Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  There was a small smell of cooking—scorned beef and skunk cabbage, I thought wildly. Unmistakably it came from the pixie house. On the formerly immaculate porch was a slopping-over garbage can, and a minuscule orange crate with unwashed, atom-sized tin cans and what were indubitably empty liquor bottles. There was a milk bottle by the door, too, filled with biliously lavender liquid. It hadn’t been taken in yet, nor had the morning paper. It was certainly a different paper. The lurid size of the headlines indicated that it was a yellow tabloid.

  A clothesline, without any clothes hanging on it at the moment, had been tacked up from one pillar of the porch to a corner of the house.

  I jerked down the cover, and fled after Jackie into the kitchen. “My God!” I said.

  “We should have asked for references,” she gasped. “Those aren’t our tenants!”

  “Not the tenants we used to have,” I agreed. “I mean the ones Mr. Henchard used to have. Did you see that garbage-pail on the porch!”

  “And the clothesline,” Jackie added. “How—how sloppy.”

  “Jukes, Kallikaks, and Jeeter Lesters. This isn’t Tobacco Road.”

  Jackie gulped. “Mr. Henchard said they wouldn’t be back, you know.”

  “Yeah, but, well—”

  She nodded slowly, as though beginning to understand. I said, “Give.”

  “I don’t know. Only Mr. Henchard said the Little Folk wanted a quiet, respectable neighborhood. And we drove them out. I’ll bet we gave the bird cage—the location—a bad reputation. The better-class pixies won’t live there. It’s—oh, dear—maybe it’s a slum.”

  “You’re very nuts,” I said.

  “I’m not. It must be that. Mr. Henchard said as much. He told us he’d have to build a new house. Desirable tenants won’t move into a bad neighborhood. We’ve got sloppy pixies, that’s all.”

  My mouth opened. I stared at her.

  “Uh-huh. The tenement type. I’ll bet they keep a pixilated goat in the kitchen,” Jackie babbled.

  “Well,” I said, “we’re not going to stand for it. I’ll evict ’em. I—I’ll pour water down their chimney. Where’s the tea-kettle?”

  Jackie grabbed me. “No, you don’t! We can’t evict them, Eddie. We mustn’t. They pay their rent,” she said.

  And then I remembered. “The planer—”

  “Just that,” Jackie emphasized, digging her fingers into my biceps. “You’d have been killed today if you hadn’t had some extra good luck. Those pixies may be sloppy, but they pay their rent.”

  I got the angle. “Mr. Henchard’s luck worked differently, though. Remember when he kicked that rock down the beach steps, and they started to cave in? Me, I do it the hard way. I fall in the planer, sure, and a cylinder bounces after me and stops the machine, but I’ll be out of a job till the planer’s fixed. Nothing like that ever happened to Mr. Henchard.”

  “He had a better class of tenant,” Jackie explained, with a wild gleam in her eye. “If Mr. Henchard had fallen in the planer, a fuse would have blown, I’ll bet. Our tenants are sloppy pixies, so we get sloppy luck.”

  “They stay,” I said. “We own a slum. Let’s get out of here and go down to Terry’s for a drink.”

  We buttoned our raincoats and departed, breathing the fresh, wet air. The storm was slashing down as furiously as ever. I’d forgotten my flash-light, but I didn’t want to go back for it. We headed down the slope, toward Terry’s faintly visible lights.

  It was dark. We couldn’t see much through the storm. Probably that was why we didn’t notice the bus until it was bearing down on us, headlights almost invisible in the dimout.

  I started to pull Jackie aside, out of the way, but my foot slipped on the wet concrete, and we took a nosedive. I felt Jackie’s body hurtle against me, and the next moment we were floundering in the muddy ditch beside the highway while the bus roared past us and was gone.

  We crawled out and made for Terry’s. The barman stared at us, said, “Whew!” and set up drinks without being asked.

  “Unquestionably,” I said, “our lives have just been saved.”

  “Yes,” Jackie agreed, scraping mud from her ears. “But it wouldn’t have happened this way to Mr. Henchard.”

  The barman shook his head. “Fall in the ditch, Eddie? And you too? Bad luck!”

  “Not bad,” Jackie told him feebly. “Good. But sloppy.” She lifted her drink and eyed me with muddy misery. I clinked my glass against hers.

  “Well,” I said. “Here’s luck.”

  WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS

  The boy was a super-baby. His parents didn’t know it, though, till the strong little servants came back through time to set up a strange sort of school—and a strange sort of inevitable dilemma.

  They were surprised at getting the apartment, what with high rents and written-in clauses in the lease, and Joe Calderon felt himself lucky to be only ten minutes’ subway ride from the University. His wife, Myra, fluffed up her red hair in a distracted fashion and said that landlords presumably expected parthenogenesis in their tenants, if that was what she meant. Anyhow, it was where an organism split in two and the result was two mature specimens. Calderon grinned, said, “Binary fission, chump,” and watched young Alexander, aged eighteen months, backing up on all fours across the carpet, preparatory to assuming a standing position on his fat bowlegs.

  It was a pleasant apartment, at that. The sun came into it at times, and there were more rooms than they had any right to expect, for the price. The next-door neighbor, a billowy blonde who talked of little except her migraine, said that it was hard to keep tenants in 4-D. It wasn’t exactly haunted, but it had the queerest visitors. The last lessee. an insurance man who drank heavily, moved out one day talking about little men who came ringing the bell at all hours asking for a Mr. Pott, or somebody like that. Not until some time later did Joe identify Pott with Cauldron—or Calderon.

  They were sitting on the couch in a pleased manner, looking at Alexander. He was quite a baby. Like all infants, he had a collar of fat at the back of his neck, and his legs. Calderon said, were like two vast and trunkless limbs of stone—at least they gave that effect. The eye stopped at their incredible bulging pinkness, fascinated. Alexander laughed like a fool, rose to his feet, and staggered drunkenly toward his parents, muttering unintelligible gibberish. “Madman,” Myra said fondly, and tossed the child a floppy velvet pig of whom he was enamored.

  “So we’re all set for the winter,” Calderon said. He was a tall, thin, harassed-looking man, a fine research physicist, and very much interested in his work at the University. Myra was a rather fragile redhead, with a tilted nose and sardonic red-brown eyes. She made deprecatory noises.

  “If we can get a maid. Otherwise I’ll char.”

  “You sound like a lost soul,” Calderon said. “What do you mean, you’ll char?”

  “Like a charwoman. Sweep, cook, clean. Babies are a great trial. Still, they’re worth it.”

  “Not in front of Alexander. He’ll get above himself.”

  The doorbell rang. Calderon uncoiled himself, wandered vaguely across the room, and opened the door. He blinked at nothing. Then he lowered his gaze somewhat, and what he saw was sufficient to make him stare a little.

  Four tiny men were standing in the hall. That is, they were tiny below the brows. Their craniums were immense, watermelon large and watermelon shaped, or else they were wearing abnormally huge helmets of glistening metal. Their faces were wizened, peaked tiny masks that were nests of lines and wrinkles. Their clothes were garish, unpleasantly colored, and seemed to be made of paper.

  “Oh?” Calderon said blankly.

  Swift looks were exchanged among the four. One of them said, “Are you Joseph Calderon?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We,” said the most wrinkled of tire quartet, “are your son’s descendents. He’s a super child. We’re here to educate him.”

  “Yes,” Calderon said. “Yes, of course. I . . . listen!”

  “To w
hat?”

  “Super—”

  “There he is,” another dwarf cried. “It’s Alexander! We’ve hit the right time at last!” He scuttled past Calderon’s legs and into the room. Calderon made a few futile snatches, but the small men easily evaded him. When he turned, they were gathered around Alexander. Myra had drawn up her legs under her and was watching with an amazed expression.

  “Look at that,” a dwarf said. “See his potential tefeetzie?” It sounded like tefeetzie.

  “But his skull, Bordent,” another put in. “That’s the important part. The vyrings are almost perfectly coblastably.”

  “Beautiful,” Bordent acknowledged. He leaned forward. Alexander reached forward into the nest of wrinkles, seized Bordent’s nose, and twisted painfully. Bordent bore it stoically until the grip relaxed.

  “Undeveloped,” he said tolerantly. “We’ll develop him.”

  Myra sprang from the couch, picked up her child, and stood at bay, facing the little men. “Joe,” she said, “are you going to stand for this? Who are these bad-mannered goblins?”

  “Lord knows,” Calderon said. He moistened his lips. “What kind of a gag is that? Who sent you?”

  “Alexander,” Bordent said. “From the year . . . ah . . . about 2450, reckoning roughly. He’s practically immortal. Only violence can kill one of the Supers, and there’s none of that in 2450.”

  Calderon sighed. “No, I mean it. A gag’s a gag. But—”

  “Time and again we’ve tried. In 1940, 1944, 1947—all around this era. We were either too early or too late. But now we’ve hit on the right time-sector. It’s our job to educate Alexander. You should feel proud of being his parents. We worship you, you know. Father and mother of the new race.”

  “Tuh!” Calderon said. “Come off it!”

  “They need proof, Dobish,” someone said. “Remember, this is their first inkling that Alexander is homo superior.”

  “Homo nuts,” Myra said. “Alexander’s a perfectly normal baby.”

  “He’s perfectly supernormal,” Dobish said. “We’re his descendants.”

  “That makes you a superman,” Calderon said skeptically, eyeing the small man.

  “Not in toto. There aren’t many of the X Free type. The biological norm is specialization. Only a few are straight-line super. Some specialize in logic, others in vervainity, others—like us—are guides. If we were X Free supers, you couldn’t stand there and talk to us. Or look at us. We’re only parts. Those like Alexander are the glorious whole.”

  “Oh, send them away,” Myra said, getting tired of it. “I feel like a Thurber woman.”

  Calderon nodded. “O.K. Blow, gentlemen. Take a powder. I mean it.”

  “Yes,” Dobish said, “they need proof. What’ll we do? Skyskinate?”

  “Too twisty,” Bordent objected. “Object lesson, eh? The stiller.”

  “Stiller?” Myra asked.

  Bordent took an object from his paper clothes and spun it in his hands. His fingers were all double-jointed. Calderon felt a tiny electric shock go through him.

  “Joe,” Myra said, white-faced. “I can’t move.”

  “Neither can I. Take it easy. This is . . . it’s—” He slowed and stopped.

  “Sit down,” Bordent said, still twirling the object. Calderon and Myra backed up to the couch and sat down. Their tongues froze with the rest of them.

  Dobish came over, clambered up, and pried Alexander out of his mother’s grip. Horror moved in her eyes.

  “We won’t hurt him,” Dobish said. “We just want to give him his first lesson. Have you got the basics, Finn?”

  “In the bag.” Finn extracted a foot-long bag from his garments. Things came out of that bag. They came out incredibly. Soon the carpet was littered with stuff—problematical in design, nature, and use. Calderon recognized a tesseract.

  The fourth dwarf, whose name, it turned out, was Quat, smiled consolingly at the distressed parents. “You watch. You can’t learn; you’ve not got the potential. You’re homo saps. But Alexander, now—”

  Alexander was in one of his moods. He was diabolically gay. With the devil-possession of all babies, he refused to collaborate. He crept rapidly backwards. He burst into loud, squalling sobs. He regarded his feet with amazed joy. He stuffed his fist into his mouth and cried bitterly at the result. He talked about invisible things in a soft, cryptic monotone. He punched Dobish in the eye.

  The little men had inexhaustible patience. Two hours later they were through. Calderon couldn’t see that Alexander had learned much.

  Bordent twirled the object again. He nodded affably, and led the retreat. The four little men went out of the apartment, and a moment later Calderon and Myra could move.

  She jumped up, staggering on numbed legs, seized Alexander, and collapsed on the couch. Calderon rushed to the door and flung it open. The hall was empty.

  “Joe—” Myra said, her voice small and afraid. Calderon came back and smoothed her hair. He looked down at the bright fuzzy head of Alexander.

  “Joe. We’ve got to—do something.”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “If it happened—”

  “It happened. They took those things with them. Alexander. Oh!”

  “They didn’t try to hurt him,” Calderon said hesitatingly.

  “Our baby! He’s no superchild.”

  “Well,” Calderon said, “I’ll get out my revolver. What else can I do?”

  “I’ll do something,” Myra promised. “Nasty little goblins! I’ll do something, just wait.”

  And yet there wasn’t a great deal they could do.

  Tacitly they ignored the subject the next day. But at 4 p.m., the same time as the original visitation, they were with Alexander in a theater, watching the latest technicolor film. The four little men could scarcely find them here—

  Calderon felt Myra stiffen, and even as he turned, he suspected the worst. Myra sprang up, her breath catching. Her fingers tightened on his arm.

  “He’s gone!”

  “G-gone?”

  “He just vanished. I was holding him . . . let’s get out of here.”

  “Maybe you dropped him,” Calderon said inanely, and lit a match. There were cries from behind. Myra was already pushing her way toward the aisle. There were no babies under the seat, and Calderon caught up with his wife in the lobby.

  “He disappeared,” Myra was babbling. “Like that. Maybe he’s in the future. Joe, what’ll we do?” Calderon, through some miracle, got a taxi. “We’ll go home. That’s the most likely place. I hope.”

  “Yes. Of course it is. Give me a cigarette.”

  “He’ll be in the apartment—” He was, squatting on his haunches, taking a decided interest in the gadget Quat was demonstrating. The gadget was a gayly-colored egg beater with four-dimensional attachments, and it talked in a thin, high voice. Not in English.

  Bordent flipped out the stiller and began to twirl it as the couple came in. Calderon got hold of Myra’s arms and held her back. “Hold on,” he said urgently. “That isn’t necessary. We won’t try anything.”

  “Joe!” Myra tried to wriggle free. “Are you going to let them—”

  “Quiet!” he said. “Bordent, put that thing down. We want to talk to you.”

  “Well—if you promise not to interrupt—”

  “We promise.” Calderon forcibly led Myra to the couch and held her there. “Look, darling. Alexander’s all right. They’re not hurting him.”

  “Hurt him, indeed!” Finn said.

  “He’d skin us alive in the future if we hurt him in the past.”

  “Be quiet,” Bordent commanded. He seemed to be the leader of the four. “I’m glad you’re co-operating, Joseph Calderon. It goes against my grain to use force on a demigod. After all, you’re Alexander’s father.”

  Alexander put out a fat paw and tried to touch the whirling rainbow egg beater. He seemed to be fascinated. Quat said, “The kivelish is sparking. Shall I vastinate?”

  “Not too f
ast,” Bordent said. “He’ll be rational in a week, and then we can speed up the process. Now, Calderons, please relax. Anything you want?”

  “A drink.”

  “They mean alcohol,” Finn said. “The Rubaiyat mentions it. remember?”

  “Rubaiyat?”

  “The singing red gem in Twelve Library.”

  “Oh, yes,” Bordent said. “That one. I was thinking of the Yahveh slab, the one with the thunder effects. Do you want to make some alcohol, Finn?”

  Calderon swallowed. “Don’t bother. I have some in that sideboard. May I—”

  “You’re not prisoners.” Bordent’s voice was shocked. “It’s just that we’ve got to make you listen to a few explanations, and after that—well, it’ll be different.”

  Myra shook her head when Calderon handed her a drink, but he scowled at her meaningly. “You won’t feel it. Go ahead.”

  She hadn’t once taken her gaze from Alexander. The baby was imitating the thin noise of the egg beater now. It was subtly unpleasant.

  “The ray is working,” Quat said. “The viewer shows some slight cortical resistance, though.”

  “Angle the power,” Bordent told him.

  Alexander said, “Modjewabba?”

  “What’s that?” Myra asked in a strained voice. “Super language?”

  Bordent smiled at her. “No, just baby talk.”

  Alexander burst into sobs. Myra said, “Super baby or not, when he cries like that, there’s a good reason. Does your tutoring extend to that point?”

  “Certainly,” Quat said calmly. He and Finn carried Alexander out. Bordent smiled again.

  “You’re beginning to believe,” he said. “That helps.”

  Calderon drank, feeling the hot fumes of whiskey along the backs of his cheeks. His stomach was crawling with cold uneasiness.

  “If you were human—” he said doubtfully.

  “If we were, we wouldn’t be here. The old order changeth. It had to start sometime. Alexander is the first homo superior.”

  “But why us?” Myra asked.

  “Genetics. You’ve both worked with radioactivity and certain shortwave radiations that effected the germ plasm. The mutation just happened. It’ll happen again from now on. But you happen to be the first. You’ll die, but Alexander will live on. Perhaps a thousand years.”