The Point of View Read online

indignation against the villains who dared to disagreewith the authority of van Manderpootz.

  I sat there intent on the strange double vision of the attitudinizor,which was in some respects like a Horsten psychomat--that is, one isable to see both through his own eyes and through the eyes of hissubject. Thus I could see van Manderpootz and Carter quite clearly, butat the same time I could see or sense what Carter saw and sensed. Thus Iperceived suddenly through my own eyes that the professor had ceasedtalking to Carter, and had turned at the approach of somebody as yetinvisible to me, while at the same time, through Carter's eyes, I sawthat vision of ecstasy which had flashed for a moment in his mind. Isaw--description is utterly impossible, but I saw a woman who, exceptpossibly for the woman of the idealizator screen, was the most beautifulcreature I had ever seen!

  I say description is impossible. That is the literal truth, for hercoloring, her expression, her figure, as seen through Carter's eyes,were completely unlike anything expressible by words. I was fascinated,I could do nothing but watch, and I felt a wild surge of jealousy as Icaught the adoration in the attitude of the humble Carter. She wasglorious, magnificent, indescribable. It was with an effort that Iuntangled myself from the web of fascination enough to catch Carter'sthought of her name. "Lisa," he was thinking. "Lisa."

  What she said to van Manderpootz was in tones too low for me to hear,and apparently too low for Carter's ears as well, else I should haveheard her words through the attitudinizor. But both of us heard vanManderpootz's bellow in answer.

  "I don't care how the dictionary pronounces the word!" he roared. "Theway van Manderpootz pronounces a word is right!"

  The glorious Lisa turned silently and vanished. For a few moments Iwatched her through Carter's eyes, but as she neared the laboratorydoor, he turned his attention again to van Manderpootz, and she was lostto my view.

  And as I saw the professor close his dissertation and approach me, Islipped the attitudinizor from my head and forced myself to a measure ofcalm.

  "Who is she?" I demanded. "I've got to meet her!"

  He looked blankly at me. "Who's who?"

  "Lisa! Who's Lisa?"

  There was not a flicker in the cool blue eyes of van Manderpootz. "Idon't know any Lisa," he said indifferently.

  "But you were just talking to her! Right out there!"

  Van Manderpootz stared curiously at me; then little by little a shrewdsuspicion seemed to dawn in his broad, intelligent features. "Hah!" hesaid. "Have you, by any chance, been using the attitudinizor?"

  I nodded, chill apprehension gripping me.

  "And is it also true that you chose to investigate the viewpoint ofCarter out there?" At my nod, he stepped to the door that joined the tworooms, and closed it. When he faced me again, it was with featuresworking into lines of amusement that suddenly found utterance in boominglaughter. "Haw!" he roared. "Do you know who beautiful Lisa is? She'sFitch!"

  "Fitch? You're mad! She's glorious, and Fitch is plain and scrawny andugly. Do you think I'm a fool?"

  "You ask an embarrassing question," chuckled the professor. "Listen tome, Dixon. The woman you saw was my secretary, Miss Fitch, seen throughthe eyes of Carter. Don't you understand? The idiot Carter's in lovewith her!"

  * * * * *

  I suppose I walked the upper levels half the night, oblivious alike ofthe narrow strip of stars that showed between the towering walls oftwenty-first century New York, and the intermittent roar of trafficfrom the freight levels. Certainly this was the worst predicament of allthose into which the fiendish contraptions of the great van Manderpootzhad thrust me.

  In love with a point of view! In love with a woman who had no existenceapart from the beglamoured eyes of Carter. It wasn't Lisa Fitch I loved;indeed, I rather hated her angular ugliness. What I had fallen in lovewith was the way she looked to Carter, for there is nothing in the worldquite as beautiful as a lover's conception of his sweetheart.

  This predicament was far worse than my former ones. When I had fallen inlove with a girl already dead, I could console myself with the thoughtof what might have been. When I had fallen in love with my ownideal--well, at least she was _mine_, even if I couldn't have her. Butto fall in love with another man's conception! The only way thatconception could even continue to exist was for Carter to remain in lovewith Lisa Fitch, which rather effectually left me outside the picturealtogether. She was absolutely unattainable to me, for Heaven knows Ididn't want the real Lisa Fitch--"real" meaning, of course, the one whowas real to me. I suppose in the end Carter's Lisa Fitch was as real asthe skinny scarecrow my eyes saw.

  She was unattainable--or was she? Suddenly an echo of a long-forgottenpsychology course recurred to me. Attitudes are habits. Viewpoints areattitudes. Therefore viewpoints are habits. And habits can be learned!

  There was the solution! All I had to do was to learn, or to acquire bypractice, the viewpoint of Carter. What I had to do was literally to putmyself in his place, to look at things in his way, to see his viewpoint.For once I learned to do that, I could see in Lisa Fitch the very thingshe saw, and the vision would become reality to me as well as to him.

  I planned carefully. I did not care to face the sarcasm of the great vanManderpootz; therefore I would work in secret. I would visit hislaboratory at such times as he had classes or lectures, and I would usethe attitudinizor to study the viewpoint of Carter, and to, as it were,practice that viewpoint. Thus I would have the means at hand of testingmy progress, for all I had to do was glance at Miss Fitch without theattitudinizor. As soon as I began to perceive in her what Carter saw, Iwould know that success was imminent.

  Those next two weeks were a strange interval of time. I haunted thelaboratory of van Manderpootz at odd hours, having learned from theUniversity office what periods he devoted to his courses. When one day Ifound the attitudinizor missing, I prevailed on Carter to show me whereit was kept, and he, influenced doubtless by my friendship for the manhe practically worshipped, indicated the place without question. Butlater I suspect that he began to doubt his wisdom in this, for I know hethought it very strange for me to sit for long periods staring at him; Icaught all sorts of puzzled questions in his mind, though as I havesaid, these were hard for me to decipher until I began to learn Carter'spersonal system of symbolism by which he thought. But at least one manwas pleased--my father, who took my absences from the office and neglectof business as signs of good health and spirits, and congratulated mewarmly on the improvement.

  But the experiment was beginning to work, I found myself sympathizingwith Carter's viewpoint, and little by little the mad world in which helived was becoming as logical as my own. I learned to recognize colorsthrough his eyes; I learned to understand form and shape; mostfundamental of all, I learned his values, his attitudes, his tastes. Andthese last were a little inconvenient at times, for on the severaloccasions when I supplemented my daily calls with visits to vanManderpootz in the evening, I found some difficulty in separating my ownrespectful regard for the great man from Carter's unreasoning worship,with the result that I was on the verge of blurting out the whole thingto him several times. And perhaps it was a guilty conscience, but I keptthinking that the shrewd blue eyes of the professor rested on me with acuriously suspicious expression all evening.

  The thing was approaching its culmination. Now and then, when I lookedat the angular ugliness of Miss Fitch, I began to catch glimpses of thesame miraculous beauty that Carter found in her--glimpses only, butharbingers of success. Each day I arrived at the laboratory withincreasing eagerness, for each day brought me nearer to the achievementI sought. That is, my eagerness increased until one day I arrived tofind neither Carter nor Miss Fitch present, but van Manderpootz, whoshould have been delivering a lecture on indeterminism, very much inevidence.

  "Uh--hello," I said weakly.

  "Umph!" he responded, glaring at me. "So Carter was right, I see. Dixon,the abysmal stupidity of the human race continually astounds me with newevidence of its astronomical depths, bu
t I believe this escapade ofyours plumbs the uttermost regions of imbecility."

  "M-my escapade?"

  "Do you think you can escape the piercing eye of van Manderpootz? Assoon as Carter told me you had been here in my absence, my mind leapednimbly to the truth. But Carter's information was not even necessary,for half an eye was enough to detect the change in your attitude onthese last few evening visits. So you've been trying to adopt Carter'sviewpoint, eh? No doubt with the idea of ultimately depriving him of thecharming Miss Fitch!"

  "W-why--"

  "Listen to me, Dixon. We will disregard the ethics of the thing and lookat it from a purely rational viewpoint, if a rational viewpoint ispossible to anybody but van