SANITY CLAUSE
Originally publishhed The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, January 1975.
Ho ho ho.
They said he used to come down the chimney. But of course these days there were no more chimneys. They said he used to travel in an eight-reindeer-power sleigh. But of course these days there were no more reindeer.
The fact was that he traveled in an ordinary aircar and came in through the ordinary iris door.
But he did have on a red suit with white furry trim, and he did carry a bundle of toys, the way they said he did in the old, old days. And here he came.
His aircar parked itself on the roof of the Winterdream condom, and he worked his way down through the housing complex. The Winterdream condom’s 400 extended families, according to his list, had an allotment of nine children under seven.
The first eight were all sanes and did not take up more than two minutes of his time apiece. The ninth would be Cathy Lesser, three.
Like the others, the Clements and the Lessers had been awaiting his yearly visit in fearful hope. The door of the Clement-Lesser apartment irised open before he had a chance to establish his presence. He bounced in.
He read in its eyes how the family huddle saw him. His eyes how they twinkled! His dimples how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry! His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, and the beard of his chin was as white as the snow. The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth, and the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath. He had a broad face and a little round belly that shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly.
“Ho ho ho.”
He looked around for Cathy. The child was hanging back, hiding behind her mother’s slacks.
“And where is Cathy?”
Her mother twisted around and pushed Cathy forward. Slowly Cathy looked up. She laughed when she saw him, in spite of herself. A wink of his eye and a twist of his head soon gave her to know she had nothing to dread.
“Ho ho ho. And how is Cathy?” He knew as soon as he saw her eyes. He vaguely remembered them from last year, but in the meanwhile something in them had deepened.
Cathy stuck her thumb in her mouth, but her gaze locked wonderingly and hopefully on the bulging sack over his shoulder.
“Cat got Cathy’s tongue?”
“She’s just shy,” her mother said.
“Cathy doesn’t have to be shy with me.” He looked at the mother and spoke softly. “Have you noticed anything…special about the child?”
The child’s mother paled and clamped her mouth tight. But a grandmother quickly said, “No, nothing. As normal a little girl as you’d want to see.”
“Yes, well, we’ll see.” It never paid to waste time with the relatives; he had a lot of homes to visit yet. Kindly but firmly he eased the Lessers and the Clements out of the room and into the corridor, where other irises were peeping.
Now that she was alone with him Cathy looked longingly at the closed door. Quickly he unslung his bundle of toys and set it down. Cathy’s eyes fixed on the bulging sack.
“Have you been a good little girl, Cathy?”
Cathy stared at him and her lower lip trembled.
“It’s all right, Cathy. I know you’ve been as good as any normal little girl can be, and I’ve brought you a nice present. Can you guess what it is?”
He visualized the beautiful doll in the lower left corner of the bag. He watched the little girl’s eyes. She did not glance at the lower left corner of the bag. He visualized the swirly huge lollipop in the upper right corner of the bag. She did not glance at the upper right corner of the bag. So far so good. Cathy could not read his mind.
“No? Well, here it is.”
He opened the bag and took out the doll. A realistic likeness of a girl with Cathy’s coloring, it might have been the child’s sibling.
“Ooo,” with mouth and eyes to match.
“Yes, isn’t she pretty, Cathy? Almost as pretty as you. Would you like to hold her?”
Cathy nodded.
“Well, let’s see first what she can do. What do you think she can do? Any idea?”
Cathy shook her head.
Still all right. Cathy could not see ahead.
He cleared a space on the table and stood the doll facing him on the far edge. It began walking as soon as he set it down. He lifted Cathy up so she could watch. The doll walked toward them and stopped on the brink of the near edge. It looked at the girl and held out its arms and said, “Take me.”
He lowered Cathy to the floor, and the doll’s eyes followed her pleadingly. Cathy gazed up at the doll. It stood within her sight but out of her reach. The girl’s eyes lit up. The doll trembled back to pseudo life and jerkily stepped over the edge of the table.
He caught it before it hit the floor, though his eyes had been on Cathy. He had got to Cathy too in the nick of time. Strong telekinesis for a three-year-old.
“Here, Cathy, hold the doll.”
While she cradled the doll, he reached into a pocket and palmed his microchip injector.
“Oh, what lovely curls. Just like the dolly’s.” He raised the curls at the nape of Cathy’s neck, baring the skin. “Do you mind if I touch them?” For some reason he always steeled himself when he planted the metallic seed under the skin, though he knew the insertion didn’t hurt. At most, a slight pulling sensation, no more than if he had tugged playfully at her curls. Then a quick forgetting of the sensation. He patted the curls back in place and pocketed the injector.
“Let’s play that game again, shall we, sugar plum?”
Gently he pried the doll from her and once more put it on the far edge of the table. This time it did not walk when he set it down. With one arm he lifted Cathy up and held her so she could see the doll. The fingers of his free hand hovered over studs on his broad black belt. The doll looked at the girl and held out its arms and said, “Take me.”
The girl’s eyes yearned across the vastness of the table. The doll suddenly trembled into pseudo life and began to walk toward them, jerkily at first, then more and more smoothly. He fingered a stud. The doll slowed. It moved sluggishly, as if bucking a high wind, but it kept coming. He fingered another stud. The doll slowed even more. In smiling agony it lifted one foot and swung it forward and set it down, tore the other free of enormous g’s and swung it forward, and so kept coming. He fingered a third stud.
He sweated. He had never had to use this highest setting before. If this failed, it meant the child was incurably insane. Earth had room only for the sane. The doll had stopped. It fought to move, shuddered and stood still.
The girl stared at the doll. It remained where it was, out of reach. A tear fattened and glistened, then rolled down each cheek. It seemed to him a little something washed out of the child’s eyes with the tears.
He reached out and picked up the doll and handed it to Cathy.
“She’s yours to keep, Cathy, for always and always.”
Automatically cradling the doll, Cathy smiled at him. He wiped away her tears and set her down. He irised the door open. “It’s all right now. You can come in.”
The Lessers and Clements timidly flooded back into the room.
“Is she—?”
“Cathy’s as normal as any little girl around.”
The worried faces regained permanent-press smoothness.
“Thank you, thank you. Say thank you, Cathy.”
Cathy shook her head.
“Cathy!”
“That’s quite all right. I’ll settle for a kiss.”
He brought his face close to Cathy’s. Cathy hesitated, then gave his rosy cheek a peck.
“Thank you, Cathy.” He shouldered his toys and straightened up. “And to all a good night.”
And laying a finger aside of his nose, and giving a nod, through the iris he bounded. The Clement-Lesser apartment was on the ground floor, and the corridor let him out onto a patch of lawn. He gave his aircar a whistle. It zoomed from the roof to his feet.
As he rode through the night to his next stop, an image flashed into his mind. For an instant he saw, real as real, a weeping doll. It was just this side of subliminal. For a moment he knew fear. Had he failed after all with Cathy? Had she put that weeping doll in his mind?
Impossible. It came from within. Such aberrations were the aftermath of letdown. Sometimes, as now after a trying case, he got these weird flashes, these near-experiences of a wild frighteningly free vision, but always something in his mind mercifully cut them short.
As if on cue, to take him out of himself, the horn of his aircar sounded its Ho ho ho as it neared the Summerdaze condom. He looked down upon the chimneyless roofs. Most likely the chimney in the Sanity Clause legend grew out of folk etymology, the word chimney in this context coming from a misunderstanding of an ancient chant of peace on Earth: Ho…Ho…Ho Chi Minh. His eyes twinkled, his dimples deepened. There was always the comfort of logic to explain the mysteries of life.
The aircar parked itself on the roof of the Summerdaze condom, and he shouldered his bundle of toys and worked his way down through the housing complex.
Ho ho ho.