“Like an old hound dog,” Ruth concluded. “You have your nerve showing your face here, Chuck Bradford, after the swindle you pulled on us.”
“I have my nerve?” Chuck shouted. Then he sat down with his head in his hands. “I don’t even have any nerves left. They’ve all popped from overuse. Sam, you’ve perpetrated the worst horror since Nero burned Rome. Why couldn’t you just have been a pyromaniac or a sex fiend?”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Ruth asked.
“Don’t act innocent. You were in on it, too.”
“On what?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Chuck said. “You got me into this mess, now you get me out.”
Sam was looking even milder than usual. “Some hitch in the hair restorer?”
“You bet your sweet life there’s some hitch!”
“I was afraid something like that might happen,” Sam said.
“What is all this?” Ruth asked. “Nobody ever tells me anything. Your hair looks all right, Chuck.”
“Oh, yes,” Chuck moaned. “My hair is all right. I’ve pulled it out by the handfuls, believe me, and it all grows back. All the people we tried Sam’s bottle on grew hair. All the hair anybody would want. And it stayed. There’s just one trouble.”
“Get to the point!”’ Ruth said. “What’s the just one trouble.”
“We didn’t waste any time,” Chuck went on, ignoring her. “We got it into production in a matter of hours. Not days, I tell you, hours. Packaging, advertising, everything went out zip-bam-boom! It sold. Boy, it sold. Supermarkets, drug stores, hot-dog stands, everywhere. Then, guess what?”
“What!” Ruth screamed.
“The hair all sprouted out for one week and then it fell off. Not just the new hair, mind you, but the old hair, too. I tell you, if something isn’t done, you’re not going to be able to tell Times Square from a billiard table. And guess who gets the blame for all this? Me. Me!” Chuck sprang up and began pacing the floor and chewing on the edge of his handkerchief.
Ruth laughed until the tears ran down her face. “How marvelous!” she said, when she could talk. “How marvelous!”
“Sam,” Chuck said, going up and clutching his erstwhile friend by the lapels. “Sam, you’ve got to help me now. You’ve got to. What did you put in your formula that isn’t in the recipe?”
“Nothing,” Sam said, gently extricating his lapels. “Absolutely nothing else. Only what I told you. Mare’s milk, moly and white wine.”
“Then why did your mixture grow hair that stays and ours doesn’t?”
“It ain’t what you do,” Sam replied, “it’s the way that you do it. You probably processed it wrong.”
“We followed the directionsexactly, Sam. Exactly.”
“That’s the trouble. You got the wrong directions.”
“You mean you deliberately gave the wrong directions?”
“Nothing of the sort,” Sam said indignantly. “When I do something I do it right. My daddy used to say, ‘Son, if a thing’s worth doing at all, it’s worth doing right.’ “
“You’re just torturing me,” Chuck said. “Why don’t you put bamboo splinters under my fingernails? Let me know right now if you’re not going to explain yourself, and I’ll go ahead and jump out of the window.”
“I sent in a correct manuscript to the Kenya International Epigraphical Review. There was a misprint in the proof sheet. That was not my fault. Nor was it my fault that you assumed the recipe was correct and used it for your own purposes.”
“My God!” Chuck said. “I came to you as a last resort. I didn’t really think you’d know what was wrong. Our chemists are working on it night and day. They’ll probably come up with a solution in the next year or two, but we can’t wait that long. I can’t wait that long. I’ll be lynched. Sam, what is that misprint?”
Sam picked up his microfilm viewer and began looking through it and taking notes on 5x8 cards. “I’m not going to tell you.”
“You know it? One word? And you’re not going to tell me!”
“Why should I?”
“Oh, now we can talk business,” Chuck said, snatching the viewer away from him. “How much? Five thousand? Ten? Oh, the hell with it. My nerves are shot. We’ll go to a million. O. K. What’s the misprint?”
Sam retrieved his microfilm viewer and became absorbed in it again. “My daddy always said,” he remarked absently to Chuck, “ ‘Son, money isn’t important.’“
“But Sam!” Ruth cried, snatching the microfilm again. “A million dollars!”
“How much do you want, Sam?” Chuck asked, pale as a prepackaged mushroom.
“My daddy always said—”
“Never mind,” Chuck interrupted. “All right, you freak, money isn’t important to you. We’ll get you something else. What is important to you?”
“Well,” Sam murmured thoughtfully. The room was silent for the space of half a cigarette. “Epigraphy is important to me.”
“We’ll get you all the epigraphy you want,” Chuck said, panting heavily. “Tons of it. Miles of it. However it comes.”
“It doesn’t work that way,” Sam said. “There’s only so much of it, and it’s all free.”
“Oh, my God,” Chuck cried. “Sam, isn’t there anything else in the world you want. Anything you’ll trade that misprint for?”
Sam thought and thought. “Yes. There is something else I want. But it isn’t the sort of thing you could do for me.”
“Full Head can do it. Full Head would sell human souls to correct the recipe for that hair restorer. What is the thing you want?”
“Oh, it would sound silly to you.”
“No, it wouldn’t.” Chuck grabbed Sam by the lapels again. “I swear, Sam. Nothing on God’s earth would sound silly to me. You can do anything. Anything. You want to chop the head off the Statue of Liberty? Put a goat on top of the Washington Monument? Tear a page out of the Gutenberg Bible? Shuffle the catalog cards in the Library of Congress? Come on, what is it?”
“You won’t laugh at me?” Sam asked anxiously.
“I’ll never laugh again as long as I live,” Chuck sobbed.
“Well, I’d like to convince my wife that money isn’t important.”
“Sam!” Ruth cried. “Get them to draw up a contract. I’ll admit it right now. And let me handle the business end of this.”
“Now, Ruth,” Sam said. “You obviously don’t mean it. You’ll sell the word for a million dollars, or however much you can get. That shows you think money is important.”
Chuck was chewing on the shredded edge of his handkerchief again. “I don’t know,” he sighed. “Maybe we can do something there. A psychologist, maybe. Or pamphlets on heart disease. Ruth, would you read the pamphlets?”
“You’re a wise one,” she answered. “Hell, no, I wouldn’t read the pamphlets. I’ve got a much better idea. Why don’t you convince Sam that money is important?”
“We’ll work on that angle, too,” Chuck said. “And the misprint. We ought to be able to work that out.”
“What were the directions to the recipe?” Ruth asked.
“The words,” Chuck answered, “are engraved on my heart in acid. ‘Pick a handful of moly in the early morning. Boil well in fresh mare’s milk. Pour in a healthy amount of pale wine. Drink.’ That’s all.”
“Well, let’s see,” Ruth said concentrating. “If I find the misprint, will you buy it from me?”
“Yes, yes,” Chuck said feverishly. “We’ll be working on that, too. Although I don’t know what we could do to that recipe that we haven’t tried. We’ve boiled it, baked it, broiled it, burned it, sun-dried it. We’ve tried it raw, slightly cooked, cooked solid. We’ve tried every possible amount of each ingredient.”
“The amounts and methods of preparation don’t matter that much,” Sam said maddeningly. “I wouldn’t go to all that trouble.”
Ruth and Chuck were muttering to themselves.
“Pick a canful?”
“Soil well in fr
esh mare’s milk?”
“Pick a handful in the barley morning?”
“Pour in a healthy amount ofstale wine?”
“Blink?”
“Pink?”
“Think?”
“Oh, hell,” Chuck said, “none of that makes sense. We’ll have experts working on this.”
“Don’t go sending any experts to work on me,” Ruth said. “Why don’t you just give us some money and when Sam sees what I can do with it, maybe he’ll change his mind.”
“We’ll see,” Chuck said. “I’m going to throw this one to a battery of idea men.” He dove out the door and went careening down the steps.
* * * *
Sam spent the rest of the evening with his microfilm viewer while Ruth sat around muttering to herself. “Store in a healthy amount of pale wine? Maybe it needs to age. Male wine? Sam, did they have a different wine for men and women?”
“What?”
“I said . . . Oh, never mind.Coil well in fresh mare’s milk? Maybe you just need to twist out a little of the juice. Like bruising mint gently for a julep. Oh, I won’t sleep until all this is cleared up.”
Her words were truer than she thought.
The next evening Sam was visited by an apparition from a calendar. She was the sort of woman about whom wives say, “Dear, that isn’t even artistic. No woman is actually built like that.” But this one was.
The girl ran a slim, white hand through her luxuriant blond hair and smiled. “Mind if I take off my wrap?”
“Of course I mind,” Ruth answered, eyeing the backless and almost frontless black velvet gown beneath. “But go ahead. I suppose Full Head sent you to show what money can buy.”
“By no means,” the girl said. She immediately pulled up a chair beside Sam and ignored Ruth completely. “Sam,” she said, “my name is Debbie. Full Head did send me. But not for the reason your wife thinks.” She gave Ruth a nasty look.
Sam looked at her and frowned. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll catch cold, Debbie?”
“Oh, no.” Debbie sprang a soft, contralto laugh that shimmied around the living room and made Ruth fear for her unborn child. “I’m so young, Sam. And warm. But how darling of you to be concerned.”
“Well, why did you come?” Ruth asked in a menacing tone.
“To learn,” the girl breathed. She breathed it on Sam’s neck. “Full Head has naturally developed an interest in epigraphy. Now, our people can’t hope to break the Scythian alphabet in a few days when it took Sam fifteen years. But we’re thinking of setting up a special department of research in epigraphy, in honor of Sam. And I’m here,” she went on, gazing up at Sam with eyes that would have been bovine had they not been blue, “to sit at the feet of the master.”
“Oh. I’m not that good,” Sam said modestly. “But if you’re really interested in epigraphy, I’d be glad to teach you a few basic rules.”
“Interested?” the girl cried. “I’mfascinated. I begged to be sent on this assignment. I think epigraphy is the most fascinating subject in the world.”
“Like hell you do,” Ruth said viciously, “You can stop right now.”
“You’ll have to excuse my wife,” Sam said apologetically. “Epigraphy always makes her nervous. I don’t know what it is that annoys her so about it.”
“I know,” Debbie said sympathetically. “It so often happens with men of powerful intellect. Your wife simply doesn’t understand you.”
Sam looked pensively at his wife. “Ruth, is that it? You don’t understand me?”
“Oh, you idiot,” Ruth said. “That female’s here to worm the misprint out of you. She’s no more interested in epigraphy than Chuck was. Look at her. Never mind,” Ruth said on second thought. “Don’t look at her. Just tell her to go home.”
“Did you really come to worm that word out of me?” Sam asked.
“Definitely not. Cross my heart,” Debbie answered, crossing a well-developed area. “You can send me right home if I say one word about that misprint.”
“Fair enough,” Sam said with a pleased look at his wife. “All right, now. Let’s get started.”
“Let’s!” Debbie moved in closer to him.
“Epigraphy, as you probably know, is from the Greek ‘epi’ and ‘graphe’ meaning—”
“Oh, Sam” Ruth cried. “I can’t stand this.”
“Well, you go on to bed, dear. I know you’re not interested.”
“Yes,” Debbie said with a sweet smile. “You go to bed. We can carry on.”
“I’ll bet you can,” Ruth said, and slammed the door behind her.
The next morning was Sunday. Ruth arose late and red-eyed. She fixed one cup of coffee, one egg and one piece of toast. When Sam came into the kitchen sniffing the air hungrily, Ruth turned on the radio with a vicious twist and continued eating to a deafening account of the morning news.
Sam got himself a bowl of what he usually referred to as flaked cardboard, turned down the radio and ate unhappily.
Suddenly Ruth forgot how mad she was and put her hand on Sam’s. “Listen!” she cried. The familiar nasal voice of the newscaster was excited.
“What’s behind the lanolin curtain? What happens to the hair that Full Head grows? Why is there an armed guard around the Full Head Building? Don’t call your senator yet. We expect to have a full report on the seven o’clock news tonight. . . . Flash! There has just been an attempted lynch of a Manhattan barber by three bald-headed men in gray flannel suits.”
“Well,” Ruth said vindictively, “I guess that ought to teach Chuck Bradford crime does not pay.”
The doorbell rang.
“I think we’d have more privacy around here,” Sam said gently but reprovingly, “if you didn’t keep speaking of the devil.”
Chuck slunk in the door with paranoidal glances over his left shoulder. “They’re after me,” he said, sinking onto the shabby sofa.
“Good for them!” Ruth commented. “I’ll buy the rope.”
“Kick a handful of moly?” Chuck asked Sam, not very hopefully.
“If you like,” Sam answered, “but it won’t help your formula.”
At this point of impasse in the history of hirsute western civilization, Fate again took a hand. A rather hairy but very capable hand, extending from a black flannel sleeve, pushed the doorbell still warm from Chuck Bradford’s caress.
“The President of the United States,” said the respectable but anonymous-looking man attached to the capable hand, “would like to see you.”
“I had a previous engagement,” Sam said with an uncertain frown. “Of course—”
“The President, too, has a full schedule.”
“Oh, of course.” Sam went peacefully.
“Creeping Socialism!” Chuck shouted after they left. “Government intervention! If they make that hair restorer a government project—hell, what can you expect after twenty years of the Re-Deal?”
“Now who could Sam have had an engagement with?” Ruth mused.
The doorbell rang. This time Fate had a soft white hand.
“Oh, he’s not here!” Debbie exclaimed, fluttering in disappointment. “He was supposed to show me through a collection of ancient coins.”
“Goodbye,” Ruth said clammily, and shut the door behind Debbie after a good, hard shove. She turned to Chuck. “O.K. I was going to wait and watch you get lynched. But I want to get that woman off Sam’s neck. You draw up a contract and I’ll give you the correct formula for Sam’s hair restorer.”
“You mean all this time you’ve known it?”
“Not all this time. But I had a lot of time to myself last night. And it occurred to me that Sam must have a carbon copy of his manuscript, and I looked and there it was.”
“You go find some neighbors to witness,” Chuck said, “and I’ll do the writing.”
Sam was gone most of the day. He opened the door to find Debbie on the sofa and Ruth in the armchair, studiously ignoring each other.
“The President of the United St
ates,” he announced, “will not go bald.”
“She won’t go away,” Ruth said.
“Why should I?” Debbie asked, smiling just for Sam.
“Because Full Head already has the formula,” Ruth volunteered. “You’re no longer needed.”
“Do you want me to go, Sam?”
“Now she wants your money,” Ruth said.
“What money? What is this? And where’s dinner?”
Star Science Fiction 5 - [Anthology] Page 18