Zombies of the Gene Pool

In Remembrance of Pat Malone by Angela Arbroath

(* REPRINTED FROM ARCHANGEL, JULY 1958, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

(Jack L. Bexler writes that Pat Malone has died in Mississippi. And I write this partly in sorrow for the loss of an old friend, and partly to let you know that I have no further details to give you on his actual passing. I did not know that Pat Malone was in Mississippi, and I believe that he was down near the Gulf, whereas I live up near Memphis, TN. Please don't send me any more letters asking for details. I don't know anything about Pat's death! What follows is a tribute to his life.-A.A.)

It has been several years since I saw Pat Malone, so perhaps the person who has died is not, in the emotional sense, the man that I knew, but, for the annals of fandom, wherein lies his best hope to be remembered, it falls to my lot to eulogize Pat Malone.

On a personal level, I can only say that I liked him as a friend and respected his talent, and then I must try to explain him to his many adversaries, because Pat Malone was truly a stormy petrel, whom few people appreciated and virtually no one understood.

Pat Malone was an idealist who valued intellectual qualities above material possessions, and he very much wanted to be a part of a special group of dedicated and intelligent people. If he could have come to terms with God, he would have become a Jesuit, I think. As it was, he opted for a group of people who wrote with spirit and enthusiasm, made strong friendships (bickering aside), and who built an environment in which intelligence and verbal skill rather than race, social aptitude, sex, or family background determined one's position. Aldous Huxley aside, let us hope that this is the Brave New World. It is certainly the world in which Pat Malone wanted to live.

When his newfound paragons fell short of these Utopian expectations, he took them to task for it. He hated the pettiness of some fans, and he was contemptuous of 'Big Name Fans,' who sought to become celebrities in what Pat considered a solemn intellectual order. He was forthright in his criticisms, and he made people angry. So long as what he said was true, Pat didn't care how people felt about its being said.

But he wanted to love us. I think that the civilization described in his novel River of Neptune is an idealization of fandom: the Marilaks are us as he would have liked us to be.

There is not much to say about my personal relationship with the young Pat Malone of the Wall Hollow fan farm. We wrote for a long while and drew mind-close, and later we came together as physical beings, and it was a very special time. I would have liked for us to have grown old together. I'd like to think of us 42 years from now, parking our air-car on a hilltop in Kenya and watching the Millennium come up like thunder, while we reminisced about sixth fandom, and all the wondrous things our old friends had done and been, but such a future was not to be.

Three years ago Pat Malone went out of our lives, and now he has even left our planet. I wish that I could have said good-bye to him before he went, so that I could have tried to tell him that even a stormy petrel is a wondrous creature to his friends.

ANGELA ARBROATH

In the Lanthanides' private party, no one was singing 'Auld Lang Syne,' and their expressions of shock and dismay left no doubt as to which way they would vote on the question of should auld acquaintance be forgot?

Only Angela Arbroath had summoned a tentative smile for the man in black. His expression suggested that he was receiving just the reception that he had expected, and was quietly enjoying it. While the others conferred in a buzzing undertone, he helped himself to straight Scotch and examined the hors d'oeuvres tray without favor.

'Is it really you, Pat?' ventured Angela, coming close to peer at him.

The stranger looked up from his perusal of the label on the bottle of Scotch. After a moment's study of the blushing middle-aged woman, he countered, 'Am I to assume that somewhere in there is the former Angela Arbroath?'

She refused to be offended. 'I do believe it is you, Pat Malone!' she cried. 'I don't know of another soul who could be so offensive and ill tempered on such short notice and little provocation. You just want to see what I'll say! Well, here goes. You don't look so hot yourself, Patrick. I don't think I'd have known you.' She gave him a hug. 'Now where the hell have you been since 1958?'

He smiled, nodding to the others who had clustered around to hear his answer. He addressed them all. 'Fandom may be a microcosm, children, but the rest of the world out there is reasonably large. I got lost in it. I found better things to do.'

Ruben Mistral was scowling. Before anyone else could speak, he stepped between the stranger and the rest of the guests, as if he were protecting them from an assassin. 'Just a minute, folks!' he announced in his crowd- control voice. 'Before anybody says anything else to this individual, I think we should consider the possibility that this is a publicity-seeking impostor. This is a media event, you know.'

The dark man smiled down at him. 'Ah, Bunzie, don't tell me you've finally learned to look before you leap! If you had been able to do that in 1954, maybe Jim here would have checked the car radiator before we left for Worldcon, and we wouldn't have been left high and dry in Seymour, Indiana.'

Bunzie reddened. 'Well, who made us late in the first place, Malone? You said you were going to set the damned alarm clock for six-thirty. And when did we wake up?'

Jim Conyers eased his way to Bunzie's side. 'If in fact this is Pat Malone,' he reminded his host.

With raised eyebrows and a cold smile, Pat Malone was scanning the group. 'Conyers,' he nodded. 'Always the sensible one. Let me guess. You're an attorney now?'

'More or less retired. But still cautious.' Conyers seemed pleased to have been pegged so well.

Pat Malone studied the others. 'Brendan, of course. My old sparring partner. And-'

'Erik Giles,' said the professor quickly. 'Good to see you again, Pat.'

The gaze moved on. 'And-unless someone brought his father to this little get-together-this must be Georgie Woodard.'

Woodard managed a feeble grin. 'I still publish Alluvial, Pat.'

'No, George. You put out a silly bit of drivel purporting to be Alluvial. That 'zine, I assure you, is deader than I am.' Malone reached for the bottle of Scotch and took it with him to the loveseat. 'Are you all going to stay in shock much longer? This one-sided chat is getting a bit tiresome.'

'We thought you were dead, Pat,' said Angela. 'We wrote tributes to you. How could you put us through all that grief when all the time you were alive, probably off somewhere laughing at us!'

'You were grieved?' He sounded surprised. 'Well, some of you weren't. I wonder if it's too late to sue Jackal Bexler for libel?'

'Yes,' said Jim Conyers.

'I thought so.' He gave a little mock bow. 'But thank you for your professional opinion, counselor. Anyhow, I rather thought that after The Last Fandango came out, I was more feared than esteemed. In fact, I'll bet some people have been looking over their shoulders ever since they heard the news of my untimely death, hoping that it wasn't a hoax.'

'But why did you do it?' asked Lorien Williams.

Brendan Surn, who had been listening with uncharacteristic attentiveness, patted her hand. 'I expect that Malone considered an obituary the most dramatic form of resignation from fandom. Didn't you, Pat? And with a death announcement, you not only got to rid yourself of old associates, you also got to hear exactly what they thought of you. I've often thought that Peter-'

'Peter Deddingfield is really dead, Brendan,' said Erik Giles sharply. 'He was killed by a drunk driver nine years ago. Besides, he was never the adolescent hoaxer that Malone has proven to be.'

Pat Malone's dark eyes blazed. 'Was I such an artful dodger, gentlemen? Or were you simply a bunch of rumor-mongers who couldn't be bothered to check your facts?'

Ruben Mistral felt that things were getting out of hand. Signaling for silence, he resumed his role as spokesman for the group. 'Okay, Pat. We'll skip the whys and the wherefores. You're not dead. How did you find out about this reunion?'

'You do yourself an injustice, Bunzie. The publicity that your people have put out has ensured that everyone on