“Finding anything interesting?” I asked, gesturing at the rocks.
“If I was, I certainly wouldn’t tell you,” said Berling, looking at me sideways in the typical paranoid-prospector way.
“Right,” I said. “Of course. So, are you satisfied with the NewYou process?”
“Sure, yeah. It’s everything they said it would be. All the parts work.”
“Thanks for your help,” I said, pulling out my tab to make a few notes, and then frowning at its blank screen. “Oh, damn. The silly thing has a loose excimer pack. I’ve got to open it up and reseat it.” I showed him the back of the unit’s case. “Do you have a little screwdriver that will fit that?”
Everybody owned some screwdrivers, even though most people rarely needed them, and they were the sort of thing that had no standard storage location. Some people kept them in kitchen drawers, others kept them in tool chests, still others kept them under the sink. Only a person who had lived in this home for a while would know where they were.
Berling peered at the slot-headed screw, then nodded. “Sure. Hang on.”
He made a beeline for the far side of the living room, going to a cabinet that had glass doors on its top half but solid metal ones on its bottom. He bent over, opened one of the metal doors, reached in, rummaged for a bit, and emerged with the appropriate screwdriver.
“Thanks,” I said, opening the case in such a way that he couldn’t see inside. I then surreptitiously removed the bit of plastic I’d used to insulate the excimer battery from the contact it was supposed to touch. Without looking up, I said, “Are you married, Mr. Berling?” Of course, I already knew the answer was yes; that fact was in his NewYou file.
He nodded.
“Is your wife home?”
His artificial eyelids closed a bit. “Why?”
I told him the honest truth since it fit well with my cover story: “I’d like to ask her whether she can perceive any differences between the new you and the old.”
Again, I watched his expression, but it didn’t change. “Sure, I guess that’d be okay.” He turned and called over his shoulder, “Lacie!”
A few moments later, a homely flesh-and-blood woman of about sixty appeared. “This is Mr. Lomax from the head office of NewYou,” said Berling, indicating me with a pointed finger. “He’d like to talk to you.”
“About what?” asked Lacie. She had a deep, not-unpleasant voice.
“Might we speak in private?” I asked.
Berling’s gaze shifted from Lacie to me, then back to Lacie. “Hrmpph,” he said, but then a moment later added, “I guess that’d be all right.” He turned around and walked away.
I looked at Lacie. “I’m just doing a routine follow-up,” I said. “Making sure people are happy with the work we do. Have you noticed any changes in your husband since he transferred?”
“Not really.”
“Oh? If there’s anything at all . . .” I smiled reassuringly. “We want to make the process as perfect as possible. Has he said anything that’s surprised you, say?”
Lacie crinkled her face even more than it normally was. “How do you mean?”
“I mean, has he used any expressions or turns of phrase you’re not used to hearing from him?”
A shake of the head. “No.”
“Sometimes the process plays tricks with memory. Has he failed to know something he should know?”
“Not that I’ve noticed.”
“What about the reverse? Has he known anything that you wouldn’t expect him to know?”
Lacie lifted her eyebrows. “No. He’s just Stu.”
I frowned. “No changes at all?”
“No, none . . . well, almost none.”
I waited for her to go on, but she didn’t, so I prodded her. “What is it? We really would like to know about any difference, any flaw in our transference process.”
“Oh, it’s not a flaw,” said Lacie, not meeting my eyes.
“No? Then what?”
“It’s just that . . .”
“Yes?”
“Well, just that he’s a demon in the sack now. He stays hard forever.”
I frowned, disappointed not to have found what I was looking for on the first try. But I decided to end the masquerade on a positive note. “We aim to please, ma’am. We aim to please.”
SIX
Ispent the next several hours tracking down and interviewing three other recent transfers; none of them seemed to be anyone other than who they claimed to be.
After that, the next name on my list was one Dr. Rory Pickover. His home was in a cubic apartment building located on the outer side of the First Circle, beneath the highest point of the dome; several windows