by Anthology
“Into the Future,” he answered. “You’re going to go into a nose-dive,” I snarled, “if you don’t start giving me the straight dope.”
“It’s the truth,” he said, and there was an unmistakable ring of sincerity in his voice. “The absolute truth. They’ve gone into the Future. If the girl was in the time machine when my wife recalled it, then she’s certainly in the Future.”
He nibbled a piece of lobster moodily and sipped his drink,
“Poor girl,” he muttered.
About me I could hear the clink of glasses and the chatter of voices, and farther away I could hear the faint rumble of Manhattan’s traffic. So I wasn’t crazy, yet. But the little fellow’s horrible calmness and sincerity in discussing the Future as if it were a proper noun, gave me distinct shocks in the cranium.
Maybe I was going crazy for I suddenly realized that I was trying to make a case for the guy’s attitude. I asked myself: How had the strange machine materialized and disappeared in the theatre? If it was a time machine, that would explain—I decided then I was crazy. Thinking seriously about time machines was proof enough that I would soon be needing keepers with white jackets.
“Look,” I said, and my voice was oddly strained, “won’t the time—I mean—the machine come back again?”
“Who cares?” ones of the blondes cried tipsily. “Let’s have ’nother drink, Ducky.”
“What do you want?”
“Champagne,” the blonde clip artist pouted.
“Champagne,” the little fellow cried to a waiter. “Lots and lots of it.” By way of thanking my Maker for small favors, I was glad as the devil
I didn’t have to foot the bill the little guy was running up.
An idea hit me then, an idea that was so simple that I’d completely overlooked it till now. I grabbed the little fellow by the arm.
“If you’re from the Future,” I said, “and the time machine has gone back without you, how’re you going to get there yourself?”
He took his attention from the blonde and blinked at me.
“I’m not,” he said. “I’m not going back. In the first place it’s impossible and secondly I don’t want to.”
“Why?” I asked.
He shuddered and gulped a mouthful of champagne.
“The Future,” he said, “is Hell! Everything run by women. They don’t need us anymore and they know it. Someday they’ll exterminate us all. Men are slaves and the women are masters. My wife is a Custodian. Big job. Bosses me around all day, nothing to do at night but take a sleep tablet and forget about it. That’s ’nother thing. Pills, pills, pills! Food pills, drink pills, baby pills, rest pills. All a man does in the Future is take pills and orders. Ish terrible!”
He dropped a succulent crumb of terrapin into his mouth and sighed ecstatically.
“I love it here. Food, drink, women! What women! They like me, tell me I’m wonderful, treat me as an equal.” One of the blondes patted him on the cheek fondly.
“Sure you’re wonderful, Honey. Let’s have just a teeny bit more lobster, huh?”
“Lobster, lots of lobster!” the little fellow cried happily to a passing waiter.
“You see,” he said triumphantly, “they do think I’m wonderful. Are all girls of this year like this?”
I looked cynically at the greedy little wenches gorging themselves with his food and drink, and scheming behind their doll-like faces how they could clip him for more.
“Fortunately,” I said, “No.”
If he heard me he didn’t get it. He was tickling one of them under the chin and making noises like a grandfather.
I leaned against the back of my chair feeling savagely ineffectual. I’d never been in such a screwy position in all of my life. I was worried about Ruby, really worried. Yet the only explanation I could get as to her whereabouts was too silly to even consider.
That she had disappeared into the Future was absurd. Then doubts began to hit me. The disappearance of the machine etc. I took a drink and followed it with two more.
The giggles of the girls were growing shriller, and the smile on the little fellow’s face was widening joyfully by the second.
“No more pills,” he cried happily. “No more orders, no more worry about becoming extinct. Here I have found Paradise beyond dreams. Oh you happy, simple people of the Past, you really live in the fullest sense of the word.”
He jerked off the silly hat and waved it in wild circles over his head.
“No more pills,” he shouted. “No more pills for ever and ever.”
He sounded like an advertisement for More-Bran cereal.
“Let’s go somewhere else, Ducky,” one of the mascaraed mamas pouted.
“Sure, sure,” Number 33 cried magnanimously, “anywhere you say.” Without wasting an instant the three girls scampered off to get their wraps. The tall, dignified waiter stepped up and laid a long piece of cardboard before my little chum in the green suit.
The little fellow set down his drink and picked up the bill.
He turned it over in his hands and then looked at me, puzzled.
“What do I do with this?” he asked. His voice was as naive as a child’s.
“Pay it,” I said bluntly. “What do you think?”
“With what?” he asked uncertainly.
I experienced a peculiar sensation in the pit of my stomach.
“Good Lord!” I groaned. “Haven’t you any money?”
The waiter’s ears pricked up. He leaned forward.
“Any difficulty gentlemen?” His voice was as suave as silk but there was an unpleasant undertone to it.
Number 33 turned to me bewilderedly. I can spot phonies but at moments I’d swear the little fellow was dead on the level when he asked: “What’s money?”
I closed my eyes and counted ten. Then I told him, trying to avoid profanity wherever possible.
When I got through with my brief discourse on elementary economics he was staring at me incredulously.
“You can’t be serious,” he said, blinking owlishly at me. “It’s absolutely unbelievable that intelligent human beings would carry metal and paper around with them to exchange for the necessities of life. It—it’s barbaric, that’s what it is.”
“Barbaric or not,” I said, “it’s one of the quaint customs of the day. And if you have any ideas about disregarding it, you will soon learn that we have even more barbaric methods to discourage you.”
I’d seen the waiter casually raise his hand and nod to two very rough, business-like looking gents who were lounging against a wall watching the crowd. “You’re joking,” the little fellow said flatly.
I glanced up and saw that the bouncers were heading our way.
“I wish I was,” I said dismally.
The waiter picked up the check from the table and cleared his throat meaningfully.
“The bill,” he said frigidly, “is sixty-eight dollars and fifty cents.”
The little fellow looked so puzzled and dismayed that I almost felt sorry for him. He looked entreatingly at me, as if expecting me to tell him it was all a joke.
The bouncers sauntered close to us and then circled the table slowly like vultures waiting to pounce in for the kill. I glanced up and saw that the three blondes who had glutted themselves with the terrapin and champagne were coming back, coats over their respective arms.
But before they reached the table they stopped. Being experts at appraising such situations they instantly interpreted the scene and realized that their sugar daddy was out of sugar.
For only an instant did they hesitate. Then they turned casually and strolled away.
The little fellow didn’t notice and I was glad.
He was too engrossed with the decidedly unfriendly attitude of the waiter and the two bouncers, who had been joined by the manager, a swarthy, stocky fellow in a tight-fitting tuxedo.
“Sixty-eight dollars and fifty cents,” the waiter repeated with unpleasant emphasis.
Suddenly off to our
right a jingling clatter sounded. Looking up I saw that some lucky guy had hit the coin machine for a few dollars in silver.
The little visitor from the Future heard and saw also.
For a second his face was puzzled and uncomprehending. Then a broad relieved smile broke over his features.
“I see, I see,” he said delightedly. “You keep the money in boxes and then when you need some you just pull a lever. Very nice, very nice indeed.”
I tried to explain that things didn’t quite work that way, but he would have none of it.
“You can’t fool me twice,” he said gaily. “You did have me puzzled for a while, but I see how the system works now. I’ll go over and get what money we need.”
I had the helpless feeling that steals over a man when he attempts to reason with a woman or a copper.
“Go ahead,” I said wearily. I slipped him a half a buck and told him how to use it. At least, I figured, it would delay the inevitable reckoning.
The waiter glared at him when he stood up and trotted over to the slot machine, but I guess he realized that since I was still at the table it wasn’t an attempt to dodge the check.
So he concentrated his stern, unwelcome attention on me.
“Is there anything else?” he inquired coldly.
“Yes,” I snapped, “bring me a glass of water and a tooth pick. The splinterless kind.”
The waiter opened his mouth, but whatever he was going to say was drowned out in a sudden whirring clatter that was followed instantly by one of the sweetest sounds in the world—the heavy jingling roar of silver.
I wheeled and saw the little fellow in the bunny suit looking at the slot machine with a pleased smile on his face, and standing knee-deep in a glittering pile of half-dollars.
He had hit the jackpot!
I stood up, feeling suddenly weak all over, and walked to the slot machine.
“They all came out,” the little green-suited fellow said proudly. Then a remorseful look stole over his face. “There won’t be anything left for the next fellow, will there?” he asked guiltily.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said in a strangled voice. I had stood about all I could.
The waiter was gathering up the coins, his unpleasantness having faded like a dew drop in the sun. He was again thinking of his tip.
“Put back what you don’t need,” the little fellow directed him. “I wouldn’t want to inconvenience the next person who came along.”
He was quite happy as he trotted alongside me to the door.
“Quite an ingenious system, I must say,” he remarked. “Just pull a lever and that’s that. Very ingenious.”
I groaned. Why did everything happen to me? I thought disgustedly. Ruby vanished without a trace, and me saddled with a nut from the Future who was convinced that he was in Paradise, when he was actually in New York.
It was probably because I was so absorbed with these distracting thoughts that I didn’t notice the sleek black car pull up to the curb alongside us. The first inkling I had of trouble’s ugly head was in the form of a sudden hard jab in the back.
I froze in my tracks. A voice said in my ear:
“Smart guy. In the car now and no tricks.”
There was nothing else to do. I stepped for the open door of the car, but just then there was an interruption.
“Where are you going?” my chum from the Future asked plaintively.
“Probably for a ride,” I answered grimly—and truthfully
“How delightful,” he answered, pleased. “You think of everything here, don’t you?”
I turned my head slightly and saw that the mug behind me was Dapper Dan, Scarlotti’s finger man. The mug I’d thrown out of the theatre not two hours before.
“Hello Danny,” I grinned. “Playing tough guy now?”
He glared at me. “Who’s the mug in the clown suit?” he grated.
“Friend of mine,” I said, trying to give the little runt the office to scram. But he stood there smiling, obviously pleased with the prospects of a ride.
“Get in!” Dapper Dan snapped at him.
“Thank you,” he answered jubilantly. He climbed awkwardly into the car. I got in after him cursing fluently. Then the car moved away from the curb in a swift rush of power.
“Wonderful,” squealed Boy Scout Suit, “wonderful!”
The car flashed through the heavy night traffic and in a few minutes was crawling over the Washington bridge to Jersey.
Beside Dapper Dan, who was seated next to me prodding a persuader into my ribs, there were two other yeggs in the car, both in the front seat.
The trip was made in ominous silence. The only person who was unaffected by the situation was the visitor from a couple of thousand years from now.
He was so immensely excited by the spectacle of Manhattan’s sky line that he forgot to jabber questions into my ear. He contented himself with squirming about, and sighing happily at the sights that spread around him.
I was so curious about him that I actually was able to forget my own predicament. If he was faking astonishment and excitement he was doing a remarkably fine job of it. If he wasn’t faking he belonged to another time era, that was certain.
The silence held until we reached a shack in Jersey set back from the street, then Dapper Dan nudged me with the gun and told me to get out.
As we filed into the dark house, I did a little worrying in behalf of myself. Things seemed to be getting worse and worse for me. Still no inkling as to where Ruby had disappeared, except the assumption that she had been snatched into a future time. But that was not the immediate problem. More pressing than that, was what Dapper Dan arid his playmates had in store for me.
A light flicked on and I saw we stood in a sparsely furnished room with all the blinds drawn. It was a deserted neighborhood, I had noticed as we entered.
“Nice place for a murder,” I remarked conversationally.
“Maybe,” Dapper Dan commented casually.
The other two thugs seated themselves without taking their eyes off me My playmate from the Future stared curiously about the ill-furnished room. His features were pleasantly but uncertainly expectant; as if he were a spectator at a peculiar game which he did not understand too well.
Dapper Dan broke the short silence.
“You held the cards a while ago,” he said softly, “when you tossed me out of your show. The situation is reversed now. And what happens to you depends on how anxious you are to cooperate.”
“Meaning what?” I asked.
“That Scarlotti intends to muscle into the show business of New York. He’s going to do it on the legit. And he thinks you’d be a good man to have working for him. It isn’t everyone that the Boss is willing to take in, you know.”
“He’s taken in everybody he’s done business with,” I said recklessly.
“Very funny,” Dapper Dan said tonelessly. “I may have to ask the boys here to show you their appreciation of your wit if you keep it up. Now, for the last time, are you in?”
I pretended to ponder the situation.
“You know,” I said thoughtfully, “I think I’ve got a good play for Scarlotti to lead off with.”
“What’s that?” Dapper Dan asked.
“It’s a play,” I said, “that symbolizes Scarlotti and his whole outfit pretty well. It’s called Brother Rat!”
Dapper Dan’s face flushed purple. His hand came out of his coat pocket holding a gun.
“You’re a little too wise, I think,” he said softly.
The little man from Tomorrow jumped excitedly when he saw the gun in Dapper Dan’s hand.
“I know what that is,” he cried, “it’s a gun. I saw one in the Collectarium once. The inscription said it was a weapon used by the cliff dwellers of the twentieth century.”
Dapper Dan’s jaw dropped a full inch.
“Who is this guy?” he demanded. “Is he a screwball?”
“Use it, please,” the little fellow begged. “I’d love to
see it work. Please try it.”
“I think I will,” Dapper Dan said softly.
He swung the muzzle around until it aimed squarely at the third clasp of the little fellow’s uniform.
“You’ll know better than to try and kid me the next time,” he said viciously. His finger tightened slowly on the trigger.
I’d swear the little fellow didn’t know he was staring straight into eternity.
The smile was still on his face and his eyes were bright with interest.
I couldn’t let him go that way. If I did I knew I’d see his friendly, innocent face before me the rest of my life.
Just as Dapper Dan’s finger closed on the trigger, I hurled myself at him. My shoulder drove into his side, and at the same instant I heard a thundering report above my head and felt a hot slash of flame sear across my neck.
But that wasn’t all. As I crashed to my knees I felt, rather than saw, a shimmering phosphorescence illuminate the room with crazy flashing lights. Then a sound like the ripping of a delicate fabric filled the room and a second later a thunderous blast jarred the very floor beneath me.
Dazed, I looked up. The sight before me caused me to blink rapidly and unbelievingly.
For before my astounded eyes, smack in the middle of the room, was a huge undulating ball of metal. Before I could collect my badly scattered wits, the hatch-like cover on the machine was flung back and a slim, auburn-headed figure slipped out and dropped to the floor.
“Ruby!” I yelled.
“Well of all people,” she exclaimed. “Whatever are you doing here?”
That was all the opportunity we had for light conversation.
For Dapper Dan had picked himself from the floor, and now he shoved the muzzle of his gun into my back and barked at his thugs.
“Grab the doll!”
They wasted no time. Struggling and twisting she was hauled to one side of the room, where she proceeded to give every member of the opposition her exact views on their ancestry and upbringing.
I knew it was all over then. Somehow Ruby had been returned, and now I had no doubts as to where she’d been. But she had returned just in time to stick her pretty neck into a tight noose of trouble.
No one had paid any attention to the little fellow, and I peered around to see what had happened to him. My first thought was that he had collected a bit of lead for himself, but I saw immediately that I was mistaken. He was cowering in a corner, a mask of terror stamped on his face. I felt a twinge of pity. It must have been an unnerving situation for him.
