The senator nodded miserably.
“And now that you’re on the verge of losing an election, they figure you aren’t worth it any longer and have refused to ask for a renewal.”
“In curbstone language,” said the senator, “that sums it up quite neatly.”
“And you come running to me,” said Norton. “What in the world do you think I can do about it?”
The senator leaned forward. “Let’s put it on a business basis, Norton. You and I have worked together before.”
“That’s right,” said Norton. “Both of us cleaned up on that spaceship deal.”
The senator said: “I want another hundred years and I’m willing to pay for it. I have no doubt you can arrange it for me.”
“How?”
“I wouldn’t know,” said the senator. “I’m leaving that to you. I don’t care how you do it.”
Norton leaned back in his chair and made a tent out of his fingers.
“You figure I could bribe someone to recommend you. Or bribe some continuation technician to give you a renewal without authorization.”
“Those are a pair of excellent ideas,” agreed the senator.
“And face excommunication if I were found out,” said Norton. “Thanks, senator, I’m having none of it.”
The senator sat impassively, watching the face of the man across the desk.
“A hundred thousand,” the senator said quietly.
Norton laughed at him.
“A half million, then.”
“Remember that excommunication, senator. It’s got to be worth my while to take a chance like that.”
“A million,” said the senator. “And that’s absolutely final.”
“A million now,” said Norton. “Cold cash. No receipt. No record of the transaction. Another million when and if I can deliver.”
The senator rose slowly to his feet, his face a mask to hide the excitement that was stirring in him. The excitement and the naked surge of exultation. He kept his voice level.
“I’ll deliver that million before the week is over.”
Norton said: “I’ll start looking into things.”
On the street outside, the senator’s step took on a jauntiness it had not known in years. He walked along briskly, flipping his cane.
Those others, Carson and Galloway and Henderson, had disappeared, exactly as he would have to disappear once he got his extra hundred years. They had arranged to have their own deaths announced and then had dropped from sight, living against the day when immortality would be a thing to be had for the simple asking.
Somewhere, somehow, they had got a new continuation, an unauthorized continuation, since a renewal was not listed in the records. Someone had arranged it for them. More than likely Norton.
But they had bungled. They had tried to cover up their tracks and had done no more than call attention to their absence.
In a thing like this, a man could not afford to blunder. A wise man, a man who took the time to think things out, would not make a blunder.
The senator pursed his flabby lips and whistled a snatch of music.
Norton was a gouger, of course. Pretending that he couldn’t make arrangements, pretending he was afraid of excommunication, jacking up the price.
The senator grinned wryly. It would take almost every dime he had, but it was worth the price.
He’d have to be careful, getting together that much money. Some from one bank, some from another, collecting it piecemeal by withdrawals and by cashing bonds, floating a few judicious loans so there’d not be too many questions asked.
He bought a paper at the corner and hailed a cab. Settling back in the seat, he creased the paper down its length and started in on column one. Another health contest. This time in Australia.
Health, thought the senator, they’re crazy on this health business. Health centers. Health cults. Health clinics.
He skipped the story, moved on to column two.
The head said:
SIX SENATORS POOR BETS FOR RE-ELECTION
The senator snorted in disgust. One of the senators, of course, would be himself.
He wadded up the paper and jammed it in his pocket.
Why should he care? Why knock himself out to retain a senate seat he could never fill? He was going to grow young again, get another chance at life. He would move to some far part of the earth and be another man.
Another man. He thought about it and it was refreshing. Dropping all the old dead wood of past association, all the ancient accumulation of responsibilities.
Norton had taken on the job. Norton would deliver.
Mr. Miller: What I want to know is this: Where do we stop? You give this life continuation to a man and he’ll want his wife and kids to have it. And his wife will want her Aunt Minnie to have it and the kids will want the family dog to have it and the dog will want—
Chairman Leonard: You’re facetious, Mr. Miller.
Mr. Miller: I don’t know what that big word means, mister. You guys here in Geneva talk fancy with them six-bit words and you get the people all balled up. It’s time the common people got in a word of common sense.
“Frankly,” Norton told him, “it’s the first time I ever ran across a thing I couldn’t fix. Ask me anything else you want to, senator, and I’ll rig it up for you.”
The senator sat stricken. “You mean you couldn’t—But, Norton, there was Dr. Carson and Galloway and Henderson. Someone took care of them.”
Norton shook his head. “Not I. I never heard of them.”
“But someone did,” said the senator. “They disappeared—”
His voice trailed off and he slumped deeper in the chair and the truth suddenly was plain—the truth he had failed to see.
A blind spot, he told himself. A blind spot!
They had disappeared and that was all he knew. They had published their own deaths and had not died, but had disappeared.
He had assumed they had disappeared because they had got an illegal continuation. But that was sheer wishful thinking. There was no foundation for it, no fact that would support it.
There could be other reasons, he told himself, many other reasons why a man would disappear and seek to cover up his tracks with a death report.
But it had tied in so neatly!
They were continuators whose applications had not been renewed. Exactly as he was a continuator whose application would not be renewed.
They had dropped out of sight. Exactly as he would have to drop from sight once he gained another lease on life.
It had tied in so neatly—and it had been all wrong.
“I tried every way I knew,” said Norton. “I canvassed every source that might advance your name for continuation and they laughed at me. It’s been tried before, you see, and there’s not a chance of getting it put through. Once your original sponsor drops you, you’re automatically cancelled out.
“I tried to sound out technicians who might take a chance, but they’re incorruptible. They get paid off in added years for loyalty and they’re not taking any chance of trading years for dollars.”