The Magnificent Wilf

by Gordon R. Dickson

  “Well,” he said, “there’s a typical general warning from Security. Suspicious of everyone—a monster under every bed.”

  “You don’t think Rejilla’s planning on doing anything like that, then?” called Lucy. “Should we be careful anyway?”

  “I suppose so. But what weak point? That’s the problem.”

  “Well, we can just be careful, Tom.”

  “May be easier said than done.”

  “Well, anyway,” answered Lucy, “there’s nothing you can do about it tonight. Put that sealed order, or whatever it is, away in the nightstand drawer. Here. Now that’s that for tonight. Sufficient unto the days are the cares thereof.” She came out of the bathroom and posed on the rug before him. “What do you think of my new nightgown?”

  Chapter 4

  “—What?” said Tom, waking up. Sunlight was filtering through the closed slats of the Venetian blinds of the bedroom. “Whazist?”

  “Tom! Wake up!” whispered Lucy urgently, shaking him.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “It’s Rex. Rex!” she hissed urgently, clutching his arm.

  “It’s what Rex? Rex what?” demanded Tom, irritably. “Rex?”

  He came all the way awake to realize that the Great Dane was standing by the side of the bed with his tongue hanging out apologetically. The bedroom door was ajar. The doors in this new house of theirs, unfortunately, had a push-button type of latch; and one of the few things Rex had learned was that pushing the button on the knob of an unlocked door with his nose made the door open. Tom had cited it to Lucy as an instance that Rex had, after all, inherited his famous great-grandfather’s brain. Lucy had remained unconvinced.

  “I love you,” said an unmistakably masculine voice.

  Tom blinked and struggled up into a sitting position. He glanced around the room. He leaned over the side of the bed and peered under it.

  “Huh?” he said.

  “I love you. Get up,” answered the voice, while Rex tried hard to lick Tom’s face.

  “Lucy!” croaked Tom, fending the dog off. “Who is it? Where is he?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to tell you,” said Lucy. “It’s Rex! Our Rex—and he’s right beside you, speaking to you.”

  “I love you. Play frisbee? Fun? Go walk.”

  “Rex!” Tom stared at the dog. “Lucy! He’s—I mean he isn’t, is he?”

  With a sudden explosion of energy, Tom jumped out of bed, lunged across the room, closed and locked the door. Turning about with his back against its panels he regarded the canine orator before him.

  “How can he talk?” he said thickly. “He hasn’t got the vocal apparatus. Say something, Rex.”

  “Play frisbee? Nice Tom.”

  “See—” yammered Tom. “His mouth doesn’t move—”

  “Nice Lucy. I love you, Lucy.”

  “I don’t care what you say!” snapped Lucy. “That’s Rex and he’s talking.”

  “Nice Lucy and Tom. I’m hungry.”

  The two humans stared at each other.

  “I’m nice, too,” said Rex.

  “Well, there you are,” said Tom insanely. “They always said he had his great-grandfather’s brain—and Rex Regis could do everything but talk. Our Rex just decided to learn to talk. That’s all.”

  “Don’t be funny!” said Lucy, sharply.

  “Who’s being funny? You hear him, don’t you?”

  “Of course I hear him. But he didn’t just learn to talk. That’s impossible.”

  “How can it be impossible when he’s doing it?”

  “I don’t care. How can he talk with the kind of mouth he has? You said that yourself.”

  “Well, he is.” Tom looked grimly at the tail-wagging Great Dane. He ordered—“Rex, say something again.”

  But Rex’s attention had wandered. He had sat down and was now nosing after what might be a flea or just a stray itch.

  “Rex!” Tom ordered again, in a sharp, no-nonsense voice.

  “I’m Rex! I’m Rex! I’m here, too!” said Rex, looking up cheerfully with one leg on the floor and the other up in the air. “See me? Play frisbee? Nice Tom. I love Lucy, too.”

  “Wait a minute!” Tom snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it!”

  “What?” asked Lucy.

  “Frisbee?” asked Rex. “Ouch! Got flea? Flea! There flea. Take that! Bite, bite, bite, bite! Crunch flea.”

  “We really ought to get a new radiant flea collar. The old one could be worn out,” said Lucy, thoughtfully. “I’ll run down to the pet shop after breakfast—”

  “Will you listen?” Tom demanded. “Listen, Lucy!”

  “Another flea?” queried Rex, checking his other hind leg. “Where flea?”

  “Lucy, it’s telepathy.”

  “Telepathy?”

  “That’s right. Look, his mouth doesn’t move and he speaks English, doesn’t he? You’re right, he couldn’t just do that overnight. But if he had been thinking these things for a long time in our language—and now suddenly he’s able to broadcast them to us so our own minds are putting them automatically into words—”

  “Tom,” said Lucy, “that’s downright silly!”

  “Why?”

  “Telepathy doesn’t exist,” said Lucy, “and if it did, how could he go telepathic all of a sudden?”

  “We don’t know telepathy doesn’t exist. The only thing is, he picked one hell of a time to do it with Mr. Rejilla here.”

  “That’s right!” said Lucy.

  “Pet me,” said Rex, nuzzling up against Tom’s pajama jacket.

  “Down, Rex! Not now!” Tom said, pushing him away.

  Ears drooping, tail sagging, Rex hung his head and burst into heart-breaking telepathic sobs.

  “Tom! How could you?” snapped Lucy. “He was just trying to get your attention.” She was out of bed in a flash and threw her arms around the dog’s neck. “Poor Rex! There, that’s all right. Tom didn’t mean it. No, he didn’t.”

  “Love Tom. Love Lucy,” gulped Rex. “Good Rex?”

  He looked up hopefully and flicked out a long, wet tongue, which Lucy almost dodged. It got her on the left ear.

  “You might have expected that,” said Tom, passing her a paper handkerchief. “Lucy, how he feels right now isn’t the important thing—”

  “Well, you made him think he’d done something wrong,” said Lucy.

  “I only—in any case, he’s forgotten about it now you’ve made a fuss over him,” said Tom. “As I was saying, the important thing is what we’re going to do with him.”

  “I see what you mean,” said Lucy, holding Rex off with one arm, while she wiped her ear with the paper handkerchief in her other hand. “We can’t have him going around talking to the neighbors. He might say anything to them. We’d have no privacy.”

  “That, too,” said Tom. “But it’s not the important thing. Have you forgotten Mr. Rejilla’s here?”

  “If you want to keep his telepathy a secret from Mr. Rejilla,” said Lucy, “I don’t see how you’re going to do it. Mr. Rejilla particularly wanted a couple with a dog, remember? Which undoubtedly means he wants to get to know Rex. And I can’t think of any way on Earth to keep Rex from talking to him telepathically, if they do get together.”

  “That’s the thing,” said Tom. He sat down on the bed and rubbed his nose thoughtfully. “But something’s got to be done,” he went on. “Rex here is now probably the most valuable piece of property on Earth at this moment, from every standpoint, including the military. To say nothing of science—they’ll want to investigate him—and maybe they can find a way to make all sorts of dogs telepathic, so they could go into enemy territory and come back and report in words.”

  “I thought that now that we were part of the civilized races in this Sector of the galaxy, and we’ve set up our own All-Earth Federation, that there’s not supposed to be any such thing as enemy territory anymore.”

  “Tell that to the Defense Departments around the globe,” muttered
Tom. “In any case, it doesn’t matter. Daneraux and his people would make enough fuss on their own if anyone else knew about Rex—particularly an Alien.”

  “But Oprinkians—”

  “Yes, I know,” said Tom, “they’ve sponsored us among the other interstellar Civilized Races, and done nothing but help us ever since the first one appeared here; but there’s still thousands of people on Earth here, still looking at them suspiciously. For our sakes—our own sakes—we’ve got to decide what to do with Rex.”

  “Well, for now,” said Lucy, decidedly, “we can begin by shutting him up in our room here. Meanwhile, you can try and get in touch with Daneraux. You could phone him right from here.”

  “No, no,” said Tom. “He’d undoubtedly be sure that Mr. Rejilla knew how to listen in on anything I said over a telephone from our place, whether he actually could or not. I’d better run out and phone from the copter port.”

  “Go walk?” asked Rex.

  “Sorry,” Tom told him, starting to dress hurriedly. “Later—if we’re lucky,” he added.

  The copter port was almost empty, as it should have been a little before nine o’clock in the morning. Tom phoned. Daneraux’s office informed Tom that Daneraux had not come in yet.

  “Hell!” said Tom. He went back home. When he got there, Lucy was drinking coffee in the living room, in a rather frilly black dress that was one of Tom’s favorites. Mr. Rejilla was seated opposite her in the red wingback armchair, playing a flute.

  “Good morning,” said the Oprinkian as Tom came in and lowered his instrument. “Take a condolence, please.”

  “Uh—I beg your pardon?” asked Tom. He dropped down on the living room sofa. Lucy got up and handed him a full cup of coffee. He took it gratefully.

  “I was just telling Mr. Rejilla how sick Rex is,” she said, giving Tom a glance that spoke volumes. “And how you had to go for the veterinarian. Did you get him?”

  “He wasn’t in his office yet.” Tom took a healthy swallow from his cup. “Ow!”

  He breathed violently out through his open mouth.

  “Well, you might have known it was hot,” said Lucy.

  “You find yourself internally dismayed by hot liquids?” inquired Mr. Rejilla. He looked up at the ceiling of the living room. “Note number one for this day,” he told it.

  He lowered his head and found Lucy and Tom staring at him.

  “I am noting myself to remember pertinent facts,” he explained to them.

  “Oh. Certainly,” said Tom.

  “I am endeavoring, you see, to understand humanity even better than heretofore, as a means of establishing the bonds between,” further explained Mr. Rejilla. “That is my mission here. Do you like music?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Tom. “Of course!”

  “Then I will play you a small composition,” said Mr. Rejilla. He did so, on the flute. The tune that came out sounded like anything but a tune. “Does it provoke you?” he inquired proudly.

  “Absolutely,” said Tom.

  “It’s very original,” volunteered Lucy, speaking in the same moment.

  “Indeed. Eighty-percent original,” said Mr. Rejilla, proudly. “That is, using your human measurements. It is a theme upon one of your native melodies.”

  “Oh?” questioned Tom, searching his memory for something in the way of music to connect it to.

  “A Chinese melody, I am so told,” said Mr. Rejilla, driving his point home.

  “I’d like some more coffee,” said Tom to Lucy. “What would you like to do today, Mr. Rejilla?”

  “I would like to peep,” said Rejilla, as Lucy passed the self-heating pot of coffee from the chair-table beside her.

  “I beg your pardon?” said Tom, puzzled.

  “Peep in on your lives. How fascinating the living process in all creatures; but particularly so in those of intelligent civilized proportions! Don’t you agree? You are inbound so many things that on Oprinkia are unthought of. This pet of yours, now in malady. Has he existed a number of years?”

  “Five, I think,” said Tom.

  “No,” said Lucy, “Six. Six years ago February third. I remember it because Groundhog Day was just one day before; and I made a joke about getting a groundhog for a pet. We’d been talking about a dog for some time.”

  “Oh yes,” said Tom. “February third.”

  “Has he offspring?” Mr. Rejilla wanted to know.

  Tom sipped cautiously at his second cup of coffee, which was beginning to get down to a tolerable temperature finally.

  “Not only that, but his offspring has offspring.”

  “A grandfather!” breathed Mr. Rejilla.

  “Yes, he is that,” said Tom.

  “How noble!” said Mr. Rejilla enthusiastically. “I will make a special effort to remember him in my thoughts. Now I must not detain you both. There will be housing affairs to demand your attention, no doubt. I would wish that you concern yourselves as customarily. Pay no attention to me. I shall merely peep as you go about your daily activities.”

  He stopped and looked at them expectantly.

  “Well—” said Tom. “That’s right. I suppose I’d better, well, cut the lawn back to size. Weren’t you going to bake a cake or something, Lucy?”

  “A cake?” asked Lucy, staring.

  “A cake.”

  “Oh, a cake! Why, as a matter of fact I was. I was going to make a cake the old-fashioned way,” explained Lucy to Mr. Rejilla. “None of this business of simply telling the kitchen Serve-all what I want, and taking whatever it delivers to me.”

  She got to her feet. “Tom, I’ll get a list of specifications from the kitchen for things you should buy me for it,” Lucy said. There was a gleam of real interest in her eye. “Yes, a homemade cake. You won’t mind going to the supply center first, before you cut the lawn, will you, Tom?”

  “Not at all,” said Tom. “I’ve got to swing by the copter port anyway, I can do that while I’m down at the store.”

  Tom got to his feet and Lucy went off to the kitchen.

  “Superb!” said Mr. Rejilla. “So this is how the human day inaugurates. I am complete attention. But Tom, the concept of ‘lawn’ escapes me. What is a lawn, and why must you cut it? It appears to me as something possibly hurtful?”

  “Not at all,” said Tom. “A lawn is that area of short green herbage that surrounds our house here. It’s like human hair. It keeps growing, and you have to cut it every so often to keep it from getting too long and keep it looking neat.”

  Lucy returned from the kitchen with a slip of paper with a list printed on it. She gave it to Tom.

  “Get these things,” she said. Tom tucked the slip into a shirt pocket.

  “I’ll go right away,” he said.

  “And I will go talk to your lawn,” said Mr. Rejilla. “It will be interesting to get its viewpoint on being kept looking neat.”

  They went their separate ways. Once more at the copter port, Tom phoned Daneraux at his office and found he was out. He gathered all the things that were on Lucy’s list, although he had to enlist the help of the store’s operator to order some of the more rare ingredients for the cake. Then, he tried phoning Daneraux’s office again. Daneraux was still out. He took back to Lucy all the things he had bought; and an hour and a half later, he was out pruning some rose bushes, with Mr. Rejilla watching.

  “—and the lawn told me,” Mr. Rejilla was saying to him, “that in its wild state it would object to being cut. But here, it takes pride in its appearance and does not object at all. It wishes to look better than other lawns.”

  “It said that, did it?” replied Tom. He reached for something interesting about lawns to add to his response; but was saved at that moment by the appearance of Lucy, who had just come out and got into their neighborhood gyroscopic three-wheeler.

  “I’m going back down to the supply center myself for a few more things!” she called to them. “This cake making from scratch is interesting. I should have tried it before!”

&n
bsp; The three-wheeler backed out of the driveway and was gone in a moment.

  “Next,” Tom said to Mr. Rejilla, “I should probably prune the hedge. Would you like to watch that?”

  “It would charm me,” said Mr. Rejilla.

  Within fifteen minutes the three-wheeler was back and Lucy left it to go into the house, throwing an encouraging smile at the two of them.

  Tom talked Mr. Rejilla into trying his hand with the pruning shears and hurried off to the kitchen. Lucy was standing before a cluttered worktable, with flour up to her elbows and even a dab of it on her nose.

  “Tom, this is actually fun! I’m sorry, honey, but you’ll have to run back to the supply center once more and get me some coloring—pink—for the icing,” she said as Tom came in. “We should never eat anything but real home cooked meals made from scratch.”

  “Daneraux didn’t phone here, did he?” asked Tom. “I didn’t have any luck reaching him from outside.”

  “I called him from here, as soon as I got back. I thought I might as well,” said Lucy. “They told me he hadn’t come in yet. Did you try that red button on your service phone he told you to push?” asked Lucy.

  “Half a dozen times; but that doesn’t work either,” said Tom. “I can’t go for this coloring of yours. I’ve got Mr. Rejilla on my hands. What’s to be done about him?”

  “He can come watch me cook,” said Lucy.

  “All right,” said Tom.

  At the supply center, this time, Tom finally got the Security man on his service phone.

  “Daneraux!” he barked. “Where have you been?”

  “Late meeting last night,” said Daneraux, a little hoarsely. “What is it?”

  “What is it?” echoed Tom. “Listen—”

  He outlined the situation.

  “You’re imagining things,” said Daneraux, coldly.

  “I tell you it’s the truth!” snarled Tom. “Come out here and see for yourself!”

  “I have no intention of coming as long as Mr. Rejilla’s there,” said Daneraux, even more coldly.

  Chapter 5

  Tom stared at Daneraux’s face in the phone screen.

  “Not coming!” he said. “I just told you there’s an emergency here, and you’re not coming?”