He felt awed and humble and disbelieving. Music without Coms, without words, could make people laugh and cry, and dance and cavort madly.
And it could turn them into lewd animals.
Wonderingly he played the music that had incited such unconcealed lust, played it louder, and louder—
And felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned to look into Val's passion-twisted face.
He asked Hulsey to come and hear him that night, and later Hulsey sat slumped on the cot in his room and shuddered. “It isn't right. No man should have that power over people. How do you do it?”
“I don't know,” Baque said. “I saw that young couple sitting there, and they were happy, and I felt their happiness. And as I played everyone in the room was happy. And then another couple came in quarreling, and the next thing I knew I had everyone mad.”
“Almost started a fight at the next table,” Hulsey said. “And what you did after that—”
“Yes. But not as much as I did last night. You should have seen it last night.”
Hulsey shuddered again.
“I have a book about ancient Greek music,” Baque said. “They had something they called ethos. They thought that the different musical scales affected people in different ways—could make them sad, or happy, or even drive them crazy. They claimed that a musician named Orpheus could move trees and soften rocks with his music. Now listen. I've had a chance to experiment, and I've noticed that my playing is most effective when I don't use the filters. There are only two filters that work on that multichord anyway—flute and violin—but when I use either of them the people don't react so strongly. I'm wondering if maybe the effects the Greeks talk about were produced by their instruments, rather than their scales. I'm wondering if the tone of an unfiltered multichord might have something in common with the tones of the ancient Greek kithara or aulos.”
Hulsey grunted. “I don't think it's the instrument, or the scales either. I think it’s Baque, and I don't like it. You should have stayed a tunesmith.”
“I want you to help me,” Baque said. “I want to find a place where we can put a lot of people—a thousand, at least—not to eat, or watch Coms, but just to listen to one man play on a multichord.”
Hulsey got up abruptly. “Baque, you're a dangerous man. I'm damned if I'll trust any man who can make me feel the way you made me feel tonight. I don't know what you're trying to do, but I won't have any part of it.”
He stomped away in the manner of a man about to slam a door, but the room of a male multichordist at the Lankey-Pank Out did not rate that luxury. Hulsey paused uncertainly in the doorway, gave Baque a parting glare, and disappeared. Baque followed him as far as the main room and stood watching him weave his way impatiently past the tables to the exit.
From his place behind the bar, Lankey looked at Baque and then glanced after the disappearing Hulsey. “Troubles?” he asked.
Baque turned away wearily. “I've known that man for twenty years. I never thought he was my friend. But then—I never thought he was my enemy, either.”
“Sometimes it works out that way,” Lankey said.
Baque shook his head. “I'd like to try some Martian whisky. I've never tasted the stuff.”
Two weeks made Baque an institution, and the Lankey-Pank Out was jammed to capacity from the time he went to work until he left the next morning. When he performed alone, he forgot about Coms and played whatever he wanted. He even performed short pieces by Bach for the customers, and received generous applause, but the reaction was nothing like the tumultuous enthusiasm that followed his improvisations.
Sitting behind the bar, eating his evening meal and watching the impacted mass of customers, Baque felt vaguely happy. He was enjoying the work he was doing. For the first time in his life he had more money than he needed.
For the first time in his life he had a definite goal and a vague notion of a plan that would accomplish it—would eliminate the Coms altogether.
As Baque pushed his tray aside, he saw Biff the doorman step forward to greet a pair of newcomers, halt suddenly, and back away in stupefied amazement. And no wonder—evening clothes at the Lankey-Pank Out!
The couple halted near the door, blinking uncertainly in the dim, smoke-tinted light. The man was bronzed and handsome, but no one noticed him. The woman's beauty flashed like a meteor against the drab surroundings. She moved in an aura of shining loveliness, with her hair gleaming golden, her shimmering, flowing gown clinging seductively to her voluptuous figure, and her fragrance routing the foul tobacco and whisky odors.
In an instant all eyes were fixed on her, and a collective gasp encircled the room. Baque stared with the others and finally recognized her: Marigold, of Morning with Marigold. Worshiped around the Solar System by the millions of devotees to her visiscope program. Mistress, it was said, to James Denton, the czar of visiscope. Marigold Manning.
She raised a hand to her mouth in mock horror, and the bright tones of her laughter dropped tantalizingly among the spellbound spacers. “What an odd place! Where'd you ever hear about a place like this?”
“I need some Martian whisky, damn it,” the man said.
“So stupid of the port bar to run out. With all those ships from Mars coming in, too. Are you sure we can get back in time? Jimmy'll raise hell if we aren't there when he lands.”
Lankey touched Baque's arm. “After six,” he said, without taking his eyes from Marigold Manning. “They'll be getting impatient.”
Baque nodded and started for the multichord. The tumult began the moment the customers saw him. They abandoned Marigold Manning, leaped to their feet, and began a stomping, howling ovation. When Baque paused to acknowledge it, Marigold and her escort were staring openmouthed at the nondescript man who could inspire such undignified enthusiasm.
Her exclamation rang out sharply as Baque seated himself at the multichord and the ovation faded to an expectant silence. “What the hell!”
Baque shrugged and started to play. When Marigold finally left, after a brief conference with Lankey, her escort still hadn't got his Martian whisky.
The next evening Lankey greeted Baque with both fists full of telenotes. “What a hell of a mess this is! You see this Marigold dame's program this morning?”
Baque shook his head. “I haven't watched visiscope since I came to work here.”
“In case it interests you, you were—what does she call it?—a 'Marigold Exclusive' on visiscope this morning. Erlin Baque, the famous tunesmith, is now playing the multichord in a queer little restaurant called the Lankey-Pank Out. If you want to hear some amazing music, wander out to the New Jersey Space Port and listen to Baque. Don't miss it. The experience of a lifetime.” Lankey swore and waved the telenotes. “Queer, she calls us. Now I've got ten thousand requests for reservations, some from as far away as Budapest and Shanghai. And our capacity is five hundred, counting standing room. Damn that woman! We already had all the business we could handle.”
“You need a bigger place,” Baque said.
“Yes. Well, confidentially, I've got my eye on a big warehouse. It'll seat a thousand, at least. We'll clean up. I'll give you a contract to take charge of the music.”
Baque shook his head. “How about opening a big place uptown? Attract people that have more money to spend. You run it, and I'll bring in the customers.”
Lankey caressed his flattened nose thoughtfully. “How do we split?”
“Fifty-fifty,” Baque said.
“No,” Lankey said, shaking his head slowly. “I play fair, Baque, but fifty-fifty wouldn't be right on a deal like that. I'd have to put up all the money myself. I'll give you one-third to handle the music.”
They had a lawyer draw up a contract. Baque's lawyer. Lankey insisted on that.
In the bleak gray of early morning Baque sleepily rode the crowded conveyer toward his apartment. It was the peak rush load, when commuters jammed against each other and snarled grumpily when a neighbor shifted his feet. The crowd seemed even heavier than usual, but Baque shrugged off the jostling and elbowing and lost himself in thought.
It was time that he found a better place to live. He hadn't minded the dumpy apartment as long as he could afford nothing better, but Val had been complaining for years. And now when they could move, when they could have a luxury apartment or even a small home over in Pennsylvania, Val refused to go. Didn't want to leave her friends, she said.
Mulling over this problem in feminine contrariness, Baque realized suddenly that he was approaching his own stop. He attempted to move toward a deceleration strip—he shoved firmly, he tried to step between his fellow riders, he applied his elbows, first gently and then viciously. The crowd about him did not yield.
“I beg your pardon,” Baque said, making another attempt. “I get off here.” This time a pair of brawny arms barred his way. “Not this morning, Baque. You got an appointment uptown.”
Baque flung a glance at the circle of hard, grinning faces that surrounded him. With a sudden effort he hurled himself sideways, fighting with all of his strength. The arms hauled him back roughly.
“Uptown, Baque. If you want to go dead, that's your affair.”
“Uptown,” Baque agreed.
At a public parking strip they left the conveyer. A flyer was waiting for them, a plush, private job that displayed a high-priority X registration number. They flew swiftly toward Manhattan, cutting across air lanes with a monumental contempt for regulations, and they veered in for a landing on the towering Visiscope International building. Baque was bundled down an anti-grav shaft, led through a labyrinth of corridors, and finally prodded none too gently into an office.