Schrodinger's Cat Trilogy (11 page)

Ubu parks carefully with neat precision flashing his ID at the Secret Service man to be passed quickly into the White House over thick carpets under brilliant chandeliers to the office of Mountbatten Babbit, scientific advisor to the President: a bald and ovoid head with impatiently piercing eyes that scanned for the exact measurement and the precisely calibrated number.

“This ah is a very delicate matter,” Babbit began at once. “We give it an Urgent rating but at the same time we do not wish to alarm the public you understand the whole investigation must be carried on with kid gloves as they say The President Himself has instructed me to make it clear to you, to make it
absolutely clear
, that no leaks will be tolerated no leaks
whatsoever
or a very big ax will fall on the whole Bureau a
very
big ax have I made myself clear?”

“Yes sir absolutely sir.”

“Good. Now, have you noticed a certain ah a certain decline in American science and technology in recent years a withering away of talent and originality so to speak?”

“Well sir law is my background you know sir I wouldn’t know a test tube from a bevatron sir….”

“The decline has been accelerating and is becoming critical in some respects,
critical.”

“Yes sir but so what sir a lot of science is classified as non-ec and not very popular with the Administration.”

Babbit’s eyes were scanning Ubu without warmth. “You think it is possible to draw a hard line a sharp boundary between ec science and non-ec science?”

“Well of course sir President Lousewart himself is always saying …”

“I’m not talking about Administration rhetoric Mr. Ubu I am talking about reality. Could you draw such a line and say this is ec research and this is non-ec?”

“Well sir I don’t get involved in politics I investigate and find out the facts and that’s my job sir administrative decisions are not our business at the Bureau.”

“There is no difference between ec and non-ec science,”
Babbit said with icy deliberation. “I will never say that in public as long as I am part of the Administration you understand the President has a right to expect loyalty from Members of the Team of course but I tell you in private ec and non-ec are terms in theology in metaphysics in value judgment,
they have nothing to do with science.
It’s all as absurd as saying some research is chocolate and some is vanilla and the chocolate is better than the vanilla.”

“Yes sir I understand you sir you have my word I’ll never repeat any of this sir.”

“Good now officially the Administration only wishes to discourage non-ec science but in fact we are suffering a drastic a dangerous possibly a
lethal
decline in all science right across the board …”

“But sir isn’t that what President Lousewart stands for? Tightening our belts, the simple rugged life of our pioneer ancestors, lowered expectations …”

“You damned fool we’re not talking about political speeches we’re talking about the realities of
survival.”

“Uh yes sir yes.”

“Survival dammit
survival.”

But quantumly inseparable from Ubu nurse Ida Pingala peeks into the Wildeblood room to see if the patient is
sleeping comfortably
(always got to be careful with these rich bitches especially the types we get here in Trans-sexuality Surgery rather be back in obs so helpless and adorable they are even if some of the mothers shouldn’t be raising kittens much less humans)
and leans fixing the hem on her skirt as the figure in the bed gurgles a half-snore mutter “Master … escape …”

Another quantum jump:

“One hundred thirty-two?” Ubu repeated.

“Those are the figures that came out of the Beast,” Babbit said evenly. “One hundred thirty-two of the top scientific minds who’ve left government since the ec programs were implemented are not working for private industry, teaching at universities, or anywhere else to be found.”

It may have been coincidence or synchronicity or the quantum inseparability principle (QUIP), but the very same day that Epicene Wildeblood became Mary Margaret Wildeblood in Baltimore and Babbit briefed Roy Ubu on the Brain Drain mystery in Washington, Blake Williams was teaching a class at Columbia and Hugo de Naranja was a student in it. Since Hugo was the first human being who ever saw the Cat, he should have been paying close attention to Williams, but in fact he was a
poet and felt it his duty to be bored by all the sciences. Hugo would settle for a gentleman’s C in “The Anthropology of Quantum Physics.” Hugo was a
Santaria
initiate, the third ex-husband of Carol Christmas, and (although he didn’t know it) he worked for Hassan i Sabbah X.

“It wasn’t Einstein,” Williams was droning along, “and it wasn’t even Heisenberg or dear old Schrödinger who drove the last nail in the coffin of common sense. It was John S. Bell, who published his memorable Theorem in 1964, nearly twenty years ago,” and blah blah blah. Hugo was more interested in the ass of the girl in the row ahead of him. He wanted both his hands on that ass. He wanted her thighs around his waist. He wanted his cock way up inside her hot White Protestant pussy. Screwing Latino girls rated 0 in his book (that was only sex), screwing Jewish girls was 5 (that was Status), but screwing a White Protestant girl was 10 points and a gold star (that was SUCCESS).

Williams continues to transmit to blank bored faces: “Bell’s Theorem basically deals with nonlocality. That is, it shows that no local explanation can account for the known facts of quantum mechanics. Um perhaps I should clarify that. A local explanation is one that assumes that things seemingly separate in space and time are really separate. Um? Yes. It assumes, that is to say, that space and time are independent of our primate nervous systems. Do I have your attention, class?

“But Bell is even more revolutionary. He offers us two choices if we try to keep locality, and if there are any students in this class who are seriously interested in the subject this would be a good time to take a few notes. Um. First choice: we can abandon quantum mechanics itself. That of course means inescapably that we abandon atomic physics and about three-quarters of everything we call science. Um. Now we really don’t want to give up
quantum mechanics so let’s look at choice two. We give up objectivity. Well, that’s not too great a sacrifice for those of us who have already given up sweets and male superiority and ha ha faith in the integrity of government or even cigarettes. We can give up objectivity. Ahhh yes but the trouble is … Yes Mr. Naranja?”

“Ees this goan be on the examination sir?”

“No you needn’t worry about that Mr. Naranja we wouldn’t dream of asking anything hard on the examination I believe the last examination with a hard question given at this university was in a survey of mathematics course in 1953 yes Mr. Lee?”

“Is possibre that quantum connection is not immediate and unmitigated? Then perhaps we take choice one and give up not quantum mechanics itself but merely modify the quantum connection in a sense that it is some way sir mediate or mitigated, does that seem possibre sir?”

“Ah Mr. Lee how did you ever land at this university there are times I suspect you of actually seeking an education but I’m afraid in this case your canny intellect has run aground. Recent experiments by Clauser and Aspect shut that door forever. The quantum connection is immediate, unmitigated, and I might say omnipresent as the Thomist God.”

“So. You tell us, Professor Williams, how many times Crauser’s experiment has been verified?”

Rebirth, Wildeblood was deciding, is messier than first birth, despite old Augustine and his
media feces et urine
trip … how much he had wanted to be Annette Haven in the clusterfuck scene in
China Girl:
one cock in Her mouth, one in Her snatch, one in each hand: ah, Wildeblood,
‘twere paradise enow. But the reality of it, the adjustments to be made:

SHe was writing it out a hundred times, to avoid making
that
mistake again. Ego is much more a body image than she had known. Psychologically, she was androgynous WoMan, the Baphomet idol; physically, she had to sit down to pee.

But Roy Ubu, back at FBI headquarters, was already briefing a five-man team on the brain drain mystery.

“You mean,” Special Agent Tobias Knight asked, “we’re supposed to find 132 missing scientists without letting anybody know that there are 132 missing scientists we’re looking for? Is that it?”

“The President Himself,” Ubu pronounced in Babbit’s frigid tones, “gives this project Top Priority.”

“In other words, it’s impossible but you want us to do it, anyway,” Knight translated.

“Now that’s enough defeatism, Toby, let’s get to work and believe in ourselves and by Christ a busted flush can win when the guys behind it have the balls for it…. Now, here’s the names in alphabetical order. One: Dr. George Washington Carver Bridge, sounds like a spade, graduate Miskatonic University; it says last worked for the government on Project Cyclops in the late seventies. Two: Dr. Charles Chance, nickname Fat, graduate Miskatonic, also last worked for the government on Cyclops. Three …”

Percy Lousewart was born in the Ohio River Valley in 1866 and by then Lousewart was no longer considered a euphonious name. His Christian name didn’t help, even though his mother had picked it due to her fervent, almost erotic, admiration for Shelley. She might as well have named the poor lad Cissy. Every time he introduced himself as Percy Lousewart, some bully or other felt compelled to make a witty remark, and a fight usually followed. Eventually poor Percy decided to change his name and went to see an educated man, a lawyer, about having the job done legally; he also wanted some advice on choosing a better, more popular title. The lawyer, alas, was more than erudite; he was a bibliomaniac, an alcoholic scholar, and the kind of crank who delights in writing letters to the
Britannica
correcting their errors. He told Percy all about the Furbish Lousewart plant and even showed him a picture of one. He was eloquent on the subject, and his passion was contagious. Percy Lousewart had his name changed only to Furbish Lousewart and took his lumps as they came. His first son was named Furbish Lousewart II and a tradition was begun.

“The fuck,” Malloy said. “Where you get an idea like that? I don’t sing, I never sing. Who’s been handing you that shit?”

It was a small furnished room on Taylor Street in the San Francisco tenderloin. A sign outside the window advertised an establishment on the ground floor,
Les Nuits de Paris Massage.

Starhawk said, “Marty, I know three guys up in Folsom because of you. They’re not sure. Each one of them, he says it might of been you, it might of been two other guys. I’m sure. I make it a point of honor to be sure about things like that. You pick up $20 here from Mendoza, $15 there from Murphy, and you tell them what you think they want to hear, mostly crap. To keep them interested, you give them a live one now and then, somebody you don’t like. You and twenty other guys in this town. Don’t crap me, Marty. I’m here to make money for you, not to give you a hard time about it.”

Malloy said, “You’re crazy. You should go see a psychiatrist. You must of been back on the reservation eating peyote again. I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“Okay,” Starhawk said. “You’re smart, Marty. You’re so damned smart you don’t admit anything, even when the other guy knows more about it than you do. My ass. You’re so damned smart you’re stupid, is what you are.”

Malloy started to get up.

“Sit down,” Starhawk said. “I keep telling you, I’m not here to give you a hard time. Listen to me, Marty, just a minute. I’ve got a century that’s not doing anything, and it’s yours.” He opened his wallet and laid a $100 bill on the table. “Now, do we talk about its four brothers, and what you do to get them, or do you go on shitting me until I go out the door and find another guy that talks to cops?”

The massage sign below the window flickered on-off, on-off.

“Suppose I do it,” Malloy said. “I mean, I’m not admitting anything, but suppose just this once I go talk to The Murph. What I got to know is, whose ass is in the sling, who goes up? You understand, I don’t want somebody comes looking for me from the Syndicate.”

“Nobody goes up, that’s the beauty of it,” Starhawk said. “You’re just going to tell Murph about a guy got in today from L.A. He’s here to do a job for Maldonado, see, and he got drunk and started shooting off his mouth about how funny it was, the guy he came to do the job on is a cop.”

“Jesus,” Malloy said. The massage sign flickered off and on again. “Don’t tell me, let me guess. Starhawk, the man of bronze, two balls of cast iron and no more brains than a hamster. You got it in your head it’s cop-hunting season and you’re going to shoot one of them. And they trust good old Marty Malloy so much they’ll spend all their time looking for an imaginary hit man from L.A., just because good old Marty tells them so. I take it all back. You don’t need a psychiatrist, you need a new brain.”

“Don’t get your bowels in an uproar,” Starhawk said. “It’s not that kind of job. It’s just a heist.”