"It is simply a rather unusual thing," Mishkin said, "to come across a castle and to be told that it is imaginary."
"I see nothing unusual about it," the robot said. "Since the latest revision of the truth-in-advertising statutes, ten gods, four major religions, and eighteen hundred and twelve cults to date have been labelled imaginary in accordance with the law."
17
Guided by the sacristan — a short cheerful old man with a white beard and a wooden leg — Mishkin and the robot toured the Imaginary Castle. They went down long stuffy passageways and through short draughty cross passageways, past factory-tarnished suits of armour and pre-faded, pre-shrunk tapestries depicting virgins and unicorns in ambiguous poses. They inspected the punishment cells where make-believe prisoners pretended to suffer from the vile incursions of fraudulent racks, ersatz pincers, and fake thumbscrews wielded by stoop-shouldered torturers whose commonplace horn-rimmed glasses robbed them of any pretence to credibility. (Only the pasteurized blood was real, and not even that was convincing.) They passed the armoury where snub-nosed demoiselles typed triplicate requests for the latest model Holy Grail swords and Big Barbarian spears.
They went to the battlements and saw the vats of Smith & Wesson polyunsaturated oil suitable for low-temperature anointing or high-temperature boiling. They looked into the chapel, where a boyish, red-haired priest made jokes in Sanskrit to a congregation of Peruvian tin miners, while Judas, crucified by a contrived clerical error, looked down, bewildered, from a Symbolist cross of rare woods that had been especially selected for the spiritual sensibility of their textures.
Finally, they came to the great banquet hall, within which was a table loaded with Broasted chickens, mugs of Orange Julius, chili dogs, clams on the half shell, and two-inch slices of roast beef done crisp on the outside and rare on the inside. And there were platters of soft ice cream, and trays of pizza, both Neapolitan and Sicilian, all of them with extra cheese and sausage, anchovies, mushrooms, and capers. There were foil-wrapped heroes and poorboys, and combination, multiple-decker sandwiches of pastrami, tongue, corned beef, chopped liver, lox, cream cheese, onions, coleslaw, potato salad, and dill and half-sour pickles. And there were great tureens of kreplach soup, and chicken soup with noodles. And there were cauldrons filled with lobster Cantonese, and platters piled high with sweet and sour spareribs, and waxed-paper containers of pressed duck with walnuts. And there were roast stuffed turkeys with cranberry sauce, cheeseburgers, shrimps in black bean sauce, and much more besides.
"What happens to me if I eat some of this?" Mishkin asked.
"Nothing," the sacristan said. "Imaginary food cannot nourish you; but it also cannot make you sick."
"Does it have a mental effect?" Mishkin asked, sampling a chili dog.
"It must have a mental effect," the sacristan pointed out, "since imaginary food is, literally, food for the mind. The precise effect varies with the intelligence and sophistication of the partaker. Among the ignorant and gullible, for example, imaginary food tends to be quite nourishing. Pseudo-nourishing, of course, but the nervous system cannot differentiate between real and imaginary events. Some idiots have managed to live for years and years on this insubstantial stuff, thus demonstrating once again the effects of belief upon the human body."
"It tastes good," Mishkin said, gnawing on a turkey drumstick and helping himself to a portion of cranberry sauce.
"Of course," the sacristan said. "Imaginary food always has the best taste."
Mishkin ate and ate, and enjoyed himself hugely. Then, heavy-laden, he went over to a couch and lay down. The gentle insubstantiality of the couch lulled him to sleep.
The sacristan turned to the robot and said, "Now the shit is really going to hit the fan."
"Why?" the robot asked.
"Because, having partaken of imaginary nourishment, that young man is about to have imaginary dreams."
"Is that bad?" the robot asked.
"It tends to get confusing."
"Perhaps I should wake him up," the robot said.
"Of course you should; but first, why don't we turn on the tube and tune in on his dream?"
"Can we do that?"
"You'd better believe it," the sacristan said. He crossed the room and turned on the television set.
"That wasn't there before," the robot said.
"One nice thing about an imaginary castle," the sacristan pointed out, "is that you can have pretty much what you want when and where you want it, with no necessity for tedious explanations that are always something of a bringdown."
"Why don't you focus that screen?"
"It is in focus," the sacristan said. "Here come the titles."
On the screen the following credits appeared:
Robert Sheckley Enterprises Presents
MISHKIN'S IMAGINARY DREAM
A Neo-Menippean Rodomontade
Produced in Can Pep des Correu Studios, Ibiza
"What was that all about?" the robot asked.
"Just the usual crap," said the sacristan. "Here comes the dream."
18
Mishkin was strolling along contemplating the nature of reality when a voice said to him, "Hi."
Mishkin started uncontrollably and looked all around. He saw no one. He was on a flat, level plain, and there was no object more than one foot high for at least five miles in any direction for anyone to hide behind.
Mishkin did not lose his cool. He answered, "How do you do?"
"Fine, thank you. And yourself?"
"Quite well, all things considered. Have we met before?"
"I don't think so," the voice said. "Still, you can never tell, can you?"
"No, you can't," Mishkin said. "What are you doing around here?"
"I live around here."
"It seems like a nice place."
"It's all right," the voice said. "But the winters are impossibly cold and damp."
"Really?"
"Yes. I suppose you're a tourist?"
"More or less," Mishkin said. "It's the first time I've been here."
"How do you like it?"
"It's very nice. I haven't seen much yet, but what I've seen seems very nice."
"I'm used to it all," the voice said. "But I suppose that's because I live here."
"Probably," Mishkin said. "That's how I usually feel at home."
"Where is your home, by the way?"
"Earth," Mishkin said.
"Big red planet."
"Small green planet."
"I think I've heard of it. Yellowstone National Park?"
"That's the place."
"You're a long, long way from home."
"I suppose I am," Mishkin said, "But, of course, I enjoy travelling."
"Did you come by spaceship?"
"Yes, I did."
"I'll bet that was interesting."
"Yes, it was."
There was a silence. Mishkin didn't know how to bring up the fact that he couldn't see whom he was talking to. He realized that he should have mentioned it earlier. Now he would appear foolish if he brought it up.
"Well," the voice said, "I suppose I'd better be getting along."
"It's been nice talking to you," Mishkin said.
"I've enjoyed it, too. I wonder if you've noticed that I'm invisible?"
"As a matter of fact, I have. I suppose that you can see me?"
"Yes, I can. We invisibles can see visible things such as yourself very well. Except for the unfortunate few among us who are blind, of course."
"Can you see each other?"
"No, of course not. We wouldn't be really invisible if we could."
"I hadn't thought of that," Mishkin said. "I suppose it's a bother?"
"Definitely," the invisible said. "We pass each other in the streets without noticing each other. That hurts people's feelings, even though they know it can't be helped. And invisibility makes falling in love difficult, too. For example, if I meet a nice young lady at the Saturday night YMCA dance I don't know if she's cute or a complete dog. And one hates to ask. I know that that sort of thing shouldn't matter, but it always seems to, doesn't it?"