loitering was too obvious, so he found himself constantly involved with the vending machines that lined the streets. The news sheets were easily thrown away, but he felt obliged at least to sample the candy bars.

Di Costa was just stepping onto the Fifth Avenue walkway. Brent got on a few hundred feet behind him. They rolled slowly uptown at the standard fifteen miles per hour. As the walkway crossed Fifty-Seventh Street, a small man in a black and gold business suit stepped briskly onto it. Brent noticed him only when he stopped next to Di Costa and tapped him on the shoulder. Di Costa turned with a smile⁠—which changed slowly into a puzzled expression.

The little man handed what appeared to be a folded piece of paper to the surprised painter. Before Di Costa could say anything, the man stepped off the walkway onto a safety platform. With a quick movement, surprising in a man of his chunky build, he vaulted the guard barrier and stepped onto the downtown walkway.

Brent could only stare open-mouthed as the black figure swept by him and was lost in the crowds. Surprised by the entire action, he turned back to find Di Costa staring directly into his eyes!

Whatever course of action he might have considered was lost. Di Costa took the initiative. He smiled and waved. Brent could hear his voice faintly through the street noises.

“Mr. Dalgreen, over here!”

Brent waved back and did the only thing possible. As he walked slowly forward he saw that Di Costa’s curiosity had gotten the better of him. Brent watched him open the note, read it⁠—and change suddenly. The man’s arm dropped to his side, his body stiffened. Staring straight ahead, he stood on the walkway, eyes fixed and as full as a Roman portrait bust.

Dalgreen hurried toward the man. Events were going too fast. He had more than a suspicion that the note and the short man were somehow connected with the secret of the paintings. He stepped forward.

The man stared ahead, unseeing and unhearing. Brent felt justified in removing the mysterious note from between his fingers. One side was blank, but the other contained a single illegible character⁠—queer sign made up of flowing curves crossed by choppy green lines. It resembled nothing Brent had ever seen in his entire life.

They rode uptown side by side. Brent leaned on the railing while Di Costa remained fixed in his strange trance. The note in Brent’s hand was tangible evidence that his suspicions had some basis in fact. As he examined it again, he was aware of an undefinable tingling in his hand. The note seemed to be vibrating, shaking free from his hand in some unknown way. Under his startled gaze it glowed suddenly and disappeared! One instant he had held it, the next his hand was empty.

He leaped back in surprise⁠—passing through the space formerly occupied by Di Costa. Gone⁠—while he had been studying the note! Leaning over the rail he had a quick glimpse of the stiff figure entering the Central Park Skyport. Cursing himself for his stupidity, Brent changed lanes and raced back to the Skyport entrance.

His luck still held. Di Costa was on the outgoing air cab line. It would take him at least ten minutes to get a cab this time of day. With a little speed and a few greased palms Brent could rent a Fly-Your-Own before the other man was airborne.

Shortly after, the orange and black cab flashed up from the takeoff circle followed closely by Brent’s blue helio. The two aircraft flew north and vanished in the distance over the Hudson.

The air cab stayed at the 10,000 foot level. Brent cruised at 8,000, lagging slightly behind, keeping in the blind spot of the other ship. The entire affair was moving too fast for his peace of mind. He had the feeling that he was no longer a free agent, that he was being pushed into things before he decided for himself.

He suddenly felt elated. The strange symbol on the note, the note that disappeared in such an inexplicable fashion, proved the existence of alien hidden forces. Every mile that rushed under his plane brought him closer to the answer. He didn’t fear death⁠—it was no longer a stranger to him. The moments of time left to him might be made more satisfactory if he ferreted out this secret. He smiled to himself.

Fifteen minutes later the two ships grounded at the Municipal Skyport in Poughkeepsie. Brent parked the ship and followed his quarry down to the street level. Except for a certain stiffness in his movements, Di Costa seemed normal. He walked quickly and turned into an office building before Brent could catch up with him.

Throwing discretion aside, Brent broke into a run. He turned into the lobby just as the elevator door closed. He pressed the call button but the car continued to rise. The indicator stopped at four, then slowly sank down again.

He was too close to the end to even consider stopping now. He stepped into the self-service elevator and pressed four. The door closed and the car began to⁠ ⁠… descend!

With the realization that he was trapped came the knowledge that there was very little he could do about it. Just wait and see who⁠—or what⁠—might be outside the car when the door opened!

The elevator dropped down to a level that must have been far beneath the basement floor. The door slid slowly back.

The room was not what he had expected. Not that he had any idea of what there would be; it was just⁠—just that this room was so ordinary!

Ordinary⁠—except for the side wall. That was an impossibility. It was a glass wall looking into a vast tank of swirling water⁠—only there was no glass! It was the surface of the ocean standing on its side. He felt himself drawn into it, falling into it.

The sensation vanished as the wall suddenly turned jet black. He became aware for the first time that he wasn’t alone in the room. There was a girl behind a chrome desk. A lovely girl with straight bronze hair and green eyes.

“An untrained person shouldn’t watch that machine, Mr. Dalgreen; it has a negative effect on the mind. Won’t you please step in?”

His jaw dropped. “How do you know my name? Who are you? What is this pl.⁠ ⁠…”

“If you’ll be seated, I’ll be with you in a moment.”

Brent saw that the elevator would stay here until he got out. He stepped into the room, and the door sliding shut behind him didn’t help his morale any. He was into it up to his neck, and the other team had taken complete charge. He sat.

The redhead pulled the sheet of paper out of her typewriter and pushed it into the strange wall. It once more had the undersea look. Brent kept his eyes averted until she turned to him with a slight frown furrowing her forehead.

“You have been very interested in Arthur Di Costa’s activities, Mr. Dalgreen. Perhaps there are some questions you would like to ask me?”

“That, lady, is the world’s best understatement! Just what happened to him today⁠ ⁠… and what is this place?”

She leaned forward and pointed. “You’re responsible for Mr. Di Costa’s visit here today. You were observed following him, so we brought him in, in the hope that you would come also. The message he received was a code word designed to trigger an automatic response planted in his mind. He came directly here, controlled by the posthypnotic suggestion.”

“But the note,” he exclaimed.

“A simple matter! It was written on a material made entirely of separate molecules. A small charge of energy held them together for a brief period of time. The charge leaked out and the material merely separated into its constituent molecules.”

The utter impossibility of the situation was striking home. The evidences of a superior culture were unmistakable. These people were his.⁠ ⁠…

“Aliens, Mr. Dalgreen⁠—I suppose you could call us that. Yes. I can read your mind quite clearly. That is why you are here today. A thought receiver in Arthur Di Costa’s study informed us of your suspicions when you first walked in. We have been following you ever since, arranging your visit here.

“I’ll tell you what I can, Mr. Dalgreen. We are not of Earth, in fact, we come from beyond your solar system. This office is, to be very frank, the outpatient ward of a sanitarium!”

“Sanitarium!” Brent shouted. “This is the office only⁠ ⁠… then where is the sanitarium?”

The girl twirled her pencil slowly, her piercing stare seeming to penetrate his eyes⁠—into his brain.

“The entire Earth is our sanitarium. Mixed in with your population are a great number of our mentally ill.”

The floor seemed to tilt under Brent’s feet. He clutched the edge of the desk. “Then Di Costa must be one of your outpatients. Is he insane?”

The girl spoke quietly. “Not insane in the strictest sense of the word. He is congenitally feebleminded; his case is incurable.”

Brent thought of the brilliant Di Costa as a moron, and the inference shook his mind. “That means that the average I.Q. of your race must be⁠ ⁠…”

“Beyond your powers of comprehension,” she said. “To your people Di Costa is normal, really far above average.

“On his home planet he was not bright enough to take his place in that highly integrated society. He became a ward of the state. His body was altered to be an exact duplicate of homo sapiens. We gave him a new body and a new personality⁠—but we could not change his basic intelligence. That is why he is here on Earth, a square peg in a square hole.