Read Ebook: The Old Ones by Curtis Betsy Raymond Ramon Illustrator

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Ebook has 447 lines and 21494 words, and 9 pages

"They were both found dead this morning at breakfast time. I just heard about it. Saul cut his wrist with his razor and Clarice fiddled with the autometab so it wouldn't raise and then went to sleep in it. Some people are just born with more nerve than others!" Avery sounded actually envious.

"This is no joke, El." Tim Daneshaw leaned against the high white bed. "Don't talk that way to anybody--there's nothing noble in killing yourself and you know you wouldn't do it even if you had the chance."

"Oh, I don't know," responded the little man defiantly, tipping back in his chair. "What's the percentage in living on here forever? Nobody knows what you were and nobody cares what you are and there's not one damn thing worth spending ten minutes on that they don't say, 'Take it easy, don't strain yourself, don't get worked up, why don't you take a rest or play a nice relaxing game of checkers.' I don't like pet mice and I think raffia baskets are an abomination. You're right about suicide not being noble--it's just common sense!"

"Elbert, Elbert," Tim was gentle, reproachful, "wait a minute. Everybody here knows how you built up Avery, Inc. singlehanded into the biggest transport corporation in the world and how you bowed out to let younger men have their chance at running the most successful business in the country." He came over and perched on the edge of the desk close to Avery. "You know the Block Nineteen Association wouldn't even be able to buy Christmas cards if you weren't handling our little investments. There isn't one person on this experiment that doesn't respect you."

"On this experiment, hell!" exploded Avery. "There isn't anybody in Block Nineteen that doesn't know I ran out when the government began hemming in big corporations with thousands of petty restrictions on mansized business so that a company president was nothing more than a yes-man to a regiment of lawyers and government accountants. If the boys in Washington knew I was handling a little stock for Block Nineteen they'd think of some way to close us up in five minutes. They'd be just as happy if they knew I was out of the way."

"But you are a genius at keeping your tracks covered and we do need you. We'll need you especially at the block meeting today," soothed Daneshaw.

"The meeting's not till day after tomorrow," Avery objected.

"We'll have to hold it now before some of us forget we're grown up and start going to pieces like the two this morning you were so excited about a minute ago." He paused. "I just can't understand it about Clarice LePays. She was so self-possessed, a charming and dignified woman. We will miss her, Elbert. She added a great deal of grace to our gatherings."

"Grace! She was just another old woman in a young woman's world. Don't be a hypocrite, Tim."

Daneshaw got up. "Anyhow, you have a job now. It's up to you and me as officers of the Block Nineteen Association to keep the others calm and give them something else to think about. You put that magic brain of yours to work on that while I go down to see Jules. I'll tell him we must have our meeting today." He put his hand on the knob.

"Calm, bah!" Avery bit the end off a stogy and spat it at the floor vehemently. "You better warn that Jules Farrar that his guinea pigs are sick and tired of his hotel-concentration-camp and of the whole world where we don't belong. I hope he lives to be a million."

"I'll tell him what you say," smiled Daneshaw grimly. "Now you get to work on a speech." He went out, a set smile still on his face.

When the amber light showed on the intercom on his desk, Dr. Farrar flipped the switch and barked a brief, "Send him in!"

Expecting the lanky white-maned Daneshaw in familiar heather-tweed, he was shocked by the appearance of the natty little man in midnight-blue dulfin slacks and ultra-conservative tabarjak. A Congressman so soon? He rose, extended his hand, half expecting the newcomer to refuse it coldly.

This little man smiled and grasped the outstretched hand heartily, saying, "Dr. Farrar? I'm Jeremy Brill of Far-Western Insurance and Annuity. Your secretary said you might have some time to spare this morning." He relinquished the hand and Dr. Farrar was freed to motion him to the green easy chair at the right of the desk.

"Glad to know you." He wasn't--he was lining up a few words for Miss Herrington on the subject of admitting salesmen. "Miss Herrington was mistaken, though, about my having much time. Something important has come up in the hospital this morning. Another day might be much better if you have anything extensive to discuss." He tried to remain courteous, keep his voice pleasant.

"I won't take but a few minutes of your day, Dr. Farrar, but there is a matter upon which The Company needs advice from you as soon as possible."

This sounded different from the usual opening. "Yes? What can I do for you?"

"You have a large group of patients here, Doctor, all of whom are well over a hundred years old."

"Not patients, Mr. Brill. Subjects. Subjects for observation on patterns of old age."

"Subjects, then. Well, a considerable number of these subjects have annuities with us and it is of great concern to us to have some estimate of their present condition."

"You mean physiologically? This group is in excellent health."

"Not exactly," the little man leaned forward confidentially. "We are more concerned with their mental state. You probably know that when a person is adjudged mentally incompetent or even gravely 'insecure,' the state takes over the care and support of such a person and The Company is released from financial obligation to that person. As a tremendous taxpayer, The Company aids in state support, but not to the extent of, shall we say, a perpetual annuity."

"Oh, I see. The company is feeling the pinch of a few long-term payments to those subjects of ours and would like to have them put away to cut expenses?" Dr. Farrar could not completely keep the scorn out of his voice.

"Oh, no, Doctor. You misunderstand me completely." Brill's tones were rich with wounded innocence. "The Company only wants to know what are the probabilities of mental breakdown at different ages, say a hundred and sixty, a hundred and eighty, two hundred. If we had some assurance of even a slight but definite tendency to, shall we say, mental erosion, with an increase in age above a hundred and fifty, The Company might find it possible to continue some such annuity plan as is now in operation." The man talked like an annual report, it seemed to Dr. Farrar, but with the difference that it had something to do with him.

"You or your medical colleagues," Brill went on brightly, "have done humanity yeoman service. Not only have you lengthened life and made living it less painful, but you have reduced the consumer-costs of life insurance to a level which makes premiums ridiculously low. Of course," he added complacently, "this has resulted in a great increase in the number of the insured and the size and scope of The Company."

"But if people are going to live forever, your company is going to have to discontinue the annuity system, is that it?" Dr. Farrar asked pointedly. "You'd leave the old folks cut off from jobs by custom and from any other income by expediency?"

Jeremy Brill was suddenly serious. "The problem of the support of paupers is hardly the immediate responsibility of Far-Western. Besides," he added hopefully, "by the time the thirty-year olders whose policies we would have to refuse to write now are old enough to worry about it, our society will no doubt have found some way for them to maintain their independence. I have the greatest faith in you social researchers, so great that my company can surely feel free to turn that problem over to you with utter confidence.

"And perhaps, as a matter of fact," he continued, "you can already tell me that there is little hope that man can pass his two-hundredth year without serious impairment of his faculties, and we shall only have to raise the age at which annuities begin to pay. The Company naturally prefers the gentle road of reform to the cataclysm of revolution." He relaxed after this burst of metaphor.

"I am not at all sure that there is any sanity data on those over 150 in statistical form. It would take me some time to be sure of any exact present correlation of mental erosion, as you call it, with age." Dr. Farrar reflected on the state of the file cases in the further corner. He wasn't at all sure, either, how much it was wise to tell this eager representative of The Company. There might be other angles. This increase in suicide, for instance.

"You see," he went on, "Block Nineteen does not have a very high complement of psychiatrists. If the subjects get too difficult to handle, we usually send them to Mayhew Mental Observing Hospital and close their files here. We do chiefly physiological research here, you know. The older subjects seem to mistrust young psychiatrists and the more practical men seem to prefer working in places like the Mayhew where the material is more interesting." Maybe he could get rid of the man by offering a better bait.

"The Company would be more than willing to offer the services of a couple of trained statistical analysts if you would like to put your unorganized material at our disposal for, shall we say, a week?"

"That won't be necessary, thanks. I could have some word for you in a couple of weeks--as soon as certain other matters are taken care of. I'd be interested in the results myself, naturally." And he would. There might be some clue to poor Clarice LePays and Forsythe and the earlier ones. A promise of figures soon would put Brill off temporarily. Now change the subject and close the talk.

"I suppose you have to do a lot of odd investigating like this in the course of company work?" Dr. Farrar asked politely.

"Yes, indeed, Doctor. Every event in the world is somehow connected with the insurance business. You might be interested to know that some of our men are now in Washington investigating space ship conditions. Confidentially, we shall probably soon be pushing a government subsidy for insurance for space crews and extra-territorial colonists. Sounds fantastic, doesn't it?"

The intercom bulb burned amber again. This time Farrar was more cautious.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"Mr. Daneshaw."

"Send him in in about a minute."

He turned to Brill. "The man who's coming in is one of our older subjects. You might like to meet him." He smiled. "Not that he's exactly typical of his age."

"You won't tell him why I'm here?" Brill requested. "The Company naturally doesn't want any publicity on this matter yet, Doctor."

"Naturally, Mr. Brill, you don't want a run on annuity policies any more than the Government wants to alarm prospective settlers on Venus by refusing to insure them. Old Daneshaw has probably forgotten more secrets than we'll ever know: but if you think best...."

"I do."

The door swung back smoothly, stopping just short of the file cases, to admit the tall tweed-clad figure of the professor emeritus, who closed it gently, deliberately.

"Morning, Tim."

"Good morning, Jules." Daneshaw noticed the stranger and stood uncertainly just inside the door.

"I'd like to introduce Mr. Brill--Mr. Daneshaw."

Daneshaw's handshake was firm but gentle like his closing of the door. He moved to the maple armchair and sat, crossing his long legs, relaxed.

"Mr. Brill's got a great-aunt on the waiting list for Block Nineteen. He's here looking us over to see if we're fit company."

Brill looked pleased. This nice old boy realized the confidence of The Powers in The Company. "It hasn't been settled yet--may take months more the way they're wrangling. The Chinese don't want it to be the Dutch and the Dutch don't want the Brazilians. You know how it is. Myself, I think the government bit off more than it could chew, offering the first American built ship to whatever group the Assembly decided to send."

Dr. Farrar winced inwardly. A political discussion with Tim Daneshaw would certainly antagonize Brill if not exhaust him. "Who would you like to see go, Tim?" he veered the talk away from the errors of the present regime.

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