The COMPLEAT Collected SFF Works, page 185
ROSS AWOKE and, as he had done three years and an eternity ago, began to exercise painfully by crawling about on the floor. The air smelled fresh and cool and there was no sign of Sister or anyone else. He ate, exercised and ate again. Almost by accident he discovered the sliding door which opened into a compartment which contained a large circular picture of the branch of a tree. There was a startling illusion of depth to the picture, and when he moved closer to examine the odd, feathery leaves he discovered that it wasn't a picture at all.
He left the tiny ship and stumbled through a carpet of grass patterned by weeds and bushes which had never grown on Earth. He breathed deeply, through his nose so as to hold the scent of growing things for as long as possible, and his pulse hammered so loudly in his ears that he thought that he might prove once and for all if it was possible to die from sheer joy. It was only slowly that sounds began to register; leaves rustling, insect noises, the swish of passing cars and the thump of waves on a beach. Five minutes took him to the edge of the sea.
There was nothing strange about the sand or the sky or the waves, except that he had never expected to see such things again. But the group of people lying on the beach were alien. It was a subtle alien-ness which, Ross now realized he had been prepared for by the reproductions in his palace—an underlying greenish tinge to their otherwise normal skin coloring. And even at this distance he could see that the people sprawling on their brightly colored bath towels might all have been close relatives of Alice ...
The implications were too vast for him to grasp all at once. He swallowed a couple of times, then said simply, "Thank you, Sister."
A silent, invisible globe of force which hovered protectively above his head bobbed once in acknowledgment. Sister had evaluated the situation and had long ago decided that allowing the Master to think that all the robots had died would be the kindest thing to do.
Ross walked slowly toward the bathers, knowing somehow that he had nothing to fear. There might be language difficulties at first, misunderstandings, even unpleasantness, but they did not look the sort of people who would hurt anyone simply for being a stranger. They didn't seem ... warlike.
They were different, of course, but not much. You wouldn't mind if your sister married one of them.
Come to think of it, he thought, you wouldn't mind marrying one yourself.
The End
Counter Security
Fantasy & Science Fiction – February 1963
Who is it that mutilates dolls, spits on stairs, steals tools from sealed cases, and slowly fills with a sense of peril the lonely and treasure-filled reaches of a department store at night?
THE OBJECT lying on Mr. Steele's desk was the remains of a large, black plastic doll, Tully saw as he took the chair which the Store Manager indicated to him. The doll had lost a leg and both arms, one eye socket was empty and the nose had been pulled out of shape. There were also patches of hair missing from the scalp, and a narrow band of spotted material—the collar of the doll's dress, no doubt—still encircled its neck. Altogether it was an intriguing and rather pitiable object, Tully thought, but hardly the sort of thing to cause the Store Manager to send for the night security man as soon as he came on duty.
Tully was about to voice his curiosity when Steele's receptionist announced Tyson of Hardware and Dodds, the Toy buyer. The SM waited until they had stopped moving in their chairs, then cleared his throat and began to speak.
"In the ordinary way, Mr. Tully," he said in his soft, unhurried voice, "all cases of malicious damage to stock by members of the staff are dealt with by the departmental Buyer or floor supervisor and are not usually the concern of the night security people. Neither, I might add, are they the direct concern of the Store Manager, since I have slightly more important matters to occupy me."
His tone became gently sarcastic and he looked pointedly at the Toy buyer who looked at the carpet.
"... However," he went on, "this seems to be an unusual case, in that neither Mr. Dodds or the supervisor on that floor have been able to do anything beyond establishing the fact that these occurences do not take place during shop hours. Meanwhile the Toy department is being terrorised by an epidemic of armless dolls—"
"That sounds like an exaggeration," Dodds broke in quickly, strong emotion doubling the volume of his naturally loud voice, "but believe me it isn't! My staff are all girls, some of them coloured, and this sort of thing ..."
The SM silenced Dodds with a coldly disapproving look. Mr. Steele detested all unnecessary noises. He liked to think of his Store as an efficient, smoothly-running machine and he was fond of reminding people that any part of it which operated loudly rendered its efficiency suspect.
"The retail value of the dolls is of no importance," Steele resumed. "What concerns us is the way in which the culprit can do such damage without being caught. That and the bad effect it is having on the Toy department staff. On the surface it looks like a practical joke, but—"
"A joke!" Dodds burst out. "I tell you my girls are terrified! At first they treated it as a joke, but then they kept finding them nearly every morning and the rumour started that there was a psychopath loose in the Store ...!"
"Very well, Mr. Dodds," said the Store Manager irritably. "You tell it."
"... Just look at the facts!" the Toy buyer rushed on, plainly too excited to notice the danger signals flying on the other side of the desk. "During the past two weeks nine dolls in all have been mutilated like this. Nine black dolls. All had a leg and both arms pulled off, the hair twisted or pulled out, the faces disfigured and their dresses torn off. One or two such incidents might be attributed to simple malicious damage, but nine of them in two weeks points to something much more sinister ..."
Tully found himself looking at the doll, which no longer seemed such an innocent object, and thinking about the implications of the word mutilate as opposed to damage.
"... I'm not saying the rumour is true," Dodds went on, "but the facts support it. They point towards a perverted mind, a mind with some dreadful obsession about Negro dolls. I mean Negro girls ..."
Dodds stopped for breath and the Store Manager rejoined the conversation. He said, "Despite what you have just heard, Mr. Tully, we are not faced with a general walkout. But the rumour is causing trouble and I want it killed. The quickest way to do that will be to find out who is pulling these dolls apart, and that is where you come in ..."
It had already been established that whatever it was that happened was occurring outside of normal shop hours, Steele told him. The dolls were always found by staff arriving in the mornings, usually by the Cleaners, who were always first in. Either the culprit was someone, not necessarily a member of the staff, who was hiding in the store at night, or the Store was being broken into from the street. It was suggested that Mr. Tully keep a closer watch on the entrances to the Toy department ...
A that point Tully felt like reminding him that the Store was reputed to be burglar-proof from the ground up, that the Toy department occupied the basement and that to gain access to it from the street would call for a fairsized mining operation. He did not say anything, however, because the Store Manager knew these things as well as he did. And he noticed that the other had made no reference to his failure to notice anything peculiar going on during the past two weeks, when dolls must have been having their arms pulled off nearly every night. But now that the matter had been brought officially to his attention he knew that Steele would have plenty to say if he did not put a stop to it.
"... This is an odd business whose solution may require a certain amount of imagination," the SM said, his eyes flicking briefly towards the inch or so of magazine showing in Tully's jacket pocket, "but then I see that that is something with which you are well supplied. Have you any questions?"
Before Tully could reply, Dodds broke in again. "Sir, you didn't mention the—"
That was as far as he got. Furiously, but still quietly, Steele said, "Mr. Dodds, there are some misdemeanors committed in this store which I, or Mr. Tully here, are not obliged to investigate personally, and complaints of people spitting on the back staircase is one of them ...!"
More to take the heat off the loud-voiced but kindly Dodds than from any strong curiosity over the matter, Tully nodded towards the Hardware buyer and said, "What is Mr. Tyson's connection with this?"
"Eh? Oh, very slight," said Steele, regaining his composure with a visible effort. "He is having trouble with shortages. Some power tools, and a motorised lawn-mower, missing from packing cases which have the manufacturer's seals unbroken. There is some kind of hanky panky going on, but pilfering at this end is not suspected so it is not a matter for you. He may also have come to lend moral support to Mr. Dodds, who is going to need it ..."
He stood up suddenly, smiled and said, "Thank you, Mr. Tully." Then he began quietly to draw Dodds' attention to the Toy department's trading figures for the preceding week in comparison to the same week last year. This was a matter which Mr. Steele was obliged to investigate in person, and as Tully closed the office door softly behind him the inquisition was just beginning to warm up.
Tully walked slowly out onto the sales floor, trying to make his mind think in a positive and constructive manner and not succeeding at all. Around him stretched the polished, square ocean of the Hardware department with its bright display islands of Do-It-Yourself, electrical goods, refrigerators, et al. There were only a few customers about, it being only half an hour to closing time, and he decided to have a chat with the people in the Hardware stockroom. Steele had told him that the shortages did not concern him, but Tully disliked having his mind made up for him even when he knew that the other party was right.
A few minutes later he was getting all the details from Carswell, Tyson's assistant. Carswell was an extremely conscientious type who expected everybody else to be the same, and the fact that everybody else wasn't had had a bad effect on his disposition over the years.
"Either the packers were drunk or the maker is trying to pull a fast one," Carswell said hotly. Then tolerantly, for him, he went on, "There might be an excuse for three power-drills being missing from a case which was supposed to contain twenty—an error in packing, no doubt, because the maker's seals on the cases were unbroken. But when we told them about it they insisted that there was no error, that they had packed twenty power-drills and if their seals were intact then we had received and in due course would be billed for twenty power-drills. And the trouble is, we've been holding them in storage unopened for a couple of weeks, which weakens our case considerably ..."
Except where they had been severed by Carswell's wire-cutters the thin metal bands sealing the cases were in one piece, smooth and shining apart from a few tiny discoloured sections which looked as if they were beginning to rust. The packing inside had fallen to the bottom of the case, but there was a suggestion of shaping to it as if the case had contained something which had been taken out rather than that the packing had merely been pushed into an empty case. For several minutes Tully poked around in it without quite knowing why, and lifted a handful up to his nose. It smelled of dust and dry straw and, vaguely, of peppermint, he thought, before he nearly blew over the case with the grandaddy of all sneezes.
Tully left Hardware and took the elevator to the ground floor, intending to ask some questions in the Toy department while its Buyer was still engaged with the Store Manager—he felt that he would get a more valuable reaction if he talked to the staff without Dodds shouting everybody down. But at the top of the basement stairs he changed his mind. There was another possibility which he should try to eliminate first.
When he reached the Nurse's Office a few minutes later he coughed gently in the manner of one intent on signalling one's presence rather than displaying symptoms of a respiratory malfunction. Through the frosted glass door which separated the tiny waiting room from the dispensary proper he saw a white shadow approach and resolve itself into the Nurse as the door was opened.
She looked down at him, the soft brown eyes in her rather severe face scanning him automatically for signs of physical injury or distress, then she said quietly, "Good Afternoon, Mr. Tully. Is something troubling you?"
"Well ... yes." said Tully, standing up. He outlined what was troubling him, the Store Manager and a lot of other people, then ended awkwardly, "... Maybe I shouldn't ask this sort of question. I mean, what you find out or even guess at might be privileged information—I'm not sure what your position is in cases like this. But I was wondering if—"
"If," the Nurse broke in firmly, "there was anyone who came to see me who was as mentally disturbed as you and this rumour you mention suggests, I might or might not divulge his name. That would depend on the circumstances. I would, however, declare him unfit for work and immediately send him to his doctor, who would take over from there. I would not allow him to run around loose. Does that answer your question, Mr. Tully?"
"Thank you, Nurse," said Tully, and left.
The possibility of a Negro-hating psychopath among the staff was not completely eliminated, he thought as he resumed his journey to the Toy department; all the talk with Nurse had proved was that the psychopath, if there was one, had not revealed himself to her.
On his way down the basement stairs Tully was caught by a stampeding mass of chattering femininity on their way up. It was quitting time, which meant that he wouldn't be able to ask the Toy girls any questions today. His only possible source of information seemed to be Miss Barr, Dodd's assistant, who was still standing by the model railway display putting on her outdoor face.
But he learned very little from his talk with her. According to Miss Barr every doll had been found in the same condition—missing both arms, one leg, one eye, the nose pulled out of shape, hair disarranged and clothing, if the doll had been wearing any, ripped off. The only minor variation was that sometimes it was the right and sometimes the left eye that had been poked out, just as it could be the right or left leg that was missing. When she began to grow agitated and started repeating herself, a condition highly unusual in the competent and levelheaded Miss Barr, Tully made gentle reassuring noises, helped her on with her coat and said good-night.
When Tully was alone in the department he closed, bolted and locked the door at the top of the stairs, then he went on the prowl. His eyes missed nothing and he kept his lips pressed together so that he breathed in a long series of sniffs. This was routine, because his job required keen eyes and a very sensitive nose.
Few people realised that the Store, equipped as it was with the latest security devices and well covered by police patrols, was in no danger of being robbed, that the greatest and only danger was from fire. There was a sprinkler system installed, of course, which could be made so sensitive that a whole department could be instantly flooded—and its stock ruined, incidently—if someone switched on an electric fire. Or it could be made less sensitive so that a fire could gain an unbreakable hold which the spray from the ceiling would be unable to check. For despite its imposing facade the Store was one of the oldest buildings in the city, and much of its stock was even more inflammable than its structure.
So the primary job of the night security man was to guard against fire and the causes of fire. Every stockroom, locker room and cubbyhole—the only exceptions were the washrooms—had its No Smoking notices. But despite the eagle eyes of the Buyers and Floor Supervisors, the staff continued to sneak off for a smoke in all those places at every opportunity. Tully did not mind them smoking; the trouble arose when they were interrupted at it and were forced to hide the evidence quickly. They hid it in some very odd places, and the evidence smouldered sometimes for hours before Tully's nose led him to it and he rendered it safe.
On this occasion he was not simply looking for smouldering cigarette ends. He intended sealing the basement from outside and before he did so he had to be sure that there was nobody hiding in it. He looked behind and under every counter and display stand and with his Master opened every locker in the Toy staff room, and finally he was satisfied that the department was empty. He spent ten minutes then at the model railway display, taking the 4-6-2 tank loco around the layout and performing a few simple shunting operations, then he killed all the lights and headed for the Dugout.
The total floor area of the basement was only a fraction of that of the ground floor, it being merely two cellars joined by a narrow corridor. A floor plan of the basement resembled a dumb-bell with square weights, the square representing the Toy department being twice the size of the one enclosing the Dugout. In the middle of the corridor was a heavy swing door which was kept permanently dogged open. There were two lights in the corridor which he switched off as he passed them.
The Dugout was a large untidy room which served as the supply base and—unofficially—rest room for the cleaning staff. Drawn up in the centre of the room like some alien armoured division were the rubber-wheeled bogies which carried the electric polishers and vacuum cleaners, and ranged around the walls were storage cupboards filled with floor polish, liquid soap and an incredible quantity of rags, most of which were oily. Of all the places in the Store, this was the one in which a fire would be most likely to start. Tully searched and sniffed meticulously, as he did every night in this potential danger spot, but without finding either a hiding place or a trace of tobacco smoke. He gave a last look around, then mounted the ramp which replaced a stairway at this end to facilitate movement of the wheeled cleaners. He switched off the lights, then closed, locked and bolted the door from the outside.
An odd thing happened while he was locking the door. One of the keys in his bunch, the thin, lightweight Master for the Wages Office lockers, flipped up suddenly and stuck to the bar. A few minutes testing showed him that the bolt and surrounding casing of the Dugout door was strongly magnetised.
