Mack Reynolds: Earth Unaware

“Coming up now.” Ed dropped the lift lever and drifted into the Old Coffee House’s parking area. It was far enough out of the city’s center for parking to be above ground. Even as he went through the motions of killing the Volkshover’s life, opening the door for her, and escorting her toward the brilliantly lighted coffee shop, Ed Wonder was muttering inwardly. Why didn’t he go into business … didn’t money make any difference at all? Ha! Why didn’t he raise walruses in goldfish bowls?

“Let’s sit at the counter,” Helen said. “Order for me while I freshen up.” She was off to the ladies’ room.

Ed took a stool at the counter.

Dave Zeiss came up and they swapped standardized amenities. Ed made his request for credit, which was accepted, ordered the coffee.

He said, “Listen, how about turning off that screen and the juke box? Between the two, I can’t hear my marbles rattle.”

Dave chuckled appreciatively. “I never before did hear that one, Mr. Wonder. You radio guys always got them on tap. How come you don’t like no music, being in the business and all?”

“That’s the exact reason I don’t like no music,” Ed growled. “Just because three quarters of the country doesn’t have anything to do but sit and stare at their idiot boxes, giving me a job supplying something for them to stare at, or listen to, doesn’t mean I have to like it too.”

Dave was shaking his head. “Gees, I’m sorry, Mr. Wonder, but I can’t turn them off. I got other customers. You know how folks are. They go squirrel if it gets too quiet. If there wasn’t no music going on, they’d go to the next joint.”

“I wanted to do some serious talking with the lady I’m with.”

“I tell you, Mr. Wonder, I’d like to do it, but it wouldn’t do no good, even if I did. Even if they did stick around, they’d just start tuning in their portables. There’s hardly anybody anymore doesn’t carry around at least a portable radio, usually a TV.”

A new voice said, “Little Ed Wonder! Horatio Alger’s representative on radio!”

Ed looked around. “Hi, Buzzo. How’s the demon reporter? How the devil do you ever hold a job dressed like a bum?”

The other said, “I seldom do, Little Ed. Seldom do, you old clothes horse.”

Ed said, screwing up his nose, “What do they make your cigars out of, rolled up army blankets?”

De Kemp took the object in question from his mouth and looked at it fondly. “This isn’t a cigar, it’s a stogie. When I was a kid I saw Tyrone Power playing a Mississippi gambler and smoking stogies. Never forgot it. A great Mississippi steamboat gambler was lost in me, Little Ed. I’ve got the soul for it. It’s a shame the sidepaddle river boat ever went out.”

Ed caught a glimpse of Helen returning to him and swiveled on his stool to help her to a place. Then his eyes bugged. He opened his mouth, couldn’t think of anything to say and closed it again.

Buzz De Kemp, his back to Helen so that he hadn’t seen her coming up, said, “Little Ed, what’s this gaff I hear about you playing up to some rich society dame? Somebody said you were trying to marry the boss’ daughter. You getting tired of working, chum? She hasn’t got a friend, has she?”

Ed Wonder closed his eyes in mute agony.

Helen looked her aristocratic look down her straight nose at the reporter. “What is this?” she said to Ed, not, Who is this?

Ed groaned. “Miss Fontaine, may I present Buzz De Kemp, of the Times-Tribune . That is, if he’s still got the job. Buzz—Helen.”

Buzz shook his head. “Phooey. You can’t be Helen Fontaine. Big glamour girl type. All jigged up hair styles, makeup that takes a couple of hours to plaster on. I’ve seen pictures of Helen…”

Helen turned to Ed, almost defensively. She said, “I washed my face and combed out my hair, just to get more comfortable. It must have been filthy in that tent. I absolutely itched .” She took the coffee and stirred sugar into it.

Ed Wonder couldn’t keep from staring at her. He said, “Listen, Helen, you didn’t take that old duffer’s sounding off seriously, did you?”

“Don’t be silly,” she said, watching the waiter fill her cup again. “It was simply dirty in that tent—I suppose.”

“What’s everybody talking about? What tent?” Buzz asked.

Ed said impatiently, “Helen and I went to a supposed revival meeting. Some offbeat crank named Ezekiel Joshua Tubber.”

“Oh, Tubber,” Buzz said. “I wanted to do up a couple of articles about him but the city editor said nobody was interested in new religious cults.”

Helen looked at him, as though for the first time. “You’ve been to his meetings?”

“That’s right. I’ve got a phobia for offbeat political economy theories. Regular phobia.”

To keep the conversation going along the present path, in wishful prayer that it would never get back to Buzz’s crack about trying to marry the boss’ daughter, Ed said, “Political economy? He’s supposed to be a religious twitch, not an economist.”

Buzz took a long drink of coffee before answering. He put the cup down and pointed at Ed with his stogie. “Where religion lets off and socio-economics begins can be a moot question, Little Ed. You’ll find most of the world’s religions have a foundation in the economic system of their time. Take Judaism. When Moses laid down those laws of his, chum, they covered every aspect of the nomad life of the Jews. Property relationships, treatment of slaves, treatment of servants and employees, money questions. The works. Same thing with Mohammedism.”

Ed said, “That was a long time ago.”

Buzz grinned at him and stuck the stogie back in his mouth. He said around it, “Want a more recent example? Take Father Divine. Ever heard of his movement? It started back in the big depression, and, believe me, if the Second War hadn’t come along Father Divine’s so-called religion might have swept the country. Because why? Because it was basically a socio-economic movement. It fed people at a time when a lot were going hungry. It was sort of a primitive communism. Everybody tossed everything he had into the common kitty. If you didn’t have anything to toss, that was okay too, you were still welcome. And then everybody worked, fixing up the delapidated old mansions they bought into what they called heavens. Those who could, got jobs on the outside as maids, chauffeurs, cooks or whatever, and the cash they brought in went into the kitty too. When a heaven saved up enough money and when enough new converts came along, they bought another old mansion and fixed up another heaven. Oh, it was going great guns until the war came along and things boomed and everybody hurried off to make a hundred dollars a week welding in the shipyards.”

Helen said, “What you say might apply to Father Divine and the Mohammedans, but not all religions are, well, economic.”

Buzz De Kemp looked at her. “That’s not exactly the way I put it. But, anyway, name one.”

“Don’t be silly. Christianity.”

Buzz threw back his head and laughed. He ground his stogie out. He said, “Who was it that said if Christianity hadn’t come along when it did, it would have been to the advantage of the Romans to invent it? And maybe they did.”

“Why, you’re insane. The Romans persecuted the Christians. Anybody knows that who’s read anything at all about history.”

“At first they persecuted them, but they made it the State religion after catching on to the fact that it was the perfect religion for a slave society. It promised pie in the sky when you died. Suffer on earth, and you get your just desert after death. What could be a better creed to keep an exploited population quiet?”