"Are you telling me I'm going to die inside the next two years?" Amos shrieked hoarsely, flushing with anger.
"I'm not telling you, sir, no indeed!" Mercer drew away a bit and wiped some of the old man's spittle from his glasses with his handkerchief. "That is the actuaries' job. Their computer has come up with your name and sent it to me. They say you will die within two years. As a public service we send you Hereafter. A service — nothing more."
"I ain't going to die in two years, not me! Not Amos Cabot!"
"That is entirely up to you, sir. My position here is just a routine one. Your subscription has been entered and will be canceled only when a copy is returned with the imprint addressee DECEASED."
"I'm not going to die!"
"That might possibly happen, though I can't recall any cases offhand. But since it is a two-year subscription I imagine it will expire automatically at the end of the second year. If it is not canceled beforehand. Yes, that's what would happen."
It ruined Amos's day, and though the sun was shining warmly he never noticed it. He went home and thought so much about the whole thing that he couldn't sleep. The next day was no better, and he began to wonder if this was part of the message the dreadful magazine had conveyed. If death was close by — they were so sure of it! — why did he not relax and agree with them? Send in his will, order the plot, tomb, gravestone, Last Message forms, and quietly expire.
"No! They'll not do it to me!"
At first he thought he would wait for next month's copy and write addressee deceased and send it back to them. That would stop the copies coming sure enough. Then he remembered fat little Mercer and could see his happy expression when the cancellation crossed his desk. Right again, dead on schedule as always. Old fool should've known you can't lick statistics. Old fool indeed! He would show them. The Cabots were a long-lived family no matter what the records said, and he was a hardheaded one, too. They weren't going to kill him off that easily.
After much wheedling he got in to see the doctor at his old union and talked him into making a complete and thorough physical checkup.
"Not bad, not bad at all for an old boy," the doctor told him while he was buttoning his shirt.
"I'm only eighty-two; that's not old."
"Of course it's not," the doctor said soothingly. "Just statistics, you know; a man of your age with your background. "
"I know all about those damned statistics. I didn't come to you for that. What's the report say?"
"You can't complain about your physical shape, Amos," he said, scanning the sheet. "Blood pressure looks all right, but you're leaning toward anemia. Do you eat much liver and fresh greens?"
"Hate liver. Greens cost too much."
"That's your choice. But remember — you can't take it with you. Spend some more money on food. Give your heart a break — don't climb too many stairs."
"I live three flights up — so how do I avoid stairs?"
"That's your choice again. If you want to take care of the old ticker move to the ground floor. And Vitamin D in the winter and. "
There was more, and after he had swallowed his first anger Amos made notes. There were food and vitamins and sleep and fresh air and a whole list of nonsense as long as your arm. But there was also the two-year subscription of Hereafter: he bent back over his notes.
Without his realizing why, the next months passed quickly. He was busy, finding a room on the ground floor, changing his eating habits, getting settled into his new place. At first he used to throw out Hereafter whenever its gloomy bulk shadowed his mail slot, but when a year had passed he grew bolder. There was an ad for mausoleums and one of the finest had a big tag on it labeled in red reserved for you. not for me!!! he scrawled above it and tore it from the magazine and mounted it on the wall. He followed it with other pictures; friendly gravediggers beckoning toward raw openings in the earth, cut-to-order coffins with comfortable padding, and all the rest. When eighteen months had passed he enjoyed himself throwing darts at "A Photograph of the Founder of Incino-Top-Rate, the Urn for Eternity," and carefully checked off the passing days on the calendar.
Only in the final few months did he begin to worry. He felt fine and the union doctor congratulated him for being a great example, but this didn't matter. Were the actuaries right — had his time almost run out? He could have worried himself to death, but that was not the way Cabots died! He would face this out and win.
First there were weeks left, then only days. The last five days before the copy was due he locked himself in his room and had the delicatessen send up food. It was expensive but he wasn't going to risk any accidents in the street, not now. He had received his twenty-four copies and his subscription should have expired. The next morning would tell. He could not fall asleep at all that night, even though he knew that regular sleep was important. Just lay there until the sky brightened. He dozed for a bit then, but woke up as soon as he heard the postman's footsteps outside. This was the day, would the magazine be there? His heart was pounding and he made himself go slow as he got into the bathrobe. His room was the first on the ground floor, right next to the entrance, and all he had to do was step out into the hall and open the front door.
"Morning," he said to the postman.
"Yeah," the man answered, slinging his heavy bag around and digging into it. Amos closed the door first — then feverishly went through the mail.
It wasn't there.
He had won!
If this was not the happiest day in his life it was close to it. Besides this, his victories over the bus company and the coin-machine crooks were nothing. This was a war won, not a battle. He'd licked them, licked their statistics and actuaries, accountants, mechanical brains, card files, clerks, and editors. He had won! He went out and drank a beer, the first one in two years; then another. Laughed and talked with the gang at the bar. He had won! He fell into bed late and slept like a log until he was dragged awake by his landlady knocking on the door.
"Mail for you, Mr. Cabot. Mail."
Fear gripped him, then slowly ebbed away. It couldn't be. In two years Hereafter had never been late once, not one day. It must be some other mail — though this wasn't his check day. He slowly opened the door and took the large envelope, his grip so loose that it almost fell from his fingers.
Only when he had laid it on the bed did he breathe naturally again — it wasn't Hereafter in its vile blue envelope; this one was a gentle pink. It did contain a magazine, though, just about the size of Hereafter, a bulky magazine with lots of pages. Its title was Senility — and the black letters were drawn in such a way that they looked as though they were made of cracked and crumbling stone. Underneath the title it said The Magazine of Geri-ART-trics. There was a picture of a feeble old man in a wheelchair with a blanket around his shoulders, sucking water through a curved glass tube. Inside was more. Ads for toilet chairs and hemorrhoid cushions, crutches and crank beds, articles on "Learn Braille When the Eyesight Goes," and "Happy Though Bedridden," and "Immobile for Twenty-five Years." A letter dropped out of the magazine and he half-read phrases here and there.
Welcome to the family. the magazine of geri-ART-trics that teaches you the art of growing old. many long years ahead of you.. empty years.. what happiness to find a copy in your mailbox every month. speaking book edition for the blind. Braille for the blind and deaf. every month.
There were tears in his eyes when he looked up. It was dark, a rainy and cold April morning with the wind rattling the window. Raindrops ran down the glass like great, cold tears.