The Best of Kage Baker

Flash Forward: 1933



“Oh, look, we’re at Pismo Beach,” exclaimed Lewis, leaning around me to peer at it. The town was one hotel and a lot of clam stands lining the highway. “Shall we stop for clams, Joseph?”

“Are you telling me you didn’t get enough clams when you worked on Son of the Sheik?” I grumbled, groping in my pocket for another mint Lifesaver. The last thing I wanted right now was food. Usually I can eat anything (and have, believe me) but this job was giving me butterflies like crazy.

“Possibly,” Lewis said, standing up in his seat to get a better view as we rattled past, bracing himself with a hand on the Ford’s windshield. The wind hit him smack in the face and his hair stood out all around his head. “But it would be nice to toast poor old Rudy’s shade, don’t you think?”

“You want to toast him? Here.” I pulled out my flask and handed it to Lewis. “It would be nice to be on time for Mr. Hearst, too, you know?”

Lewis slid back down into his seat and had a sip of warm gin. He made a face.

“Ave atque vale, old man,” he told Valentino’s ghost. “You’re not actually nervous about this, are you, Joseph?”

“Me, nervous?” I bared my teeth. “Hell no. Why would I be nervous meeting one of the most powerful men in the world?”

“Well, precisely,” Lewis had another sip of gin, made another face. “Thank God you won’t be needing this bootlegger any more. Vale Volstead Act, too! You must have known far more powerful men in your time, mustn’t you? You worked for a Byzantine emperor once, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Three or four of ’em,” I corrected him. “And believe me, not one had anything like the pull of William Randolph Hearst. Not when you look at the big picture. Anyway, Lewis, the rules of the whole game are different now. You think a little putz like Napoleon could rule the world today? You think Hitler’d be getting anywhere without the media? Mass communication is where the real power is, kiddo.”

“He’s only a mortal, after all,” Lewis said. “Put it into perspective! We’re simply motoring up to someone’s country estate to spend a pleasant weekend with entertaining people. There will be fresh air and lovely views. There will be swimming, riding, and tennis. There will be fine food and decent drink, at least one hopes so—”

“Don’t count on booze,” I said. “Mr. Hearst doesn’t like drunks.”

“—and all we have to do is accomplish a simple document drop for the Company,” Lewis went on imperturbably, patting the briefcase in which he’d brought the autographed Valentino script. “A belated birthday present for the master of the house, so to speak.”

“That’s all you have to do,” I replied. “I have to actually negotiate with the guy.”

Lewis shrugged, conceding my point. “Though what was that story you were telling me the other night, about you and that pharaoh, what was his name—? It’s not as though there will be jealous courtiers ordering our executions, after all.”

I made a noise of grudging agreement. I couldn’t explain to Lewis why this job had me so on edge. Probably I wasn’t sure. I lie to myself a lot, see. I started doing it about thirteen thousand years ago and it’s become a habit, like chain-sucking mints to ward off imaginary nervous indigestion.

Immortals have a lot of little habits like that.


We cruised on up the coast in my Model A, through the cow town of San Luis Obispo. This was where Mr. Hearst’s honored guests arrived in his private rail car, to be met at the station by his private limousines. From there they’d be whisked away to that little architectural folly known to later generations as Hearst Castle, but known for now just as The Ranch or, if you were feeling romantic, La Cuesta Encantada.

You’ve never been there? Gee, poor you. Suppose for a moment you owned one of the more beautiful hills in the world, with a breathtaking view of mountains and sea. Now suppose you decided to build a house on top of it, and had all the money in the world to spend on making that house the place of your wildest dreams, no holds barred and no expense spared, with three warehouses full of antiques to furnish the place.

Hell yes, you’d do it; anybody would. What would you do then? If you were William Randolph Hearst, you’d invite guests up to share your enjoyment of the place you’d made. But not just any guests. You could afford to lure the best minds of a generation up there to chat with you, thinkers and artists, Einsteins and Thalbergs, Huxleys and G.B. Shaws. And if you had a blonde mistress who worked in the movies, you got her to invite her friends, too: Gable and Lombard, Bette Davis, Marie Dressler, Buster Keaton, Harpo Marx, Charlie Chaplin.

And the occasional studio small fry like Lewis and me, after I’d done a favor for Marion Davies and asked for an invitation in return. The likes of us didn’t get the private railroad car treatment. We had to drive all the way up from Hollywood on our own steam. I guess if Mr. Hearst had any idea who was paying him a visit, he’d have sent a limo for us too; but the Company likes to play its cards close to the vest.

And we didn’t look like a couple of immortal cyborg representatives of an all-powerful twenty-fourth-century Company, anyway. I appear to be an ordinary guy, kind of dark and compact (O.K., short) and Lewis…well, he’s good-looking, but he’s on the short side, too. It’s always been Company policy for its operatives to blend in with the mortal population, which is why nobody in San Luis Obispo or Morro Bay or Cayucos wasted a second glance on two average cyborg joes in a new Ford zipping along the road.

Anyway we passed through little nowhere towns-by-the-sea and rolling windswept seacoast, lots of California scenery that was breathtaking, if you like scenery. Lewis did, and kept exclaiming over the wildflowers and cypress trees. I just crunched Pep-O-Mints and kept driving. Seventeen miles before we got anywhere near Mr. Hearst’s castle, we were already on his property.

What you noticed first was a distant white something on a green hilltop: two pale towers and not much more. I remembered medieval hill towns in Spain and France and Italy, and so did Lewis, because he nudged me and chuckled: “Rather like advancing on Le Monastier, eh? Right about now I’d be practicing compliments for the lord or the archbishop or whoever, and hoping I’d brought enough lute strings. What about you?”

“I’d be praying I’d brought along enough cash to bribe whichever duke it was I had to bribe,” I told him, popping another Lifesaver.

“It’s not the easiest of jobs, is it, being a Facilitator?” Lewis said sympathetically. I just shook my head.

The sense of displacement in reality wasn’t helped any by the fact that we were now seeing the occasional herd of zebra or yak or giraffe, frolicking in the green meadows beside the road. If a roc had swept over the car and carried off a water buffalo in its talons, it wouldn’t have seemed strange. Even Lewis fell silent, and took another shot of gin to fortify himself.

He had the flask stashed well out of sight, though, by the time we turned right into an unobtrusive driveway and a small sign that said hearst ranch. Here we paused at a barred gate, where a mortal leaned out of a shack to peer at us inquiringly.

“Guests of Mr. Hearst’s,” I shouted, doing my best to look as though I did this all the time.

“Names, please?”

“Joseph C. Denham and Lewis Kensington,” we chorused.

He checked a list to be sure we were on it and then, “Five miles an hour, please, and the animals have right-of-way at all times,” he told us, as the gates swung wide.

“We’re in!” Lewis gave me a gleeful dig in the ribs. I snarled absently and drove across the magic threshold, with the same jitters I’d felt walking under a portcullis into some baron’s fortress.

The suspense kept building, too, because the road wound like five miles of corkscrew, climbing all that time, and there were frequent stops at barred gates as we ascended into different species habitats. Lewis had to get out and open them, nimbly stepping around buffalo pies and other things that didn’t reward close examination, and avoiding the hostile attentions of an ostrich at about the third gate up. Eventually we turned up an avenue of orange trees and flowering oleander.

“Oh, this is very like the south of France,” said Lewis. “Don’t you think?”

“I guess so,” I muttered. A pair of high wrought-iron gates loomed in front of us, opening unobtrusively as we rattled through, and we pulled up to the Grand Staircase.

We were met by a posse of ordinary-looking guys in chinos and jackets, who collected our suitcases and made off with them before we’d even gotten out of the car. I managed to avoid yelling anything like “Hey! Come back here with those!” and of course Lewis was already greeting a dignified-looking lady who had materialized from behind a statue. A houseboy took charge of the Model A and drove it off.

“…Mr. Hearst’s housekeeper,” the lady was saying. “He’s asked me to show you to your rooms. If you’ll follow me—? You’re in the Casa del Sol.”

“Charming,” Lewis replied, and I let him take the lead, chatting and being personable with the lady as I followed them up a long sweeping staircase and across a terrace. We paused at the top, and there opening out on my left was the biggest damn Roman swimming pool I’ve ever seen, and I worked in Rome for a couple of centuries. The statues of nymphs, sea gods, et cetera, were mostly modern or museum copies. Hearst had not yet imported what was left of an honest-to-gods temple and set it up as a backdrop for poolside fun. He would, though.

Looming above us was the first of the “little guest bungalows”. We craned back our heads to look up. It would have made a pretty imposing mansion for anybody else.

“Delightful,” Lewis said. “Mediterranean Revival, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir,” the housekeeper replied, leading us up more stairs. “I believe this is your first visit here, Mr. Kensington? And Mr. Denham?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Mr. Hearst would like you to enjoy your stay, and has asked that I provide you with all information necessary to make that possible,” the housekeeper recited carefully, leading us around the corner of the house to its courtyard. The door at last! And waiting beside it was a Filipino guy in a suit, who bowed slightly at the waist when he saw us.

“This is Jerome,” the housekeeper informed us. “He’s been assigned to your rooms. If you require anything, you can pick up the service telephone and he’ll respond immediately.” She unlocked the door and stepped aside to usher us in. Jerome followed silently and vanished through a side door.

As we stood staring at all the antiques and Lewis made admiring noises, the housekeeper continued: “You’ll notice Mr. Hearst has furnished much of this suite with his private art collection, but he’d like you to know that the bathroom—just through there, gentlemen—is perfectly up-to-date and modern, with all the latest conveniences, including shower baths.”

“How thoughtful,” Lewis answered, and transmitted to me: Are you going to take part in this conversation at all?

“That’s really swell of Mr. Hearst,” I said. I’m even more nervous than I was before, O.K.?

The housekeeper smiled. “Thank you. You’ll find your bags are already in your assigned bedrooms. Jerome is unpacking for you.”

Whoops. “Great,” I said. “Where’s my room? Can I see it now?”

“Certainly, Mr. Denham,” said the housekeeper, narrowing her eyes slightly. She led us through a doorway that had probably belonged to some sixteenth-century Spanish bishop, and there was Jerome, laying out the contents of my cheap brown suitcase. My black suitcase sat beside it, untouched.

“If you’ll unlock this one, sir, I’ll unpack it too,” Jerome told me.

“That’s O.K.,” I replied, taking the black suitcase and pushing it under the bed. “I’ll get that one myself, later.”

In the very brief pause that followed, Jerome and the housekeeper exchanged glances, Lewis sighed, and I felt a real need for another Lifesaver. The housekeeper cleared her throat and said, “I hope this room is satisfactory, Mr. Denham?”

“Oh! Just peachy, thanks,” I said.

“I’m sure mine is just as nice,” Lewis offered. Jerome exited to unpack for him.

“Very good.” The housekeeper cleared her throat again. “Now, Mr. Hearst wished you to know that cocktails will be served at Seven this evening in the assembly hall, which is in the big house just across the courtyard. He expects to join his guests at Eight; dinner will be served at Nine. After dinner Mr. Hearst will retire with his guests to the theater, where a motion picture will be shown. Following the picture, Mr. Hearst generally withdraws to his study, but his guests are invited to return to their rooms or explore the library.” She fixed me with a steely eye. “Alcohol will be served only in the main house, although sandwiches or other light meals can be requested by telephone from the kitchen staff at any hour.”

She thinks you’ve got booze in the suitcase, you know, Lewis transmitted.

Shut up. I squared my shoulders and tried to look open and honest. Everybody knew that there were two unbreakable rules for the guests up here: no liquor in the rooms and no sex between unmarried couples. Notice I said “for the guests”. Mr. Hearst and Marion weren’t bound by any rules except the laws of physics.

The housekeeper gave us a few more helpful tidbits like how to find the zoo, tennis court, and stables, and departed. Lewis and I slunk out into the garden, where we paced along between the statues.

“Overall, I don’t think that went very well,” Lewis observed.

“No kidding,” I said, thrusting my hands in my pockets.

“It’ll only be a temporary bad impression, you know,” Lewis told me helpfully. “As soon as you’ve made your presentation—”

“Hey! Yoo hoo! Joe! You boys made it up here O.K.?” cried a bright voice from somewhere up in the air, and we turned for our first full-on eyeful of La Casa Grande in all its massive glory. It looked sort of like a big Spanish cathedral, but surely one for pagans, because there was Marion Davies hanging out a third-story window waving at us.

“Yes, thanks,” I called, while Lewis stared. Marion was wearing a dressing gown. She might have been wearing more, but you couldn’t tell from this distance.

“Is that your friend? He’s cute,” she yelled. “Looks like Freddie March!”

Lewis turned bright pink. “I’m his stunt double, actually,” he called to her, with a slightly shaky giggle.

“What?”

“I’m his stunt double.”

“Oh,” she yelled back. “O.K.! Listen, do you want some ginger ale or anything? You know there’s no—” she looked naughty and mimed drinking from a bottle, “until tonight.”

“Yes, ginger ale would be fine,” bawled Lewis.

“I’ll have some sent down,” Marion said, and vanished into the recesses of La Casa Grande.

We turned left at the next statue and walked up a few steps into the courtyard in front of the house. It was the size of several town squares, big enough to stage the riot scene from Romeo and Juliet complete with the Verona Police Department charging in on horseback. All it held at the moment, though, was another fountain and some lawn chairs. In one of them, Greta Garbo sat moodily peeling an orange.

“Hello, Greta,” I said, wondering if she’d remember me. She just gave me a look and went on peeling the orange. She remembered me, all right.

Lewis and I sat down a comfortable distance from her, and a houseboy appeared out of nowhere with two tall glasses of White Rock over ice.

“Marion Davies said I was cute,” Lewis reminded me, looking pleased. Then his eyebrows swooped together in the middle. “That’s not good, though, is it? For the mission? What if Mr. Hearst heard her? Ye gods, she was shouting it at the top of her lungs.”

“I don’t think it’s going to be any big deal,” I told him wearily, sipping my ginger ale. Marion thought a lot of people were cute, and didn’t care who heard her say so.

We sat there in the sunshine, and the ice in our drinks melted away. Garbo ate her orange. Doves crooned sleepily in the carillon towers of the house and I thought about what I was going to say to William Randolph Hearst.

Pretty soon the other guests started wandering up, and Garbo wouldn’t talk to them, either. Clark Gable sat on the edge of the fountain and got involved in a long conversation with a sandy-haired guy from Paramount about their mutual bookie. One of Hearst’s five sons arrived with his girlfriend. He tried to introduce her to Garbo, who answered in monosyllables, until at last he gave it up and they went off to swim in the Roman pool. A couple of friends of Marion’s from the days before talkies, slightly threadbare guys named Charlie and Laurence who looked as though they hadn’t worked lately, got deeply involved in a discussion of Greek mythology.

I sat there and looked up at the big house and wondered where Hearst was, and what he was doing. Closing some million-dollar media deal? Giving some senator or congressman voting instructions? Placing an order with some antiques dealer for the contents of an entire library from some medieval duke’s palace?

He did stuff like that, Mr. Hearst, which was one of the reasons the Company was interested in him.

I was distracted from my uneasy reverie when Constance Talmadge arrived, gaining on forty now but still as bright and bouncy as when she’d played the Mountain Girl in Intolerance, and with her Brooklyn accent just as strong. She bounced right over to Lewis, who knew her, and they had a lively chat about old times. Shortly afterward the big doors of the house opened and out came, not the procession of priests and altar boys you’d expect, but Marion in light evening dress.

“Hello, everybody,” she hollered across the fountain. “Sorry to keep you waiting, but you know how it is—Hearst come, Hearst served!”

There were nervous giggles and you almost expected to see the big house behind her wince, but she didn’t care. She came out and greeted everybody warmly—well, almost everybody; Garbo seemed to daunt even Marion—and then welcomed us in through the vast doorway, into the inner sanctum.

“Who’s a first-timer up here?” she demanded, as we crossed the threshold. “I know you are, Joe, and your friend—? Get a load of this floor.” She pointed to the mosaic tile in the vestibule. “Know where that’s from? Pompeii! Can you beat it? People actually died on this floor.”

If she was right, I had known some of them. It didn’t improve my mood.

The big room beyond was cool and dark after the brilliance of the courtyard. Almost comfortable, too: had contemporary sofas and overstuffed chairs, little ashtrays on brass stands. If you didn’t mind the fact that it was also about a mile long and full of Renaissance masterpieces, with a fireplace big enough to roast an ox and a coffered ceiling a mile up in the air, it was sort of cozy. Here, as in all the other rooms, were paintings and statues representing the Madonna and Child. It seemed to be one of Mr. Hearst’s favorite images.

We milled around aimlessly until servants came out bearing trays of drinks, at which time the milling became purposeful as hell. We converged on those trays like piranhas. The Madonna beamed down at us all, smiling her blessing.

The atmosphere livened up a lot after that. Charlie sat down at a piano and began to play popular tunes. Gable and Laurence and the guy from Paramount found a deck of cards and started a poker game. Marion worked the rest of the crowd like the good hostess she was, making sure that everybody had a drink and nobody was bored.

The Hearst kid and his girlfriend came in with wet hair. A couple of Hearst’s executives (slimy-looking bastards) came in too, saw Garbo and hurried over to try to get her autograph. A gaunt and imposing grande dame with two shrieking little mutts made an entrance, and Marion greeted her enthusiastically; she was some kind of offbeat novelist who’d had one of her books optioned, and had come out to Hollywood to work on the screenplay.

I roamed around the edges of the vast room, scanning for the secret panel that concealed Hearst’s private elevator. Lewis was gallantly dancing the Charleston with Connie Talmadge. Marion made for them, towing the writer along.

“—And this is Dutch Talmadge, you remember her? And this is, uh, what was your name, sweetie?” Marion waved at Lewis.

“Lewis Kensington,” he said, as the music tinkled to a stop. The pianist paused to light a cigarette.

“Lewis! That’s it. And you’re even cuter up close,” said Marion, reaching out and pinching his cheek. “Isn’t he? Anyway you’re Industry too, aren’t you, Lewis?”

“Only in a minor sort of way,” Lewis demurred. “I’m a stunt man.”

“That just means you’re worth the money they pay you, honey,” Marion told him. “Unlike some of these blonde bimbos with no talent, huh?” She whooped with laughter at her own expense. “Lewis, Dutch, this is Cartimandua Bryce! You know? She writes those wonderful spooky romances.”

The imposing-looking lady stepped forward. The two chihuahuas did their best to lunge from her arms and tear out Lewis’s throat, but she kept a firm grip on them.

“A-and these are her little dogs,” added Marion unnecessarily, stepping back from the yappy armful.

“My familiars,” Cartimandua Bryce corrected her with a saturnine smile. “Actually, they are old souls who have re-entered the flesh on a temporary basis for purposes of the spiritual advancement of others.”

“Oh,” said Connie.

“O.K.,” said Marion.

“This is Conqueror Worm,” Mrs. Bryce offered the smaller of the two bug-eyed monsters, “and this is Tcho-Tcho.”

“How nice,” said Lewis gamely, and reached out in an attempt to shake Tcho-Tcho’s tiny paw. She bared her teeth at him and screamed frenziedly. Some animals can tell we’re not mortals. It can be inconvenient.

Lewis withdrew his hand in some haste. “I’m sorry. Perhaps the nice doggie’s not used to strangers?”

“It isn’t that—” Mrs. Bryce stared fixedly at Lewis. “Tcho-Tcho is attempting to communicate with me telepathically. She senses something unusual about you, Mr. Kensington.”

If she can tell the lady you’re a cyborg, she’s one hell of a dog, I transmitted.

Oh, shut up, Lewis transmitted back. “Really?” he said to Mrs. Bryce. “Gosh, isn’t that interesting?”

But Mrs. Bryce had closed her eyes, I guess the better to hear what Tcho-Tcho had to say, and was frowning deeply. After a moment’s uncomfortable silence, Marion turned to Lewis and said, “So, you’re Freddie March’s stunt double? Gee. What’s that like, anyway?”

“I just take falls. Stand in on lighting tests. Swing from chandeliers,” Lewis replied. “The usual.” Charlie resumed playing: I’m the Sheik of Araby.

“He useta do stunts for Valentino, too,” Constance added. “I remember.”

“You doubled for Rudy?” Marion’s smile softened. “Poor old Rudy.”

“I always heard Valentino was a faggot,” chortled the man from Para-mount. Marion rounded on him angrily.

“For your information, Jack, Rudy Valentino was a real man,” she told him. “He just had too much class to chase skirts all the time!”

“Soitain people could loin a whole lot from him,” agreed Connie, with the scowl of disdain she’d used to face down Old Babylon’s marriage market in Intolerance.

“I’m just telling you what I heard,” protested the man from Paramount.

“Maybe,” Gable told him, looking up from his cards. “But did you ever hear that expression, ‘Say nothing but good of the dead’? Now might be a good time to dummy up, pal. That or play your hand.”

Mrs. Bryce, meanwhile, had opened her eyes and was gazing on Lewis with a disconcerting expression.

“Mr. Kensington,” she announced with a throaty quaver, “Tcho-Tcho informs me you are a haunted man.”

Lewis looked around nervously. “Am I?”

“Tcho-Tcho can perceive the spirit of a soul struggling in vain to speak to you. You are not sufficiently tuned to the cosmic vibrations to hear him,” Mrs. Bryce stated.

Tell him to try another frequency, I quipped.

“Well, that’s just like me, I’m afraid.” Lewis shrugged, palms turned out. “I’m terribly dense that way, you see. Wouldn’t know a cosmic vibration if I tripped over one.”

Cosmic vibrations, my ass. I knew what she was doing; carney psychics do it all the time, and it’s called a cold reading. You give somebody a close once-over and make a few deductions based on the details you observe. Then you start weaving a story out of your deductions, watching your subject’s reactions to see where you’re accurate and tailoring your story to fit as you go on. All she had to work with, right now, was the mention that Lewis had known Valentino. Lewis has Easy Mark written all over him, but I guessed she was up here after bigger fish.

“Tcho-Tcho sees a man—a slender, dark man—” Mrs. Bryce went on, rolling her eyes back in her head in a sort of alarming way. “He wears Eastern raiment—”

Marion downed her cocktail in one gulp. “Hey, look, Mrs. Bryce, there’s Greta Garbo,” she said. “I’ll just bet she’s a big fan of your books.”

Mrs. Bryce’s eyes snapped back into place and she looked around.

“Garbo?” she cried. She made straight for the Frozen Flame, dropping Lewis like a rock, though Tcho-Tcho snapped and strained over her shoulder at him. Garbo saw them coming and sank further into the depths of her chair. I was right. Mrs. Bryce was after bigger fish.

I didn’t notice what happened after that, though, because I heard a clash of brass gates and gears engaging somewhere upstairs. The biggest fish of all was descending in his elevator, making his delayed entrance.

I edged over toward the secret panel. My mouth was dry, my palms were sweaty. I wonder if Mephistopheles ever gets sweaty palms when he’s facing a prospective client?

Bump. Here he was. The panel made no sound as it opened. Not a mortal soul noticed as W.R. Hearst stepped into the room, and for that matter Lewis didn’t notice either, having resumed the Charleston with Connie Talmadge. So there was only me to stare at the very, very big old man who sat down quietly in the corner.

I swear I felt the hair stand on the back of my neck, and I didn’t know why.

William Randolph Hearst had had his seventieth birthday a couple of weeks before. His hair was white, he sagged where an old man sags, but his bones hadn’t given in to gravity. His posture was upright and powerfully alert.

He just sat there in the shadows, watching the bright people in his big room. I watched him. This was the guy who’d fathered modern journalism, who with terrifying energy and audacity had built a financial empire that included newspapers, magazines, movies, radio, mining, ranching. He picked and chose presidents as though they were his personal appointees. He’d ruthlessly forced the world to take him on his own terms; morality was what he said it was; and yet there wasn’t any fire that you could spot in the seated man, no restless genius apparent to the eye.

You know what he reminded me of? The Goon in the Popeye comic strips. Big as a mountain and scary too, but at the same time sad, with those weird deep eyes above the long straight nose.

He reminded me of something else, too, but not anything I wanted to remember right now.

“Oh, you did your trick again,” said Marion, pretending to notice him at last. “Here he is, everybody. He likes to pop in like he was Houdini or something. Come on, W.R., say hello to the nice people.” She pulled him to his feet and he smiled for her. His smile was even scarier than the rest of him. It was wide, and sharp, and hungry, and young.

“Hello, everybody,” he said, in that unearthly voice Ambrose Bierce had described as the fragrance of violets made audible. Flutelike and without resonance. Not a human voice; jeez, I sound more human than that. But then, I’m supposed to.

And you should have seen them, all those people, turn and stare and smile and bow—just slightly, and I don’t think any of them realized they were bowing to him, but I’ve been a courtier and I know a grovel when I see one. Marion was the only mortal in that room who wasn’t afraid of him. Even Garbo had gotten up out of her chair.

Marion brought them up to him, one by one, the big names and the nobodies, and introduced the ones he didn’t know. He shook hands like a shy kid. Hell, he was shy! That was it, I realized: he was uneasy around people, and Marion—in addition to her other duties—was his social interface. O.K., this might be something I could use.

I stood apart from the crowd, waiting unobtrusively until Marion had brought up everybody else. Only when she looked around for me did I step out of the shadows into her line of sight.

“And—oh, Joe, almost forgot you! Pops, this is Joe Denham. He works for Mr. Mayer? He’s the nice guy who—”

Pandemonium erupted behind us. One of the damn chihuahuas had gotten loose and was after somebody with intent to kill, Lewis from the sound of it. Marion turned and ran off to deal with the commotion. I leaned forward and shook Hearst’s hand as he peered over my shoulder after Marion, frowning.

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Hearst,” I told him quietly. “Mr. Shaw asked me to visit you. I look forward to our conversation later.”

Boy, did that get his attention. Those remote eyes snapped into close focus on me, and it was like being hit by a granite block. I swallowed hard but concentrated on the part I was playing, smiling mysteriously as I disengaged my hand from his and stepped back into the shadows.

He wasn’t able to say anything right then, because Tcho-Tcho was herding Lewis in our direction and Lewis was dancing away from her with apologetic little yelps, jumping over the furniture, and Marion was laughing hysterically as she tried to catch the rotten dog. Mrs. Bryce just looked on with a rapt and knowing expression.

Hearst pursed his lips at the scene, but he couldn’t be distracted long. He turned slowly to stare at me and nodded, just once, to show he understood.

A butler appeared in the doorway to announce that dinner was served. Hearst led us from the room, and we followed obediently.

The dining hall was less homey than the first room we’d been in. Freezing cold in spite of the roaring fire in the French Gothic hearth, its gloom was brightened a little by the silk Renaissance racing banners hanging up high and a lot of massive silver candlesticks. The walls were paneled with fifteenth-century choir stalls from Spain. I might have dozed off in any one of them, back in my days as a friar. Maybe I had; they looked familiar.

We were seated at the long refectory table. Hearst and Marion sat across from each other in the center, and guests were placed by status. The nearer you were to the master and his mistress, the higher in favor or more important you were. Guests Mr. Hearst found boring or rude were moved discreetly further out down the table.

Well, we’ve nowhere to go but up, Lewis transmitted, finding our place cards clear down at the end. I could see Hearst staring at me as we took our plates (plain old Blue Willow that his mother had used for camping trips) and headed for the buffet.

I bet we move up soon, too, I replied.

Ah! Have you made contact? Lewis peered around Gable’s back at a nice-looking dish of venison steaks.

Just baited the hook. I tried not to glance at Hearst, who had loaded his plate with pressed duck and was pacing slowly back to the table.

Does this have to be terribly complicated? Lewis inquired, sidling in past Garbo to help himself to asparagus soufflé. All we want is permission to conceal the script in that particular Spanish cabinet.

Actually we want a little more than that, Lewis. I considered all the rich stuff and decided to keep things bland. Potatoes, right.

I see. This is one of those need-to-know things, isn’t it?

You got it, kiddo. I put enough food on my plate to be polite and turned to go back to my seat. Hearst caught my eye. He tracked me like a lighthouse beam all the way down the table. I nodded back, like the friendly guy I really am, and sat down across from Lewis.

I take it there’s more going on here than the Company has seen fit to tell me? Lewis transmitted, unfolding his paper napkin and holding out his wine glass expectantly. The waiter filled it and moved on.

Don’t be sore, I transmitted back. You know the Company. There’s probably more going on here than even I know about, O.K.?

I only said it to make him feel better. If I’d had any idea how right I was…

So we ate dinner, at that baronial banqueting table, with the mortals. Gable carried on manful conversation with Mr. Hearst about ranching, Marion and Connie joked and giggled across the table with the male guests, young Hearst and his girl whispered to each other, and a servant had to take Tcho-Tcho and Conqueror Worm outside because they wouldn’t stop snarling at a meek little dachshund that appeared under Mr. Hearst’s chair. Mrs. Bryce didn’t mind; she was busy trying to tell Garbo about a past life, but I couldn’t figure out if it was supposed to be hers or Garbo’s. Hearst’s executives just ate, in silence, down at their end of the table. Lewis and I ate in silence down at our end.

Not that we were ignored. Every so often Marion would yell a pleasantry our way, and Hearst kept swinging that cold blue searchlight on me, with an expression I was damned if I could fathom.

When dinner was over, Mr. Hearst rose and picked up the dachshund. He led us all deeper into his house, to his private movie theater.

Do I have to tell you it was on a scale with everything else? Walls lined in red damask, gorgeous beamed ceiling held up by rows of gilded caryatids slightly larger than lifesize. We filed into our seats, I guess unconsciously preserving the order of the dinner table because Lewis and I wound up off on an edge again. Hearst settled into his big leather chair with its telephone, called the projectionist and gave an order. The lights went out, and after a fairly long moment in darkness, the screen lit up. It was Going Hollywood, Marion’s latest film with Bing Crosby. She greeted her name on the screen with a long loud raspberry, and everyone tittered.

Except me. I wasn’t tittering, no sir; Mr. Hearst wasn’t in his big leather chair anymore. He was padding toward me slowly in the darkness, carrying his little dog, and if I hadn’t been able to see by infrared I’d probably have screamed and jumped right through that expensive ceiling when his big hand dropped on my shoulder in the darkness.

He leaned down close to my ear.

“Mr. Denham? I’d like to speak with you in private, if I may,” he told me.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Hearst,” I gasped, and got to my feet. Beside me, Lewis glanced over. His eyes widened.

Break a leg, he transmitted, and turned his attention to the screen again.

I edged out of the row and followed Hearst, who was walking away without the slightest doubt I was obeying him. Once we were outside the theater, all he said was, “Let’s go this way. It’ll be faster.”

“O.K.,” I said, as though I had any idea where we were going. We walked back through the house. There wasn’t a sound except our footsteps echoing off those high walls. We emerged into the assembly hall, eerily lit up, and Hearst led me to the panel that concealed his elevator. It opened for him. We got in, he and I and the little dog, and ascended through his house.


My mouth was dry, my palms were sweating, my dinner wasn’t sitting too well…well, that last one’s a lie. I’m a cyborg and I can’t get indigestion. But I felt like a mortal with a nervous stomach, know what I mean? And I’d have given half the Renaissance masterpieces in that house for a roll of Pep-O-Mints right then. The dachshund watched me sympathetically.

We got out at the third floor and stepped into Hearst’s private study. This was the room from which he ran his empire when he was at La Cuesta Encantada, this was where phones connected him directly to newsrooms all over the country; this was where he glanced at teletype before giving orders to the movers and shakers. Up in a corner, a tiny concealed motion picture camera began to whirr the moment we stepped on the carpet, and I could hear the click as a modified Dictaphone hidden in a cabinet began to record. State-of-the-art surveillance, for 1933.

It was a nicer room than the others I’d been in so far. Huge, of course, with an antique Spanish ceiling and golden hanging lamps, but wood-paneled walls and books and Bakhtiari carpets gave it a certain warmth. My gaze followed the glow of lamplight down the long polished mahogany conference table and skidded smack into Hearst’s life-size portrait on the far wall. It was a good portrait, done when he was in his thirties, the young emperor staring out with those somber eyes. He looked innocent. He looked dangerous.

“Nice likeness,” I said.

“The painter had a great talent,” Hearst replied. “He was a dear friend of mine. Died too soon. Why do you suppose that happens?”

“People dying too soon?” I stammered slightly as I said it, and mentally yelled at myself to calm down: it was just business with a mortal, now, and the guy was even handing me an opening. I gave him my best enigmatic smile and shook my head sadly. “It’s the fate of mortals to die, Mr. Hearst. Even those with extraordinary ability and talent. Rather a pity, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Oh, yes,” Hearst replied, never taking his eyes off me a moment. “And I guess that’s what we’re going to discuss now, isn’t it, Mr. Denham? Let’s sit down.”

He gestured me to a seat, not at the big table but in one of the comfy armchairs. He settled into another to face me, as though we were old friends having a chat. The little dog curled up in his lap and sighed. God, that was a quiet room.

“So George Bernard Shaw sent you,” Hearst stated.

“Not exactly,” I said, folding my hands. “He mentioned you might be interested in what my people have to offer.”

Hearst just looked at me. I coughed slightly and went on: “He spoke well of you, as much as Mr. Shaw ever speaks well of anybody. And, from what I’ve seen, you have a lot in common with the founders of our Company. You appreciate the magnificent art humanity is capable of creating. You hate to see it destroyed or wasted by blind chance. You’ve spent a lot of your life preserving rare and beautiful things from destruction.

“And—just as necessary—you’re a man with vision. Modern science, and its potential, doesn’t frighten you. You’re not superstitious. You’re a moral man, but you won’t let narrow-minded moralists dictate to you! So you’re no coward, either.”

He didn’t seem pleased or flattered, he was just listening to me. What was he thinking? I pushed on, doing my best to play the scene like Claude Rains.

“You see, we’ve been watching you carefully for quite a while now, Mr. Hearst,” I told him. “We don’t make this offer lightly, or to ordinary mortals. But there are certain questions we feel obliged to ask first.”

Hearst just nodded. When was he going to say something?

“It’s not for everybody,” I continued, “what we’re offering. You may think you want it very much, but you need to look honestly into your heart and ask yourself: are you ever tired of life? Are there ever times when you’d welcome a chance to sleep forever?”

“No,” Hearst replied. “If I were tired of life, I’d give up and die. I’m not after peace and tranquillity, Mr. Denham. I want more time to live. I have things to do! The minute I slow down and decide to watch the clouds roll by, I’ll be bored to death.”

“Maybe.” I nodded. “But here’s another thing to consider: how much the world has changed since you were a young man. Look at that portrait. When it was painted, you were in the prime of your life—and so was your generation. It was your world. You knew the rules of the game, and everything made sense.

“But you were born before Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg address, Mr. Hearst. You’re not living in that world anymore. All the rules have changed. The music is so brassy and strident, the dances so crude. The kings are all dying out, and petty dictators with dirty hands are seizing power. Aren’t you, even a little, bewildered by the sheer speed with which everything moves nowadays? You’re only seventy, but don’t you feel just a bit like a dinosaur sometimes, a survivor of a forgotten age?”

“No,” said Hearst firmly. “I like the present. I like the speed and the newness of things. I have a feeling I’d enjoy the future even more. Besides, if you study history, you have to conclude that humanity has steadily improved over the centuries, whatever the cynics say. The future generations are bound to be better than we are, no matter how outlandish their fashions may seem now. And what’s fashion, anyway? What do I care what music the young people listen to? They’ll be healthier, and smarter, and they’ll have the benefit of learning from our mistakes. I’d love to hear what they’ll have to say for themselves!”

I nodded again, let a beat pass in silence for effect before I answered. “There are also,” I warned him, “matters of the heart to be considered. When a man has loved ones, certain things are going to cause him grief—if he lives long enough to see them happen. Think about that, Mr. Hearst.”

He nodded slowly, and at last he dropped his eyes from mine.

“It would be worse for a man who felt family connections deeply,” he said. “And every man ought to. But things aren’t always the way they ought to be, Mr. Denham. I don’t know why that is. I wish I did.”

Did he mean he wished he knew why he’d never felt much paternal connection to his sons? I just looked understanding.

“And as for love,” he went on, and paused. “Well, there are certain things to which you have to be resigned. It’s inevitable. Nobody loves without pain.”

Was he wondering again why Marion wouldn’t stop drinking for him?

“And love doesn’t always last, and that hurts,” I condoled. Hearst lifted his eyes to me again.

“When it does last, that hurts too,” he informed me. “I assure you I can bear pain.”

Well, those were all the right answers. I found myself reaching up in an attempt to stroke the beard I used to wear.

“A sound, positive attitude, Mr. Hearst,” I told him. “Good for you. I think we’ve come to the bargaining table now.”

“How much can you let me have?” he said instantly.

Well, this wasn’t going to take long. “Twenty years,” I replied. “Give or take a year or two.”

Yikes! What an expression of rapacity in his eyes. Had I forgotten I was dealing with William Randolph Hearst?

“Twenty years?” he scoffed. “When I’m only seventy? I had a grandfather who lived to be ninety-seven. I might get that far on my own.”

“Not with that heart, and you know it,” I countered.

His mouth tightened in acknowledgment. “All right. If your people can’t do any better—twenty years might be acceptable. And in return, Mr. Denham?”

“Two things, Mr. Hearst,” I held up my hand with two fingers extended. “The Company would like the freedom to store certain things here at La Cuesta Encantada from time to time. Nothing dangerous or contraband, of course! Nothing but certain books, certain paintings, some other little rarities that wouldn’t survive the coming centuries if they were kept in a less fortified place. In a way, we’d just be adding items to your collection.”

“You must have an idea that this house will ‘survive the coming centuries’, then,” said Hearst, looking grimly pleased.

“Oh, yes, sir.” I told him. “It will. This is one thing you’ve loved that won’t fade away.”

He rose from his chair at that, setting the dog down carefully, and paced away from me down the long room. Then he turned and walked back, tucking a grin out of sight. “O.K., Mr. Denham,” he said. “Your second request must be pretty hard to swallow. What’s the other thing your people want?”

“Certain conditions set up in your will, Mr. Hearst,” I said. “A secret trust giving my Company control of certain of your assets. Only a couple, but very specific ones.”

He bared his smile at me. It roused all kinds of atavistic terrors; I felt sweat break out on my forehead, get clammy in my armpits.

“My, my. What kind of dumb cluck do your people think I am?” he inquired jovially.

“Well, you’d certainly be one if you jumped at their offer without wanting to know more,” I smiled back, resisting the urge to run like hell. “They don’t want your money, Mr. Hearst. Leave all you want to your wife and your boys. Leave Marion more than enough to protect her. What my Company wants won’t create any hardship for your heirs, in any way. But—you’re smart enough to understand this—there are plans being made now that won’t bear fruit for another couple of centuries. Something you might not value much, tonight in 1933, might be a winning card in a game being played in the future. You see what I’m saying here?”

“I might,” said Hearst, hitching up the knees of his trousers and sitting down again. The little dog jumped back into his lap. Relieved that he was no longer looming over me, I pushed on.

“Obviously we’d submit a draft of the conditions for your approval, though your lawyers couldn’t be allowed to examine it—”

“And I can see why.” Hearst held up his big hand. “And that’s all right. I think I’m still competent to look over a contract. But, Mr. Denham! You’ve just told me I’ve got something you’re going to need very badly one day. Now, wouldn’t you expect me to raise the price? And I’d have to have more information about your people. I’d have to see proof that any of your story, or Mr. Shaw’s for that matter, is true.”

What had I said to myself, that this wasn’t going to take long?

“Sure,” I said brightly. “I brought all the proof I’ll need.”

“That’s good,” Hearst told me, and picked up the receiver of the phone on the table at his elbow. “Anne? Send us up some coffee, please. Yes, thank you.” He leaned away from the receiver a moment to ask: “Do you take cream or sugar, Mr. Denham?”

“Both,” I said.

“Cream and sugar, please,” he said into the phone. “And please put Jerome on the line.” He waited briefly. “Jerome? I want the black suitcase that’s under Mr. Denham’s bed. Yes. Thank you.” He hung up and met my stare of astonishment. “That is where you’ve got it, isn’t it? Whatever proof you’ve brought me?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact,” I replied.

“Good,” he said, and leaned back in his chair. The little dog insinuated her head under his hand, begging for attention. He looked down at her in mild amusement and began to scratch between her ears. I leaned back, too, noting that my shirt was plastered to my back with sweat and only grateful it wasn’t running down my face.

“Are you a mortal creature, Mr. Denham?” Hearst inquired softly.

Now the sweat was running down my face.

“Uh, no, sir,” I said. “Though I started out as one.”

“You did, eh?” he remarked. “How old are you?”

“About twenty thousand years,” I answered. Wham, he hit me with that deadweight stare again.

“Really?” he said. “A little fellow like you?”

I ask you, is five foot five really so short? “We were smaller back then,” I explained. “People were, I mean. Diet, probably.”

He just nodded. After a moment he asked: “You’ve lived through the ages as an eyewitness to history?”

“Yeah. Yes, sir.”

“You saw the Pyramids built?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact.” I prayed he wouldn’t ask me how they did it, because he’d never believe the truth, but he pushed on:

“You saw the Trojan War?”

“Well, yes, I did, but it wasn’t exactly like Homer said.”

“The stories in the Bible, are they true? Did they really happen? Did you meet Jesus Christ?” His eyes were blazing at me.

“Well—” I waved my hands in a helpless kind of way. “I didn’t meet Jesus, no, because I was working in Rome back then. I never worked in Judea until the Crusades, and that was way later. And as for the stuff in the Bible being true…Some of it is, and some of it isn’t, and anyway it depends on what you mean by true.” I gave in and pulled out a handkerchief, mopping my face.

“But the theological questions!” Hearst leaned forward. “Have we got souls that survive us after physical death? What about Heaven and Hell?”

“Sorry.” I shook my head. “How should I know? I’ve never been to either place. I’ve never died, remember?”

“Don’t your masters know?”

“If they do, they haven’t told me,” I apologized. “But then there’s a lot they haven’t told me.”

Hearst’s mouth tightened again, and yet I got the impression he was satisfied in some way. I sagged backward, feeling like a wrung-out sponge. So much for my suave, subtle Mephistopheles act.

On the other hand, Hearst liked being in control of the game. He might be more receptive this way.

Our coffee arrived. Hearst took half a cup and filled it the rest of the way up with cream. I put cream and four lumps of sugar in mine.

“You like sugar,” Hearst observed, sipping his coffee. “But then, I don’t suppose you had much opportunity to get sweets for the first few thousand years of your life?”

“Nope,” I admitted. I tasted my cup and set it aside to cool. “No Neolithic candy stores.”

There was a discreet double knock. Jerome entered after a word from Mr. Hearst. He brought in my suitcase and set it down between us. “Thanks,” I said.

“You’re welcome, sir,” he replied, without a trace of sarcasm, and exited as quietly as he’d entered. It was just me, Hearst and the dog again. They looked at me expectantly.

“All right,” I said, drawing a deep breath. I leaned down, punched in the code on the lock, and opened the suitcase. I felt like a traveling salesman. I guess I sort of was one.

“Here we are,” I told Hearst, drawing out a silver bottle. “This is your free sample. Drink it, and you’ll taste what it feels like to be forty again. The effects will only last a day or so, but that ought to be enough to show you that we can give you those twenty years with no difficulties.”

“So your secret’s a potion?” Hearst drank more of his coffee.

“Not entirely,” I said truthfully. I was going to have to do some cryptosurgery to make temporary repairs on his heart, but we never tell them about that part of it. “Now. Here’s something I think you’ll find a lot more impressive.”

I took out the viewscreen and set it up on the table between us. “If this were, oh, a thousand years ago and you were some emperor I was trying to impress, I’d tell you this was a magic mirror. As it is…you know that Television idea they’re working on in England right now?”

“Yes,” Hearst replied.

“This is where that invention’s going to have led in about two hundred years,” I said. “Now, I can’t pick up any broadcasts because there aren’t any yet, but this one also plays recorded programs.” I slipped a small gold disc from a black envelope and pushed it into a slot in the front of the device, and hit the play button.

Instantly the screen lit up pale blue. A moment later a montage of images appeared there, with music booming from the tiny speakers: a staccato fanfare announcing the evening news for April 18, 2106.

Hearst peered into the viewscreen in astonishment. He leaned close as the little stories sped by, the attractive people chattering brightly: new mining colonies on Luna, Ulster Revenge League terrorists bombing London again, new international agreement signed to tighten prohibitions on Recombinant DNA research, protesters in Mexico picketing Japanese-owned auto plants—

“Wait,” Hearst said, lifting his big hand. “How do you stop this thing? Can you slow it down?”

I made it pause. The image of Mexican union workers torching a sushi bar froze. Hearst remained staring at the screen.

“Is that,” he said, “what journalism is like, in the future?”

“Well, yes, sir. No newspapers anymore, you see; it’ll all be online by then. Sort of a print-and-movie broadcast,” I explained, though I was aware the revelation would probably give the poor old guy future shock. This had been his field of expertise, after all.

“But, I mean—” Hearst tore his gaze away and looked at me probingly. “This is only snippets of stuff. There’s no real coverage; maybe three sentences to a story and one picture. It hasn’t got half the substance of a newsreel!”

Not a word of surprise about colonies on the Moon.

“No, it’ll be pretty lightweight,” I admitted. “But, you see, Mr. Hearst, that’ll be what the average person wants out of news by the twenty-second century. Something brief and easy to grasp. Most people will be too busy—and too uninterested—to follow stories in depth.”

“Play it over again, please,” Hearst ordered, and I restarted it for him. He watched intently. I felt a twinge of pity. What could he possibly make of the sound bites, the chaotic juxtaposition of images, the rapid, bouncing, and relentless pace? He watched, with the same frown, to about the same spot; then gestured for me to stop it again. I obeyed.

“Exactly,” he said. “Exactly. News for the fellow in the street! Even an illiterate stevedore could get this stuff. It’s like a kindergarten primer.” He looked at me sidelong. “And it occurs to me, Mr. Denham, that it must be fairly easy to sway public opinion with this kind of pap. A picture’s worth a thousand words, isn’t it? I always thought so. This is mostly pictures. If you fed the public the right little fragments of story, you could manipulate their impressions of what’s going on. Couldn’t you?”

I gaped at him.

“Uh—you could, but of course that wouldn’t be a very ethical thing to do,” I found myself saying.

“No, if you were doing it for unethical reasons,” Hearst agreed. “If you were on the side of the angels, though, I can’t see how it would be wrong to pull out every trick of rhetoric available to fight for your cause! Let’s see the rest of this. You’re looking at these control buttons, aren’t you? What are these things, these hieroglyphics?”

“Universal icons,” I explained. “They’re activated by eye movement. To start it again, you look at this one—” Even as I was pointing, he’d started it again himself.

There wasn’t much left on the disc. A tiny clutch of factoids about a new fusion power plant, a weather report, a sports piece, and then two bitty scoops of local news. The first was a snap and ten seconds of sound, from a reporter at the scene of a party in San Francisco commemorating the two-hundredth anniversary of the 1906 earthquake. The second one—the story that had influenced the Company’s choice of this particular news broadcast for Mr. Hearst’s persuasion—was a piece on protesters blocking the subdivision of Hearst Ranch, which was in danger of being turned into a planned community with tract housing, golf courses, and shopping malls.

Hearst caught his breath at that, and if I thought his face had been scary before I saw now I had had no idea what scary could be. His glare hit the activation buttons with almost physical force: replay, replay, replay. After he’d watched that segment half a dozen times, he shut it off and looked at me.

“They can’t do it,” he said. “Did you see those plans? They’d ruin this coastline. They’d cut down all the trees! Traffic and noise and soot and—and where would all the animals go? Animals have rights, too.”

“I’m afraid most of the wildlife would be extinct in this range by then, Mr. Hearst,” I apologized, placing the viewer back into its case. “But maybe now you’ve got an idea about why my Company needs to control certain of your assets.”

He was silent, breathing hard. The little dog was looking up at him with anxious eyes.

“All right, Mr. Denham,” he said quietly. “To paraphrase Dickens: Is this the image of what will be, or only of what may be?”

I shrugged. “I only know what’s going to happen in the future in a general kind of way, Mr. Hearst. Big stuff, like wars and inventions. I’m not told a lot else. I sincerely hope things don’t turn out so badly for your ranch—and if it’s any consolation, you notice the program was about protesting the proposed development only. The problem is, history can’t be changed, not once it’s happened.”

“History, or recorded history, Mr. Denham?” Hearst countered. “They’re not at all necessarily the same thing, I can tell you from personal experience.”

“I’ll bet you can,” I answered, wiping away sweat again. “O.K., you’ve figured something out: there are all kinds of little zones of error in recorded history. My Company makes use of those errors. If history can’t be changed, it can be worked around. See?”

“Perfectly,” Hearst replied. He leaned back in his chair and his voice was hard, those violets of sound transmuted to porphyry marble. “I’m convinced your people are on the level, Mr. Denham. Now. You go and tell them that twenty years is pretty much chickenfeed as far as I’m concerned. It won’t do, not by a long way. I want nothing less than the same immortality you’ve got, you see? Permanent life. I always thought I could put it to good use and, now that you’ve shown me the future, I can see my work’s cut out for me. I also want shares in your Company’s stock. I want to be a player in this game.”

“But—” I sat bolt upright in my chair. “Mr. Hearst! I can manage the shares of stock. But the immortality’s impossible! You don’t understand how it works. The immortality process can’t be done on old men. We have to start with young mortals. I was only a little kid when I was recruited for the Company. Don’t you see? Your body’s too old and damaged to be kept running indefinitely.”

“Who said I wanted immortality in this body?” said Hearst. “Why would I want to drive around forever in a rusted old Model T when I could have one of those shiny new modern cars? Your masters seem to be capable of darned near anything. I’m betting that there’s a way to bring me back in a new body, and if there isn’t a way now, I’ll bet they can come up with one if they try. They’re going to have to try, if they want my cooperation. Tell them that.”

I opened my mouth to protest, and then I thought—why argue? Promise him anything. “O.K.,” I agreed.

“Good,” Hearst said, finishing his coffee. “Do you need a telephone to contact them? My switchboard can connect you anywhere in the world in a couple of minutes.”

“Thanks, but we use something different,” I told him. “It’s back in my room and I don’t think Jerome could find it. I’ll try to have an answer for you by tomorrow morning, though.”

He nodded. Reaching out his hand, he took up the silver bottle and considered it. “Is this the drug that made you what you are?” He looked at me. His dog looked up at him.

“Pretty much. Except my body’s been altered to manufacture the stuff, so it pumps through me all the time,” I explained. “I don’t have to take it orally.”

“But you’d have no objection to sampling a little, before I drank it?”

“Absolutely none,” I said, and held out my empty coffee cup. Hearst lifted his eyebrows at that. He puzzled a moment over the bottlecap before figuring it out, and then poured about three ounces of Pineal Tribrantine Three cocktail into my cup. I drank it down, trying not to make a face.

It wasn’t all PT3. There was some kind of fruit base, cranberry juice as far as I could tell, and a bunch of hormones and euphoriacs to make him feel great as well as healthy, and something to stimulate the production of telomerase. Beneficial definitely, but not an immortality potion by a long shot. He’d have to have custom-designed biomechanicals and prosthetic implants, to say nothing of years of training for eternity starting when he was about three. But why tell the guy?

And Hearst was looking young already, just watching me: wonderstruck, scared, and eager. When I didn’t curl up and die, he poured the rest of the bottle’s contents into his cup and drank it down, glancing furtively at his hidden camera.

“My,” he said. “That tasted funny.”

I nodded.

And of course he didn’t die either, as the time passed in that grand room. He quizzed me about my personal life, wanted to hear about what it was like to live in the ancient world, and how many famous people I’d met. I told him all about Phoenician traders and Egyptian priests and Roman senators I’d known. After a while Hearst noticed he felt swell—I could tell by his expression—and he got up and put down the little dog and began to pace the room as we talked, not with the heavy cautious tread of the old man he was but with a light step, almost dancing.

“So I said to Apuleius, ‘But that only leaves three fish, and anyway what do you want to do about the flute player—’” I was saying, when a door in the far corner opened and Marion stormed in.

“W-w-where were you?” she shouted. Marion stammered when she was tired or upset, and she was both now. “Thanks a lot for s-sneaking out like that and leaving me to t-t-talk to everybody. They’re your guests too, y-you know!”

Hearst turned to stare at her, openmouthed. I really think he’d forgotten about Marion. I jumped up, looking apologetic.

“Whoops! Hey, Marion, it was my fault. I needed to ask his advice about something,” I explained. She turned, surprised to see me.

“Joe?” she said.

“I’m sorry to take so long, dear,” said Hearst, coming and putting his arms around her. “Your friend’s a very interesting fellow.” He was looking at her like a wolf looks at a lamb chop. “Did they like the picture?”

“N-n-no!” she said. “Half of ’em left before it was over. You’d think they’d s-stay to watch Bing C-Crosby.”

If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the millennia, it’s when to exit a room.

“Thanks for the talk, Mr. Hearst,” I said, grabbing my black case and heading for the elevator. “I’ll see if I can’t find that prospectus. Maybe you can look at it for me tomorrow.”

“Maybe,” Hearst murmured into Marion’s neck. I was ready to crawl down the elevator cable like a monkey to get out of there, but fortunately the car was still on that floor, so I jumped in and rattled down through the house like Mephistopheles dropping through a trapdoor instead.


It was dark when I emerged into the assembly hall, but as soon as the panel had closed after me light blazed up from the overhead fixtures. I blinked, looking around. Scanning revealed a camera mount, way up high, that I hadn’t noticed before. I saluted it Roman style and hurried out into the night, over the Pompeiian floor. As soon as I had crossed the threshold, the lights blinked out behind me. More surveillance. How many faithful Jeromes did Hearst have, sitting patiently behind peepholes in tiny rooms?

The night air was chilly, fresh with the smell of orange and lemon blossoms. The stars looked close enough to fall on me. I wandered around between the statues for a while, wondering how the hell I was going to fool the master of this house into thinking the Company had agreed to his terms. Gee: for that matter, how was I going to break it to the Company that they’d underestimated William Randolph Hearst?

Well, it wasn’t going to be the first time I’d had to be the bearer of bad news to Dr. Zeus. At last I gave it up and found my way back to my wing of the guest house.

There was a light on in the gorgeously gilded sitting room. Lewis was perched uncomfortably on the edge of a sixteenth-century chair. He looked guilty about something. Jumping to his feet as I came in, he said: “Joseph, we have a problem.”

“We do, huh?” I looked him over wearily. All in the world I wanted right then was a hot shower and a few hours of shuteye. “What is it?”

“The, ah, Valentino script has been stolen,” he said.

My priorities changed. I strode muttering to the phone and picked it up. After a moment a blurred voice answered.

“Jerome? How you doing, pal? Listen, I’d like some room service. Can I get a hot fudge sundae over here at La Casa del Sol? Heavy on the hot fudge?”

“Make that two,” Lewis suggested. I looked daggers at him and went on:

“Make that two. No, no nuts. And if you’ve got any chocolate pudding or chocolate cake or some Hershey bars or anything, send those along, too. O.K? I’ll make it worth your while, chum.”


“…so I just thought I’d have a last look at it before I went to bed, but when I opened the case it wasn’t there,” Lewis explained, licking his spoon.

“You scanned for thermoluminescence? Fingerprints?” I said, putting the sundae dish down with one hand and reaching for cake with the other.

“Of course I did. No fingerprints, and judging from the faintness of the thermoluminescence, whoever went through my things must have been wearing gloves,” Lewis told me. “About all I could tell was that a mortal had been in my room, probably an hour to an hour and a half before I got there. Do you think it was one of the servants?”

“No, I don’t. I know Mr. Hearst sent Jerome in here to get something out of my room, but I don’t think the guy ducked into yours as an afterthought to go through your drawers. Anybody who swiped stuff from Mr. Hearst’s guests wouldn’t work here very long,” I said. “If any guest had ever had something stolen, everybody in the Industry would know about it. Gossip travels fast in this town.” I meant Hollywood, of course, not San Simeon.

“There’s a first time for everything,” Lewis said miserably.

“True. But I think our buddy Jerome has faithful retainer written all over him,” I said, finishing the cake in about three bites.

“Then who else could have done it?” Lewis wondered, starting on a dish of pudding.

“Well, you’re the Literary Specialist. Haven’t you ever accessed any Agatha Christie novels?” I tossed the cake plate aside and pounced on a Hershey bar. “You know what we do next. Process of elimination. Who was where and when? I’ll tell you this much, it wasn’t me and it wasn’t Big Daddy Hearst. I was with him from the moment we left the rest of you in the theater until Marion came up and I had to scram.” I closed my eyes and sighed in bliss, as the Theobromos high finally kicked in.

“Well—” Lewis looked around distractedly, trying to think. “Then—it has to have been one of us who were in the theater watching Going Hollywood.”

“Yeah. And Marion said about half the audience walked out before it was over,” I said. “Did you walk out, Lewis?”

“No! I stayed until the end. I can’t imagine why anybody left. I thought it was delightful,” Lewis told me earnestly. “It had Bing Crosby in it, you know.”

“You’ve got pudding on your chin. O.K; so you stayed through the movie.” I said, realizing my wits weren’t at their sharpest right now but determined to thrash this through. “And so did Marion. Who else was there when the house lights came up, Lewis?”

Lewis sucked in his lower lip, thinking hard through the Theobromine fog. “I’m replaying my visual transcript,” he informed me. “Clark Gable is there. The younger Mr. Hearst and his friend are there. The unpleasant-looking fellows in the business suits are there. Connie’s there.”

“Garbo?”

“Mm—nope.”

“The two silents guys? Charlie and Laurence?”

“No.”

“What’s his name, Jack from Paramount, is he there?”

“No, he isn’t.”

“What about the crazy lady with the dogs?”

“She’s not there either.” Lewis raised horrified eyes to me. “My gosh, it could have been any one of them.” He remembered the pudding and dabbed at it with his handkerchief.

“Or the thief might have sneaked out, robbed your room and sneaked back in before the end of the picture,” I told him.

“Oh, why complicate things?” he moaned. “What are we going to do?”

“Damned if I know tonight,” I replied, struggling to my feet. “Tomorrow you’re going to find out who took the Valentino script and get it back. I have other problems, O.K.?”

“What do you mean?”

“Mr. Hearst is upping the ante on the game. He’s given me an ultimatum for Dr. Zeus,” I explained.

“Wowie.” Lewis looked appalled. “He thinks he can dictate terms to the Company?”

“He’s doing it, isn’t he?” I said, trudging off to my bedroom. “And guess who gets to deliver the messages both ways? Now you see why I was nervous? I knew this was going to happen.”

“Well, cheer up,” Lewis called after me. “Things can’t go more wrong than this.”

I switched on the light in my room, and found out just how much more wrong they could go.

Something exploded up from the bed at my face, a confusion of needle teeth and blaring sound. I was stoned, I was tired, I was confused, and so I just slapped it away as hard as I could, which with me being a cyborg and all was pretty hard. The thing flew across the room and hit the wall with a crunch. Then it dropped to the floor and didn’t move, except for its legs kicking, but not much or for long.

Lewis was beside me immediately, staring. He put his handkerchief to his mouth and turned away, ashen-faced.

“Ye gods!” he said. “You’ve killed Tcho-Tcho!”

“Maybe I just stunned her?” I staggered over to see. Lewis staggered with me. We stood looking down at Tcho-Tcho.

“Nope,” Lewis told me sadly, shaking his head.

“The Devil, and the Devil’s dam, and the Devil’s…insurance agent,” I swore, groping backward until I found a chair to collapse in. “Now what do we do?” I averted my eyes from the nasty little corpse and my gaze fell on the several shreddy parts that were all that remained of my left tennis shoe. “Hey! Look what the damn thing did to my sneaker!”

“How did she get in here, anyway?” Lewis wrung his hands.

“So much for my playing tennis with anybody tomorrow,” I snarled.

“But—but if she was in here long enough to chew up your shoe…” Lewis paused, eyes glazing over in difficult thought. “Oh, I wish I hadn’t done that Theobromos. Isn’t that the way it always is? Just when you think it’s safe to relax and unwind a little—”

“Hey! This means Cartimandua Bryce took your Valentino script,” I said, leaping to my feet and grabbing hold of the chair to steady myself. “See? The damn dog must have followed her in unbeknownst!”

“You’re right.” Lewis’s eyes widened. “Except—well, no, not necessarily. She didn’t have the dogs with her, don’t you remember? They wouldn’t behave at table. They had to be taken back to her room.”

“So they did.” I subsided into the chair once more. “Hell. If somebody was sneaking through the rooms, the dog might have got out and wandered around until it got in here, chewed up my shoe, and went to sleep on my bed.”

“And that means—that means—” Lewis shook his head. “I’m too tired to think what that means. What are we going to do about the poor dog? I suppose we’ll have to go tell Mrs. Bryce.”

“Nothing doing,” I snapped. “When I’m in the middle of a deal with Hearst? Hearst, who’s fanatic about kindness to animals? Sorry about that, W.R., but I just brutally murdered a dear little chihuahua in La Casa del Sol. Thank God there aren’t any surveillance cameras in here!”

“But we have to do something,” Lewis protested. “We can’t leave it here on the rug! Should we take it out and bury it?”

“No. There’s bound to be a search when Mrs. Bryce notices it’s gone,” I said. “If they find the grave and dig it up, they’ll know the mutt didn’t die naturally, or why would somebody take the trouble to hide the body?”

“Unless we hid it somewhere it’d never be found?” Lewis suggested. “We could pitch it over the perimeter fence. Then, maybe the wild animals would remove the evidence!”

“I don’t think zebras are carrion eaters, Lewis.” I rubbed my temples wearily. “And I don’t know about you, but in the condition I’m in, I don’t think I’d get it over the fence on the first throw. All I’d need then would be for one of Hearst’s surveillance cameras to pick me up in a spotlight, trying to stuff a dead chihuahua through a fence. Hey!” I brightened. “Hearst has a zoo up here. What if we shotput Tcho-Tcho into the lion’s den?”

Lewis shuddered. “What if we missed?”

“To hell with this.” I got up. “Dogs die all the time of natural causes.”

So we wound up flitting through the starry night in hyperfunction, leaving no more than a blur on any cameras that might be recording our passage, and a pitiful little corpse materialized in what we hoped was a natural attitude of canine demise on the front steps of La Casa Grande. With any luck it would be stiff as a board by morning, which would make foul play harder to detect.


Showered and somewhat sobered up, I opened the field credenza in my suitcase and crouched before it to tap out my report on its tiny keys.

WRH WILLING, HAD PT3 SAMPLE, BUT HOLDING OUT FOR MORE. TERMS: STOCK SHARES PLUS IMMORTALITY PROCESS. HAVE EXPLAINED IMPOSSIBILITY. REFUSES TO ACCEPT.

SUGGEST: LIE. DELIVER 18 YEARS PER HISTORICAL RECORD WITH PROMISE OF MORE, THEN RENEGOTIATE TERMS WITH HEIRS.

PLEASE ADVISE.

It didn’t seem useful to tell anybody that the Valentino script was missing. Why worry the Company? After all, we must be going to find it and complete at least that part of the mission successfully, because history records that an antiques restorer will, on Christmas 20, 2326, at the height of the Old Hollywood Revival, find the script in a hidden compartment in a Spanish cabinet, once owned by W.R. Hearst but recently purchased by Dr. Zeus Incorporated. Provenance indisputably proven, it will then be auctioned off for an unbelievably huge sum, even allowing for twenty-fourth-century inflation. And history cannot be changed, can it?

Of course it can’t.

I yawned pleasurably, preparing to shut the credenza down for the night, but it beeped to let me know a message was coming in. I scowled at it and leaned close to see what it said.

TERMS ACCEPTABLE. INFORM HEARST AND AT FIRST OPPORTUNITY PERFORM REPAIRS AND UPGRADE. QUINTILIUS WILL CONTACT WITH STOCK OPTIONS.

I read it through twice. Oh, O.K; the Company must mean they intended to follow my suggestion. I’d promise him the moon but give him the eighteen years decreed by history, and he wouldn’t even be getting those if I didn’t do that repair work on his heart. What did they mean by upgrade, though? Eh! Details.

And I had no reason to feel lousy about lying to the old man. How many mortals even get to make it to eighty-eight, anyway? And when my stopgap measures finally failed, he’d close his eyes and die—like a lot of mortals—in happy expectation of eternal life after death. Of course, he’d get it in Heaven (if there is such a place) and not down here like he’d been promised, but he’d be in no position to sue me for breach of contract anyway.

I acknowledged the transmission and shut down at last. Yawning again, I crawled into my fabulous priceless antique Renaissance-era hand-carved gilded bed. The chihuahua hadn’t peed on it. That was something, at least.


I slept in next morning, though I knew Hearst preferred his guests to rise with the sun and do something healthy like ride five miles before breakfast. I figured he’d make an exception in my case. Besides, if the PT3 cocktail had delivered its usual kick he’d probably be staying in bed late himself, and so would Marion. I squinted up at the left-hand tower of La Casa Grande, making my way through the brilliant sunlight.

No dead dog in sight anywhere, as I hauled open the big front doors; Tcho-Tcho’s passing must have been discovered without much commotion. Good. I walked through the cool and the gloom of the big house to the morning room at the other end, where sunlight poured in through French doors. There a buffet was set out with breakfast.

Lewis was there ahead of me, loading up on flapjacks. I heaped hash browns on my plate and, for the benefit of the mortals in various corners of the room, said brightly: “So, Lewis! Some swell room, huh? How’d you sleep?”

“Fine, thanks,” he replied. Other than a slight Theobromos hangover. “But, you know, the saddest thing happened! One of Mrs. Bryce’s little dogs got out in the night and died of exposure. The servants found it this morning.”

“Gee, that’s too bad.” Anybody suspect anything?

No. “Yes, Mrs. Bryce is dreadfully upset.” I feel just awful.

Hey, did you lure the damn mutt into my room? We’ve got worse things to worry about this morning. I helped myself to coffee and carried my plate out into the dining hall, sitting down at the long table. Lewis followed me.

Right, the Valentino script. Have you had any new ideas about who might have taken it?

No. I dug into my hash browns. Has anybody else complained about anything missing from their rooms?

No, nobody’s said a word.

The thing is—nobody knew you had it with you, right? You didn’t happen to mention that you were carrying around an autographed script for The Son Of the Sheik?

No, of course not! Lewis sipped his coffee, looking slightly affronted. I’ve only been in this business for nearly two millennia.

Maybe one of the guests was after Garbo or Gable, and got into your room by mistake? I turned nonchalantly to glance into the morning room at Gable. He was deeply immersed in the sports section of one of Mr. Hearst’s papers.

Well, if it was an obsessive Garbo fan he’d have seen pretty quickly that he wasn’t in a woman’s room. Lewis put both elbows on the table in a manly sort of way. So if it was one of the ladies after Gable—? Though it still doesn’t explain why she’d steal the script.

I glanced over at Connie, who was sitting in an easy chair balancing a plate of scrambled eggs on her knees as she ate. Connie wouldn’t have done it, and neither would Marion. I doubt it was the Hearst kid’s popsy. That leaves Garbo and Mrs. Bryce, who left the movie early.

But why would Garbo steal the script? Lewis drew his eyebrows together.

Why does Garbo do anything? I shrugged. Lewis looked around uneasily.

I can’t see her rifling through my belongings, however. And that leaves Mrs. Bryce.

Yeah. Mrs. Bryce. Whose little dog appeared mysteriously in my bedroom.

I got up and crossed back into the morning room on the pretext of going for a coffee refill. Mrs. Bryce, clad in black pajamas, was sitting alone in a prominent chair, with Conqueror Worm greedily wolfing down Eggs Benedict from a plate on the floor. Mrs. Bryce was not eating. Her eyes were closed and her face turned up to the ceiling. I guess she was meditating, since she was doing the whole lotus position bit.

As I passed, Conqueror Worm left off eating long enough to raise his tiny head and snarl at me.

“I hope you will excuse him, Mr. Denham,” said Mrs. Bryce without opening her eyes. “He’s very protective of me just now.”

“That’s O.K., Mrs. Bryce,” I said affably, but I kept well away from the dog. “Sorry to hear about your sad loss.”

“Oh, Tcho-Tcho remains with us still,” she said serenely. “She has merely ascended to the next astral plane. I just received a communication from her, in fact. She discarded her earthly body in order to accomplish her more important work.”

“Gee, that’s just great,” I replied, and Gable looked up from his paper at me and rolled his eyes. I shrugged and poured myself more coffee. I still thought Mrs. Bryce was a phony on the make, but if she wanted to pretend Tcho-Tcho had passed on voluntarily instead of being swatted like a tennis ball, that was all right with me.

You think she might have done it, after all? Lewis wondered as I came back to the table. She had sort of fixated on me, before Marion turned her on Garbo.

Could be. I think she’s too far off on another planet to be organized enough for cat burglary, though. And why would she steal the script and nothing else?

I can’t imagine. What are we going to do? Lewis twisted the end of his paper napkin. Should we report the theft to Mr. Hearst?

Hell no. That’d queer my pitch. Some representatives of an all-powerful Company we’d look, wouldn’t we, letting mortals steal stuff out of our rooms? No. Here’s what you do: see if you can talk to the people who left the theater early, one by one. Just sort of engage them in casual conversation. Find out where each one of the suspects went, and see if you can cross-check their stories with others.

Lewis looked panicked. But—I’m only a Literature Preservation Specialist. Isn’t this interrogation sort of thing more in your line of work, as a Facilitator?

Maybe, but right now I’ve got my hands full, I responded, just as the lord of the manor came striding into the room.

Mr. Hearst was wearing jodhpurs and boots, and was flushed with exertion. He hadn’t gotten up late after all, but had been out on horseback surveying his domain, like one of the old Californio dons. He hit me with a triumphant look as he marched past, but didn’t stop. Instead he went straight up to Mrs. Bryce’s chair and took off his hat to address her. Conqueror Worm looked up and him and cowered, then ran to hide behind the chair.

“Ma’am, I was so sorry to hear about your little dog! I hope you’ll do me the honor of picking out another from my kennels? I don’t think we have any chihuahuas at present, but in my experience a puppy consoles you a good deal when you lose an old canine friend,” he told her, with a lot more power and breath in his voice than he’d had last night. The PT3 was working, that much was certain.

Mrs. Bryce looked up from her meditation, startled. Smiling radiantly she rose to her feet.

“Why, Mr. Hearst, you are too kind,” she replied. No malarkey about ascendance to astral planes with him, I noticed. He offered her his arm and they swept out through the French doors, with Conqueror Worm running after them desperately.

What happens when we’ve narrowed down the list of suspects? Lewis tugged at my attention.

Then we steal the script back, I told him.

But how? Lewis tore his paper napkin clean in half. Even if we move fast enough to confuse the surveillance cameras in the halls—

We’ll figure something out, I replied, and then shushed him, because Marion came floating in.

Floating isn’t much of an exaggeration, and there was no booze doing the levitation for her this morning. Marion Davies was one happy mortal. She spotted Connie and made straight for her. Connie looked up and offered a glass.

“I saved ya some arranch use, Marion,” she said meaningfully. The orange juice was probably laced with gin. She and Marion were drinking buddies.

“Never mind that! C’mere,” Marion told her, and they went over to whisper and giggle in a corner. Connie was looking incredulous.

And are you sure we can rule the servants out? Lewis persisted.

Maybe, I replied, and shushed him again, because Marion had noticed me and broken off her chat with Connie, her smile fading. She got up and approached me hesitantly.

“J-Joe? I need to ask you about something.”

“Please, take my seat, Miss Davies.” Lewis rose and pulled the chair out for her. “I was just going for a stroll.”

“Gee, he’s a gentleman, too,” Marion said, giggling, but there was a little edge under her laughter. She sank down across from me, and waited until Lewis had taken his empty plate and departed before she said: “Did you—um—come up here to ask Pops for m-money?”

“Aw, hell, no,” I said in my best regular guy voice. “I wouldn’t do something like that, Marion.”

“Well, I didn’t really think so,” she admitted, looking at the table and pushing a few grains of spilled salt around with her fingertip. “He doesn’t pay blackmailers, you know. But—y-you’ve got a reputation as a man who knows a lot of secrets, and I just thought—if you’d used me to get up here to talk to him—” She looked at me with narrowed eyes. “That wouldn’t be very nice.”

“No, it wouldn’t,” I agreed. “And I swear I didn’t come up here to do anything like that. Honest.”

Marion just nodded. “The other thing I thought it might be,” she went on, “was that you might be selling some kind of patent medicine. A lot of people know he’s interested in longevity, and it looked like he’d been drinking something red out of his coffee cup, you see.” Her mouth was hard. “He may be a millionaire and he’s terribly smart, but people take advantage of him all the time.”

“Not me,” I said, and looked around as though I wanted to see who might be listening. I leaned across the table to speak close to her ear. “Listen, honey, the truth is—I really did need his advice about something. And he was kind enough to listen. But it’s a private matter and believe me, he’s not the one being blackmailed. See?”

“Oh!” She thought she saw. “Is it Mr. Mayer?”

“Why, no, not at all,” I answered hurriedly, in a tone that implied exactly the opposite. Her face cleared.

“Gee, poor Mr. Mayer,” she said. She knitted her brows. “So you didn’t give W.R. any kind of…spring tonic or something?”

“Where would I get something like that?” I looked confused, as I would be if I were some low-level studio dick who handled crises for executives and had never heard of PT3.

“Yeah.” Marion reached over and patted my hand. “I’m sorry. I just wanted to be sure.”

“I don’t blame you,” I said, getting to my feet. “But please don’t worry, O.K.?”

She had nothing to worry about, after all. Unlike me. I still had to talk to Mr. Hearst.

I strolled out through the grounds to look for him. He found me first, though, looming abruptly into my path.

“Mr. Denham.” Hearst grinned at me. “I must commend you on that stuff. It works. Have you communicated with your people?”

“Yes, sir, I have,” I assured him, keeping my voice firm and hearty.

“Good. Walk with me, will you? I’d like to hear what they had to say.” He started off, and I had to run to fall into step beside him.

“Well—they’ve agreed to your terms. I must say I’m a little surprised.” I laughed in an embarrassed kind of way. “I never thought it was possible to grant a mortal what you’re asking for, but you know how it is—the rank and file aren’t told everything, I guess.”

“I suspected that was how it was,” Hearst told me placidly. His little dachshund came racing to greet him. He scooped her up and she licked his face in excitement. “So. How is this to be arranged?”

“As far as the shares of stock go, there’ll be another gentleman getting in touch with you pretty soon,” I said. “I’m not sure what name he’ll be using, but you’ll know him. He’ll mention my name, just as I mentioned Mr. Shaw’s.”

“Very good. And the other matter?”

Boy, the other matter. “I can give you a recipe for a tonic you’ll drink on a daily basis,” I said, improvising. “Your own staff can make it up.”

“As simple as that?” He looked down at me sidelong, and so did the dog. “Is it the recipe for what I drank last night?”

“Oh, no, sir,” I told him truthfully. “No, this will be something to prolong your life until the date history decrees that you appear to die. See? But it’ll all be faked. One of our doctors will be there to pronounce you dead, and instead of being taken away to a mortuary, you’ll go to one of our hospitals and be made immortal in a new body.”

That part was a whopping big bald-faced lie, of course. I felt sweat beading on my forehead again, as we walked along through the garden and Hearst took his time about replying.

“It all sounds plausible,” he said at last. “Though of course I’ve no way of knowing whether your people will keep their word. Have I?”

“You’d just have to trust us,” I agreed. “But look at the way you feel right now! Isn’t that proof enough?”

“It’s persuasive,” he replied, but left the sentence unfinished. We walked on. O.K, I needed to impress him again.

“See that pink rose?” I pointed to a bush about a hundred yards away, where one big bloom was just opening.

“I see it, Mr. Denham.”

“Count to three, O.K.?”

“One,” Hearst said, and I was holding the rose in front of his eyes. He went pale. Then he smiled again, wide and genuine. The little dog whuffed at me uncertainly.

“Pretty good,” he said. “And can you ‘put a girdle round about the earth in forty minutes’?”

“I might, if I could fly,” I said. “No wings, though. You don’t want wings too, do you, Mr. Hearst?”

He just laughed. “Not yet. I believe I’ll go wash up now, and then head off to the tennis court. Do you play, Mr. Denham?”

“Gee, I just love tennis,” I replied, “but, you know, I got all the way up here and discovered I’d only packed one tennis shoe.”

“Oh, I’ll have a pair brought out for you.” Hearst looked down at my feet. “You’re, what, about a size six?”

“Yes, sir,” I said with a sinking feeling.

“They’ll be waiting for you at the court,” Hearst informed me. “Try to play down to my speed, will you?” He winked hugely and ambled away.

I was on my way back to the breakfast room with the vague hope of drinking a bottle of pancake syrup or something when I came upon Lewis. He was creeping along a garden path, keenly watching a flaxen-haired figure slumped on a marble bench amid the roses.

“What are you doing, Lewis?” I said.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” he replied sotto voce. “I’m stalking Garbo.”

“All right…” I must have looked dubious, because he drew himself up indignantly.

“Can you think of any other way to start a casual conversation with her?” he demanded. “And I’ve worked out a way—” he looked around and transmitted the rest, I’ve worked out quite a clever way of detecting the guilty party.

Oh yeah?

You see, I just engage Garbo in conversation and then sort of artlessly mention that I didn’t catch the end of Going Hollywood because I had a dreadful migraine headache, so I went back to my room early, and would she tell me how it came out? And if she’s not the thief, she’ll just explain that she left early too and has no idea how it turned out. But! If she’s the one who took the script, she’ll know I’m lying, because she’ll have been in my room and seen I wasn’t there. And she’ll be so disconcerted that her blood pressure will rise, her pulse will race, her pupils will dilate, and she’ll display all the other physical manifestations that would show up on a polygraph if I happened to be using one! And then I’ll know.

Ingenious, I admitted. Worked all the time for me, when I was an Inquisitor.

Thank you. Lewis beamed.

Of course, first you have to get Garbo to talk to you.

Lewis nodded, looking determined. He resumed his ever-so-cautious advance on the Burning Icicle. I shrugged and went back to La Casa del Sol to change into tennis togs.

Playing tennis with W.R. Hearst called for every ounce of the guile and finesse that had made me a champion in the Black Legend All-Stars, believe me. I had to demonstrate all kinds of hyperfunction stunts a mortal wouldn’t be able to do, like appearing on both sides of the net at once, just to impress him with my immortalness; and yet I had to avoid killing the old man with the ball, and—oh yeah—let him win somehow, too. I’d like to see Bill Tilden try it some time.

It was hell. Hearst seemed to think it was funny, at least; he was in a great mood watching me run around frantically while he kept his position in center court, solid as a tower. He returned my sissy serves with all the force of cannon fire. His dog watched from beyond the fence, standing up on her hind legs to bark suspiciously. She was sure there was something funny about me now. Thank God Gable put in an appearance after about an hour of this, and I was able to retire to the sidelines and wheeze, and swear a tougher hour was never wasted there. Hearst paused before his game long enough to make a brief call from a courtside phone. Two minutes later, there was a smiling servant offering me a glass of ice-cold ginger ale.

Gable didn’t beat Hearst, either, and I think he actually tried. Clark wasn’t much of a toady.

I begged off to go shower—dark hairy guys who play tennis in hyperfunction tend to stink—and slipped out afterward to do some reconnoitering.

Tonight I planned to slip in some minor heart surgery on Hearst as he slept, to guarantee those eighteen years the Company was giving him. The trick was going to be getting in undetected. There had to be another way to reach Hearst’s rooms besides his private elevator, but there were no stairs visible in any of the rooms I’d been in. How did the servants get up there?

Prowling slowly around the house and bouncing sonar waves off the outside, I found a couple of ways to ascend. The best, for my purposes, was a tiny spiral staircase that was entered from the east terrace. I could sneak through the garden, go straight up, find my way to Hearst’s bedroom, and depart the same way once I’d fixed his heart. I could even wear the tennis shoes he’d so thoughtfully loaned me.

I was wandering in the direction of the Neptune pool when there was a hell of a racket from the shrubbery ahead of me. Conqueror Worm came darting out, yapping savagely. I was composed enough not to kick him as he raced up to my ankles. He growled and backed away when I bared my teeth at him in my friendliest fashion.

“Hi, doggie,” I said. “Poor little guy, where’s your mistress?”

A dark-veiled figure that had been standing perfectly still on the other side of the hedge decided to move, and Cartimandua Bryce walked forward calling out: “Conqueror! Oh! Conqueror, you mustn’t challenge Mr. Denham.” She came around the corner and saw me.

There was a pause. I think she was waiting for me to demand in astonishment how she’d known it was me, but instead I inquired: “Where’s your new dog?”

“Still in Mr. Hearst’s kennels,” she replied, with a proud lift of her head. “Dear Mr. Hearst is having a traveling basket made for her. Such a kind man!”

“He’s a swell guy, all right,” I agreed.

“And just as generous in this life as in his others,” she went on. “But, you know, being a Caesar taught him that. Ruling the Empire either ennobled a man or brought out his worst vices. Clearly, our host was one of those on whom the laurel crown conferred refinement. Of course, he is a very old soul.”

“No kidding?”

“Oh, yes. He has come back many, many times. Many are the names he has borne: Pharaoh, and Caesar, and High King,” Mrs. Bryce told me, in as matter-of-fact a voice as though she was listing football trophies. “He has much work to do on this plane of existence, you see. Of course, you may well wonder how I know these things.”

“Gee, Mrs. Bryce, how do you know these things?” I asked, just to be nice.

“It is my gift,” she said, with a little sad smile, and she sighed. “My gift and my curse, you see. The spirits whisper to me constantly. I described this terrible and wonderful affliction in my novel Black Covenant, which of course was based on one of my own past lives.”

“I don’t think I’ve read that one,” I admitted.

“A sad tale, as so many of them are,” she said, sighing again. “In the romantic Scottish Highlands of the thirteenth century, a beautiful young girl discovers she has an uncanny ability to sense both past and future lives of everyone she meets. Her gift brings inevitable doom upon her, of course. She finds her long-lost love, who was a soldier under Mark Antony when she was one of Cleopatra’s handmaidens, and is now a gallant highwayman—I mean her lover, of course—and, sensing his inevitable death on the gallows, she dares to die with him.”

“That’s sad, all right.” I agreed. “How’d it sell?”

“It was received by the discerning public with their customary sympathy,” Mrs. Bryce replied.

“Is that the one they’re doing a screenplay on?” I inquired.

“No,” she said, looking me up and down. “That’s Passionate Girl, the story of Mary, Queen of Scots, told from the unique perspective of her faithful terrier. I may yet persuade Miss Garbo to accept the lead role But, Mr. Denham—I am sensing something about you. Wait. You work in the film industry—”

“Yeah, for Louis B. Mayer,” I said.

“And yet—and yet—” She took a step back and shaded her eyes as she looked at me. “I sense more. You cast a long shadow, Mr. Denham. Why—you, too, are an old soul!”

“Oh yeah?” I said, scanning her critically for Crome’s radiation. Was she one of those mortals with a fluky electromagnetic field? They tend to receive data other mortals don’t get, the way some people pick up radio broadcasts with tooth fillings, because their personal field bleeds into the temporal wave. I couldn’t sense anything out of the ordinary in Mrs. Bryce, though. Was she buttering me up because she thought I could talk Garbo into starring in Passionate Girl at MGM? Well, she didn’t know much about my relationship with Greta.

“Yes—yes—I see you in the Mediterranean area—I see you dueling with a band of street youths—is it in Venice, in the time of the Doges? Yes. And before that…I see you in Egypt, Mr. Denham, during the captivity of the Israelites. You loved a girl…yet there was another man, an overseer…” Conqueror Worm might be able to tell there was something different about me, but his mistress was scoring a big metaphysical zero.

“Really?”

“Yes,” she said, lowering her eyes from the oak tree above us, where she had apparently been reading all this stuff. “Do you experience disturbing visions, Mr. Denham? Dreams, perhaps of other places, other times?”

“Yeah, actually,” I couldn’t resist saying.

“Ah. If you desire to seek further—I may be able to help you.” She came close and put her hand on my arm. Conqueror Worm prowled around her ankles, whining like a gnat. “I have some experience in, shall we say, arcane matters? It wouldn’t be the first time I have assisted a questing soul in unraveling the mystery of his past lives. Indeed, you might almost call me a detective…for I sense you enjoy the works of Mr. Dashiell Hammett,” she finished, with a smile as enigmatic as the Mona Lisa.

I smiled right back at her. Conqueror Worm put his tail between his legs and howled.

“Gosh, Mrs. Bryce, that’s really amazing,” I said, reaching for her hand and shaking it. “I do like detective fiction.” And there was no way she could have known it unless she’d been in my room going through my drawers, where she’d have seen my well-worn copy of The Maltese Falcon. “Did your spirits tell you that?”

“Yes,” she said modestly, and she was lying through her teeth, if her skin conductivity and pulse were any indication. Lewis was right, you see: we can tell as much as a polygraph about whether or not a mortal is truthful.

“You don’t say?” I let go her hand. “Well, well. This has been really interesting, Mrs. Bryce. I’ve got to go see how my friend is doing now, but, you know, I’d really like to get together to talk with you about this again. Soon.”

“Ah! Your friend with the fair hair,” she said, and looked wise. Then she stepped in close and lowered her voice. “The haunted one. Tell me, Mr. Denham…is he…inclined to the worship of Apollo?”

For a moment I was struck speechless, because Lewis does go on sometimes about his Roman cultural identity, but then I realized that wasn’t what Mrs. Bryce was implying.

“You mean, is he a homo?”

“Given to sins of the purple and crimson nature,” she rephrased, nodding.

Now I knew she had the Valentino script, had seen Rudy’s cute note and leaped to her own conclusion. “Uh…gee. I don’t know. I guess he might be. Why?”

“There is a male spirit who will not rest until he communicates with your friend,” Mrs. Bryce told me, breathing heavily. “A fiery soul with a great attachment to Mr. Kensington. One who has but recently passed over. A beautiful shade, upright as a smokeless flame.”

The only question now was, why? One thing was certain: whether or not Lewis had ever danced the tango with Rudolph Valentino, Mrs. Bryce sure wished she had. Was she planning some stunt to impress the hell out of all these movie people, using her magic powers to reveal the script’s whereabouts if Lewis reported it missing?

“I wonder who it is?” I said. “I’ll tell him about it. Of course, you know, he might be kind of embarrassed—”

“But of course.” She waved gracefully, as though dismissing all philistine considerations of closets. “If he will speak to me privately, I can do him a great service.”

“O.K., Mrs. Bryce,” I said, winking, and we went our separate ways through the garden.

I caught up with Lewis in the long pergola, tottering along between the kumquat trees. His tie was askew, his hair was standing on end, and his eyes shone like a couple of blue klieg lights.

“The most incredible thing just happened to me,” he said.

“How’d you make out with Garbo?” I inquired, and then my jaw dropped, because he drew himself up and said, with an effort at dignity:

“I’ll thank you not to speculate on a lady’s private affairs.”

“Oh, for crying out loud!” I hoped he’d had the sense to stay out of the range of the surveillance cameras.

“But I can tell you this much,” he said, as his silly grin burst through again, “she absolutely did not steal my Valentino script.”

“Yeah, I know,” I replied. “Cartimandua Bryce took it after all.”

“She—Really?” Lewis focused with difficulty. “However did you find out?”

“We were talking just now and she gave the game away.” I explained. “Oldest trick in the book, for fake psychics: snoop through people’s belongings in secret so you know little details about them you couldn’t have known otherwise, then pull ’em out in conversation and wow everybody with your mystical abilities.

“What do you want to bet that’s what she was doing when she sneaked out of the theater? She must have used the time to case people’s rooms. That’s how the damn dog got in our suite. It must have followed her somehow and gotten left behind.”

“How sordid,” Lewis said. “How are we going to get it back, then?”

“We’ll think of a way.” I said. “I have a feeling she’ll approach you herself, anyhow. She’s dying to corner you and give you a big wet kiss from the ghost of Rudolph Valentino, whom she thinks is your passionate dead boyfriend. You just play along.”

Lewis winced. “That’s revolting.”

I shrugged. “So long as you get the script back, who cares what she thinks?”

“I care,” Lewis protested. “I have a reputation to think about!”

“Like the opinions of a bunch of mortals are going to matter in a hundred years!” I said. “Anyway, I’ll bet you’ve had to do more embarrassing things in the Company’s service. I know I have.”

“Such as?” Lewis demanded sullenly.

“Such as I don’t care to discuss just at the present time,” I told him, flouncing away with a grin. He grabbed a pomegranate and hurled it at me, but I winked out and reappeared a few yards off, laughing. The lunch bell rang.


I don’t know what Lewis did with the rest of his afternoon, but I suspect he spent it hiding. Myself, I took things easy; napped in the sunlight, went swimming in the Roman pool, and relaxed in the guest library with a good book. By the time we gathered in the assembly hall for cocktail hour again,

I was refreshed and ready for a long night’s work.

The gathering was a lot more fun now that I wasn’t so nervous about Mr. Hearst. Connie got out a Parcheesi game and we sat down to play with Charlie and Laurence. The Hearst kid and his girlfriend took over one of the pianos and played amateurish duets. Mrs. Bryce made a sweeping entrance and backed Gable into a corner, trying out her finder-of-past-lives routine on him. Marion circulated for a while, before getting into a serious discussion of real estate investments with Jack from Paramount. Mr. Hearst came down in the elevator and was promptly surrounded by his executives, who wanted to discuss business. Garbo appeared late, smiling to herself as she wandered over to the other piano and picked out tunes with one finger.

Lewis skulked in at the last moment, just as we were all getting up to go to dinner, and tried to look as though he’d been there all along. The ladies went in first. As she passed him, Garbo reached out and tousled his hair, though she didn’t say a word.

The rest of us—Mr. Hearst included—gaped at Lewis. He just straightened up, threw his shoulders back, and swaggered into the dining hall after the ladies.

My place card was immediately at Mr. Hearst’s right, and Lewis was seated on the other side of me. It didn’t get better than this. I looked nearly as smug as Lewis as I sat down with my loaded plate. Cartimandua Bryce had been given the other place of honor, though, at Marion’s right, I guess as a further consolation prize for the loss of Tcho-Tcho. Conqueror Worm was allowed to stay in her lap through the meal this time. He took one look at me and cringed down meek as a lamb, only lifting his muzzle for the tidbits Mrs. Bryce fed him.

She held forth on the subject of reincarnation as we dined, with Marion drawing her out and throwing the rest of us an occasional broad wink, though not when Hearst was looking. He had very strict ideas about courtesy toward guests, even if he clearly thought she was a crackpot.

“So what you’re saying is, we just go on and on through history, the same people coming back time after time?” Marion inquired.

“Not all of us,” Mrs. Bryce admitted. “Some, I think, are weaker souls and fade after the first thundering torrent of life has finished with them. They are like those who retire from the ball after but one dance, too weary to respond any longer to the fierce call of life’s music.”

“They just soita go ova to da punchbowl and stay there, huh?” said Connie.

“In a sense,” Mrs. Bryce told her, graciously ignoring her teasing tone. “The punchbowl of Lethe, if you will; and there they imbibe forgetfulness and remain. Ah, but the stronger souls plunge back headlong into the maelstrom of mortal passions!”

“Well, but what about going to Heaven and all that stuff?” Marion wanted to know. “Don’t we ever get to do that?”

“Oh, undoubtedly,” Mrs. Bryce replied, “for there are higher astral planes beyond this mere terrestrial one we inhabit. The truly great souls ascend there in time, as that is their true home; but even they yield to the impulse to assume flesh and descend to the mundane realms again, especially if they have important work to do here.” She inclined across the table to Hearst. “As I feel you have often done, dear Mr. Hearst.”

“Well, I plan on coming back after this life, anyhow,” he replied with a smile, and nudged me under the table. I nearly dropped my fork.

“I don’t know that I’d want to,” said Marion a little crossly. “My g-

goodness, I think I’d rather have a nice rest afterwards, and not come back and have to go fighting through the whole darned business all over again.”

Hearst lifted his head and regarded her for a long moment.

“Wouldn’t you, dear?” he said.

“N-no,” Marion insisted, and laughed. “It’d be great to have some peace and quiet for a change.”

Mrs. Bryce just nodded, as though to show that proved her point. Hearst looked down at his plate and didn’t say anything else for the moment.

“But anyway, Mrs. Bryce,” Marion went on in a brighter voice, “who else do you think’s an old soul? What about the world leaders right now?”

“Chancellor Hitler, certainly,” Mrs. Bryce informed us. “One has only to look at the immense dynamism of the man! This, surely, was a Teutonic Knight, or perhaps one of the barbarian chieftains who defied Caesar.”

“Unsuccessfully,” said Hearst in a dry little voice.

“Yes, but to comprehend reincarnation is to see history in its true light,” Mrs. Bryce explained. “Over the centuries his star has risen inexorably, and will continue to rise. He is a man with true purpose.”

“You don’t feel that way about Franklin Delano Roosevelt, do you?” Hearst inquired.

“Roosevelt strives,” said Mrs. Bryce noncommittally. “But I think his is yet a young soul, blundering perhaps as it finds its way.”

“I think he’s an insincere bozo, personally,” Hearst said.

“Unlike Mussolini! Now there is another man who understands historical destiny, to such an extent one knows he has retained the experience of his past lives.”

“I’m afraid I don’t think much of dictators,” said Hearst, in that castle where his word was law. Mrs. Bryce’s eyes widened with the consciousness of her misstep.

“No, for your centuries—perhaps even eons—have given you the wisdom to see that dictatorship is a crude substitute for enlightened rule,” she said.

“By which you mean good old American democracy?” he inquired. Wow, Mrs. Bryce was sweating. I have to admit it felt good to sit back and watch it happen to somebody else for a change.

“Well, of course she does,” Marion said. “Now, I’ve had enough of all this history talk, Pops.”

“I wanna know more about who we all were in our past lives, anyway,” said Connie. Mrs. Bryce joined in the general laughter then, shrill with relief.

“Well, as I was saying earlier to Mr. Gable—I feel certain he was Mark Antony.”

All eyes were on Clark at this pronouncement. He turned beet red but smiled wryly.

“I never argue with a lady,” he said. “Maybe I was, at that.”

“Oh, beyond question you were, Mr. Gable,” said Mrs. Bryce. “For I myself was one of Cleopatra’s maidens-in-waiting, and I recognized you the moment I saw you.”

Must be a script for Black Covenant in development, too.

There were chuckles up and down the table. “Whaddaya do to find out about odda people?” Connie persisted. “Do ya use one of dose Ouija boards or something?”

“A crude parlor game,” Mrs. Bryce said. “In my opinion. No, the best way to delve into the secrets of the past is to speak directly to those who are themselves beyond the flow of time.”

“Ya mean, have a seance?” Connie looked intrigued. Marion’s eyes lit up.

“That’d be fun, wouldn’t it? Jeepers, we’ve got the perfect setting, too, with all this old stuff around!”

“Now—I don’t know—” said Hearst, but Marion had the bit in her teeth.

“Oh, come on, it can’t hurt anybody. Are you all done eating? What do you say, kids?”

“Aren’t you supposed to have a round table?” asked Jack doubtfully.

“Not necessarily,” Mrs. Bryce told him. “This very table will do, if we clear away dinner and turn out the lights.”

There was a scramble to do as she suggested. Hearst turned to look at me sheepishly, and then I guess the humor of it got to him: an immortal being sitting in on a seance. He pressed his lips together to keep from grinning.

I shrugged, looking wise and ironic.

Marion came running back from the kitchen and took her place at table. “O.K.,” she yelled to the butler, and he flicked an unseen switch. The dining hall was plunged into darkness.

“Whadda we do now?” Connie asked breathlessly.

“Consider the utter darkness and the awful chill for a moment,” replied Mrs. Bryce in somber tones. “Think of the grave, if you are tempted to mock our proceedings. And now, if you are all willing to show a proper respect for the spirits—link hands, please.”

There was a creaking and rustling as we obeyed her. I felt Hearst’s big right hand enclose my left one. Lewis took my other hand. Good Lord, it’s dark in here, he transmitted.

So watch by infrared, I told him. I switched it on myself; the place looked really lurid then, but I had a suspicion about what was going to happen and I wanted to be prepared.

“Spirits of the unseen world,” intoned Mrs. Bryce. “Ascended ones! Pause in your eternal meditations and heed our petition. We seek enlightenment! Ah, yes, I begin to feel the vibrations—there is one who approaches us. Can it be? But yes, it is our dear friend Tcho-Tcho! Freed from her disguise of earthly flesh, she once again parts the veil between the worlds. Tcho-Tcho, I sense your urgency. What have you to tell us, dear friend? Speak!”

I think most of the people in the room anticipated some prankster barking at that point, but oddly enough nobody did, and in the strained moment of silence that followed Mrs. Bryce let her head sag forward. Then, slowly, she raised it again, and tilted it way back. She gasped a couple of times and then began to moan in a tiny falsetto voice, incoherent sounds as though she were trying to form words.

“Woooooo,” she wailed softly. “Woooo woo woo woo! Woo woooo!”

There were vibrations then, all right, from fourteen people trying to hold in their giggles. Mrs. Bryce tossed her head from side to side.

“Wooooo,” she went on, and Conqueror Worm sat up in her lap and pointed his snout at the ceiling and began to talk along with her in that way that dogs will, sort of wou-wou, wou-wou wou, and beside me Hearst was shaking with silent laughter. Mrs. Bryce must have sensed she was losing her audience, because the woo-woos abruptly began to form into distinct words:

“I have come back,” she said. “I have returned from the vale of felicity because I have unfinished business here. Creatures of the lower plane, there are spirits waiting with me who would communicate with you. Cast aside all ignorant fear. Listen for them!”

After another moment of silence Marion said, in a strangling kind of voice:

“Um—we were just wondering—can you tell us who any of us were in our past lives?”

“Yes…” Mrs. Bryce appeared to be listening hard. “There is one…she was born on the nineteenth day of April.”

Connie sat up straight and peered through the darkness in Mrs. Bryce’s direction. “Why, dat’s my boithday!” she said in a stage whisper.

“Yes…I see her in Babylon, Babylon that is fallen…yea, truly she lived in Babylon, queen of cities all, and carried roses to lay before Ishtar’s altar.”

“Jeez, can ya beat it?” Connie exclaimed. “I musta been a priestess or something.”

“Pass on now…I see a man, hard and brutal…he labors with his hands. He stands before towers that point at heaven…black gold pours forth. He has been too harsh. He repents…he begs forgiveness…”

I could see Gable gritting his teeth so hard the muscles in his jaws stood out. His eyes were furious. I wondered if she’d seen a photograph of his father in his luggage. Or had Mrs. Bryce scooped this particular bit of biographical detail out of a movie magazine?

Anyway he stubbornly refused to take the bait, and after a prolonged silence the quavery voice continued:

“Pass on, pass on…There is one here who has sailed the mighty oceans. I see him in a white cap…”

There was an indrawn breath from one of Hearst’s executives. Somebody who enjoyed yachting?

“Yet he has sailed the seven seas in another life…I see him kneeling before a great queen, presenting her with all the splendor of the Spanish fleet…this entity bore the name of Francis Drake.”

Rapacious little pirate turned cutthroat executive? Hey, it could happen.

“Pass on now…” I could see Mrs. Bryce turn her head slightly and peer in Lewis’s direction through half-closed eyes. “Oh, there is an urgent message…there is one here who pleads to speak…this spirit with his dark and smoldering gaze…he begs to be acknowledged without shame, for no true passion is shameful…he seeks his other self.”

Yikes! transmitted Lewis, horrified.

O.K. She wanted to convince us Rudolph Valentino was trying to say something? He was going to say something, all right. I didn’t care whether Lewis or Rudy were straight or gay or swung both ways, but this was just too mean-spirited.

I pulled my right hand free from Lewis’s and wriggled the left one loose from Hearst’s. He turned his head in my direction and I felt a certain speculative amusement from him, but he said nothing to stop me.

So here’s what Hearst’s surveillance cameras and Dictaphones recorded next: a blur moving through the darkness and a loud crash, as of cymbals. Tcho-Tcho’s voice broke off with a little scream.

Next there was a man’s voice speaking out of the darkness, but from way high up in the air where no mortal could possibly be—like on the tiny ledge above the wall of choir stalls. If you’d ever heard Valentino speak (like I had, for instance) you’d swear it was him yelling in a rage: “I am weary of lies! There is a thief here, and if what has been stolen is not returned tonight, the djinni of the desert will avenge. The punishing spirits of the afterlife will pursue! Do you DARE to cross me?”

Then there was a hiss and a faint smell of sulfur, and gasps and little shrieks from the assembled company as an apparition appeared briefly in the air: Valentino’s features, and who could mistake them? His mouth was grim, his eyes hooded with stern determination, just the same expression as Sheik Ahmed had worn advancing on Vilma Banky. Worse still, they were eerily pallid against a scarlet shadow. Somebody screamed, really screamed in terror.

The image vanished, there was another crash, and then a confused moment in which the servants ran in shouting and the lights were turned on.

Everybody was sitting where they had been when the lights had gone out, including me. Down at the end of the table, though, where nobody was sitting, one of Mr. Hearst’s collection of eighteenth-century silver platters was spinning around like a phonograph record.

Everyone stared at it, terrified, and the only noise in that cavernous place was the slight rattling as the thing spun slowly to a stop.

“Wow,” said the Hearst kid in awe. His father turned slowly to look at me. I met his eyes and pulled out a handkerchief. I was sweating again, but you would be, too, you know? And I used the gesture to drop the burnt-out match I had palmed.

“What the hell’s going on?” said Gable, getting to his feet. He stalked down the table to the platter and halted, staring at it.

“What is it?” said Jack.

Gable reached out cautiously and lifted the platter in his hands. He tilted it up so everybody could see. There was a likeness of Valentino smeared on the silver, in some red substance.

“Jeez!” screamed Connie.

“What is that stuff?” said Laurence. “Is it blood?”

“Is it ectoplasm?” demanded one of the executives.

Gable peered at it closely.

“It’s ketchup,” he announced. “Aw, for Christ’s sake.”

Everyone’s gaze was promptly riveted on the ketchup bottle just to Mr. Hearst’s right. Hard as they stared at it, I don’t think anybody noticed that it was five inches further to his right than it had been when the lights went out.

Or maybe Mr. Hearst noticed. He pressed his napkin to his mouth and began to shiver like a volcano about to explode, squeezing his eyes shut as tears ran down.

“P-P-Pops!” Marion practically climbed over the table to him, thinking he was having a heart attack.

“I’m O.K.—” He put out a hand to her, gulping for breath, and she realized he was laughing. That broke the tension. There were nervous guffaws and titters from everyone in the room except Cartimandua Bryce, who was pale and silent at her place. Conqueror Worm was still crouched down in her lap, trembling, trying to be The Little Dog Who Wasn’t There.

“Gee, that was some neat trick somebody pulled off!” said young Hearst.

Mrs. Bryce drew a deep breath and rose to her feet, clutching Conqueror Worm.

“Or—was it?” she said composedly. She swept the room with a glance. “If anyone here has angered the spirit of Rudolph Valentino, I leave it to his or her discretion to make amends as swiftly as possible. Mr. Hearst? This experience has taken much of the life force from me. I must rest. I trust you’ll excuse me?”

“Sure,” wheezed Hearst, waving her away.

She made a proudly dignified exit. I glanced over at Lewis, who stared back at me with wide eyes.

Nice work, he transmitted. I grinned at him.

I wouldn’t go off to your room too early, I advised. Give her time to put the script back.

O.K.

“Well, I don’t know about the rest of you,” Hearst said at last, sighing, “but I’m ready for some ice cream, after that.”

So we had ice cream and then went in to watch the movie, which was Dinner at Eight. Everybody stayed through to the end. I thought it was a swell story.


Lewis and I walked back to La Casa del Sol afterwards, scanning carefully, but nobody was lurking along the paths. No horrible little dog leaped out at me when I turned on the light in my room, either.

“It’s here,” I heard Lewis crowing.

“The script? Safe and sound?”

“Every page!” Lewis appeared in my doorway, clutching it to his chest. “Thank God. I think I’ll sleep with it under my pillow tonight.”

“And dream of Rudy?” I said, leering.

“Oh, shut up.” He pursed his lips and went off to his room.

I relaxed on my bed while I listened to him changing into his pajamas, brushing his teeth, gargling and all the stuff even immortals have to do before bedtime. He climbed into bed and turned out the light, and maybe he dreamed about Rudy, or even Garbo. I monitored his brainwaves until I was sure he slept deeply enough. Time for the stuff he didn’t need to know about.

I changed into dark clothes and laced up the tennis shoes Hearst had loaned me. Opening my black case, I slid out its false bottom and withdrew the sealed prepackaged medical kit I’d been issued from the Company HQ in Hollywood before coming up here. With it was a matchbox-sized Hush Field Unit.

I stuck the Hush Unit in my pocket and slid the medical kit into my shirt. Then I slipped outside, and raced through the gardens of La Cuesta Encantada faster than Robin Goodfellow, or even Evar Swanson, could have done it.

The only time I had to pause was at the doorway on the east terrace, when it took me a few seconds to disable the alarm and pick the lock; then I was racing round and round up the staircase, and so into Hearst’s private rooms.

I had the Hush Field Unit activated before I came anywhere near him, and it was a good thing. There was still a light on in his bedroom. I tiptoed in warily all the same, hoping Marion wasn’t there.

She wasn’t. She slept soundly in her own room on the other end of the suite. I still froze when I entered Hearst’s room, though, because Marion gazed serenely down at me from her life-sized nude portrait on the wall. I looked around. She kept pretty strange company: portraits of Hearst’s mother and father hung there too, as well as several priceless paintings of the Madonna and Child. I wondered briefly what the pictures might have to say to one another, if they could talk.

Hearst was slumped unconscious in the big armchair next to his telephone. Thank God he hadn’t been using it when the Hush Field had gone on, or there’d be a phone off the hook and a hysterical night operator sending out an alarm now. He’d only been working late, composing an editorial by the look of it, in a strong confident scrawl on a lined pad. His dachshund was curled up at his feet, snoring. I set it aside gently and, like an ant picking up a dead beetle, lifted Hearst onto his canopied bed. Then I turned on both lamps, stripped off Hearst’s shirt and took out the medical kit.

The seal hissed as I broke it, and I peeled back the film to reveal…

The wrong medical kit.

I stared into it, horrified. What was all this stuff? This wasn’t what I needed to do routine heart repair on a mortal! This was one of our own kits, the kind the Base HQ repair facilities stocked. I staggered backward and collapsed into Hearst’s comfy chair. Boy, oh boy, did I want some Pep-O-Mints right then.

I sat there a minute, hearing my own heart pounding in that big quiet house.

All right, I told myself, talented improvisation is your forte, isn’t it? You’ve done emergency surgery with less, haven’t you? Sure you have. Hell, you’ve used flint knives and bronze mirrors and leeches and…there’s bound to be something in that kit you can use.

I got on my feet and poked through it. O.K., here were some sterile Scrubbie Towelettes. I cleansed the area where I’d be making my incision. And here were some sterile gloves, great; I pulled those on. A scalpel. So far, so good. And a hemostim, and a skin plasterer, yeah, I could do this! And here was a bone laser. This was going to work out after all.

I gave Hearst a shot of metabolic depressant, opened him up, and set to work, telling myself that somebody was going to be in big trouble when I made my report to Dr. Zeus…

Hearst’s ribs looked funny.

There was a thickening of bone where I was having to use the laser, in just the places I needed to make my cuts. Old trauma? Damned old. Funny-looking.

His heart looked funny too. Of course, I expected that. Hearst had a heart defect, after all. Still, I didn’t expect the microscopic wired chip attached to one chamber’s wall.

I could actually taste those Pep-O-Mints now. My body was simulating the sensation to comfort me, a defense against the really amazing stress I was experiencing.

I glanced over casually at the medical kit and observed that there was an almost exact duplicate of the chip, but bigger, waiting for me in a shaped compartment. So were a bunch of other little implants.

Repairs and upgrade. This was the right kit after all.

I set down my scalpel, peeled off my gloves, took out my chronophase, and opened its back. I removed a small component. Turning to Hearst’s phone, I clamped the component to its wire and picked up the receiver. I heard weird noises and then a smooth voice informing me I had reached Hollywood HQ.

“This is Facilitator Joseph and what the hell is going on here?” I demanded.

“Downloading file,” the voice replied sweetly.

I went rigid as the encoded signal came tootling through the line to me. Behind my eyes flashed the bright images: I was getting a mission report, filed in 1862, by a Facilitator Jabesh…assigned to monitor a young lady who was a passenger on a steamer bound from New York to the Isthmus of Panama, and from there to San Francisco. She was a recent bride, traveling with her much older husband. She was two months pregnant. I saw the pretty girl in pink, I saw the rolling seas, I saw the ladies in their bustles and the top-hatted guys with muttonchop whiskers.

The girl was very ill. Ordinary morning sickness made worse by mal de mer? Jabesh—there, man in black, tipping his stovepipe hat to her—posing as a kindly doctor, attended her daily. One morning she fainted in her cabin and her husband pulled Jabesh in off the deck to examine her. Jabesh sent him for a walk around the ship and prepared to perform a standard obstetric examination on the unconscious girl.

Jabesh’s horrified face: almost into his hands she miscarried a severely damaged embryo. It was not viable. His frantic communication, next, on the credenza concealed in his doctor’s bag. The response: priority gold, with an authorization backed up by Executive Facilitator General Aegeus. The child was to live, at all costs. He was to make it viable. Why? Was the Company making certain that history happened as written again? But how could he save this child? With what? Where did he even start?

He downloaded family records. Here was an account of the husband having had a brother “rendered helpless” by an unspecified disease and dying young. Some lethal recessive? Nobody could make this poor little lump of flesh live! But the Company had issued a Priority Gold.

I saw the primitive stateroom, the basin of bloody water, Jabesh’s shirtsleeves rolled up, his desperation. The Priority Gold blinking away at him from his credenza screen.

We’re not bound by the laws of mortals, but we do have our own laws. Rules that are never broken under any circumstances, regulations that carry terrible penalties if they’re not adhered to. We can be punished with memory effacement, or worse.

Unless we’re obeying a Priority Gold. Or so rumor has it.

Jabesh repaired the thing, got its heart-bud beating again. It wasn’t enough. Panicked, he pulled out a few special items from his bag (I had just seen one of them) and did something flagrantly illegal: he did a limited augmentation on the embryo. Still not enough.

So that was when he rolled the dice, took the chance. He did something even more flagrantly illegal.

He mended what was broken on that twisted helix of genetic material. He did it with an old standard issue chromosome patcher, the kind found in any operative’s field repair kit. They were never intended to be used on mortals, let alone two-month-old embryos, but Jabesh didn’t know what else to do. He set it on automatic and by the time he realized what it was doing, he was too late to stop the process.

It redesigned the baby’s genotype. It surveyed the damage, analyzed what was lacking, and filled in the gaps with material from its own preloaded DNA arsenal. It plugged healthy chromosome sequences into the mess like deluxe Tinkertoy units until it had an organism with optimal chances for survival. That was what it was programmed to do, after all. But it had never had to replace so much in a subject, never had to dig so deeply into its arsenal for material, and some of the DNA in there was very old and very strange indeed. Those kits were first designed a hundred thousand years ago, after all, when Homo sapiens hadn’t quite homogenized.

By the time the patcher had finished its work, the embryo had been transformed into a healthy hybrid of a kind that hadn’t been born in fifty millennia, with utterly unknown potential.

I could see Jabesh managing to reimplant the thing and get the girl all tidy by the time her gruff husband came back. He was telling the husband she needed to stay off her feet and rest, he was telling him that nothing in life is certain, and tipping his tall hat, good day, sir, and staggering off to sit shaking in his cabin, drinking bourbon whiskey straight out of a case bottle without the least effect.

He knew what he’d done. But Jabesh had obeyed the Priority Gold.

I saw him waiting, afraid of what might happen. Nothing did, except that the weeks passed, and the girl lost her pallor and became well. I could see her crossing at Panama—there was the green jungle, there was the now visibly pregnant mother sidesaddle on a mule—and here she was disembarking at San Francisco.

It was months before Jabesh could summon the courage to pay a call on her. Here he was being shown into the parlor, hat in hand. Nothing to see but a young mother dandling her adored boy. Madonna and child, to the life. One laughing baby looks just like another, right? So who’d ever know what Jabesh had done? And here was Jabesh taking his leave, smiling, and turning to slink away into some dark corner of history.

The funny thing was, what Jabesh had done wasn’t even against the mortals’ law. Yet. It wouldn’t become illegal until the year 2093, because mortals wouldn’t understand the consequences of genetic engineering until then.

But I understood. And now I knew why I’d wanted to turn tail and run the moment I’d laid eyes on William Randolph Hearst, just as certain dogs cowered at the sight of me.

The last images flitted before my eyes, the baby growing into the tall youth with something now subtly different about him, that unearthly voice, that indefinable quality of endlessly prolonged childhood that would worry his parents. Then! Downloaded directly into my skull before I could even flinch, the flashing letters: priority gold. repair and upgrade. Authorized by Facilitator General Aegeus, that same big shot who’d set up Jabesh.

I was trapped. I had been given the order.

So what could I do? I hung up the phone, took back my adapter component, pulled on a fresh pair of gloves, and took up my scalpel again.

How bad could it be, after all? I was coming in at the end of the story, anyway. Eighteen more years weren’t so much, even if Hearst never should have existed in the first place. Any weird genetic stuff he might have passed on to his sons seemed to have switched off in them. And, looking at the big picture, had he really done any harm? He was even a decent guy, in his way. Too much money, enthusiasm, appetite for life, an iron will, and unshakable self-assurance…and a mind able to think in more dimensions than a human mind should. O.K., so it was a formula for disaster.

I knew, because I remembered certain men with just that kind of zeal and ability. They had been useful to the Company, back in the old days before history began, until they had begun to argue with Company policy. Then the Company had had a problem on its hands, because the big guys were immortals. Then the Company had had to fight dirty, and take steps to see there would never be dissension in its ranks again.

But that had been a long time ago, and right now I had a Priority Gold to deal with, so I told myself Hearst was human enough. He was born of woman, wasn’t he? There was her picture on the wall, right across from Marion’s. And he had but a little time to live.

I replaced the old tired implants with the fresh new ones and did a repair job on his heart that ought to last the required time. Then I closed him up and did the cosmetic work, and got his shirt back on his old body.

I set him back in his chair, returned the editorial he had been writing to his lap, set the dog at his feet again, gathered up my stuff, turned off the opposite lamp, and looked around to see if I’d forgotten anything. Nope. In an hour or so his heart would begin beating again and he’d be just fine, at least for a few more years.

“Live forever, oh king,” I told him sardonically, and then I fled, switching off the hush field as I went.

But my words echoed a little too loudly as I ran through his palace gardens, under the horrified stars.


Hearst watched, intrigued, as Lewis slid the Valentino script behind the panel in the antique cabinet. With expert fingers Lewis worked the panel back into its grooves, rocking and sliding it gently, until there was a click and it settled into the place it would occupy for the next four centuries.

“And to think, the next man to see that thing won’t even be born for years and years,” Hearst said in awe. He closed the front of the cabinet and locked it. As he dropped the key in his waistcoat pocket, he looked at Lewis speculatively.

“I suppose you’re an immortal too, Mr. Kensington?” he inquired.

“Well—yes, sir, I am,” Lewis admitted.

“Holy Moses. And how old are you?”

“Not quite eighteen hundred and thirty, sir.”

“Not quite! Why, you’re no more than a baby, compared to Mr. Denham here, are you?” Hearst chuckled in an avuncular sort of way. “And have you known many famous people?”

“Er—I knew Saint Patrick,” Lewis offered. “And a lot of obscure English novelists.”

“Well, isn’t that nice?” Mr. Hearst smiled down at him and patted him on the shoulder. “And now you can tell people you’ve known Greta Garbo, too.”

“Yes, sir,” said Lewis, and then his mouth fell open, but Hearst had already turned to me, rustling the slip of paper I had given him.

“And you say my kitchen staff can mix this stuff up, Mr. Denham?”

“Yeah. If you have any trouble finding all the ingredients, I’ve included the name of a guy in Chinatown who can send you seeds and plants mail-order,” I told him.

“Very good,” he said, nodding. “Well, I’m sorry you boys can’t stay longer, but I know what those studio schedules are like. I imagine we’ll run into one another again, though, don’t you?”

He smiled, and Lewis and I sort of backed out of his presence salaaming.

Neither one of us said much on the way down the mountain, through all those hairpin turns and herds of wild animals. I think Lewis was scared Hearst might still somehow be able to hear us, and actually I wouldn’t have put it past him to have managed to bug the Model A.

Myself, I was silent because I had begun to wonder about something, and I had no way to get an answer on it.

I hadn’t taken a DNA sample from Hearst. It wouldn’t have been of any use to anybody. You can’t make an immortal from an old man, because his DNA, no matter how unusual it is, has long since begun the inevitable process of deterioration, the errors in replication that make it unusable for a template.

This is one of the reasons immortals can only be made from children, see? The younger you are, the more bright and new-minted your DNA pattern is. I was maybe four or five when the Company rescued me, not absolute optimum for DNA but within specs. Lewis was a newborn, which is supposed to work much better. Might fetal DNA work better still?

That being the case…had Jabesh kept a sample of the furtive work he’d done, in that cramped steamer cabin? Because if he had, if Dr. Zeus had it on file somewhere…it would take a lot of work, but the Company might meet the terms of William Randolph Hearst.

But they wouldn’t actually ever really do such a thing, would they?

We parked in front of the general store in San Simeon and I bought five rolls of Pep-O-Mints. By the time we got to Pismo Beach I had to stop for more.