My Best Science Fiction Story

by Leo Margulies

  Pete began to sweat.

  “Gimme time, Ben. Say, four weeks, huh? I oughtta locate it by then.” He smothered a smile when the caliph acquiesced. If he failed, inside of four weeks he would be safely back in the twentieth century.

  Ali Ben Mahmoud tossed a ruined drumstick aside, replete.

  “Lest you misunderstand, Major Bo, I have imposed a new tax. Fifty tomans a day for all who promote entertaining in theaters.”

  Pete shrugged. That was chicken-feed. But the caliph continued:

  “Shrug not, O Bo. This tax increaseth each day by fifty tomans, thus to insure thy most earnest efforts in the search for the flying carpet.” He smiled benignly. “Tax defaulters, of course—” He again made the cute little throat-cutting gesture.

  Pete gulped; they evidently played for keeps in Bagdad.

  “Okay, Ali, if that’s the way you want it. I’ll do my best.” Wherewith he bowed himself out of The Presence, muttering angrily.

  Back at his office, Pete realized things would have to hum. In ten days that mounting tax would be more than his profits could handle.

  At once he began to organize road-shows. The beauty of the scheme was that, besides increasing revenue, it would send his agents to all parts of the kingdom and multiply his chances of catching the eye and ear of the cagey magic carpet inventor. These Major Bo’s Units were whipped together and sent out by caravan at the rate of one a day.

  By the end of a fortnight, Pete’s touring tyros were laying them in the aisles all over the country. But his agents, though they returned with tales of success and bags of gold, brought not a word of the traveling tapestry.

  STALLING for more time, Pete cast about for more sources of revenue. He found that his boogie-woogie was sweeping the country, being played and sung from public house to harem. Promptly he organized the Fraternal Order of Loyal Song Composers and Publishers, consisting of himself and Sabu.

  With the help of the caliph, whose coffers were beginning to creak with the mounting tax collections on Bo’s vaudeville, a law was hurriedly passed which forbade anyone so much as to hum a FOOLSCAP tune without first buying a license to do so. A dictatorship has its points, Pete mused.

  Sabu was horrified with this alliance with Evil, despite the increased income. Pete tried to pass it off nonchalantly with the famous ward-heeler political aphorism, “If you can’t lick ‘em, then join ‘em.”

  But Bo had his worries, and they increased geometrically. Ali Ben Mahmoud wanted the secret of the flying carpet. He was also jealous of the ability of the upstart tycoon, Major Bo, and determined to smash him. He could have Bo executed, of course, but Bo was now a very popular man in the kingdom; repercussions might repercuss. Besides, there was more in it for the caliph by taxing the financial genius to ruin.

  Ali Ben watched Pete’s frantic squirmings with dispassionate detachment, to see just how much the man could really earn before the rising tax rate caught up with him.

  There was no real escape; Pete knew that. It was a race against time. He had to pyramid his enterprises and expand them so as to hold out till Dr. Mayhem rescued him. FOOLSCAP enabled him to meet the racket payments for several more days, but a week yet remained.

  His wits had never worked more smoothly. Already he had introduced the use of cosmetics and exotic hairdos on his chorus girls. The situation was ripe for public exploitation. Desperately he rounded up some artists, instructed them hurriedly in the delicate art of make-up, and opened the Chez Bo — Coiffures, Cosmetiques; “Be Beautified By Bo.”

  As all big-time beauty parlors, the Chez Bo was a colossal success. Bagdad babes were pretty awful beneath their veils, and there was plenty of room for lipstick, rouge, face creams, and what-not. Unfortunately, though the returns still kept the caliph’s tax collectors at bay, there was no news of the restless rug.

  As doom approached with each hour, Pete surveyed his financial empire with horror. The ramifications of Bo’s entertainment enterprises and their subsidiaries were almost endless. When the crash came, it would make the debacle of Ivar Kreuger, the Match King, look like a pitiful imitation by comparison.

  Inevitably, of course. The Day arrived. The tax mounted too high to be met; Pete sent the leering collector home empty-handed. Within an hour the street resounded with the tramp of hooves as the Camel Police rode up to arrest him.

  “Sabu,” said Pete sadly, “this is the end. We ain’t found that magic carpet so the joint is pinched. You better scram while the scrammin’ is good, kid. Take your liquid assets and lam till the heat’s off.”

  Sabu got the general drift of the genie’s strange tongue. Bo, alas, was about to return to the magic bottle, never to appear again, perhaps. But Sabu was loyal. Bo had promised him great wealth, and had kept that promise; therefore Sabu would not desert him.

  Pete started to argue the lad into fleeing at once. For once he had outsmarted himself, having calculated things too fine. Before he had finished talking, and just as the cops pushed in, the world began to slip out of focus, slantwise, in the familiar distortion that carried the Time Traveler back home again …

  Zung-g-g!

  PETE heaved to his feet, one hand indelicately over his mouth. He made gobbling noises. Professor Aker trotted into the deserted lab.

  “Ah, there, Manx!” he said anxiously. “Nausea? We didn’t expect you for an hour or so yet. Was the journey successful?”

  Pete flung himself onto a couch, quickly readjusting himself to his own world. He listened impatiently to Aker’s questions.

  “Quiet!” he interrupted finally. “There ain’t no magic carpet, an’ that’s that. Now keep still and lemme think.”

  Minutes passed, and Aker began to fidget in alarm. A speechless and pensive Pete was a strange phenomenon, indeed.

  “Anything wrong, Manx?” He ventured.

  “Plenty.” Pete grunted. “There’s a nice kid back there in Bagdad who’s in a terrific jam ‘cause o’ me. An’ the guy whose body I took over—boy! Is he in trouble! Look, Prof, answer me this one question.”

  He posed his problem, received a puzzled but very accurate reply.

  “Okay, Prof. I gotta go back there in a coupla days. Make it four. Can you work the Time Chair without Mayhem?”

  “Of course, my dear fellow.” He nodded and stared keenly at Manx. realizing there were hidden depths in the tough little man’s character. For him to return deliberately into whatever hornet’s nest he had inevitably stirred up, just to help a boy who was now dust centuries old—that took courage.

  “You realize that whereas we can send you back to about the same time, we couldn’t possibly say as to whose mind you will enter.”

  “That’s okay,” Pete agreed. “It couldn’t be any worse’n it was when I left.” He grimly strode to the Time Chair once more, watched Professor Aker adjust the delicately sensitive selectors. “Let ‘er rip!”

  Zung-g-g!

  Again the blinding sunlight beat down upon Pete Manx, but this time the clamor of Bagdad was gone. Instead was a whispering silence, and Pete stared around wonderingly at a desert.

  He was dressed in fine silks again, but with burnoose instead of turban. He sat astride a magnificent black horse, a veritable Whirlaway. Behind him, obviously awaiting his command, was a hard-bitten crew of some three dozen well-armed fighting men.

  It was evident he was now a nomad, leader of a band of desert raiders. Ahead lay the glory that was Bagdad, wavering in the heat waves. His course was plain. He speared a brown, muscular arm toward the distant city.

  “Thar’s where we’re a-headin’. Dig in them spurs, cowboys!”

  The bandits yelled fierce approval.

  “Our sheikh Hassan speaks mighty words! Onward!” The riders thundered across the desert.

  When they came to a dusty halt beneath the walls of Bagdad, the guard of the city gates stared suspiciously as Pete rode up.

  “What dost thou wish?” he wanted to know.

  “Open up!” Pete cried imperiously.
<
br />   “Open! Huh! Says who?”

  “Open, sez me !” retorted Pete. “Special envoy to Ali Ben Mahmoud!”

  The bluff worked. The guard looked around uncertainly, then opened the gates to allow Pete and his men to pass through. Little did Pete realize that the effect of his strange command was to be told and retold through the bazaars and, distorted by time, become a legendary password—Open Sesame.

  THE same manner did not open the gates of the caliph’s residence, but an added sentence did the trick. “Tell Ali I’m the inventor of the magic carpet,” he announced.

  A messenger vanished into the mansion, returned pop eyed.

  “The stranger is permitted to enter forthwith,” he said. “Alone.”

  Pete grinned insolently and ordered his whole gang to follow. They did, right into the presence of Ali Ben Mahmoud. As usual, the caliph was eating, popping grapes into his mouth and spitting out the seeds like a machine-gunner. Poker-faced he stared at the wild-looking delegation.

  “Thou’rt the maker of the flying carpet?”

  Pete nodded.

  “That’s me. And I’ll make one for you right in your courtyard, provided you’ll agree to one condition.”

  Ali turned his attention to some pears.

  “So?”

  “You probably got a guy named Major Bo and a kid named Sabu in the jug. They ain’t done nothin’ wrong. Free ‘em and the carpet’s yours.”

  Ali downed a goblet of wine.

  “I could make thee divulge thy secret,” he observed, “without concessions on my part.”

  Pete bared his teeth confidently, looked around at his men. He gloried in a sense of power. The situation was delicately balanced. He did not have sufficient strength, of course, to seize the caliph and whip his army; out-and-out warfare, while Ali Ben was still in the picture, could end only in disaster for Pete. However, he could make a lot of trouble, and he figured that rather than risk his fat hide, the caliph would gladly make the small concession asked.

  The release of Bo and Sabu was important before Pete could set his plan in motion; else he might be whisked back to his own time before rescuing the lad.

  “Maybe,” he allowed, “but Ali Ben Mahmoud, on whom be peace, is all-wise. You realize you can have the secret without trouble. Why waste time and blood?” He glanced around at Ali’s personal guards.

  Ali pecked at some sweetmeats, cogitating. Then he clapped his hands. “Bring Bo and the lad with the bottle,” he ordered.

  All hands stood around in an armed truce, waiting alertly till two battered figures were brought in. Major Bo was a wreck of a man whose mind was on the verge of collapse. Sabu had been explaining to him all that he had done during the past weeks, none of which he understood. The boy was in better shape, though plainly despairing.

  Pete grinned at him.

  “Hey, kid, been rubbing that bottle again?”

  Sabu stared at Hassan, still clutching the brass bottle.

  “Why, O Sheikh?”

  “Because the genie’s back again. Only it’s in me this time, see?” Hope flared in Sabu’s eyes.

  “Ai! Thou’lt save me and Major Bo?”

  “Yep. You two are free, only stick around with me a while. And promise never to rub that bottle again. It’s made a mess o’ trouble.”

  “Enough of this strange talk,” the caliph interrupted. “I understand it not. Besides, where is the magic carpet, as promised?”

  “I’ll get busy on it right away, Ali. Just get me a flock o’ weavers and a coppersmith.”

  WORKING day and night without benefit of union contract, the weavers made a tremendous silken tapestry that covered nearly the entire courtyard, shaped like a five-pointed star.

  They also made a gigantic harness and a wicker basket. As the use of varnish dates back to great antiquity, Pete easily made some. He melted sandarac in warm oil and applied the stuff warm. By afternoon of the second day the coat of varnish was dry. Across the center of the whole thing Pete splashed the cabalistic symbol: P-38.

  The caliph, no longer blandly unemotional, inspected the mystic figures with ill-concealed superstition.

  “This is the magic carpet?” he demanded.

  “Yeah, man. Fastest thing that flies. An’ you’re gonna be the first to ride on it!”

  Ali Ben nearly strangled on a forgotten mouthful of fruit. But, putting on a bold front, he sat cross-legged on the carpet and commanded it to fly. Pete hurriedly explained it wasn’t quite ready yet.

  Meantime Pete had instructed his coppersmith to make two slender bits of copper tubing, each fifteen inches long, and another shorter cylinder six inches long and three in diameter. This was supported by twin tripods, and filled with iron filings.

  “Now if you’ll gimme that brass bottle, kid,” he said to Sabu, “I’ll make with another genie pretty soon.”

  “Bismallah! A brother genie, lord?” Sabu quivered in fearful delight.

  “You said it.” Pete filled the bottle partially with water, then joined bottle and cylinder with one copper tube, while the other tube led away from the cylinder.

  That evening he climbed a tower, with the caliph watching narrowly, and scanned the countryside. The sky was clear, the horizon sharp in the sunset. Pete shook his head and came down.

  “The—er—signs and portents ain’t just right. Tomorrow, maybe.” Next morning he went through the same ritual with the same result. The caliph began to get restive. Fortunately, on the evening of the third day, Pete found the horizon obscured by low-lying dust. Sandstorm.

  Pete returned grinning.

  “Tomorrow ayem’s the big moment, Ali. Get lots o’ sleep tonight.” Then he added to his workmen, “You know your instructions; get busy. I’ll fire up the boiler department.”

  The weavers in puzzlement drew up the corners of the five-pointed silken blanket, and sewed the edges together, leaving a small hole. Into this Pete fastened a hollow reed with a crude flap valve inside. The seams were hastily varnished.

  “May leak a bit,” he said, just as though there was a single soul in Bagdad with the faintest idea of what he was talking about, “but not much.”

  Turning to his bottle-and-cylinder contraption, he built small, hot fires beneath each. Presently the water began to boil, and the steam passed from the bottle over the iron filings.

  “Y’see,” Pete elaborated to Sabu, “with steam, iron brought to a red heat interacts vigorously, according to Prof. Aker. The oxygen in the steam combines with the iron and makes iron oxide. What’s left is hydrogen.” With which he plugged the end tube into the reed leading into the now sack-like magic carpet.

  ALL through the night Sabu refilled the brass bottle as fast as it was emptied; more and more hydrogen hissed into the balloon. At first sign of its uneasy stirrings, weavers and coppersmith fled screaming. Only Pete’s warriors had the courage to stay and watch the big gas-bag finally rise and hang, tugging mightily, against the night sky. Pete had foresightedly thrown harness and attached basket over the balloon before it rose. The whole thing was tethered to Ali’s fountain.

  By dawn the windstorm hit hard, but behind Bagdad’s sheltering walls little of it was felt. Ali Ben Mahmoud gave it not a thought as he gaped at the monster which had been born in his garden overnight.

  Pete bowed with a flourish.

  “The magic carpet, O Lord, awaiting its brave passenger, the courageous Ali Ben Mahmoud.”

  The balloon wavering above the caliph’s walls had attracted quite a crowd, and Pete had discreetly spread word of how the grave caliph was to ride the rug that morning. A half-hearted yell arose as Ali was spied through the gates. Thus, with Pete having neatly put the pressure on him, the caliph was obliged to go through with it.

  Ali stepped into the basket

  “Just command it to rise,” Pete said, “and up she’ll go. Command it to descend, an’ see what happens. If you wish to descend faster, throw out the rocks I put in there.”

  “Arise, o magic carpet,” Ali quav
ered to the bulbous giant.

  Pete’s scimitar severed the tether. The bag rose and was promptly caught by the wind raging above Bagdad’s walls. It shuddered, swooped, and soared away. Ali Ben Mahmoud was last heard screaming at the carpet to descend, frantically bombarding the city’s roofs as he tossed out the ballast.

  In three minutes Ali had passed from view, and the populace was already festively expressing its heartfelt joy.

  “Well, that’s that,” said Pete. “I hereby proclaim Sabu the new popular caliph of Bagdad. Me an’ my—er—retainers will be your advisers in a gentlemanly sort o’ way. Always be a good ruler, kid. The people already like you an’ Major Bo. So just keep taxes low, encourage trade, put down crime, be merciful. Now my time’s about up. This is the genie signing off, kid. So long—”

  Sabu’s face was a mixture of bewilderment, pride, and sorrow at the departure of the mightiest of all genies, indeed.

  Zung-g-g!

  The lab at P. U. whirled once and came to a gentle stop. Pete sighed with relief and stepped from the Time Chair to greet Professor Aker, Dr. Mayhem, and Colonel Crowell. Crowell scowled.

  “Professor Aker tells me you have failed in your solemn mission.”

  “Oh, I dunno. It’s a fact there wasn’t no magic carpet, till I invented it.” Pete passed over this hastily. “But it wouldn’t interest the Army. However, I did figure out a way to get rid of Hitler. It worked swell in ancient Bagdad. I pulled a coup d’etat.”

  “Coup d’etat!” The colonel raised his eyes to heaven. Ice clung to his words. “Gentlemen, I am sorry to have wasted your time and mine in this fruitless endeavor. Even if the whole thing has not been a gigantic hoax, it is obvious that the scope of your invention has been greatly exaggerated!”

  “I done my best to help,” said Pete plaintively.

  COLONEL CROWELL jerked his cap in irritation. “The War Department,” he announced, “is not going to like my report on this episode. Good-day!” The door slammed behind him.