"You"re feeling the emotion of the creatures on the stage," Kelexel said. "If it"s too strong, reduce it by turning this control to your left." He moved a dial on the chair arm. The excitement ebbed.
"Is it real?" she asked.
The mob was a wash of colors in antique styles -- blues, flutters of red, dirty rags on arms and feet, rare glitters of b.u.t.tons or emblems, tricorne hats on some of the men, red c.o.c.kades. There was an odd familiarity about the scene that inflicted Ruth with an abrupt feeling of fear. Her body came alive to tom-tom pulse-beats from some fire-flickering past. She sensed driving rhythms of drums within herself.
"Is it real?" she demanded, raising her voice this time.
The mob was running now, feet thudding. Brown feet winked under the long dresses of the women.
"Real?" Kelexel asked. "What an odd question. It"s . . . perhaps real in a sense. It happened to natives such as yourself. Real -- how strange. That idea has never concerned me."
The mob ran through a park now. Kelexel bent over Ruth"s shoulder, sharing the aura of the sensimesh web. There came a wet smell of gra.s.s, evergreens with their resin pungency, the sweaty stink of the natives in their exertions. Stage center focused down onto the running legs. They rushed past with a scissoring urgency, across brown paths, gra.s.s, disturbing yellow petals in a flower border. Wet wind, busy feet, crushed petals -- there was fascination in the movement.
Viewpoint drew back, back, back. A cobbled street, high stone walls came into stage center. The mob raced toward the gray stained walk. Steel flashed in their midst now.
"They appear to be storming a citadel," Kelexel said.
"The Bastille," Ruth whispered. "It"s the Bastille."
The recognition held her hypnotized. Here was the actual storming of the Bastille. No matter the present date, here in front of her senses it was July 14, 1789, with an organized movement of soldiery sweeping in from the right of the mob. There was the clatter of hooves on stone, gun carriages rumbling, hoa.r.s.e shouts, curses. The pantovive"s translator rendered them faithfully into English because she had asked for it in English.
Ruth gripped the arms of her chair.
Abruptly, Kelexel reached forward, depressed a gray key at her left. The scene faded.
"I remember that one well," he said. "One of Fraffin"s more successful productions." He touched Ruth"s hair. "You understand how it works now? Focusing here." His hand came forward, demonstrating. "Intensity here. It"s quite simple to operate and should provide you many hours of enjoyment."
Enjoyment? Ruth thought.
Slowly, she turned, looked up at Kelexel. There was a lost sense of horror in her eyes. The storming of the Bastille: a Fraffin production!
Fraffin"s name was known to her. Kelexel had explained the workings of the storyship.
Until this moment, she hadn"t begun to plumb the implications behind that label.
Storyship.
"Duties call me elsewhere at the moment," Kelexel said. "I"ll leave you to the enjoyment of your pantovive."
"I . . . thought you were going to . . . stay," she said. Suddenly, she didn"t want to be alone with this machine. She recognized it as an attractive horror, a thing of creative reality that might open a h.o.a.rd of locked things which she couldn"t face. She felt that the reality of the pantovive might turn into flames and scorch her. It was wild, potent, dangerous and she could never control it nor chain her own desires to use it.
Ruth took Kelexel"s hand, forced a smile onto her face. "Please stay."
Kelexel hesitated. The invitation in his pet"s face was obvious and attractive, but Ynvic, fitting Ruth to the pantovive, had sent a new train of ideas coursing through his mind. He felt the stirrings of responsibility, his duty to the Investigation. Ynvic, the oddly stolid and laconic shipsurgeon, yes -- she might just be the weak spot in Fraffin"s organization. Kelexel felt the need to test this new avenue.
"I"m sorry," he said, "but I must leave. I"ll return as soon as possible."
She saw she couldn"t move him and she dropped back, faced the raw temptation which was this machine. There came the sounds of Kelexel leaving and she was alone with the pantovive.
Presently, she said: "Current story in progress, latest production." She depressed the proper keys.
The oval stage grew almost dark with little star glimmers of yellow along its edges. A dot of blue light appeared at the center of focus, flickered, washed white and suddenly there was a man standing at a mirror shaving with a straightedge razor. She gasped with recognition. It was Anthony Bondelli, her father"s attorney. She held her breath, trying to still a terrifying sense of eavesdropping.
Bondelli stood with his back to her, his face visible as a reflection in the mirror. It was a deeply tanned face with two wings of smooth black hair sweeping back from a high, thin forehead. His nostrils flared above a pencil-line mustache and small mouth. The chin was broad, out of proportion with the narrow features, a fact she had noted before. He radiated a feeling of sleepy complacency.
And indistinct shouting began to dominate the scene. Bondelli paused in his shaving, turned and called through an open doorway on his right: "What th" h.e.l.l"s all that noise?" He resumed shaving, muttered: "Always turn that d.a.m.n" TV too loud."
Ruth grew conscious of odors in the scene -- a wet smell of shaving soap and over that the pervasive aroma of frying bacon. The realism held her rigid in her chair. She felt herself breathing quietly lest Bondelli turn and find her spying.
Presently, a woman in a bold Chinese-pattern dressing gown appeared in the bathroom doorway. She held her hands rigidly clasped in front of her bosom:
In a sudden premonition, Ruth wanted to turn off the pantovive, but her muscles refused to obey. She knew the woman in the dressing gown: Marge Bondelli, a pleasantly familiar figure with braided blonde hair pinned back from her round face. That face was contorted now in shock.
"Tony!" she said.
Bondelli pulled the razor slowly down beneath his jaw, taking care at the pattern of deep creases which ran from the sides of his jaw down along his neck. "Whuzzit?"
The television still could be heard in the background, a muted sense of conversation. Bondelli pulled the razor slowly upward. A look of glazed shock dominated his wife"s blue eyes. She said: "Joe Murphey killed Adele last night!"
"Ouch!" A thin line of red appeared on Bondelli"s neck. He ignored it, splashed the razor down into the washbasin, whirled.
Ruth felt herself trembling uncontrollably. It"s just like a movie, she told herself. This isn"t really happening right now. Pain in her chest made it difficult to breathe. My mother"s death is a Fraffin Production!
"That terrible sword," Bondelli"s wife whispered.
Bondelli thrust himself away from the washbasin, pa.s.sed his wife, went into the living room and stood before the television.
Ruth felt herself drawn into his wake, a partic.i.p.ant, sharing the horror and shock which radiated from the Bondellis as the pantovive amplified her own emotions. The television announcer was recapping the story, using still photographs taken by the town"s own newspaper photographer. Ruth stared at the photographs -- her mother"s face, her father"s . . . diagrams with white X"s and arrows. She willed herself to turn away from this horror, could not move.
Bondelli said: "Never mind my breakfast. I"m going down to the office."
"You"re bleeding," his wife said. She had brought a styptic pencil from the bathroom. She dabbed at the cut on his neck. "Hold still. It"ll get all over your collar." She pushed up his chin. "Tony . . . you stay out of this. You"re not a criminal lawyer."
"But I"ve handled Joe"s law ever since he . . . Ouch! d.a.m.n it, Marge, that stings!"
"Well, you can"t go out bleeding like that," She finished, put the pencil beside the washbasin. "Tony, I"ve a funny feeling . . . don"t get involved."
"I"m Joe"s lawyer. I"m already involved."
Abruptly, Ruth found control of her muscles. She slapped the pantovive shutoff, leaped to her feet, pushing herself away from the machine.
My mother"s murder something to amuse the Chem!
She whirled away, strode toward the bed. The bed repelled her. She turned her back on it. The casual way Kelexel had left her to discover this filled her with terrified anger. Surely he must"ve known she"d find out. He didn"t care! No, it was worse than that: he hadn"t even thought about it. The whole thing was of no concern to him. It was beneath his attention. It was less than not caring. It was disdain, repellant . . . hateful . . .
Ruth looked down, found she was wringing her hands. She glanced around the room. There must be some weapon here, anything with which to attack that hideous . . . Again, she saw the bed. She thought of the golden ecstasy there and suddenly hated her own body. She wanted to tear her flesh. Tears started from her eyes. She strode back and forth, back and forth.
I"ll kill him!