by William Tenn
"Hi, Pop. I called the office. Tough go."
"Burns!" I turned in relief to the young man lounging against the wall of the building. The only friend I had made in this crazy, barbaric era. "You didn't get the flirgleflip. They'd bartered it, or sold it, or lost it."
"No, Pop, I didn't get the flirgleflip." He took my arm gently. "Let's walk."
"Where?"
"Find a job for you, an occupation into which you can fit your futuristic talents."
"And what would that be?"
"That is the problem, the nasty, difficult problem. Not many flirgles to be flipped in this period. That's all you can do well and you're too old to learn another profession. Yet a man must eat. If he doesn't, he gets odd feelings and strange, mournful quaverings in his abdomen. Ah, well."
"Evidently, you were wrong about the temporal emissary."
"No, I wasn't. You attracted their attention. You've been contacted."
"By whom?"
"Me."
I would have stopped in astonishment directly in the path of a scudding vehicle if Burns's pressure on my arm hadn't kept me moving.
"You mean you're a temporal emissary? You take me back?"
"Yes, I'm a temporal emissary. No, I don't take you back."
Completely confused, I shook my head carefully. "I don't—"
"You don't go back, Pop. First, because this way Banderling is accused of destroying the rights of a communal individual—namely you. This way the Institute decides that the radiation depressor will bear years of investigation and development before anything but completely stable individuals are allowed near it. Eventually time travel will be discovered—and in the proper period—as the result of a textual cross-reference to Banderling's radiation depressor. Second, you don't go back because it is now impossible for you to blab loudly about temporal emissaries without getting into a walled establishment where they make guests wear their sheets like overcoats."
"You mean it was all deliberate, your meeting me and worming the flirgleflip out of my possession and convincing me that I must make a splash, as you put it, so that I am maneuvered into a position where nobody in this society will believe me—"
—|—
We turned right down a narrow street of little cafes. "I mean even more than that was deliberate. It was necessary for Banderling to be the kind of person he is—"
"A fathead?" I suggested bitterly.
"—so that the radiation depressor would be put on the shelf a sufficient number of years as a result of the 'Terton Tragedy.' It was necessary for you to have the profession and background you do, completely unfit for the needs of this period, so that you will be able to make no appreciable alteration in it. It was further necessary—"
"I thought you were my friend. I liked you."
"It was further necessary for me to be the kind of person I am so that your confidence would be won by me as soon as you—er, arrived and the project began to work properly. Also, being the kind of person I am, I am going to be very uncomfortable at what I did with you. This discomfort is probably also necessary for another facet of the Temporal Embassy's plans. Everything fits, Terton, into everything else—even the temporal embassy at the end of time, I suspect. Meanwhile, I had a job to do."
"And Banderling? What happens to him when I fail to return?"
"He's barred from physical research, of course. But since he's young, he will manage to develop a new profession. And the mores of your era being what they are, he will become a flirgleflip—replacing you in the community. He will have a Readjustment Course first, however. Which reminds me—I've been concentrating so hard on getting you a job you can do, I forget important things."
I mused on the irony of Banderling's supposed revolt being part of the plans of the Temporal Embassy. And on the pathos of my spending what remained of my lifetime in this insane age. Suddenly I noticed that Burns had detached the dolik from my necklace.
"One of those oversights," he explained as he pocketed it. "You shouldn't have taken it with you, according to our original plans. Now I'll have to see that it's returned as soon as I get you settled in your job. That dolik is the Thumtse Dilemna, you know. The schedule calls for its problem to be solved by one of your colleagues at the Institute."
"Who solves it?" I asked with great interest. "Masterson, Foule, Greenblatt?"
"None of them." He grinned. "According to the schedule, the Thumtse Dilemna is solved finally by Thomas Alva Banderling."
"Banderling," I cried as we paused in front of a grimy restaurant which had a Dishwasher Wanted sign in the window. "Banderling? That fathead?"
AFTERWORD
Some stories just don't work. I rewrote this one several times, and I never could make it even slightly better. Really, when it comes to the creative act, there does not seem to be any rule that holds true all the way down the line.
I have written full-length stories in one night and done no more beyond the first draft than correct spelling mistakes—and been reasonably proud of the result. I have written and rewritten others over the years and have come to consider them among my best. And, conversely, stories that I've ripped hot from my typewriter and immediately sent off to an agent or editor have, upon later rereading, turned out to be things that I've wanted to hide under sofa cushions or behind wallpaper. And so have been pieces that I've worked and reworked and changed and buffed and polished until there's nothing left but a single subordinate clause from the original draft.
Lovely, lovely babies and dismal miscarriages—they all come up in their turn and have to be accepted as my very own.
The notion that precipitated "Flirgleflip" seemed to be a good one: temporal embassies from every century to the century before, working, on the basis of known historical results, to improve the future (and, of course, no longer being sent back to a period when knowledge that time travel was possible might have deleterious consequences). The thought of creating an occupation or future profession that would be close to meaningless in the present also intrigued me (as, for example, what would the Egyptians of 500 AD be able to make of a twenty-first-century exobiologist or computer technician or particle physicist?).
But the story qua story never took off. Upon reexamination more than half a century later, I wonder if I've found the reason. After all, I cut out a whole lot of subordinate clauses, but I did always keep the first line. That's because the story, whatever it is, seems to unroll precisely from the agonized exclamation, "Banderling, you are a fathead!" and repeat that in the inevitable conclusion.
No, that first line belongs as first line.
Still... If I did put "Flirgleflip" in my word processor now... If I did try one last rewrite, taking out the first line and substituting another one...
Ahh...
Written 1947——Published 1950
ERRAND BOY
Yes, I'm the Malcolm Blyn who phoned you from the village. Mind if I come in and take a seat—I won't take up much of your time? Thanks. Now, here's the story, and if you're the man I've been tearing the country apart for, there's a million in it—
No, please! I'm not selling gold mine stocks or a patent for an internal combustion atomic engine: I'm not selling anything. I'm a salesman all right—been one all my life and I know I look like a salesman right down to my bottom adjective—but today I'm not selling anything.
Today I'm buying.
If you have the stuff, that is. The stuff the errand boy said you or someone with your—Listen! I'm not crazy, believe me till you hear it all! Please sit down and listen. He wasn't an ordinary errand boy; he was an errand boy like Einstein is an accountant. The errands he ran! But you must understand... here, have a cigar.
Here's my card. Blyn's Wholesale Paints and Painters' Supplies—that's me—Any Quantity of Any Paint Delivered Anywhere at Any Time. Of course, by "anywhere" we mean the continental United States only. But it looks good on the card. Salesmanship.
That's me, a salesman. Give me something to sell: an improvement, a s
ervice or a brand-new crazy novelty gimmick—I guarantee to get people tearing the lining out of their pants pockets. I've always kept Emerson's famous wisecrack framed on my office wall, you know: "If a man can write a better book, preach a better sermon, or make a better mousetrap than his neighbor, though he builds his house in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door." Solid stuff. And I'm the guy that gets them interested in beating a path in the first place.
I'm good. I want you to understand that. I can put it over, whatever it is you've got—if only you're the guy that's got it. But I must have something to put over, something good. No hot air. No, I'm not accusing you of putting out the hot air. I don't know yet what you put out—raise chickens, mostly? Yeah. So listen.
Five weeks ago this coming Wednesday, we had a rush job. Three hundred gallons of flat white to the Expando Construction Corporation, an outfit I'd been trying to sell ever since they started up after the war. Eleven o'clock, and they wanted it delivered to their new development over in north Jersey by noon, so their men could start slapping it on the walls right after lunch.
I was out on the floor of the warehouse lighting a fire under Hennessey, my foreman, so he'd light a fire under his crew. Cans of paint were being stacked and shipped as fast as the bank says no to an extension of your loan, men were rolling this way, guys were hustling that way—when I heard Hennessey make a crack.
"Hey, that new errand boy's been gone a long time. Kid must have given up." About a dozen men stopped working and laughed for a while. They could see it was supposed to be funny—Hennessey was their boss.
"Since when do we have a new errand boy?" I stopped Hennessey in his tracks. "I do all the hiring and firing around here. Any new personnel have to go on the books—a dozen different ones these days. Do you want to get me into trouble? Haven't you ever heard of Social Security? Child Labor Laws? How old is the kid?"
"Aw, Mr. Blyn, how should I know? They all look alike to me. Maybe nine, maybe ten, eleven. A lot thinner than most kids I've seen, but a lot healthier. Looks—sorta rich."
"Well, if he's that young, he's got no business in the warehouse district this early in a weekday. Probably on the hook. I'll have the New York Board of Education on my neck as well as the working papers people. Don't I have enough trouble, Hennessey, with two road-happy truck drivers who use a Pennsylvania map to get lost in New Jersey, without—"
"I didn't hire him, honest. He come around here asking for a job in that funny voice like kid stars have in the movies. He says he's willing to start at the bottom and prove himself, he feels he's bound to rise, he's got the will to win, all he wants is a chance. I tell him the way business has been lately, we wouldn't hire Alexander Graham Bell to run our switchboard. He says he doesn't care; he wants to get a foot on the ladder of success. He'll work for nothing."
"So?"
"So, I make out I'm thinking—at ten this morning, things were slow on the floor—and finally I say I'll give him a crack at trying out for errand boy. I hand him an empty can and say I want it filled with green paint—it should have orange polka dots. I'm testing him, see? He grabs the can and takes off. He won't bother us any more. You shoulda seen the guys after he left, Mr. Blyn: they fit to died."
"Hold me up," I said. "I'm getting weak myself. Almost as funny as the time you locked Whalen in the washroom with a stink bomb. That reminds me—you'll be taking orders from Whalen if your crew doesn't get that truck loaded and out of here in ten minutes."
He wiped his hands on his overalls and started to say something. Then he changed his mind and began yelling up and down the warehouse. He asked his men if they didn't think it was time to crawl out of their coffins, he told them to get their asses behind every dolly that wasn't being used, he got the place hissing where before it was only humming.
One thing about Hennessey: he might have been a practical joker from way back when he found all the amusing things you could do with diapers; but he was one crackerjack foreman. The way he made those monkeys hustle reminded me of the way I fit a fountain pen in a customer's hand just before he begins to purse his lips.
Then the kid walked in.
"Hey, Ernest," somebody yelled. "Look. Ernest's back."
Work stopped. The kid walked in, breathing hard, and set the can down in front of Hennessey. He was dressed in a white blouse, patched corduroy pants and high-laced brown shoes. But I'd never seen corduroy like that before, or that kind of white broadcloth in a shirt. The material seemed to be very thin—and, well, rich somehow. That's the only way to describe it. Like expensive imitation iron.
"Glad you're back, kid," Hennessey told him. "I've been needing a left-handed paintbrush. Shop around and see if you can pick one up for me. But it must be left-handed."
A couple of characters on the loading platform started to chuckle. The kid started out. He turned at the big sliding doors.
"I'll try, sir," he said in a voice like he had a flute in his throat. "I'll do my best. But this paint—I couldn't find any green paint with orange polka dots. This only has red polka dots. I hope it will do."
Then he left.
For a moment we all stared at the patch of sidewalk where he'd been standing. Then I laughed; in a second the roars were bouncing off the second-story ceiling. The men just stood there with dollies and paint stacked on them, laughing their heads off.
"Hennessey, the wise guy!" someone yelled.
"All I could find was green paint with red polka dots!"
"Please, sir, I hope it will do. Wow!"
"Did that kid let you have it!"
"Poor Hennessey!"
Hennessey stood there, his great big fists hanging at his sides and no one to use them on. Suddenly he noticed the can of paint. He drew his right leg back and came tearing at it with a kick that would have sent it into Long Island Sound. Only he missed it. He just touched a corner of the can—rocking it enough to spill a drop—missed his footing and came smashing down on his great big backside. The roars got louder as he scrambled to his feet.
In a second, the laughter had stopped cold and everyone and his brother was hustling again. Not a man in that warehouse wanted to attract Hennessey's attention after his joke had bounced back at him.
Still chuckling, I strolled over and looked at the can. I wanted to see what junk the kid had used to fill it. Looked like water. The liquid in the can was mostly transparent, with little brown flecks floating around. Not paint, certainly—no kind I knew.
I glanced at the floor where a drop had been spilled when my foreman tried to kick the can.
I began strangling on a howl.
The junk the kid had used to fill the can—the junk had been green paint with red polka dots. Red polka dots!
No doubt at all: a little oval puddle dripped up to the side of the can; the warehouse floor now had a spot painted green with red polka dots. And this kid—this errand boy—this Ernest—had found it somewhere.
One thing I told you I can tell. Saleability. I can tell the saleable something in somebody else's dream at night when I'm sleeping on the other side of town. I can sniff it—but, you know all that. But do you know how saleable that kind of paint would be? Sell it as a sure-fire novelty to manufacturers, sell it as a gimmick to guys who putter around their own home, sell it as a brand-new idea in design to interior decorators. It's a natural; it's a gold mine.
But I had to move fast. I picked up the can by the wire handle; I scuffed the paint spot carelessly with my foot. Luckily, it seemed to take a long time to dry: it mixed with the dust on the floor and lost its color. I walked out into the street where Hennessey was standing near the truck watching his crew load.
"What did you say that kid's name was? Ernest?"
He looked up. "Yeah," he brooded. "Ernest. Didn't give me his last name. But if he ever shows his wise puss around here—"
"OK. I have an important business appointment. Take over until I get back and get that flat white out." I turned and started in the direction the kid had gone.
I knew Hennessey was staring at the can of paint I carried swinging from my left hand. He was wondering what I wanted with it, with the kid. Let him wonder, I told myself. Give Hennessey the curiosity; I'll take the profit.
—|—
I caught sight of the kid about three blocks away; he was going east, in the direction of the park. He stopped in front of a hardware store, thought a moment, walked in. By the time he came out again, I'd caught up with him. He was shaking his head unhappily.
We walked side by side for a while before he noticed me. I couldn't get over those clothes of his. Even the old-fashioned high shoes he was wearing weren't made out of anything I'd ever seen; the material hugged his foot like another layer of skin; it wasn't leather, I was sure of that.
"No luck?" I asked.
He jumped and stared a bit. Then he seemed to recognize the face as one of those that had been staring at him a while ago. "No. No... er, luck. The distributor said he was very sorry but he was just this moment fresh out of left-handed paintbrushes. Exactly what they all said when I asked them for the paint with the polka dots. I don't mean any offense, but... but this is an inefficient method of circulating goods."
I watched his face while he said that. Really meant every word of it. What a kid! I stopped and scratched my head. Should I come right out and ask him where he'd found the paint, or should I let him talk into the secret as most people will usually do?
He had turned pale and then begun blushing. I didn't like to see that in a boy. That musical soprano voice was bad enough, his thinness for a kid his size—he was almost as tall as me—I could take; but a boy who blushed had just never met a real school bully.
"Look, Ernest," I began. I reached out and put my hand on his shoulder, you know, fatherly-like. "Ernest, I—"