(urth) Short Story 102: Cherry Jubilee

[Marc Aramini]

“Cherry Jubilee” appeared in *Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine* in
1982 and is reprinted in* Storeys from the Old Hotel.*

SUMMARY: On Captain Bogdanoff’s *Red Star*, the famous escape artist Merry
Houdini and her four year old adult clone Cherry are in transit to Soviet
controlled Mars with their sponsor, Koroviev, to begin a tour.  An American
agent named Smith is invited to dinner with Bogdanoff, the girls, Koroviev,
a dark woman named Vera Oussinko (who works for the KGB), and Pasik and
Anna Petrovsky (a bureaucrat and his biochemist wife).  Smith talks with
Cherry, the woman in red, at the dinner quite extensively.  Her intellect
is that of an adult and she reveals her plans to someday work independently
of Merry.  Her eyes brighten up at the cherry jubilee desert, and Smith
explains the concept of the Jewish jubilee – every fifty years, “all tribal
lands were returned to their possessors – even if they had been leased or
sold … they held a celebration, because everybody was getting his birth
right back.”  At this, she looks solemn and states that she “likes it”
while tasting the dessert.

On ship, they plan to shoot Merry out into space in a locked coffin from
which she will escape.  The clone ties a safety line which the captain
insists upon using for the act to tether the coffin to the ship. When Smith
bumps into the clone, she smiles and he “attempt[s] to smile in return.” As
they leave the airlock to watch, they see a coffin in space and eventually
perceive a hand spring forth from it.  Smith runs back to the airlock to
find globules of blood floating in the zero gravity environment, “like
cherries.”

That night Vera attempts to talk her way through the case.  She asserts
that Cherry has been murdered, stabbed with Vera’s own steak knife, which
she noticed was gone before the table was cleared. Only those at the dinner
table had access to the knives.  Merry says that she had no reason to kill
her clone, who cost her “over two hundred thousand”. Vera states her motive
was an affair with Captain Bogdanoff.  She says that Smith might have been
sent by his government to keep the clone from being studied by Soviet
scientists. The KGB agent also explores whether Pasik Petrovsky could have
been Cherry’s lover, but he denies it and he and his wife hold hands.
Koroviev says that his career with the Ministry of Art is finished and he
has no conceivable motive, though Anna asserts that a murder would generate
interest on Mars amongst engineers, geologists and astronomers, attracting
them.

Next Vera explores the positions of all of the suspects.  Koroviev was
absent during the launch of the coffin, and the Petrovsky family returned
to the airlock briefly to look for an earring which had floated away.  The
weight of the gold earring and how far it travelled in that short time
leads Smith to posit that the stabbing was very recent with the blood so
near to Cherry’s body when he came upon it.

Because the safety tether to the coffin was cut, Vera concludes that
someone was trying to kill both Merry and Cherry. She asserts that the lock
used on the coffin would have disintegrated when exposed to the vacuum of
the airlock, and that Merry could have kept her head with a concealed
oxygen mask and used air pressure to return to the ship while the coffin
was in darkness (Merry will not reveal how her trick worked).  Vera
dismisses Koroviev’s suggestion that the Petrovsky’s could have killed
Cherry together because of the timing of the cut rope – it was cut before
they were close enough to assault Merry.   She believes Cherry stayed
behind at the air lock to let the floating Merry back in, and that the
murderer closed the lock, so Merry went to a utility entrance where her
second confederate, Koroviev, was waiting to let her in. Since Vera has
accounted for everyone’s presence at the time of the murder, she believes
the murderer must have had a confederate, and accuses Bogdanoff with his
subordinates and robotic staff, which he can reprogram.  She believes he
cut the rope before it was brought out, concealed in the coil, and that his
position at dinner made him an ideal candidate for stealing her knife.
Since his father in law is an important official and he was having an
affair, she thinks Bogdanoff wanted to silence Cherry and Merry.

All her conclusions unravel after an abrupt cut where it is revealed that
Vera herself has been arrested for the murder.  Smith goes to talk to the
surviving Houdini.  He hints that it would be possible for them to be
together most of the time during her tour on Mars.  She rejects him.  He
says she was friendlier the first night at the table and calls her Cherry,
which she says is a guess.  They wonder that Vera’s KGB status did not
protect her, and Smith says, “It’s the same for us Americans, Cherry.  If
you go too far and the law finds out, it’s all over.”

He offers to tell her how the trick actually worked: the looped coil
tightened up so that the coffin never left the hold, and Koroviev was at
another exit casting a second coffin into space with its cord already cut –
the hand they witnessed in outer space just a prosthetic.  She had used
sealant inside the lid to protect her air supply when the air lock was
opened, and the other Houdini stayed behind to close the airlock after
everyone was gone.  It was at that point that the woman inside the coffin
struck.

He believes the clone was simply life insurance to do the dangerous tricks,
and the surviving Houdini admits to Smith she stabbed her assistant as she
opened the coffin.  She also says that Smith is “a more dangerous person
than I am.  You’re a spy of some sort, aren’t you? … Part of the reason you
won’t turn me in is that it looks better if a Russian killed Cherry than if
I killed Merry.”  He says he won’t turn her in when they return to Earth if
things go well between them on Mars.

He admits he was first “put on to” her when her eyes got round discussing
the jubilee year.  Merry Houdini (whom Smith now erroneously believes is
Cherry) then says he has gotten himself a girl on Mars through “radical
economics”.  He says he wishes he could have gotten his girl the way she
got her man instead (with beauty rather than blackmail).

COMMENTARY:

In *Bibliomen*, Wolfe talks of a fictional detective story written by Adam
Poor called *A Salted Mine* which I feel is worth quoting:

A man is found murdered in a Washington, DC subway station; he is without
identification.  A detective is seduced and beaten, and solves the crime.  A
second detective appears who shows the solution to be false, clues having
been planted and altered by the first detective.  A third detective (who is
in fact the attorney of the first detective) shows that the accusations
made against the first are without foundation, he having been accused by
the second to further his career.  At the conclusion of the book, the
reader realizes that the third detective is in fact the murderer- or
rather, that he is meant to be the murderer, the clues that implicate him
having been planted by a fourth party, Poor himself.

I can’t help but feel that this synopsis matches up better with “Cherry
Jubilee” than with any other story in Wolfe’s body of work.  Wolfe’s own
introduction states that it “is a science fiction mystery story, among
other things.  Alex Schomburg gave it a marvelous illustration showing
dinner aboard the spacecraft; if you’re going to try to solve the mystery,
you’d be wise to draw a picture – or at least a chart – of the same sort.”

Even after a seating chart is produced, which clockwise would show at the
head Captain Bogdanoff, to his left “Merry” Houdini in white, then the
American Smith, the supposed clone “Cherry” Houdini in red, Pasik Petrovsky
at the foot, his wife Anna, then the Soviet member of the Arts Council
Koroviev, and finally KGB agent Vera Oussinko to Bogdanoff’s right, there
are still some interpretational problems.  The Petrovsky family takes great
interest in the Houdini in red, ostensibly Cherry Houdini, and this
involves an interpretation – are they watching her so closely because she
doesn’t seem to be a clone and exhibits suspicious behavior, or simply
because they are interested in clones?  The Houdini in white is far closer
to Vera Oussinko to steal her knife, as is Bogdanoff, so we must choose
whether to believe the surviving Houdini in the end who says she grabbed
Vera’s knife because it was the farthest away, or disbelieve it as
impractical (though she is a magician, or at the very least a magician’s
apprentice). Luckily, there are more concrete details in the story to let
us know that indeed Smith’s deductions can be trusted (except for one major
assumption in which he is incorrect).

In light of Wolfe’s introduction, it seems that the solutions offered by
the two detectives in the story, first Vera Oussinko, who is herself
arrested, and then Smith, are both somehow unsatisfactory, though Smith’s
assumptions prompt a confession of the crime.

The entire interpretation which we are about to present hinges on one very
important bit of trust.  Smith’s explanation for the trick and how it was
accomplished explains the cut line as part of the set up for the illusion
and seems more reasonable than a person surviving the vacuum of space
without an atmospheric suit (a completely different coffin released by
Koroviev is seen outside the ship – the other one never left the airlock
because of the manner in which the assistant Houdini attached it).

His earlier identification of Koroviev as KGB seems to be an example of his
judgment failing, however.   Should we trust Smith in recognizing that the
girls switched colors and identities after the dinner?  After the girl in
red, ostensibly Cherry, bumps into him after the girl in white is sealed in
the coffin for the escape act, he “attempted to smile” – he doesn’t feel
the same way for the girl in red as he did at dinner because she is
significantly more shallow and vapid.

The speech patterns of “Cherry” Houdini in red at the dinner are fairly
complex and well developed.  She talks far more than “Merry” in white –
indeed, almost all the dialogue is voiced by her.  Smith is under the
impression that the woman in red at the dinner is the woman in white at the
outset of the trick – that they have switched places.  How can we be
confident that Koroviev’s belief in their switch is accurate?  Besides his
natural attraction to the woman on his left during dinner, his instincts
are actually quite good.  He has deduced exactly how the trick works.

At the escape trick, the woman in red (Cherry) says, “Five minutes is
plenty of time for poor Merry to suffocate in the vacuum, but my gosh,
isn’t it fun!  She promised to let me try it on the way home … This is a
new one she’s just worked out.”

Earlier at the dinner table, the girl in white (Cherry pretending to be
Merry) had a similar exclamation: “My God, what a relief … I thought Cherry
and I were the only Americans on board.”  She boasted, “Wait until you see
what I am going to do here on the Red Star!”

In contrast, the dialogue of the woman in red at dinner (Merry, who
actually survives), supposedly the four year old clone, seems more
sophisticated: “[The Captain] is a little obvious, isn’t he?  But he’s a
dear, and you can’t blame him for wanting to make Merry feel at home … I
have an adult mind, and of course while we were travelling in the Soviet
Union I had many opportunities.  Now I’m learning Merry’s techniques by
assisting her.  When I’m good enough, I’ll go off on my own – perhaps tour
South America.”  When Smith is attempting to blackmail her into being his
girlfriend, her dialogue never seems boastful or exclamatory.  She says,
“You said it was radical economics, and it was.  This is too, I
suppose.  You’ve
just gotten yourself a girl on Mars- all through radical economics.”

If we trust Smith’s assertion that the woman in red at the dinner actually
is the woman in white at the escape, then it is mighty curious that her
speech patterns are so much more sophisticated at the age of four than
Merry Houdini’s.  “My gosh”, “My God”, and even “she promised to let me try
it on the way home” sound a bit more juvenile than calling the captain
obvious (but a dear) in inviting the American to the table. The narrative
voice refers to the assistant in white as a clone in the third person voice
during the escape scene – this narrative voice can actually be trusted,
despite Smith’s conclusions.  In the opening scene, the clone is pretending
to be Merry, and during the trick, Merry has resumed her rightful position
and intends to keep it.

As far as the title: Smith explains the jubilee as follows: “In the ancient
civilization of Israel, all tribal lands were returned to their possessors
– even if they had been leased or sold – every fifty years.  That fiftieth
year was called the jubilee.  They held a celebration, because everybody
was getting his birth-right back.”  This causes the Houdini in red’s eyes
to light up, creating Smith’s attraction for her.

Smith is correct in all his assumptions save one – Cherry and Merry have
switched before dinner, as the clone, Cherry, has been blackmailing Merry
and attempting to keep her birthright.  Her methods are quite simple –
Merry has trusted her with the secret to her tricks, and Cherry has
probably threatened to reveal them if she is not given the glory. In order
to reclaim her identity even for a brief time, Merry has to come up with a
new trick that the actual Cherry cannot yet perform.  Thus the murder of
the clone Cherry is a reclamation of Merry’s birthright, and Smith is
correct in every particular but fails to realize that the girls have
switched both before and after the dinner – he only recognizes the later
switch.

POINT OF VIEW AND RELIABILITY IN WOLFE:


Overall, the narrative third person voice is trustworthy in identifying the
clone as such during the set up of the escape scene, but the voice feels no
obligation to provide complete narrative closure.  This trend appears as
early as “The Green Wall Said” and “Forlesen”, but the tendency of the
third person narrative to obfuscate through serious omission in Wolfe has
not yet reached its peak (*Home Fires, An Evil Guest, Castleview*, and
perhaps “The Ziggurat” and *There Are Doors* are all primarily third person
narrations with the kinds of elided implications we would expect of a first
person narrator, but without discernible motive, save that it is a
trademark of Wolfe). A subjective narrator, motive, and personal bias or
handicap can provide the necessary key to interpretation quite easily, but
in other narratives, we must accept that it is simply a hallmark of Wolfe’s
style.  Without the introduction to the story, would we have ever doubted
Smith’s conclusion?  Likewise, in the hands of another author, less careful
with dialogue, would there even be a mystery to discuss at the end of the
story?

We can recognize that Smith’s conclusions are off by his inherent sexism –
he knows that there must be a KGB agent present and assumes it to be
Koroviev, never thinking that the female Vera could be that agent.  Similarly,
even though he is able to tell that Cherry and Merry have switched place
after the dinner, his failure to understand her motives allows him to be
duped by Merry’s manipulation, even though she gets him to call her Merry
by the end of their interaction.  The most important thing to her is
maintaining the integrity of her secrets, which Cherry threatened.  The
master of seeking out bribes and theft is ironically unable to recognize
the theft of a birthright and attempted blackmail right under his nose,
even with his excellent deductive powers.

SOVIET/AMERICAN RELATIONS

The relationship between the Soviet Union and the United States is not
represented frequently in Wolfe’s fiction, though the idea of socialism and
a redistribution of wealth coming to America, along with a stratified class
distribution of funds, is especially prevalent in his short stories of the
1970s.  When the Soviet Union does appear, as in “The Peace Spy”, the
interaction is not quite as hostile as one would expect from the cold war
environment, and the lines between heroic and villainous characters are
often not drawn across nationalistic lines.

Here, a female KGB agent is perhaps the most courageous character in the
story, more noble than the American Smith and neither a blackmailer like
Cherry nor a murderess like Merry.  Even though her deductive powers are
not supported by the text, she pays a price for daring to suspect someone
in a position of authority. Koroviev asserts, “The time when our Soviet
citizens learned English for technical purposes is past.”  To this,
“Cherry” at dinner responds, “Isn’t that wonderful … Now we can speak
English when we have to keep secrets.”  The only mark against Vera, besides
her wild speculation about the trick, is Merry’s impression of her when she
held her hand in such a commandeering fashion.

Smith says that he is present seeking evidence of theft and bribery in the
Soviet system, then proceeds to try to blackmail Merry, taking the bribe of
her affection. In light of how Merry has responded to Vera and Cherry when
she feels her freedom compromised or challenged, we can imagine that Smith
should be careful.

LITERARY ALLUSIONS AND NAMES:

Captain Bogdanoff, with his ship Red Star, comes from the utopian soviet
novel *Red Star* by Bogdanov, which involves a socialist alien government
on Mars.  As an early Soviet SF novel which explores the implications of a
society which operates under communal property laws, it doesn’t necessarily
have to resonate on the plot level to be a valid reference.  The Martians
in the novel do conceal quite a bit, including gender identity, and some
ideologies lead the protagonist to commit murder to prevent genocide, which
is being considered by Martian idealists.

Bulgakov’s *Master and Margarita*, in which the devil comes to Russia,
features a valet named Koroviev. The name comes from the Russian word for
cow.

Pasik and Anna Petrovsky’s last name implies “the rock”.

Vera Oussenko’s first name means faith or true, but the only truth to her
assertion might be that Cherry was murdered.  However, the possibility
exists that Bogdanoff is an accomplice, though he seems unable to
distinguish between the two girls when they switch colors (Smith can tell
when they switch because he has fallen for the woman in red at the dinner
and realizes those same feelings for the woman in white at the escape –
Merry Houdini.)

RELIGIOUS ALLUSIONS AND SYMBOLS:

Despite the resonance Merry creating a child through asexual means and the
presence of a family whose last name derives from Peter, I feel that any
religious symbols are marginally unimportant in light of the dominant
symbol: the clone’s blood forms cherry-like spheres in the zero-gravity
environment. Those blood globes resonate with “the swollen crimson sphere”
of Mars through the viewport as Smith attempts to blackmail Merry. The
Jewish idea of the jubilee is equally important, for Merry has regained her
birthright from her clone.

UNANSWERED QUESTIONS:


Why is Smith really there? He says he is interested in the irregular
distribution of wealth through theft and bribery, but his American presence
remains nebulous, though Merry indicates part of his motive in not turning
her in is for the political and media ramification of having a Russian
villain, regardless of the truth.  What is America’s current economic
system?  Smith knows a good deal about ancient economic ideas, but the
interplanetary importance of America seems marginal in light of the waning
of English as a universal language.

It seems unlikely that Bogdanov knows anything in light of his ignorance of
which Houdini is which, but we must wonder if there was any tangential
involvement on his part in light of Vera’s name and the eager kiss he
delivers to Merry.

CONNECTION WITH OTHER WORKS:

The failure of the detectives in this story definitely shows that even
Wolfe’s third person narratives must be treated carefully. One tendency
which appears here quite noticeably becomes a habit of narration later: a
detective or privileged speaker hypothesizing about mysterious events,
often from a position of incomplete knowledge or ignorance. *Long Sun,
Short Sun*, and just about every novel after *Pirate Freedom* exhibit this
feature from time to time.  Sometimes the reconstruction of events is
particularly untrustworthy, as in the case of Skip in *Home Fires*.
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