He turned again and strode off, with Artie, B. J. and Alvah in his wake.
THE room they entered was, from Alvah’s point of view, the worst he had struck yet. It was a hundred feet long by fifty wide, and everywhere―perched on the walls and on multi-leveled racks that ran the length of the room, darting through the air in flutters of brilliance―were tiny raucous birds, feathered in every prismatic shade, green, electric blue, violet, screaming red.
“Mark seven one-oh-three!” Bither shouted. The roomful of birds took it up in a hideous echoing chorus. An instant later, a sudden flapping sound turned itself into an explosion of color and alighted on the stocky man’s shoulder, preening its feathers with a blunt green beak. “Rrk,” it said and then, quite clearly, “Mark seven one-oh-three.”
The stocky man made a perch of one forefinger and handed the thing across to Artie’s shoulder. “I can’t give you this one. It’s the only copy I got. You’ll have to listen to it and remember what you need.”
“I’ll remember.” Artie glanced at the bird on his shoulder and said, “Magnus utility tree.”
The stocky man looked around, saw B. J. “Now, Beej, is it important? Because―”
“Magnus utility tree,” the bird was saying. “Thrives in all soils, over ninety-one per cent resistant to most rusts, scales and other infestations. Edible from root to branch. Young shoots and leaves excellent for salads. Self-fertilizing. Sap can be drawn in second year for―”
“Doc,” said the girl clearly, “this is Alvah Gustad. From New York. Alvah, meet Doc Bither.”
“―golden orangoes in spring and early summer, Bither aperries in late summer and fall. Will crossbreed with―”
“New York, huh?” said Bither. “You a long way from home, young―Excuse me. Artie?”
“―series five to one hundred fifteen. Trunks guaranteed straight and rectilinear, two-by-four at end of second year, four-by-six at―”
“I all set. Doc.”
“―mealie pods and winterberries―”
“Fine, all right.” He took B. J.‘s arm. “Let’s go someplace we can talk.”
“―absorb fireproofing and stiffening solutions freely through roots …”
BITHER led the way into a small, crowded room. “Now, he said, peering intently at Alvah, what’s the problem?”
B. J. explained briefly. Then they both stared at Alvah. Sweat was beaded coldly on his brow and his knees were trembling but he seemed to have stabilized the nausea just below the critical point. The idea, he told himself, was to convince yourself that the whole building was a realie stage and all the objects in it props. Wasn’t there a line to that effect in one of the classics―The Manager of Copenhagen, or perhaps Have It Your Own Way?
“What do you think?” Bither asked.
“Might try him out.”
“Um. Damn it, I wish we hadn’t run out of birds. Can you take this down for me, Beej? I’ll arrange for the Fair rental fee, Alvah, if you just answer a few questions.”
It sounded innocuous enough, but Alvah felt a twinge of suspicion. “What kind of questions?”
“Just personal questions, like how old, what you do for a living.”
“Twenty-six. I’m an actor.”
“Always been an actor?”
“No.”
“What else you done?”
“Labor.”
“What kind?” B. J. asked.
“Worked with his hands, he means,” Bither told her. “Parents laborers, too?”
“Yes.”
B. J. and Bither exchanged glances. Alvah shifted uncomfortably. If that’s all …”
“One or two more. I want you to tell me, near as you can, when was the first time you remember knowing that our clothes and our animals and us and all the things we make smelled bad?”
It was too much. Alvah turned and lurched blindly out the door. He heard their voices behind him:
“… minutes.”
“… alley door!”
Then there were hands on him, steering him from behind as he stumbled forward at a half-run. They turned him right, then left and finally he was out in the cool air, not a moment too soon.
When he straightened, wiping tears away, he was alone, but a moment later the girl appeared in the doorway.
“That’s all,” she said distantly. You can start your exhibition whenever you want.
IV
THE magic tricks went over fairly well―at least nobody yawned. The comic monologue, however, was a flat failure, even though the piece had been expertly slanted for a rural audience and, by all the laws of psychostatics, should have rated at least half a dozen boffs. (“So the little boy came moseying back up the road, and his grandpa said to him, ‘Why didn’t you drive them hogs out of the corn like I told you?’ And the little fellow piped up, ‘Them ain’t hogs―them’s shoats!’ ”)
Alvah launched hopefully into his sales talks and demonstrations.
The all-purpose fireless lifetime cooker was received with blank stares. When Alvah fried up a savory batch of proteinpaste fritters and offered to hand them out, nobody responded but one small boy, and his mother hauled him down off the platform stair by the slack of his pants.
Smiling doggedly, Alvah brought out the pocket-workshop power tools and accessories. This, it appeared, was more like it. An interested hum went up as he drilled three holes of various sizes in a bar of duroplast, then sawed through it from end to end and finally cut a mortise in one piece, a tenon in the other, and fitted them together. A few more people drifted in.
“And now, friends,” said Alvah, “if you’ll continue to give me your kind attention …”
The next item was the little giant power-plant for the home, shop or office. Blank stares again. Alvah picked out one Muckfoot in the front row―a blear-eyed, open-mouthed fellow, with hair over his forehead and a basket under his arm, who seemed typical―and spoke directly to him. He outdid himself about the safety, economy, efficiency and unobtrusiveness of a little giant power-plant. He explained its operation in words a backward two-year-old could understand.
“A little giant,” he concluded, leaning over the platform rail to stare hypnotically into the Muckfoot’s eyes, “is the power-plant for you!”
The fellow blinked, slowly produced a dark-brown lump of something from his pocket, slowly put it into his inattentive mouth, and as slowly began to chew.
Alvah breathed deeply and clutched the rail. “And now,” he said, giving the clincher, “the marvel of the age―the superspeed runabout!” He pressed the button that popped open a segment of the floater’s hull and lowered the gleaming little twowheeled car into view.
“Now, friends,” he said, “just to demonstrate the amazing qualities of this miracle of modern science―is there―any gentleman in the crowd who has an animal he fancies for speed?”
FOR the first time, the Muckfeet reacted according to the charts. Shouts rocketed up: “Me, by damn!” “Me!” “Right here, mister!” “Yes, sir!”
“Friends, friends!” said Alvah, spreading his hands. “There won’t be time to accommodate you all. Choose one of you to represent the rest!”
“Swifty!” somebody yelped, and other voices took up the cry. A red-haired young man began working his way back out of the crowd, propelled by gleeful shouts and slaps on the back.
Alvah took an indicator and began pointing out the salient features of the runabout. He had not got more than a quarter of the way through when the redhead reappeared, mounted astride an animal which, to Alvah’s revolted gaze, looked to be part horse, part lynx, part camel and part pure horror.