The Pleasure Tube Page 14

  "The debriefing's suspended," I say. "He doesn't have the right."

  Collette nods, tight-lipped; there is an exhaustion in her green eyes. "He made me wish we had taken off in that beautiful car, just run from LasVenus. But what's the use?"

  "Taylor," I say with a kind of nervous scorn. "What if you did go through with a resignation now, what if you did quit?"

  "Now that we're in flight, they'd, well... It's what we talked about before. They'd put me in third class and make me pay. I suppose I could stay here with you. But they'd send you someone else, another woman."

  Despite my growing depression I can't resist taking advantage of the look on Collette's face, a hangdog disgust at both third class and the idea of another woman living in the cabin. "How do you know I'd mind?' I ask with a smile.

  "What?" she says, putting both feet on the floor and stiffening her back. "I have to put up with him, and now I have to put up with you? What are you going to do, Rawley, run off with all of us when we get back to L. A.? You're going to need a bigger car. You bastard."

  "No," I grin, "just you. There'll only be room for you."

  "You bastard," she says after a moment. "You did me last night and you did the Japanese girl yesterday afternoon. Are you trying to set a record?"

  "The Japanese girl was your surprise," I remind her. She begins to glare at me. Since yesterday, there's been a new electricity between us—her presence, the looks she gives me with her jade-green eyes, make me a little weak-kneed. And we seem to say less, communicate in glances that require no explanation. She is giving me one of her looks now—close-mouthed, haughty, her eyes wide and menacing.

  "All right," I say, "you just hang on. We won't be on this trip forever. And I'll talk to Taylor. I'll talk to him myself."

  She actually smiles.

  I rise and kiss her on the cheek, then begin helping her clear away the breakfast china. I want to get the console clear, to get started.

  As Collette finishes in the kitchen, I punch a query through:

  SEARCH PROGRAM SEARCH PROGRAM SEARCH

  QUERY LOC.//

  COL. R. TAYLOR//

  SCICOM OFF./GUAM STA. REF.//

  CABIN #/PT FLT 8//

  CABIN LOC: ENTER ENTER ENTER

  RETRIEVE RETRIEVE RETRIEVE

  ##################

  RESET RESET RESET

  Taylor's presence doesn't register on the ship's roster; he must be under another name. I pull the list of names of passengers who boarded for the first time in LasVenus, think at first there can't be many, but sixty-four names show up. In the end I try Werhner's trick for limited-access material, but there's no record of Taylor's presence on any of the classified rosters. Now it's Taylor locked into a private world to which I cannot find a seam, there's no way for me to get to him short of searching the ship.

  I start seething, decide to trace through to Guam. But now I find not a single line clear. Agana is apparently under a blackout, not even routine military or SciCom traffic getting through, not even a weather report coming out. Incredible, I think, how stupid. I should have put Collette in that goddamned car and taken off.

  "You're right," Erica says two hours after lunch. "There's more to do this leg. The program's richer. That's the way it's supposed to be, has to be, I guess. You'd see it better if you weren't so desynched."

  Erica is leaning with her hip on the couch, Collette is sitting alongside me as we watch what must be a women's program, a cosmetics demonstration. The models are languid women, the voice-over throaty:

  "On her face: veilessence cream makeup in copper with cedar mauve blushing pomade. On her eyes: powder eyeshadow in wood violet and hickory. On her lips: revenescence rose. Smoky grape satin-skin camisole leotard. And on the right, now. On her face, veilessence light ivory with blushing cream in glazed heather plum. Spun-gold pink, spun-gold cherry highlighting patina, frost-spun..."

  With her own makeup, in her suede suit, Collette is as stunning as the models on the screen, smells gorgeously of frangipani. But the gloom clouds her face, a tired glaze in her eyes, and her shoulders sag. She and Erica are to report to Service Control. Their going is supposed to be routine, still we all wonder about it.

  "It's that time," Erica says.

  "I'll be along," Collette says glumly.

  Erica kisses us both, says she's going on ahead, leaves the two of us on the sofa. I shut down the screen.

  "We would be in Mexico by now," Collette says after a moment. "What an adventure it would have been."

  "Well, it's still an adventure," I say. "You'll have to admit that."

  Collette slips her hand under mine and leans on my shoulder. I feel her warmth and my breath goes a little thin again with the presence and odor of her. I have asked myself if she might not still be in collusion with Taylor, or if she's in love with me as she says; and I wonder now if it finally matters. I haven't felt this way about a woman since Maxine came back to me, pleaded to come back, and I realized how much I needed her. My God, I wonder, looking at Collette, am I genuinely falling in love with her?

  "We've been through a lot together," Collette says; she's saying exactly what's on my own mind. "I'll never forget the end of that afternoon in LasVenus."

  I won't, either, and I sigh. I feel even worse because only now do I realize there wasn't a way to pay my respects after Massimo's death, no ceremony to attend, no way to think his passing through.

  Alone. The window/wall fills the cabin with the kaleidoscopic colors of something called Pastoral Fantasy. The Beethoven is soothing, but the light show is just annoying. I clear the screen, punch up Guam again out of compulsion:

  ATTN//GUAM STATUS//ALL TRAFFIC DOWN//ALL TRAFFIC DOWN

  ATTN//GUAM STATUS//ALL TRAFFIC DOWN//ALL TRAFFIC DOWN

  Nothing's changed. Strange to think of Guam now; I recall some of its odors, the putrefaction of the base's littered beach.

  After ten minutes of playing around and using my sign key, I manage to reach into the databank of Medex. I poke around in passenger statistics and on the bottom line discover something that confirms what Collette mentioned early in the trip: the death rate on theTube is phenomenal, as high as two hundred per thousand on some all-third-class flights. That data leads me into fail­safe programs for the total hologram, into my own fail­safe program. I see that I am entered to disconnect and trauma detoxify if my heart beats at a rate of 145, or if my blood pressure reads 200 /145—I'm not sure what either really means, but both seem high. My palms get clammy at the idea of trauma and the thought of the mortality rate. I adjust my own tolerances down twenty percent, then post the entry to commit when I'm switched in, hide the entry in storage. I don't want to leave footprints. The blue lights wink confirmation and I think to leave a memory code to remind Collette.

  But I don't punch a memory tape. I wonder. I still do feel the slight pull of distrust about her at times, like the partly corroded edge of a razor drawn against my feelings. I don't know—I've been spooked before I came on the ship, thought it was the simple fact of my life. And yet... I punch up tonight's dinner program, getting tired of this machine.

  FIRST-CLASS SERVICE//

  DINNER//DAY 9

  Coq au Vin

  Brussels Sprouts Bordelaise

  Tarminochi Salad

  Hot Bread

  White Bordeaux

  That's it, I think. I'll run a blind. Just what Werhner would do, I laugh to myself, I'll have to tell him about this when I see him. If I see him. The laugh doesn't last.

  ENTER ENTER ENTER

  PROGRAM CHANGE//MEAL SERVICE

  SUBS.//new dinner program—day 9

  SUBS.//new dinner program—Cannelloni

  Green Salad

  Chianti

  It happens at the pool, just as I enter the water, naked today like the rest of the swimmers. My mind is blank. I am thinking only of the dive, oblivious to the colors and voices at poolside, the music. At the precise point of impact there is a burst of light, and I am diving through
a hatch passageway, not through a ship, but into a white, whirling sun, flames at my feet, orange and red driven flames, the sound of rushing wind—the light alongside me is a blur of blue-white, ahead painfully white, bleached utterly, I am falling into it.

  My hand on something solid: the tile bottom of the pool. I push off with my palms, shoot upward to the silvery surface, through.

  I float for a moment, breathing heavily, take in the people, hear the tropical music. I dive again, but all I see is the water, the sides and bottom of the pool, green tiles meticulously grouted, smooth to the touch, sloping upward from the deep bottom. Then I hang on at the pool's gutter. An athletic woman asks me if I'm all right, is something wrong, asks if I need help.

  When Collette finally returns in the late afternoon, she explains she's had a long meeting on new options, hasn't seen Taylor. She says she had some of her own business to attend to; she passes Taylor's presence off as nothing. As a matter of fact, she is exuberant—she smiles broadly, there is a glow to her that wasn't there at midday. It annoys me. I wonder if she's lying.

  "I have a gift for you," she says, combing out her hair. "But you have to take a shower."

  "I've been to the pool," I answer.

  She puts the wide comb down, stares at me energetically. "Take a shower," she says, turning me to the bath, pushing at my bottom. "And stay in there for at least fifteen minutes. Take some good drugs."

  "Collette..."

  "Just do as I say. Please, Rawley?'

  When I leave the bath, dressed only in a terry-cloth robe I haven't tied, I find there are three attractive women in the cabin with Collette—dark-haired, Middle Eastern women with olive skin and rich brown eyes. One is as tall as Collette, the other two have their hair in pigtails, like twins. I am embarrassed for a moment, do up my robe. They are all looking at me with suppressed, sexual laughter.

  Which leaves me awkwardly grinning. The cabin lights are dimmed and I detect a new scent, the scent of myrrh; I haven't smelled myrrh since Hong Kong. Someone's hung gauzy curtains by the recliner, and I realize I can see through the caftans the three women are wearing, they are virtually transparent.

  "These are three of my friends from service," Collette says softly. "I did the best I could."

  I start to speak, but Collette interrupts me. "Right"— she smiles—"and that's good, Rawley. Your friend asks me strange questions, but my friends see me through. There isn't anything they wouldn't do for me."

  "Look, uh, who, uh..." I say a little breathlessly. The three women are flawless, stand with a deerlike sway watching me. Thank God, I think, I took some stimulants, not a time to feel sleepy. One of the women with pigtails crooks her mouth in a languid smile, reaches out and touches, strokes my arm under the terry cloth. "They're your harem, Rawley," Collette giggles, close to me, moving behind and rubbing my neck. "Mmmm. Your skin is dry. It's this ship air, Rawley. Delia, bring some oil." Her hands around my waist, Collette unties the firm knot of my robe, then begins to bring it down from my shoulders. The twins each kneel on one knee to guide the sleeves down my arms. "Sit the master down," Collette says as the tall woman brings a cruet of oil, passes the vial unstoppered beneath my nose, then takes my hand. The smell is sweet and musky, slightly like that of bananas, it makes my head swim. One of the twins brings a long, ornate ivory pipe. Collette walks toward the door.

  This moment, my mind entirely clear: one of the twins lights three candles, then draws her hands along my body, her hair brushing against my thighs. "So strong," she says. "You look so strong, Rawley." The new silk sheet beneath me is cool and the air a cool ache upon my genitals

  I watch as the woman stands at the foot of the recliner, slowly pulls off her caftan, the candle shadows moving behind her. The sight of her nakedness pierces me: she is a smallish woman, but her breasts are large, their curves not the curves of a pitcher, but of a dome; she has a cleavage even when they are naked. Her nipples darken as they come erect, her curves and hollows lapped by candlelight. I feel a sweet shock as the two other women kneel astride me, the light playing over them, and begin to rub the sweet oil on my chest and stomach, their breasts swaying as they work, their hair spilling over me. My body is aswarm with breasts, with moving lips and hands.

  I open my eyes and Collette's face is near mine, her eyes slightly glazed and full of candlelight, she's come back.

  "Because I love you," she says. "Because I love you, Rawley. And because we're here. I wanted to show you what it can be like to be here."

  "Hungry?" Collette says later. "The girls left some food. Couscous. Lamb. But I made a special menu while waiting this afternoon, something just for you. You can ask for it any time."

  Collette hands me a pad of gold ship's stationery; this is what she's printed:

  COLLETTE'S MENU

  Dutch Pecks// Hot Buttered Kisses//

  Salade//Fresh Green Kisses

  Entree//Hot Passionate Kisses Francais

  Vegetable Kisses//

  Dessert//Whipped Cream Kisses//Chocolate Kisses//

  Honey Kisses//

  Kisses Espresso//

  "And you can ask for anything," I tell her, "anything you want."

  "It's close by," she whispers, touching my hand. "Love me, Rawley."

  Massimo's "if one can trust such a woman" in my mind, I kiss her and tell her that I do.

  Still later, after the women have gone, Collette calls me into the kitchen/bar of the cabin, she's among the clutter at the service range.

  She is looking at two trays of cannelloni. "I didn't punch these up for dinner. Did you? I did a trace, there weren't any entries showing. These came through on the dinner program. Did you punch them up?"

  "No," I say, my ears slightly burning. I have been mentally swimming in the self-indulgent way of a man who's fallen in love; I've forgotten what I did this afternoon.

  "I thought I canceled the coq au vin we were supposed to have, since Delia... I know I did."

  "Well," I say, tentatively touching the sauce with my index finger, then touching the tip of my tongue. "The cannelloni looks good."

  She slaps at my hand. "Are you going to eat this?' she asks. "Where did it come from? Somebody's messing with the program, somebody who knows how to cover his tracks. I wouldn't eat this food."

  "What do you mean, somebody?" I ask, reaching to pick up one of the cannelloni with my fingers. Collette grabs my wrist, squeezes hard.

  "Rawley. Taylor—or who knows? That friend of yours died, Rawley."

  I look at Collette in puzzlement for an instant, but I'm shamed utterly. And to make it worse, the sauce is terrific.

  "I'll just take a bite," I mutter, taking her hand from my wrist and reaching for a fork. Collette turns away, angry with me. With my back to her back I take a sizable bite. Absolutely delicious. "Incredible," I say. "This cannelloni is incredible." I keep eating.

  After a minute Collette asks me quietly how I feel.

  "Great," I tell her. "I told you this was still an adventure. Try some pasta."

  "No," she says balefully. "I don't like cannelloni."

  "All right. I think I can eat them all."

  "Well," she says after another minute, the odor of the sauce having completely filled the cabin and the cannelloni already half gone, "maybe just one." I look at her; she has the beginnings of a resigned, chagrined smile on her lips. "An adventure, the man says. Hand me that silver fork on the counter, will you? I'll eat my last meal in style."

  Chapter 8

  Vietahiti

  As we descend in the morning sun, the island Collette names Vietahiti is spread out beneath us as it would be on a chart, surrounded by a rich blue sea. It is shaped into a coarse figure eight by two volcanos, their craters among the clouds. A flat saddle lies between them and contains, I see, one long, wide runway, a starship launch tower, and a group of support buildings. It is a large island, at least five hundred kilometers square. Its entire windward coast is indented with bays and coves inside small islands, and a deep gre
en jungle stretches inland on a rising plain. On the leeward side, steep valleys corrugate the slopes, rising to a band of light green on the easternmost volcano, a forest of tropical hardwoods, Collette says. There's hardly a sign of human presence, the sight is almost breathtaking after LasVenus. We pass through the clouds just over a mawlike, moonlike crater, break through over continuous jungle, then swing back toward the saddle over the ocean to make a gliding approach. For a long moment the window/wall shows a view straight down into the reef; I see coral alleys racing by with sand bottom, like fine veins in a blue and emerald sea. Then a flash of beach, wide and almost white, then the jungle, dense and ripe, deep green.

  Ah, I think, what Guam could be, without the base, without Agana—what Guam could be.

  Before we leave the ship, the message pager starts right in, signals live line. I flip the toggle, speak, give in. There is only a simple audio patch through the electronics to the resort; the wall screen is out. "Two-nine-two. Rawley Voorst. Patching through. I'll take what you have."

  "Negative message," I hear the girl from traffic say, her voice crackling and hard to hear against the sound of steel guitars being piped through the ship. "There's somebody waiting for you."

  "Traffic, this is two-nine-two. Do I read 'someone waiting'? Please identify."

  "Two-nine-two, traffic. He won't say who he is."

  I look at Collette, she has stopped packing and is watching me.

  "What does he look like, traffic? Can you describe? A man with black hair, bushy black hair, glasses? Or short. You did say he."