Free The Mammoth Book of 20th Century SF II by David G. Hartwell Page A

merely chuckled.
    She lashed out: “Damn you, get me a cab.”
    “I’ve had one waiting half an hour.”
    Chapter Two
    “Tell ya what the professor’s gonna do, ladies and gentlemen. He’s gonna defend not just one paradox. Not just two. Not just a dozen. No, ladies and
gentlemen, the professor’s gonna defend seventeen , and all in the space of one short hour, without repeating himself, and including a brand-new one he has just thought up today:
‘Music owes its meaning to its ambiguity.’ Remember, folks, an axiom is just a paradox the professor’s already got hold of. The cost of this dazzling display . . . don’t
crowd there, mister . . .”
    Anna felt a relaxing warmth flowing over her mind, washing at the encrusted strain of the past hour. She smiled and elbowed her way through the throng and on down the street, where a garishly
lighted sign, bat-wing doors, and a forlorn cluster of waiting women announced the next attraction:
    “FOR MEN ONLY. Daring blindfold exhibitions and variety entertainments continuously.”
    Inside, a loudspeaker was blaring: “Thus we have seen how to compose the ideal end-game problem in chess. And now, gentlemen, for the small consideration of an additional quarter . .
.”
    But Anna’s attention was now occupied by a harsh cawing from across the street.
    “Love philters! Works on male or female! Any age! Never fails!”
    She laughed aloud. Good old Matt! He had foreseen what these glaring multifaceted nonsensical stimuli would do for her. Love philters! Just what she needed!
    The vendress of love philters was of ancent vintage, perhaps seventy-five years old. Above cheeks of wrinkled leather her eyes glittered speculatively. And how weirdly she was clothed! Her
bedraggled dress was a shrieking purple. And under that dress was another of the same hue, though perhaps a little faded. And under that , still another.
    “That’s why they call me Violet,” cackled the old woman, catching Anna’s stare. “Better come over and let me mix you one.”
    But Anna shook her head and passed on, eyes shining. Fifteen minutes later, as she neared the central Via area, her receptive reverie was interrupted by the outburst of music ahead.
    Good! Watching the street dancers for half an hour would provide a highly pleasant climax to her escapade. Apparently there wasn’t going to be any man in a polka dot suit. Matt was going
to be disappointed but it certainly wasn’t her fault she hadn’t found him.
    There was something oddly familiar about that music.
    She quickened her pace, and then, as recognition came, she began to run as fast as her crouching back would permit. This was her music – the prelude to Act III of her ballet!
    She burst through the mass of spectators lining the dance square. The music stopped. She stared out into the scattered dancers, and what she saw staggered the twisted frame of her slight body.
She fought to get air through her vacuously wide mouth.
    In one unearthly instant, a rift had threaded its way through the dancer-packed square, and a pasty white face, altogether spectral, had looked down that open rift into hers. A face over a body
that was enveloped in a strange glowing gown of shimmering white. She thought he had also been wearing a white academic mortar board, but the swarming dancers closed in again before she could be
sure.
    She fought an unreasoning impulse to run.
    Then, as quickly as it had come, logic reasserted itself; the shock was over. Odd costumes were no rarity on the Via. There was no cause for alarm.
    She was breathing almost normally when the music died away and someone began a harsh harangue over the public address system. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, it is our rare good fortune to have
with us tonight the genius who composed the music you have been enjoying.”
    A sudden burst of laughter greeted this, seeming to originate in the direction of the orchestra, and was counterpointed by an uncomplimentary blare from one of the