Simulacra

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THE SIMULACRA

by PHILIP K. DICK (1964)

The interoffice memo at Electronic Musical Enterprise frightened Nat Flieger and he did not know why. It dealt,

after all, with a great opportunity, the famed Soviet pianist Richard Kongrosian, a psychokineticist who played

Brahms and Schumann without manually approaching the keyboard, had been located at his summer home in Jenner,

California. And, with luck, Kongrosian would be available for a series of recording sessions with EME. And yet --

Perhaps, Flieger reflected, it was the dark, wet forests of the extreme northern coastal region of California which

repelled him; he liked the dry southlands near Tijuana, here where EME maintained its central offices. But

Kongrosian, according to the memo, would not come out of his summer home; he had entered semi-retirement,

possibly due to some unknown domestic situation, hinted to be a tragedy involving either his wife or his child. This

had happened years ago, the memo implied.

It was nine in the morning. Nat Flieger reflexively poured water in a cup and fed the living protoplasm

incorporated into the Ampek F-a2 recording system which he kept in his office; the Ganymedean life form did not

experience pain and had not yet objected to being made over into a portion of an electronic system... neurologically it

was primitive, but as an auditory receptor it was unexcelled.

Water trickled through the membranes of the Ampek F-a2 and was gratefully absorbed; the conduits of the living

system pulsed. I could take you along, Flieger decided. The F-a2 was portable and he preferred its curve to later,

more sophisticated equipment. Flieger lit a delicado, walked to the window of his office to switch the blind to

receive; warm Mexican sunlight burst in and he blinked. The F-a2 went into a state of extreme activity, then,

utilizing the sunlight and the water, its metabolic processes stimulated. From habit Flieger watched it at work, but his

mind was still on the memo.

Once more he picked up the memo, squeezed it, and it instantly whined, '...this opportunity presents EME with an

acute challenge, Nat. Kongrosian refuses to perform in public but we have a contract through our Berlin affiliate,

Art-Cor, and legally we can make Kongrosian record for us... at least if we can get him to stand still long enough. Eh,

Nat?'

'Yes,' Nat Flieger said, nodding absently, replying to Leo Dondoldo's voice.

Why had the famed Soviet pianist acquired a summer home in northern California? That in itself was radical,

frowned on by the central government in Warsaw. And if Kongrosian had learned to defy the ukases of the supreme

Communist authority he could scarcely be expected to flinch from a showdown with EME; Kongrosian, now in his

sixties, was a professional at ignoring the legal ramifications of contemporary social life, either in Communist lands

or in the USEA. Like many artists, Kongrosian travelled his own way, somewhere in between the two overpowering

social realities.

A certain amount of hucksterism would have to be brought into such a pressing as this. The public had a short

memory, as was well known; it would have to be forcibly reminded of Kongrosian's existence and musical cum

Psionic talents. But EME's publicity department could readily handle it; after all, they had managed to sell many an

unknown, and Kongrosian, for all his momentary obscurity, was scarcely that. But I wonder just how good

Kongrosian is today, Nat Flieger reflected.

The memo was trying to sell him on that, too. '...everybody knows that Kongrosian has up until quite recently

played before private gatherings,' the memo declared fervently. 'For bigwigs in Poland and Cuba and before the

Puerto Rican elite in New York. One year ago, in Birmingham, he appeared before fifty Negro millionaires for

benefit purposes; the funds raised went to help with Afro Moslem lunar type colonization. I talked to a couple of

modern composers who were present at that; they swore that Kongrosian hadn't lost any of his pizazz. Let's see... that

was in 2040. He was fifty-two, then. And of course he's always at the White House, playing for Nicole and that

nonentity, der Alte.'

We had better get the F-a2 up there to Jenner and get him down on oxytape, Nat Flieger decided. Because this

may be our last chance; artistic Psis like Kongrosian have a reputation for dying early.

He answered the memo. 'I'll handle it, Mr Dondoldo. I'll fly up to Jenner and try to negotiate with him personally.'

That was his decision.

'Whee,' the memo exulted. Nat Flieger felt sympathy for it.

The buzzing, super-alert, obnoxiously persistent reporting machine said, 'Is it true, Dr Egon Superb, that you're

going to try to enter your office today?'

There should have been some way to keep reporting machines out of one's house, Dr Superb reflected. However,

there was not. He said, 'Yes. As soon as I finish this breakfast which I am eating I will get into my wheel, drive to

downtown San Francisco, park in a lot, walk directly to my office on Post Street, where as usual I will give

psychotherapy to my first patient of the day. Despite the law, the so-called McPhearson Act.' He drank his coffee.

'And you have the support-'

'The IAPP has fully endorsed my action,' Dr Superb said.

In fact he had talked to the executive council of the International Association of Practising Psychoanalysts just ten

minutes ago. 'I don't know why you picked me out to interview. Every member of the IAPP will be in his office this

morning.' And there were over ten thousand members, scattered throughout the USEA, both in North America and in

Europe.

The reporting machine purred intimately, 'Who do you feel is responsible for the passage of the McPhearson Act

and der Alte's willingness to sign it into law?'

'You know who,' Dr Superb said, 'and so do I. Not the army and not Nicole and not even the NP. It's the great

ethical pharmaceutical house, the cartel A.G. Chemie, in Berlin.' Everyone knew that; it was hardly news. The

powerful German cartel had sold the world on the notion of drug-therapy for mental illness; there was a fortune to be

made, there. And by corollary, psychoanalysts were quacks, on a par with orgone box and health food healers. It was

not like the old days, the previous century, when psychoanalysts had had stature. Dr Superb sighed.

'Does it cause you anguish,' the reporting machine said penetratingly, 'to abandon your profession under external

compulsion? Hmm?'

'Tell your audience,' Dr Superb said slowly, 'That we intend to keep on, law or no law. We can help, just as

chemical therapy can help. In particular, characterological distortions -- where the entire life-history of the patient is

involved.' He saw now that the reporting machine represented one of the major TV networks; an audience of perhaps

fifty million sat in on this interchange. Dr Superb felt suddenly tongue-tied.

After breakfast when he walked outside to his wheel he found a second reporting machine lying in wait for him.

'Ladies and gentlemen, this is the last of the race of the Vienna School of analysts. Perhaps the once distinguished

psychoanalyst Dr Superb will say a few words to us.

'Doctor?' It rolled towards him, blocking his way. 'How do you feel, sir?'

Dr Superb said, 'I feel lousy. Please get out of my way.'

'Going to his office for the last time,' the machine declared, as he slipped away, 'Dr Superb wears the air of a

condemned man and yet a man secretly proud in the knowledge that according to his own lights he's done his job.

But time and tide have passed all the Dr Superbs by... and only the future will know if this is a good thing. Like the

practice of bloodletting, psychoanalysis has thrived and then waned and now a new therapy has taken its place.'

Having boarded his wheel, Dr Superb started up the feeder-road and presently he was rolling along the autobahn

towards San Francisco, still feeling lousy, dreading what he knew to be inevitable: the clash with the authorities

which lay directly ahead.

He was not a young man any more. There was too much spare flesh at his midsection; physically, he was too

dumpy, almost middle-aged, to be a participant in these events. And he had a bald spot, which his bathroom mirror

took pains to disclose to him each morning. Five years ago he had divorced his third wife, Livia, and had not

remarried; his career was his life, his family. So what now? It was indisputable that, as the reporting machine had

said, today he went to his office for the last time. Fifty million people in North America and Europe would watch,

but would this get him a new vocation, a new transcendental goal to replace the old one? No, it would not.

To cheer himself up he picked up the wheel's phone receiver and dialled a prayer.

When he had parked and had walked to his Post Street office he found a small crowd of people and several more

reporting machines and a handful of blue-uniformed San Francisco police waiting.

'Morning,' Dr Superb said to them awkwardly as he ascended the stairs of the building, key in hand. The crowd

parted for him. He unlocked the door and pushed it open, letting morning sunlight spill into the long corridor with its

prints by Paul Klee and Kandinsky which he and Dr Buckleman had put up seven years ago when together they had

decorated this rather old building.

One of the reporting machines declared. 'The test will come, TV-viewers, when Dr Superb's first patient of the

day arrives.'

The police, at parade rest, waited silently.

Pausing at the doorway before going on into his office, Dr Superb looked back at the people and then said, 'Nice

day.'

'For October, anyhow.' He tried to think of something more to say, some heroic phrase which would convey the

nobility of his sentiments and position. But nothing came to mind.

Perhaps, he decided, it was because there simply was no nobility involved; he was simply doing what he had done

five days a week now for years on end and it did not involve any special courage to keep the routine alive one more

time. Of course, he would pay for this donkey-like persistence by being arrested; intellectually he knew that, but his

body, his lower nervous system, did not. Somatically, he continued along his path.

Someone in the crowd, a woman, called, 'We're with you, doctor. Good luck.' Several others grinned at him, and a

flimsy cheer went up, briefly. The police looked bored. Dr Superb shut the door and went on.

In the front room, at her desk, his receptionist Amanda Conners raised her head and said, 'Good morning, doctor.'

Her bright red hair glowed, tied by a ribbon, and from her lowcut mohair sweater, her breasts protruded divinely.

'Morning,' Dr Superb said, pleased to see her here today, and so well-groomed at that. He handed her his coat,

which she hung in the closet. 'Um, who's the first patient?' He lit a mild Florida cigar.

Consulting her book, Amanda said, 'It's Mr Rugge, doctor. At nine o'clock. That'll give you time for a cup of

coffee. I'll fix it.' She quickly started towards the coffee machine in the corner.

'You know what's going to be happening here in a little while,' Superb said. 'Don't you?'

'Oh yes. But the IAPP will provide bail, won't it?' She brought him the small paper cup, carrying it with shaking

fingers.

'I'm afraid this means the end of your job.'

'Yes.' Mandy nodded, no longer smiling; her large eyes had become dark. 'I can't understand why der Alte didn't

veto that bill; Nicole was against it and so I was sure he would, right up to the last moment. My god, the

government's got that time travel equipment; surely they can go ahead and see the harm this'll cause -- the

impoverishment to our society.'

'Maybe they did look ahead.' And he thought, there will be no impoverishment.

The office door opened. There stood the first patient of the day, Mr Gordon Rugge, pale with nervousness.

'Ah, you came,' Dr Superb said. In fact, Rugge was early.

'The bastards,' Rugge said. He was a tall, lean man, in his mid-thirties, well dressed; professionally he was a

broker on Montgomery Street.

Behind Rugge appeared two plainclothes members of the City Police. They fixed their gaze on Dr Superb,

waiting.

The reporting machines extended their hose-like receptors, sucking in data rapidly. For an interval no one moved

or spoke.

'Let's step into my inner office,' Dr Superb said to Mr Rugge. 'And pick up where we left off last Friday.'

'You're under arrest,' one of the two plainclothes police said at once. He advanced and handed Dr Superb a folded

writ. 'Come along.' Taking hold of Superb's arm he started to lead him towards the door; the other plainclothes man

moved to the other side so that they had Superb between them. It was all done neatly, with no fuss.

To Mr Rugge, Dr Superb said, 'I'm sorry, Gordon. Obviously there's nothing I can do by way of continuing your

therapy.'

'The rats want me to take drugs,' Rugge said bitterly.

'And they know that pills make me sick; they're toxic to my particular system.'

'It is interesting,' one of the reporting machines was murmuring, for the benefit of its TV audience, 'to observe the

loyalty of the analyst's patient. And yet, why not? This man has placed his faith in psychoanalysis possibly for years.'

'For six years,' Rugge said to it. 'And I'd go six more, if necessary.'

Amanda Conners began to cry silently into her handkerchief.

As Dr Superb, escorted by both the plainclothes men and the uniformed San Francisco police, was led to the

waiting patrol car, the crowd once again gave a meagre cheer of encouragement. But for the most part, Superb

observed, they were older people. Remnants from earlier times when psychoanalysis was respected; like himself,

part of another era entirely. He wished there were a few youths to be seen, but there were not.

At the police station the thin-faced man in the heavy overcoat, smoking the Bela King handmade Philippine cigar,

glanced out the window with flat, cold eyes, consulted his watch, then paced restlessly.

He was just putting out his cigar and preparing to light another when he caught sight of the police car. At once he

hurried outside on to the loading platform where the police were preparing to begin processing of the individual in

question. 'Doctor,' he said. 'I'm Wilder Pembroke. I'd like to talk to you a moment.' He nodded to the .police and they

fell back, leaving Dr Superb unhanded. 'Come inside; I've got temporary use of a room on the second floor. This

won't take long.'

'You're not one of the City Police,' Dr Superb said eyeing him acutely. 'Or perhaps you're NP.' He looked uneasy,

now. 'Yes, that must be it.'

Pembroke, as he led the way to the elevator, said, 'Just consider me an interested party.' He lowered his voice as a

group of police officials passed them. 'Interested in seeing you back in your office, treating your patients.'

'You have authority to do that?' Superb asked.

'I think so.' The elevator came and the two of them entered it. 'It'll take an hour or so to get you back there,

however. Please try to be patient.' Pembroke lit a fresh cigar.

He did not offer one to Superb.

'May I ask -- what agency you are with?'

'I told you.' Pembroke felt irritable. 'You're simply to consider me an interested party; don't you understand?' He

glared at Superb, and neither of them spoke again until they had reached the second floor. 'Sorry to be abrupt,'

Pembroke said as they walked down the hall. 'But I'm very concerned about your arrest. Very disturbed.' He held the

door open, and Superb cautiously entered room 209. 'Of course, I get disturbed rather readily. It's my job, more or

less. Just as it's your job not to permit yourself to become emotionally involved.' He smiled, but Dr Superb did not

smile back. Too tense for that, Pembroke observed. Superb's reaction fitted the profile contained in the dossier.

They seated themselves warily, facing each other.

Pembroke said, 'There's a man coming to consult you.

Not far from now, going to be a patient of yours. You understand? So we want you to be there; we want your

office open so you can accept him and treat him.'

Nodding, his face rigid, Dr Superb said, 'I -- see.'

'The rest -- the others you treat -- we don't care about.

Whether they get sicker, get well, pay you a fortune, welsh on their bills -- anything. Just this one individual.'

'And after he's treated,' Superb said, 'then you'll shut me down? Like all the other psychoanalysts?'

'We'll talk about that then. Not right now.'

'Who is this man?'

Pembroke said, 'I'm not going to tell you.'

'I assume,' Dr Superb said after a pause, 'you've used von Lessinger's time travel apparatus to scout out my results

with this man.'

'Yes, 'Pembroke said.

'So you have no doubts I will be able to cure him.'

'On the contrary,' Pembroke said. 'You won't be able to help him; that's exactly why we want you there. If he

obtains chemical therapy he'll recover his mental balance.

And it's extremely important to us that he remains ill. So you can see, doctor, we need the continued professional

existence of a quack, a practising psychoanalyst.' Carefully Pembroke relit his cigar, which had gone out. So your

primary instructions are: turn down no new patients. You understand? However insane -- or rather, however

evidently sane.' He smiled; the doctor's discomfort amused him.

Lights burned late in the great communal apartment building The Abraham Lincoln, as this was All Souls night:

the residents, all six hundred of them, were required by their charter to attend, down in the subsurface community

hall.

They filed in, men, women and children; at the door Vince Strikerock, businesslike and cool, a good, solid

bureaucratic official, operated their new identification reader, checking each of them in turn to be sure that no one

from outside, from another communal apartment building, got in. The residents submitted good-naturedly and it all

went very fast.

'Hey Vince, how much'd it set us back?' asked old Joe Purd, oldest resident in the building; he had moved in with

his wife the day the building, in May of 1992, had been built.

His wife was dead now and the children had grown up, married and moved on, but Joe remained.

'Plenty,' Vince said quietly, 'But it's error-proof. It isn't merely subjective.' Up to now, in his permanent job as

sergeant of arms, he had admitted people merely by his ability to recognize them. But that way, he had let in a pair of

goons from Robin Hill Manor and they had disrupted the entire meeting with their questions and comments. It would

not happen again: Vince Strikerock had vowed that, to himself and to his fellow apartment dwellers. And he meant

it.Passing out copies of the agenda, Mrs Wells smiled fixedly and chanted, 'Item 3 A, Appropriation for Roof

Repairs, has been moved to 4 A. Please make a note of that.'

The residents accepted their agendas and then divided into two streams flowing to opposite sides of the hall; the

liberal faction of the building seated themselves on the right and the conservatives on the left, each conspicuously

ignoring the existence of the other. A few uncommitted persons -- new residents or oddballs -- took seats in the rear,

self-conscious and silent as the room buzzed with many small conferences.

The tone, the mood of the room, was tolerant, but the residents knew that tonight there was going to be a clash.

Presumably, both sides were prepared. Here and there documents, petitions, newspaper clippings rustled as they were

read and exchanged, handed back and forth.

On the platform, seated at the table with the four building trustees, chairman Donald Tishman felt sick at his

stomach.

A peaceful man, he shrank from these violent squabbles.

Even seated in the audience he found it too much for him, and here tonight he would have to take active part; time

and tide had rotated the chair around to him, as it did to each resident in turn, and of course it would be the night the

school issue reached its climax.

The room had almost filled and now Patrick Doyle, the current building skypilot, looking none too happy in his

long white robe, raised his hands for silence. 'The opening prayer,' he called huskily, cleared his throat and brought

forth a small card. 'Everyone please shut your eyes and bow your head.' He glanced at Tishman and the trustees, and

Tishman nodded for him to continue. 'Heavenly father,'

Doyle read, 'we the residents of the communal apartment building Abraham Lincoln beseech you to bless our

assembly tonight. Um, we ask that in your mercy you enable us to raise the funds for the roof repairs which seem

imperative. We ask that our sick be healed and that in processing applicants wishing to live amongst us we show

wisdom in whom we admit and who we turn away. We further ask that no outsiders get in and disrupt our law-

abiding, orderly lives and we ask in particular that lastly, if it be thy will, that Nicole Thibodeaux be free of her sinus

headaches which have caused her not to appear before us on TV lately, and that those headaches not have anything to

do with that time two years ago, which we recall, when that stagehand allowed that weight to fall and strike her on

the head, sending her to the hospital for several days. Anyhow, amen.'

The audience agreed, 'Amen.'

Rising from his chair, Tishman said, 'Now, before the business of the meeting, we'll have a few rewarding

minutes of our own talent display for our enjoyment. First, the three Fetersmoeller girls from apartment number 205.

They will do a soft-shoe dance to the tune of "I'll Build a Stairway to the Stars." ' He reseated himself, and on to the

stage came the three little blonde-haired children, familiar to the audience from talent shows in the past.

As the Fetersmoeller girls, in their striped pants and glittery silver jackets, shuffled smilingly through the dance,

the door to the outside corridor opened and a latecomer, Edgar Stone, appeared.

He was late, this evening, because he had been grading test papers of his next-door neighbour, Mr Ian Duncan,

and as he stood in the doorway his mind was still on the test and the poor showing which Duncan -- whom he barely

knew had made. It seemed to him that without even having finished the grading of the test he could see that Duncan

had failed.

On the stage the Fetersmoeller girls sang in their scratchy voices, and Stone wondered why he had come. Perhaps

for no more reason than to avert a fine, it being mandatory for the residents to be here tonight. These amateur talent

shows, put on so frequently, meant nothing to him; he recalled the old days when the TV set had carried

entertainment, good shows put on by professionals. Now of course all the professionals who were any good were

under contract to the White House, and the TV had become educational, not entertaining. Mr Stone thought of the

glorious old golden age, long since gone, of great old movie comics such as Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine,

and then he looked once more at the Fettersmoeller sisters and groaned.

Vince Strikerock, ever on duty, hearing him, glanced at him severely.

At least he had missed the prayer. He presented his identification to Vince's expensive new machine and it

allowed him to pass -- lucky break! -- down the aisle towards a vacant seat. Was Nicole watching this, tonight? Was

a talent scout present somewhere in the audience? He saw no unfamiliar faces. The Fetersmoeller girls were wasting

their time. Seating himself, he closed his eyes and listened, unable to endure watching. They'll never make it, he

thought.

They'll have to face it, and so will their ambitious parents, they're untalented, like the rest of us... The Abraham

Lincoln has added little to the cultural store of the USEA, despite its sweaty, strenuous determination, and you are

not going to be able to alter that.

The hopelessness of the Fetersmoeller girls' position made him remember once more the test papers which Ian

Duncan, trembling and waxen-faced, had pressed into his hands early that morning. If Duncan failed he would be

even worse off than the Fetersmoeller girls because he would not even be living at The Abraham Lincoln; he would

drop out of sight -- their sight, anyhow -- and would revert to a despised and ancient status: he would, in all

probability, unless gifted with some special skills, find himself once more in a dorm, working on a manual gang as

they all had done back in their teens.

Of course he would also be refunded the money which he had paid for his apartment, a large sum which

represented the man's sole major investment in life. From one standpoint, Stone envied him. What would I do, he

asked himself as he sat, eyes closed, if I had my equity back right now, in a lump sum? Perhaps, he thought, I'd

emigrate. Buy one of those cheap, illegal jalopies they peddle at those lots whichClapping hands roused him. The

girls had finished, and he, too, joined in the applause. On the platform, Tishman waved for silence. 'Okay, folks, I

know you enjoyed that, but there's lots more in store, tonight. And then there's the business part of the meeting; we

mustn't forget that.' He grinned at them.

Yes, Stone thought. 'The 'beezness'. And he felt tense, because he was one of the radicals at The Abraham Lincoln

who wanted to abolish the building's grammar school and send their children to a public grammar school where they

would be exposed to children from other buildings entirely.

It was the kind of idea which met much opposition. And yet, in the last weeks, it had gained support. Perhaps they

were entering an odd and unusual time. In any case, what a broadening experience it would be; their children would

discover that people in other apartment buildings were no different from themselves. Barriers between people of all

apartments would be torn down and a new understanding would come about.

At least, that was how it struck Stone, but the conservatives did not see it that way. Too soon, they said, for such

mixing. There would be outbreaks of fights as the children clashed over which building was supreme. In time it

would happen... but not now, not so soon.

Risking the severe fine, small, grey, nervous Mr Ian Duncan missed the assembly and remained in his apartment

that evening, studying official Government texts on the political history of the United States of Europe and America.

He was weak in that, he knew; he could barely comprehend the economic factors, let alone all the relpol ideologies

that had come and gone during the twentieth century, directly contributing to the present situation. For instance, the

rise of the Democratic-Republican Party. Once it had been two parties (or was it three?) which had engaged in

wasteful quarrels, in struggles for power, just the way buildings fought now. The two -- or three -- parties had

merged, about 1985, just before Germany entered the USEA. Now there was just the one party, which had ruled a

stable and peaceful society, and everyone, by law, belonged to it. Everyone paid dues and attended meetings and

voted, each four years, for a new der Alte -- for the man they thought Nicole would like best.

It was nice to know that they, the people, had the power to decide who would become Nicole's husband, each four

years; in a sense it gave to the electorate supreme power, even above Nicole herself. For instance, this latest man,

Rudolf Kalbfleisch. Relations between this der Alte and the First Lady were quite cool, indicating that she did not

like this most recent choice very much. But of course being a lady she would never let on.

When did the position of First Lady begin to assume stature greater than that of President? The text inquired. In

other words, when did our society become matriarchal, Ian Duncan said to himself. Around about 1990; I know the

answer to that. There were glimmerings before that -- the change came gradually. Each year der Alte became more

obscure, the First Lady became better known, more liked, by the public which brought it about. Was it a need for

mother, wife, mistress, or perhaps all three? Anyhow they got what they wanted; they got Nicole and she is certainly

all three and more besides.

In the corner of his living room the television set said taaaaanggg, indicating that it was about to come on. With a

sigh, Duncan closed the official relpol textbook and turned his attention to the screen. A special, dealing with

activities at the White House, he speculated. Another tour, perhaps, or a thorough scrutiny (in massively-detailed

depth) about a new hobby or passion of Nicole's. Has she taken up collecting bone-china cups? If so, we will have to

view each and every damn cup.

Sure enough, the round, heavy, wattled features of Maxwell W. Jamison, the White House News Secretary,

appeared on the screen. 'Evening, people of this land of ours,' he said solemnly. 'Have you ever wondered what it

would be like to descend to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean? Nicole has, and to answer that question she has

assembled here in the Tulip Room of the White House three of the world's foremost oceanographers. Tonight she

will ask them for their stories, and you will hear them too, as they were taped live, just a short while ago through the

facilities of the Unified Triadic Network's Public Affairs Bureau.'

And now to the White House, Duncan said to himself. At least vicariously. We who can't find our way there, who

have not talents which might interest the First Lady even for one evening: we get to see in anyhow, through the

carefullyregulated window of our television set.

Tonight he did not really want to watch, but it seemed expedient to do so; there might be a surprise quiz on the

programme, at the end. And a good grade on a surprise quiz might well offset the bad grade he had surely made on

the recent relpol test, now being corrected by his neighbour, Mr Edgar Stone.

On the screen bloomed now the lovely tranquil features, the pale skin and dark, intelligent eyes, the wise and yet

pert face of the woman who had come to monopolize their attention, on whom an entire nation, almost an entire

planet, dwelt obsessively. At the sight of her, Ian Duncan felt sick with fear. He had failed her; his rotten test results

were somehow known to her and although she would say nothing, the disappointment was there.

'Good evening,' Nicole said in her soft, slightly husky voice.

'It's this way,' Duncan found himself mumbling. 'I don't have a head for abstractions; I mean, all this religio-

political philosophy -- it makes no sense to me. Couldn't I just concentrate on concrete reality? I ought to be baking

bricks or turning out shoes.' I ought to be on Mars, he thought, on the frontier.

I'm flunking out here; at thirty-five I'm washed up, and she knows it.

Let me go Nicole, he thought in desperation. Don't give me any more tests, because I don't have a chance of

passing them. Even this programme about the ocean's bottom; by the time it's over I'll have forgotten all the data. I'm

no use to the Democratic-Republican Party.

He thought about his former buddy Al, then. Al could help me. Al worked for Loony Luke, at one of his Jalopy

Jungles peddling the little tin and cardboard ships that even defeated People could afford, ships that could, if luck

was with them, successfully make a one-way trip to Mars. Al, he said to himself, could get me a jalopy wholesale.

On the TV screen, Nicole was saying, And really, it is a world of much enchantment, with luminous entities far

surpassing in variety and in sheer delightful wonder anything found on other planets. Scientists compute that there

are more forms of life in the ocean-'

Her face faded, and a sequence showing unnatural, grotesque fish took its place. This is part of the deliberate

propaganda line, Duncan realized. An effort to take our minds off Mars and the idea of getting away from the Party -

- and from her. On the screen a bulbous-eyed fish gaped at him, and his attention, despite himself, was captured.

Jeez, he thought, it is a weird world down there. Nicole, he thought, you've got me trapped. If only Al and I had

succeeded; we might be performing right now for you, and we'd be happy. While you interviewed world-famous

oceanographers Al and I would be discreetly playing in the background, perhaps one of the Bach 'Two Part

Inventions'.

Going to the closet of his apartment, Ian Duncan bent down and carefully lifted a cloth-wrapped object into the

light. We had so much youthful faith in this, he recalled.

Tenderly, he unwrapped the jug; then, taking a deep breath, he blew a couple of hollow notes on it. Duncan &

Miller and Their Two-man Jug Band, he and Al Miller had been, playing their own arrangement for two jugs of Bach

and Mozart and Stravinsky. But the White House talent scout -- the skunk. He had never even given them a fair

audition. It had been done, he told them. Jesse Pigg, the fabulous jug-artist from Alabama, had got to the White

House first, entertaining and delighting the dozen and one members of the Thibodeaux family gathered there with his

version of 'Derby Ram' and 'John Henry' and the like.

'But,' Ian Duncan had protested, 'this is classical jug. We play late Beethoven sonatas.'

'We'll call you,' the talent scout had said briskly. 'If Nicky shows an interest at any time in the future.'

Nicky! He had blanched. Imagine being that intimate to the First Family. He and Al, mumbling pointlessly, had

retired from the stage and their jugs, making way for the next act, a group of dogs dressed up in Elizabethan

costumes portraying characters from Hamlet.

The dogs had not made it, either, but that was little consolation.

'I am told,' Nicole was saying, 'that there is so little light in the ocean depths that, well, observe this strange

fellow.' A fish, sporting a glowing lantern before him, swam across the TV screen.

Startling him, there came a knock on the apartment door.

With caution, LAN Duncan answered it. He found his neighbour Mr Stone standing there, looking nervous.

'You weren't at All Souls?' Edgar Stone said. 'Won't they check and find out?' He held in his hands Ian Duncan's

corrected test.

Duncan said, 'Tell me how I did.' He prepared himself.

Entering the apartment, Stone shut the door after him. He glanced at the TV set, saw Nicole seated with the

oceanographers, listened for a moment to her, then abruptly said in a hoarse voice, 'You did fine.' He held out the

test.

'I passed?'

Duncan could not believe it. He accepted the papers, examining them with incredulity. And then he understood

what had happened.

Stone had conspired to see that he passed. He had falsified the score, probably out of humanitarian motives.

Duncan raised his head and they looked at each other, neither speaking. This is terrible, Duncan thought. What'll I do

now? His reaction amazed him, but there it was.

I wanted to fail, he realized. Why? So I can get out of here, so I would have an excuse to give up all this, my

apartment and my job, say fork it and go. Emigrate with nothing more than the shirt on my back, in a jalopy that falls

to pieces the moment it comes to rest in the Martian wilderness.

'Thanks,' he said glumly.

In a rapid voice, Stone said, 'Y-you can do the same for me sometime.'

'Oh yeah, be happy to,' Duncan said.

Scuttling back out of the apartment, Stone left him alone with the TV set, his jug and the falsely corrected test

papers, and his thoughts.

One would have to go back to the year 1994, the year that West Germany entered the Union as the fifty-third of

the United States, to understand why Vince Strikerock, an American citizen and an inhabitant of The Abraham

Lincoln Apartments, was listening to der Alte on the television set while he shaved, the next morning. There was

something about this particular der Alte, President Rudi Kalbfleisch, which always irritated him, and it would be a

great thing when Kalbfleisch, in two more years, reached the end of his term and had, by law, to retire. It was always

a great thing, a good day, when the law got one of them out of office; Vince always found it worth celebrating.

None the less, Vince felt, it was best to do all that was possible with the old man while he remained in office, and

so he put down his razor and went into the living room to fiddle with the knobs of the TV set. He adjusted the n, the r

and b knobs, and hopefully anticipated a turn for the better in the dire droning on of the speech... however, no change

took place. Too many other viewers had their own ideas as to what the old man ought to be saying, Vince realized. In

fact there were probably enough other people in this one apartment building alone to offset any pressures he might

try to exert on the old man through his particular set. But anyhow that was democracy. Vince sighed. This was what

they had wanted: a government receptive to what the people said. He returned to the bathroom and continued

shaving.

'Hey Julie!' he called to his wife. 'Is breakfast about ready?' He heard no sound of her stirring about in the kitchen

of the apartment. And come to think of it, he hadn't noticed her beside him in bed as he had groggily got up this

morning.

All at once he remembered. Last night after All Souls he and Julie, after a particularly bitter fight, had got

divorced, had gone down to the building's M & D Commissioner and filled out the D papers. Julie had packed her

things then and there; he was alone in the apartment -- no one was fixing his breakfast and unless he got busy he

would miss it entirely.

It was a shock, because this particular marriage had endured for six entire months and he had become thoroughly

used to seeing her in the mornings. She knew just how he liked his eggs (cooked with a small amount of Mild

Munster cheese). Damn the new permissive devorce legislation that old President Kalbfleisch had ushered in! Damn

Kalbfleisch in general; why didn't the old man turn over and die some afternoon during his famous two o'clock nap?

But then of course another der Alte would simply take his place. And even the old man's death wouldn't bring Julie

back; that lay outside the area of USEA bureaucracy, vast as it was.

Savagely, he went to the TV set and pressed the s knob; if enough citizens pushed it, the old man would stop

entirely -- the stop knob meant total cessation of the mumbling speech.

Vince waited, but the speech went on.

And then it struck him as odd that there should be a speech so early in the morning; after all, it was only eight

a.m. Perhaps the entire lunar colony had gone up in a single titanic explosion of its fuel depot. The old man would be

telling them that more belt-tightening was required, in order to restock the space programme; these and other quaint

calamities had to be expected. Or perhaps at last some authentic remains of a sentient race had been unearthed -- or

was the term unmarsed? -- on the fourth planet, hopefully not in the French area but in, as der Alte liked to phrase it,

'one's own'. You Prussian bastards, Vince thought. We never should have admitted you into what I like to phrase as

'our tent', our federal union, which should have been confined to the Western Hemisphere. But the world has shrunk.

When you are founding a colony millions of miles away on another moon or planet, the three thousand miles

separating New York from Berlin did not seem meaningful. And god knew the Germans in Berlin were willing.

Picking up the telephone, Vince called the manager of the apartment building. 'My wife Julie -- I mean my ex-

wife did she take another apartment last night?' If he could locate her he could perhaps have breakfast with her and

that would be cheering. He listened hopefully.

'No, Mr Strikerock.' A pause. 'Not according to our records.'

Aw hell, Vince thought, and hung up.

What was marriage, anyhow? An arrangement of sharing things, such as right now being able to discuss the

meaning of der Alte giving an eight a.m. speech and getting someone else -- his wife -- to fix breakfast while he

prepared to go to his job at Karp u. Sohnen Werke's Detroit branch. Yes, it meant an arrangement in which one could

get another person to do certain things one didn't like to do, such as cooking meals; he hated having to eat food

which he had prepared himself. Single, he would eat at the building's cafeteria; he foresaw that, based on past

experience. Mary, Jean, Laura, now Julie; four marriages and the last the shortest.

He was going downhill. Maybe, god forbid, he was a latent queer.

On the TV, der Alte uttered,'...and paramilitary activity recalls the Days of Barbarism and hence is doubly to be

renounced.'

Days of Barbarism -- that was the sweet-talk for the Nazi Period of the middle part of the previous century, now

gone nearly a century but still vividly, if distortedly, recalled. So der Alte had taken to the airwaves to denounce the

Sons of Job, the latest nut organization of a quasi-religious nature flapping about in the streets, proclaiming a

purification of national ethnic life, etc., or whatever it was they proclaimed.

In other words, stiff legislation to bar persons from public life who were odd -- those born specially, due to the

years of radiation fall-out from bomb testing, in particular from the vicious People's China blasts.

That would mean Julie, Vince conjectured, since she's sterile. Because she could not bear children she would not

be permitted to vote... a rather neurotic connective, logically possible only in the minds of a Central European people

such as the Germans. The tail that wags the dog, he said to himself as he dried his face. We in Nord Amerika are the

dog; the Reich is the tail. What a life. Maybe I ought to emigrate to colonial reality, live under a faint, fitful,

paleyellow sun where even things with eight legs and a stinger get to vote... no Sons of Job, there. Not that all the

special people were that special, but a good many of them had seen fit -- and for good reason -- to emigrate. As had

quite a number of quite unspecial folk who were simply tired of the overpopulated, bureaucratically-controlled life

on Terra these days, whether in the USEA, in the French Empire, or in People's Asia, or Free -- that is, black --

Africa.

In the kitchen he fixed himself bacon and eggs. And, while the bacon cooked, he fed the sole pet allowed him in

the apartment building: George III, his small green turtle.

George III ate dried flies (twenty-five per cent protein, more nourishing than human food), hamburger, and ant

eggs, a breakfast which caused Vince Strikerock to ponder on the axiom de gustibus non disputandum est there's no

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THESIMULACRAbyPHILIPK.DICK(1964)1TheinterofficememoatElectronicMusicalEnterprisefrightenedNatFliegerandhedidnotknowwhy.Itdealt,afterall,withagreatopportunity,thefamedSovietpianistRichardKongrosian,apsychokineticistwhoplayedBrahmsandSchumannwithoutmanuallyapproachingthekeyboard,hadbeenlocatedathissum...

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