The Head said mildly, “I’ve watched Butch, you know, Worden. And you don’t look crazy. But if this sort of thing is sprung on the armed forces on Earth there’ll be trouble. They’ve been arguing for armed rocket-ships. If your friends start a real war for defense—if they can—maybe rocket warships will be the answer.”
Worden nodded.
“Right. But our rockets aren’t so good that they can fight this far from a fuel-store and there couldn’t be one on the Moon with all of Butch’s kinfolk civilized—as they nearly are now—and as they certainly will be within the next few weeks. Smart people, these cousins and such of Butch!”
“I’m afraid they’ll have to prove it,” said the Head. “Where’d they get this sudden surge in culture?”
“From us,” said Worden. “Smelting from me, I think. Metallurgy and mechanical engineering from the tractor-mechanics. Geology—call it Lunology here—mostly from you.”
“How’s that?” demanded the Head.
“Think of something you’d like Butch to do,” said Worden grimly, “and then watch him.”
The Head stared and then looked at Butch. Butch—small and furry and swaggering—stood up and bowed profoundly from the waist. One paw was placed where his heart could be. The other made a grandiose sweeping gesture. He straightened up and strutted, then climbed swiftly into Worden’s lap and put a skinny furry arm about his neck.
“That bow,” said the Head, very pale, “is what I had in mind. You mean—”
“Just so,” said Worden. “Butch’s ancestors had no air to make noises in for speech. So they developed telepathy. In time, be sure, they worked out something like music—sounds carried through rock. But like our music it doesn’t carry meaning. They communicate directly from mind to mind. Only we can’t pick up communications from them and they can from us.”
“They read our minds!” said the Head. He licked his lips. “And when we first shot them for specimens they were trying to communicate. Now they fight.”
“Naturally,” said Worden. “Wouldn’t we? They’ve been picking our brains. They can put up a terrific battle now. They could wipe out this station without trouble. They let us stay so they-could learn from us. Now they want to trade.”
“We have to report to Earth.” said the Head slowly, “but—”
“They brought along some samples,” said Worden. “They’ll swap diamonds, weight for weight, for records. They like our music. They’ll trade emeralds for textbooks—they can read, now! And they’ll set up an atomic pile and swap plutonium for other things they’ll think of later. Trading on that basis should be cheaper than a war!”
“Yes,” said the Head. “It should. That’s the sort of argument men will listen to. But how—”
“Butch,” said Worden ironically. “Just Butch! We didn’t capture him—they planted him on us! He stayed in the station and picked our brains and relayed the stuff to his relatives. We wanted to learn about them, remember? It’s like the story of the psychologist…”
* * * *
There’s a story about a psychologist who was studying the intelligence of a chimpanzee. He led the chimp into a room full of toys, went out, closed the door and put his eye to the keyhole to see what the chimp was doing. He found himself gazing into a glittering interested brown eye only inches from his own. The chimp was looking through the keyhole to see what the psychologist was doing.
*
THE MIDDLE OF THE WEEK AFTER NEXT
(Originally Published in 1952)
It can be reported that Mr. Thaddeus Binder is again puttering happily around the workshop he calls his laboratory, engaged again upon something that he—alone—calls philosophic-scientific research. He is a very nice, little, pink-cheeked person, Mr. Binder—but maybe somebody ought to stop him.
Mr. Steems could be asked for an opinion. If the matter of Mr. Binder’s last triumph is mentioned in Mr. Steems’ hearing, he will begin to speak, rapidly and with emotion. His speech will grow impassioned; his tone will grow shrill and hoarse at the same time; and presently he will foam at the mouth. This occurs though he is not aware that he ever met Mr. Binder in person, and though the word “compenetrability” has never fallen upon his ears. It occurs because Mr. Steems is sensitive. He still resents it that the newspapers described him as the Taxi Monster—a mass murderer exceeding even M. Landru in the number of his victims. There is also the matter of Miss Susie Blepp, to whom Mr. Steems was affianced at the time, and there is the matter of Patrolman Cassidy, whose love-life was rearranged. Mr. Steems’ reaction is violent. But the background of the episode was completely innocent. It was even chastely intellectual.
The background was Mr. Thaddeus Binder. He is a plump little man of sixty-four, retired on pension from the Maintenance Department of the local electric light and power company. He makes a hobby of a line of research that seems to have been neglected. Since his retirement, Mr. Binder has read widely and deeply, quaffing the wisdom of men like Kant, Leibnitz, Maritain, Einstein, and Judge Rutherford. He absorbs philosophical notions from those great minds and then tries to apply them practically at his workbench. He does not realize his success. Definitely!
Mr. Steems drove a taxicab in which Mr. Binder rode just after one such experiment. The whole affair sprang from that fact. Mr. Binder had come upon the philosophical concept of compenetrability. It is the abstract thought that—all experience to the contrary notwithstanding—two things might manage to be in the same place at the same time. Mr. Binder decided that it might be true. He experimented. In Maintenance, before his retirement, he had answered many calls in the emergency truck, and he knew some things that electricity on the loose can do. He knows some other things that he doesn’t believe yet. In any case, he used this background of factual data in grappling with a philosophical concept. He made a device. He tried it. He was delighted with the results. He then set out to show it to his friend Mr. McFadden.
It was about five o’clock in the afternoon of May 3rd. Mr. Binder reached the corner of Bliss and Kelvin Streets near his home. He had a paper-wrapped parcel under his arm. He saw Mr. Steems’ cab parked by the curb. He approached and gave the address of his friend, Mr. McFadden, on Monroe Avenue. Mr. Steems looked at him sourly. Mr. Binder got into the cab and repeated the address. Mr. Steems snapped, “I got it the first time!” He pulled out into the traffic, scowling. Everything was normal.
Mr. Binder settled back blissfully. The inside of the cab was dingy and worn, but he did not notice. The seat-cushion was so badly frayed that there was one place where a spring might stab through at any instant. But Mr. Binder beamed to himself. He had won an argument with his friend, Mr. McFadden. He had proof of his correctness. It was the paper parcel on his lap.
The cab passed Vernon Street. It went by Dupuy Street. Mr. Binder chuckled to himself. In his reading, the idea of compenetrability had turned up with a logical argument for its possibility that Mr. Binder considered hot stuff. He had repeated that argument to Mr. McFadden, who tended to skepticism. Mr. McFadden had said it was nonsense. Mr. Binder insisted that it was a triumph of inductive reasoning. Mr McFadden snorted. Mr. Binder said, “All right, I’ll prove it!” Now he was on the way to do so.
His reading of abstruse philosophy had brought him happiness. He gloated as he rode behind Mr. Steems. He even untied his parcel to admire the evidence all over again. It was a large, thin, irregularly-shaped piece of soft leather, supposedly a deerskin. It has been a throw-over on the parlor settee, and had had a picture of Hiawatha and Minnehaha on it. The picture was long gone, now, and the whole thing was about right to wash a car with; but Mr. Binder regarded it very happily. It was his proof that compenetrability was possible.
Another cab eeled in before Mr. Steems, forcing him to stop or collide. Mr. Steems jammed on his brakes, howling with wrath. The brakes screamed, the wheels locked, and Mr Binder slid forward off his seat. Mr. Steems hurled invective at the other driver. In turn, he received invective. They achieved heights of eloquen
ce, which soothed their separate ires. Mr. Steems turned proudly to Mr. Binder.
“That told him off, huh?”
Mr. Binder did not answer. He was not there. The back of the cab was empty. It was as if Mr. Binder had evaporated.
Mr. Steems fumed. He turned off abruptly into a side street, stopped his cab, and investigated. Mr. Binder was utterly gone. A large patch of deerskin lay on the floor. On the deerskin there was an unusual collection of small objects. Mr. Steems found:
1 gold watch, monogrammed THB, still running
87 cents in silver, nickel, and copper coins
1 pocket-knife
12 eyelets of metal, suitable for shoes
1 pair spectacles in metal case
1 nickel-plated ring, which would fit on a tobacco-pipe
147 small bits of metal, looking like zipper-teeth
1 key-ring, with keys
1 metal shoelace tip
1 belt-buckle, minus belt
Mr. Steems swore violently. “Smart guy, huh!” he said wrathfully. “Gettin’ a free ride! He outsmarted himself, he did! Let ’im try to get this watch back! I never seen ’im!”
He pocketed the watch and money. The other objects he cast contemptuously away. He was about to heave out the deer hide when he remembered that Miss Susie Blepp had made disparaging remarks about the condition of his cab. So had her mother, while grafting dead-head cab-rides as Mr. Steems’ prospective mother-in-law. Mr. Steems said, “The hell with her!” But then, grudgingly, he spread the deerhide over the backseat cushion. It helped. It hid the spring that was about to stab through.
Mr. Steems was dourly pleased. He went and hocked Mr. Binder’s watch and felt a great deal better. He resumed his lawful trade of plying the city streets as a common carrier. Presently he made a soft moaning sound.
Susie’s mother stood on the curb, waving imperiously. His taxi flag was up. Trust her to spot that first! He couldn’t claim he was busy. Bitterly, he pulled in and opened the back door for her. She got in, puffing a little. She was large and formidable, and Mr. Steems marveled gloomily that a cute trick like Susie could have such a battleaxe for a mother.
“Susie told me to tell you,” puffed Mrs. Blepp, “that she can’t keep tonight’s date.”
“Oh, no?” said Mr. Steems sourly.
“No,” said Susie’s mother severely. She waited challengingly for Steems to drive her home (any hesitation on his part would mean a row with Susie). She slipped off her shoes. She settled back.
Mr. Steems drove. As he drove, he muttered. Susie was breaking a date.
Maybe she was going out with, someone else. There was a cop named Cassidy who always looked wistfully at Susie, even in the cab of her affianced boyfriend. Mr. Steems muttered anathemas upon all cops.
He drew up before Susie’s house Susie wouldn’t be home yet. He turned to let Susie’s mother out.
His eyes practically popped out of his head.
The back of the cab was empty. On the seat there was 17 cents in pennies, one nickel, a slightly greenish wedding-ring, an empty lipstick container, several straight steel springs, twelve bobbie pins, assorted safety pins, and a very glittering dress-ornament. On the floor Mrs. Blepp’s shoes remained—size ten-and-a-half.
Mr. Steems cried out hoarsely. He stared about him, gulped several times for air, and then drove rapidly away. Something was wrong. He did not know what, but it was instinct to get away from there. Mr. Steems did not want trouble. He especially did not want trouble with Susie. But here it was.
This was bad business! Presently he stopped and inspected his cab with infinite care. Nothing. The deerskin made a good-looking seat-cover. That was all. There was no opening anywhere through which Susie’s mother could have fallen. She could not have gone out through the door. Under no circumstances would she have abandoned her shoes. Something untoward and upsetting had come into Mr. Steems’ life.
Mr. Steems retired to a bar and had several beers. There was a situation to be faced; to be thought out. But Mr. Steems was not an intellectual type. Thinking made his head hurt. He could not ask advice, because nobody would believe what he had to say. Apprehension developed into desperation, and then into defiance.
“I didn’t do nothing,” muttered Mr. Steems truculently. “I don’t know nothing about it!” Would Susie not be willing to believe that? “I never seen her!” said Mr. Steems in firm resolve. “I never set eyes on that old battleaxe today! The hell with her!”
He had another beer. Then he realized that to stay encloistered, drinking beer after beer might suggest to someone that he was upset. So he set out to act in so conspicuously normal a manner that nobody could suspect him of anything. He had lost considerable time in his meditation, however. It was nearly nine o’clock when he resumed his cruising. It was half-past nine when he stopped behind a jam of other vehicles at a red light on Evers Avenue. He waited. He brooded.
Somebody wrenched open the door of the cab and crawled in.
Mr. Steems reacted normally. “Hey! What’s the idea? Howya know I want a fare now?”
Something cold and hard touched his spine and a hoarse voice snarled: “Get goin’, buddy. Keep your mouth shut, an’ don’t turn around!”
The red light changed. Shoutings broke out half a block behind. Mr. Steems—with cold metal urging him—shifted gears with great celerity. He drove with all the enthusiasm of a man with no desire to be mixed up in gunplay. The shouting died away in the distance. Mr. Steems drove on and drove on.
Presently he dared to say meekly: “Where you want me to drive you or let you out?”
Behind him there was silence.
Resting on the deerskin seat-cover there was a very nasty-looking automatic pistol, a black-jack, $1.25 in coins, seventeen watches, thirty four rings, a sterling silver gravy-bowl, and a garnet necklace. There were also two large gold teeth.
Mr. Steems, trembling, went home and put the cab away. Then, unable to stay alone, he went out and drank more beers as he tried to figure things out. He did not succeed.
After a long time, he muttered bitterly, “It ain’t my fault! I don’t know nothing about it!” Still later he said more bitterly still, “I can’t do nothing about it, anyways!” Both statements were true. They gave Mr. Steems some pleasure. He was innocent. He was blameless. Whatever might turn up, he could stridently and truthfully insist upon his complete rectitude. So he had some more beers.
* * * *
Came the dawn, and Susie babbling frantically on a telephone. Her mother hadn’t come home or called, and it was raining terribly, and—
Mr. Steems said indignantly, “I ain’t seen her. What’s the idea of missing that date with me?”
Susie wept. She repeated that her mother had not come home. The police —Patrolman Cassidy—had checked, and she hadn’t been in any accident. Susie wanted Mr. Steems to do something to find out what had become of her mother.
“Huh!” said Mr. Steems. “Nobody ain’t going to kidnap her! I don’t know nothing about it. What you want me to do?”
Susie, sniffling, wanted him to help find her mother. But Mr. Steems knew better than to try. It hurt his head even to think about it. Besides, he didn’t want to get mixed up in anything.
“Look,” he said firmly, “it’s rainin’ cats and dogs outside. I got to make some money so we can get married, Susie. The old dame’ll turn up. Maybe she’s just kickin’ up her heels. G’bye.”
He went out to his cab. Rain fell heavily. It should have brought joy to Mr. Steems’ heart, but he regarded his cab uneasily. It wore a look of battered innocence. Mr. Steems grimly climbed into the front seat.
He set forth to act innocent. It seemed necessary. That was about nine o’clock in the morning.
* * * *
By half-past ten, cold chills were practically a permanent fixture along his spine. He had had passengers. They had vanished. Unanimously. Inexplicably. They left behind them extraordinary things as mementos. Financially, Mr. Steems was not doing badly. H
e averaged half a dollar or better in cash from every fare. But otherwise he was doing very badly indeed. At eleven, driving in teeming rain, he saw Patrolman Cassidy—and Cassidy saw him. At Cassidy’s gesture, Mr. Steems pointed to the back of his cab, implying that he had a fare, and drove on through the rain. His teeth chattered. He drove hastily to his lodgings. Business had been good. Far too good to have allowed Cassidy a look into the cab. Mr. Steems furtively carried into his lodgings:
4 suitcases
1 briefcase
2 dozen red roses
1 plucked chicken, ready for the oven
2 qts. milk
1 imitation-leather-covered wallpaper catalog
From his pockets he dumped into a bureau drawer not less than eight watches—men’s and women’s—four rings, eleven bracelets and nine scatter-pins. He had brushed out of the cab at least a double handful of small nails, practically all of them bent at the end and many of them rusted.
Mr. Steems was in a deplorable mental state. Once he had stashed his loot, however, indignation took the place of uneasiness.
“What’s that guy Cassidy want to see me for, huh?” he demanded of the air. “What’s he tryin’ to do? Figure I done somethin’ to that old bag?”
He drove back indignantly in search of Cassidy. He scowled at the raincoated cop when he found him. Cassidy explained that Susie was upset. Did Mr. Steems, by any chance—
“I told her I didn’t know nothing about the old dame!” said Mr. Steems stridently. “Sure, she grafts a ride every time she gets a chance! But I didn’t see her yesterday. What’s Susie think I done to her, anyway?”
Patrolman Cassidy did not know. Naturally.
And then a passenger with two suitcases and a briefcase stepped up beside Cassidy and said, “Is this taxi taken?”
There was nothing for Mr. Steems to do but accept him as a fare. To refuse would have been suspicious.
The Second Murray Leinster Megapack Page 65
