Odd! Very odd! It was the kind of proposition that made well-bred conductors remove their caps and scratch their heads. Conductor Cullen did so. It didn't help, but he repeated the process at Bergen Street, the next station, where again the first car lost not one of its population. And at Grand Army Plaza, he added to the headscratching process a few rare old Gaelic words that had passed down from father to son for hundreds of years. They ionized the surrounding atmosphere, but otherwise did not affect the situation.
At Eastern Parkway, Cullen tried an experiment. He carefully refrained from opening the first car's doors at all. He leaned forward eagerly, twisted his head and watched - and was treated to nothing short of a miracle. The New York subway rider is neither shy, meek nor modest, and doors that do not open immediately or sooner are helped on their way by sundry kicks. But this time there was not a kick, not a shriek, not even a modified yell. Cullen's eyes popped.
He was getting angry. At Franklin Avenue, where he again contacted the Express, he flung open the doors and swore at the crowd. Every door spouted commuters of both sexes and all ages, except that terrible first car. At those doors, three men and a very young girl got on, though Cullen could plainly see the slight bulging of the walls that the already super-crowded condition of the car had caused.
For the rest of the trip to Flatbush Avenue, Cullen ignored the first car completely, concentrating on that last stop where everyone would have to get off. Everyone! President, Church and Beverly Road were visited and passed, and Cullen found himself counting the stations to the Flatbush terminus.
They seemed like such a nice bunch of passengers, too. They read their newspapers, stared into the whirling blackness out the window, or at the girl's legs across the way, or at nothing at all, quite like ordinary people. Only, they didn't want to get out. They didn't even want to get into the next car, where empty seats filled the place. Imagine New Yorkers resisting the impulse to pass from one car to the other, and missing the chance to leave the doors open for the benefit of the draft.
But it was Flatbush Avenue! Cullen rubbed his hands, slammed the doors open and yelled in his best unintelligible manner, 'Lasstop!' He repeated it two or three times hoarsely and several in that damned first car looked up at him. There was reproach in their eyes. Have you never heard of the Mayor's anti-noise campaign, they seemed to say.
The last other passenger had come out of the train, and the scattered new ones were coming in. There were a few curious looks at the jammed car, but not too many. The New Yorker considers everything he cannot understand a publicity stunt.
Cullen fell back on his Gaelic once more and dashed up the platform toward the motorman's booth. He needed moral assistance. The motorman should have been out of his cab, preparing for his next trip, but he wasn't. Cullen could see him through the glass of the door, leaning on the controls and staring vacantly at the bumper-stop ahead.
'Gus!' cried Cullen. 'Come out! There's a hell of-'
At that point, his tongue skidded to a halt, because it wasn't Gus. It was a little old man, who smiled politely and twiddled his fingers in greeting.
Patrick Cullen's Irish soul rebelled. With a yelp, he grabbed the edge of the door and tried to shove it open. He should have known that wouldn't work. So, taking a deep breath and commending said Irish soul to God, he made for the open door and ploughed into the mass of haunted humans in that first car. Momentum carried him six feet, and then there he stuck. Behind him, those he had knocked down picked themselves up from the laps of their fellow-travelers, apologized with true New York courtesy (consisting of a growl, a grunt, and a grimace) and returned to their papers.
Then, caught helplessly, he heard the Dispatcher's bell. It was time for his own train to be on its way. Duty called! With a superhuman effort, he inched toward the door, but it closed before he could get there, and the train commenced to move.
It occurred to Cullen that he had missed a report for the first time, and he said, 'Damn!' After the train had travelled some fifty feet, it came to him that they were going the wrong way, and this time he said nothing.
After all, what was there to say - even in the purest of Gaelic.
How could a train go the wrong way at Flatbush Ave. There were no further tracks. There was no further tunnel. There was a bumper-stop to prevent eccentric motormen from trying to bore one. It was absurd. Even the Big Deal couldn't do it.
But there they were!
There were stations in this new tunnel, too - cute little small ones just large enough for one car. But that was all right, because only one car was travelling. The rest had somehow become detached, presumably to make the routine trip to Bronx Park.
There were maybe a dozen stations on the line - with curious names. Cullen noticed only a few, because he found it difficult to keep his eyes from going out of focus. One was Archangel Boulevard; another Seraph Road; still another Cherub Plaza.
And then, the train slid into a monster station, that looked uncommonly like a cave, and stopped. It was huge, about three hundred feet deep and almost spherical. The tracks ran to the exact center without trusses, and the platform at its side likewise rested comfortably upon air.
The conductor was the only person left in the car, the rest having mostly gotten off at Hosannah Square. He hung limply from the porcelain hand-grip, staring fixedly at a lip-stick advertisement. The door of the motorman's cabin opened and the little man came out. He glanced at Cullen, turned away, then whirled back.
'Hey,' he said, 'who are you?'
Cullen rotated slowly, still clutching the hand-grip. 'Only the conductor. Don't mind me. I'm quitting anyway. I don't like the work.'
'Oh dear, dear, this is unexpected.' The little man waggled his head and tch-tched. 'I'm Mr. Crumley,' he explained. 'I steal things. People mostly. Sometimes subway cars, - but they're such big, clumsy things, don't you think?'
'Mister,' groaned Cullen. 'I quit thinking two hours ago. It didn't get me anywhere. Who are you, anyway?'
'I told you - I'm Mr. Crumley. I'm practicing to be a god.'
'A gob?' said Cullen. 'You mean a sailor?'
'Dear, no,' frowned Mr. Crumley. 'I said, "god," as in Jehovah. Look!' He pointed out the window to the wall of the cave. Where his finger pointed, the rock billowed and rose. He moved his finger and there was a near ridge of rock describing a reversed, lower case 'h.'
That's my symbol,' said Crumley modestly. 'Mystic, isn't it? But that's nothing. Wait till I really get things organized. Dear, dear, will I give them miracles!'
Cullen's head swivelled between the raised-rock symbol and the simpering Mr. Crumley, until he began to get dizzy, and then he stopped.
'Listen,' he demanded hoarsely. 'How did you get that car out of Flatbush Avenue? Where did that tunnel come from? Are some of them foreigners -'
'Oh, my, no!' answered Mr. Crumley. 'I made that myself and willed it so that no one would notice. It was quite difficult. It just wears the ectoplasm right out of me. Miracles with people mixed up in it are much harder than the other kind, because you have to fight their wills. Unless you have lots of Believers, you can't do it.- Now that I've got over a hundred thousand, I can do it, but there was a time,' he shook his head reminiscently, 'when I couldn't even have levitated a baby - or healed a leper. Oh, well, we're wasting time. We ought to be at the nearest factory.'
Cullen brightened. 'Factory' was more prosaic. 'I once had a brother,' he said, 'who worked in a sweater factory, but-'
'Oh, goodness, Mr. Cullen. I'm referring to my Believers' Factories. I have to educate people to believe in me; don't I, and preaching is such slow work. I believe in mass production. Some day I intend to be called the Henry Ford of Utopia, Why, I've got twelve Factories in Brooklyn alone and when I manufacture enough Believers, I'll just cover the world with them.'