“Which one of you? Which one of you?”
The fog shifted and swam; the figures faded. Straining, he could once more see that other figure, the black silhouette framed by the doorway, lit only from behind. He stared at the silhouette, needing to know, demanding to know which one it had been.
He searched the bulky, shapeless outline, looking for something that would tell him. The remembered outline of the head, the ears, the neck, then the collar of the coat, the—
The ears.
He squinted, trying to see, trying to remember, and yes, the ears were outlined plainly, and the four possibilities had just been reduced to three. For Nancy had long blonde hair, curling around her face, covering her ears. It hadn’t been Nancy.
Three. It was one of three now, Herb or Eddie or Morry. But which one?
Height. That would help, if he could visualize the figure well enough, if he could see it in relation to the door frame, the height... Eddie and Herb were both tall; Morry was short. Probably Eddie even seemed taller than he was because he was so thin. But really he was—
Denton pulled himself back. His mind was beginning to wander, and he recognized that as a danger sign. He couldn’t lose consciousness, he couldn’t lose awareness, not until he knew.
He stared at the outlined figure in the fog, and slowly he forced himself to visualize the door frame around it again, and slowly he saw it, and the figure was tall.
Tall.
Eddie or Herb. Eddie or Herb.
It was those two, now, one or the other. He tried to superimpose the figures of each of them on the figure of the silhouette, but the bulky coat ruined that. It was impossible, there was nothing left to distinguish it, make it any more one person than another.
And death was creeping closer, moving in like the fog, creeping across his shoulders and down among his ribs, up from his legs to touch his stomach with icy fingers. He had to know soon.
He tried to see it all again, in the mist between himself and the television set, seeing it like a run-through for the show, seeing every step. The door opening, the black figure standing there, the bright flash—
From the figure’s right side!
“Herb!” he shouted.
It couldn’t have been Eddie. Eddie was left-handed, and his impaired right hand would never have been able to lift the gun or squeeze the trigger, it had been Herb.
With his shout — his whispered shout — the fog faded completely away, the outlined figure was gone. Sight and sound returned, and he heard Lisa Lyle singing her song. It was the last number of the show. It must be almost nine o’clock; he’d been sitting here wounded now for almost an hour.
Lisa Lyle finished, and there was thunderous canned applause and he saw himself come striding into camera range. He saw that whole and walking, strong and smiling self come out and wave at the imaginary audience, wave at Don Denton dying in his chair.
He stared at that tiny image of himself. That was him! Him, at six o’clock, with two hours left, and that self could somehow change this, could somehow keep what had and was happening from being true.
Dream and reality, desire and fact, need and truth, shifted and mingled confusedly in his mind. He was barely real himself. He was dying faster now, becoming less and less real, and the image on the television screen was almost all that was left of him.
That image had to be warned. “It’s Herb!” Danton called. “It’s Herb!” Whispering it at that tiny blue-gray self across the room. Reality was going, like the lights of a city flicking out one by one, and darkness was spreading in. “Be careful! It’s Herb!”
“That’s about all the show there is, folks,” answered his image.
“Don’t go home!” he shrieked. “It’s Herb!”
“I certainly hope you’ve enjoyed yourself,” said the image, smiling at him.
“Stay away!” screamed Denton.
The image waved a careless hand, as though to tell Denton not to be silly, there was nothing wrong in the world, nothing at all. “We’ll be seeing you!”
He had to get away, he had to live, he had to warn himself not to come here tonight. There was that image, the real Don Denton, in the television set, and right beside him was the telephone.
“Help me!” shrieked Denton all at once. “Call! Call! Help me!” And it seemed to him as though it should be the easiest thing in the world, for that real image of himself to reach over and pick up the telephone and call for help.
But, instead, that image merely waved and cried, “Good night!” The blind and stupid image of himself, blowing a kiss at the dying man in the chair.
“Help me!” Denton screamed, but the words were buried by a bubbling-up of blood, filling his throat.
The image receded, down and down, growing smaller and ever smaller as the boom camera was raised toward the ceiling. “Love you! Love you!” cried the tiny doomed image to the dead man in the chair. “Good night! Good night!”
The Risk Profession
The men who did dangerous work had a special kind of insurance policy. But when somebody wanted to collect on that policy, the claims investigator suddenly became a member of...
Mr. Henderson called me into his office my third day back on Earth. That was a day and a half later than I’d expected. Roving claims investigators for Tangiers Mutual Insurance Corporation don’t usually get to spend more than thirty-six consecutive hours at home base.
Henderson was jovial but stern. That meant he was happy with the job I’d just completed, and that he was pretty sure I’d find some crooked shenanigans on this next assignment. That didn’t please me. I’m basically a plain-living type, and I hate complications. I almost wished for a second there that I was back on Fire and Theft in Greater New York. But I knew better than that. As a roving claim investigator, I avoided the more stultifying paper work inherent in this line of work and had the additional luxury of an expense account nobody ever questioned.
It made working for a living almost worthwhile.
When I was settled in the chair beside his desk, Henderson said, “That was good work you did on Luna, Ged. Saved the company a pretty pence.”
I smiled modestly and said, “Thank you, sir.” And reflected to myself for the thousandth time that the company could do worse than split that saving with the guy who’d made it possible. Me, in other words.
“Got a tricky one this time, Ged,” said my boss. He had done his back-patting, now we got down to business. He peered keenly at me, or at least as keenly as a round-faced tiny-eyed fat man can peer. “What do you know about the Risk Profession Retirement Plan?” he asked me.
“I’ve heard of it,” I said truthfully. “That’s about all.”
He nodded. “Most of the policies are sold off-planet, of course. It’s a form of insurance for non-insurables. Spaceship crews, asteroid prospectors, people like that.”
“I see,” I said unhappily. I knew right away this meant I was going to have to go off-Earth again. I’m a one-gee boy all the way. Gravity changes get me in the solar plexus. I get g-sick at the drop of an elevator.
“Here’s the way it works,” he went on, either not noticing my sad face or choosing to ignore it. “The client pays a monthly premium. He can be as far ahead or as far behind in his payments as he wants — the policy has no lapse clause — just so he’s all paid up by the Target Date. The Target Date is a retirement age, forty-five or above, chosen by the client himself. After the Target Date, he stops paying premiums, and we begin to pay him a monthly retirement check, the amount determined by the amount paid into the policy, his age at retiring, and so on. Clear?”