"No, sir," said John, who was gathering confidence. "I just happened to remember. I have a good memory for these things."
"And took the trouble to keep it from your loyal companions all these years? There’s no one here who had any idea you hid a good memory behind that unremarkable forehead of yours."
"No point in showing it, Mr. Ross, is there? Now when I have, it doesn’t seem to have gained me any goodwill, does it?"
And it hadn’t. Ross glowered at him and turned away.
John’s excitement over the dinner table at Gino’s that night made it difficult for him to talk coherently, but Susan listened patiently and tried to act as a stabilizing force.
"You might just have happened to remember, you know," she said. "By itself it doesn’t prove anything, Johnny."
"Are you crazy?" He lowered his voice at Susan’s gesture and quick glance about. He repeated in a semiwhisper, " Are you crazy? You don’t suppose it’s the only thing I remember, do you? I think I can remember anything I ever heard. It’s just a question of recall. For instance, quote some line out of Shakespeare."
"To be or not to be."
John looked scornful. "Don’t be funny. Oh, well, it doesn’t matter. The point is that if you recite any line, I can carry on from there for as long as you like. I read some of the plays for English Lit classes at college and some for myself and I can bring any of it back. I’ve tried. It flows! I suppose I can bring back any part of any book or article or newspaper I’ve ever read, or any TV show I’ve ever watched – word for word or scene for scene."
Susan said, "What will you do with all that?"
John said, "I don’t have that consciously in my head at all times. Surely you don’t – wait, let’s order – "
Five minutes later, he said, "Surely you don’t – My God, I haven’t forgotten where we left off. Isn’t it amazing? – Surely you don’t think I’m swimming in a mental sea of Shakespearean sentences at all times. The recall takes an effort, not much of one, but an effort."
"How does it work?"
"I don’t know. How do you lift your arm? What orders do you give your muscles? You just will the arm to lift upward and it does so. It’s no trouble to do so, but your arm doesn’t lift until you want it to. Well, I remember anything I’ve ever read or seen when I want to but not when I don’t want to. I don’t know how to do it, but I do it."
The first course arrived and John tackled it happily.
Susan picked at her stuffed mushrooms. "It sounds exciting."
"Exciting? I’ve got the biggest, most wonderful toy in the world. My own brain. Listen, I can spell any word correctly and I’m pretty sure I won’t ever make any grammatical mistake."
"Because you remember all the dictionaries and grammars you ever read?"
John looked at her sharply. "Don’t be sarcastic, Sue."
"I wasn’t being – "
He waved her silent. "I never used dictionaries as light reading. But I do remember words and sentences in my reading and they were correctly spelled and correctly parsed."
"Don’t be so sure. You’ve seen any word misspelled in every possible way and every possible example of twisted grammar, too."
"Those were exceptions. By far the largest number of times I’ve encountered literary English, I’ve encountered it used correctly. It outweighs accidents, errors, and ignorance. What’s more, I’m sure I’m improving even as I sit here, growing more intelligent steadily."
"And you’re not worried. What if – "
"What if I become too intelligent? Tell me how on Earth you think becoming too intelligent can be harmful."
"I was going to say," said Susan, coldly, "that what you’re experiencing is not intelligence. It’s only total recall."
"How do you mean ‘only’? If I recall perfectly, if I use the English language correctly, if I know endless quantities of material, isn’t that going to make me seem more intelligent? How else need one define intelligence? You aren’t growing just a little jealous, are you, Sue?"
"No," more coldly still. "I can always get an injection of my own if I feel desperate about it."
John put down his fork. "You can’t mean that."
"I don’t, but what if I did?"
"Because you can’t take advantage of your special knowledge to deprive me of my position."
"What position?"
The main course arrived and for a few moments, John was busy. Then he said, in a whisper, "My position as the first of the future. Homo superior! There’ll never be too many of us. You heard what Kupfer said. Some are too dumb to make it. Some are too smart to change much. I’m the one!"
"Dead average." One corner of Susan’s mouth lifted.
"Once I was. There’ll be others like me eventually. Not many, but there’ll be others. It’s just that I want to make my mark before the others come along. It’s for the firm, you know. Us!"
He remained lost in thought thereafter, testing his brain delicately.
Susan ate in an unhappy silence.
John spent several days organizing his memories. It was like the preparation of an orderly reference book. One by one, he recalled all his experiences in the six years he had spent at Quantum Pharmaceuticals and all he had heard and all the papers and memos he had read.
There was no difficulty in discarding the irrelevant and unimportant and storing them in a "hold till further notice" compartment where they did not interfere with his analysis. Other items were put in order so that they established a natural progression.
Against that skeletal organization, he resurrected the scuttlebutt he had heard; the gossip, malicious or otherwise; casual phrases and interjections at conferences which he had not been conscious of hearing at the time. Those items which did not fit anywhere against the background he had built up in his head were worthless, empty of factual content. Those which did fit clicked firmly into place and could be seen as true by that mere fact.
The further the structure grew, and the more coherent, the more significant new items became and the easier it was to fit them in.
Ross stopped by John’s desk on Thursday. He said, "I want to see you in my office at the nonce, Heath, if your legs will deign to carry you in that direction."
John rose uneasily. "Is it necessary?’ I’m busy."
"Yes, you look busy." Ross looked over the clear desk which, at the moment, held nothing but a studio photo of a smiling Susan. "You’ve been this busy all week. But you’ve asked me whether seeing me in my office is necessary. For me, no; but for you, vital. There’s the door to my office. There’s the door to the hell out of here. Choose one or the other and do it fast."
John nodded and, without undue hurry, followed Ross into his office.
Ross seated himself behind his desk but did not invite John to sit. He maintained a hard stare for a moment, then said, "What the hell’s got into you this week, Heath? Don’t you know what your job is?"
"To the extent that I have done it, it would seem that I do," said John. "The report on microcosmic is on your desk and complete and seven days ahead of deadline. I doubt that you can have complaints about it."
"You doubt, do you? Do I have permission to have complaints if I choose to after communing with my soul? Or am I condemned to applying to you for permission?"
"I apparently have not made myself plain, Mr. Ross. I doubt that you have rational complaints about it. To have those of the other variety is entirely up to you."
Ross rose now. "Listen, punk, if I decide to fire you, you won’t get the news by word of mouth. It won’t be anything I say that will give you the glad tidings. You will go out through the door in a violent tumble and mine will be the propulsive force behind that tumble. Just keep that in your small brain and your tongue in your big mouth. Whether you’ve done your work or not is not at question right now. Whether you’ve done everyone else’s is. Who and what gives you the right to manage everyone in this place?"