Dayworld

Chapter 7

Wednesday's wife stared unseeingly at him through her window. He turned away from her to his own cylinder, which faced hers across a narrow aisle. It bore a plaque with the name ROBERT AQUILINE TINGLE. His own face looked at him through the window. Its door should have been locked since there was someone-no, some thing-inside it, and it should be unlocked only from the inside. Caird, however, had arranged that it could be opened.

At the moment, he could do nothing with the air-inflated dummy. He ran from the room to the shower room, removing the gun and taking off the sash and blouse on the way. In the shower room, he punched a button, and the water began gushing at a preset pressure and temperature. The rest of his clothes came off, and he stepped under the water and began vigorously soaping himself. There was not time to do a thorough cleansing of the makeup; he stepped out while there were still paint streaks on his legs. He rubbed off these with a towel and then threw the towel into the hamper. He would dispose of that later, though the chances that his wife would see it were small. Taking another towel, he began rubbing himself, only to stop with a muttered exclamation. He reached over and punched the button to stop the shower.

His hair was still too wet, but he did not have time to dry it completely. After putting the second towel on top of the first in the hamper, he picked up his Tuesday clothes, balled them, and put them under the towel. When he had the opportunity, he would hide the clothes and towel in his personal possessions closet or destroy them.

Naked except for the neck-chain and ID star and holding the gun, he ran down the hallway and into the stoner room. Eighty seconds to go. He could get into the cylinder and try to find room beside the hard and unsqueezable replica or he could pretend that he was just coming out of the cylinder. The second action seemed more perilous. The microsecond that destoning power went on, his wife would probably open her eyes. She would see that the door was closed. Unless he stood in front of the window of his stoner until she had gone away, she would see that other face in the window. Even if she did not see it, she would wonder why he had gotten out of his cylinder before she did. And he would have a hell of a time explaining why he kept standing in front of the cylinder window.

"Choices of equal misfortune," he muttered.

Cursing, he opened the door and sidled in, bent over. Ten seconds to go. His foot hit the stoned shoulderbag on the floor, and he said, "Ouch!" After dropping the gun, he leaned hard against the cold and heavy dummy. It fell away from him, stopping when the side of its head hit the cylinder. He crowded in front of the dummy and straightened up. Anyone looking in would see part of it behind him.

Three seconds to go before destoning power struck. It would have no effect on him since he was not stoned. Maybe he could pull this off.

Perhaps it was the sight of his wife, recalling the one he had just left, that stabbed a panicky thought through the other panics. "Oh, my God! I forgot to complete the license application! Ozma will kill me!"

Wednesday-World

VARIETY, Second Month of the Year

D5-W1 (Day-Five, Week-One)

Chapter 8

Nokomis Moondaughter, a long-legged brunette of medium height, stepped out of the cylinder. She wore a clinging scarlet ankle-length robe slashed with black. Her thi

Caird knew that she was wondering why he was still standing in the cylinder. He gave up his intention to "carve," as he called the process, the persona of Bob Tingle. That would have to come later; no time for it now. Just now, he must keep her from seeing the dummy.

He pushed the door open, bounded through the doorway, and closed the door behind him quickly. Bounding again, he grabbed Nokomis and lifted her in his arms. Whirling, he danced down the hall.

"What are you doing?" she cried. "What's gotten into you?" He set her down in the kitchen and said, "I love you, and I'm so glad to see you! Is that so hard to understand?"

She laughed, then said, "No. Yes. Usually, you slouch out like some rough crotch-scratching beast who's lost his way to the bathroom. You're grumpy until you've had your coffee. Don't you think you should put some clothes on?"

"Yes, you're right. It's too early for the sight of naked me."

He leaned down and kissed her lips. "Shall we have coffee and talk a while? Or should we sleep first?"

She narrowed her dark eyes, and something settled over her face, what he called the suspiration of suspicion. It was like the mist formed on a mirror by a breath. Suspiration of suspicion.

"How could you forget?" she said. "You know I slept for six hours before getting up for stoning. You told me you took a nap for an hour or so while I was sleeping. You woke up just as I did. Or so you said. You never go to sleep right after a nap. Why do you want to sleep now?"

As Bob Tingle, he would have remembered what he had told her. But he was still Jeff Caird, desperate after yesterday's events and jittery with the present urgency. The dummy. He had to deflate it.

He told himself to smooth out the rippling inside himself. Press it down with a quiet and cool mental hand.

"I'm not Tik-Tok," he said. "I don't run on wind-up machinery. Now and then, I use free will. Or call it whim. Or indigestion."

"You certainly didn't act sleepy and tired when you sprang out like a jack-in-the-box."

Before he had married her, he had known that she was a radar set sensitized only to nonroutine phenomena, a TV cha

The near-panic wrapped itself around him again. It was an octopus of ectoplasm seen and felt only by himself. But which self? Not just Caird. Caird would not have thought of such phrases as "suspiration of suspicion" and "octopus of ectoplasm." Tingle was trying to get out, but he wrnild never make it until Caird had a minute to go through the summoning ceremony, the ritual raising the top of Tingle's tomb, immured in his mind and making him master of this mess-he meant "mass"-known in Wednesday as Tingle. However, Caird would never be completely gone. If he were, Caird-Tingle would be completely ineffective in his role and duties as an immer. Jeff Caird was the primary, the original.

"A jack-in-the-box!" he cried, smiling. "How about a Bob-in-the-box? Your box!"

He picked her up and whirled again. "Let's!"

She smiled, but she said, "Let's not. And let me down. You know I have to practice. After that ... I'm not frigid, you know."

He set her down on her feet and said, "No, you're not, but I wonder sometimes about your thermostat. OK. Anything you want, Tippytoes. Your every desire is mine. You make the coffee, and Tingle will go tinkle."

Caird would never have said that either. Perhaps, the evocation evulsion was evitable.

I have to stop that sort of thing, Caird thought. At least, water it down. It's too much. But it's a sign that Tingle lurks on the threshold of Wednesday and might come out even if I neglected the ritual. Now, however, was no time for experimenting. Too dangerous.