"Mister, you're funning me again!" she cried angrily.
"No, no--please. I plead ignorance."
"Well," she said, "you're a heathen, and heathens are improper. Here's a paper. Come to this address tomorrow night and be baptized and be happy. We shouts and we stomps and we talk in voices, so if you want to hear our all-cornet, all-brass band, you come, won't you now?"
"I'll try," he said hesitantly.
Down the street she went, patting her tambourine, singing at the top of her voice, "Happy Am I, I'm Always Happy."
Dazed, Ettil returned to his letter.
"Dear Tylla: To think that in my naivete I imagined that the Earthmen would have to counterattack with guns and bombs. No, no. I was sadly wrong. There is no Rick or Mick or Jick or Bannon--those lever fellows who save worlds. No.
"There are blond robots with pink rubber bodies, real, but somehow unreal, alive but somehow automatic in all responses, living in caves all of their lives. Theirderrieres are incredible in girth. Their eyes are fixed and motionless from an endless time of staring at picture screens. The only muscles they have occur in their jaws from their ceaseless chewing of gum.
"And it is not only these, my dear Tylla, but the entire civilization into which we have been dropped like a shovelful of seeds into a large concrete mixer. Nothing of us will survive. We will be killed not by the gun but by the glad-hand. We will be destroyed not by the rocket but by the automobile . . ."
Somebody screamed. A crash, another crash. Silence.
Ettil leaped up from his letter. Outside, on the street two ears had crashed. One full of Martians, another with Earthmen. Ettil returned to his letter:
"Dear, dear Tylla, a few statistics if you will allow. Forty-five thousand people killed every year on this continent of America; made into jelly right in the can, as it were, in the automobiles. Red blood jelly, with white marrow bones like sudden thoughts, ridiculous horror thoughts, transfixed in the immutable jelly. The cars roll up in tight neat sardine rolls--all sauce, all silence.
"Blood manure for green buzzing summer flies, all over the highways. Faces made into Halloween masks by sudden stops. Halloween is one of their holidays. I think they worship the automobile on that night--something to do with death, anyway.
"You look out your window and see two people lying atop each other in friendly fashion who, a moment ago, had never met before, dead. I foresee our army mashed, diseased, trapped in cinemas by witches and gum. Sometime in the next day I shall try to escape back to Mars before it is too late.
"Somewhere on Earth tonight, my Tylla, there is a Man with a Lever, which, when he pulls it, Will Save the World. The man is now unemployed. His switch gathers dust. He himself plays pinochle.
"The women of this evil planet are drowning us in a tide of banal sentimentality, misplaced romance, and one last fling before the makers of glycerin boil them down for usage. Good night, Tylla. Wish me well, for I shall probably die trying to escape. My love to our child."
Weeping silently, he folded the letter and reminded himself to mail it later at the rocket post.
He left the park. What was there to do? Escape? But how? Return to the post late tonight, steal one of the rockets alone and go back to Mars? Would it be possible? He shook his head. He was much too confused.
All that he really knew was that if he stayed here he would soon be the property of a lot of things that buzzed and snorted and hissed, that gave off fumes or stenches. In six months he would be the owner of a large pink, trained ulcer, a blood pressure of algebraic dimensions, a myopia this side of blindness, and nightmares as deep as oceans and infested with improbable lengths of dream intestines through which he must violently force his way each night. No, no.
He looked at the haunted faces of the Earthmen drifting violently along in their mechanical death boxes. Soon--yes, very soon--they would invent an auto with six silver handles on it!
"Hey, there!"
An auto horn. A large long hearse of a car, black and ominous pulled to the curb. A man leaned out.
"You a Martian?"
"Yes."
"Just the man I gotta see. Hop in quick--the chance of a lifetime. Hop in. Take you to a real nice joint where we can talk. Come on--don't stand there."
As if hypnotized, Ettil opened the door of the car, got in.
They drove off.
"What'll it be, E.V.? How about a manhattan? Two manhattans, waiter. Okay, E.V. This is my treat. This is on me and Big Studios! Don't even touch your wallet. Pleased to meet you, E.V. My name's R. R. Van Plank. Maybe you hearda me? No? Well, shake anyhow."
Ettil felt his hand massaged and dropped. They were in a dark hole with music and waiters drifting about. Two drinks were set down. It had all happened so swiftly. Now Van Plank, hands crossed on his chest, was surveying his Martian discovery.
"What I want you for, E.V., is this. It's the most magnanimous idea I ever got in my life. I don't know how it came to me, just in a flash. I was sitting home tonight and I thought to myself, My God, what a picture it would make!Invasion of Earth by Mars. So what I got to do? I got to find an adviser for the film. So I climbed in my car and found you and here we are. Drink up! Here's to your health and our future.Skoal!"
"But----" said Ettil.
"Now, I know, you'll want money. Well, we got plenty of that. Besides, I got a li'l black book full of peaches I can lend you."
"I don't like most of your Earth fruit and----"
"You're a card, mac, really. Well, here's how I get the picture in my mind--listen." He leaned forward excitedly. "We got a flash scene of the Martians at a big powwow, drummin' drums, gettin' stewed on Mars. In the background are huge silver cities----"
"But that's not the way Martian cities are----"
"We got to have color, kid. Color. Let your pappy fix this. Anyway, there are all the Martians doing a dance around a fire----"
"We don't dance around fires----"
"Inthis film you got a fire and you dance," declared Van Plank, eyes shut, proud of his certainty. He nodded, dreaming it over on his tongue. "Then we got a beautiful Martian woman, tall and blond."
"Martian women are dark----"
"Look, I don't see how we're going to be happy, E.V. By the way, son, you ought to change your name. What was it again?"
"Ettil."
"That's a woman's name. I'll give you a better one. Call you Joe. Okay, Joe. As I was saying, our Martian women are gonna be blond, because, see, just because. Or else your poppa won't be happy. You got any suggestions?"
"I thought that----"
"And another thing we gotta have is a scene, very tearful, where the Martian woman saves the whole ship of Martian men from dying when a meteor or something hits the ship. That'll make a whackeroo of a scene. You know, I'm glad I found you, Joe. You're going to have a good deal with us, I tell you."
Ettil reached out and held the man's wrist tight. "Just a minute. There's something I want to ask you."
"Sure, Joe, shoot."
"Why are you being so nice to us? We invade your planet, and you welcome us--everybody--like long-lost children. Why?"
"They sure grow 'em green on Mars, don't they? You're a naive-type guy--I can see from way over here. Mac, look at it this way. We're all Little People, ain't we?" He waved a small tan hand garnished with emeralds.
"We're all common as dirt, ain't we? Well, here on Earth, we're proud of that. This is the century of the Common Man, Bill, and we're proud we're small. Billy, you're looking at a planet full of Saroyans. Yes, sir. A great big fat family of friendly Saroyans--everybody loving everybody. We understand you Martians, Joe, and we know why you invaded Earth. We know how lonely you were up on that little cold planet Mars, how you envied us our cities----"
"Our civilization is much older than yours----"
"Please, Joe, you make me unhappy when you interrupt. Let me finish my theory and then you talk all you want. As I was saying, you was lonely up there, and down you came to see our cities and our wo
men and all, and we welcomed you in, because you're our brothers, Common Men like all of us.
"And then, as a kind of side incident, Roscoe, there's a certain little small profit to be had from this invasion. I mean for instance this picture I plan, which will net us, neat, a billion dollars, I bet. Next week we start putting out a special Martian doll at thirty bucks a throw. Think of the millions there. I also got a contract to make a Martian game to sell for five bucks. There's all sorts of angles."
"I see," said Ettil, drawing back.
"And then of course there's that whole nice new market. Think of all the depilatories and gum and shoeshine we can sell to you Martians."
"Wait. Another question."
"Shoot."
"What's your first name? What's the R.R. stand for?"
"Richard Robert."
Ettil looked at the ceiling. "Do they sometimes, perhaps, on occasion, once in a while, by accident, call you--Rick?"
"How'd you guess, mac? Rick, sure."
Ettil sighed and began to laugh and laugh. He put out his hand. "So you're Rick? Rick! So you're Rick!"
"What's the joke, laughing boy? Let Poppa in!"
"You wouldn't understand--a private joke. Ha, ha!" Tears ran down his cheeks and into his open mouth. He pounded the table again and again. "So you're Rick. Oh, how different, how funny. No bulging muscles, no lean jaw, no gun. Only a wallet full of money and an emerald ring and a big middle!"
"Hey, watch the language! I may not be no Apollo, but----"
"Shake hands, Rick. I've wanted to meet you. You're the man who'll conquer Mars, with cocktail shakers and foot arches and poker chips and riding crops and leather boots and checkered caps and rum collinses."
"I'm only a humble businessman," said Van Plank, eyes slyly down. "I do my work and take my humble little piece of money pie. But, as I was saying, Mort, I been thinking of the market on Mars for Uncle Wiggily games and Dick Tracy comics; all new. A big wide field never even heard of cartoons, right? Right! So we just toss a great big bunch of stuff on the Martians' heads. They'll fight for it, kid, fight! Who wouldn't, for perfumes and Paris dresses and Oshkosh overalls, eh? And nice new shoes----"
"We don't wear shoes."
"What have I got here?" R.R. asked of the ceiling. "A planet full of Okies? Look, Joe, we'll take care of that. We'll shame everyone into wearing shoes. Then we sell them the polish!"
"Oh."
He slapped Ettil's. arm. "Is it a deal? Will you be technical director on my film? You'll get two hundred a week to start, a five-hundred top. What you say?"
"I'm sick," said Ettil. He had drunk the manhattan and was now turning blue.
"Say, I'm sorry. I didn't know it would do that to you. Let's get some fresh air."
In the open air Ettil felt better. He swayed. "So that's why Earth took us in?"
"Sure, son. Any time an Earthman can turn an honest dollar, watch him steam. The customer is always right. No hard feelings. Here's my card. Be at the studio in Hollywood tomorrow morning at nine o'clock. They'll show you your office. I'll arrive at eleven and see you then. Be sure you get there at nine o'clock. It's a strict rule."
"Why?"
"Gallagher, you're a queer oyster, but I love you. Good night. Happy invasion!"
The car drove off.
Ettil blinked after it, incredulous. Then, rubbing his brow with the palm of his hand, he walked slowly along the street toward the rocket port.
"Well, what are you going to do?" he asked himself, aloud. The rockets lay gleaming in the moonlight silent. From the city came the sounds of distant revelry. In the medical compound an extreme case of nervous breakdown was being tended to: a young Martian who, by his screams, had seen too much, drunk too much, heard too many songs on the little red-and-yellow boxes in the drinking places, and had been chased around innumerable tables by a large elephant-like woman. He kept murmuring: "Can't breathe . . . crushed, trapped."
The sobbing faded. Ettil came out of the shadows and moved on across a wide avenue toward the ships. Far over, he could see the guards lying about drunkenly. He listened. From the vast city came the faint sounds of cars and music and sirens. And he imagined other sounds too: the insidious whir of malt machines stirring malts to fatten the warriors and make them lazy and forgetful, the narcotic voices of the cinema caverns lulling and lulling the Martians fast, fast into a slumber through which, all of their remaining lives, they would sleepwalk.
A year from now, how many Martians dead of cirrhosis of the liver, bad kidneys, high blood pressure, suicide?
He stood in the middle of the empty avenue. Two blocks away a car was rushing toward him.
He had a choice: stay here, take the studio job, report for work each morning as adviser on a picture, and, in time, come to agree with the producer that, yes indeed, there were massacres on Mars; yes, the women were tall and blond; yes, there were tribal dances and sacrifices; yes, yes, yes. Or he could walk over and get into a rocket ship and, alone, return to Mars.
"But what about next year?" he said.
The Blue Canal Night Club brought to Mars. The Ancient City Gambling Casino, Built Right Inside. Yes, Right Inside a Real Martian Ancient City! Neons, racing forms blowing in the old cities, picnic lunches in the ancestral graveyards--all of it, all of it.
But not quite yet. In a few days he could be home. Tylla would be waiting with their son, and then for the last few years of gentle life he might sit with his wife in the blowing weather on the edge of the canal reading his good, gentle books, sipping a rare and light wine, talking and living out their short time until the neon bewilderment fell from the sky.
And then perhaps he and Tylla might move into the blue mountains and hide for another year or two until the tourists came to snap their cameras and say how quaint things were.
He knew just what he would say to Tylla. "War is a bad thing, but peace can be a living horror."
He stood in the middle of the wide avenue.
Turning, it was with no surprise that he saw a car bearing down upon him, a car full of screaming children. These boys and girls, none older than sixteen, were swerving and ricocheting their open-top car down the avenue. He saw them point at him and yell. He heard the motor roar louder. The car sped forward at sixty miles an hour.
He began to run.
Yes, yes, he thought tiredly, with the car upon him, how strange, how sad. It sounds so much like . . . a concrete mixer.
* * *
Marionettes, Inc.
THEY walked slowly down the street at about ten in the evening, talking calmly. They were both about thirty-five, both eminently sober.
"But why so early?" said Smith.
"Because," said Braling.
"Your first night out in years and you go home at ten o'clock."
"Nerves, I suppose."
"What I wonder is how you ever managed it. I've been trying to get you out for ten years for a quiet drink. And now, on the one night, you insist on turning in early."
"Mustn't crowd my luck," said Braling.
"What did you do, put sleeping powder in your wife's coffee?"
"No, that would be unethical. You'll see soon enough."
They turned a corner. "Honestly, Braling, I hate to say this, but youhave been patient with her. You may not admit it to me, but marriage has been awful for you, hasn't it?"
"I wouldn't say that."
"It's got around, anyway, here and there, how she got you to marry her. That time back in 1979 when you were going to Rio----"
"Dear Rio. I neverdid see it after all my plans."
"And how she tore her clothes and rumpled her hair and threatened to call the police unless you married her."
"She always was nervous, Smith, understand."
"It was more than unfair. You didn't love her. You told her as much, didn't you?"
"I recall that I was quite firm on the subject."
"But you married her anyhow."
"I had my business to think of, as well as my mother
and father. A thing like that would have killed them."
"And it's been ten years."
"Yes," said Braling, his gray eyes steady. "But I think perhaps it might change now. I think what I've waited for has come about. Look here."
He drew forth a long blue ticket.
"Why, it's a ticket for Rio on the Thursday rocket!"
"Yes, I'm finally going to make it."
"But how wonderful! Youdo deserve it! But won'tshe object? Cause trouble?"
Braling smiled nervously. "She won't know I'm gone. I'll be back in a month and no one the wiser, except you.
Smith sighed. "I wish I were going with you."
"Poor Smith,your marriage hasn't exactly been roses, has it?"
"Not exactly, married to a woman who overdoes it. I mean, after all, when you've been married ten years, you don't expect a woman to sit on your lap for two hours every evening, call you at work twelve times a day and talk baby talk. And it seems to me that in the last month she's gotten worse. I wonder if perhaps she isn't just a little simple-minded?"
"Ah, Smith, always the conservative. Well, here's my house. Now, would you like to know my secret? How I made it out this evening?"
"Will you really tell?"
"Look up, there!" said Braling.
They both stared up through the dark air.
In the window above them, on the second floor, a shade was raised. A man about thirty-five years old, with a touch of gray at either temple, sad gray eyes, and a small thin mustache looked down at them.
"Why, that'syou!" cried Smith.
"Sh-h-h, not so loud!" Braling waved upward. The man in the window gestured significantly and vanished.
"I must be insane," said Smith.
"Hold on a moment." They waited.
The street door of the apartment opened and the tall spare gentleman with the mustache and the grieved eyes came out to meet them.
"Hello, Braling," he said.
"Hello, Braling," said Braling.
They were identical.
Smith stared. "Is this your twin brother? I never knew--"
"No, no," said Braling quietly. "Bend close. Put your ear to Braling Two's chest."
Smith hesitated and then leaned forward to place his head against the uncomplaining ribs.
Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick.
"Oh no! Itcan't be!"
"It is."
"Let me listen again."