Afterlife Crisis Page 5

  “We can’t!” she exclaimed, derailing my train of thought. “Norm Stradamus and his flock have disappeared! I don’t know where they’ve gone. Perhaps they’ve gone into hiding, or found a way to breach the veil between this world and the hidden realm of the Great Omega—”

  “What about the City Solicitor?” I suggested. “He was there.”

  “He’s gone, too,” said Oan. And her lower lip got a bit more chewing done to it. “What about the Intercessor himself?”

  “No, not Ian. And not Penelope or Abe. They’ve all biffed off to parts unknown. Dash it,” I added, for I’d had it up to the eye teeth with modified memories and disappearing persons, “surely there must be someone else who could lend support to your story. Some other witness, apart from yours truly, who can bootstrap our story and lend it a dose of credibility.”

  “We could ask Sir Isaac Newton!” chirped Oan.

  I gaped at the old bird. Slack-jawed, if you catch my meaning. And if you’d cared to describe me as thunderstruck, you wouldn’t be far wrong.

  Chapter 4

  And I’ll tell you why I gaped. Oan’s remark had smote me like a blow. Or do I mean “smitten”? In any case, the Isaac to whom she referred was, if you’ll recall, the White Whale to my Captain Ahab, if that allusion means what I think it does, and it struck me as sinister that he, the chief whatdoyoucallit of a quest I had shelved for the nonce while on the hunt for Zeus, might weasel his way into this slab of dialogue with Oan. Story A horning in on Story B, if you follow me. And hitherto I’d always heard him called “Isaac,” or sometimes “Isaac Newton,” never having encountered a “sir” attached to his name. I instituted inquiries.

  “Sir Isaac Newton?” I said, agog.

  “Two chairs,” said Oan’s roommate.

  “Yes. Sir Isaac Newton, the scientist,” said Oan.

  “You mean secretary.”

  “No, scientist.”

  “He’s the City Solicitor’s personal secretary.”

  “He isn’t!” said Oan. “He’s Detroit’s most eminent scientist and a professor at Detroit University.”

  “Surely not.”

  “But he is!” said Oan.

  “He’s a secretary!”

  “No he isn’t!”

  “Grrnmph,” said Fenny.

  It occurred to me that life in the hospice had finally unhinged Oan’s little grey cells; not that they had been too well hinged in the first place. Nevertheless, perceiving we could be at this all day, I gave diplomacy a go.

  “Allowing, mistress Oan, for the fact that Isaac may no longer serve as personal secretary to the City Solicitor, for I haven’t checked his CV in the last few days, I can assure you that in the fairly recent past he did fill that post, relying on it as the source of his weekly envelope.”

  “No, he didn’t,” insisted the misinformed halfwit. And she followed this with a claim that she could prove it. She instituted a bit of stage business in which she opened a drawer in her bedside table and fished out a rather futuristic-looking datapad, this gadget being festooned with more blinking lights and other indicia of high-techishness than the ones you usually see.

  Never having set my eyes on this particular brand of doodad, I allowed an impressed “oh, ah” to escape my lips.

  “Impressive little thingummy,” I added, thinking no harm could be done by dishing out compliments.

  “It’s the latest in I-Ware,” she said.

  This confused me, largely owing to the fact that I didn’t see her words in print. I mean to say, to the untrained ear it seemed she’d said “eyewear,” and I looked in vain for a spot to hook the thing across one’s ears. Oan must have noticed my puzzled expression, for she served up a couple of footnotes.

  “Capital I, dash W-A-R-E,” she said. “I-Ware. A line of devices produced by Professor Newton. They’re ever so popular. But that’s not what I wanted to show you. Please, look here.”

  She fiddled with the device for a space and summoned up an article from today’s edition of the Detroit Times. She turned the device toward me for inspection.

  And you’ll understand my surprise when I tell you that there, on the palm-sized screen before me, was the unmistakable face of the Isaac of recent discussion, accompanied by a caption, which I now read aloud:

  “Sir Isaac Newton, Lucasian Chair of Mathematics.”

  “That’s right,” said Oan. “He’s been the Lucasian Chair for ages.”

  “Is that good?” I asked.

  “Of course!” said Oan. “It’s one of the most prestigious positions at the university.”

  “Two chairs,” said Oan’s flambéed companion.

  “One chair,” I corrected, tolerantly. “Lucasian, whatever that means.”

  Having quieted the peanut gallery, I ran an eyeball or two over the first few lines of the article. What they said left me goggling. I mean to say, when you know for certain that a fellow is a personal secretary, and you catch two lines of text identifying this self-same egghead as the “longtime holder of DU’s Lucasian Chair,” you goggle. It seemed, in short, that Isaac Newton was not the furtive skulker I’d been led to expect when Abe press-ganged me for this mission, but rather a chump of wide renown who could be found by anyone willing to breathe the fug of a university.

  This turn of events annoyed me. I mean to say, no one is more amenable to the Author’s retroactive, editorial revisions in the manuscript than I, but you’d like to think that when He changes things which touch on what we might call “the central plot,” He might keep His protagonist abreast. Common courtesy, I mean to say.

  “So you see, Mr. Feynman,” said Oan, “Sir Isaac Newton, who was in the cavern throughout the crucial moments, would be the perfect witness to verify our claims to Dr. Peericks.”

  “So why didn’t you give that chump a yodel and ask him to corroborate your story, instead of me?” I asked, still peeved.

  Here Oan blushed, and plucked her coverlet once more.

  “I hadn’t thought of it,” said Oan. “And I wanted you, Mr. Feynman. I thought you’d be the most helpful. I thought that, meeting someone as brave, clever, and worldly as you — one who stands alone as the Hand of the Intercessor, I mean — that Dr. Peericks would be so impressed he’d accept our story without question. And I thought you and I might work together, that we might walk the same path and, well—”

  I silenced her with a look.

  “An understandable gaffe,” I said, pausing to appreciate the “brave, clever, and worldly” sequence. It’s not often that I’m given the old oil in this fashion, most of my circle being more inclined to the slam than to the rave.

  “But why do you now proffer Isaac as a witness for the defence?” I asked, getting back to the nub; or the res, if you prefer. “Why should Peericks trust his word any more than ours?”

  “He’s a scientist!” Oan persisted, “a scientist known for careful and meticulous observation. And he’s a hero to Dr. Peericks. Why, if he were to back us up, Dr. Peericks would be forced to accept the truth of all I’ve said!”

  No doubt you’ve seen my objection coming from several miles away. This Isaac, whatever chairs he might now hold, is no straight-shooting corroborator of others’ apocalyptic memories, but a snake of the lowest order and the principal villain in my quest. And Abe the First — a usually reliable source — had referred to this blighter as The Most Dangerous Man in the World. Isaac was not, in short, the sort of person to whom yours truly could turn for a spot of testimonial support. I put this objection to Oan.

  “I’m sure he’d help you,” said Oan. “First and foremost, Sir Isaac Newton is a scientist. A popular one. He isn’t dangerous in the least — I can’t imagine why Abe the First might have suggested otherwise. And the professor values truth above all else. He’s famous for it and says so all the time. He’d be sure to think the truths revealed in the cavern are amon
g the most important. They touch on the very heart of things — the nature of the universe, the fabric of reality, even the very Laws of Attraction — Professor Newton would surely want to make this known. I don’t know why he hasn’t talked about this already. I — why, that’s it!” she carried on, in a great-scotting sort of way, “I’ll bet he’s also waiting for someone else, another reliable observer, to verify what he witnessed in the cavern. He may doubt his own perceptions, and seek further support for what he believes he saw. He lives for evidence, Mr. Feynman. Why, I’ll bet he’d be excited to hear that you are able to verify his claims! Oh, Mr. Feynman! This is perfect!”

  I stroked the chin. It was true that, if I could give this Isaac an authoritative footnote or two, lending credence to any observations he had made in the grotto, then he might be inclined to help. By adding my own voice to his, I might help the poor fish survive the rigours of peer review. This was, I could see, an idea.

  “So you really think he’ll help us?” I asked.

  “I’m sure of it!” she said.

  “But what of Abe’s warning? Abe called this chump The World’s Most Dangerous Man, and Abe isn’t known for making mistakes.”

  This held her. But then she snapped the fingers again, experiencing a second eureka moment in the space of just two pages.

  “An experiment!” she exclaimed. “Isaac has never hurt anyone. I can’t imagine him meaning to cause anyone harm. He really is highly respected and very popular. If he’s a danger to anyone at all, it must be the result of some experiment he’s running. Perhaps some new chemical compound, or a new source of energy. Something explosive. Or maybe some kind of environmental danger. An unintentionally hazardous piece of I-Ware that he hasn’t yet released.”

  “Some sort of science thingummy, eh?” I said, stroking the chin a second time. This squared with what I knew about Isaac. Even when he’d been the Solicitor’s personal secretary, he was always inventing things. The IPT. Flexion Filing. Boson whips and whatnot.

  “That must be it,” said Oan. “It has to be some sort of dangerous invention, or an experiment with consequences that Isaac fails to foresee. Perhaps Abe sent you to warn him!”

  Once again this loony bird, as dotty as she might be, had swung the jury in her favour. For whatever reason, the Author had taken this Isaac chump and retroactively rewritten his character sketch, replacing his prior role as a dreary personal secretary with that of a highly vaunted academician. How dangerous could a scientist be? I mean, they spend their days in lab coats tinkering with vials, computational devices, and electronic doodads. If he was undertaking some sort of lab experiment which posed a risk to all and sundry, why, I’d simply point out the danger, convince him to abandon this folly and pursue some less dangerous pastime, and Bob, as they say, is your uncle. Story A would be neatly tied with a bow in service of Story B: I would convince Isaac to cheese the tinkering and then use him to corroborate Oan’s story, which would in turn have the effect of unsealing Peericks’s lips, convincing him to spill the goods about Zeus’s current whereabouts. Why, the plan couldn’t be surer of success.

  “You’ve convinced me,” I announced.

  “Two chairs!” said Oan’s companion.

  “Grrmph,” said Fenny.

  “How wonderful!” said Oan.

  “The path is set,” I said, in that inspiring way of mine. “I shall set sail for Detroit University, tell Isaac to put a sock in whatever experimental tinkering imperils the known universe, and convince him to wire Peericks confirming your views about the cavern and associated events. I should be back by nightfall.”

  “By nightfall?” asked Oan, registering incredulity.

  “By nightfall,” I confirmed. “I’ll pop into the IPT and head straight for old DU this afternoon.”

  “Two chairs,” said Oan’s roommate.

  “The IP what?” said Oan, befogged.

  “T,” I said, which made me thirsty.

  “But what in Abe’s name is an IPT?”

  “Instantaneous personal transport. Teleportation thingummy. Move from Spot A to Spot B in a flash. Invented by Isaac Newton himself, if memory serves. Why, it’s how I travelled today.”

  “Surely you’re joking, Mr. Feynman,” she said, gargling, or possibly laughing lightly. “You say the strangest things. There’s no such thing as instantaneous transport. There never has been, and there never will be. That’s what this article is about,” she added, tapping the I-Ware datalink she’d conjured earlier. “Professor Newton made an announcement just this morning. He has proved beyond any doubt that teleportation is impossible.”

  Chapter 5

  You’re probably thinking that Oan’s recent obiter dictum must have shivered the Feynman timbers, but it didn’t. On the contrary, her statement about the ipt failed altogether to shatter my customary aplomb. If there’s one thing life in Detroit Mercy has taught me, and taught me well, it’s that you can’t put too much stock in the ravings of hospice dwellers, not even those who are bunged into the place through unfortunate misunderstandings. Nor was I bothered by the fact that Oan’s fatheaded pronouncements were supported by some digitized slab of yellow tabloid journalism. “Fake news,” I might have said to myself had I been in the mood for soliloquies. I wasn’t fussed in the least. The recollection of arriving by ipt that very morning was still fresh in the Feynman bean, and I remained confident that I’d take my departure by ipt as well. And thus it was that not a trace of despondency or agitation etched my finely chiselled features when I absorbed Oan’s suggestion that teleportation was a mere thingummy of the Feynman imagination.

  Indeed, it’s fair to say I was in a breezy mood when I bid farewell to Oan and her scorched pal, and breezier still when I checked in with Dr. Peericks. Shoving the Feynman nose a few inches into his office, I cordially toodle-ood in the chump’s direction, punctuating my farewell with an assurance that I’d return post-haste equipped with props and documentation designed to cajole Oan’s little grey cells back into working order. This seemed to satisfy the old brain scrutinizer, who thanked me several times before I withdrew.

  And I’ll tell you why my m. was breezy. When I’d arrived at Detroit Mercy, shaking from stem to stern at the prospect of being recognized as a recent escapee, I’d been beset by doubts and qualms. Would I find myself consigned to a padded cell? Would my quest grind to a halt before I made it through chapter 4? Or would the Author, in His wisdom, drop bread crumbs in the vicinity of the hospice, leading me toward the trails of my twin quarry, viz, Isaac Newton and Zeus? But now, after my tête-à-tête with Oan, the mists had cleared and my path was set. The Isaac situation, hitherto veiled in mystery, would be solved by a few well-chosen words warning him off whatever ill-advised experiment he’d started. Isaac would, no doubt, be so sincerely grateful for my helpful words of caution that he would rally ’round and help Oan fly the hospice coop, which would in turn allow Peericks to pitch his woo, leading him to unseal his lips with respect to Zeus’s current locale, thus strewing happy endings all around. All as simple as do re mi, as the expression is. So it was with a song in my heart that I hitched up at the local IPT hub in search of instant transportation to Isaac’s lair, viz, the faculty offices at Detroit University.

  Except it wasn’t an IPT hub. It was a bus depot, of all ghastly things. And if there’s anything more depressing than a proletarian bus station awash with gloomy transit users, it is a bus station that takes the place of the teleportation thingummy on which your strategy depends.

  The thing about life that’s always baffled me, and probably always will, is the way that, as soon as the hand of fate eases matters a little by taking something off your mind, it then sidles up behind you and shoves on something else, as if seeing how much the traffic will bear.

  I saw in an instant that there was but one explanation for this most recent fly in the ointment. The Author had, for whatever reason, seen fit to make yet another blas
ted retroactive revision to His manuscript — all without regard for my own preferences. After spending an idle hour erasing references to Feynman’s prior sojourns at the hospice, He now thought it shrewd to remove Detroit’s IPT network and replace it with fleets of rusty, ill-upholstered motor coaches. Dashed inconvenient of the chap, I’ll admit, but He must have had His reasons. Perhaps He wanted to have a crack at penning a travelogue and felt that instantaneous whooshing from spot to spot unduly hastened the hero’s journey. Or perhaps some fatheaded critic of His previous work had opined that the Author had spent too little time describing the various slabs of geography found between Plot Point A and Plot Point B. Whatever His reason, though, there was nothing for me to do but buy a ticket and settle in.

  And on thinking about tickets, it occurred to me that I had one in my pocket — the ticket for the IPT journey which had whisked me hospiceward a few hours earlier.

  I fished it out for inspection. My deductions proved true. I saw at a glance that this item was no longer a ticket for a trip through the IPT, as it had been that morning, but a receipt for a bus trip all the way from the Riviera to the station nearest the hospice — the very depot where I now stood. The Author had, I perceived, been dashed thorough in His revisions, replacing a stub which had hitherto been marked IPT 6F with another which read Detroit Transit Commission — Bus 34A — Detroit Mercy.

  For me, the task of tracking down this station’s ticket seller, doling out an appropriate sum, and securing a spot on the next bus bound for Detroit University was but the work of a moment. Within minutes, I was perched on a fairly gum-free bench, where I equipped myself with a handy, printed copy of the Times.

  I took this opportunity to drink in the full contents of the article about Sir Isaac Newton, hoping it would provide much-needed intel about the next stop on my voyage.