I don’t care, the senator cried desperately. I don’t care what happens. They played a lousy trick on me. They can’t get away with it. I’ll fix their clocks for them. I’ll—
Sure, you will, said the voice, mocking.
Go away, shrieked the senator. Go away and leave me. Let me be alone.
You are alone, said the thing in the corner. You are more alone than any man has ever been before.
Chairman Leonard: You represent an insurance company, do you not, Mr. Markely? A big insurance company.
Mr. Markely: That is correct.
Chairman Leonard: And every time a person dies, it costs your company money?
Mr. Markely: Well, you might put it that way if you wished, although it is scarcely the case—
Chairman Leonard: You do have to pay out benefits on deaths, don’t you?
Mr. Markely: Why, yes, of course we do.
Chairman Leonard: Then I can’t understand your opposition to life continuation. If there were fewer deaths, you’d have to pay fewer benefits.
Mr. Markely: All very true, sir. But if people had reason to believe they would live virtually forever, they’d buy no life insurance.
Chairman Leonard: Oh, I see. So that’s the way it is.
The senator awoke. He had not been dreaming, but it was almost as if he had awakened from a bad dream—or awakened to a bad dream—and he struggled to go back to sleep again, to gain the Nirvana of unawareness, to shut out the harsh reality of existence, to dodge the shame of knowing who and what he was.
But there was someone stirring in the room, and someone spoke to him and he sat upright in bed, stung to wakefulness by the happiness and something else that was almost worship which the voice held.
“It’s wonderful, sir,” said Otto. “There have been phone calls all night long. And the telegrams and radiograms still are stacking up.”
The senator rubbed his eyes with pudgy fists.
“Phone calls, Otto? People sore at me?”
“Some of them were, sir. Terribly angry, sir. But not too many of them. Most of them were happy and wanted to tell you what a great thing you’d done. But I told them you were tired and I could not wake you.”
“Great thing?” said the senator. “What great thing have I done?”
“Why, sir, giving up life continuation. One man said to tell you it was the greatest example of moral courage the world had ever known. He said all the common people would bless you for it. Those were his very words. He was very solemn, sir.”
The senator swung his feet to the floor, sat on the edge of the bed, scratching at his ribs.
It was strange, he told himself, how a thing would turn out sometimes. A heel at bedtime and a hero in the morning.
“Don’t you see, sir,” said Otto, “you have made yourself one of the common people, one of the short-lived people. No one has ever done a thing like that before.”
“I was one of the common people,” said the senator, “long before I wrote that statement. And I didn’t make myself one of them. I was forced to become one of them, much against my will.”
But Otto, in his excitement, didn’t seem to hear.
He rattle on: “The newspapers are full of it, sir. It’s the biggest news in years. The political writers are chuckling over it. They’re calling it the smartest political move that was ever pulled. They say that before you made the announcement you didn’t have a chance of being re-elected senator and now, they say, you can be elected president if you just say the word.”
The senator sighed. “Otto,” he said, “please hand me my pants. It is cold in here.”
Otto handed him his trousers. “There’s a newspaperman waiting in the study, sir. I held all the others off, but this one sneaked in the back way. You know him, sir, so I let him wait. He is Mr. Lee.”
“I’ll see him,” said the senator.
So it was a smart political move, was it? Well, maybe so, but after a day or so, even the surprised political experts would begin to wonder about the logic of a man literally giving up his life to be re-elected to a senate seat.
Of course the common herd would love it, but he had not done it for applause. Although, so long as the people insisted upon thinking of him as great and noble, it was all right to let them go on thinking so.
The senator jerked his tie straight and buttoned his coat. He went into the study and Lee was waiting for him.
“I suppose you want an interview,” said the senator. “Want to know why I did this thing.”
Lee shook his head. “No, senator, I have something else. Something you should know about. Remember our talk last week? About the disappearances?”
The senator nodded.
“Well, I have something else. You wouldn’t tell me anything last week, but maybe now you will. I’ve checked, senator, and I’ve found this—the health winners are disappearing, too. More than eighty percent of those who participated in the finals of the last ten years have disappeared.”
“I don’t understand,” said the senator.
“They’re going somewhere,” said Lee. “Something’s happening to them. Something’s happening to two classes of our people—the continuators and the healthiest youngsters.”
“Wait a minute,” gasped the senator. “Wait a minute, Mr. Lee.”
He groped his way to the desk, grasped its edge and lowered himself into a chair.
“There is something wrong, senator?” asked Lee.
“Wrong?” mumbled the senator. “Yes, there must be something wrong.”
“They’ve found living space,” said Lee, triumphantly. “That’s it, isn’t it? They’ve found living space and they’re sending out the pioneers.”
The senator shook his head. “I don’t know, Lee. I have not been informed. Check Extrasolar Research. They’re the only ones who know—and they wouldn’t tell you.”
Lee grinned at him. “Good day, senator,” he said. “Thanks so much for helping.”
Dully, the senator watched him go.
Living space? Of course, that was it.
They had found living space and Extrasolar Research was sending out handpicked pioneers to prepare the way. It would take years of work and planning before the discovery could be announced. For once announced, world government must be ready to confer immortality on a mass production basis, must have ships available to carry out the hordes to the far, new worlds. A premature announcement would bring psychological and economic disruption that would make the government a shambles. So they would work very quietly, for they must work quietly.
His eyes found the little stack of letters on one corner of the desk and he remembered, with a shock of guilt, that he had meant to read them. He had promised Otto that he would and then he had forgotten.
I keep forgetting all the time, said the senator. I forget to read my paper and I forget to read my letters and I forget that some men are loyal and morally honest instead of slippery and slick. And I indulge in wishful thinking and that’s the worst of all.
Continuators and health champions disappearing. Sure, they’re disappearing. They’re headed for new worlds and immortality.
And I … I … if only I had kept my big mouth shut—