Walter kicked at the ashes of my book, scattering them. “I think that’s about that,” he said. “Come on, Leo. Let’s go see what Charlotte’s got in mind for dinner.” She was cooking roast chicken and crispy potatoes, my favorite. It was her way of making up for what had just happened. Walter, too, was apologetic. “How about if we walk over to Calder’s and sample their wares,” he said, when our quiet meal was finished. “Leo, would you object to a peppermint or two?” “Walter, we must have chocolate,” Charlotte said. “All right,” Walter said, “chocolates all around. How’s that strike you, Leo?” “Sure,” I said. I got a sack of chocolate nonpareils and ate them methodically on the way home, but I was not appeased. I had, however, discovered in myself a talent for writing forbidden books. And here I am. Here I am.
3.
Through Pickman’s Vault, I had begun corresponding with a group of fans who called themselves the Futurian Literary Science Society. This was Donald Wollheim, Fred Pohl, John Michel, Doc Lowndes,* and a few others, all of whom would go on to be very well known. Back then, Wollheim was the only one who had published anything in a professional magazine, but in the world of fandom, they were titans. For a Parry Sound kid to be exchanging letters with them was very exciting, even if my new friends in the States asked odd questions: Was it true that some people in Canada had only one leg, and faces in their stomachs? Did they really play hokey with the vertebrae of dinosaurs, and use strips of elk meat for currency? I answered with great candor, and my responses delighted the Futurians so much that they urged me to visit New York for the First World Science Fiction Convention. So, of course, of course, I went. With silent apologies to my adoptive parents, I stole twenty dollars from the cash register of Spinks Hardware and hitchhiked to Toronto, where I got on a bus. It was the summer of 1939, and I had just turned seventeen.
Pohl was the one who had invited me, so I went to his apartment, on Dean Street, in Brooklyn. I arrived at about ten in the morning. Through the door, I heard the most unbelievable noises: it sounded like somebody was being machine-gunned, while somebody else shouted at a moving train. I knocked and knocked, and finally, a chubby, mustached person with buck teeth opened the door. He was wearing a violet satin dressing gown and one blue slipper. “Mr. Pohl?” I asked. “I’m Lowndes,” he said. “Who the fuck are you?” I had sent a telegram from Toronto, saying that I was on my way, but it hadn’t arrived yet. I introduced myself. “Holy shit,” Lowndes said. “It’s the Canadian!” From somewhere farther back in the apartment the reply came: “Ask if he can use a sewing machine!” “You might as well come in,” Lowndes said. “You couldn’t possibly make things worse than they are presently.”
The apartment was hot and dark, like a tomb dug into the base of a volcano. In the living room, two young men in shirtsleeves wrestled with a bolt of silver fabric, most of which had unrolled on the floor. There was, in fact, a sewing machine in the room, but what they were doing seemed to have no relation to it. A can of silver paint was balanced on the radiator, with the handle of a brush sticking out of it. “The Canadian,” Lowndes said, as if it were my title. “This is Fred, and this is Johnny.” In the gloom it was hard to tell which was which. “What are you doing?” I asked. “Isn’t it obvious?” one of them said. “We’re making space suits.” “Wouldn’t it be easier if you turned on a light?” “It would,” the same one snapped, “except the electricity’s been turned off.” “Not the h-h-heat, though,” the other one said. “Welcome to N-n-new York.” The person who would turn out to be Pohl banged on the floor with the handles of a pair of scissors. “God dammit! I told you we should have done this last week.” “I told you Doris should have d-done it,” said the one who would turn out to be John Michel. “Fuck you,” said Pohl.
I watched them with horror and amusement. “Maybe if you lay it flat on the floor, and double a length of it over,” I suggested. They did this. “Now,” I said, “if you have a pencil? We can trace one of your bodies, and then cut out the shape.” “Too dark to see a pencil outline. Doc, lie on the floor. We’ll cut around you directly.” This, too, was done. Lowndes cried out only once: “My ear!” But feeding the doubled shape into the sewing machine was impossible. “What if we scratch the suits and just wear the helmets,” Michel suggested. “We could be visitors from a planet with more or less terrestrial conditions, but a slightly different atmosphere.” “Without the suits,” Pohl said, “we’ll just look like people with fucking bowls on our heads.” And, in fact, next to the pot of paint there was a stack of four deep wooden bowls. “We could paint our clothes silver,” Lowndes offered. “And be what, spacemen who wear ties?” countered Pohl. “No. It’s hopeless. We’re going to give up the whole fucking thing.” “Excuse me,” I said, “but what’s this for?” Even in the darkness, I could tell that the Futurians did not think I had asked an intelligent question. “For the convention,” Lowndes said. It began the following afternoon.
Pohl took the cutout fabric to the window and sewed up the legs of Lowndes’s suit by hand, but we had all overlooked the fact that Lowndes was three-dimensional. He hopped around with one leg in the space suit, one out. “What are you people doing?” asked Wollheim, who had just come in. He had been in Pohl’s bedroom, typing up a leaflet with the Futurians’ demands, to be handed out at the convention. “We need a steamroller to flatten Lowndes,” Pohl said. “We need s-s-someone who knows how to s-sew,” said Michel. “Forget the costumes,” Wollheim said. “No one cares if we dress up or not. What we’ve got to do is crush the viper, Moskowitz.” “Moskowitz?” I said. Michel, Lowndes, and Pohl all told Wollheim at once that the Canadian had arrived. “Now?” Wollheim said. “Well, put him to work.” He handed a mimeograph stencil to Michel. “I figure we need two hundred copies.” Over by the window, Pohl dropped a cigarette into the paint can. “Is paint flammable?” he asked no one in particular.
I began to form new ideas about the Futurians: they were more frightening than I had expected. “Is he talking about Sam Moskowitz?”* I asked. Lowndes took it on himself to explain. The convention had been organized by a fascist dictatorship which consisted of Moskowitz, Jimmy Taurasi, and Willy Sykora,* whom they referred to as “Dirty Willie.” All three of them hated democracy and freedom of expression and basic human dignity. They were trying to turn fandom into an extension of the militaristic scientific establishment which was leading the world to the brink of another catastrophic war. “A plot which we must resist, with our lives, if necessary,” Lowndes said, striking his chest, which made a hollow sound. “We’ll definitely resist with your life, Doc,” Pohl said. The cigarette seemed to have gone out. “We’re fighting for the future of civilization,” Michel said. “It’s as simple as that.” But a moment later he was dissatisfied with his own answer, and asked, “Have you read Marx’s Kapital?” Here I made a terrible mistake: “I might have seen it in Amazing Stories,” I said. The Futurians laughed until they began to choke and cough. “Jesus, you are a spaceman,” Pohl said. “I was joking,” I said. I wished that I had stayed in Parry Sound, but then it occurred to me that if the Futurians were really intelligent, they wouldn’t be working in the dark. “Does this building have a roof?” I asked. “No, it rises infinitely into space,” said Pohl. “Let’s take the suits up there,” I said, “and see what we can do.”
The space suits were hopeless, but we carried the mimeograph machine to the roof and spent the rest of the day running off leaflets. From the rooftop, I had a view of countless buildings, more than I had ever seen in one place before. There was the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower, and, behind it, the Empire State Building with its zeppelin mast, and Manhattan rising to the north and south of it like a vast windowed wall; far in the west was New York Harbor, a silver squib from which the Statue of Liberty poked up like a nail. Cars honked on Flatbush Avenue. Someone was playing Caruso on a record player. And there I was, with four of the best-known fans in fandom, printing up antifascist propaganda to save civilization! “You guys,
this is fun!” I said. But the Futurians were sullen and busy. In the light of day, they looked like young gargoyles: Pohl had a high forehead and an overbite; Lowndes, who had changed into black trousers and what looked like a red pajama top, had buck teeth and bandy legs. Michel’s cheeks were pocked with old acne scars, and fresh pimples dotted his chin. His right arm was in a sling. The wind blew some pages to the edge of the roof, and Pohl shouted for someone to get them, so I got them. I ran down to Pohl’s apartment for a stapler, and on my way back up, I passed a perplexed-looking old woman in a sea-green housedress. “Roof repairs,” I said. I went up and down, carrying finished leaflets and new stencils, until it was dark outside, and completely lightless in the apartment. Wollheim and Michel went home, and Lowndes, Pohl, and I ate beans cold from the can. Then Lowndes went to sleep on the sofa, and I lay on the hard, dirty floor, thinking about how lucky I was.
The convention did not mark the start of a new era. What happened was, we arrived early at the Midtown hall which the fascists had rented from the Baha’i: it was decorated with green sunbursts and murals depicting the succession of the prophets and the unity of all mankind. “Lo, the future is upon us!” Michel exclaimed. And so it was. Moskowitz and Taurasi waited outside the upstairs auditorium, and they wouldn’t let us in without consulting Willy Sykora, who hadn’t arrived yet. We went downstairs; we went upstairs again. Someone called the police, but Moskowitz told them everything was all right. They said they would come back in an hour. We loitered peaceably downstairs, distributing leaflets entitled “People of Earth! Beware of the Dictatorship!” to puzzled fans. I had been in New York for only a day, but already I felt like an insider. “Don’t let the fascists make the rules!” I implored teenagers in high-waisted pants and propeller beanies. “Scientific socialism is the future!” A photographer from Time magazine took my picture. Isaac Asimov arrived and asked me, “Who are you?” “Who are you?” I asked him back. Of course, he wasn’t Isaac Asimov, not the Isaac Asimov, yet. Two girls arrived. One was from California, and the other was Pohl’s girlfriend, Doris. She was surprisingly beautiful—very surprisingly, considering how Pohl looked. She had auburn hair and high-arched eyebrows and a cruel mouth, like the Dragon Lady in Terry and the Pirates. I offered her a leaflet. “Where’s Fred?” she asked. “Upstairs,” I said. “Sam Moskowitz won’t let us in.” “And a big strong kid like you is afraid of Moskowitz?” Doris said. “Phoo.”
Well. Michel and I hid our pamphlets under a radiator and followed her upstairs. Wollheim and Pohl were standing outside the auditorium, along with some Futurians whom I hadn’t met. “He wants us to promise that we won’t disrupt the convention,” Pohl said. “How can we promise that?” Wollheim asked. “What if we go in and one of us has a seizure?” Moskowitz, a large youth with slicked-back black hair, who did, actually, look like a fascist, grimaced. “Just promise that you won’t mess things up on purpose,” he said. “That’s undemocratic,” Pohl said. “If we promise, then everyone who goes in should have to promise. You can’t hold us to a different standard.” “Well, I promise,” Doris said, and for some reason she looked not at Pohl but at me. “Are you coming?” I would have liked to follow her, but I didn’t want to disappoint the others. Moskowitz was scowling. “I guess . . .” he said, but just then Sykora came up the stairs. It was immediately clear why his nickname was “Dirty Willy.” Everything about him was gray, except his fingernails, which were edged with black. He stood there like a sad, short human pyramid and shook his head. “You know what I found in the lobby?” he asked. “Communist propaganda!” “I wonder who could have left it there,” Wollheim said. “You know what you guys are?” Moskowitz said. “You’re a bunch of liars.” “We are n-n-not,” Michel said. “You’re the l-l-liar, S-s-s . . .” He stopped, breathless. “He can’t even say it,” Moskowitz said, laughing. Michel stepped toward him, and Moskowitz took a step back, surprised, and almost lazily pushed Michel, who fell to his knees. That wasn’t fair, I thought. Michel was half Moskowitz’s size. I approached Moskowitz, intending to reason with him, and also to shield Michel from further harm, but Sykora, misunderstanding, shouted, “Help! Police!” and the police, who were just then on their way up the stairs, seized my arms and escorted me down to the street. Wollheim and Pohl ran after me, shouting, “He didn’t do anything! Don’t touch him! We’ll sue!”
We spent the afternoon in a cafeteria near the Baha’i hall, handing out leaflets to hungry fans. Asimov came and put an entire hard-boiled egg into his mouth. “You fellas missed a lot,” he said. “Charlie Hornig* gave a great speech about the future of science fiction! He says it’s all going to be nuclear physics, and we have to educate everyone to do math.” “Shut up, Isaac,” Pohl said. “The hard sciences are going to take over the so-called soft sciences,” Asimov went on, undeterred—it was impossible to deter him. “Even the brain is just chemistry!” Cyril Kornbluth* came in, a short, dour kid with curly black hair, who reminded me of the cigar-chomping infants you see sometimes in cartoons. He and Pohl had just been to the World’s Fair, and they got into an argument about whether the automated highways in the Futurama exhibit would make traffic better or worse. I entered into a daydream in which I hip-checked Moskowitz, shoved the heel of my hand in Taurasi’s face, and slid into the auditorium. What did I find inside? Goodness. Doris. In reality she did not appear. When it got dark, we walked down Lexington Avenue, whooping and kicking trash cans. “Did you see Sam Moskowitz’s face when the Canadian muscled in?” Lowndes asked. “Sheer terror.” “Where’d you learn that move, Canadian?” Wollheim asked. “Hockey,” I said. “But I didn’t do anything really.” “Didn’t you?” Wollheim said. “Spinks, you’re all right.” He took my arm and we skipped together down the street. Wollheim sang,
From nineteen thirty-nine to eight hundred thousand, seven hundred and one,
The Futurians’ work is never done,
First we’ll annoy, then we’ll destroy,
Every last Eloi,
From Brooklyn to Washington!
The others joined in. Then, changing key, they continued,
Arise, ye prisoners of Earth!
Arise, ye hungry hacks!
For Science thunders in your guts,
It’s time to take a crap!
Away with all your inhibitions,
And god-damn Gernsback’s eyes—
Piss on all scientifictions!
Futurians, arise, arise!
to a tune that sounded vaguely familiar. “What song is that?” I asked. Wollheim let go of my arm. “Spinks,” he said gaily, “we must educate you.” He went into a Western Union office and tried to send a telegram that said FUCK YOU to Moskowitz, but the clerk rejected it, so he sent one that read THE BANISHED SEND THEIR REGARDS TO THE TYRANNOUS TRIO. Then Wollheim went back to his parents’ apartment on the Upper West Side, and the rest of us took the subway to Pohl’s.
Pohl’s mother was asleep, so we went up to the roof. We lay with our backs to the low parapet and talked about whether humanity would ever travel to other stars. “We’ve got to,” Pohl said fervently. “It’s the only way we’re going to escape extinction.” Kornbluth was skeptical: “How many people are you planning to squeeze onto that spaceship, Fred? And how many generations is it going to take before they’ve all got webbed fingers and Habsburg lips?” “What you could do . . .” Pohl began, but then Michel said, “Hold on, who’s that?” He pointed across the courtyard at a lit window where two girls were preparing for bed. One of them took off her dress, and—“My God,” Michel said, “that c-can’t be r-real.” “I think it’s underwear,” Lowndes said. He had worked in a Civilian Conservation Corps camp in Connecticut, and claimed great knowledge of sexual matters. “We’ll see,” Asimov said. He produced a small device from the inside pocket of his blazer. It looked like a cross between a telescope and a kazoo. “It’s called a Wonderscope,” he explained. “It uses X-ray filters to see hidden objects.” We took turns l
ooking through it, but could see only colorless blobs which, Pohl said, were probably on our own eyeballs. The girls had put on dressing gowns and were daubing their faces with cold cream. One was tall and fair, the other short and dark. Neither was anything like as beautiful as Doris. “Courtesans, doubtless,” said Lowndes. We lay on the parapet, watching, until their window went dark, then we rolled onto our backs and looked up at the few faint stars. “Say,” I told Michel, “I’d like to read that book you were talking about, Kapital?”
4.
To the Futurians’ surprise, and to my own, I did not go back to Parry Sound. Instead, I moved into Pohl’s apartment, with the understanding that I would contribute five dollars a week toward the rent. I slept on Pohl’s sofa and spent a lot of time with Pohl’s mother, a small, sharp woman, who worked as a substitute teacher, and seemed frightened by her brilliant but erratic son. Pohl had just quit his job as a messenger for an insurance company, and he spent his days looking for work and his nights writing poems and teaching himself to play the guitar. I looked for work, too, but more often than not my search took me over Brooklyn Bridge, as people said in those days, to the used-book shops on Fourth Avenue, where I spent hours leafing through volumes of Lord Dunsany, Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, and M. P. Shiel.* One day, while I was ogling a locked bookcase of weird rarities in Dauber & Pine, on Fifth Avenue, a youngish, baldish clerk in a black jacket and high-collar white shirt came up and asked if I was looking for something in particular. “Do you have any Lovecraft?” I asked. He laughed. “Not much,” he said, and pointed out a back issue of Weird Tales, which I already owned. “Are you a fan?” he asked. I informed him that I was the editor of Pickman’s Vault, which, I said, was one of the best-known magazines for Lovecraft collectors in all of North America. “Is that so,” the clerk said, amused. He told me his name was Samuel Loveman, and he had been Lovecraft’s friend. “You knew him?” I squeaked. “What was he like?” “Howard was a gentleman,” Loveman said. Howard! I could hardly speak. Loveman asked what I was doing in New York, and I told him about the convention. “I know Donald!” he said. “He came to a party at Belknap’s apartment, once.” I knew who Belknap was, but I’d never thought of him as having an apartment. As if by magic, names were turning into people. The only name I hadn’t heard before was Loveman’s. “Do you write stories?” I asked. He shook his head. “I am a poet,” he said. He made it sound very grand.
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