It is not an easy job, not always a pleasant one. But One far wiser than I, infinitely good, has decreed that it must be done (sighs), and be done dispassionately.
(He pulls on wire, and brings in another star, the biggest of all. The infrared light hits it, and it lights up brilliantly, and on it is the image of the Oak, the symbol of the organization.)
Alas, a young beauty. But already there are those who hate the sight of it, who clamor for it to be torn from the heavens. (He dabs at it with his dust cloth, shrugs, and holds the star at arm's length, preparatory to dropping it.) Enter a clean-cut, handsome young engineer from audience.
YOUNG ENG. (Shakes foot of ladder.) No! No, Sky Manager, no!
OLD MAN. (Looks down curiously.) What is this? A mere stripling challenges the caretaker of the heavens? Enter unkempt young radical through trap door in stage.
RADICAL. (Sneeringly) Take it down.
YOUNG ENG. There's never been a more brilliant, beautiful star!
RADICAL. There's never been a bloodier, blacker one!
OLD MAN. (Looks perplexedly from the two men to the star and back.) Hmmmm. Are you prepared to appeal the fate of this star with reason rather than emotion? My duties require that I be the sworn enemy of emotion.
YOUNG ENG. I am!
RADICAL. I, too. (Smiles.) And I promise to take very little of your time.
CLOSE QUARTER-SPHERES.
OPEN QUARTER-SPHERES.
A tall judge's rostrum now surrounds the old man's ladder. The old man wears a judge's wig and robes. The radical and the young engineer are similarly robed and wigged after the fashion of English barristers.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE.
Oyez, oyez, oyez! The Court of Celestial Relations is now in session!
OLD MAN. (Bangs with gavel.) Order in the court. The prosecution will proceed.
RADICAL. (Offensively ingratiating.) Your honor, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the prosecution will show that the star in question is as tarnished - nay, black! - as any ever hung in the heavens. I will call but one witness, but that witness in effect is a million witnesses, each of whom could tell the same sordid tale, tell the unvarnished truth in the same simple words from the heart. I'd like to call John Averageman to the stand.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE. John Averageman, John Averageman. Take the stand, please. Enter John Averageman through trap door in stage floor.
(He is slightly pudgy, shy, middle-aged, endearing. His clothes are cheap, verging on being comical. He is in awe of the court, and has perhaps had a couple of drinks to bolster his nerve.)
RADICAL. (Touches John's arm.) I'm looking out for you, John. Take your time about answering. Don't let them rattle you. Let me do the thinking, and you'll be all right.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE. Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
JOHN. (Looks questioningly at radical.) Do I?
RADICAL. You do.
RADICAL. John, suppose you tell the court what you did before the war, before this new star arose to spoil, to besmirch the heavens.
JOHN. I was a machinist in the Averagetown Works of the Averagetown Manufacturing Company.
RADICAL. And now?
JOHN. I'm in the Reconstruction and Reclamation Corps, sir. Shovelman First Class.
RADICAL. Suppose, for the edification of the court, you tell us what you made before the star arose, and what you make now.
JOHN. (Stares upward, remembering and computing with difficulty.) Well, sir, when the defense work and all got going before the war, seems to me I could make better'n a hundred a week with overtime. Best week I ever had, I guess, was about a hundred and forty-five dollars. Now I get thirty a week.
RADICAL. Uh-huh. In other words, as that star went up, your income dropped. To be exact, John, your income dropped about eighty per cent.
YOUNG ENG. (Jumps to feet impulsively, likably.) Your honor, I -
OLD MAN. Wait until the cross-examination.
YOUNG ENG. Yessir. Sorry, sir.
RADICAL. I think we've made it amply clear that the American standard of living has tumbled eighty per cent. (His features assume an annoyingly pious expression.) But enough of merely materialistic considerations. What has the ascent of this star meant to John Averageman in terms of his spirit? John, tell the court what you told me. Remember? About the engineers and managers -
JOHN. Yessir. (Looks hesitantly at young engineer.) No offense, sir -
RADICAL. (Prodding.) The truth can never be spoken without someone getting hurt, John. Go right ahead.
JOHN. Well, sir, it hurts a man a lot to be forgotten. You know - to have the fellers in charge, the engineers and managers, just sort of look right through him like they don't see him. A guy likes to know somebody thinks enough of him to look out for him.
YOUNG ENG. (Urgently) Your honor!
OLD MAN. (Severely) I will not tolerate any further interruptions from you. The issues are far graver than I thought. (To radical) Please proceed.
RADICAL. Go ahead, John.
JOHN. Well, sir, that's just about it. Kind of summing up, seems like these days the engineers and managers and the like are everything, and the average man is just nothing any more.
RADICAL. (Pretends to be overcome by the tragedy of John's testimony. After seemingly searching for words and struggling with emotion for thirty seconds, he at last speaks, choked up and angry.) Star of wonder, star of might; star of wondrous beauty bright. Take it down. (Shakes fist.) Take it down! (Gestures at John.) We've heard the voice of the people - the people, yes. "Take it down!" they say.
Who is it that says, "Leave it up?" Who? Not John, not the people. Who? (Dramatically, he produces a pamphlet from his breast pocket.) Your honor, ladies and gentlemen of the jury (reads from pamphlet), at the start of the war, the average income for engineers and managers in this great land of ours was $8,449.27. Now, on this poisoned night, as the black star reaches its zenith, eighty per cent of John Averageman's pay check has been wrenched from him. And what is the average pay check for engineers and managers, you ask? (Reads from the pamphlet again, with bitter emphasis on every syllable.) Fifty-seven thousand eight hundred and ninety-six dollars and forty-one cents!
(Explosively.) Your witness!
(Radical slinks over to the far post and leans against it to watch contemptuously.)
YOUNG ENG. (Softly, kindly) John.
JOHN. (Suspiciously, hostilely) Yessir?
YOUNG ENG. John, tell me - when you had this large income, before the star arose, did you by any chance have a twenty-eight-inch television set?
JOHN. (Puzzled) No, sir.
YOUNG ENG. Or a laundry console or a radar stove or an electronic dust precipitator?
JOHN. No, sir, I didn't. Them things were for the rich folks.
YOUNG ENG. And tell me, John, when you had all that money, did you have a social insurance package that paid all of your medical bills, all of your dentist bills, and provided for food, housing, clothes, and pocket money in your old age?
JOHN. No, sir. There wasn't no such thing then, in those days.
YOUNG ENG. But you have them now, now that the (sarcastically) black star has risen, haven't you?
JOHN. Yessir, that's right, I do. But -
YOUNG ENG. John, you've heard of Julius Caesar? Good, you have. John, do you suppose that Caesar, with all his power and wealth, with the world at his feet, do you suppose he had what you, Mr. Averageman, have today?
JOHN. (Surprised) Come to think of it, he didn't. Huh! What do you know?
RADICAL. (Furiously) I object! What has Caesar got to do with it?
YOUNG ENG. Your honor, the point I was trying to make was that John, here, since the star in question has risen, has become far richer than the wildest dreams of Caesar or Napoleon or Henry VIII! Or any emperor in history! Thirty dollars, John - yes, that is how much money you make. But, not with all his gold and armies could Charlemagn
e have gotten one single electric lamp or vacuum tube! He would have given anything to get the security and health package you have, John. But could he get it? No!
JOHN. Well, for heaven's sakes! But -
YOUNG ENG. (Anticipates John's objection.) But the engineers and managers have forgotten Mr. Averageman?
JOHN. Yessir, that's what I was going to say.
YOUNG ENG. John, do you know that no manager or engineer would have a job if it weren't for you? How could we forget you for even a minute, when every minute of our lives is spent trying to give you what you want! Do you know who my boss is, John?
JOHN. Don't believe I ever met the gentleman.
YOUNG ENG. (Smiling) Oh, I think maybe you have. He's you, John! If I can't give you what you want, I'm through. We're all through, and down comes the star.
JOHN. (Blushing) Gosh, I never looked at it quite that way before, sir. (Laughs modestly.) But I guess that's right, isn't it? What do you know about that? But -
YOUNG ENG. But I make too much money? Fifty-seven thousand dollars? Is that what worries you?
JOHN. Yessir, that's a lot of money.
YOUNG ENG. John, before the star arose, the payroll for producing what I produce for you, for my boss, Mr. Averageman, ran to more than fifty-seven thousand dollars a week. Not a year, mind you, but a week! It looks to me, John, like you, the consumer, are the big winner, not me.
JOHN. (Whistles low, under his breath.) Is that a fact! (Points suddenly at radical, who is very restive.) But, he said -
YOUNG ENG. We've answered everything he's said, John. And I'd like to add one little thought. He'd like to take advantage of your good nature. He wants power, and he doesn't care about anything else. He'd like to make you swallow his half-truths, John, and get you to help him pull down the star, and put himself in power, and the whole world back in the Dark Ages!
JOHN. (Glowering.) Oh, he would, would he?
(Radical looks worried, then frightened and chagrined, and suddenly makes dash for trap door in stage. John is right after him, and trap door closes. Stage lights fade, and blue feature spot comes up on young engineer, who moves directly to center of stage. Band starts "Battle Hymn of the Republic" softly, almost imperceptibly.)
YOUNG ENG. (Reflectively, soberly, conversationally) Yes, there are those who've clamored so loudly against our star that some have been convinced it is tarnished. And if that star were to come down, it would be partly our fault. Yes, ours! Every minute of the day we should be pointing out how beautiful it is, and why it is beautiful. We hold our peace too much.
(Points at star. Infrared beam hits it, making it glow beautifully.) Under it, we've become rich beyond the wildest dreams of the past! Civilization has reached the dizziest heights of all time!
(Music swells a little in volume.)
Thirty-one point seven times as many television sets as all the rest of the world put together!
(Music gets louder still.)
Ninety-three per cent of all the world's electrostatic dust precipitators! Seventy-seven per cent of all the world's automobiles! Ninety-eight per cent of its helicopters! Eighty-one point nine per cent of its refrigerators!
(Music gets louder still.)
Seventy-one point three per cent of the world's generating capacity!
Eighty-five per cent of its industrial control vacuum tubes!
Sixty-nine per cent of its fractional horsepower motors!
Ninety-eight point three per cent of . . .
(Music crescendos, drowning him out.)
Fade feature spot. Launch rockets from shore.)
CLOSE QUARTER-SPHERES.
OPEN QUARTER-SPHERES.
The young engineer is gone, and so are the trappings of the court. The old man is at the top of his ladder, alone with his stars, as he was at the beginning.
He holds out the star bearing the image of the Oak, smiles, hooks it onto the wire, and sends it out, where it glows in infrared.
OLD MAN. Yes, out it goes again, brighter than all the rest. (He reaches under his robe, and comes out with a powerful flashlight, whose beam he aims directly upward.) And when I come back to examine the stars for stains in another century, will it gleam as it does now? Or? (Looks meaningfully at the foot of the ladder.) Well, what determines whether it will be tarnished or not? (Looks at the audience.) It depends on - (Suddenly brings down the flashlight, so its beam strikes face after face after face in the audience.) You! And You! And You! etc.
(Fire rockets. Hit "Stars and Stripes Forever" hard.)
CLOSE QUARTER-SPHERES.
(Turn on amphitheater floodlights.)
Kroner's hand crashed down on Paul's knee. "Phwew! The best keynoter yet! Paul - the story, the whole story in a nutshell!"
"You'll be interested in knowing - " said the loudspeaker over the applause. "Here's an announcement of interest: In the past, the keynote plays have been written by professional writers under our supervision. This play you've just seen was written, believe it or not, by an engineer and manager within the organization! Bill Holdermann, stand up! Stand up! Stand up, Bill!"
The audience went wild.
"I knew it!" shouted Kroner. "It was real! It went right to the heart. It had to be somebody inside!"
Holdermann, a shaggy, worn-out nobody from the Indianapolis Works, stood a few rows ahead of Paul, red, smiling, and with tears in his eyes. At the sunset of life, he had arrived. Perhaps a muffled wisp of the applause reached the ears of his wife, the woman who had had faith in him when no one else had, across the water, on the Mainland.
"Bonfire in five minutes," said the loudspeaker. "Five minutes to make new contacts, then the bonfire."
Shepherd struggled through the crowd and took Kroner's attention away from Paul. " 'Not with all his gold and armies,' " Shepherd quoted from the play. " 'Not with all his gold and armies could Charlemagne have gotten one single electric lamp or vacuum tube!' " He shook his head wonderingly, admiringly. "Don't tell me art is dying."
"Art who?" said Paul under his breath, and he walked away from them, into the twilight at the fringe of the ring of floodlights. The rest of the crowd drifted, tightly packed, toward the shore, where Luke Lubbock, Alfy, and others of the service staff were pouring kerosene on a hillock of pine fagots.
The play was virtually the same play that had begun every Meadows session, even before the war, when the island had belonged to a steel company. Twenty years ago, Paul's father had brought him up here, and the play's message had been the same: that the common man wasn't nearly as grateful as he should be for what the engineers and managers had given him, and that the radicals were the cause of the ingratitude.
When Paul had first seen the allegory, as a teen-ager, he'd been moved deeply. He had been struck full force by its sublime clarity and simplicity. It was a story in a nutshell, and the heroic struggle against ingratitude was made so vivid for his young mind that he'd worshipped his father for a little while as a fighter, a latter-day Richard the Lionhearted.
"Well," his father had said after that first play, years ago, "what are you thinking, Paul?"
"I had no idea - no idea that's what was going on."
"That's the story," his father had said sadly. "The whole story. That's the way it is."
"Yessir." Their eyes had met, and an inexpressibly sweet sense of eternal tragedy had passed between them, between their generations - a legacy of Weltschmerz as old as humanity.
Now, Paul stood by himself on a dark walk, bewildered by the picture of, as Kroner put it, the men at the head of the procession of civilization, the openers of doors to undreamed-of new worlds. This silly playlet seemed to satisfy them completely as a picture of what they were doing, why they were doing it, and who was against them, and why some people were against them. It was a beautifully simple picture these procession leaders had. It was as though a navigator, in order to free his mind of worries, had erased all the reefs from his maps.
Suddenly, light flashed in Paul's eyes, but less dazzling lig
ht than the Sky Manager's. He faced his own image in a mirror framed by fluorescent lamps. Over the mirror was the legend, THE BEST MAN IN THE WORLD FOR THE BEST JOB IN THE WORLD. The island was covered with such booby traps. The lamps about this mirror were old ones, and they gave off a wavering light tinged with greens and purples. They gave his skin the quality of corroded copper, and his lips and eye rims were lavender. He discovered that there was nothing disquieting about seeing himself dead. An awakening conscience, unaccompanied by new wisdom, made his life so damned lonely, he decided he wouldn't much mind being dead. And the good offices of the cocktail hour were wearing away.
A drone in the sky to the east distracted him - probably the amphibian bearing the priceless two hundred and fifty pounds of Doctor Francis Eldgrin Gelhorne, and his know-how.
Paul took a step down the path, which turned off the lights, and headed back toward the bonfire, which was sending sparks and flames up hundreds of feet and turning the faces about it to a sweaty pink.
Vonnegut, Kurt - Player Piano (v5.0) Page 21
