Watson, Ian - Novel 10 by Deathhunter (v1.1) Read Free Book Online Page B

thought Jim.
                 “No
one else saw it?”
                 “Oh
believe me, I was cautious about asking! I dropped a few hints — ‘Is there a
mosquito in the room?’ ‘Is there a moth in here?’— but I didn’t want that on my records.
Then I began seeing it all the time, while people were about to die. Almost seeing it, but never quite. It was there, though. It
needed bringing out — like computer enhancement of a photograph. Yeah, it
needed focusing. Then one day I happened to be present when there was an
accident on the Bead way. Somehow an empty pod got detached. It fell right down
and crushed one fellow and badly injured another. It nearly got me! And I wish
it had! The first fellow died immediately, and I didn’t see anything beside
him. But the other fellow lingered on for five or ten minutes. The ambulance
was delayed. And I saw this thing arrive — the same thing that I saw in the euthanasia room. I almost saw it.”
                 So
Weinberger had decided that he was the Galileo of Death . . . But where was his
telescope, to see the mountains of the Moon? There couldn’t be one.
                 “What
did you plan to do with this corpse-sweat, as you call it? What was the big
scheme, which the crab aborted?”
                 Oddly,
Weinberger seemed to appreciate the almost brutal thrust of Jim’s question. He
was not quite as protective of his fantasy as Jim had imagined.
                 “Oh,
how we hid ourselves from death in the old days! How we sheltered! What a
wealth of resources we poured into shelters, once! Nuke shelters, right?”
                 “They’re
still okay for growing mushrooms in.”
                 “But
there’s another sort of hide, Jim.” Weinberger glanced up at the dead camera,
mounted under the ceiling. “That’s the photographer’s hide — to snap the bird
of death on the wing. I wasn’t just going to build a tripwire camera, though.
Oh no, I was a good deal more ambitious than that! I was going to build a cage
— to trap that bird and hold it. I know how to do it, Jim. I got started, too.
I almost finished. I can build ... a cage for Death.”
                 A Cage for Death.
                 “You’ll
have to give me time to think about that one, Nathan.”
                 “Be
my guest,” said Weinberger smugly — smug in the certainty that Jim could never
accept the notion?
                 Obviously,
if Jim resisted it, this would only serve to reinforce Weinberger’s fantasy. On
the other hand, if Jim encouraged it much further at this moment, it might well
bloom hysterically — giving Weinberger a massive set-back.
                 “It’s
a lot to take in at once.”
                 “Oh,
it is.”
                 Too,
Weinberger might feel that he had shown his whole hand prematurely. Then he
would resent Jim bitterly.
                 “I’d
rather like to check the literature for anything on the death pheromone.”
                 “You
won’t find a thing. I never did. I had to figure it all out myself.”
                 “There
could have been some hint, some minor insight, that cropped up since you left the House. Something that didn’t
warrant announcing or publicising because it couldn’t be properly demonstrated. There may be a record of it in Central Data.”
                 “Do
you honestly imagine anybody else even guessing there was a pheromone to look for?”
                 “I
think it’s unlikely.”
                 “I’ll
tell you why you won’t find anything new. It’s rather important to decide the
precise time of death, right? That’s why you monitor the ‘thanatos’ rhythm —
which I'd say is linked to the
pheromone output, but I don’t have the equipment to prove it. . . If anyone
else had found out