by Sesh Heri
136
“Now was that your article? Good Newspaper hoax! Wrote a few myself in my younger days.” “Are you accusing me of fabricating a hoax?”
“Not at all, my dear, not at all. I’m just saying you didn’t get your facts straight. Get your facts straight first, then you can distort ‘em any way you like.” Lillie said, “The facts are that last night several dozen people witnessed an airship f lying over Lake Michigan.”
“Those aren’t the facts, my dear, those are the claims.” “And,” Lillie asked, “what do you claim are the facts?” “Most likely… that, uh… somebody got hold of some bad whiskey, and… had a case of the delirium tremens.” “Many people say they saw the airship.” “I have found that many people will say just about anything.” “But several witnesses were respected citizens of Chicago,” Ade said. “I don’t think they would make up a story like that. Now. What do you think?” “I think that your two minutes are long gone. Come on, Hall.” Hall and I stood up.
“But Mr. Twain—” Lillie started, she and Ade standing up. “Clemens. Call me Clemens. Mark Twain’s just my nom de plume.” “Haven’t I heard that Mr. Tesla calls you Mark?” Lillie asked.
“Well, now. Maybe you have. And maybe he does. Mr. Tesla can do what- ever he likes. Geniuses usually do. Now. If you’ll excuse me.” “But—”
“Young lady, persistence is one thing—pesterin’—quite another.”
Hall and I strolled away toward the entrance of the restaurant. There we retrieved our hats and coats. I turned back and gave Lillie and Ade a little grin and wave. Ade grinned and gave a short wave back. “Cagey old rascal,” Ade said in a low tone between the teeth of his grin. “Don’t say anything,” Lillie said.
Ade said, “I’d just like to know what’s going on. Are you going to tell me? Or are you going to give me the brush-off again like you did last night?” “Not here. Come on.”
As Hall and I got into a cab out on the street, I saw Lillie and Ade coming out of the hotel’s entrance. I looked at them around the edge of the cab and they stared back at me. We drove off, and I said, “I’ve just figured out how I’ll pay Paige’s seven thousand dollar bill.” “How?” Hall asked.
“Remember that story I wrote last summer about Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer going to Africa in a balloon?” “I do. Tom Sawyer Abroad. Sort of an imitation Jules Verne.”
137
“I should say not! Burlesque Verne, always! Imitate Verne, never!” “All right. What are you going to do with it?” “I’m going to polish it up a mite and we’re going to publish it as a book.” “And you think that will bring seven thousand?” “Or more. People are interested in airships now. They’ve got airships on their brains. They’re seeing airships every time they look at a bird or the Moon. And they’ll buy my airship story.” “All right. I’ll see if we can fit it into our publishing schedule.” “If? We will fit it in. I’ll give you a finished manuscript shortly. But first I want to work on a character in the story—the inventor of the airship.” “Yes. What was his name?”
“He doesn’t have a name. I just call him the ‘Professor.’ He’s just a lunatic inventor. I’ve modeled him after Paige.” “Oh, ho! After Paige? I thought you were going to say Tesla.”
“There might be a little of Tesla there, around the edges. But the main height and bulk is all Paige.” “But do you think the public will accept Tom and Huck traveling around the world in a balloon?”
“Hall, haven’t you learned by now that ‘the public’ will accept whatever they are given? Besides, Tom and Huck are my property and I can do whatsoever I desire with them: put them in an airship balloon, or starve them on a desert island, or elect them Presidents of the United States, or drive them crazy and shut them up in a lunatic asylum, or hang them as horse thieves—just as I see fit.” “Are you saying there is no literary logic to the characters of Tom and Huck?”
“Literary logic? That’s a contradiction itself. There is no logic to literature, only the illusion of logic. Very little of what happens in literature has any real logic to it, only contrivance.” “What about life?”
“Life has neither logic nor contrivance. It is just one damned thing after another and then it ends as senselessly, as meaninglessly, as illogically as it began.” “And what about the afterlife?”
“I cannot speak on that, for I have no experience there. But from what I have been told there seems to be no logic in heaven; we are all forgiven for our sins for no good reason at all, a completely undeserved forgiveness. Can you find any logic in that? As for Hell—there may be some logic in Hell. And that’s the thing about logic: we always want it applied exclusively to the other fellow.”
Lillie and Ade walked east along Jackson Street. Every once in a while, Lillie would glance quickly over her shoulder then look forward again just as quickly. The third time she did this, Ade asked, “What?”
138
“I think I’m being followed by a Pinkerton agent,” Lillie said.
“Well,” Ade said, “looking behind won’t help. If you were being shadowed by an ordinary ‘f ly man,’ he’d be easy enough to spot, but if a Pinkerton man is after you, you’ll never know it.” “Let’s just keep walking,” Lillie said. “I don’t want to talk here.”
They kept walking along Jackson Street several blocks until they reached Michigan Avenue. There they crossed the avenue and proceeded along a wide cement walkway that led out to a pier terminating on the shore of Lake Michi- gan; it was one of the new piers that were just being completed for the lake steamers going down to the fair. Under the pier, the trains of the Illinois Cen- tral ran along their tracks belching steam and coal dust. At the end of the pier Lillie and Ade stopped and looked out over the lake. For a moment they watched a cargo ship steaming along out on the distant horizon. Then Ade turned with his back to the lake and leaned on the pier’s railing. “Nobody’s behind us,” Ade said. “I don’t think anyone can know what we’re saying.” Lillie turned around and looked back at the buildings along Michigan Avenue.
“No one could hear us,” Lillie said. “But a man with a spyglass could read our lips from the window of one of those buildings.” “I don’t think a man with a spyglass is in any of those windows,” Ade said with a smile. “If Pinkerton’s men wanted you, you wouldn’t be walking around here. You’d be in their custody.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Lillie said. “What makes you think Pinkerton’s men would want to put me in their custody? They want to find out what I know and what I’m going to do next. They can’t find that out by putting me in their custody. Do you think I am a fool?” “No, Lilly.” Ade said, ”I do not think you are a fool. Far from it.” Lillie kept looking back at the city.
“All right,” Ade said, turning back around. “No one is out on the lake. Are you going to tell me what’s going on or not?” Lillie turned back around to the lake.
“Two weeks ago I had lunch with a former classmate of mine. Her father is an astronomer. She told me that her father and his associates have observed th rough t heir t elescopes a ship f l ying o ver t he Unit ed S t at es.” “You mean they’ve seen Tesla’s airship?”
“Not Tesla’s. This ship was a tenth of a mile in length and floating one hundred miles above the surface of the earth.” Ade turned and looked at Lillie for a long moment, then looked back at the blue horizon before them. Lillie went on, “These astronomers have met with President Cleveland and Nikola Tesla and know about Tesla’s airship. Tesla has built his airship to use
139
it to find the origin of the giant ship. At the moment they all suspect that the giant ship comes from Mars.” “So last night… ”
“Yesterday afternoon I covered the Wagner concert at the Auditorium. Afterwards, I went down to the Daily News to file my review and there was Mark Twain coming out of the building. I knew that he’s friends with both Cleveland and Tesla, and I already knew that Tesla is in the city for the fair. It was a coincidence, and I don’t believe in coincidences.”
“Neither do I.”
“So after seeing Mark Twain, I decided to follow Tesla just to see what would happen. I went down to the grounds of the World’s Fair and found Tesla leaving the Electricity Building. I followed him back to his hotel and then to Grand Central Station. There he met three men with broad brimmed hats pulled down over their faces. One of the men was quite large.” “Cleveland.”
“Cleveland. They went out of a service entrance at the station and got into that landau. I followed them to the Great Northern. Then you showed up.” Ade had listened to Lillie with great attention, weighing her every word. Although Lillie’s reasoning was a little faulty, she impressed Ade. But actually, my presence in Chicago had nothing to do with Cleveland or Tesla. Cleveland had come to Chicago to see the airship, and when Tesla found out I was in town, he decided to bring me along to see it, too. “So what do you intend to do now?” Ade asked.
“I’m going back to that warehouse and get photographs of the airship and anything else that can prove my story.” “I take it back.”
“Take what back?”
“That you’re not a fool. If you go back to that warehouse, you won’t just be a fool, you will be a fool in bigger trouble than you could ever imagine!” “George!”
“Lillie! You have to be crazy to think of going back there!”
“George, I’m going back there, and no one, neither you nor anyone else, is going to stop me!” Ade looked away from Lillie and shook his head. “George, don’t you understand any of this?” “Yes! Do you?”
“Can’t you see what they’re doing—Cleveland and Tesla? They’re deciding for us—for us, George, what reality will be.” “Lillie, the rulers of the world have always decided what reality will be.” “Yes, I know. But here in the United States there has been a glimmer, a mere ray of hope, shining out from beyond the empty, ignorant centuries, that for once—just once—people would be able to see the world as it truly is, not as
140
they are ordered to believe it to be! Do you intend to walk away from that, George? Do you? Because if you intend to do that, if you intend to betray this— this—this precious opportunity to know things as they really are—and to tell people what you know—then you might as well walk away from your own life— your own self—your own soul! You might as well crawl in a hole and die the death of a dog and a slave! Go on, George! Go crawl! Go crawl and run and cower! But get the hell out of my way!” Lillie turned, but Ade grabbed her by the arms. “Let go of me!” Lillie shouted.
“No!” Ade shouted back. “Not until you listen to me! And you are going to listen! Do you think for one second that Yost and Dennis and Lawson are going to print anything you write about Cleveland? Hell, no! They’ll turn you over to Pinkerton’s men and let them throw away the key! Or even worse— they’ll laugh at you to your face and then show you the door where you will then make a permanent exit from the Newspaper business!” “If the Record won’t print my story, I’ll go elsewhere!” “No Newspaper in this country will print your story!”
George tried hard reasoning, ”Do you know what the ‘Freedom of the Press’ means? It means we are free to print exactly what we are told to print, no more and no less! The moment we step off the beam—we plummet—and, honey, it’s sixteen stories down and no net!” “I’ve always f lown without a net ‘honey’!” Lillie shot back, “And I’m not going to start doing otherwise now. I don’t give a damn if every paper in this country slams its door in my face. I’m coming out with this story—and I’m coming out shooting with both barrels—and I’m aiming between the eyes! Let anybody else take their best shot. I do not give a royal damn. If I have to print my own story—if I have to shout from the street corners and the rooftops—I’m going to get the truth out, because the people have a right to know—the people have a right to know because they are not dogs and slaves and cattle. Do you understand now? Do you know who I am? I’m out to get the truth to the people, no matter what. Now let go of me.” “I’ll let go of you! I’ll let go of you if you’ll just answer me one question! One question only!” “What?”
Ade looked deep into Lillie’s eyes, searching there for the answer to the question he was about to ask.
“Are the ‘people’ worth it? I’d really like to know. Because, in all honesty, I’ve never felt the ‘people’ were worth a good goddamn.” Lillie looked deep into Ade’s eyes, searching for the answer to why Ade would ask such a question. Finally she said: “The ‘people’ will never be worth a good goddamn until they start being the ‘people’. And the ‘people’ starts with you and me. You and me, George.
141
We are the ‘people.’ I don’t know about you, George, but I want to be a human being, not a cow. And I want it so much I won’t settle for anything else. What about you, George? Are you willing to settle for anything less?”
George Ade stood looking into Lillie West’s eyes. He let go of her shoul- ders and looked down. Lillie shook her head slowly, looking at Ade all the while, her eyes narrowed in bitterness and contempt. She turned, and began to walk away. “Wait,” Ade said.
Lillie stopped and looked back. Ade was looking at her, his hands hanging helplessly at his sides. “I can’t let you go there… by yourself.” “You can’t stop me.”
“Lillie… I know I can’t stop you. I wouldn’t want to stop you if I could. I just wish I could stop the world from doing to you what it is going to do.” “You can stay here and wish all you want,” Lillie said, and she turned away. “Lillie!” Lillie stopped.
“I’m going with you.” She turned back to Ade. “Why? You just said I was a fool.”
“I know. And you are. And so am I, goddamn it.”
Lillie stood looking at Ade who stood there with his fists clenched at his sides. After a moment, a faint smile came over Lillie’s face. Ade’s hands unclenched, and his mouth opened in wonder. He was seeing himself for the first time in his life. “Well,” Lillie said with a shrug, “come on if you’re coming.”
Ade stepped up to Lillie and held out the crook of his elbow. Lillie grasped it with her hand. The two of them looked at each other a moment and then turned and rushed off toward Michigan Avenue.
Hall and I reached the warehouse where Paige was holed up. The shabby alley that ran along the side of the building was filled with a line of private carriages. The coachmen stood together talking, and they all turned to look at us as we drove up. Our driver stopped the horses near the door of the warehouse. “Wait here,“ I said to our driver, and Hall and I got out of the cab.
I approached the door of the warehouse, and had started up the cement steps, when I heard and felt a sickening crunch beneath the sole of my right shoe. I lifted my foot and looked down. I had stepped on a snail and had crushed its shell into a hundred fragments. “Well, polish it on the shine box and damn it to hell!” I said, scraping the remnants of the snail from the sole of my shoe and on to the edge of the cement step. I looked up at Hall who was suppressing a laugh.
142
I said, “Can’t Paige at least keep the front step clean?”
I opened the door and went in. A group of men stood around the machine looking it over. Paige was saying something. He looked up when Hall and I came in, and said: “Here they are, gentlemen, Mr. Fredrick Hall and Mr. Samuel Clemens — known to the world as Mark Twain.”
Everybody turned to look, and I felt like I was the elephant at the circus, or one half of the Siamese Twins—maybe Hall was the other half. I said, “You fellows go right ahead there and don’t let Hall and me inter- rupt. Paige, go right ahead with what you were saying.” Paige nodded to me, and gave me a tight little hateful smile. He said:
“I was just giving a little informal introduction until you and Mr. Hall saw fit to arrive.” I said, “We were detained by some very insistent reporters. I apologize for being late. Now please proceed.”
“Well,” Paige said, “I was just about to explain the differences between my typesetting machine and the Linotype. The Paige comp
ositor is a true typeset- ting machine, while the Linotype is a typecasting machine. My machine takes dead matter from the compositor’s forme and distributes it for re-setting. The Linotype uses a complex and unwieldy foundry to heat lead to a molten state and then inject the molten lead into brass matrices in order to produce a lead slug line. It is a dangerous and unnecessary process. Furthermore, the Paige typesetter justifies lines of type with mathematical precision, spacing the words and letters with a degree of artistry that can only be found elsewhere with the finest of hand-set type. The Linotype uses a crude mechanism to squeeze its brass matrices into justification. It does not space letters according to math- ematical law as does the Paige typesetter, but rather produces a random spac- ing, sometimes pushing the letters too close together, sometimes spreading them too far apart. The Linotype, in short, is a primitive attempt at automating the typesetting process. Whereas, my machine is a true typesetter—and it is, in fact, more. It is—with no exaggeration of statement—a thinking machine. It counts the number of letters and words in a line of text, and then calculates the exact proper spacing of the letters in that line. The Paige typesetter is nothing less than a revolution in printing and a harbinger of a coming age when ma- chines will store information in their mechanical brains and use that informa- tion to think for themselves.” A tall man stepped forward, and said, “You have made some extraordinary claims, Mr. Paige. All quite general and unproved. Can you give us some specifics?” “I would be happy to do so,” Paige said. “I direct your attention to the machine shaft. Its speed is 220 revolutions per minute. With this speed, the machine can distribute some 7,500 EMS of solid matter per hour. An expert
143
operator can set up and justify over 9,000 EMS per hour and 12,000 EMS on rush matter.” “Impressive,” the tall man said.
Paige said, “Here you see the distributor of the type from the dead matter. It is possible to distribute type into the magazine and set the same type out of the magazine all during the same revolution of the cam-shaft. The distributor is capable of being filled with 200 characters. After the operator sets the type at the keyboard, the automatic justification of the type commences. The machine measures the words, adds the sum of these together, subtracts from the sum the length of the line, divides the number of the words—less one, and automati- cally selects a space—or combination of spaces—for insertion in the line which would justify the line within the limit of 0.005 inch. When the justification process is completed, a mechanism moves the completed line forward, ready for insertion into the live-matter galley.” “Can we see this accomplished?” the tall man asked.