"Really? But God is an unscientific concept."
"This is a different god. I didn't invent it. I bought it. On Ganymede. It's a Ganymedean Weather Deity."
"Say something," Pat said to the god. "So he'll believe your owner."
"Let's debate my existence," the god said sneeringly. "You take the negative. Agreed?"
Matson grinned. "What is this, Eric? A little robot? Sort of hideous looking."
"Honest. It's a god. On the way it did a couple of miracles for me. Not big miracles, of course, but enough to convince me."
"Hearsay," Matson said. But he was interested. "Pass a miracle, god. I'm all ears."
"I am not a vulgar showpiece," the god growled.
"Don't get it angry," Eric cautioned. "There's no limit to its powers, once aroused."
"How does a god come into being?" Tom asked. "Does a god create itself? If it's dependent on something prior then there must be a more ultimate order of being which --"
"Gods," the tiny figure stated, "are inhabitants of a higher level, a greater plane of reality. A more advanced dimension. There are a number of planes of existence. Dimensional continuums, arranged in a hierarchy. Mine is one above yours."
"What are you doing here?"
"Occasionally beings pass from one dimensional continuum to another. When they pass from a superior continuum to an inferior -- as I have done -- they are worshipped as gods."
Tom was disappointed. "You're not a god at all. You're just a life-form of a slightly different dimensional order that's changed phase and entered our vector."
The little figure glowered. "You make it sound simple. Actually, such a transformation requires great cunning and is seldom done. I came here because a member of my race, a certain malodorous Nar Dolk, committed a heinous crime and escaped into this continuum. Our law obliged me to follow in hot pursuit. In the process this flotsam, this spawn of dampness, escaped and assumed some disguise or other. I continually search, but he has not yet been apprehended." The small god broke off suddenly. "Your curiosity is idle. It annoys me."
Tom turned his back on the god. "Pretty weak stuff. We do more down at the Terran Metals Lab than this character ever --"
The air crackled, ozone flashing. Tom Matson shrieked. Invisible hands lifted him bodily and propelled him to the door. The door swung open and Matson sailed down the walk, tumbling in a heap among the rose bushes, arms and legs flailing wildly.
"Help!" Matson yelled, struggling to get up.
"Oh, dear," Pat gasped.
"Golly." Eric shot a glance at the tiny figure. "You did that?"
"Help him," Pat urged, white-faced. "I think he's hurt. He looks funny."
Eric hurried outside and helped Matson to his feet. "You okay? It's your own fault. I told you if you kept annoying it something might happen."
Matson's face was ablaze with rage. "No little pipsqueak god is going to treat me like this!" He pushed Eric aside, heading back for the house. "I'll take it down to the Lab and pop it in a bottle of formaldehyde. I'll dissect it and skin it and hang it up on the wall. I'll have the first specimen of a god known to --"
A ball of light glowed around Matson. The ball enveloped him, settling in place around his lean body so that he looked like a filament in an incandescent light.
"What the hell!" Matson muttered. Suddenly he jerked. His body faded. He began to shrink. With a faint whoosh he diminished rapidly. Smaller and smaller he dwindled. His body shuddered, altering strangely.
altering strangely.
"See?" Eric said wildly. "I told you to keep quiet! Now look what it's done!"
The toad hopped feebly toward the house. At the porch it sagged into immobility, defeated by the steps. It uttered a pathetic, hopeless chug.
Pat's voice rose in a wail of anguish. "Oh, Eric! Look what it's done! Poor Tom!"
"His own fault," Eric said. "He deserves it." But he was beginning to get nervous. "Look here," he said to the god. "That's not a very nice thing to do to a grown man. What'll his wife and kids think?"
"What'll Mr Bradshaw think?" Pat cried. "He can't go to work like that!"
"True," Eric admitted. He appealed to the god. "I think he's learned his lesson. How about turning him back? Okay?"
"You just better undo him!" Pat shrieked, clenching her small fists. "If you don't undo him you'll have Terran Metals after you. Even a god can't stand up to Horace Bradshaw."
"Better change him back," Eric said.
"It'll do him good," the god said. "I'll leave him that way for a couple of centuries --"
"Centuries!" Pat exploded. "Why, you little blob of slime!" She advanced ominously toward the box, shaking with wrath. "See here! You turn him back or I'll take you out of your box and drop you into the garbage disposal unit!"
"Make her be still," the god said to Eric.
"Calm down, Pat," Eric implored.
"I will not calm down! Who does it think it is? A present! How dare you bring this moldy bit of refuse into our house? Is this your idea of a --"
Her voice ceased abruptly.
Eric turned apprehensively. Pat stood rigid, her mouth open, a word still on her lips. She did not move. She was white all over. A solid gray-white that made cold chills leap up Eric's spine. "Good Lord," he said.
"I turned her to stone," the god explained. "She made too much noise." It yawned. "Now, I think I'll retire. I'm a little tired, after my trip."
"I can't believe it," Eric Blake said. He shook his head numbly. "My best friend a toad. My wife turned to stone."
"It's true," the god said. "We deal out justice according to how people act. They both got what they deserved."
"Can -- can she hear me?"
"I suppose."
Eric went over to the statue. "Pat," he begged imploringly. "Please don't be mad. It isn't my fault." He gripped her ice-cold shoulders. "Don't blame me! I didn't do it." The granite was hard and smooth under his fingers. Pat stared blankly ahead.
"Terran Metals indeed," the god grumbled sourly. Its single eye studied Eric intently. "Who is this Horace Bradshaw? Some local deity, perhaps?"
"Horace Bradshaw owns Terran Metals," Eric said gloomily. He sat down and shakily lit a cigarette. "He's about the biggest man on Terra. Terran Metals owns half the planets in the system."
"Kingdoms of this world do not interest me," the god said noncommittally, subsiding and shutting its eye. "I will retire now. I wish to contemplate certain matters. You may wake me later, if you wish. We can converse on theological subjects, as we did on the ship coming here."
"Theological subjects," Eric said bitterly. "My wife a stone block and it wants to talk about religion."
But the god was already withdrawn, retired into itself.
"A lot you care," Eric muttered. Anger flickered in him. "This is the thanks I get for taking you off Ganymede. Ruin my household and my social life. Fine god you are!"
No response.
Eric concentrated desperately. Maybe when the god awoke it would be in a better mood.
Maybe he could persuade it to turn Matson and Pat back to their usual forms. Faint hope stirred. He
Maybe he could persuade it to turn Matson and Pat back to their usual forms. Faint hope stirred. He
If nobody came looking for Matson.
The toad sat disconsolately on the walk, drooping with misery. Eric leaned toward it. "Hey, Matson!"
The toad looked slowly up.
"Don't worry, old man. I'll get it to turn you back. It's a cinch." The toad didn't stir. "A lead-pipe cinch," Eric repeated nervously.
The toad drooped a little more. Eric looked at his watch. It was late afternoon, almost four. Tom's shift at Terran began in half an hour. Sweat came out on his forehead. If the god went on sleeping and didn't wake up in half an hour -