Strange Ports of Call

by August Derleth (ed)

  “But, gentlemen, it had not reached the point where it could be termed an unusually large accumulation of wealth. Far larger accumulations existed upon the earth. A descendant of a man once known as John D. Rockefeller possessed an accumulation of great size, but which, as a matter of fact, was rapidly dwindling as it passed from generation to generation. So, let us travel ahead another one hundred years. During this time, as we learn from our historical and political archives, the socialists began to die out, since they at last realized the utter futility of combating the balance of power. The account, though, now stood:

  2421 500 years $2,520,000

  “It is hardly necessary for me to make any comment. Those of you who are most astute, and others of you who flunked my course before and are now taking it the second time, of course know what is coming.

  “Now, the hundred years which ended with the year 2521 A.D., saw two events—one, very important and vital to mankind, and the other very interesting. I will explain.

  “During the age in which this John Jones lived, there lived also a man, a so-called scientist called Metchnikoff. We know, from a study of our vast collection of Egyptian Papyri and Carnegie Library books, that this Metchnikoff promulgated the theory that old age—or rather senility—was caused by colon-bacillus. This fact was later verified. But while he was correct in the etiology of senility, he was crudely primeval in the therapeutics of it.

  “He proposed, gentlemen, to combat and kill this bacillus by utilizing the fermented lacteal fluid from a now extinct animal called the cow, models of which you can see at any time at the Solaris Museum.”

  A chorus of shrill, piping laughter emanated from the brass cylinder. The professor waited until the merriment had subsided and then continued:

  “I beg of you, gentlemen, do not smile. This was merely one of the many similar quaint superstitions existing in that age.

  “But a real scientist, Professor K122B62411-Male, again attacked the problem in the twenty-fifth century. Since the cow was now extinct, he could not waste his valuable time experimenting with fermented cow lacteal fluid. He discovered the old y-rays of Radium—the rays which you physicists will remember are not deflected by a magnetic field—were really composed of two sets of rays, which he termed the 5 rays and the z rays. These last named rays—only when isolated—completely devitalized all colon-bacilli which lay in their path, without in the least affecting the integrity of any interposed organic cells. The great result, as many of you already know, was that the life of man was extended to nearly two hundred years. That, I state unequivocally, was a great century for the human race.

  “But I spoke of another happening—one, perhaps, of more interest than importance. I referred to the bank account of John Jones the fortieth. It, gentlemen, had grown to such a prodigious sum that a special bank and board of directors had to be created in order to care for, and reinvest it. By scanning the following notation, you will perceive the truth of my statement:

  2521 600 years $47,900,000

  “By the year 2621 A.D., two events of stupendous importance took place. There is scarcely a man in this class who has not heard of how Professor P222D29333-Male accidentally stumbled upon the scientific fact that the effect of gravity is reversed upon any body which vibrates perpendicularly to the plane of the ecliptic with a frequency which is an even multiple of the logarithm of 2 of the Naperian base ‘e.’ At once, special vibrating cars were constructed which carried mankind to all planets. That discovery of Professor P222D29333-Male did nothing less than open up seven new territories to our inhabitants; namely: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. In the great land rush that ensued, thousands who were previously poor became rich.

  “But, gentlemen, land, which so far had been constituted one of the main sources of wealth, was shortly to become valuable for individual golf links only, as it is today, on account of another scientific discovery.

  “This second discovery was in reality, not a discovery, but the perfection of a chemical process, the principles of which had been known for many centuries. I am alluding to the construction of the vast reducing factories, one upon each planet, to which the bodies of all persons who have died on their respective planets are at once shipped by Aerial Express. Since this process is used today, all of you understand the methods employed; how each body is reduced by heat to its component constituents: hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, calcium, phosphorus, and so forth; how these separated constituents are stored in special reservoirs together with the components from thousands of other corpses; how these elements are then synthetically combined into food tablets for those of us who are yet alive—thus completing an endless chain from the dead to the living. Naturally, then, agriculture and stock-raising ceased, since the food problem, with which man had coped from time immemorial, was solved. The two direct results were, first—that land lost the inflated values it had possessed when it was necessary for tillage, and second—that men were at last given enough leisure to enter the fields of science and art.

  “And as to the John Jones Dollar, which now embraced countless industries and vast territory on the earth, it stood, in value:

  2621 700 years $912,000,000

  “In truth, gentlemen, it now constituted the largest private fortune on the terrestrial globe. And in that year, 2621 A.D., there were thirteen generations yet to come, before John Jones the fortieth would arrive.

  “To continue. In the year 2721 A.D., an important political battle was concluded in the Solar System Senate and House of Representatives. I am referring to the great controversy as to whether the Earth’s moon was a sufficient menace to interplanetary navigation to warrant its removal. The outcome of the wrangle was that the question was decided in the affirmative. Consequently—

  “But I beg your pardon, young men. I occasionally lose sight of the fact that you are not so well informed upon historical matters as myself. Here I am, talking to you about the moon, totally forgetful that many of you are puzzled as to my meaning. I advise all of you who have not yet attended the Solaris Museum on Jupiter to take a trip there some Sunday afternoon. The Interplanetary Suburban Line runs trains every half hour on that day. You will find there a complete working model of the old satellite of the Earth, which, before it was destroyed, furnished this planet light at night through the crude medium of reflection.

  “On account of this decision as to the inadvisability of allowing the moon to remain where it was, engineers commenced its removal in the year 2721. Piece by piece, its was chipped away and brought to the Earth in Interplanetary freight cars. These pieces were then propelled by Zoodolite explosive, in the direction of the Milky Way, with a velocity of 11,217 meters per second. This velocity, of course, gave each departing fragment exactly the amount of kinetic energy it required to enable it to overcome the backward pull of the Earth from here to infinity. I dare say those moon-hunks are going yet.

  “At the start of the removal of the moon in 2721 A.D., the accumulated wealth of John Jones the fortieth, stood:

  2721 800 years $17,400,000,000

  “Of course, with such a colossal sum at their command, the directors of the fund had made extensive investments on Mars and Venus.

  “By the end of the twenty-eighth century, or the year 2807 A.D., the moon had been completely hacked away and sent piecemeal into space, the job having required eighty-six years. I give, herewith, the result of John Jones’s Dollar, both at the date when the moon was completely removed and also at thq close of the nine-hundredth year after its deposit:

  2807 886 years $219,000,000,000

  2821 900 years $332,000,000,000

  “The meaning of those figures, gentlemen, as stated in simple language, was that the John Jones Dollar now comprised practically all the wealth on Earth, Mars, and Venus—with the exception of one university site on each planet, which was, of course, school property.

  “And now I will ask you to advance with me to the year 2906 A.D. In this year the directors of the
John Jones fund awoke to the fact that they were in a dreadful predicament. According to the agreement under which John Jones deposited his Dollar away back in the year 1921, interest was to be compounded annually at three per cent. In the year 2900 A.D., the thirty-ninth generation of John Jones was alive, being represented by a gentleman named J664M42721-Male, who was thirty years of age and engaged to be married to a young lady named T246M42652-Female.

  “Doubtless, you will ask, what was the predicament in which the directors found themselves. Simply this:

  “A careful appraisement of the wealth on Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury, and likewise Earth, together with an accurate calculation of the remaining heat in the Sun and an appraisement of that heat at a very decent valuation per calorie, demonstrated that the total wealth of the Solar System amounted to $6,309,525,241,362.15.

  “But, unfortunately, a simple computation showed that if Mr. J664M42721-Male married Miss T246M42652-Female, and was blessed by a child by the year 2921, which year marked the thousandth year since the deposit of the John Jones Dollar, then in that year there would be due the child the following amount:

  2921 1000 years $6,310,000,000,000

  “It simply showed beyond all possibility of argument, that by 2921 A.D. we would be $474,758,637.85 shy—that we would be unable to meet the debt to John Jones the fortieth.

  “I tell you, gentlemen, the Board of Directors was frantic.

  Such wild suggestions were put forth as the sending of an expeditionary force to the nearest star in order to capture some other Solar System and thus obtain more territory to make up the deficit. But that project was impossible on account of the number of years that it would have required.

  “Visions of immense law suits disturbed the slumber of those unfortunate individuals who formed the John Jones Dollar Directorship. But on the brink of one of the biggest civil actions the courts had ever known, something occurred that altered everything.”

  The professor again withdrew the tiny instrument from his vest pocket, held it to his ear and adjusted the switch. A metallic voice rasped: “Fifteen o’clock and fifty-two minutes—fifteen o’clock and fifty-two minutes—fift—” He replaced the instrument and went on with his talk.

  “I must hasten to the conclusion of my lecture, gentlemen, as I have an engagement with Professor C122B24999-Male of the University of Saturn at sixteen o’clock. Now, let me see; I was discussing the big civil action that was hanging over the heads of the John Jones Dollar directors.

  “Well, this Mr. J664M42721-Male, the thirty-ninth descendant of the original John Jones, had a lover’s quarrel with Miss T246M42652-Female, which immediately destroyed the probability of their marriage. Neither gave in to the other. Neither ever married. And when Mr. J664M42721-Male died in 2946 A.D., of a broken heart, as it was claimed, he was single and childless.

  “As a result, there was no one to turn the Solar System over to. Immediately, the Interplanetary Government stepped in and took possession of it. At that instant, of course, private property ceased. In the twinkling of an eye almost, we reached the true socialistic and democratic condition for which man had futilely hoped throughout the ages.

  “That is all today, gentlemen. Class is dismissed.”

  One by one, the faces faded from the Visaphone.

  For a moment, the professor stood ruminating.

  “A wonderful man, that old socialist, John Jones the first,” he said softly to himself, “a far-seeing man, a bright man, considering that he lived in such a dark era as the twentieth century. But how nearly his well-contrived scheme went wrong. Suppose that fortieth descendant had been born?”

  Henry Kuttner (1914—) is a Los Angeles native and lives at Laguna Beach with his wife, C. L. Moore, equally well known in the related fields of the weird and science-fiction. He has written for many magazines, including Charm, Astounding Science-Fiction, Weird Tales, Strange Stories, and Thrilling Wonder Stories. His first mystery novel, The Brass Ring, published in 1945 by Duett, Sloan & Pearce, was written under the byline of Lewis Padgett. It was under another byline, Keith Hammond, that Call Him Demon originally appeared.

  CALL HIM DEMON

  Henry Kuttner

  A LONG TIME AFTERWARD SHE WENT back to Los Angeles and drove past Grandmother Keaton’s house. It hadn’t changed a great deal, really, but what had seemed an elegant mansion to her childish, 1920 eyes was now a big ramshackle frame structure, gray with scaling paint.

  After twenty-five years the—insecurity—wasn’t there any more, but there still persisted a dull, irrational, remembered uneasiness, an echo of the time Jane Larkin had spent in that house when she was nine, a thin, big-eyed girl with the Buster Brown bangs so fashionable then.

  Looking back, she could remember too much and too little. A child’s mind is curiously different from an adult’s. When Jane went into the living room under the green glass chandelier on that June day in 1920, she made a dutiful round of the family, kissing them all. Grandmother Keaton and chilly Aunt Bessie and the four uncles. She did not hesitate when she came to the new uncle—who was different.

  The other kids watched her with impassive eyes. They knew. They saw she knew. But they said nothing just then. Jane realized she could not mention the—the trouble—either, until they brought it up. That was part of the silent etiquette of childhood. But the whole house was full of uneasiness. The adults merely sensed a trouble, something vaguely wrong. The children, Jane saw, knew.

  Afterward they gathered in the back yard, under the big date-palm. Jane ostentatiously fingered her new necklace and waited. She saw the looks the others exchanged—looks that said, “Do you think she really noticed?” And finally Beatrice, the oldest, suggested hide-and-seek.

  “We ought to tell her, Bee,” little Charles said.

  Beatrice kept her eyes from Charles.

  “Tell her what? You’re crazy, Charles.”

  Charles was insistent but vague.

  “You know.”

  “Keep your old secret,” Jane said. “I know what it is, anyhow. He’s not my uncle.”

  “See?” Emily crowed. “She did too see it. I told you she’d notice.”

  “It’s kind of funny,” Jane said. She knew very well that the man in the living room wasn’t her uncle and never had been, and he was pretending, quite hard—hard enough to convince the grown-ups—that he had always been here. With the clear, unprejudiced eye of immaturity, Jane could see that he wasn’t an ordinary grown-up. He was sort of—empty.

  “He just came,” Emily said. “About three weeks ago.”

  “Three days,” Charles corrected, trying to help, but his temporal sense wasn’t dependent on the calendar. He measured time by the yardstick of events, and days weren’t standard sized for him. They were longer when he was sick or when it rained, and far too short when he was riding the merry-go-round at Ocean Park or playing games in the back yard.

  “It was three weeks,” Beatrice said.

  “Where’d he come from?” Jane asked.

  There were secret glances exchanged.

  “I don’t know,” Beatrice said carefully.

  “He came out of a big round hole that kept going around,” Charles said. “It’s like a Christmas tree through there, all fiery.”

  “Don’t tell lies,” Emily said. “Did you ever truly see that, Charles?”

  “No. Only sort of.”

  “Don’t they notice?” Jane meant the adults.

  “No,” Beatrice told her, and the children all looked toward the house and pondered the inscrutable ways of grown-ups. “They act like he’s always been here. Even Granny. Aunt Bessie said he came before I did. Only I knew that wasn’t right.”

  “Three weeks,” Charles said, changing his mind.

  “He’s making them all feel sick,” Emily said. “Aunt Bessie takes aspirins all the time.”

  Jane considered. On the face of it, the situation seemed a little silly. An uncle three weeks old? Perhaps the adults were
merely pretending, as they sometimes did, with esoteric adult motives. But somehow that didn’t seem quite the answer. Children are never deceived very long about such things.

  Charles, now that the ice was broken and Jane no longer an outsider, burst suddenly into excited gabble.

  “Tell her, Bee! The real secret—you know. Can I show her the Road of Yellow Bricks? Please, Bee? Huh?”

  Then the silence again. Charles was talking too much. Jane knew the Road of Yellow Bricks, of course. It ran straight through Oz from the Deadly Desert to the Emerald City.

  After a long time Emily nodded.

  “We got to tell her, you know,” she said. “Only she might get scared. It’s so dark.”

  “You were scared,” Bobby said. “You cried, the first time.”

  “I didn’t. Anyhow it—it’s only make believe.”

  “Oh, no!” Charles said. “I reached out and touched the crown last time.”

  “It isn’t a crown,” Emily said. “It’s him. Ruggedo.”

  Jane thought of the uncle who wasn’t a real uncle—who wasn’t a real person. “Is he Ruggedo?” she asked.

  The children understood.

  “Oh, no,” Charles said. “Ruggedo lives in the collar. We give him meat. All red and bluggy. He likes it! Gobble, gobble!” Beatrice looked at Jane. She nodded toward the club house, which was a piano-box with a genuine secret lock. Then, somehow, quite deftly, she shifted the conversation onto another subject. A • game of cowboys-and-Indians started presently and Bobby, howling terribly, led the rout around the house.

  The piano-box smelled pleasantly of acacia drifting through the cracks. Beatrice and Jane, huddled together in the warm dimness, heard diminishing Indian-cries in the distance. Beatrice looked curiously adult just now.

  “I’m glad you came, Janie,” she said. “The little kids don’t understand at all. It’s pretty awful.”