Arthur Zagat - The Golden Age of Science Fiction Volume IX

A pleasant-faced man with a startled look said, “Oh—sorry. This gadget on the door-casing surprised me. Ah—I think my children, Jimmie and Jean, are here. I’m Bill MacDonald.”

Behind him Philon heard Jean suppress a dismayed cry. “Gosh, Jimmie, it’s late. Daddy’s had to come for us!”

Philon said, “And I’m Phil Miller, MacDonald. Come in. We’ll be down in a moment.”

The MacDonald children and John headed for the stairs in a happy rush, ignoring the descending escalator, two steps at a time. Philon followed at a meditative pace, his thoughts trooping stealthily abreast. Seventy thousand dollars. Now, if he were to….

“Beautiful home you’ve got here, Miller.”

Philon came out of his daydreaming to see MacDonald coming into view around the corner of a living room ell.

Philon took his extended hand. “Thanks. Glad you like it.”

Jean broke in breathlessly. “Oh, Daddy, you ought to see how they conduct classes—by school TV. You write on a glass square and it appears immediately at the teacher’s roll-board. And when you—”

Jimmie interrupted. “Aw, lemme tell ’im something too, Jean. Dad, John used a spare TV for Jean’s freshman class while we ‘showed’ for junior class on his. Gosh, in history, Dad, their old newsreels go back to World War Two. I even saw your Marine unit—”

MacDonald cut his son short. “That’s enough, Jimmie. You can tell us about it later.” He herded his children toward the front door. “Thanks, Miller, for letting the kids use the school TV. I’m having one installed tomorrow.”

After they left John said with a sparkle Philon had never seen before, “You know, Phil, those are the most interesting kids I’ve ever met. All the others I know are bored stiff. They’ve been everyplace and they’ve done everything.

“But Jimmie and Jean ask more questions about things than anybody I know. They’re really interested. Every time I drop in on them they’re studying history beginning with the middle of the Twentieth Century. They’re absolutely fascinated and read it like fiction.”

With more on his mind than his neighbors’ unusual behavior Philon said, “Mmm.” He stood looking at the boy for a long moment until John finally shifted self-consciously.

“What’s the matter, Phil?”

Philon ended his musing. “Tomorrow night we’re all going to call on the MacDonalds. And while we’re there I want you to slip that copy of the Smyth Report out of their library.”

For a moment the young boy’s smooth face was a blank mask. Then it filled in with shocked surprise, then resentment and finally anger. “You mean—steal?”

“Of course. If they’re too innocent to realize the value of the book that’s their hard luck.”

“But, Phil, I can’t imagine myself stealing from….”

Impatiently, Philon said, “Since when did you suddenly get so holier-than-thou? Life is harsh, life is iron-fisted and if you don’t keep your guard up you’re going to get socked in the kisser.”

John said slowly with a certain tone of shame, “Yes, I know. As far back as I can remember you’ve told me that. But in spite of it I can’t help feeling it isn’t right to treat the MacDonalds that way. They’re too nice, too good.”

“Look, John. You might as well learn the hard facts of life. All the high-sounding arguments for a moral world and all the laws on the books implementing those arguments are just eyewash. Sure, the President swears that he will uphold the constitution and enforce all the laws.

“Then we carefully surround him with counterspies—wire his rooms with dictaphones, slit his mail, install secret informers on his staff. All because no matter who the party is able to elect we don’t trust him—because the society he represents does not trust itself.”

“Is that why we have more and bigger jails than ever?”

Philon shrugged. “All I’m trying to tell you is don’t go soft-headed or the world will take your shirt.”

The next day before leaving for the office Philon said to his wife, “Call up the MacDonalds and if they’re going to be home tonight tell them we’ll be over for a visit.”

Ursula made a face. “Do we have to call on those people? They’ll bore me stiff.”

“For heaven’s sake, Ursula! It’s a matter of vital importance to me—and you also, if I have to appeal to your wide streak of selfishness.”

“I can’t see it.”

“I’ll explain later. I’ve got to go.”

During the day Ursula called him. “Well, Phil, I called as you said and I’ve committed us for dinner tonight.”

“Dinner! Hmm, they are convivial people.”

“Yes and the dinner is going to be cooked right there in their house. How vulgar can some people get?”

That evening while dressing Ursula said, “Phil, John spends a lot of time at the MacDonalds’. What do you suppose he sees in them? It gets me the way he quotes them all the time and reports their least doings. Today he came tearing into the house and said, ‘Ursula, it’s wonderful!’ I said, ‘What’s wonderful?’ And John said, ‘The dinner they’re cooking at MacDonalds’. I’ve never smelled anything like it in all my life. Why don’t we cook in our house like they do? Mrs. MacDonald was baking cookies and let me have one right out of the oven. Mmmm, boy was it good!’”

Ursula finished, “Now, I ask you, did you ever hear anything so barbaric—cooking in the house and having all the odors permeate the whole place?”

“Well, we’ll see.”

Later when they arrived at the MacDonalds’ they were welcomed with a quiet warmth and friendliness that Philon cynically assumed to be a new and different front.

As they sat down to dinner Mrs. MacDonald, a rosy-cheeked woman with a quick and ready smile, said, “I’m sorry we aren’t able to get a connection yet. So everything we’re eating tonight is right out of our deep-freeze.”

John Miller said, “Gosh, Mrs. MacDonald, as far as I’m concerned, I’d rather eat from your deep-freeze anytime than from the FP!”

Bill MacDonald looked across the table at Jean and said, “All right, Jean.”

Jean and all the MacDonalds bent their heads and the girl began, “We thank Thee for our daily bread as by Thy hands….”

As the girl spoke Phil’s gaze drifted around to his wife, who lifted her shoulders in mystified amazement. But it was a bigger surprise to see John’s bent head. For the moment John was a part of this family—part of a wholeness tied together by an invisible bond. The utter strangeness of it shocked Philon into rare clarity of insight.

He saw himself wrapped up in his business with little regard for Ursula or John, letting them exist under his roof without making them a part of his life. Ursula with her succession of gigolos and her psycho-plays and John withdrawn into his upstairs room with his books. Then he closed his mind again as if the insight were too blinding.

What strange customs these MacDonalds had! Yet he had to admit the meal looked more appetizing than anything he had ever seen. It gave an impression of sumptuous plenty to see the food for everybody in one place instead of individually packaged under glistening thermocel. And instead of throwaway dishes they used chinaware that could have come right out of a museum.

Ursula asked, “What kind of fish is this?”

Bill MacDonald answered with a big grin. “It’s Royal Chinook salmon that I caught in the fish derby on the Columbia River only last—”

Mrs. MacDonald colored suddenly. “You’ll have to forgive Bill. He gets himself so wrapped up in his fishing.”

Glancing at MacDonald Philon was surprised to see the same confusion and embarrassment on his host’s face.

It was after dinner when Mrs. MacDonald and Jean were clearing the table that Philon looked over the library shelves. MacDonald himself appeared uneasy and hovered in the background.