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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..59010a2 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #60664 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/60664) diff --git a/old/60664-h.zip b/old/60664-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 21537ec..0000000 --- a/old/60664-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/60664-h/60664-h.htm b/old/60664-h/60664-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 4f449c0..0000000 --- a/old/60664-h/60664-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1096 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=us-ascii" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Pipe Dream, by Fritz Leiber. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -div.titlepage { - text-align: center; - page-break-before: always; - page-break-after: always; -} - -div.titlepage p { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0em; - font-weight: bold; - line-height: 1.5; - margin-top: 3em; -} - -.ph1 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; font-weight: bold; } -.ph1 { font-size: large; margin: .83em auto; } - -.ph2 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } -.ph2 { font-size: medium; margin: .83em auto; } - -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Pipe Dream, by Fritz Leiber - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll -have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using -this ebook. - - - -Title: Pipe Dream - -Author: Fritz Leiber - -Release Date: November 10, 2019 [EBook #60664] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIPE DREAM *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/cover.jpg" width="344" height="500" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="titlepage"> -<h1>PIPE DREAM</h1> - -<h2>BY FRITZ LEIBER</h2> - -<p class="ph1"><i>Simon Grue found a two-inch mermaid in<br /> -his bathtub. It had arms, hips, a finny<br /> -tail, and (here the real trouble began)<br /> -a face that reminded him irresistibly<br /> -of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich....</i></p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Worlds of If Science Fiction, February 1959.<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>It wasn't until the mermaid turned up in his bathtub that Simon Grue -seriously began to wonder what the Russians were doing on the roof next -door.</p> - -<p>The old house next door together with its spacious tarpapered roof, -which held a sort of pent-shack, a cylindrical old water tank, and -several chicken-wire enclosures, had always been a focus of curiosity -in this region of Greenwich Village, especially to whoever happened -to be renting Simon's studio, the north window-cum-skylight of which -looked down upon it—if you were exceptionally tall or if, like Simon, -you stood halfway up a stepladder and peered.</p> - -<p>During the 1920's, old-timers told Simon, the house had been owned by -a bootlegger, who had installed a costly pipe organ and used the water -tank to store hooch. Later there had been a colony of shaven-headed -Buddhist monks, who had strolled about the roof in their orange and -yellow robes, meditating and eating raw vegetables. There had followed -a <i>commedia dell' arte</i> theatrical group, a fencing salon, a school of -the organ (the bootlegger's organ was always one of the prime renting -points of the house), an Arabian restaurant, several art schools and -silvercraft shops of course, and an Existentialist coffee house.</p> - -<p>The last occupants had been two bony-cheeked Swedish blondes who -sunbathed interminably and had built the chicken-wire enclosures to -cage a large number of sinister smoke-colored dogs—Simon decided they -were breeding werewolves, and one of his most successful abstractions, -"Gray Hunger", had been painted to the inspiration of an eldritch -howling. The dogs and their owners had departed abruptly one night in -a closed van, without any of the dogs ever having been offered for -sale or either of the girls having responded with anything more than a -raised eyebrow to Simon's brave greetings of "Skoal!"</p> - -<p>The Russians had taken possession about six months ago—four brothers -apparently, and one sister, who never stirred from the house but could -occasionally be seen peering dreamily from a window. A white card with -a boldly-inked "Stulnikov-Gurevich" had been thumbtacked to the peeling -green-painted front door. Lafcadio Smits, the interior decorator, told -Simon that the newcomers were clearly White Russians; he could tell it -by their bushy beards. Lester Phlegius maintained that they were Red -Russians passing as White, and talked alarmingly of spying, sabotage -and suitcase bombs.</p> - -<p>Simon, who had the advantages of living on the spot and having -been introduced to one of the brothers—Vasily—at a neighboring -art gallery, came to believe that they were both Red and White and -something more—solid, complete Slavs in any case, Double Dostoevsky -Russians if one may be permitted the expression. They ordered vodka, -caviar, and soda crackers by the case. They argued interminably (loudly -in Russian, softly in English), they went on mysterious silent errands, -they gloomed about on the roof, they made melancholy music with their -deep harmonious voices and several large guitars. Once Simon though -they even had the bootlegger's organ going, but there had been a bad -storm at the time and he hadn't been sure.</p> - -<p>They were not quite as tight-lipped as the Swedish girls. Gradually a -curt front-sidewalk acquaintance developed and Simon came to know their -names. There was Vasily, of course, who wore thick glasses, the most -scholarly-looking of the lot and certainly the most bibulous—Simon -came to think of Vasily as the Vodka Breather. Occasionally he could be -glimpsed holding Erlenmayer flasks, trays of culture dishes, and other -pieces of biological equipment, or absentmindedly wiping off a glass -slide with his beard.</p> - -<p>Then there was Ivan, the dourest of the four, though none of them save -Vasily seemed very amiable. Simon's private names for Ivan were the -Nihilist and the Bomber, since he sometimes lugged about with him a -heavy globular leather case. With it and his beard—a square black -one—he had more than once created a mild sensation in the narrow -streets of the Village.</p> - -<p>Next there was Mikhail, who wore a large crucifix on a silver chain -around his neck and looked like a more spiritual Rasputin. However, -Simon thought of him less as the Religious than as the Whistler—for -his inveterate habit of whistling into his straggly beard a strange -tune that obeyed no common harmonic laws. Somehow Mikhail seemed to -carry a chilly breeze around with him, a perpetual cold draught, so -that Simon had to check himself in order not to clutch together his -coat collar whenever he heard the approach of the eerie piping.</p> - -<p>Finally there was Lev, beardless, shorter by several inches, and -certainly the most elusive of the brothers. He always moved at a -scurry, frequently dipping his head, so that it was some time before -Simon assured himself that he had the Stulnikov-Gurevich face. He -did, unmistakably. Lev seemed to be away on trips a good deal. On his -returns he was frequently accompanied by furtive but important-looking -men—a different one on each occasion. There would be much bustle at -such times—among other things, the shades would be drawn. Then in a -few hours Lev would be off again, and his man-about-town companion too.</p> - -<p>And of course there was the indoors-keeping sister. Several times Simon -had heard one of the brothers calling "Grushenka", so he assumed that -was her name. She had the Stulnikov-Gurevich face too, though on her, -almost incredibly, it was strangely attractive. She never ventured on -the roof but she often sat in the pent-shack. As far as Simon could -make out, she always wore some dark Victorian costume—at least it -had a high neck, long sleeves, and puffed shoulders. Pale-faced in -the greenish gloom, she would stare for hours out of the pent-shack's -single window, though never in Simon's direction. Occasionally she -would part and close her lips, but not exactly as if she were speaking, -at least aloud—he thought of calling her the Bubble Blower. The effect -was as odd as Mikhail's whistling but not as unpleasant. In fact, Simon -found himself studying Grushenka for ridiculously long periods of time. -His mild obsession began to irk him and one day he decided henceforth -to stay away altogether from his north window and the stepladder. As a -result he saw little of the alterations the Russians began to make on -the roof at this point, though he did notice that they lugged up among -other things a length of large-diameter transparent plastic piping.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>So much for the Russians, now for the mermaid. Late one night Simon -started to fill his bathtub with cold water to soak his brushes -and rags—he was working with a kind of calcimine at the time, -experimenting with portable murals painted on large plaster-faced -wooden panels. Heavily laden, he got back to the bathroom just in time -to shut off the water—and to see a tiny fish of some sort splashing -around in it.</p> - -<p>He was not unduly surprised. Fish up to four or five inches in length -were not unheard-of apparitions in the cold-water supply of the area, -and this specimen looked as if it displaced no more than a teaspoon of -water.</p> - -<p>He made a lucky grab and the next moment he was holding in his firmly -clenched right hand the bottom half of a slim wriggling creature hardly -two inches long—and now Simon was surprised indeed.</p> - -<p>To begin with, it was not greenish white nor any common fish color, -but palely-pinkish, flesh-colored in fact. And it didn't seem so much -a fish as a tadpole—at least its visible half had a slightly oversize -head shaped like a bullet that has mushroomed a little, and two tiny -writhing arms or appendages of some sort—and it felt as if it had -rather large hips for a fish or even a tadpole. Equip a two-months -human embryo with a finny tail, give it in addition a precocious -feminine sexiness, and you'd get something of the same effect.</p> - -<p>But all that was nothing. The trouble was that it had a face—a tiny -face, of course, and rather goggly-ghostly like a planarian's, but a -face nevertheless, a human-looking face, and also (here was the real -trouble) a face that bore a grotesque but striking resemblance to that -of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich.</p> - -<p>Simon's fingers tightened convulsively. Simultaneously the slippery -creature gave a desperate wriggle. It shot into the air in a high curve -and fell into the scant inch of space between the bathtub and the wall.</p> - -<p>The next half hour was hectic in a groveling sort of way. Retrieving -anything from behind Simon's ancient claw-footed bathtub was a most -difficult feat. There was barely space to get an arm under it and at -one point the warping of the floor boards prevented even that. Besides, -there was the host of dust-shrouded objects it had previously been too -much trouble to tease out—an accumulation of decades. At first Simon -tried to guide himself by the faint flopping noises along the hidden -base of the wall, but these soon ceased.</p> - -<p>Being on your knees and your chest with an ear against the floor and -an arm strainingly outstretched is probably not the best position to -assume while weird trains of thought go hooting through your head, but -sometimes it has to happen that way. First came a remembered piece -of neighborhood lore that supported the possibility of a connection -between the house next door and the tiny pink aquatic creature now -suffering minute agonies behind the bathtub. No one knew what ancient -and probably larceny-minded amateur plumber was responsible, but the -old-timers assured Simon there was a link between the water supply of -the Russians' house with its aerial cistern and that of the building -containing Simon's studio and several smaller apartments; at any -rate they maintained that there had been a time during the period -when the bootlegger was storing hooch in the water tank that several -neighborhood cold-water taps were dispensing a weak but nonetheless -authoritative mixture of bourbon and branch water.</p> - -<p>So, thought Simon as he groped and strained, if the Russians were -somehow responsible for this weird fishlet, there was no insuperable -difficulty in understanding how it might have gotten here.</p> - -<p>But that was the least of Simon's preoccupations. He scrabbled wildly -and unsuccessfully for several minutes, and then realizing he would -never get anywhere in this unsystematic manner, he began to remove the -accumulated debris piece by piece: dark cracked ends of soap, washrags -dried out in tortured attitudes, innumerable dark-dyed cigarette -stumps, several pocket magazines with bleached wrinkled pages, empty -and near-empty medicine bottles and pill vials, rusty hairpins, bobby -pins, safety pins, crumpled toothpaste tubes (and a couple for oil -paint), a gray toothbrush, a fifty-cent piece and several pennies, the -mummy of a mouse, a letter from Picasso, and last of all, from the dark -corner behind the bathtub's inside claw, the limp pitiful thing he was -seeking.</p> - -<p>It was even tinier than he'd thought. He carefully washed the dust and -flug off it, but it was clearly dead and its resemblance to Grushenka -Stulnikov-Gurevich had become problematical—indeed, Simon decided that -someone seeing it now for the first time would think it a freak minnow -or monstrous tadpole and nothing more, though mutation or disease had -obviously been at work. The illusion of a miniature mermaid still -existed in the tapering tail and armlike appendages, but it was faint. -He tried to remember what he knew about salamanders—almost nothing, -it turned out. He thought of embryos, but his mind veered away from the -subject.</p> - -<p>He wandered back into the studio carrying the thing in his hand. He -climbed the stepladder by the north window and studied the house -next door. What windows he could see were dark. He got a very vague -impression that the roof had changed. After he had strained his -eyes for some time he fancied he could see a faint path of greenish -luminescence streaming between the pent-shack and the water-tank, but -it was very faint indeed and might only be his vision swimming.</p> - -<p>He climbed down the stepladder and stood for a moment weighing the tiny -dead thing in his hand. It occurred to him that one of his friends at -the university could dig up a zoologist to pass on his find.</p> - -<p>But Simon's curiosity was more artistic than scientific. In the end he -twisted a bit of cellophane around the thing, placed it on the ledge -of his easel and went off to bed ... and to a series of disturbingly -erotic dreams.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Next day he got up late and, after breakfasting on black coffee, -gloomed around the studio for a while, picking things up and putting -them down. He glanced frequently at the stepladder, but resisted the -temptation to climb up and have another look next door. Sighing, he -thumbtacked a sheet of paper to a drawing board and half-heartedly -began blocking in a female figure. It was insipid and lifeless. -Stabbing irritably at the heavy curve of the figure's hip, he broke -his charcoal. "Damn!" he said, glaring around the room. Abandoning -all pretense, he threw the charcoal on the floor and climbed the -stepladder. He pressed his nose against the glass.</p> - -<p>In daylight, the adjoining roof looked bare and grimy. There was a big -transparent pipe running between the water tank and the shack, braced -in two places by improvised-looking wooden scaffolding. Listening -intently, Simon thought he could hear a motor going in the shack. The -water looked sallow green. It reminded Simon of those futuristic algae -farms where the stuff is supposed to be pumped through transparent -pipes to expose it to sunlight. There seemed to be a transparent top -on the water tank too—it was too high for Simon to see, but there -was a gleam around the edge. Staring at the pipe again, Simon got the -impression there were little things traveling in the water, but he -couldn't make them out.</p> - -<p>Climbing down in some excitement, Simon got the twist of cellophane -from the ledge of the easel and stared at its contents. Wild thoughts -were tumbling through his head as he got back up on the stepladder. -Sunlight flashed on the greenish water pipe between the tank and the -shack, but after the first glance he had no eyes for it. Grushenka -Stulnikov-Gurevich had her face tragically pressed to the window of -the shack. She was wearing the black dress with high neck and puffed -shoulders. At that moment she looked straight at him. She lifted her -hands and seemed to speak imploringly. Then she slowly sank from sight -as if, it horridly occurred to Simon, into quicksand.</p> - -<p>Simon sprang from his chair, heart beating wildly, and ran down the -stairs to the street. Two or three passersby paused to study him as he -alternately pounded the flaking green door of the Russians' house and -leaned on the button. Also watching was the shirt-sleeved driver of a -moving van, emblazoned "Stulnikov-Gurevich Enterprises," which almost -filled the street in front of the house.</p> - -<p>The door opened narrowly. A man with a square black beard frowned out -of it. He topped Simon by almost a head.</p> - -<p>"Yes?" Ivan the Bomber asked, in a deep, exasperated voice.</p> - -<p>"I must see the lady of the house immediately," Simon cried. "Your -sister, I believe. She's in danger." He surged forward.</p> - -<p>The butt of the Bomber's right palm took him firmly in the chest and he -staggered back. The Bomber said coldly, "My sister is—ha!—taking a -bath."</p> - -<p>Simon cried, "In that case she's drowning!" and surged forward again, -but the Bomber's hand stopped him short. "I'll call the police!" Simon -shouted, flailing his limbs. The hand at his chest suddenly stopped -pushing and began to pull. Gripped by the front of his shirt, Simon -felt himself being drawn rapidly inside. "Let go! Help, a kidnapping!" -he shouted to the inquisitive faces outside, before the door banged -shut.</p> - -<p>"No police!" rumbled the Bomber, assisting Simon upstairs.</p> - -<p>"Now look here," Simon protested futilely. In the two-story-high -living room to his right, the pipes of an organ gleamed golden from -the shadows. At the second landing, a disheveled figure met them, -glasses twinkling—Vasily the Vodka Breather. He spoke querulously in -Russian to Ivan, who replied shortly, then Vasily turned and the three -of them crowded up the narrow third flight to the pent-shack. This -housed a small noisy machine, perhaps an aerator of some sort, for -bubbles were streaming into the transparent pipe where it was connected -to the machine; and under the pipe, sitting with an idiot smile on a -chair of red plush and gilt, was a pale black-mustached man. An empty -clear-glass bottle with a red and gold label lay on the floor at his -feet. The opposite side of the room was hidden by a heavy plastic -shower curtain. Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich was not in view.</p> - -<p>Ivan said something explosive, picking up the bottle and staring at -it. "Vodka!" he went on. "I have told you not to mix the pipe and the -vodka! Now see what you have done!"</p> - -<p>"To me it seemed hospitable," said Vasily with an apologetic gesture. -"Besides, only one bottle—"</p> - -<p>Ducking under the pipe where it crossed the pent-shack, Ivan picked -up the pale man and dumped him crosswise in the chair, with his -patent-leather shoes sticking up on one side and his plump hands -crossed over his chest. "Let him sleep. First we must take down all -the apparatus, before the capitalistic police arrive. Now: what to do -with this one?" He looked at Simon, and clenched one large and hairy -fist.</p> - -<p>"<i>Nyet-nyet-nyet</i>," said the Vodka Breather, and went to whisper in -Ivan's ear. They both stared at Simon, who felt uncomfortable and began -to back toward the door; but Ivan ducked agilely under the pipe and -grasped him by the arm, pulling him effortlessly toward the roof exit. -"Just come this way if you please, Mr. Gru-<i>ay</i>," said Vasily, hurrying -after. As they left the shack, he picked up a kitchen chair.</p> - -<p>Crossing the roof, Simon made a sudden effort and wrenched himself -free. They caught him again at the edge of the roof, where he had -run with nothing clearly in mind, but with his mouth open to yell. -Suspended in the grip of the two Russians, with Ivan's meaty palm over -his mouth, Simon had a momentary glimpse of the street below. A third -bearded figure, Mikhail the Religious, was staring up at them from -the sunny sidewalk. The melancholy face, the deep-socketed tormented -eyes, and the narrow beard tangled with the dangling crucifix combined -to give the effect of a Tolstoy novel's dust-jacket. As they hauled -Simon away, he had the impression that a chilly breeze had sprung up -and the street had darkened. In his ears was Mikhail's distant, oddly -discordant whistling.</p> - -<p>Grunting, the two brothers set Simon down on the kitchen chair and slid -him across the roof until something hard but resilient touched the top -of his head. It was the plastic pipe, through which, peering upward, he -could see myriads of tiny polliwog-shapes flitting back and forth.</p> - -<p>"Do us a kindness not to make noise," said Ivan, removing his palm. "My -brother Vasily will now explain." He went away.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Curiosity as much as shock kept Simon in his chair. Vasily, bobbing -his head and smiling, sat down tailor-fashion on the roof in front -of him. "First I must tell you, Mr. Gru-<i>ay</i>, that I am specialist -in biological sciences. Here you see results of my most successful -experiment." He withdrew a round clear-glass bottle from his pocket and -unscrewed the top.</p> - -<p>"Ah?" said Simon tentatively.</p> - -<p>"Indeed yes. In my researches, Mr. Gru-<i>ay</i>, I discovered a chemical -which will inhibit growth at any level of embryonic development, -producing a viable organism at that point. The basic effect of -this chemical is always toward survival at whatever level of -development—one cell, a blastula, a worm, a fish, a four-legger. -This research, which Lysenko scoffed at when I told him of it, I had -no trouble in keeping secret, though at the time I was working as the -unhappy collaborator of the godless soviets. But perhaps I am being too -technical?"</p> - -<p>"Not at all," Simon assured him.</p> - -<p>"Good," Vasily said with simple satisfaction and gulped at his bottle. -"Meanwhile my brother Mikhail was a religious brother at a monastery -near Mount Athos, my Nihilist brother Ivan was in central Europe, -while my third brother Lev, who is of commercial talents, had preceded -us to the New World, where we always felt it would some day be our -destiny to join one another.</p> - -<p>"With the aid of brother Ivan, I and my sister Grushenka escaped from -Russia. We picked up Mikhail from his monastery and proceeded here, -where Lev had become a capitalist business magnate.</p> - -<p>"My brothers, Ivan especially, were interested in my research. He -had a theory that we could eventually produce hosts of men in this -way, whole armies and political parties, all Nihilist and all of them -Stulnikov-Gureviches. I assured him that this was impossible, that I -could not play Cadmus, for free-swimming forms are one thing, we have -the way to feed them in the aqueous medium; but to make fully developed -mammals placental nourishment is necessary—that I cannot provide. Yet -to please him I begin with (pardon me!) the egg of my sister, that was -as good a beginning as any and perhaps it intrigued my vanity. Ivan -dreamed his dreams of a Nihilist Stulnikov-Gurevich humanity—it was -harmless, as I told myself."</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus.jpg" width="331" height="500" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>Simon stared at him glassy-eyed. Something rather peculiar was -beginning to happen inside his head—about an inch under the point -where the cool water-filled plastic pipe pressed down on his scalp. -Little ghostly images were darting—delightfully wispy little -girl-things, smiling down at him impudently, then flirting away with a -quick motion of their mermaid tails.</p> - -<p>The sky had been growing steadily darker and now there came the growl -of thunder. Against the purple-gray clouds Simon could barely make out -the semi-transparent shapes of the polliwogs in the pipe over his head; -but the images inside his mind were growing clearer by the minute.</p> - -<p>"Ah, we have a storm," Vasily observed as the thunder growled again. -"That reminds me of Mikhail, who is much influenced by our Finnish -grandmother. He had the belief as a child that he could call up the -winds by whistling for them—he even learned special wind musics from -her. Later he became a Christian religious—there are great struggles -in him. Mikhail objected to my researches when he heard I used the -egg of my sister. He said we will produce millions of souls who are -not baptized. I asked him how about the water they are in, he replied -this is not the same thing, these little swimmers will wriggle in hell -eternally. This worried him greatly. We tried to tell him I had not -used the egg of my sister, only the egg of a fish.</p> - -<p>"But he did not believe this, because my sister changed greatly at -the time. She no longer spoke. She put on my mother's bathing costume -(we are a family people) and retired to the bathtub all day long. I -accepted this—at least in the water she is not violent. Mikhail said, -"See, her soul is now split into many unredeemed sub-souls, one each -for the little swimmers. There is a sympathy between them—a hypnotic -vibration. So long as you keep them near her, in that tank on the -roof, this will be. If they were gone from there, far from there, the -sub-souls would reunite and Grushenka's soul would be one again." He -begged me to stop my research, to dump it in the sea, to scatter it -away, but Lev and Ivan demand I keep on. Yet Mikhail warned me that -works of evil end in the whirlwind. I am torn and undecided." He gulped -at his vodka.</p> - -<p>Thunder growled louder. Simon was thinking, dreamily, that if the soul -of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich were split into thousands of sub-souls, -vibrating hynotically in the nearby water tank, with at least one of -them escaping as far as his bathtub, then it was no wonder if Grushenka -had a strange attraction for him.</p> - -<p>"But that is not yet the worst," Vasily continued. "The hypnotic -vibrations of the free-swimming ones in their multitude turn out to -have a stimulating effect on any male who is near. Their sub-minds -induce dreams of the piquant sort. Lev says that to make money for the -work we must sell these dreams to rich men. I protest, but to no avail."</p> - -<p>"Lev is maddened for money. Now besides selling the dreams I find he -plans to sell the creatures themselves, sell them one by one, but keep -enough to sell the dreams too. It is a madness."</p> - -<p>The darkness had become that of night. The thunder continued to growl -and now it seemed to Simon that it had music in it. Visions swam -through his mind to its rhythm—hordes of swimming pygmy souls, -of unborn water babies, migrations of miniature mermaids. The pipe -hanging between water tank and pent-shack became in his imagination -a giant umbilicus or a canal for a monstrous multiple birth. Sitting -beneath it, helpless to move, he focused his attention with increasing -pleasure on the active, supple, ever more human girl-bodies that swam -across his mind. Now more mermaid than tadpole, with bright smiling -lips and eyes, long Lorelei-hair trailing behind them, they darted and -hovered caressingly. In their wide-cheeked oval faces, he discovered -without shock, there was a transcendent resemblance to the features of -Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich—a younger, milk-skinned maiden of the -steppes, with challenging eyes and fingers that brushed against him -with delightful shocks....</p> - -<p>"So it is for me the great problem," Vasily's distant voice -continued. "I see in my work only the pure research, the play of -the mind. Lev sees money, Ivan sees dragon teeth—fodder for his -political cannon—Mikhail sees unshriven souls, Grushenka sees—who -knows?—madness. It is indeed one great problem."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Thunder came again, crashingly this time. The door of the pent-shack -opened. Framed in it stood Ivan the Bomber. "Vasily!" he roared. "Do -you know what that idiot is doing now?"</p> - -<p>As the thunder and his voice trailed off together, Simon became aware -at last of the identity of the other sound, which had been growing in -volume all the time.</p> - -<p>Simultaneously Vasily struggled to his feet.</p> - -<p>"The organ!" he cried. "Mikhail is <i>playing</i> the Whirlwind Music! We -must stop him!" Pausing only for a last pull at the bottle, he charged -into the pent-shack, following Ivan.</p> - -<p>Wind was shaking the heavy pipe over Simon's head, tossing him back and -forth in the chair. Looking with an effort toward the west, Simon saw -the reason: a spinning black pencil of wind that was writing its way -toward them in wreckage across the intervening roofs.</p> - -<p>The chair fell under him. Stumbling across the roof, he tugged futilely -at the door to the pent-shack, then threw himself flat, clawing at the -tarpaper.</p> - -<p>There was a mounting roar. The top of the water tank went spinning off -like a flying saucer. Momentarily, as if it were a giant syringe, the -whirlwind dipped into the tank. Simon felt himself sliding across the -roof, felt his legs lifting. He fetched up against the roof's low wall -and at that moment the wind let go of him and his legs touched tarpaper -again.</p> - -<p>Gaining his feet numbly, Simon staggered into the leaning pent-shack. -The pale man was nowhere to be seen, the plush chair empty. The curtain -at the other side of the room had fallen with its rods, revealing a -bathtub more antique than Simon's. In the tub, under the window, sat -Grushenka. The lightning flares showed her with her chin level with -the water, her eyes placidly staring, her mouth opening and closing.</p> - -<p>Simon found himself putting his arms around the black-clad figure. With -a straining effort he lifted her out of the tub, water sloshing all -over his legs, and half carried, half slid with her down the stairs.</p> - -<p>He fetched up panting and disheveled at the top landing, his attention -riveted by the lightning-illuminated scene in the two-story-high living -room below. At the far end of it a dark-robed figure crouched at the -console of the mighty organ, like a giant bat at the base of the -portico of a black and gold temple. In the center of the room Ivan was -in the act of heaving above his head his globular leather case.</p> - -<p>Mikhail darted a look over his shoulder and sprang to one side. The -projectile crashed against the organ. Mikhail picked himself up, -tearing something from his neck. Ivan lunged forward with a roar. -Mikhail crashed a fist against his jaw. The Bomber went down and didn't -come up. Mikhail unwrapped his crucifix from his fingers and resumed -playing.</p> - -<p>With a wild cry Simon heaved himself to his feet, stumbled over -Grushenka's sodden garments, and pitched headlong down the stairs.</p> - -<p>When he came to, the house was empty and the Stulnikov moving van -was gone. At the front door he was met by a poker-faced young man -who identified himself as a member of the FBI. Simon showed him the -globular case Ivan had thrown at the organ. It proved to contain a -bowling ball.</p> - -<p>The young gentleman listened to his story without changing expression, -thanked him warmly, and shooed him out.</p> - -<p>The Stulnikov-Gureviches disappeared for good, though not quite without -a trace. Simon found this item in the next evening's paper, the first -of many he accumulated yearningly in a scrapbook during the following -months:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p class="ph2">MERMAID RAIN A HOAX, SCIENTIST DECLARES</p> - -<p><i>Milford, Pa.</i>—The "mermaid rain" reported here has been declared a -fraud by an eminent European biologist. Vasily Stulnikov-Gurevich, -formerly Professor of Genetics at Pire University, Latvia, passing -through here on a cross-country trip, declared the miniature -"mermaids" were "albino tadpoles, probably scattered about as a hoax -by schoolboys."</p></div> - -<p>The professor added, "I would like to know where they got them, -however. There is clear evidence of mutation, due perhaps to fallout."</p> - -<p>Dr. Stulnikov directed his party in a brief but intensive search for -overlooked specimens. His charming silent sister, Grushenka Stulnikov, -wearing a quaint Latvian swimming costume, explored the shallows of the -Delaware.</p> - -<p>After collecting as many specimens as possible, the professor and his -assistants continued their trip in their unusual camping car. Dr. -Stulnikov intends to found a biological research center "in the calm -and tolerant atmosphere of the West Coast," he declared.</p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Pipe Dream, by Fritz Leiber - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIPE DREAM *** - -***** This file should be named 60664-h.htm or 60664-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/6/6/60664/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll -have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using -this ebook. - - - -Title: Pipe Dream - -Author: Fritz Leiber - -Release Date: November 10, 2019 [EBook #60664] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIPE DREAM *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - - - - - PIPE DREAM - - BY FRITZ LEIBER - - _Simon Grue found a two-inch mermaid in - his bathtub. It had arms, hips, a finny - tail, and (here the real trouble began) - a face that reminded him irresistibly - of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich...._ - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Worlds of If Science Fiction, February 1959. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -It wasn't until the mermaid turned up in his bathtub that Simon Grue -seriously began to wonder what the Russians were doing on the roof next -door. - -The old house next door together with its spacious tarpapered roof, -which held a sort of pent-shack, a cylindrical old water tank, and -several chicken-wire enclosures, had always been a focus of curiosity -in this region of Greenwich Village, especially to whoever happened -to be renting Simon's studio, the north window-cum-skylight of which -looked down upon it--if you were exceptionally tall or if, like Simon, -you stood halfway up a stepladder and peered. - -During the 1920's, old-timers told Simon, the house had been owned by -a bootlegger, who had installed a costly pipe organ and used the water -tank to store hooch. Later there had been a colony of shaven-headed -Buddhist monks, who had strolled about the roof in their orange and -yellow robes, meditating and eating raw vegetables. There had followed -a _commedia dell' arte_ theatrical group, a fencing salon, a school of -the organ (the bootlegger's organ was always one of the prime renting -points of the house), an Arabian restaurant, several art schools and -silvercraft shops of course, and an Existentialist coffee house. - -The last occupants had been two bony-cheeked Swedish blondes who -sunbathed interminably and had built the chicken-wire enclosures to -cage a large number of sinister smoke-colored dogs--Simon decided they -were breeding werewolves, and one of his most successful abstractions, -"Gray Hunger", had been painted to the inspiration of an eldritch -howling. The dogs and their owners had departed abruptly one night in -a closed van, without any of the dogs ever having been offered for -sale or either of the girls having responded with anything more than a -raised eyebrow to Simon's brave greetings of "Skoal!" - -The Russians had taken possession about six months ago--four brothers -apparently, and one sister, who never stirred from the house but could -occasionally be seen peering dreamily from a window. A white card with -a boldly-inked "Stulnikov-Gurevich" had been thumbtacked to the peeling -green-painted front door. Lafcadio Smits, the interior decorator, told -Simon that the newcomers were clearly White Russians; he could tell it -by their bushy beards. Lester Phlegius maintained that they were Red -Russians passing as White, and talked alarmingly of spying, sabotage -and suitcase bombs. - -Simon, who had the advantages of living on the spot and having -been introduced to one of the brothers--Vasily--at a neighboring -art gallery, came to believe that they were both Red and White and -something more--solid, complete Slavs in any case, Double Dostoevsky -Russians if one may be permitted the expression. They ordered vodka, -caviar, and soda crackers by the case. They argued interminably (loudly -in Russian, softly in English), they went on mysterious silent errands, -they gloomed about on the roof, they made melancholy music with their -deep harmonious voices and several large guitars. Once Simon though -they even had the bootlegger's organ going, but there had been a bad -storm at the time and he hadn't been sure. - -They were not quite as tight-lipped as the Swedish girls. Gradually a -curt front-sidewalk acquaintance developed and Simon came to know their -names. There was Vasily, of course, who wore thick glasses, the most -scholarly-looking of the lot and certainly the most bibulous--Simon -came to think of Vasily as the Vodka Breather. Occasionally he could be -glimpsed holding Erlenmayer flasks, trays of culture dishes, and other -pieces of biological equipment, or absentmindedly wiping off a glass -slide with his beard. - -Then there was Ivan, the dourest of the four, though none of them save -Vasily seemed very amiable. Simon's private names for Ivan were the -Nihilist and the Bomber, since he sometimes lugged about with him a -heavy globular leather case. With it and his beard--a square black -one--he had more than once created a mild sensation in the narrow -streets of the Village. - -Next there was Mikhail, who wore a large crucifix on a silver chain -around his neck and looked like a more spiritual Rasputin. However, -Simon thought of him less as the Religious than as the Whistler--for -his inveterate habit of whistling into his straggly beard a strange -tune that obeyed no common harmonic laws. Somehow Mikhail seemed to -carry a chilly breeze around with him, a perpetual cold draught, so -that Simon had to check himself in order not to clutch together his -coat collar whenever he heard the approach of the eerie piping. - -Finally there was Lev, beardless, shorter by several inches, and -certainly the most elusive of the brothers. He always moved at a -scurry, frequently dipping his head, so that it was some time before -Simon assured himself that he had the Stulnikov-Gurevich face. He -did, unmistakably. Lev seemed to be away on trips a good deal. On his -returns he was frequently accompanied by furtive but important-looking -men--a different one on each occasion. There would be much bustle at -such times--among other things, the shades would be drawn. Then in a -few hours Lev would be off again, and his man-about-town companion too. - -And of course there was the indoors-keeping sister. Several times Simon -had heard one of the brothers calling "Grushenka", so he assumed that -was her name. She had the Stulnikov-Gurevich face too, though on her, -almost incredibly, it was strangely attractive. She never ventured on -the roof but she often sat in the pent-shack. As far as Simon could -make out, she always wore some dark Victorian costume--at least it -had a high neck, long sleeves, and puffed shoulders. Pale-faced in -the greenish gloom, she would stare for hours out of the pent-shack's -single window, though never in Simon's direction. Occasionally she -would part and close her lips, but not exactly as if she were speaking, -at least aloud--he thought of calling her the Bubble Blower. The effect -was as odd as Mikhail's whistling but not as unpleasant. In fact, Simon -found himself studying Grushenka for ridiculously long periods of time. -His mild obsession began to irk him and one day he decided henceforth -to stay away altogether from his north window and the stepladder. As a -result he saw little of the alterations the Russians began to make on -the roof at this point, though he did notice that they lugged up among -other things a length of large-diameter transparent plastic piping. - - * * * * * - -So much for the Russians, now for the mermaid. Late one night Simon -started to fill his bathtub with cold water to soak his brushes -and rags--he was working with a kind of calcimine at the time, -experimenting with portable murals painted on large plaster-faced -wooden panels. Heavily laden, he got back to the bathroom just in time -to shut off the water--and to see a tiny fish of some sort splashing -around in it. - -He was not unduly surprised. Fish up to four or five inches in length -were not unheard-of apparitions in the cold-water supply of the area, -and this specimen looked as if it displaced no more than a teaspoon of -water. - -He made a lucky grab and the next moment he was holding in his firmly -clenched right hand the bottom half of a slim wriggling creature hardly -two inches long--and now Simon was surprised indeed. - -To begin with, it was not greenish white nor any common fish color, -but palely-pinkish, flesh-colored in fact. And it didn't seem so much -a fish as a tadpole--at least its visible half had a slightly oversize -head shaped like a bullet that has mushroomed a little, and two tiny -writhing arms or appendages of some sort--and it felt as if it had -rather large hips for a fish or even a tadpole. Equip a two-months -human embryo with a finny tail, give it in addition a precocious -feminine sexiness, and you'd get something of the same effect. - -But all that was nothing. The trouble was that it had a face--a tiny -face, of course, and rather goggly-ghostly like a planarian's, but a -face nevertheless, a human-looking face, and also (here was the real -trouble) a face that bore a grotesque but striking resemblance to that -of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich. - -Simon's fingers tightened convulsively. Simultaneously the slippery -creature gave a desperate wriggle. It shot into the air in a high curve -and fell into the scant inch of space between the bathtub and the wall. - -The next half hour was hectic in a groveling sort of way. Retrieving -anything from behind Simon's ancient claw-footed bathtub was a most -difficult feat. There was barely space to get an arm under it and at -one point the warping of the floor boards prevented even that. Besides, -there was the host of dust-shrouded objects it had previously been too -much trouble to tease out--an accumulation of decades. At first Simon -tried to guide himself by the faint flopping noises along the hidden -base of the wall, but these soon ceased. - -Being on your knees and your chest with an ear against the floor and -an arm strainingly outstretched is probably not the best position to -assume while weird trains of thought go hooting through your head, but -sometimes it has to happen that way. First came a remembered piece -of neighborhood lore that supported the possibility of a connection -between the house next door and the tiny pink aquatic creature now -suffering minute agonies behind the bathtub. No one knew what ancient -and probably larceny-minded amateur plumber was responsible, but the -old-timers assured Simon there was a link between the water supply of -the Russians' house with its aerial cistern and that of the building -containing Simon's studio and several smaller apartments; at any -rate they maintained that there had been a time during the period -when the bootlegger was storing hooch in the water tank that several -neighborhood cold-water taps were dispensing a weak but nonetheless -authoritative mixture of bourbon and branch water. - -So, thought Simon as he groped and strained, if the Russians were -somehow responsible for this weird fishlet, there was no insuperable -difficulty in understanding how it might have gotten here. - -But that was the least of Simon's preoccupations. He scrabbled wildly -and unsuccessfully for several minutes, and then realizing he would -never get anywhere in this unsystematic manner, he began to remove the -accumulated debris piece by piece: dark cracked ends of soap, washrags -dried out in tortured attitudes, innumerable dark-dyed cigarette -stumps, several pocket magazines with bleached wrinkled pages, empty -and near-empty medicine bottles and pill vials, rusty hairpins, bobby -pins, safety pins, crumpled toothpaste tubes (and a couple for oil -paint), a gray toothbrush, a fifty-cent piece and several pennies, the -mummy of a mouse, a letter from Picasso, and last of all, from the dark -corner behind the bathtub's inside claw, the limp pitiful thing he was -seeking. - -It was even tinier than he'd thought. He carefully washed the dust and -flug off it, but it was clearly dead and its resemblance to Grushenka -Stulnikov-Gurevich had become problematical--indeed, Simon decided that -someone seeing it now for the first time would think it a freak minnow -or monstrous tadpole and nothing more, though mutation or disease had -obviously been at work. The illusion of a miniature mermaid still -existed in the tapering tail and armlike appendages, but it was faint. -He tried to remember what he knew about salamanders--almost nothing, -it turned out. He thought of embryos, but his mind veered away from the -subject. - -He wandered back into the studio carrying the thing in his hand. He -climbed the stepladder by the north window and studied the house -next door. What windows he could see were dark. He got a very vague -impression that the roof had changed. After he had strained his -eyes for some time he fancied he could see a faint path of greenish -luminescence streaming between the pent-shack and the water-tank, but -it was very faint indeed and might only be his vision swimming. - -He climbed down the stepladder and stood for a moment weighing the tiny -dead thing in his hand. It occurred to him that one of his friends at -the university could dig up a zoologist to pass on his find. - -But Simon's curiosity was more artistic than scientific. In the end he -twisted a bit of cellophane around the thing, placed it on the ledge -of his easel and went off to bed ... and to a series of disturbingly -erotic dreams. - - * * * * * - -Next day he got up late and, after breakfasting on black coffee, -gloomed around the studio for a while, picking things up and putting -them down. He glanced frequently at the stepladder, but resisted the -temptation to climb up and have another look next door. Sighing, he -thumbtacked a sheet of paper to a drawing board and half-heartedly -began blocking in a female figure. It was insipid and lifeless. -Stabbing irritably at the heavy curve of the figure's hip, he broke -his charcoal. "Damn!" he said, glaring around the room. Abandoning -all pretense, he threw the charcoal on the floor and climbed the -stepladder. He pressed his nose against the glass. - -In daylight, the adjoining roof looked bare and grimy. There was a big -transparent pipe running between the water tank and the shack, braced -in two places by improvised-looking wooden scaffolding. Listening -intently, Simon thought he could hear a motor going in the shack. The -water looked sallow green. It reminded Simon of those futuristic algae -farms where the stuff is supposed to be pumped through transparent -pipes to expose it to sunlight. There seemed to be a transparent top -on the water tank too--it was too high for Simon to see, but there -was a gleam around the edge. Staring at the pipe again, Simon got the -impression there were little things traveling in the water, but he -couldn't make them out. - -Climbing down in some excitement, Simon got the twist of cellophane -from the ledge of the easel and stared at its contents. Wild thoughts -were tumbling through his head as he got back up on the stepladder. -Sunlight flashed on the greenish water pipe between the tank and the -shack, but after the first glance he had no eyes for it. Grushenka -Stulnikov-Gurevich had her face tragically pressed to the window of -the shack. She was wearing the black dress with high neck and puffed -shoulders. At that moment she looked straight at him. She lifted her -hands and seemed to speak imploringly. Then she slowly sank from sight -as if, it horridly occurred to Simon, into quicksand. - -Simon sprang from his chair, heart beating wildly, and ran down the -stairs to the street. Two or three passersby paused to study him as he -alternately pounded the flaking green door of the Russians' house and -leaned on the button. Also watching was the shirt-sleeved driver of a -moving van, emblazoned "Stulnikov-Gurevich Enterprises," which almost -filled the street in front of the house. - -The door opened narrowly. A man with a square black beard frowned out -of it. He topped Simon by almost a head. - -"Yes?" Ivan the Bomber asked, in a deep, exasperated voice. - -"I must see the lady of the house immediately," Simon cried. "Your -sister, I believe. She's in danger." He surged forward. - -The butt of the Bomber's right palm took him firmly in the chest and he -staggered back. The Bomber said coldly, "My sister is--ha!--taking a -bath." - -Simon cried, "In that case she's drowning!" and surged forward again, -but the Bomber's hand stopped him short. "I'll call the police!" Simon -shouted, flailing his limbs. The hand at his chest suddenly stopped -pushing and began to pull. Gripped by the front of his shirt, Simon -felt himself being drawn rapidly inside. "Let go! Help, a kidnapping!" -he shouted to the inquisitive faces outside, before the door banged -shut. - -"No police!" rumbled the Bomber, assisting Simon upstairs. - -"Now look here," Simon protested futilely. In the two-story-high -living room to his right, the pipes of an organ gleamed golden from -the shadows. At the second landing, a disheveled figure met them, -glasses twinkling--Vasily the Vodka Breather. He spoke querulously in -Russian to Ivan, who replied shortly, then Vasily turned and the three -of them crowded up the narrow third flight to the pent-shack. This -housed a small noisy machine, perhaps an aerator of some sort, for -bubbles were streaming into the transparent pipe where it was connected -to the machine; and under the pipe, sitting with an idiot smile on a -chair of red plush and gilt, was a pale black-mustached man. An empty -clear-glass bottle with a red and gold label lay on the floor at his -feet. The opposite side of the room was hidden by a heavy plastic -shower curtain. Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich was not in view. - -Ivan said something explosive, picking up the bottle and staring at -it. "Vodka!" he went on. "I have told you not to mix the pipe and the -vodka! Now see what you have done!" - -"To me it seemed hospitable," said Vasily with an apologetic gesture. -"Besides, only one bottle--" - -Ducking under the pipe where it crossed the pent-shack, Ivan picked -up the pale man and dumped him crosswise in the chair, with his -patent-leather shoes sticking up on one side and his plump hands -crossed over his chest. "Let him sleep. First we must take down all -the apparatus, before the capitalistic police arrive. Now: what to do -with this one?" He looked at Simon, and clenched one large and hairy -fist. - -"_Nyet-nyet-nyet_," said the Vodka Breather, and went to whisper in -Ivan's ear. They both stared at Simon, who felt uncomfortable and began -to back toward the door; but Ivan ducked agilely under the pipe and -grasped him by the arm, pulling him effortlessly toward the roof exit. -"Just come this way if you please, Mr. Gru-_ay_," said Vasily, hurrying -after. As they left the shack, he picked up a kitchen chair. - -Crossing the roof, Simon made a sudden effort and wrenched himself -free. They caught him again at the edge of the roof, where he had -run with nothing clearly in mind, but with his mouth open to yell. -Suspended in the grip of the two Russians, with Ivan's meaty palm over -his mouth, Simon had a momentary glimpse of the street below. A third -bearded figure, Mikhail the Religious, was staring up at them from -the sunny sidewalk. The melancholy face, the deep-socketed tormented -eyes, and the narrow beard tangled with the dangling crucifix combined -to give the effect of a Tolstoy novel's dust-jacket. As they hauled -Simon away, he had the impression that a chilly breeze had sprung up -and the street had darkened. In his ears was Mikhail's distant, oddly -discordant whistling. - -Grunting, the two brothers set Simon down on the kitchen chair and slid -him across the roof until something hard but resilient touched the top -of his head. It was the plastic pipe, through which, peering upward, he -could see myriads of tiny polliwog-shapes flitting back and forth. - -"Do us a kindness not to make noise," said Ivan, removing his palm. "My -brother Vasily will now explain." He went away. - - * * * * * - -Curiosity as much as shock kept Simon in his chair. Vasily, bobbing -his head and smiling, sat down tailor-fashion on the roof in front -of him. "First I must tell you, Mr. Gru-_ay_, that I am specialist -in biological sciences. Here you see results of my most successful -experiment." He withdrew a round clear-glass bottle from his pocket and -unscrewed the top. - -"Ah?" said Simon tentatively. - -"Indeed yes. In my researches, Mr. Gru-_ay_, I discovered a chemical -which will inhibit growth at any level of embryonic development, -producing a viable organism at that point. The basic effect of -this chemical is always toward survival at whatever level of -development--one cell, a blastula, a worm, a fish, a four-legger. -This research, which Lysenko scoffed at when I told him of it, I had -no trouble in keeping secret, though at the time I was working as the -unhappy collaborator of the godless soviets. But perhaps I am being too -technical?" - -"Not at all," Simon assured him. - -"Good," Vasily said with simple satisfaction and gulped at his bottle. -"Meanwhile my brother Mikhail was a religious brother at a monastery -near Mount Athos, my Nihilist brother Ivan was in central Europe, -while my third brother Lev, who is of commercial talents, had preceded -us to the New World, where we always felt it would some day be our -destiny to join one another. - -"With the aid of brother Ivan, I and my sister Grushenka escaped from -Russia. We picked up Mikhail from his monastery and proceeded here, -where Lev had become a capitalist business magnate. - -"My brothers, Ivan especially, were interested in my research. He -had a theory that we could eventually produce hosts of men in this -way, whole armies and political parties, all Nihilist and all of them -Stulnikov-Gureviches. I assured him that this was impossible, that I -could not play Cadmus, for free-swimming forms are one thing, we have -the way to feed them in the aqueous medium; but to make fully developed -mammals placental nourishment is necessary--that I cannot provide. Yet -to please him I begin with (pardon me!) the egg of my sister, that was -as good a beginning as any and perhaps it intrigued my vanity. Ivan -dreamed his dreams of a Nihilist Stulnikov-Gurevich humanity--it was -harmless, as I told myself." - -Simon stared at him glassy-eyed. Something rather peculiar was -beginning to happen inside his head--about an inch under the point -where the cool water-filled plastic pipe pressed down on his scalp. -Little ghostly images were darting--delightfully wispy little -girl-things, smiling down at him impudently, then flirting away with a -quick motion of their mermaid tails. - -The sky had been growing steadily darker and now there came the growl -of thunder. Against the purple-gray clouds Simon could barely make out -the semi-transparent shapes of the polliwogs in the pipe over his head; -but the images inside his mind were growing clearer by the minute. - -"Ah, we have a storm," Vasily observed as the thunder growled again. -"That reminds me of Mikhail, who is much influenced by our Finnish -grandmother. He had the belief as a child that he could call up the -winds by whistling for them--he even learned special wind musics from -her. Later he became a Christian religious--there are great struggles -in him. Mikhail objected to my researches when he heard I used the -egg of my sister. He said we will produce millions of souls who are -not baptized. I asked him how about the water they are in, he replied -this is not the same thing, these little swimmers will wriggle in hell -eternally. This worried him greatly. We tried to tell him I had not -used the egg of my sister, only the egg of a fish. - -"But he did not believe this, because my sister changed greatly at -the time. She no longer spoke. She put on my mother's bathing costume -(we are a family people) and retired to the bathtub all day long. I -accepted this--at least in the water she is not violent. Mikhail said, -"See, her soul is now split into many unredeemed sub-souls, one each -for the little swimmers. There is a sympathy between them--a hypnotic -vibration. So long as you keep them near her, in that tank on the -roof, this will be. If they were gone from there, far from there, the -sub-souls would reunite and Grushenka's soul would be one again." He -begged me to stop my research, to dump it in the sea, to scatter it -away, but Lev and Ivan demand I keep on. Yet Mikhail warned me that -works of evil end in the whirlwind. I am torn and undecided." He gulped -at his vodka. - -Thunder growled louder. Simon was thinking, dreamily, that if the soul -of Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich were split into thousands of sub-souls, -vibrating hynotically in the nearby water tank, with at least one of -them escaping as far as his bathtub, then it was no wonder if Grushenka -had a strange attraction for him. - -"But that is not yet the worst," Vasily continued. "The hypnotic -vibrations of the free-swimming ones in their multitude turn out to -have a stimulating effect on any male who is near. Their sub-minds -induce dreams of the piquant sort. Lev says that to make money for the -work we must sell these dreams to rich men. I protest, but to no avail." - -"Lev is maddened for money. Now besides selling the dreams I find he -plans to sell the creatures themselves, sell them one by one, but keep -enough to sell the dreams too. It is a madness." - -The darkness had become that of night. The thunder continued to growl -and now it seemed to Simon that it had music in it. Visions swam -through his mind to its rhythm--hordes of swimming pygmy souls, -of unborn water babies, migrations of miniature mermaids. The pipe -hanging between water tank and pent-shack became in his imagination -a giant umbilicus or a canal for a monstrous multiple birth. Sitting -beneath it, helpless to move, he focused his attention with increasing -pleasure on the active, supple, ever more human girl-bodies that swam -across his mind. Now more mermaid than tadpole, with bright smiling -lips and eyes, long Lorelei-hair trailing behind them, they darted and -hovered caressingly. In their wide-cheeked oval faces, he discovered -without shock, there was a transcendent resemblance to the features of -Grushenka Stulnikov-Gurevich--a younger, milk-skinned maiden of the -steppes, with challenging eyes and fingers that brushed against him -with delightful shocks.... - -"So it is for me the great problem," Vasily's distant voice -continued. "I see in my work only the pure research, the play of -the mind. Lev sees money, Ivan sees dragon teeth--fodder for his -political cannon--Mikhail sees unshriven souls, Grushenka sees--who -knows?--madness. It is indeed one great problem." - - * * * * * - -Thunder came again, crashingly this time. The door of the pent-shack -opened. Framed in it stood Ivan the Bomber. "Vasily!" he roared. "Do -you know what that idiot is doing now?" - -As the thunder and his voice trailed off together, Simon became aware -at last of the identity of the other sound, which had been growing in -volume all the time. - -Simultaneously Vasily struggled to his feet. - -"The organ!" he cried. "Mikhail is _playing_ the Whirlwind Music! We -must stop him!" Pausing only for a last pull at the bottle, he charged -into the pent-shack, following Ivan. - -Wind was shaking the heavy pipe over Simon's head, tossing him back and -forth in the chair. Looking with an effort toward the west, Simon saw -the reason: a spinning black pencil of wind that was writing its way -toward them in wreckage across the intervening roofs. - -The chair fell under him. Stumbling across the roof, he tugged futilely -at the door to the pent-shack, then threw himself flat, clawing at the -tarpaper. - -There was a mounting roar. The top of the water tank went spinning off -like a flying saucer. Momentarily, as if it were a giant syringe, the -whirlwind dipped into the tank. Simon felt himself sliding across the -roof, felt his legs lifting. He fetched up against the roof's low wall -and at that moment the wind let go of him and his legs touched tarpaper -again. - -Gaining his feet numbly, Simon staggered into the leaning pent-shack. -The pale man was nowhere to be seen, the plush chair empty. The curtain -at the other side of the room had fallen with its rods, revealing a -bathtub more antique than Simon's. In the tub, under the window, sat -Grushenka. The lightning flares showed her with her chin level with -the water, her eyes placidly staring, her mouth opening and closing. - -Simon found himself putting his arms around the black-clad figure. With -a straining effort he lifted her out of the tub, water sloshing all -over his legs, and half carried, half slid with her down the stairs. - -He fetched up panting and disheveled at the top landing, his attention -riveted by the lightning-illuminated scene in the two-story-high living -room below. At the far end of it a dark-robed figure crouched at the -console of the mighty organ, like a giant bat at the base of the -portico of a black and gold temple. In the center of the room Ivan was -in the act of heaving above his head his globular leather case. - -Mikhail darted a look over his shoulder and sprang to one side. The -projectile crashed against the organ. Mikhail picked himself up, -tearing something from his neck. Ivan lunged forward with a roar. -Mikhail crashed a fist against his jaw. The Bomber went down and didn't -come up. Mikhail unwrapped his crucifix from his fingers and resumed -playing. - -With a wild cry Simon heaved himself to his feet, stumbled over -Grushenka's sodden garments, and pitched headlong down the stairs. - -When he came to, the house was empty and the Stulnikov moving van -was gone. At the front door he was met by a poker-faced young man -who identified himself as a member of the FBI. Simon showed him the -globular case Ivan had thrown at the organ. It proved to contain a -bowling ball. - -The young gentleman listened to his story without changing expression, -thanked him warmly, and shooed him out. - -The Stulnikov-Gureviches disappeared for good, though not quite without -a trace. Simon found this item in the next evening's paper, the first -of many he accumulated yearningly in a scrapbook during the following -months: - - MERMAID RAIN A HOAX, SCIENTIST DECLARES - - _Milford, Pa._--The "mermaid rain" reported here has been - declared a fraud by an eminent European biologist. Vasily - Stulnikov-Gurevich, formerly Professor of Genetics at Pire - University, Latvia, passing through here on a cross-country trip, - declared the miniature "mermaids" were "albino tadpoles, probably - scattered about as a hoax by schoolboys." - -The professor added, "I would like to know where they got them, -however. There is clear evidence of mutation, due perhaps to fallout." - -Dr. Stulnikov directed his party in a brief but intensive search for -overlooked specimens. His charming silent sister, Grushenka Stulnikov, -wearing a quaint Latvian swimming costume, explored the shallows of the -Delaware. - -After collecting as many specimens as possible, the professor and his -assistants continued their trip in their unusual camping car. Dr. -Stulnikov intends to found a biological research center "in the calm -and tolerant atmosphere of the West Coast," he declared. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Pipe Dream, by Fritz Leiber - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIPE DREAM *** - -***** This file should be named 60664.txt or 60664.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/6/6/60664/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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