Idona wanted to talk about sex and did. Had I ever done this? Well, how about that? Did I like it? Did the lady like it? Was it true that two girls could do this to each other? How did I know? Had I watched? Well, didn’t I think it was all right for people to watch? Why not? And a whole lot more pretty much like that. Animals and dolls and she used to have a dildo made of walrus ivory. Mostly it had been better than the real thing, only it wasn’t warm and couldn’t kiss her.
Sometimes I told the truth and sometimes I did not, which was more fun. Of course I was storing up facts and notions all the time. Audrey had been good for sex most nights, but that was bound to stop sooner or later. When it did, would Ricci and Idona be around? And willing? Maybe so—and maybe not.
Ricci would be cozy and a lot of fun, but hard to get rid of if I ever wanted to get rid of her. Also she would make every guy who saw her jealous, which might get me in a lot of scrapes. Idona would be hell on wheels. Sometimes that means lots of fun in bed, but she would be hell on wheels twenty-four/seven.
Prof. Peggy Pepper’s flitter seated four, so Dr. Fevre, my patron, Chandra, and Prof. Peggy herself flew back in that. How the rest of us slept on the boat going back doesn’t really matter, but I am going to give it anyway in case you care. Audrey and I had Cabin One, up toward the bow and slept on the bunks there, just like two fully humans would. Ricci and Idona had Cabin Two, and Millie and Rose Cabin Three. None of which matters much.
The refrigerated bins were full of cadavers, and when I lay awake at night I used to wonder whether any of them were still a little bit alive, and whether those living ones were conscious sometimes or anyway semiconscious. I wanted to open the bins up and have a look, but the boat wouldn’t hear of it. Sure, I had chartered it originally, but I’d signed it over to Dr. Fevre and pocketed the refund. So he was the boss now and an old customer and whatever he said went.
Millie and Rose joined me at the rail the first morning when I was standing out there alone. All three of us kept quiet at first, looking at the sea and the sky. After a while Rose and Millie started talking, how beautiful it was and how grim, both at the same time.
So I said, “This is something you do on a boat when you’re out of sight of land—or anyway, that’s how it’s been for me. On land nobody does it.”
Rose shook her head. “You’ve spent both lives in the city, Ern. Farmers do. In the evening when they’re tired especially. They lean over on the fence and look up at the sky, the immensity of it and all the sun and rain, all the fog and snow, and all the winds and birds it holds. All the peaceful still days, and wilder storms than city people have ever seen.”
I asked whether she had lived on a farm.
“Yes, I did. I—I mean the first me—was a farmer’s daughter, just like the girl in a thousand dirty jokes.” Rose smiled, a secret, private smile. “I wrote and wrote when my mother thought I was doing my homework.”
Millie said, “You were, in a way.”
“I suppose. Then after I got out of school, I wrote when my folks were asleep. I wrote five books, and then the next one sold. That was Across Magic River. It sold, and I was so proud! But I didn’t tell my folks until I got the advance. Then I showed them. Nobody laughs at a writer with a check.”
I wanted to know if they had tried to take her money.
“No, but they told me how to spend it. No matter what they said, I never promised I would. I’d just nod and say I could see where that might be a good idea.” Rose laughed. “What I really did was buy a nice new dress that looked romantic and get my hair done, and have my picture taken. The publisher hadn’t asked for a picture, but I decided he might next time. He did, and I sent that one.”
I said I would like to see it.
“So would I. I haven’t seen it. Not this edition of me, I mean. I’ve looked in the library, looked every place I could think of.”
Millie said, “You should hire a detective. I know a good one, and he works cheap.”
“You mean Ern.”
“What you really need,” I told her, “is a librarian.”
Rose nodded thoughtfully. “We’re going back to that little library in Polly’s Cove, aren’t we?”
Millie said, “I’m sure you’re right.”
“It’s old,” I told Rose, “and small. Small libraries like that one often keep things that larger libraries would throw out.”
“Such as my books.”
“And mine.” I shrugged.
“Oh, they wouldn’t dare!” She was being kind, and I knew it and blessed her for it in my thoughts.
Millie said, “It’s not much of a life, being a library resource.”
Rose shook her head. “Don’t let them hear you say that. They’ll burn you.”
Millie ignored it. “Do you know what part I liked?”
I said, “I can’t guess. What was it?”
“Cooking with our hostess in that cozy cottage in the village. That’s what Dr. Fevre checked me out for, and of course the library would never have permitted it if they’d known.”
Rose said, “Must I tell what he got me for? Really, do either of you want me to?”
I said, “I’m not curious, Rose.”
“You mean you know already. He’s got Ricci and Idona for that now.”
Millie put in, “Plus Peggy, that fully human girl.”
“Plus Peggy. Right.”
“Which must be why Ricci and Idona are here on the boat with us.” Millie looked thoughtful. “He was afraid they’d make a scene.”
“Huh!” Rose was disgusted. “He’s afraid Idona will stick her knife in him.”
Later I remembered that conversation. It was not important, but I couldn’t have forgotten it if I had tried.
13
THE CHEAP DETECTIVE
We got back to Polly’s Cove almost a week later than Peggy and the Fevre family. Here I would stop writing if only I could pretend my adventure ended here. The rest gets spooky, and the one-armed edition of me—of your humble narrator, Ern A. Smithe—who cut his own throat was bad enough. Ever since I figured out what must have happened, I’ve known I may kill myself someday. I don’t like it, but I know it’s the truth. The thing that I will never do is leave a record like this incomplete. If I’m going to tell my story—and I have already told a lot of it—then I damn well ought to stay alive long enough to complete it.
So I’ll try. Here goes.
Chandra returned Audrey and me to the Polly’s Cove Public Library. We were both overdue, so there were fines to pay, but they were subtracted from the deposit and just shaved the edge.
Did we mind being returned? Audrey did and it showed, so Chandra kindly checked her out again. I was happy to be back on a library shelf. For years I had wanted to have a real adventure, something truly interesting, complicated, and astonishing, during all those quiet days when I had stood untouched and tried to remember the ins and outs of Shasta the Cougar or whatever.
All right, my adventures had come and they had been the real thing, but they were over and done with. Now it was time for me to think about them from 360 angles, how things had looked and how they had sounded. The smell of the sea, and the taste of the various things I’d eaten during those wildly shining days. Would I have put all of them in my books if I could? That was something I thought about a lot; you are holding the answer. I’ve been scribbling away, and I’m trying.