“That stick was dead,” Croswell mused. “Some oil in our skin, I imagine.”
Maarten shuddered. “Do you suppose that all the carvings we touched—the huts—the temple—”
“I should think so,” Croswell said.
Maarten closed his eyes and visualized it, the sudden bursting into bloom of the dead, dried wood.
“I think they’ll understand,” he said, trying very hard to believe himself. “It’s a pretty symbol and they’re quite an understanding people. I think they’ll approve of—well, at least some of the things we are.”
THE STORE OF THE WORLDS
Mr. Wayne came to the end of the long, shoulder-high mound of gray rubble, and there was the Store of the Worlds. It was exactly as his friends had described; a small shack constructed of bits of lumber, parts of cars, a piece of galvanized iron and a few rows of crumbling bricks, all daubed over with a watery blue paint.
Mr. Wayne glanced back down the long lane of rubble to make sure he hadn’t been followed. He tucked his parcel more firmly under his arm; then, with a little shiver at his own audacity, he opened the door and slipped inside.
“Good morning,” the proprietor said.
He, too, was exactly as described; a tall, crafty-looking old fellow with narrow eyes and a downcast mouth. His name was Tompkins. He sat in an old rocking chair, and perched on the back of it was a blue and green parrot. There was one other chair in the store, and a table. On the table was a rusted hypodermic.
“I’ve heard about your store from friends,” Mr. Wayne said.
“Then you know my price,” Tompkins said. “Have you brought it?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Wayne, holding up his parcel. “But I want to ask first—”
“They always want to ask,” Tompkins said to the parrot, who blinked. “Go ahead, ask.”
“I want to know what really happens.”
Tompkins sighed. “What happens is this. You pay me my fee. I give you an injection which knocks you out. Then, with the aid of certain gadgets which I have in the back of the store, I liberate your mind.”
Tompkins smiled as he said that, and his silent parrot seemed to smile, too.
“What happens then?” Mr. Wayne asked. “Your mind, liberated from its body, is able to choose from the countless probability-worlds which the Earth casts off in every second of its existence.”
Grinning now, Tompkins sat up in his rocking chair and began to show signs of enthusiasm.
“Yes, my friend, though you might not have suspected it, from the moment this battered Earth was born out of the sun’s fiery womb, it cast off its alternate-probability worlds. Worlds without end, emanating from events large and small; every Alexander and every amoeba creating worlds, just as ripples will spread in a pond no matter how big or how small the stone you throw. Doesn’t every object cast a shadow? Well, my friend, the Earth itself is four-dimensional; therefore it casts three-dimensional shadows, solid reflections of itself through every moment of its being. Millions, billions of Earths! An infinity of Earths! And your mind, liberated by me, will be able to select any of these worlds, and to live upon it for a while.”
Mr. Wayne was uncomfortably aware that Tompkins sounded like a circus barker, proclaiming marvels that simply couldn’t exist. But, Mr. Wayne reminded himself, things had happened within his own lifetime which he would never have believed possible. Never! So perhaps the wonders that Tompkins spoke of were possible, too.
Mr. Wayne said, “My friends also told me—”
“That I was an out-and-out fraud?” Tompkins asked. “Some of them implied that,” Mr. Wayne said cautiously. “But I try to keep an open mind. They also said—”
“I know what your dirty-minded friends said. They told you about the fulfillment of desire. Is that what you want to hear about?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Wayne. “They told me that whatever I wished for—whatever I wanted—”
“Exactly,” Tompkins said. “The thing could work in no other way. There are the infinite worlds to choose among. Your mind chooses, and is guided only by desire. Your deepest desire is the only thing that counts. If you have been harboring a secret dream of murder—”
“Oh hardly, hardly!” cried Mr. Wayne.
“—then you will go to a world where you can murder, where you can roll in blood, where you can outdo Sade or Caesar, or whoever your idol may be. Suppose it’s power you want’ Then you’ll choose a world where you are a god, literally and actually. A bloodthirsty Juggernaut, perhaps, or an all-wise Buddha.”
“I doubt very much if I—”
“There are other desires, too,” Tompkins said. “All heavens and all hells. Unbridled sexuality. Gluttony, drunkenness, love, fame—anything you want.”
“Amazing!” said Mr. Wayne.
“Yes,” Tompkins agreed. “Of course, my little list doesn’t exhaust all the possibilities, all the combinations and permutations of desire. For all I know you might want a simple, placid, pastoral existence on a South Seas island among idealized natives.”
“That sounds more like me,” Mr. Wayne said, with a shy laugh.
“But who knows?” Tompkins asked. “Even you might not know what your true desires are. They might involve your own death.”
“Does that happen often?” Mr. Wayne asked anxiously.
“Occasionally.”
“I wouldn’t want to die,” Mr. Wayne said.
“It hardly ever happens,” Tompkins said, looking at the parcel in Mr. Wayne’s hands.
“If you say so...But how do I know all this is real? Your fee is extremely high, it’ll take everything I own. And for all I know, you’ll give me a drug and I’ll just dream! Everything I own just for a—a shot of heroin and a lot of fancy words!”
Tompkins smiled reassuringly. “The experience has no drug-like quality about it. And no sensation of a dream, either.”
“If it’s true, “Mr. Wayne said, a little petulantly, “why can’t I stay in the world of my desire for good?”
“I’m working on that,” Tompkins said. “That’s why I charge so high a fee; to get materials, to experiment. I’m trying to find a way of making the transition permanent. So far I haven’t been able to loosen the cord that binds a man to his own Earth—and pulls him back to it. Not even the great mystics could cut that cord, except with death. But I still have my hopes.”
“It would be a great thing if you succeeded,” Mr. Wayne said politely.
“Yes it would!” Tompkins cried, with a surprising burst of passion. “For then I’d turn my wretched shop into an escape hatch! My process would be free then, free for everyone! Everyone would go to the Earth of their desires, the Earth that really suited them, and leave this damned place to the rats and worms—”
Tompkins cut himself off in mid-sentence, and became icy calm. “But I fear my prejudices are showing. I can’t offer a permanent escape from the Earth yet; not one that doesn’t involve death. Perhaps I never will be able to. For now, all I can offer you is a vacation, a change, a taste of another world and a look at your own desires. You know my fee. I’ll refund it if the experience isn’t satisfactory.”
“That’s good of you,” Mr. Wayne said, quite earnestly. “But there’s that other matter my friends told me about. The ten years off my life.”
“That can’t be helped,” Tompkins said, “and can’t be refunded. My process is a tremendous strain on the nervous system, and life-expectancy is shortened accordingly. That’s one of the reasons why our so-called government has declared my process illegal.”
“But they don’t enforce the ban very firmly,” Mr. Wayne said.
“No. Officially the process is banned as a harmful fraud. But officials are men, too. They’d like to leave this Earth, just like everyone else.”