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Transcriber's Note:
This etext was produced from Amazing Science Fiction Stories April 1960.Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyrighton this publication was renewed.
_The little man stood in front of the monstrous machine as the synaptic drone heightened to a scream. No ... no, he whispered. Don't you understand...._
WE'RE FRIENDS, NOW
By HENRY HASSE
ILLUSTRATED by VARGA
* * * * *
Today more than other days Raoul Beardsley felt the burden, the draggingsense of inevitability. He frowned; he glanced at his watch; he leanedforward to speak to the copter pilot and then changed his mind. Hesettled back, and from idle habit adjusted his chair-scope to thefamiliar broad-spoked area of Washington just below.
"I'll _not_ have it happening again today!" he told himself grimly ...and at once his thoughts quavered off into many tangles ofself-reproach. "Blasted nonsense the way I've been acting. A _machine_,a damned gutless machine like that! Why do I persist in letting it getto me?"
He pondered that and found no solace. "Delusion," he snorted. "Hypersynapse-disorder ... that's how Jeff Arnold would explain _me_. I wishhe'd confine his diagnostics to the Mechanical Division where itbelongs! He's amused, they're all amused at me--but damn it they justdon't know!"
Beardsley's rotund body sagged at the thought. Adjusting thechair-scope, he fixed his gaze on the broad facade of Crime-CentralBuilding far across the city; again he felt the burgeoning embarrassmentand foreboding, but he put it down with an effort before it reached theedge of fear. _Not today_, he thought fiercely. _No, by God, I justwon't permit it to happen._
There. So! He felt much better already. And he had really made good timethis morning. Today of _all_ days he mustn't keep ECAIAC waiting.
Beardsley was the only one _not_ to panic when theinfallible machine broke down.]
Mustn't.... Something triggered in Beardsley, and he was assailed with aperverse rebellion at the thought.
* * * * *
Must not? But why not? Why shouldn't he just _once_ keep ECAIAC and JeffArnold and his clique stewing in their own tangle of tubes andelectronic juice? And wouldn't _this_, he gloated, be the perfect dayfor it! Arnold especially--just once to shatter that young man'scomplacent routine....
No. Beardsley savored the thought tastily, and let it trickle away, andthe look of glee on his cherubic face was gone. For too many years hisjob as serological "cooerdinator" (Crime-Central) had kept him pinned tothe concomitant routine. Pinned or crucified, it was all the same; incrime analysis as in everything these days, personal sense ofachievement had been too unsubtly annihilated. Recalling his justcompleted task--the Citizen Files and _persona-tapes_ and the endlessannotating--Beardsley felt himself sinking still further into that mireof futility that encompassed neither excitement nor particular pride.
He brought himself back with a grimace, aware that he was clutching thebriefcase of tapes possessively from long habit. The pilot had touchedthe news-stat, and abruptly one of the new "commerciappeals" grated onBeardsley's senses:
"... we repeat, yes, PROT-O-SUDS is now available in _flake_ or _cake_ orthe new attachable _luxury-spray_. Remember, PROT-O-SUDS has _never_ beenlaboratory-tested, it contains _no_ miracle ingredients, _no_ improvedscientific formula, and NO LANOLIN. Then what is the new PROT-O-SUDS? Itell you frankly, friends, it is nothing but a lot of pure soft soap!Remember ... we make no fabulous claims for PROT-O-SUDS ... we assume thatyou are reasonably clean to start with! And now for your late breakfastnews, PROT-O-SUDS takes you direct to the Central News Bureau for a finalsurvey on the Carmack murder case...."
Beardsley groaned. New voice in the background, while the screen presenteda slow montage. Cine-runs of the great Carmack himself, including those atthe International Cybernetics Congress a year ago ... survey of the murderscene, the Carmack mansion ... close-up of ECAIAC ... diagrammatic detailof ECAIAC ... then dramatically, the grim and imposing figure of GeorgeMandleco, Minister of Justice.
And then the news-caster's voice: "... certain that final processingwill go forward today. It would be a gross understatement to say thatthe Carmack Case has captured the attention of the nation, bothofficialdom and public alike! _Never_ in the history of Crime-Centralhas there been such an undercurrent of speculation and excitement...."
"Excitement?" murmured Beardsley.
"And now it is heightened, by no less an authority than the Minister ofJustice himself, who brought both plaudits and censure upon himselftoday with the outright statement that _deep-rooted political issues_may well be involved. As you must know by now, it was the murdered manhimself--Amos Carmack--who some years ago carried on the incessantlobbying that resulted in ECAIAC being accepted _pro bono publico_ byCrime-Central. What devastating irony! For now it is ECAIAC itself thatmust weigh each detail, correlate all factors, probe every motive andmachination leading to the _murder of its creator_...."
"That's not entirely true, you know," muttered Beardsley.
Quick flicker, again a close-up of ECAIAC, and the drama-laden voice:"ECAIAC! Electronic Analysis Integrator and Computor. And now--anexclusive! From a very reliable source this reporter has learned that_three Primes_ are involved...."
"Ha!" grated Beardsley.
"... and they will be broken down in quotient. Two must ultimately beeliminated--barring, of course, the possible emergence of any minorfactor to status of Prime, which at this stage seems unlikely. It isestimated that by today or tomorrow at the latest Carmack's murdererwill be brought to justice...."
Beardsley had taken as much as he could of this pseudo-factual mush. Hejerked forward violently, rapped the pilot on the shoulder. "DAMN IT!WILL YOU SHUT THE DAMN THING OFF!"
* * * * *
He was immediately appalled at his outburst, and by the pilot's startledglance, but the stat went off immediately.
Beardsley leaned back muttering to himself. Carmack, Carmack! For sevenweeks now he had lived with it intricately and intimately, as the caseshoved everything else right off the news-stat. People took the latestechoes to bed with them, commuters gobbled it with their breakfastcereal. Thank God today would see the end, and they could once more havethe hot South Polar crisis with their cereal.
* * * * *
Seven weeks! He clutched the bulging briefcase with a wearisome horror.Twenty-two persona-tapes from Central File, all neatly processed andready for ECAIAC. End result of the endless chart sifts, emphasis (asalways!) on parietosomatic recession, the slow emergence of minorconstants, the inexorable trend toward Price Factor and then_verification_, _verification_, to each his own, with all the subtle andshaded values of the Augment Index brought finally to focus on therelevance-graph _Carmack_.
Sure, thought Beardsley. A thing of augment-indexing and psych-tapes,quite without possibility of error. Now in the _old_ days of crimedetection--it might have taken them seven months instead of weeks, notto mention frustration and leg-work and false-leads and sweat, but--
His mouth pulled down bitterly. _Serological Cooerdinator. Glorifiedfile-clerk is more like it. High-salaried errand-boy._
"Here we are, sir!" The pilot's voice jarred him to reality as thecopter berthed.
Beardsley hurried toward the roof entrance. His faded blue suit, a sizetoo large, flapped about him, and the outmoded felt hat seemed to
sinkto the level of his thick-lensed glasses. The guard greeted him, butsuppressed a smile as the cherubic little man flashed his official pass.
For there was something about Raoul Beardsley that eternally evokedamusement--an air of vacuous innocence and a remote forlornness. He gavethe appearance of a person who sold shoes during the day, washed hiswife's dishes at night and then solved two or three galacti-gram puzzlesbefore turning off the light precisely at ten. Few, if any, rememberedthat this nervous little man had once been top Inspector of New YorkCity's Homicide Bureau ... but that was a dozen long years ago. Sincethen he had seen the antiquated detective methods of 1960 disappear, andhe had died a little, too, seeing his Homicide Bureau relegated to amere subsidiary with the growth of the Cooerdinate and MechanicalDivisions. His appointment to Chief of Co-oerdinants, Federal, wasautomatic and unquestioned; and Beardsley would have been