repudiated by his own father. There was a mystery here; and suddenly, in a flash of insight, Duncan thought he had guessed the solution. Sir Mortimer had cloned himself-and it had turned out badly.
The theory was ingenious, and not without a certain poetic truth. It merely happened to be wrong.
PARTY GAMES
It was well for Duncan that he was now becoming less awed by conspicuous displays of culture. Impressed, by all means; overwhelmed, no. Too strong a colonial inferiority complex would certainly have spoiled his enjoyment of this reception.
He had been to other parties since his arrival, but this was by far the largest. It was sponsored by the National Geographic Society-no, that was tomorrow -by the Congressional Foundation, whatever that might be, and there were at least a thousand guests circulating through the marble halls.
“If the roof fell in on us now,” he overheard someone remark, rather smugly, “Earth would start running around like a headless chicken.”
There seemed no reason to fear such a disaster; the National Gallery of Art had stood for almost four hundred years. Many of its treasures, of course, were far older: no one could possibly put a value on the paintings and sculpture displayed in its halls. Leonardo’s Ginevra de’ Benci,
Michelangelo’s miraculously recovered bronze David, Picasso’s Willie
Maugham, Esq.” Levinski’s Martian Dawn, were merely the most famous of the wonders it had gathered through the centuries. Every one of them, Duncan knew, he could study through holograms in closer detail than he was doing now-but it was not the same thing. Though the copies might
be technically perfect, 185 these were the originals, forever unique; the ghosts of the long-dead artists still lingered here. When he returned to Titan, he would be able to boast to his friends: “Yes-I’ve stood within a meter of a genuine Leonardo.”
It also amused Duncan to realize that never on his own world could he move in such a crowd-and be completely unrecognized. He doubted if there were ten people here who knew him by sight; most of them would be ladies he had addressed on that memorable evening with the Daughters of the Revolutions.
He was, as George Washington had neatly put it, still one of Earth’ s leading unknown celebrities. Barring untoward events, his status would remain that way until he spoke to the world on July Fourth. And perhaps even after that … However, his identity could be discovered easily enough, except by the most short-sighted individuals; he was wearing a badge that bore in prominent letters the words DUNCAN MACKENZIE, TITAN. He had thought it impolite to make a fuss about the spelling. Like Malcolm, he had given up that argument years ago.
On Titan, such labels would have been completely unnecessary; here they were essential. The advance of microelectronics had relegated to history two problems that, until the late twentieth century, had been virtually insoluble: At a really big party, how do you find who’s there—and how do you locate any given person? When Duncan checked in at the foyer, he found himself confronting a large board bearing hundreds of names. That at once established the guest list or, to be more accurate, the list of guests who wished to make their presence known. He spent several minutes studying it, and picked out half a dozen possible targets. George, of course, was there; and so was Ambassador Farrell. No point in hunting up them; he saw them every day.
Against each name was a button, and a tiny lamp. When the button was pressed, the guest’s badge would emit a buzz just loud enough for him to hear, and his light would start Bashing. He then had two
alternatives. He could apologize to the group he was with, 186 and start drifting toward a central rendezvous area. By the time he arrived-which could be anything from a minute to half an hour after the signal, according to the number of encounters en route-the caller might still be there; or he might have gotten fed up and moved away.
The other alternative was to press a button on the badge itself, which would cut off the signal. The light on the board would then shine with a steady glow, informing the world that the cal lee did not wish to be disturbed. Only the most persistent or bad-mannered inquirer would ignore this hint.
Although some hostesses thought the system too coldly mechanical, and refused to use it at any price, it was in fact deliberately imperfect.
Anyone who wished to opt out could neglect to pick up his badge, and it would then be assumed that he had not put in an appearance. To aid this deception, an ample supply of false badges was available, and the protocol that went with them was well understood. If you saw a familiar face above an innocuous JOHN DOE or MARY SMITH, you investigated no further. But a
JESUS CHRIST or a JULIUS CAESAR was fair game.
