it doesn't matter. The point is that if you recite any line, I can carry on from there for as long as you like. I read some of the plays for English Lit classes at college and some for myself and I can bring any of it back. I've tried. It flows! I suppose I can bring back any part of any book or article or newspaper I've ever read, or any TV show I've ever watched - word for word or scene for scene."
Susan said, "What will you do with all that?"
John said, "I don't have that consciously in my head at all times. Surely you don't - wait, let's order - "
Five minutes later, he said, "Surely you don't - My God, I haven't forgotten where we left off. Isn't it amazing? - Surely you don't think I'm swimming in a mental sea of Shakespearean sentences at all times. The recall takes an effort, not much of one, but an effort."
"How does it work?"
"I don't know. How do you lift your arm? What orders do you give your muscles? You just will the arm to lift upward and it does so. It's no trouble to do so, but your arm doesn't lift until you want it to. Well, I remember anything I've ever read or seen when I want to but not when I don't want to. I don't know how to do it, but I do it."
The first course arrived and John tackled it happily.
Susan picked at her stuffed mushrooms. "It sounds exciting."
"Exciting? I've got the biggest, most wonderful toy in the world. My own brain. Listen, I can spell any word correctly and I'm pretty sure I won't ever make any grammatical mistake."
"Because you remember all the dictionaries and grammars you ever read?"
John looked at her sharply. "Don't be sarcastic, Sue."
"I wasn't being - "
He waved her silent. "I never used dictionaries as light reading. But I do remember words and sentences in my reading and they were correctly spelled and correctly parsed."
"Don't be so sure. You've seen any word misspelled in every possible way and every possible example of twisted grammar, too."
"Those were exceptions. By far the largest number of times I've encountered literary English, I've encountered it used correctly. It outweighs accidents, errors, and ignorance. What's more, I'm sure I'm improving even as I sit here, growing more intelligent steadily."
"And you're not worried. What if - "
"What if I become too intelligent? Tell me how on Earth you think becoming too intelligent can be harmful."
"I was going to say," said Susan, coldly, "that what you're experiencing is not intelligence. It's only total recall."
"How do you mean 'only'? If I recall perfectly, if I use the English language correctly, if I know endless quantities of material, isn't that going to make me seem more intelligent? How else need one define intelligence? You aren't growing just a little jealous, are you, Sue?"
"No," more coldly still. "I can always get an injection of my own if I feel desperate about it."
John put down his fork. "You can't mean that."
"I don't, but what if I did?"
"Because you can't take advantage of your special knowledge to deprive me of my position."
"What position?"
The main course arrived and for a few moments, John was busy. Then he said, in a whisper, "My position as the first of the future. Homo superior! There'll never be too many of us. You heard what Kupfer said. Some are too dumb to make it. Some are too smart to change much. I'm the one!"
"Dead average." One corner of Susan's mouth lifted.
"Once I was. There'll be others like me eventually. Not many, but there'll be others. It's just that I want to make my mark before the others come along. It's for the firm, you know. Us!"
He remained lost in thought thereafter, testing his brain delicately.
Susan ate in an unhappy silence.
7
John spent several days organizing his memories. It was like the preparation of an orderly reference book. One by one, he recalled all his experiences in the six years he had spent at Quantum Pharmaceuticals and all he had heard and all the papers and memos he had read.
There was no difficulty in discarding the irrelevant and unimportant and storing them in a "hold till further notice" compartment where they did not interfere with his analysis. Other items were put in order so that they established a natural progression.
Against that skeletal organization, he resurrected the scuttlebutt he had heard; the gossip, malicious or otherwise; casual phrases