Universe Twister - Keith Laumer [136]
"Well, then—I'm inspecting the slums," he amended "—except that there aren't any slums in Artesia," he recalled. "But how about Colby Corners? We had a swell little slum back there, created and maintained by as determined a crew of slum dwellers as ever put coal in a bathtub." He squinted harder, marshaling his psychic forces. "I'm in a Federal Aid to Undesirables project," he assured himself, "doing research for a book on how long it takes the average family of ne'er-do-wells to convert a clean, new, modern welfare-supplied apartment into the kind of homey chaos they're used to . . ."
"Say, would you mind hallucinating a little more quietly?" a querulous voice with an edge like a gnawed fingernail inquired from the far corner of the room. "I'm trying to catch a few winks."
"Oh, so you're alive after all," Lafayette replied. "I certainly admire your ability to doss down in comfort in the midst of this mare's nest."
"What do you suggest?" came the snappish reply. "That I huddle here with every nerve a-tingle to monitor each nuance of total boredom and discomfort?"
"How do we get out?" Lafayette said tersely. "That's the question we ought to be thinking about."
"You're good at questions, how are you at answers?" The voice, O'Leary thought, was a nerve-abrading combination of petulant arrogance and whining self-pity. He suppressed the impulse to snap back.
"I've tried the door," he said in tones of forced optimism. "It's a single slab of cast iron, as far as I can determine, which seems to limit the possibilities in that direction."
"You're not going to let a little thing like a cast-iron door slow you down, surely? From your tone of voice, I assumed you'd just twist it off its hinges and hit someone over the head with it."
" . . . which means we'll have to look for some other mode of egress," O'Leary finished, gritting his teeth.
"Splendid. You work at that. As for me, I'm catching up on my sleep. I've had a pretty strenuous forty-eight hours—"
"Oh, have you? Well, it can't begin to compare with my last forty-eight hours. I started off on top of a windmill, worked my way through a homicidal giant and a set of pirates, two jail cells, an execution, a fall down an elevator shaft, a trial for espionage, and a trip on a flying carpet, to say nothing of the present contretemps."
"Uuuum-ha!" Lafayette's cellmate yawned. "Lucky you. As for myself, I've been busy: I've parlayed with a mad prince, dickered with a duke, carried out a daring rescue, double-crossed a sorcerer, and been beaten, kicked, hit on the head, slugged, and thrown in a dungeon."
"I see. And what are you doing about it?"
"Nothing. You see, it's actually all a dream. After a while I'll wake up and you'll be gone, and I can get back to my regular routine."
"Oh, I see. The solitude has driven you off your hinge. Rather ironic, actually," he added with a hollow chuckle. "You, imagining I'm a figment of your nightmare. I remember when I had similar ideas about a lot of things that turned out to be painfully real."
"So if you'll stop chattering, so I can go back to sleep, I'll be grateful," the abrasive voice remarked.
"Listen to me, Sleeping Beauty," O'Leary said sharply. "This is real—as real as anything that ever happened to you. Maybe hardship has driven you out of whatever wits you may once have had, but try to grasp the concept: you're in a cell—a real, live, three-dee cell, complete with mice. And unless you want to stay here until you rot—or the hangman comes for you—you'd better stir your stumps!"
"Go 'way. I haven't finished my nap."
"Gladly—if I could! Wake up, numbskull! Maybe between the two of us we can do something!"
"Poo. You're nothing but a figment. All I have to do is go back to sleep, and I'll wake up back in Hatcher's Crossroads, bagging groceries at Bowser's."
Lafayette laughed hollowly. "You remind me of a poor innocent nincompoop I used to know," he said. "By the way, where's this Hatcher's Crossroads located?"
"In the Oklahoma Territory. But you wouldn't know about that. It's not part of this dream."