Dayworld Read Online Free PDF Page B

... Mauser, isn’t it?” 
    “Fine.” 
    “Still teaching at East Harlem University?” 
    Wallenquist nodded; his jowls flapped like sails. 
    “Good, good. Party, heh? Anyone I know?” 
    “Perhaps. It’s one of those arty events. The host is Malcolm Chang Kant, the curator of the Twentieth-Century Museum.” 
    “I’ve heard of him, of course. But I don’t move in those circles. It’s good that you do. An organic should know people outside his field.”
    You’d be surprised how many I know, Caird thought. He continued the ritual by asking about the major’s health and that of his wife, two children, and three grandchildren.
    “Fine, couldn’t be better.”
    Wallenquist paused. Caird had turned his head away until he was looking at the major from the corners of his eyes. He moved his head then to look directly into his eyes and received the full blast.
    “I got a make-your-ears-prick-up case,” the major said. “A daybreaker! Ah, I thought so! That woke you up, heh?”
    He punched Caird lightly on the arm. “I’ll supervise, of course, but I’m letting you have all the fun. You’re a damned good man, by God, and what’s more, I like you!”
    “Thanks,” Caird said. “I ... get along fine with you, too.”
    “I know my people. If I do say so myself, I got a knack for bringing out the best in the best. You’re a real bloodhound, Jeff.”
     
     
     

 
    4.
     
    The major got off the desk, much to Caird’s relief, went behind it, sat down, and activated a wall strip behind and to one side of him. Wallenquist spun his chair to look at it.
    “This isn’t any run-of-the-mill daybreaker.”
    Three views of a clothed adult male from head to toes and at different angles appeared. Below these came three views of the same man unclothed. The two stared, fascinated, at the circumcised organ. Caird had never seen one in the flesh and had viewed few photographs of them. It was exotic but ugly and Old Stone Ageish.
    The head and shoulders, full-face, of the same subject followed. His red hair was long, and he wore a green skullcap. The bushy red beard underlined a strong broad face with small green eyes, a broad and short nose with flaring nostrils, and very thin lips.
     
    YANKEV GAD GRIL
    MONDAY SENIOR
     
    His code-identification flashed. It moved up and was succeeded by codes of his earprints, eyeprints, fingerprints, footprints, voiceprints, normal skin-odorprints, bloodtype, skull and skeleton X-ray and sonograms, brain topography and waveprints, hormone balance, hair and blood and genetic prints, exterior dimensions, intelligence quotient, psychic quotient, social quotient, and gait classification.
    Wallenquist told the strip to roll the file more slowly. After a few seconds, Caird said, “Hold it! Allergic to shellfish? Orthodox Jews don’t cat shellfish!”
    “Aba!” the major said, his tone indicating that he had just seen a great light. “This Jew does! Did, I mean. Just once. See he got dizzy and broke out in hives. See there. He said it was a judgment of God on him!”
    “Nobody’s perfect,” Caird said.
    “Ah, but, by God, humankind will be perfect!”
    Yes, Caird thought. Next year we meet in Jerusalem. The second coming of Christ occurs any moment now. The proletariat will govern, and the state will eventually wither away.
    “As you can see,” Wallenquist said, “he seemed to be an exemplary citizen, aside from being religious. Then, poof!” Wallenquist threw his hands up. “Houdinied! Didn’t come out of his stoner yesterday. His colleagues at Yeshiva investigated, of course—he has no family—and his stoner was empty. No messages, nothing to indicate what had happened.”
    Wallenquist bent down close to Caird. “That means that he’s in Tuesday. Right now!”
    Caird got up from the chair and began pacing back and forth. “Yankev Gril,” he said. “I know the man.”
    “You know him? But ...”
    “You didn’t read all the file. He played chess with other days via