The Condition of Muzak by Michael Moorcock Page B

pulled them onto his grubby feet. “Anyway, if we’re being accusatory, what happened to you? I thought we were going to be together always.”
    “It’s your sentimentality I can’t stand.” She rose like a disturbed wasp, leaving her gun where it was. “It’s your main drawback. You could have been a brilliant physicist. If you’d only had a better grip on the scientific method.”
    “My black box…”
    “Your father’s invention, and you know it. You developed it, certainly, but to ends that were completely irresponsible. Think how much better things could be if you hadn’t started experimenting for your own amusement rather than for the good of the world.”
    “People get what they want out of my box.”
    “What they think they want. And its power source is ludicrous. Utterly wasteful.”
    “It’s not much different to yours.”
    She clicked her tongue.
    “What they think they want is usually what they do want,” he added. “Is there anything wrong—?”
    “God almighty, you don’t know what morality is, do you?”
    “I tried to find out. I became a Jesuit…”
    She turned over his clothing with her pointed foot. “Is this junk all yours?”
    “You can have it, if you like.”
    “What would I do with it? You’ve no ambitions, have you, Mr Cornelius? No sense of purpose? No ideals?”
    “Since Catherine was killed…”
    “I don’t think necrophilia counts as an ideal.”
    “Standards change.” Jerry was miserable. “And we’re proof enough of that, aren’t we? After all, we didn’t need to become divided…”
    “We’ve discussed that already. The scheme didn’t work out. Too many regressive genes—put us straight back to square one.”
    He shrugged and stooped to pick up a black T-shirt.
    “Everything’s fluxed up, thanks to you,” she said. “I had this perfect programme all plotted and ready to go, then suddenly the co-ordinates are haywire. I didn’t need to make too many enquiries to find out where the interference was coming from. I had to abandon the whole programme because you were playing games with your silly little box.”
    “Well, you needn’t worry. I haven’t got it any more.”
    “It’s too bloody late now, isn’t it! Where is it?”
    “I lost it. Or lent it.”
    “You’re lying.”
    “I had a touch of my old trouble. Didn’t you have it, recently? Paramnesia? Paramnesia?”
    “That wouldn’t—”
    “Then it developed into ordinary amnesia. I’m not even sure how I got here. There was a party at Holland Park…”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.
    “Then maybe it hasn’t happened to you yet,” he told her reasonably. He paused to think. “Or maybe it hasn’t happened to any of us yet. Maybe it won’t happen, after all.”
    “Oh, you shifty little sod.”
    “That’s another thing I was wondering about…”
    “I came here to try to clear up the confusion.” She found a wallet and began to search through it, emptying company credits and luncheon vouchers onto the floor. She turned a fifty million mark silk banknote in her fingers and absently touched it to her lips, licking it. “Why did you choose this mausoleum, anyway?”
    “I forget.”
    “You usually stay with your mother in a crisis.” She picked up another wallet. It contained nothing but a bundle of overstamped Rhodesian guinea-notes.
    “Is she around?”
    “Apparently.”
    “I’m tired.” He reached for her gun.
    “Steady on, Mr Cornelius.” She became alarmed.
    “I only wanted to look at it. I’ve hardly ever seen one. Are they still making them?”
    “How should I know?” She shook out the pockets of a black velvet jacket and began carefully to inspect each worn piece of paper. “Where are your own weapons, by the way?”
    “In store somewhere.” He was vague. “Do you want to look at them?”
    “Certainly not.” She had discovered a huge perfectly cut diamond and was holding it up to the green-shaded light bulb. “This is