Pohl Frederik: The Midas Plague

Howland said, “Go on, run it. I can’t go until you put it in the works.”

Morey grinned and pushed the button. The board lighted up; within it, a tiny metronomic beep began to pulse. That was all. At the other end of the quarter-mile shed, Morey knew, the automatic sorters and conveyers were fingering through the copper reels and steel ingots, measuring hoppers of plastic powder and colors, setting up an intricate weaving path for the thousands of individual components that would make up Bradmoor’s new K-50 Spin-a-Game. But from where they stood, in the elaborately muraled programing room, nothing showed. Bradmoor was an ultra-modernized plant; in the manufacturing end, even robots had been dispensed with in favor of machines that guided themselves.

Morey glanced at his watch and logged in the starting time while Howland quickly counter-checked Morey’s raw-material flow program.

“Checks out,” Howland said solemnly, slapping him on the back. “Calls for a celebration. Anyway, it’s your first design, isn’t it?”

“Yes. First all by myself, at any rate.”

Howland was already fishing in his private locker for the bottle he kept against emergency needs. He poured with a flourish. “To Morey Fry,” he said, “our most favorite designer, in whom we are much pleased.”

Morey drank. It went down easily enough. Morey had conscientiously used his liquor rations for years, but he had never gone beyond the minimum, so that although liquor was no new experience to him, the single drink immediately warmed him. It warmed his mouth, his throat, the hollows of his chest; and it settled down with a warm glow inside him. Howland, exerting himself to be nice, complimented Morey fatuously on the design and poured another drink. Morey didn’t utter any protest at all.

Howland drained his glass. “You may wonder,” he said formally, “why I am so pleased with you, Morey Fry. I will tell you why this is.”

Morey grinned. “Please do.”

Howland nodded. “I will. It’s because I am pleased with the world, Morey. My wife left me last night.”

Morey was as shocked as only a recent bridegroom can be by the news of a crumbling marriage. “That’s too ba—I mean is that a fact?”

“Yes, she left my beds and board and five robots, and I’m happy to see her go.” He poured another drink for both of them. “Women. Can’t live with them and can’t live without them. First you sigh and pant and chase after ’em—you like poetry?” he demanded suddenly.

Morey said cautiously, “Some poetry.”

Howland quoted: “’How long, my love, shall I behold this wall between our gardens—yours the rose, and mine the swooning lily.’ Like it? I wrote it for Jocelyn—that’s my wife—when we were first going together.”

“It’s beautiful,” said Morey.

“She wouldn’t talk to me for two days.” Howland drained his drink. “Lots of spirit, that girl. Anyway, I hunted her like a tiger. And then I caught her. Wow!”

Morey took a deep drink from his own glass. “What do you mean, wow?” he asked.

“Wow” Howland pointed his finger at Morey. “ Wow, that’s what I mean. We got married and I took her home to the dive I was living in, and wow we had a kid, and wow I got in a little trouble with the Ration Board—nothing serious, of course, but there was a mixup— and wow fights.

“Everything was a fight,” he explained. “She’d start with a little nagging, and naturally I’d say something or other back, and bang we were off. Budget, budget, budget; I hope to die if I ever hear the word ‘budget’ again. Morey, you’re a married man; you know what it’s like. Tell me the truth, weren’t you just about ready to blow your top the first time you caught your wife cheating on the budget?”

“Cheating on the budget?” Morey was startled. “Cheating how?”

“Oh, lots of ways. Making your portions bigger than hers. Sneaking extra shirts for you on her clothing ration. You know.”

“Damn it, I do not know!” cried Morey. “Cherry wouldn’t do anything like that!”

Howland looked at him opaquely for a long second. “Of course not,” he said at last. “Let’s have another drink.”

Ruffled, Morey held out his glass. Cherry wasn’t the type of girl to cheat. Of course she wasn’t. A fine, loving girl like her—a pretty girl, of a good family; she wouldn’t know how to begin.

Howland was saying, in a sort of chant, “No more budget. No more fights. No more ‘Daddy never treated me like this.’ No more nagging. No more extra rations for household allowance. No more—Morey, what do you say we go out and have a few drinks? I know a place where—”

“Sorry, Howland,” Morey said. “I’ve got to get back to the office, you know.”

Howland guffawed. He held out his wristwatch. As Morey, a little unsteadily, bent over it, it tinkled out the hour. It was a matter of minutes before the office closed for the day.

“Oh,” said Morey. “I didn’t realize—Well, anyway, Howland, thanks, but I can’t. My wife will be expecting me.”

“She certainly will,” Howland sniggered. “Won’t catch her eating up your rations and hers tonight.”

Morey said tightly, “Howland!”

“Oh, sorry, sorry.” Howland waved an arm. “Don’t mean to say anything against your wife, of course. Guess maybe Jocelyn soured me on women. But honest, Morey, you’d like this place. Name of Uncle Piggotty’s, down in the Old Town. Crazy bunch hangs out there. You’d like them. Couple nights last week they had—I mean, you understand, Morey, I don’t go there as often as all that, but I just happened to drop in and—”

Morey interrupted firmly. “Thank you, Howland. Must go home. Wife expects it. Decent of you to offer. Good night. Be seeing you.”

He walked out, turned at the door to bow politely, and in turning back cracked the side of his face against the door jamb. A sort of pleasant numbness had taken possession of his entire skin surface, though, and it wasn’t until he perceived Henry chattering at him sympathetically that he noticed a trickle of blood running down the side of his face.

“Mere flesh wound,” he said with dignity. “Nothing to cause you least conshter—consternation, Henry. Now kindly shut your ugly face. Want to think.”

And he slept in the car all the way home.

It was worse than a hangover. The name is “holdover.” You’ve had some drinks; you’ve started to sober up by catching a little sleep. Then you are required to be awake and to function. The consequent state has the worst features of hangover and intoxication; your head thumps and your mouth tastes like the floor of a bear-pit, but you are nowhere near sober.

There is one cure. Morey said thickly, “Let’s have a cocktail, dear.” Cherry was delighted to share a cocktail with him before dinner. Cherry, Morey thought lovingly, was a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful-He found his head nodding in time to his thoughts and the motion made him wince.

Cherry flew to his side and touched his temple. “Is it bothering you, darling?” she asked solicitously. “Where you ran into the door, I mean?”

Morey looked at her sharply, but her expression was open and adoring. He said bravely, “Just a little. Nothing to it, really.”

The butler brought the cocktails and retired. Cherry lifted her glass. Morey raised his, caught a whiff of the liquor and nearly dropped it. He bit down hard on his churning insides and forced himself to swallow.

He was surprised but grateful: It stayed down. In a moment, the curious phenomenon of warmth began to repeat itself. He swallowed the rest of the drink and held out his glass for a refill. He even tried a smile. Oddly enough, his face didn’t fall off.