Gene Wolfe - Copperhead.pdf - Gene Wolfe - margozap

Copperhead

by Gene Wolfe

The telephone in the study rang ten minutes before the news came on. The new President picked it up

and said hello.

"Mister President?"

"Speaking." Only eighteen people were supposed to have the number. For an instant, the new President

wondered how many actually did.

"This is Marsha. Boone's killed himself."

The new President was silent, conscious that there were a thousand things to say and unable to say even

the least of them. In his mind's eye he saw the leaves, a drift of red, yellow, and gold autumn leaves at the

foot of the tree on the hill. Leaves still touched with green here and there, and the stirring under those

leaves.

"He left a note. I haven't been able to find out what was in it."

"Don't."

"Don't?"

"It will be damaging to us in some way. They'll find out, Marsha, and they'll throw it in our faces. We'll

know a lot more about it than we want to then, and you're needed for other things."

"He was my husband, Mr. President. The divorce—"

"I know."

"It wasn't—wasn't final. Not yet. I want to know why he killed himself."

He recalled it exactly. "There was a crash in Idaho in August," the general had said. "We found this in the

wreckage."

"Are you still there, Mr. President?"

The irony almost overcame him, but he managed to say, "Still here."

"He hung himself with—with a telephone cord from the chandelier in the dining room. That's what they

told me. He stood on a chair, a—a chair on top of the table. He p-put the cord around his neck …"

The new President turned on the TV and pressed the MUTE button. It was easy, he thought. All the

buttons were so easy.

"I need to know, Mr. President. I need to find out."

"You know."

"I need to see the letter."

"Then do." He murmured comforting words, his friendship with Boone and Marsha, the great contribution

Boone had made to his administration. After a time that seemed long, the silent TV showed him with

Boone, with Boone and Marsha, with Boone at the convention. Eventually he hung up.

The phone rang again at once. He picked it up and said, "I ought to get call waiting on this thing."

"Yes, Mr. President, you should." There was no humor in Rance's voice, none at all.

"I was about to call you. Boone's hung himself."

"I was calling to tell you. This phone was busy."

"There's a suicide note. Do you have it?"

"No, sir."

"Get it. Don't let the press get it, and don't let Marsha see it. The cops will have it. Find out if they've

made copies. If they have, destroy them."

"Do you want to see it, Mr. President?"

He did not. He knew what would be in it, and knew that it would sicken him. "No," he said. Elsewhere in

the house another phone was ringing. He got up from his chair and kicked the door shut. Peggy would

get it, and Peggy, seeing the closed door, would stall them. Or stall them anyway, door closed or not.

"Maybe I'll want to see it later. Not now. I want you to find her and bring her here."

"Find who, Mr. President?"

"Who the hell do you think?"

"Jane Doe?"

"You're watching her, or you're damned well supposed to be."

"We are." Rance said.

"A hell of a lot of good it did. Bring her here. Now!"

"Won't you be going back to Washington, Mr. President?"

Rage would help nothing. He had told the general to leave the Changer with him. He had done that. He

himself had pressed the button. It had pressed very easily. He made his voice calm, and was gratified to

hear it. He did not sound like a man who was controlling his voice at all. "I'm going to stay here, George,

until this blows over a little. First the murder, then this. Washington will be a zoo."

"I'm sure you're right, Mr. President."

"I know I am. Fortunately we've got three years until the next election."

"Longer than that, Mr. President."

"Nearly three years until the next campaign." Although no one was watching, the new President made

himself smile. Smiles showed in your voice. "That's what matters. How fast can you get her here,

George?"

"Can we play rough, Mr. President? If she doesn't want to come?" Rance was stalling, giving himself time

to think. That showed in your voice, too.

"Yes. Absolutely."

"What about Karen?"

The new President had not thought of that, but he would need to talk to Karen. Karen wanted a big job,

but had she earned one? Controlling the redhead was like neck-reining a tiger. Perhaps she had.

Assistant Secretary of Labor might be enough. "Yes," he said. "Bring Karen, if she can come. If she

can't, don't wait for her."

"Five hours, Mr. President."

He glanced at his wrist. "Eleven tonight, our time."

· · · · ·

They arrived at ten fifty-five in a black Lincoln Navigator, three FBI agents, Karen, and Jane Doe. He

had told the Secret Service to get out and stay out, and had telephoned the Secretary of the Treasury

when they had refused. They were a hundred yards or more away from the house, every one of them.

Now he ordered the FBI agents to return to their vehicle and stand by, and waved Karen and Jane Doe

in. The former looked smart, competent, and horribly tired; as always the latter was so lovely that it was

only with difficulty that he kept himself from gawking at her.

"You're beat," he told Karen. "Jane and I are going into the den to talk. Alone."

Karen nodded, and the tall and superlatively graceful woman he had named Jane Doe smiled

enigmatically and brushed hair the color of new copper wire away from her face.

"I know you've done a lot," he said. "I know you've done the best you could at an impossible job. I want

you to understand that I know that, no matter what else I may say tonight and no matter what happens

tonight. Do you?"

"Yes, Mr. President."

Her voice had been so low that he had scarcely heard her. As he spoke again, he wondered whether she

knew about Boone. If she did not, this certainly was not the time to tell her. "It may be hours—I don't

know. I may need more from you tonight, and I may not. I don't know that, either. I want you go into my

wife's bedroom and lie down. She's in Washington, so you won't be disturbed. If there's anything in there

you need, take it. Cosmetics. Clean whatever. I'll square it with her."

"I'll be all right, Mr. President. Don't worry about me."

"Try to get to sleep. That's what I'm saying."

She nodded. "I will, Mr. President."

"I'm going back tomorrow, and when I get back I'll make a slot for you. Something in State, some nice,

quiet country where they speak English, Madame Ambassador."

The other woman laughed, the summons of golden bells.

"You come in here with me," he told her, and shut the door behind them, and locked it.

" 'Ou douh nawt leek mee."

"My feelings about you no longer matter." He waited for her to sit down, then sat down himself. It was in

his desk drawer, the left upper drawer.

He got it out, turned it over in his hands for a few seconds, and laid it on his desk. In appearance it was a

lopsided oval of black plastic with three red buttons, remarkable only in that its black was the black of

space, a deeper black than any human technology was capable of, and in that its buttons might easily

have been drops of fresh blood.

" 'Ou 'ad dawt vhen Aw coom."

"Yes, I did." The sunlit hilltop, the accumulation of fallen leaves at the base of the tree were back, more

vivid than ever. "I slipped it into my pocket." He cleared his throat. "I shouldn't have had it at all, and I

had my hands full with you."

She laughed again; her eyes were of every conceivable color, depending as it seemed upon the lighting

and her mood. Just now they too gleamed scarlet.

Like the eyes of a white rat, the new President thought. Could she have been a pet in the place from

which she came? A laboratory animal? "I never told you about this," he said aloud. "I'm going to tonight,

because I owe it to you. You don't like to listen—"

She smiled, and her perfect teeth looked both whiter and sharper than any other woman's teeth.

"Or sit still. You don't have to listen if you don't want to. If you want to get up and wander around, that's

fine. But I'm going to say it."

"Aw siht awn 'ou lahp? Aw siht vher steal. Naw mahter 'ow meany vhertds, Aw lesson."

"No."

"Naw vahn vahtches." She was clearly amused.

He shook his head. "I had been working hard. Not only after my inauguration, but for more than a year

before it. Working twelve or thirteen hours every day without a break. Spring came and my wife and I

came back here; I meant to take three days off—a long weekend. Some people in Spokane started

burning things again, and my three days turned out to be eighteen hours. I went back to Washington and

back to work."

"Aw douh nawt vhork. Aw douh nawt naw ahbawt dhees." She rose more gracefully than any dancer,

seeming to float from the chair.

"Fall came. Football season. I'd lost twenty pounds, and I was yelling at everybody. My wife had to stay

in Washington, but I cleared my desk and flew back here. I wanted to drink beer and watch football.

Most of all, I wanted to sleep."

She poked the fire as a child would, gratified by the cloud of sparks.

"I was here a day and half when General Martens called. There had never really been a crash before. All

that about Roswell was nonsense, but this time there'd been a real crash or something that looked like

one, and they had an artifact that still worked. I should have kept my damned mouth shut, but I said bring

it here. I wanted to see it."

"Dhees dhing 'ou shaw mee? Eet dhaws nawt eent'res mee."

"There are other universes." The new President's voice fell. "All the astrophysicists say so. The Changer

accesses them. Point it at something, press a button, and you get its cognate. Sometimes. Maybe all the

time, but maybe sometimes the cognate is so close you can't tell anything's happened. Did I tell you we

went up on the hill?"

" 'Ou deed nawt." She sat down again and crossed her legs. "Aw rhemember dhawt 'ill. Aw vhas colt."

He nodded. "You were naked. General Martens didn't want to talk in the house—he was afraid of

listening devices, really paranoid about them. We walked clear across the big meadow and climbed the

hill. I sat on a rock up there, and he on a fallen tree. I'd started to sit down beside him, but he didn't want

that, and at first I didn't understand. Later I got it—he was afraid I'd grab it."

She laughed.

"Which I did, in a way. He showed it to me, but he didn't want me to touch it. I was President,

goddamnit, and he was trying to give me orders. I made him give it to me and leave it with me. I told him

I'd give it back to him when I was through with it.

"Then I sat there on that rock and watched him walk back to the house—back to his blue Air Force

Chevy. I turned the Changer over and over in my hands, and I thought, "By God, this President stuff can

be fun once in a while. It's about time."

"Vhat ahbawt mee?"

"I'm getting to that. There's a big maple up there. It was fifteen or twenty feet from where I was sitting,

and its leaves were thick all around it." He paused, remembering. "Half its leaves had fallen, or about that.

After the general's car went into Three Mile Woods, I looked at them. I don't know why, but I did.

Perhaps I had heard something."

He paused, cleared his throat. "Suddenly they moved, stirred. There was only a very light breeze so it

wasn't that. There was something in there, something under the leaves, and I guess my hand tightened on

the Changer. It must have, because there you were."

"Ahh!"

"Yes. You know the rest. You know a lot more, too. Things you won't tell about the place you came

from." He knew he should pick up the Changer at this point, but he discovered that he was unable to do

so. He pointed to it instead. "I'm going to change you again. You know why, unless you're a lot stupider

than I think you are."

"'Ou dheenk Aw dell 'ou vhife."

"No. No, I take it back. Yes, that and a couple of dozen other things. I'm going to offer you a last

chance. Do you want to stay here?"

"Aw douh nawt car."

"I offer it anyway. You've always said you don't remember the place you came from, the other universe.

I'll be frank, since this is likely to be our last conversation. You've lied to us. Tell me the truth, and it's

Gene Wolfe - Copperhead.pdf

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