Phineas told him—in detail. “And so,” he concluded firmly—quite firmly, “I feel I’ve been done a grave injustice, Mr. Alexander. I’m positive my destination should have been the other place.”
“The other place?” Alexander seemed surprised.
“Exactly so. Heaven, to be more precise.”
Alexander nodded thoughtfully. “Quite so, Mr. Potts.
Only I’m afraid there’s been a little misunderstanding. You see… ah… this is heaven. Still, I can see you don’t believe me yet, so we’ve failed to place you properly. We really want to make people happy here, you know. So, if you’ll just tell me what you find wrong, we’ll do what we can to rectify it.”
“Oh.” Phineas considered. This might be a trick, of course, but still, if they could make him happy here, give him his due reward for the years filled with temptation resisted and noble suffering in meekness and humility, there seemed nothing wrong with it. Possibly, it came to him, there were varying degrees of blessedness, and even such creatures as Callahan and his ilk were granted the lower ones—though it didn’t seem quite just. But certainly his level wasn’t Callahan’s.
“Very well,” he decided. “First, I find myself living in that room with the gray streak on the wallpaper, sir, and for years I’ve loathed it; and the alarm and telephone; and—”
Alexander smiled. “One at a time please. Now, about the room. I really felt we’d done a masterly job on that, you know. Isn’t it exactly like your room on the former level of life? Ah, I see it is. And didn’t you choose and furnish that room yourself?”
“Yes, but—”
“Ah, then we were right. Naturally, Mr. Potts, we assumed that since it was of your own former creation, it was best suited to you. And besides, you need the alarm and telephone to keep you on time and in contact with your work, you know.”
“But I loathe drafting!” Phineas glanced at this demon who was trying to trap him, expecting it to wilt to its true form. It didn’t. Instead, the thing that was Mr. Alexander shook its head slowly and sighed.
“Now that is a pity; and we were so pleased to find we could even give you the same employer as before. Really, we felt you’d be happier under him than a stranger. However, if you don’t like it, I suppose we could change. What other kind of work would you like?”
Now that was more like it, and perhaps he had even misjudged Alexander. Work was something Phineas hadn’t expected, but—yes, that would be nice, if it could be arranged here. “I felt once I was called,” he suggested.
“Minister, you mean? Now that’s fine. Never get too many of them, Mr. Potts. Wonderful men, do wonderful work here. They really add enormously to the happiness’ of our Hereafter, you know. Let me see, what experience have you had?” He beamed at Potts, who thawed under it; then he turned to a bookshelf, selected a heavy volume and consulted it. Slowly the beam vanished, and worry took its place.
“Ah, yes, Phineas Theophilus Potts. Yes, entered training 1903. Hmmm. Dismissed after two years of study, due to. a feeling he might… might not be quite temperamentally suited to the work and that he was somewhat too fana… ahem!… overly zealous in his criticism of others. Then transferred to his uncle’s shop and took up drafting, which was thereafter his life’s work. Umm. Really, that’s too bad.” Alexander turned back to Phineas. “Then, Mr. Potts, I take it you never had any actual experience at this sort of work?”
Phineas squirmed. “No, but—”
“Too bad.” Alexander sighed. “Really, I’d like to make things more to your satisfaction, but after all, no experience—afraid it wouldn’t do. Tell you what, we don’t like to be hasty hi our judgments; if you’ll just picture exactly the life you want—no need to describe ft, I’ll get it if you merely think it—maybe we can adjust things. Try hard now.”
With faint hope, Phineas tried. Alexander’s voice droned out at him. “A little harder. No, that’s only a negative picture of what you’d like not to do. Ah…, van, no. I thought for a minute you had something, but it’s gone. I think you’re trying to picture abstractions, Mr. Potts, and you know one can’t do that; I get something very vague, but it makes no sense. There! That’s better.”
He seemed to listen for a few seconds longer, and
Phineas was convinced now it was all sham; he’d given up trying. What was the use? Vague jumbled thoughts were all he had left, and now Alexander’s voice broke in on them.
“Really, Mr. Potts, I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do for you. I get a very clear picture now, but it’s exactly the life we’d arranged for you, you see. Same room, same work. Apparently that’s the only life you know. Of course, if you want to improve we have a great many very fine schools located throughout the city.”
Phineas jerked upright, the control over his temper barely on. “You mean—you mean, I’ve got to go on like that?”
“Afraid so.”
“But you distinctly said this was heaven.”
“It is.”
“And I tell you,” Phineas cried, forgetting all about controlling his temper, “that this is hell!”
“Quite so, I never denied it. Now, Mr. Potts, I’d like to discuss this further, but others are waiting, so I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
Alexander looked up from his papers, and as he’ looked, Phineas found himself outside the door, shaken-and sick. The door remained open as the girl called Katy came up, looked at him in surprise, and went in. Then it closed, but still he stood there, unable to move, leaning against the wooden frame for support.
There was a mutter of voices within, and his whirling thoughts seized on them for anchor. Katy’s voice first. “—seems to take it terribly hard, Mr. Alexander. Isn’t there something we can do?”
Then the low voice of Alexander. “Nothing, Katy. It’s up to him now. I suggested the schools, but I’m afraid he’s another unfortunate. Probably even now he’s out there convincing himself that all this is merely illusion, made to try his soul and test his ability to remain unchanged. If that’s the case, well, poor devil, there isn’t much we can do, you know.”
But Phineas wasn’t listening then. He clutched the words he’d heard savagely to his bosom and went stiffly out and back toward the office of G. R. Sloane across from the little room, No. 408. Of course he should have known. All this was merely illusion, made to try his soul. Illusion and test, no more.
Let them try him, they would find him humble in his sufferings as always, not complaining, resisting firmly their temptations. Even though Sloane denied him the right to fast, still he would find some other way to do proper penance for his sins; though Callahan broke his back, though a thousand bees attacked him at once, still he would prevail.
“Forgive and guide me to sin no more, but preserve me in righteousness all the days of my life,” he repeated, and turned into the building where there was more work and misery waiting for him. Sometime he’d be rewarded. Sometime.
Back in his head a small shred of doubt sniggered gleefully.
The Wings of Night
“Damn all martians!” Fats Welch’s thin mouth bit out the words with all the malice of an offended member of a superior race. “Here we are, loaded down with as sweet a high-rate cargo of iridium as ever came out of the asteroids, just barely over the moon, and that injector starts mismetering again. If I ever see that bulbous Marshy—”
“Yeah.” Slim Lane groped back with his right hand for the flexible-shaft wrench, found it, and began wriggling and grunting forward into the mess of machinery again. “Yeah. I know. You’ll make mince meat out of him. Did you ever figure that maybe you were making your own trouble? That maybe Martians are people after all? Lyro Bmachis told you it would take two days to make the overhaul of the injector control hookup, so you knocked him across the field, called his ancestors dirty dogs, and gave him just eight hours to finish repairs. Now you expect his rush job to be a labor of love for you—Oh, skip it, Fats, and give me the screwdriver.”