So did Ross. He said, "Let's just go into this restaurant. I know we have no money—don't nag me please, Helena. We'll order, eat, not pay, and get arrested." He held up his hand at the protests.
"I said, get arrested. The smartest thing we could do. Obviously somebody's running this place—and it's not the stoops we've seen. The quickest way I know of to get to whoever's in charge is to get in trouble. And once they see us we can explain everything."
It made sense to them. Unfortunately the first restaurant they tried was corn-operated—from the front door on. So were the second to seventh. Ross tried to talk Bernie into slugging a pedestrian so they could all be jugged for disturbing the peace, but failed.
Helena noted at last that the women's wear shops had live attendants who, presumably, would object to trouble. They marched into one of the gaudy places, each took a dress from a rack and methodically tore them to pieces.
A saleslady approached them dithering and asked tremulously: "What for did you do that? Din't you like the dresses?"
"Well yes, very much," Helena began apologetically. "But you see, the fact is———"
"Shuddup!" Ross told her. He said to the saleslady: "No. We hated them. We hate every dress here.
We're going to tear up every dress in the place. Why don't you call the police?"
"Oh," she said vaguely. "All right," and vanished into the rear of the store. She returned after a minute and said, "He wants to know your names."
"Just say 'three desperate strangers,' " Ross told her.
"Oh. Thank you." She vanished again.
The police arrived in five minutes or so. An excited elder man with many stripes on his arms strode up to them excitedly as they stood among the shredded-rums of the dresses. "Where'd they go?" he demanded. "Didja see what they looked like?"
"We're them. We three. We tore these dresses up. You'd better take them along for evidence."
"Oh," the cop said. "Okay. Go on into the wagon. And no funny business, hear me?"
They offered no funny business. In the wagon Ross expounded on his theme that there must be directing intelligences and that they must be at the top. Helena was horribly depressed because she had never been arrested before and Bernie was almost jaunty. Something about him suggested that he felt at home hi a patrol wagon.
It stopped and the elderly stripe-wearer opened the door for them. Ross looked on the busy street for anything resembling a station house and found none.
The cop said, "Okay, you people. Get going. An' let's don't have no trouble or I'll run you in."
Ross yelled in outrage, "This is a frame-up! You have no right to turn us loose. We demand to be arrested and tried!"
"Wise guy," sneered the cop, climbed into the wagon and drove off.
They stood forlornly as the crowd eddied and swirled around them. "There was a plate of sandwiches at that party," Helena recalled wistfully. "And a ladies' room." She began to cry. "If only you hadn't acted so darn superior, Ross! I'll bet they would have let us have all the sandwiches we wanted."
Bernie said unexpectedly, "She's right. Watch me."
He buttonholed a pedestrian and said, "Duh."
"Yeah?" asked the pedestrian with kindly interest.
Bernie concentrated and said, "Duh. I yam losted. I yam broke. I losted all my money. Gimme some money, mister, please?"
The pedestrian beamed and said, "That is real tough luck, buddy. If I give you some money will you send it to me when you get some more? Here is my name wrote on a card."
Bernie said, "Sure, mister. I will send the money to you."
"Then," said the pedestrian, "I will give you some money because you will send it back to me. Good luck, buddy."
Bernie, with quiet pride, showed them a piece of paper that bore the interesting legend Twenty Dollars.
"Let's eat," Ross said, awed.
A machine on a restaurant door changed the bill for a surprising heap of coins and they swaggered hi, making beelines for the modest twin doors at the rear of the place. Close up the doors were not very modest, but after the initial shock Ross realized that there must be many on this planet who could not read at all. The washroom attendant, for instance, who collected the "dimes" and unlocked the booths. "Dime" seemed to be his total vocabulary.
By comparison the machines in the restaurant proper were intelligent. The three of them ate and ate and ate. Only after coffee did they spare a thought for Dr. Sam Jones, who should about then be .awakening with a murderous hangover aboard the starship.
Thinking about him did not mean they could think of anything to do.
"He's hi trouble," Bernie said. "We're in trouble. First things first."
"What trouble?" asked Helena brightly. "You got twenty dollars by asking for it and I suppose you can get plenty more. And I think we wouldn't have got thrown out of that party if—ah—we hadn't gone swaggering around talking as if we knew everything. Maybe these people here aren't very bright——"
Ross snorted.
Helena went on doggedly, "——not very bright, but they certainly can tell when somebody's brighter than they are. And naturally they don't like it. Would you like it? It's like a really old person talking to a really young person about nothing but age. But here when you're bright you make everybody feel bad every time you open your mouth."
"So," Ross said impatiently, "we can go on begging and drifting. But that's not what we're here for. The answer is supposed to be on Earth. Obviously none of the people we've seen could possibly know anything about genetics. Obviously they can't keep this machine civilization going without guidance. There must be people of normal intelligence around. In the government, is my guess."
"No," said Helena, but she wouldn't say why. She just thought not.
The inconclusive debate ended with them on the street again. Bernie, who seemed to enjoy it, begged a hundred dollars. Ross, who didn't, got eleven dollars hi singles and a few threats of violence for acting like a wise guy. Helena got no money and three indecent proposals before Ross indignantly took her out of circulation.
They found a completely automatic hotel at nightfall. Ross tried to inspect Helena's room for comfort and safety, but was turned back at the threshold by a staggering jolt of electricity.
"Mechanical house dick," he muttered, picking himself up from the floor. "Well," he said to her sourly, "it's safe. Good night."
And later hi the gents' room, to Bernie: "You'd think the damn-fool machine could be adjusted so that a person with perfectly innocent intentions could visit a lady——"
"Sure," said Bernie soothingly, "sure. Say, Ross, frankly, is this Earth exactly what you expected it to be?"
The attendant moved creakily across the floor and said hopefully, "Dune?"
13
THEIR second day on the bum they accumulated a great deal of change and crowded into a telephone booth. The plan was to try to locate their starship and find out what, if anything, could be done for Sam Jones.
An automatic Central conferred with an automatic Information and decided that they wanted the Captain of the Port, Baltimore Rocket Field.
They got the Port Captain on the wire and Ross asked after the starship. The captain asked, "Who wan'sta know, huh?"
Ross realized he had overdone it and shoved Bernie at the phone. Bernie snorted and guggled and finally got out that he jus' wannit ta know. The captain warmed up immediately and said oh, sure, the funny-lookin' ship, it was still there all right.
"How about the fella that's in it?"
"You mean the funny-lookin' fella? He went someplace."
"He went someplace? What place?"
"Someplace. He went away, like. I din't see him go, mister. I got plenty to do without I should watch out for every dummy that comes along."
"T'anks" said Bernie hopelessly at Ross's signal.