Harker compelled himself to watch. Needles plunged into the dead man's skin; electrodes fastened to the scalp discharged suddenly. It was weird, vaguely terrifying, laden with burdensome implications for the future. All that seemed missing was the eery blue glow that characterized the evil experiments of stereotyped mad scientists.
He told himself that these men were not mad. He told himself that what they were doing was a natural outgrowth of the scientific techniques of the past century, that it was no more terrifying to restore life than it was to preserve it with antibiotics or serums. But he sensed a conflict within himself: he knew that if he accepted this assignment, he could embrace the idea intellectually but that somewhere in the moist jungle-areas of his subconscious mind he would feel disturbed and repelled.
"Watch the needles," Raymond whispered. "Heartbeat's beginning now. Respiration. The electro-encephalograph is recording brain currents again."
"The test, of course, is whether these things continue after your machinery is shut off, isn't it?" Harker asked.
"Of course."
Time edged by. Harker's over-strained attention wandered; he took in the barren peeling walls of the lab, the dingy window through which late-afternoon light streamed. He had heard somewhere that the old-fashioned incandescent bulbs emitted a 60-cycle hum, and he tried unsuccessfully to hear it. Sweat-blotches stippled his shirt.
"Now!" Vogel said. He threw a master lever. The equipment whined faintly and cut off.
The heartbeat recorder and the respiration indicator showed a momentary lapse, then returned to their previous level. The EEG tape continued recording.
Harker's eyes widened slightly. A slow smile appeared on Raymond's face; behind him, Harker could hear Lurie cracking his knuckles nervously, and bespectacled Dr. Klaus tensely grinding his molars together.
"I guess we did it," Vogel said.
The dead man's arms moved slowly. His eyelids fluttered, but the anesthetic ensured continued unconsciousness. His lips parted—and the soft groan that came forth was, for Harker, the clincher he had been half-hoping would not be forthcoming.
The man groaned again. Harker felt suddenly weary, and turned his head away.
CHAPTER IV
Harker's shock reaction was violent, instinctive, and brief. He quivered uncontrollably, put his hands to his face, and started to lose his balance. Raymond was right there; he caught him, held him upright for a moment, and released him. Harker wobbled and grinned shamefacedly.
"That's strong stuff," he said.
"I've got stronger stuff in my office. Come on."
He and the lab director returned to the adjoining room. Raymond closed the door and clicked it; Lurie and Klaus remained in the lab. Raymond reached into his bookcase, pushed a thick black-bound volume to one side, and withdrew a half-empty bottle of Scotch. He poured a double shot for Harker, a single for himself, and replaced the bottle.
"Drink up. Straight."
Harker swallowed the liquor in two frantic gulps. He gasped, grinned again, and shakily set down the glass. "God. I'm roasting in my own sweat."
"It isn't a pleasant sight the first time, I guess. I wish I could share some of your emotional reaction, but I'm blocked out. My dad was a biochemist, specialty life-research. He had me cutting up frogs when I was three. I'm numb to any such reactions by now."
"Don't let that trouble you," Harker said. He shivered. "I could live very happily without seeing another demonstration of your technique, you know."
Raymond chuckled. "Does that mean you're convinced we aren't quacks?"
Harker shrugged. "What you have is heap big medicine. I wonder if I've got the voltage needed to handle the job you want me to do."
"You wouldn't be here if we didn't think so."
"I was fourth on the list," Harker said. "Lurie told me."
"You were my personal choice. I was outvoted. But I knew you'd accept and the other three would turn us down without even coming out here to investigate."
"I haven't said I've accepted," Harker pointed out.
"Well? Do you?"
Harker was silent for a moment, his mind returning to the impact of the scene he had just witnessed. There was still plenty he had to know, of course: the corporate set-up of this lab, including knowledge of the powers that had "outvoted" the director; the financial resources behind him; the possible bugs in the technique.
A dozen implications unfolded. His mind was already at work planning the campaign. He was thinking of people to see, wires to pull, angles to check.
"I guess I accept," he said quietly.
Raymond smiled and reached into his desk. He handed Harker a check drawn on a Manhattan bank for $2,400, payable to James Harker, and signedSimeon Barchet, Treasurer.
"What's this?"
"That's four weeks salary, in advance. Barchet's the trustee who administers the Beller Fund. I had him write the check yesterday. I was pretty confident you'd join us, you see."
Harker spent a quietly tense weekend at home with his family. He told Lois about the assignment, of course; he never kept things from her, even the most unpleasant. She was dubious, but willing to rely on his judgment.
He worked off some of his physical tension by playing ball in the backyard with his sons. Chris, entering adolescence, was developing an athlete's grace; seven-year-old Paul did not yet have the coordination needed for catching and throwing a baseball, but he gave it a good try.
On Sunday the four of them drove upstate to a picnic ground, ate out, even went for a brief swim though it was really too early in the season for that. Harker splashed and laughed with his sons, but there was an essential somberness about him that Lois quietly pointed out.
"I know," he admitted. "I'm thinking."
"About the Beller Labs business?"
He nodded. "I keep finding new angles in it. I try to guess what the reaction of the organized churches will be, and what political capital will be made. More likely than not the parties will take opposite stands. Somebody will dig up the fact that I used to be a National Liberal bigwig, and that'll enter into the situation. After a while it'll become so confused by side-issues that—" He stopped. "I don't sound very enthusiastic about this job, do I?"
"No," Lois said. "You don't."
"I guess I really haven't made up my mind where I stand," he said. "There are too many tangential things I don't know about yet."
"Like what?"
Harker shook his head. "I'm trying not to think about them. This is my day off, remember?"
On Monday he polished off his routine work early, by half-past-ten, and stepped out of his office. He walked down the beige corridor to the door inscribedWilliam F. Kellyand knocked sharply.
"Bill? Me, Jim."
"Come on in, boy."
Kelly was sitting back of an impeccably clear mahogany desk, looking well-barbered, well-manicured, well-fed. He was the senior partner of the law firm that now called itself Kelly, Harker, Portobello, and Klein. In his late fifties, ruddy-faced, quick-witted, Kelly was by religion a loyal Catholic and by politics a determined maverick.
He said, "How's the ex-Governor this morning?"
Harker grinned. Kelly was the one man who could not offend him with those words. "A washed-up has-been, as usual. Bill, I've got a big offer to do some work for a Jersey outfit. I think it's going to tie me up for the next few months. I thought I'd let you know."
Kelly blinked, then grinned, showing even white teeth. "Full-time?"
"Pretty near."
"How about your pending cases?"
Harker said, "I'm keeping the Bryant case. Fuller and Heidell will have to be handed over to someone else, I'm afraid."
"I guess you know what you're doing, Jim. Who's the big client?"
"Hush-hush. Nice pay, though."
"Can't even tell old Bill, eh? Well, I know better than to pry. But how come you're telling me all this, anyway? I don't give a damn what work you take on, Jim. You're a free agent here."
Calmly Harker said, "I thought I'd let you know because the account's a controversial one. I want you to realize that I'm doing it on my own hook and not as a member of K.H.P. & K. When and if the boomerang comes around and hits me in the face, I don't want you and Mike and Phil to get black eyes too."
Dead seriousness replaced the amiable grin on Kelly's pink face. "Have I ever backed off a hot item, Jim?"
"You might back off this one."
Kelly leaned forward and turned on all his considerable personal charm. "Look here, son, I'm a decade older than you are and a damned sight cagier. Maybe you better talk this thing out with me. If you're free for lunch—"
"I'm not," Harker said doggedly. "Bill, let's drop the whole thing. I know what I'm getting into and I didn't come here for advice. Okay?"
Kelly began to chuckle. "You said the same damn thing the night you were elected Governor. Remember, when you started telling me about how you were going to turn the whole State machine upside-down? I warned you, and I warn you again, but you don't learn. The only thing that got turned upside-down was you."
"So I'm a fool. But at least I'm adedicatedfool."
"That's the worst kind," Kelly drawled amiably. As Harker started to leave the older man's office Kelly added, "Good luck, anyway, on whatever you're getting your fool feet tangled up in."
"Thanks, Bill. Sorry I have to be so tight-mouthed."
On his way back to his office he passed the reception-desk; Joan looked up at him and said, "Oh, Mr. Harker—call just came in for you. Mr. Jonathan Bryant's on the phone. He's waiting."
"Switch it into my office," Harker told her. His brows contracted.Jonathan? What does that particular vulture want?
Harker cut round the desks in the outer office and let himself into his sanctum. He activated the phone. There was the usual three-second circuit-lag, and then the gray haze of electronic "noise" gave way to the fishbelly face of Jonathan Bryant.
"Hello, Harker," he said abruptly. "Just thought I'd call you up to let you know that I've obtained a stay of the hearing on my father's will. It's being pushed up from the 16th to the 23rd."
Harker scowled. "I don't have any official notice of that fact yet."
"It's on its way via court messenger. Just thought I'd let you know about it."
"Go ahead," Harker said. "Gloat all you want, if it gives you pleasure. Your father's will is unbreakable, and you know it damn well. All this stalling—"
"Legal delay," Jonathan corrected.
"All this stalling is just a waste of everybody's time. Sure, I know you're hoping the old man will die before the hearing, but I assure you that can't influence the outcome. If you're that anxious to collect, stop obtaining postponements and just pull the old man's feeding-plugs out. It'll save a lot of heartache for all of us, him included."
"Harker, you lousy politico, you should have been debarred twenty years ago."
"The word you want to use isdisbarred," Harker said coldly. "Suppose you get off my line and stop bothering me now? I'd call you a filthy jackal except that I'm too busy for slander suits just now, even suits that I'd win."
Angrily he snapped off contact and the screen blanked.Nuisance, he thought, referring both to Jonathan and to the postponement of the hearing. He didn't seriously believe that the Bryant heirs were going to upset the old man's will, and the quicker he got the case off his personal docket the faster he would be free for full-time work on the Beller Labs account.
He took a doodlepad from his desk and scrawled three names on it:
Winstead.
Thurman.
Msgnr. Carteret.
Leo Winstead was the man who had succeeded him in the Governor's mansion in Albany—a steady, reliable National-Liberal party-line man, flexible and open in his views but loyal to the good old machine. He would be one of the first men Harker would have to see; Winstead would give him the probable Nat-Lib party line on the resurrection gimmick, and he could be trusted to keep things to himself until given the official release.
Clyde Thurman was New York's senior Senator, a formidable old ogre of a man with incalculable influence in Washington. Harker had been a Thurman protege, fifteen years ago; publicly old Clyde had soured on Harker since his futile attempt at political independence, but Harker had no idea where the old man stood privately. If he could win Thurman over to his side, Senate approval of revivification legislation was a good bet. The Nat-Libs controlled 53 seats in the 123rd Congress; the American-Conservatives held only 45, with the other two seats held down by self-proclaimed Independents. In the House, it was even better: 297 to 223, with 20 Independents of variable predictability.
Harker's third key man was Monseigneur Carteret. The Father was a highly-respected member of New York's Catholic hierarchy, shrewd and liberal in his beliefs, and already (at the age of 38) considered a likely candidate for an Archepiscopacy and beyond that the red hat.
Harker had met Father Carteret through Kelly. While he was no Catholic himself, nor currently a member of any other organized group, Harker had struck up a close friendship with the priest. He could rely on Carteret to give him an accurate and confidential appraisal of the possible Church reaction to announcement of a successful technique for resuscitating the dead.
Harker ripped the sheet off the doodlepad and pocketed it. He hung poised over his desk, deep in thought, his active mind already picturing the interviews he might be having with these people.
After a moment he reached for his phone and punched out the coordinates of Father Carteret's private number. Might as well begin with him, Harker thought.
A pleasantly monkish face appeared on the screen after several rings. "Yes? May I help you?"
"I'd like to speak to Father Carteret, please. My name is James Harker."
"Pardon, Mr. Harker. Father Carteret is in conference with Bishop O'Loughlin. Would you care to have him call you when he's free?"
"When will that be?"
"A half hour, I'd say. Is your matter urgent?"
"Reasonably. Tell the Monseigneur I'd like to make an appointment to see him some time today or tomorrow, and ask him to call me at my office."
"Does he have your number?"
"I think so. But you'd better take it anyway, just to make sure. MON-4-38162."
He blanked the screen, waited a moment, and dialed the number Raymond had given him to use when calling the laboratory. The pale, goggle-eyed face of David Klaus appeared on the screen.
"I'd like to talk to Raymond."
"Dr. Raymond's busy in the hormone lab," Klaus said sharply. "Try again in an hour or so."
Harker frowned impatiently; he had taken an immediate dislike to this jittery little enzyme researcher. He said, "You tell Raymond—"
"Just a minute," a new voice said. There was confusion on the screen for an instant; then Klaus' face disappeared and the precise, tranquil features of Martin Raymond took their place.
"I thought you were busy in the hormone lab," Harker said. "Klaus told me so."
Raymond laughed without much humor behind it. "Klaus is frequently inaccurate, Mr. Harker. What's on your mind?"
"Thought I'd let you know that I'm getting down to immediate operation. I'm lining up interviews with key people for today and tomorrow as a preliminary investigation of your legal situation."
"Good. By the way—Mitchison's prepared some publicity handouts on the process. He wants you to okay them before we send them to the papers."
Harker repressed a strangled cough. "Okay them? Listen, Mart, that's exactly why I called. My first official instruction is that the present wrap of ultra-security is to continue unabated until I'm ready to lift it. Tell that to Mitchison and tell him in spades."
Raymond smiled evenly. "Of course—Jim. All secrecy wraps on until you give the word. I'll let Mitchison know."
"Good. I'll be out at the lab sometime between here and Wednesday to find out some further information. I'll keep in touch whenever I can."
"Right."
Harker broke contact and stared puzzledly at the tips of his fingers for a moment. His uneasiness widened. His original suspicion that behind the smooth facade of the Beller Research Laboratories lay possible dissension was heightened by Klaus' peculiar behavior on the phone—and the idea of Mitchison doing anything as premature as sending out press handouts now, before the ground had been surveyed and the ice broken, gave him the cold running shudders.
It was going to be enough of a job putting this thing across as it was—without tripping over the outstretched toes of his employers.
CHAPTER V
Monseigneur Carteret's private office reminded Harker of Mart Raymond's. Like Raymond's, it was small, and like Raymond's it was ringed with jammed bookshelves. The furniture was unostentatious, old and well-worn. As a concession to the 21st century Carteret had installed a video pickup and a telescreen attachment to go with his phone. A small crucifix hung on the one wall not encumbered with books.
Carteret leaned forward and peered curiously at Harker. The priest, Harker knew, suffered from presbyopia. He was a lean man with the sharp facial contours of an ascetic: upthrust cheekbones, lowering brows, grizzled close-cropped hair turning gray. His lips were fleshless, pale.
Harker said, "I have to apologize for insisting on such a prompt audience, Father."
Carteret frowned reprovingly. "You told me yesterday it was an urgent matter. To me urgency means—well,urgency. My column for theIntelligencercan wait a few hours, I guess."
His voice was dramatically resonant. He flashed his famous smile.
Harker said, "Fair enough. I'm here seeking an ecclesiastical opinion."
"I'll do my best. You understand that anyrealopinion on a serious matter would have to come from the Bishop, not from me—and ultimately from Rome."
"I know that. I wouldn't want this to get to Rome just yet. I want a private, off-the-record statement from you."
"I'll try. Go ahead."
Harker took a deep breath. "Father, what's the official Church position on resurrection of the dead? Actual physical resurrection here and now, I mean, not the Last Trump."
Carteret's eyes twinkled. "Officially? Well, I've never heard Jesus being condemned for raising Lazarus. And on the third day after the crucifixion Jesus Himself was raised, if that's what you mean. I don't see—"
"Let me make myself clear," Harker said. "The resurrections of Jesus and of Lazarus both fall into the miracle category. Suppose—suppose a mortal being, a doctor, could take a man who had been dead eight or nine hours, or even a day, and bring him back to life."
Carteret looked momentarily troubled. "You speak hypothetically, of course." When Harker did not answer he went on, "Our doctrine holds that death occurs at the moment of 'complete and definitive separation of body and soul.' Presumably the process you discuss makes no provision for restoring the soul."
Harker shrugged. "I'm not capable to judge that. Neither, I'd say, are the men who have developed this—ah—hypothetical process."
"In that case," Carteret said, "the official Church position would be that any human beings revived by this method would be without souls, and therefore no longer human. The whole procedure would be considered profoundly irreligious."
"Blasphemous and sacrilegious as well?"
"No doubt."
Harker was silent for a moment. He said at length, "How about artificial respiration, heart massage, adrenalin injections? For decades seemingly dead people have been brought back to life with these techniques. Aretheyall without souls too?"
Carteret seemed to squirm. His strong fingers toyed with a cruciform paperweight on his desk. "I recall a statement of Pius XII, eighty or ninety years ago, about that. The Pope admitted that it was impossible to tell precisely when the soul had left the body—and that so long as the vital functions maintained themselves, it could be held that the person in question was not dead."
"In other words, if resuscitation techniques could be applied successfully, the patient is considered never to have been dead?"
Carteret nodded slowly.
"But if the patient had been pronounced dead by science and left in that state for half a day or more, andthenreanimated by a hypothetical new technique—?"
"In that case there has been a definite discontinuity of the life-process," Carteret said. "I may be wrong, but I can't see how the Vatican could give such a technique its approval."
"Ever?"
Carteret smiled. "Jim, it's a verity that the Church is founded on a Rock, but that doesn't mean our heads are made of stone. No organization lasts two thousand years without being susceptible to change. If in the course of time we're shown that a reanimation technique restores both bodyandsoul, no doubt we'll give it approval. At present, though, I can foresee only one outcome."
Harker knotted his fingers together tensely. The priest's response had not been a surprise to him, but he had hoped for some wild loophole. If any loophole existed, Carteret would have found it.
Quietly he said, "All right, Father. I'll put my cards on the table now. Such a processhasbeen invented. I've seen it work. I've been retained as legal adviser for the group that developed it, and I'm shopping around for religious and secular opinions before I let them spring the news on the public."
"You want my secular opinion, Jim, now that you've had the religious one?"
"Of course."
"Drop it. Get out of this thing as fast as you can. You're asking for trouble."
"I know that. But I can only see this process as a force for good—for minimizing tragedy in everyday life."
"Naturally. And I could offer you six arguments showing how it'llincreasesuffering. Is it a complex technique requiring skilled operators?"
"Yes, but—"
"In that case it won't be available to everybody right away. Areyougoing to decide who lives and who stays dead? Suppose you're faced with the choice between a good and virtuous nobody or an evil but talented creative artist."
"I know.The Doctor's Dilemma. I don't have any slick answers to that, Father. But I still don't think it's any reason to suppress this thing."
"Maybe not. On a purely secular level, though, I tell you it's sheer dynamite. Not to mention the opposition you're bound to get from religious groups. Jim, listen to me: you had a wonderful career once. You wrecked it. But now you're continuing your headstrong ways right to the point of self-destruction."
"Which is frowned upon by your Church," Harker snapped, irritated. "But—"
"I'm not talking about my Church!" Carteret thundered. "I'm talking about you, your family, the rest of your life. You're getting into very deep waters."
"I'll shoulder the responsibility myself."
"I wish you could," the priest murmured. "I wish any of us could. But we can't ever do that, of course."
He shrugged, "Go in peace, Jim. Any time you want to talk to me, just pick up the phone and call. I guarantee no proselytizing."
"Of course everything we've just said is confidential, you understand."
Carteret nodded. He lifted his arms, shaking the sleeves of his cassock back. "Observe. No concealed tape-recorders under my garments. No telespies in the wall."
Chuckling, Harker opened the door and stood at the threshold a moment. "Thanks for talking to me, Father. Even if I can't agree with you."
"I'm used to disagreement," Carteret said. "If everyone who came in here agreed with everything I said, I think I'd lose my faith. So long, Jim."
"Good-bye, Father."
Harker emerged on the steps of the old cathedral where Carteret had his office, paused for a few deep breaths, and looked around. Fifth Avenue was humming with activity, here at noontime on a Tuesday in mid-month.
He thought:Tuesday, May 14, 2033. A pleasant late-spring day. And any time I decide to give the word, the entire nature of human philosophy will change.
Harker walked downtown to 43rd Street, stopped in for a quick coffee, and headed toward the Monorail Terminal. Puffing businessmen clutching attache cases sped past him, each on some business of no-doubt-vital importance, each blithely shortening his life-span with each new ulcer and each new deposit of cholesterol in the arteries. Well, before long it would be possible to bring these fat executives back to life each time they keeled over, Harker thought. What a frantic speedup would resultthen!
He bought a round-trip ticket to Litchfield, put through a call to the laboratory, and boarded the slim graceful yellow-hulled bullet that was the New Jersey monobus. He sat back, cushioning himself against the first jolt of acceleration, and waited for departure.
The eleventh commandment:Thou need not die.Harker shivered a little at the magnitude of the Beller project; each day he realized a little more deeply the true awesome nature of the whole breakthrough.
Mitchison was waiting for him at the Litchfield monobus depot in the big black limousine. Harker climbed in, sitting next to the public-relations man on the front seat.
"Well?" Mitchison jammed his cigar into one corner of his mouth. "What did the padrè have to say?"
"Precisely what we all expected."
"Nix?"
"Double-double nix with molasses and cherries on top," Harker said. "His unofficial feeling is that the Church will ixnay this thing the second it's announced."
"Umm. Take some heavy thinking to cancelthatout. How about the politicos?"
The car pulled into the Beller Labs' private road. Harker said, "I'm going to Albany later in the week to see Governor Winstead. After him I'll go after Senator Thurman. Depending on what they say—"
"The hell with that," Mitchison growled. "When do you figure we can release this thing to the public?"
Harker turned round in his seat. In a level voice he said, "When you're planning to touch off a fusion bomb, you look around first and make sure you won't get scragged yourself. Same here. This project's been kept under wraps for eight years, and I'm damned if I'll release anything now until I see exactly where we all stand."
"And you'll pussyfoot around for months?"
"What do you care?" Harker demanded. "Are you getting paid by the week or by the amount of publicity you send out?"
Mitchison grunted something but made no intelligible answer. They pulled up at the road-block and Harker got out at the right; the guards nodded curtly to him this time but made no attempt to interfere as he headed toward the administration building. Mitchison took his car to the parking-area.
Knocking at Raymond's door, Harker said, "You there, Mart?"
The door opened. A diminutive hatchet-faced man peered up at him. "Hello, Harker."
Taken off balance, Harker blinked a moment, then said, "Hello. I don't think we've met, have we?"
"You've seen my name. At the bottom of your check. I'm Barchet. Administrator of the Beller Fund."
Harker smiled at the little man and looked past him to Raymond. He shook his head. "It's no go, Mart. The Father says the Church will oppose us."
Raymond shrugged. "We could have figured on that, I guess. What's the next step?"
Harker nodded. "I see Winstead on Friday. I hope for better luck there."
"Doubtful," Barchet snorted. His voice was an annoying saw-edged whine. Harker wondered whether the little man was going to be around the Litchfield labs very often; he had a deep dislike for moneymen.
Ignoring Barchet's comment, Harker said to Raymond, "Mart, how solid is the tenure of the people in this organization?"
"What do you mean?"
"Do all the affiliated men have verbal contracts like me, or are some inked in black-and-white?"
"Most of the research men have verbal agreements."
"How about Mitchison?"
Barchet turned to peer at Harker. Raymond frowned and said, "Why Mitchison?"
"I'll be blunt," Harker said. "I'd like to bounce him. He does not seem very capable and he's awfully trigger-happy about releasing data on the project. If it's okay with you, I'd like to bring in a couple of the boys who handled my gubernatorial campaign. They—"
Interrupting icily, Barchet said, "It seems to me we have more than enough people of radical political affiliation working for us now. Anyone who handled a Nat-Lib campaign would be no asset to our work."
Harker goggled. "Iwas a Nat-Lib Governor! You hired me, and you think that two press-agents—"
"I might as well tell you," Barchet said. "You were hired over my positive objections, Mr. Harker. Your party happens to be the one in power, but it definitely does not represent the main ideological current of American enterprise. And if we succeed in our aims, I like to think it will bedespiteyour presence on our team, not because of it."
"Huh? Who the hell—"
"Wait a minute, Jim," Raymond cut in. "And you too, Simeon. I don't want any fighting in here!"
"I'm simply stating views that I expound regularly at our meetings," Barchet said. "For your information, Mr. Harker, Cal Mitchison is the best publicity agent money can buy. I will not consent to his dismissal."
"You may have to consent to my resignation, then," Harker said angrily. "Dammit, Mart, if I knew this outfit was run by—"
"Watch yourself, Mr. Harker," Barchet warned.
"Calm down, Jim." Raymond disengaged himself from his desk and, glowering down at Barchet, said, "Simeon, you know damned well Harker was approved by a majority of the shareholders. You have no business raising a squabble like this now. He was hired and given free rein—and if he wants to fire Mitchison, it's within his province."
"I insist on bringing the matter before the Board—and if Mitchison is dismissed without full vote, I'll cause trouble. Good day, Dr. Raymond."
The little man sailed past Harker without a word and slammed the door. Harker grinned and said, "What washeso upset about?"
Raymond slumped wearily behind his desk. "Barchet's the official voice of old Beller in this outfit—and Beller was as conservative as they come. Barchet thinks you're an arch-radical because you held office for the Nat-Libs. And the little bugger carries a lot of weight on the Board, so we have to humor him."
Harker nodded. He understood now what Raymond had meant when he said he had been "outvoted" in the matter of hiring Harker as first choice. It did not increase his opinion of Beller Research Laboratories.
"I wouldn't blame you if you quit today," Raymond said suddenly. "With Mitchison on pins and needles to give the word to the public, and that idiot Klaus battling for my job because he's tired of enzyme work—"
"Klaus? But he's just a kid!"
"He's twenty-nine, and for an ex-prodigy that's ancient. Degree from Harvard at fifteen, that sort of thing. I have to keep close watch on him or he'll put a scalpel in my back."
"Why not fire him?" Harker suggested.
"Two reasons. He's got a contract, for one—and for another I'd rather have him with us than agin us, if you know what I mean. Lesser of two evils."
Raymond sighed. "Great little place we have here, Jim. Sometimes I feel like closing the windows and turning up the gas." He shook his head reflectively. "But it wouldn't work. Some bastard would drag me next door and bring me back to life again."
He reached into the bookshelf and produced the liquor bottle. "One quick shot apiece," he said. "Then I want to take you round back to show you the rest of the lab."
CHAPTER VI
The grand tour of the laboratory grounds was as disturbing as it was stimulating. Seemingly tireless, Raymond marched him through room after room where elaborate experiments were going on.
"Serotonin-diffraction goes on in here. This room's plasma research; remind me to bring you back some time when the big centrifuge is running. Fascinating. This is Klaus' enzyme lab, and down here—"
Harker puffed along behind the lab director, listening to the flow of unfamiliar terms, dazzled by the array of formidable scientific devices. He saw kennels where lively dogs bounded joyfully up and down and struggled to lick his hands through the cage; it was a little jarring to learn that every dog in the room had been "dead" at least once, for periods ranging from a few minutes to twenty-eight hours. He met a grave little rhesus monkey that held the record; it had been dead thirty-nine hours, two months before.
"We had a pair of them," Raymond said. "We brought this fellow back at the 39-hour mark, and held the other off for nine more hours in hopes of hitting a full two days. We didn't make it. The surviving monk moped for days about it."
Harker nodded. He was swept on; into a large room lined with ledgers, which Raymond said contained all the records of the Beller Laboratories since its opening in 2024. White-smocked researchers turned to look up as Harker and his guide passed through into a long, well-lit lab room, then out into the afternoon warmth and across to the other building, for more of the same.
"Well," Harker said finally, after they had returned to Raymond's office. "It's a busy place."
Raymond nodded. "We keep it moving. And it gets results. Despite everything, it gets results."
Despite everything.Harker didn't like the implications of that. He was beginning to form a picture of Raymond as an able man surrounded by stumbling-blocks and obstacles, and bulling his way through none the less. He wondered how it would be once he got the campaign into full swing, not too many weeks from now.
Harker leaned back, trying to relax. Raymond said, "Is it too early for you to give me an outline of the program you're planning?"
Harker hunched his shoulders forward uneasily. "It's still in the formative stage. I'm seeing Governor Winstead on Friday, as you know, and early next week I'll go down to Washington and talk to Senator Thurman. If we get them on our side, the rest is relatively easy."
"And if we don't?"
Harker did not smile. "Then we have a fight."
"Why do you say that? Can't we just set up an instruction center and start resuscitating?"
"Pardon me, Mart, if I say that your approach's a naive one. Wecan'tdo any such thing. Not even if you limit use of the apparatus to fully qualified M.D.'s. You see, anything as radical as this will have to be routed through the Federal Health Department, and they'll simply boot it on up to the President, and he'll refer it to Congress. What we need is a law making use of your technique legal."
"Is there any law saying it'sillegalto reanimate the dead?" Raymond asked.
"Not yet. But you can bet there'll be an attempt to ram one through, before long. Which is why we have to put through a law of our own."
Raymond fell silent; his blue-cheeked face looked grave. An idea occurred to Harker and he said, "Do you have any idea how big our public-relations budget is?"
Raymond shrugged. "Pretty big. I guess you can have three or four hundred thousand, if you need it."
"Three or four hundredmillionis more in line with what we'll need," Harker said. He saw the stunned expression on Raymond's face and added, "Certainly at least a million, to begin with."
"But why? Why should it be necessary tosellthe idea of restoring life? You'd think the people of America would rise up and acclaim us as saviors."
"You'd think so, wouldn't you?" Harker shook his head bleakly. "It doesn't work that way, Mart. For one thing, they'll be afraid to try it. There'll be plenty of 'zombie' jokes, and behind those jokes will be unvoiced fear. Uh-uh, Mart. If we're going to put this thing across, we'll need a big public-relations budget. And we can't let a bubble-head like Mitchison handle the job."
"It'll take a little time to fire him."
"Why?"
"You heard Barchet. Mitchison's Barchet's man. We'll have to go through shareholder channels to get rid of Mitchison."
"How long will that take?"
"Two weeks, maybe three," Raymond said. "Will that hold things up too badly?"
"We'll manage," Harker said tiredly.
Harker spent the next morning, Wednesday, at his office, tidying up unfinished business. The delayer on the Bryant hearing had come through, and he read the document carefully, scowled, and jammed it into his desk drawer. He phoned the Bryant home and learned that the old man was very low; the penguinoid doctor refused to let Harker speak with him. Harker suspected the fine hand of Jonathan Bryant lurking behind that ukase, but there wasn't much he could do about it. The old man wasn't going to last forever, anyway—but Harker genuinely wanted him to hold out until after the hearing, at least.
Nasty business. Jonathan had deliberately obtained the stay of hearing in hopes that his father would die before the case came up.
He left the office at noon, spent some time downtown in the public library trying to find some books that would give him a little scientific background, and headed for home about four that afternoon. His home life had been suffering, a bit, in the week since he had plunged himself fully into the Beller Labs project. He had been coming home at odd hours, which upset Lois' routine, and his attitude was one of withdrawn introversion, which made things tough on the children. Still, they all were very cooperative about it, Harker thought. He hoped he could make it up to them when the pressure let up.
Ifthe pressure ever let up.
Thursday passed slowly. Harker remained at home, in his study, and tried to read the books he had brought from the library. He was surprised to learn that formal resuscitation research dated from the middle years of the past century. He traced down a few of the terms Raymond had thrown at him, and learned a bit about the mechanics of the Beller reanimation technique.
But, he realized when he put the books down, he knew very little in detail. He had simply skimmed the surface, acquiring a veneer of terms which he could use to impress the even-less-educated.
A politician's trick, he thought. But what else could he do?
He woke early on Friday, before six, and made breakfast for himself. By the time he had turned off the autocook and set the kitchen-servo tomop-up, Lois and the children were moving about upstairs. They had come down for breakfast before he was ready to leave.
"Morning, Dad," Chris said. "Up early, eh?"
"I have to make a 9:30 jet," he explained. "It's the last one before noon."
Paul appeared, thumbing his eyes, yawning. "Where you going, Daddy?"
"Albany," Harker said.
The seven-year-old looked awake immediately. "Albany? Are you Governor again, Daddy?"
"Hush, stupid!" Chris said savagely.
But Harker merely smiled and shook his head. "No, I won't be Governor any more, Paul. I'm going to visit Mr. Winstead.He'sthe Governor now."
"Oh," the boy said gravely.
Harker reached the West Side jet terminal at ten after nine. The big 150-seater was out on the field, surrounded by attendants. It would make the trip to Albany in just under thirteen minutes.
It was a silly business. It took him twice that long to get to the terminal from his home. But modern transportation was full of such paradoxes.
At nine-thirty-five the great ship erupted from the landing-strip; not much later it was roaring over Westchester, and not very much after that it was taxiing to a smooth and uneventful landing just outside Albany.
Thirteen minutes. And it took twenty-five minutes more for the jetport bus to bring them across the Hudson into Albany proper after the flight.
His appointment with Governor Winstead was for eleven that morning. Declining the public transport service, Harker walked through town to the governor's mansion—a walk that he had come to know well, in his four years in Albany.
The town hadn't changed much. Still third-rate, dirty, bedraggled; one of his proposed reforms had been to move the Capitol downstate to New York City, where it really belonged, but naturally the force of sentiment was solidly against him, not to mention the American-Conservative Party, whose New York stronghold Albany was.
He smiled at the memory. He had fought so many losing battles, in his four years as Governor.
The guards at Winstead's mansion recognized him, of course, and tipped their hats. Harker grinned amiably at them and passed through, but he felt inward discomfort.Theirjobs were pegged down by civil-service regulations; his had not been, and he had lost it. In an odd way it made him feel inferior.
He traveled the familiar journey upstairs to the Governor's office. Winstead was there to greet him with outstretched hand and a faintly abashed smile.
"Jim. So glad you could come up here."
"It's not a courtesy call, Leo. I'm here to ask some advice."
"Any way I can help, Jim, you know I will."
Harker experienced a moment of disorientation as he took a seat facing Winstead across the big desk that had been his until a few months ago. It was strange to find himself sitting onthisside of the desk.
He looked for ways to begin saying what he had come here to say. He sensed the other man's deep embarrassment, and shared it in a way, because the awkwardness of this first meeting between Governor and ex-Governor was complex and many-leveled.
Winstead was ten years his senior: a good party man, a reliable workhorse who had come up through the ranks of the Manhattan District Attorney's office, and who had turned down a judgeship because he thought he had a shot at the race for Governor. But the party had chosen the bright, meteorically-rising young Mayor, James Harker, to be the standard-bearer instead, and an avalanche of Nat-Lib votes from downstate had swept Harker in.
Then it had been necessary to discard Harker four years later, and good dependable old Leo Winstead was trotted out of private law practice to take his place. The Nat-Lib tide held true; Winstead was elected, and now it was the ex-prodigy who entered private law practice instead of using the Governorship as a spring-board into the White House.
Harker said, "Leo, you carry weight with the party. I don't any more."
"Jim, I—"
"Don't try to apologize, Leo, because it's my own fault and none of yours that I'm where I am now. I'm simply asking you to exert some influence on behalf of a project I'm involved in."
It was a naked attempt at lobbying. Harker hoped Winstead's unconscious guilt-feelings would lead him to support the Beller people.
"What sort of project is it, Jim?"
"It's—it's a sort of revolutionary breakthrough in science, Leo. A process to reanimate people who have been dead less than twenty-four hours."
Winstead sat up. "Are you serious?"
"Dead serious. I'm going down to Washington next week to see Thurman. This thing reallyworks—and I want to get it legally approved."
"And exactly where do I come in?"
"You're a powerful official, Leo. If you came out in praise of this new development—"
"Dangerous business, Jim. The Church—"
"I know all about the Church. And you can bet our friends the American-Conservatives will make some kind of political capital about the news. The Nat-Libs willhaveto take a favorable stand on this."
"Suppose we don't?" Winstead asked. His voice was tense and off-center; he ran his knotty hands nervously through his bushy shock of white hair. "You know as well as I do that this is no time to hop off supporting anything too far-fetched."
Harker began to feel a sense of exasperation. "Far-fetched? Leo, I saw a dead man come back to life right in front of me. If you think—"
"I don't think anything. Thinking's not my job. If you'll pardon my saying so, Jim, you did too much thinking for your own good when you were in Albany. This thing has to be handled with kid gloves. It would not surprise me if the government clamps down and bottles it all up until all its aspects have been fully explored."
"Federal Research Act of '92," Harker said thinly. "It guarantees freedom of research without government interference, as you know well enough."
Winstead seemed to be perspiring heavily. "Laws can be repealed or amended, Jim. Listen here: why don't you go see Thurman? Find out howhestands on the matter. Then come back here and maybe we can talk about it again."
It was obviously a dismissal. Winstead had no intentions of getting involved with something that had so many ramifications as this.
Tiredly Harker rose. "Okay. I'll see Thurman."
"Good."
"One more thing, Leo—this project hasn't been announced to the public yet. Since you're aware of the fuss it's going to kick up, I hope you'll be thoughtful enough to keep your mouth shut until we're ready to spring it ourselves."
"Of course, Jim. Of course."
CHAPTER VII
It was a very long weekend.
Harker reached his home at five-thirty that evening, having left Winstead around noon. He had had a miserable chlorella-steak lunch on the wrong side of State Street and spent the early afternoon strolling around Albany, easing the inner tension that gripped him. He made the 4:15 jet back to New York.
Chris was watching the video when he came in; it was a weekend, and the boy had no homework. He hopped up immediately and said, "Drink, Dad?"
"Martini.Verydry."
The boy busied himself with the pushbutton controls of the autobar while Harker hung up his hat and jacket. Lois appeared from the general vicinity of the kitchen.
"Did you see Winstead?"
He nodded. "Yeah, I saw him. He obviously doesn't want any part of the project."
"Oh. Dr. Raymond called, from the labs. He wanted to know if you were back yet. I told him you'd call as soon as you came home."
Harker picked up the phone, yanked down on the long-distance switch, and punched out Raymond's number. He waited, hoping Raymond himself would pick up and not Klaus or Barchet or someone like that.
Raymond did. He looked inquisitively out of the screen and Harker told him exactly what Winstead had said. When he had finished the flat, weary recital, he added, "I'm going to Washington on Monday. But if Thurman gives me the brush-off, we may be in trouble."
Raymond grinned with unconvincing heartiness. "We'll get through somehow, Jim. Have faith."
"I sincerely wish I could," Harker said.
He sipped the drink Chris put in his hand, and after a little of the cold gin had filtered into his bloodstream he felt better. It was a false comfort, he knew, but it was comfort all the same. He went upstairs to the sitting-room, picked out a musictape almost at random, put it on. The selection was a mistake: Handel'sMessiah, Part III. He listened to the big alto aria that opened the section: