Earth Unaware

by Mack Reynolds

  Earth Unaware

  Mack Reynolds

  His words alone could change the world—his words alone DID change the world. Was it mass hypnosis, a hex, or THE POWER?

  First published as “Of Godlike Power”.

  Earth Unaware

  by Mack Reynolds

  PART ONE

  “…The will is free

  Strong is the soul, and wise, and beautiful

  The seeds of godlike power are in us still

  Gods are we, Bards, Saints, Heroes, if we will.”

  Matthew Arnold

  1

  Jerry, in the control booth, was making stretching motions. Ed Wonder looked up at the studio clock. They were running long.

  He said to the guest, “To go back a bit. You used a couple of terms there that most of us haven’t been checked out on, I’m sure.” He looked down at the pad upon which he scribbled notes as the program continued. “Palin… palin… something or other.”

  “Palingenesis,” Reinhold Miller said with only the slightest trace of condescension.

  “That’s right. And metempsychosis. Did I get that one?”

  “That is correct. Metempsychosis. The passage of the soul from one body to another. From the Latin, which in turn was from the Greek. In all modesty I would still suppose that I am the world’s outstanding authority on palingenesis and metempsychosis.”

  Ed Wonder said, “You defined metempsychosis for us; just what is palingenesis?”

  “It means rebirth, regeneration, the doctrine of transmigration of souls.”

  “Well, how does that differ from metempsychosis?”

  “I am afraid that time limitations prevent my going into the matter in the detail that would be necessary completely to clarify the subject.”

  “That’s too bad. Well, here’s another item I wanted to ask about. You say you’ve been reincarnated three times. You were first born as Alexander, the Macedonian who conquered the Persian empire. You described how you died of fever after the big binge in Babylon, and then your, ah, soul was transmigrated into the newly born body of Hannibal, the Carthaginian who later nearly, but not quite, defeated Rome. After Hannibal committed suicide by taking poison, you woke up again in the body of Marshal Ney, Napoleon’s right hand man.”

  “That is all correct.”

  “What I wondered about is where your, ah, soul was in-between. If my andent history isn’t all kooked up, Alexander was something like four hundred years or so B.C. Hannibal led his elephants over the Alps perhaps a hundred and fifty years later. Don’t hold me to those dates, folks, I was the top champ at cutting classes when it came to ancient history. Now, let’s see, Marshal Ney must have been born in the 18th Century if he fought with Napoleon. That’s a pretty long hop from your first reincarnation to your second.”

  Reinhold Miller said stiffly, “There is no time in death.”

  “How was that again?”

  “One feels no sense of lapse between lives. When I was executed in my incarnation as Michel Ney, there seemed a sudden flash of light and pain, and then I was conscious immediately of being newly born into the world as a crying child.”

  Ed Wonder thoughtfully touched the tip of his nose with his forefinger, then consciously took it away. He was going to have to kill that mannerism if he ever got the program onto television, it looked kooky.

  He said, “Well, there was one other thing, Mr. Miller. Don’t you think it’s somewhat of a coincidence that in all three of your earlier, ah, incarnations, you were one of the greatest military geniuses the world has ever seen?”

  “Perhaps mine is a soul of destiny.”

  “What did you tell us your present occupation is, Mr. Miller?”

  “I am an accountant.”

  Ed Wonder looked down at his pad. “Oh yes. Here we are. Assistant accountant at the Brisby Department Store, in Brisby, Pennsylvania. I thought practically all accounting was automated in these days of the Welfare State. Brisby must be a bit behind. But aren’t you somewhat surprised that your latest incarnation wasn’t Douglas MacArthur, or Eisenhower, or possibly Viscount Montgomery? You know, just to keep it consistent.”

  “It is not mine to question. The eternal spirit moves in mysterious ways.”

  “Well, look. What I meant was that two or three times before we’ve had reincarnations on the program. And what’s always surprised me about people who, ah, claim to be born again, is that it’s never the gardener who worked the swing shift in Tamerlane’s melon patch, but always Tamerlane himself. It’s never a chimney sweep in Moscow, in the year 1175, but Catherine the Great. How come you folks who get reincarnated were always big shots in the former life?”

  Miller reacted to that, as he did with everything, with calm dignity and an appealing sincerity which, Ed decided, the twitch element listening in were probably swallowing like crazy.

  “I might refer you to the case of Bridey Murphy.”

  “Touché,” Ed said jovially. “You got me there. Folks, you’ll remember way back in 1956 or so when the country was all interested in a lady out Colorado way who used to go into hypnotic trances and recall a former life in which she was a simple Irish colleen in the late 18th Century.”

  His phone clicked and he took it up.

  Dolly said, “Professor Dee is on, Little Ed. He wants to ask the guest some questions.”

  Ed Wonder hung up and made a signal to Jerry in the engineer’s booth.

  He said, “Folks, I’ve just had a call from Professor Varley Dee. You old hands remember the professor—teaches anthropology over at the university. We’ve had him on as a panelist half a dozen times over. The professor is one of the great sceptics of all time. Folks, he just don’t buy nothin’. Professor Dee wants to ask our honored guest of the evening, Mr. Reinhold Miller, a few questions, and if Mr. Miller doesn’t mind, we’ll just switch on the old beeper phone which is a method by which you listeners can hear both ends of the conversation. All right, Mr. Miller?”

  “I am perfectly willing to answer any questions whatsoever.”

  “Fine. Well, Professor?”

  Varley Dee’s cranky voice crisped in. “You say you were once Alexander the Great. If that is so, you must clearly remember the battle of Issus, the most famous of Alexander’s victories.”

  “I remember it as though it happened yesterday.”

  “I’m sure you do,” Dee said sarcastically: “Now then, during the battle where was Ptolemy?”

  “Who?”

  “Ptolemy, Ptolemy. Later the founder of the Macedonian dynasty in Egypt and the ancestor of Cleopatra.”

  “Oh.” Reinhold Miller cleared his throat. “Your pronunciation is faulty. He…”

  “I studied Ancient Greek for eight years,” Professor Dee snapped.

  “…fought on the left flank.”

  “He did not!” Dee said. “He was one of the companions and fought side by side with Alexander, Black Clitus and the rest of…”

  “Nonsense,” Miller said, snap in his voice. “You picked that up in some silly history book. I know where he fought. Who could know better? I was there.”

  Jerry was making circular motions to Ed Wonder from the control booth. Wind it up.

  Ed began to cut in, but Dee continued over the beeper phone, “All right, I’ll admit I wasn’t there. However, some of those historians you scorn—including Ptolemy himself, who wrote an account—were there. But’s here’s another question. Still sticking to Ptolemy. What was his surname?”

  Miller’s face worked.

  “Come, come,” the professor urged. “He was one of Alexander’s closest friends.”

  Ed reluctantly came to the rescue. He said, “Gentlemen, we’re going to have to call time. Sorry, perhaps we can get together on another occasion. Thank
you…”

  “His surname was Soter” Professor Dee crowed. “As Alex…” but at that point Jerry killed the beeper phone contact.

  “…Thank you, Professor Dee. And especially thank you, Mr. Reinhold Miller, who joined us tonight to explain his reincarnation three times over. This is station WAN, the Voice of the Hudson Valley, coming to you from Kingsburg, New York. You have been listening to Edward Wonder’s Far Out Hour.” He cued the engineer by saying, “Let the music go round and round, Jerry.”

  The red light flickered off, indicating the studio was no longer hot. Ed Wonder leaned back in his chair and shifted his shoulders in an elaborate stretch. He tensed up, on mike, particularly on these long programs in which he had to carry most of the dialogue.

  Reinhold Miller said, “You mentioned back there the possibility of my appearing again on the program. I’d be glad…”

  “I’ll bet you would.” Ed Wonder yawned deliberately.

  The other looked at him. “I beg your pardon?”

  Ed Wonder’s small briefcase was on the padded table before him. They padded studio tables so that nonpro guests couldn’t make unwanted noises to go out over the air by drumming fingernails or pencil points. He brought forth some papers and a checkbook. “Let’s see,” he said. “Your take was to be fifty bucks and expenses, right?”

  “That was the agreement. Look here…”

  Ed Wonder had brought forth his pen. “No, you look here, Miller. We get a lot of kooky people on this program. Folks who tell about seeing little green men coming out of flying saucers, folks who claim they’re clairvoyants, mediums, fortunetellers, necromancers, witches. We even had a guy thought he was a werewolf once.” He was writing rapidly, even as he spoke. “But you know something? Most of them are sincere. For all I know, some of them might even be right. We’ve got open minds on this program.”

  “I… I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Wonder.”

  “I think you do. I thought when I offered to pay your expenses and fifty dollars for your time, you were a man—mistaken or not—who really believed he had lived in earlier incarnations.” Ed Wonder grunted deprecation. “Anybody can read up a bit on historical characters like Alexander, Hannibal and Ney.”

  The other’s lips were pale and thin. “You can’t talk to me that way. I came here in good faith.”

  “And to pick up a quick fifty bucks. The proof of the pudding, Miller. You weren’t able to answer Professor Dee’s questions. As a historian he had read more on Alexander and his men than you had.”

  “See here, Mr. Wonder, I admit I’ve read a great deal about the men whose bodies I formerly occupied. I admit also that some details of my earlier incarnations I have forgotten. That could happen to anyone. Surely there are details in your own life that you have forgotten. That doesn’t…”

  The radio man was yawning, even as he waved the check in the air to dry it. “Here’s your travel expenses. And now I’ll write you a separate check for your loot.”

  Reinhold Miller flushed angrily. “I’ll take the expense money, because I need it. But if you think I’m a fake, Mr. Miller, you can keep the fifty.”

  “That’s up to you. Please sign this receipt for total compensation.”

  Rheinhold Miller grabbed the pen, signed, took up the small check, turned sharply on his heel and left through the sound padded door to the hall. Ed Wonder looked after him calculatingly for a moment, then stuffed his things back into the briefcase.

  Jerry was motioning to him from the control room, and he arose and sauntered in, lighting a cigarette.

  Ed Wonder said, “Jerry, where in the devil do you get your clothes, from the Salvation Army? You make the program look crumby. And what do you smoke in that prehistoric pipe, soft coal?”

  The engineer grunted around the stem of the pipe in question, then said, “This isn’t TV. Even if it were, I wouldn’t be on camera. Did you do him out of his money, Little Ed?”

  “What?”

  “Alexander the Great, in there.”

  “He was a fake.”

  “You know, he might be missing a few marbles but he believed in it. He thought he was telling the truth.”

  “That’s not the way I received it. This program’s on a limited budget, Jerry.”

  “Yeah. And if there’s anything left over at the end of the month, it goes into your pocket. You get a flat sum for the package.”

  “What’s it to you?”

  “Not a thing. I love to watch you operate. They can automate nine people out of ten out of work, but the eternal chisler we will always have with us.”

  Ed Wonder flushed. “I suggest you keep your nose out of my business if you want to stay out of trouble.”

  Jerry took his pipe from his mouth and grunted humor.

  “Trouble! From you, Little Ed? What kind of trouble could you cause anybody?” He examined the knuckles of his right hand, reflectively.”—that a smash in that cute little mustache wouldn’t cure.”

  The other took a quick half step back. He gathered himself and said nastily, “Is all this what you called me in here for?”

  “Fatso came in while you were on mike. He wants to see you.”

  “Mulligan? What’s he doing here this time of night?”

  Ed Wonder turned and left before waiting for an answer. There was a small hall immediately outside the soundproofed door which opened into the control room. There were two other similar doors, one of which opened into Studio Three which Ed Wonder had utilized for his late hour program and the other into the corridor beyond.

  Ed walked down the corridor to the offices, coming up to Dolly’s desk before going on to his own to leave his briefcase. He pretended to flinch.

  “Holy smokes, what’ve you done to your hair?”

  She touched it. “Oh, do you like it, Little Ed? It’s the latest—latest from Italy. The Fantasy-mode.”

  He shook his head, eyes closed in sorrow. “Do you think women’s hair will ever come back?” He dropped the bantering tone.

  He went over to his own desk, put the briefcase in a drawer and locked it. He started toward Matthew Mulligan’s office, adjusting his bow tie. He paused before the door a moment, then knocked two careful raps.

  The station head was seated behind his desk, listening to the Rock’n’Swing music which followed Ed Wonder’s show and looking as though it wasn’t helping his digestion.

  “You wanted to see me, Mr. Mulligan?”

  The older man looked him directly in the eye and blatted, “My country, may she always be right…” And then left it there.

  Ed Wonder blinked. The other was evidently waiting for him to finish the quotation. His mind hurried it up. He said, “Ah… but my country, right or left.”

  “…but my country, right or wrong.” Mulligan said accusingly, “I can see you’re not a member of the society.”

  It came to Ed Wonder. The Stephen Decatur Society, an organization that considered the Birchers too far left. He had heard that Matthew Mulligan was a member.

  “Well, no sir,” Ed said earnestly. “I was thinking of looking further into it, possibly joining up, but I’ve been awfully busy with the program. Have you thought any further of putting it on television, Mr. Mulligan?”

  “No, I haven’t,” Mulligan growled. “Sit down. You make me nervous jittering around. I didn’t call you in to talk about your program, Little Ed, but while we’re on it I don’t mind admitting it’s not quite what I pictured when you sold me the idea. Sure, sure, you get some character who says he flew to the moon in a flying saucer, but how come you’ve never got anybody to show us a chunk of it he brought back, or something? And these fortunetellers. What we need on your program is somebody who predicts Number One, over in Moscow, will get knocked off next Tuesday, and, bingo, it happens. Something like that’d have a dozen sponsors bidding for your show.”

  Ed Wonder wished he dared close his eyes in pain. Instead, he said hurriedly, “What was it you did call me in for, Mr. Mulligan?”

  �
��Oh? Yeah, well, what’re you doing tomorrow night, Little Ed?”

  “I’ve got a date. Tomorrow’s one of my free days, Mr. Mulligan.”

  “Well, maybe you can take her along. See here, have you ever heard of some twitch named Ezekiel Joshua Tubber?”

  “I don’t think so. A name like that I’d remember. I don’t think it’s possible to break this date.”

  The studio chief ignored him. “He’s some kind of religious nut, or something. But the thing is, the society’s got a couple of letters and a phone call complaining about him, understand? Claim he’s subversive.”

  “I thought you said he was a religious twitch.”

  “Yeah, but subversive too. A lot of these reds hide out in the guise of religion. Like that archbishop over in England, whatever his name was. And some of these Jewish rabbis that’re always signing petitions against segregation. Anyway, at the last meeting of the chapter it was decided to investigate this Tubber. So I was given the assignment.”

  Ed Wonder could see it coming. “This date…” he began hopefully.

  “I don’t know anything about religious nuts, but you, with this program are all up on crackpots. So tomorrow night you can attend his meeting. Here’s the address, an empty lot over on Houston street. You can give a report at the next meeting of the chapter.”

  “Look, Mr. Mulligan, I wouldn’t know a subversive if I found one under the bed.” He played his trump. “This date is with Helen.”

  “Helen?”

  “Helen Fontaine. Jensen Fontaine’s daughter.”

  “Helen Fontaine! What would a classy, high stepping girl like Miss Fontaine see in…” He cut the question short with a burp, and pursed his heavy lips. “See here,” he said finally, “did you ever talk to Mr. Fontaine about your program, now that it’s been on a while?”

  “He’s crazy for it,” Ed said quickly. “He was telling me so just the other night. We were sitting around having a couple of drinks together while I was waiting for Helen to finish dressing.”