Otterburn, moving tentatively, said, “Wouldn’t be practical unless I were going to jump off a high building or something. Now let’s try the stat at various settings with all my clothes on.”
Two hours later de Castro asked, “You say you do not feel any effect, any mental effect that is?”
“Not a bit. I never felt better.”
“It might be that you are afflicted with euphoria,” said de Castro, “like that induced by alcohol or anoxemia.”
Otterburn shook his head vigorously. “Nonsense, Doc. I’ve drunk liquor and I’ve been anoxic in the altitude chamber and I know what euphoria feels like. I feel perfectly normal. Want me to do some simple addition to show you?”
De Castro looked at his watch. “That is a good idea for another series of tests, but I fear we cannot start them tonight.”
“Jeepers, nearly quitting time!” said Otterburn. “Say, why don’t you guys let me wear this thing overnight, just to make sure it has no mental effects?”
“Oh, couldn’t do that,” said Dubrowsky quickly. “Secret equipment.”
“And you could not return it until Monday,” said de Castro.
“So what? It’s under my clothes where it doesn’t show/’ Otterburn stood up in a marked manner and buttoned his coat.
“I’ve made up my mind. It’ll take Ed half an hour to get this thing off me and I’ve got a date this evening—that is, I hope to have a date—and don’t want to be late. It’ll be perfectly safe, because as you said yourself nothing can happen to me. Even bullets would bounce off, and the faster they come the harder they bounce.”
He grinned. “Anyway I don’t see how you guys can stop me. All I have to do is turn the control to high and to heck with you!”
He walked out, leaving the men staring at one another in wonderment and alarm, uncertain what to do about his highhanded action.
On his way back to his own department, Otterburn paused to take out his wallet and check the currency in it. His routine had always been to go home, calculate his expenses for the next two weeks and take the rest of his pay down to the bank during their Friday evening open hour and deposit it. He had never, at least consciously, thought of blowing all his pay in one tremendous binge. Well, why shouldn’t he? He was only young once.
He strode into the space occupied by his own section. The engineers were standing around the hatrack, gassing and watching the clock. Otterburn tapped Lucy Kneipf firmly on the shoulder. “This way,” he said with a jerk of his head. “Doing anything tonight, gorgeous?”
“Why—uh—let me think. No, I—”
“Okay, then how about dinner and a show with me?”
“Well, I—I’d like to, but Don said he might come around.”
“Oh, bolt Don McQueen! Why should you let him keep you dangling? Come on, what do you say?” He managed to put such an unexpected man-of-distinction air into the invitation that the girl stammered: “Wh-Why, all right.”
“Good. Pick you up at eighteen-hundred.” Why had he ever been afraid to ask her out? And why had he ever cringed before McQueen? When he threw put his chest and straightened his back he was fully as large as the redhead.
The bell rang, and he passed McQueen on the way out. The latter looked at him with an expression compounded of puzzlement and suspicion.
Otterburn swung his arm to give McQueen a hearty clap on the back and roared, “Good night, you old weasel! Have a crummy week-end!”
The only hitch was that his slap on the back failed to make contact. His hand bounced back without ever touching McQueen’s sports jacket, though McQueen staggered a little from the transmitted force of the blow.
-
Otterburn showed up at Lucy Kneipf’s house at six-fifteen. When she came downstairs she paused at the sight of his dinner-jacket, from which floated a faint odor of naphthalene.
“It won’t do,” he said sternly. “Go back up and put on a dinner-dress.”
“But—I’m sorry. Why didn’t you tell me? After all—” Resentment made itself heard in her voice.
However, he cut her off with, “That’s all right. One if these days I shall probably ask you to marry me and you will probably accept. So you might—”
“What?”
“Sure. You don’t think I’d let a pretty girl like you spend the rest of your life running a slide-rule, do you? So you might as well get in practice now.”
She stood with her mouth open as if one of the experimental rabbits in the Psychoelectric Laboratory had roared at her with the voice of a lion. Then she quietly went upstairs and reappeared ten minutes later in a longer dress.
He ushered her out and into a taxi with a lordly air as if he did this sort of thing all the time. “We’re eating at the Troc,” he said. “It’s probably a clip-joint but just let ‘em try to clip me and see what happens. It’s only a block from the show.”
“What show is it?”
“Crinolina. Oh, it just occurred to me—I hope you haven’t seen it?”
“N-no.”
“You like musicals, I trust. I phoned Bergen’s and got two on the aisle, fifth row. If we don’t like it we can walk out in the middle. Hey, driver, a little more speed, please! Say, have you heard about Dillworth in the Metallurgical Lab and his wife? Darndest thing—”
He rattled on about office gossip, his own opinions on everything and his plans for his—that is to say their—future. Finally she got a word in edgewise.
“You know, Tom, you’ve talked more in the last fifteen minutes than in all the six months I’ve known you?”
“Is that so? I talk rather well, don’t you think? Now—oh, here we are. Just a min while I fling a purse of gold to our charioteer.”
In the restaurant he told the headwaiter, “Two please. Your very best table, and not too near the music.”
When the music started he said, after a slight hesitation, “Dance?”
“But there’s nobody else on the floor. Let’s wait—”
“All the better. We’re less likely to bump people. What do we care if they look at us?”
“Oh, but please, Tom. Wait till there are at least a few—” Otterburn’s eyes took on a dangerous glitter. “If you won’t dance with me, Lucy,” he said, “I shall get out there and do a solo!” He rose. “Are you corning?”
She hastily followed him to the floor. After a couple of turns she said, “Why, you’re not as bad as I—I mean, you’re good!”
He smiled tolerantly. He had thought, himself, that his coordination seemed exceptionally good this evening. “For a man who hasn’t danced in nearly a year I get along. I find I can do practically anything I want to if I put my mind to it. The only trouble is that I know only a couple of simple steps.
“You’ll have to teach me some of those fancy Latin American numbers. You know, like this!” He stamped his feet and wagged his fundament to indicate his idea of a South American dance, ignoring the fact that he was still the only man on the dance floor.
However, more were now coming in from all sides. Presently the floor became crowded, and Otterburn said, “Our cocktails have arrived, I see. To heck with dancing. Let’s drink!”
She said, “Tom, what on earth has come over you? It’s as if some other personality had suddenly taken over your body.”
“What? Why? Nothing’s come over me. I’m perfectly normal and never felt better in my life. If you don’t believe me I can recite my past history for the last fifteen years to show you I remember it. Ahh, good cocktail. Waiter, the menu. Hey, waiter!” His voice rose to a near-shout to emphasize his point.
When dinner was slow in coming, Otterburn made unpleasant comparisons between the Troc and the government cafeteria where they ate lunch. Then he shouted and banged on his glass until he got attention. The headwaiter and all the other waiters were by now beginning to bend black looks upon him as if he had chosen their place to start a public temperance lecture.
When the noise of the music and the general chatter made it hard for him to make
himself heard he simply sat back and raised his voice to a bellow.
“Look at those four fat slobs at the table in back of you, Lucy! The ones with the red faces and the loud voices. Must be a bunch of salesmen figuring how to trim their customers. Anybody who makes that much racket ought to be hove out. For a nickel I’d heave a roll at ‘em.”
“Please don’t,” wailed Miss Kneipf. “Control yourself, Tom! They’re not doing any harm and they’re not making a bit more noise than you are!”
“Heck,” growled Otterburn, “I’ve controlled myself too much.” He attacked the remains of his steak. “Hey, waiter! Dessert, please!”
-
CHAPTER III
When the check finally arrived Otterburn looked at it closely, then called, “Waiter, come here! What’s this charge? I thought you had a big sign out front, ‘No Cover Charge.’ How about it?”
The waiter looked. “Oh, sir, that’s the minimum liquor charge.”
“What’s that? I haven’t seen anything about it on your menu.”
The waiter turned the menu over and pointed to a line of three-point type, barely visible. By holding the menu up to the light and straining his eyes, Otterburn made out the words Minimum liquor charge, $5.00 per person.
Otterburn said, “Lucy, run along and meet me in front of the ticket-agency. Know where Bergen’s is? Same block as the theater but on the corner of Fifteenth.”
“But why, Tom?”
“Because I’m going to make a disturbance. I told you I wouldn’t let these gyp-artists clip me. So if you don’t want to get caught in a riot be on your way. No argument now!”
Then, turning back to the waiter, he roared, “You mean you expect me to read that line of flyspecks? To heck with’ you! I’ll pay for the one cocktail apiece the young lady and I had and for our dinners and that’s all.”
“Shall I getta the manager, sir?”
“Yes, bring on your manager! Here’s what I owe you, and not another cent do you get. Get out of my way!”
Finding his path blocked by a couple of very large waiters, and hearing the headwaiter cry, “Get that guy!” Otterburn seized the corner of the tablecloth that covered the table at which sat the four noisy fat red-faced men. They were noisy no longer, however, since like all the other customers they were watching Thomas Otterburn.
He pulled the tablecloth, which came off the table with a frightful crash of plates and glasses, and threw it over the heads of the burly waiters.
Waiters rushed at him from all points of the compass. Although Otterburn kicked a couple of tables over to block their path, a couple did get close enough to throw punches and kicks, which however merely bounced off his force-screen.
“Gyp me, eh?” he yelled. “I’ll show you crooks. Come on, why don’t you hit me?” He pushed a large waiter, who had been vainly trying to punch his face, so that the man fell backwards, carrying a couple more tables with him.
As Otterburn dodged about the throng of waiters trying to get at him and customers trying to get away, the air became filled with plates, glasses and a chair or two flying at him. All bounced off.
As he heard a waiter yell: “E un’ diavolo!” he plunged through the door of the men’s washroom. Seeing the window open, he climbed out, dropped to the ground and walked the length of the alley to the street.
A waiter was leading a policeman into the Troc. Otterburn shrank back into the shadow until they had passed out of sight. Then he took stock of himself.
The Troc still had his hat but perhaps he had better not try to reclaim it just yet. It wasn’t much of a hat anyhow. He must buy one of those snappy black-felt numbers, like the hats priests wore, to wear with his tux.
Said tux had several spots made by water, liquor and food that had not come at him so fast as to be deflected off by the field, and his knees were dusty from the climb through the window. He dusted his knees and worked on the spots for some seconds with his handkerchief.
Then, considering himself presentable enough for practical purposes, he stepped out of his alley and melted into the throng just as the policeman stuck his head out the window of the men’s washroom to see what had become of il diavolo.
Since Otterburn’s watch told him that he had plenty of time yet he strolled slowly toward Bergen’s, ogling the crowds as they passed. He had always been puzzled by stories of men accosted or picked up by girls on the street, since nothing of the sort had ever happened to him.
The reason, he now realized, was simply that he had never made a practice of ogling but instead had always walked with a quick and businesslike step, his eyes glued dutifully to the pavement in front of him.
Now he was surprised to observe how many of the girls were walking slowly and unaccompanied and how they returned his stare with an expression that seemed on the verge of breaking into a welcoming smile if he would only encourage them. He must look into this matter some time when he didn’t have Lucy on his hands. Speaking of whom—
Lucy was not in front of Bergen’s. Otterburn picked up his tickets and waited outside the speculator’s for five minutes, becoming more and more impatient. She must have stood him up, though he couldn’t imagine why. It wasn’t as if he’d done anything offensive or out of the ordinary. Oh well, there were just as good fish in the sea and he couldn’t fool around all evening.
He started down the street towards the theater, scanning the crowd for another pickup. There didn’t seem to be so many now that he was actually looking for them. However, two doors short of the theater he spotted a girl standing still in the doorway—a tall bleached-blonde, good-looking despite a beaky nose, heavy makeup and a distinctly used look.
“Good evening, miss,” he said politely, showing his tickets. “I beg your pardon but my girl just stood me up. Would you like to go to the show next door with me?”
“Why—” she hesitated, giving him a calculating eye. “Sure, I don’t mind. My boy-friend has let me down too. My name’s M’rie; what’s yours?”
By the time they reached their seats Otterburn was telling the girl whatever came into his head. He rattled on, “Got a date after the show? No? Fine. We’ll come up to my place. Heck of a dump but it’s home to me.
“I can’t ask you to see my etchings because I only own one and that’s not very good but I’ll show it to you if you insist. We might stop at the liquor store on the way and get a bottle of anti-freeze. Make a real night of it.”
“Why Mister Otterburg,” she said coyly, “I only just know you.”
“It occurs to me,” he said as they sat down, “that I don’t even know whether this show’s any good. I haven’t been reading the reviews. Say, that gives me an idea! I won’t be gypped twice in one evening—three times, if you count my girl’s running out on me. You wait here a minute. I’ll be right back.”
Five minutes later, as the music started he returned with a large paper bag. He gave M’rie a peek inside. It was full of tomatoes. “Now,” he said, “the show had better be good.”
Alas, Crinolina was not good—at least not according to Thomas Otterburn’s hypercritical taste. During the first act he commented on the low quality of the performance so audibly that people shushed him. It began to dawn upon him that if it had been a better show he probably couldn’t have obtained such good seats on short notice.
During the second act a heroine in crinoline and a hero in the garb of a pre-Civil-War South’n gentleman engaged in an endless love-duet that went round and round without getting anywhere. When the hero finally kissed the heroine’s dainty hand, and then placed a tall beaver hat on his yellow curls, Otterburn stood up.
He cried, “It stinks!” and let fly with a tomato.
The first missile splashed against the backdrop. The second carried away the hero’s top-hat and the third disappeared into the folds of the heroine’s vast skirts.
The aria died as if beheaded. Shouts resounded through the house. Feeling a hand snatch at him from behind, Otterburn turned quickly to face a man in the audien
ce who had risen to grapple with him, and let him have a tomato in the face.
M’rie cowered away from him as if he were an inhuman monster. He stepped out into the aisle and threw his two remaining tomatoes at the ushers pounding down it towards him, then ran.
His flight took him to the orchestra in three long steps. He had some vague idea of leaping to the stage and escaping out the wings. Now, however, he saw a small door at one side of the orchestra-pit, below the level of the footlights. Into this he bolted and slammed it shut behind him.
Inside the door steps led down and to the left. He found himself in a big room below the stage, a room full of ropes and pieces of scenery. There was machinery for moving the stage itself and things whose names he did not even know.
My Best Science Fiction Story Page 17