A Rare Commodity
a plot-untwist for And The Answer Is
by Betsy Rogers
birdies95 at hotmail.com
birdies95 at att.net
No copyright infringement, no profit, blah, blah, blah Ginger. (to quote a favorite Far Side cartoon)
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Dr. Cyrus Browning walked through the dark, grimy halls toward the room of his patient.
Patient. If one could call him that. Gold mine was more likely the term.
When Cyrus had first completed his education, he dreamed of changing the world - finding a cure for or at least a cause for any one of the diseases that plagued mankind. But the discoveries that came so easily to many managed to elude him. He had drifted from position to position, seemingly demoted by sheer circumstance. Now, at what should have been the peak of his career, he was stuck here, with the human refuse that civizilized society wanted to forget.
They were rude, dirty, and smelly. None of them sparked even the slightest of pity in Cyrus. He still had some detached intellectual interest in their condition, but the inhabitants of this pit were insane castoffs. Although Dr. Cyrus Browning was the chief doctor of the Wichita Convalescant Home for the Feeble Minded, he felt like the King of Putrescence. He knew somehow that the directors sniggered at him behind their cuffs every time they paid him his paltry salary.
But he would have the last laugh. The patient - the one who had been delivered to the home in the decade after the Great War had ended - he would be Dr. Cyrus Browning's key to the future. He couldn't give his descendants a patent, or a great name to point to. But he could give them fortune despite his own bad luck.
After years of tracking the ramblings of the man who called himself Tempus, Cyrus was convinced the man was, contrary to all belief, completely sane. He was a time traveler. The only alternate explanation was that the man had precognitave skills. In either case, it didn't matter. Hayes stealing the election in '76, the assassination of President Garfield - in the twenty years Cyrus had attended Tempus, the man had predicted more than any charlatan could possibly have known by luck.
When Cyrus had first noticed that the predictions were more often right than not, he rewarded Tempus's "good behavior" with a journal and pen - to record these predictions. Through the years, this journal had become thick with the names of circumstances, people, and companies - heavens only knew what some of the magical-sounding words were, but these were obviously names to look for in the future. A few wisely invested dollars and his descendants would be taken care of for generations.
The goose was now full of golden eggs, and was ready for the harvest, Cyrus thought to himself, shamelessy mixing metaphors. Tempus, poor tortured soul that he was, had succumbed to pneumonia earlier that week, according to the notes from the caretakers and staff doctors. There had been a number of victims of cholera and pneumonia in the home - Cyrus suspected he should care more about that, but, after all, they were overcrowded. Tempus's single room - a luxury in the facility - almost certainly contained at least one new resident already.
Going through Tempus's few personal effects, Cyrus felt the smile fade from his face. It wasn't there. The book wasn't there. Before he could berate himself for attending the conference in Chicago - medical conferences were one of the few luxuries the cheap board of directors allotted the Chief of the home - Cyrus took a deep breath.
"Jennings!" His voice boomed down the dank corridor. Soon, there was the shuffle of footsteps approaching the door.
"Sir?"
"Who packed up the deceased patients' belongings? Mr. Tempus had something that is missing."
"Sir, I packed up the belongings myself, Sir. It's in the case notes. Mr. Tempus fell from consciousness on Sunday and was received by the Holy Spirit on Thursday afternoon. After Dr. Hartley confirmed death, I packed the belongings and brought them here."
"The journal is very important. I plan to use it to write an important thesis which may very well cure others with Mr. Tempus's mental condition in the future. Think, man. Where could it be?"
Jennings face wrinkled in concentration before quickly clearing. "Mr. Miller, sir. Mr. Miller was a new admittance on Tuesday. We had no other rooms, so Dr. Hartley assigned him to Mr. Tempus's room until such another opening occurred. He was moved to room 3 on Wednesday, sir. Mr. Tempus never gained consciousness during that period, so I don't think he'd have been disturbed..." But Dr. Browning was no longer listening.
"Get out of my way, man." Pushing the resident out of his way, impatient to find this Mr. Miller. "What is Mr. Miller's psychosis?"
"He hears voices, sir. Also, he looks to have signs of the cholera which so many have here." Dr. Jennings waited to hear a word of sympathy from his ultimate superior, and was once again disappointed.
Cyrus barely knocked on the patient's door before opening it, but there was no one to be offended by the intrusion. Looking around, Cyrus huffed angrily. "Where on earth are the patients, Jennings?"
"Sir? I explained that he, as well as Mr. Morlock are exhibiting signs of the cholera. I would wager they are in the privvy. The chamber pots can't hold the volume of waste these patients are producing." Dr. Jennings was not shocked to see Dr. Browning search the room, but he was surprised to see the esteemed Chief Physician exit the room and head toward the outhouses.
A minute later, there was an outraged howl echoing through the facility. Dr. Jennings ran outside to see Dr. Browning on the ground, holding the leather binding of an empty book. It was the missing journal, and all of the papers had been ripped out.
"Sir? Sir. You know that paper has been a rare commodity here. I think Mr. Miller saw the chance to clean himself and thoght Mr Tempus wouldn't miss the paper. He won't, you know. And there will be other patients you can study, Sir. Sir? I know it's a great loss to science, but sir?"
But Cyrus Browning was not to be consoled. His legacy was gone.
written 30 March 2004
This is dedicated to Paul-Gabriel Wiener who doesn't know me from Adam. I've been doing catch-up on all the fine fic from 2003 and ran into a spate of plot-untwists written by PGW, all of which made me laugh (especially the one with the smart kids). So, though this may stink, it was written as a tribute.
