Fritz Leiber - The Green Millennium

Sacheverell said, “Mary, remind me to burn our black sweaters tomorrow morning.”

From the look on Juno’s face, Phil could tell that Jack had finally done something to please her.

But he had done it rather too late. The satisfaction washed out of Juno’s face and only the grimness was left as she said to him, “That million was just for you, Jack, or for you and Cookie until half a minute ago. Another thing, Billig isn’t going to pull out of this – and if he did he’s the kind of man who kills the people who save him. But even if you got your million, I wouldn’t take any part of it. Don’t get the idea that anybody, including that crazy green cat, has made me go soft. It’s just that I wouldn’t ever accept anything from you, Jack – not ever again.” Without a pause she turned to Phil and said, “Brimstine’s behind the counter in the Bug-Eyed Bar in All Pleasures Amusement Park. I’ll take you to the exact spot.”

At that moment, when everyone was watching Juno, a cool, scornful voice spoke from the dining room: “And we’ll be coming along.”

Phil’s head followed the others around. Standing in front of Lucky’s altar, his bulging forehead wrinkled with unsmiling amusement, was Carstairs. To his left stood Llewellyn, eyes gleaming in his impassive black face. To Carstairs’ right lounged Buck, yawning but watchful. Phil got the feeling that the hep-thugs were trying to look like the muzzles of the weapons they held with casual proficiency. Close beside Buck and a little behind him stood Mitzie Romadka.

Carstairs said, “We’ve been finding out some things about this green cat ourselves.” He could talk very softly because there wasn’t any noise in the room. “We think it would be a lot more desirable if we were the ones who sold the cat to Uncle Sammy. You people are going to help us get the cat. Incidentally, clown,” he addressed Phil, “your little girl friend here was responsible for our locating you people. Isn’t that so, Mitz?”

But Mitzie said nothing. To Phil, she looked remarkably pale, tight-lipped and miserable for a girl enjoying a revenge.

“Yes,” Carstairs continued, “she came whimpering to us a little while ago, asking us to kidnap you or something silly like that. Can you imagine, clown, your girl friend was stupid enough to think we’d be pleased at her and even do something for her, after we’d kicked her out of the gang and she’d skunked on us to Billig? Youthful illusions die hard. Well, instead of that she did something for us. After a little persuasion she told us all she knows about the green cat and you people, also some addresses – including this one.”

And now Phil saw that Mitzie was looking at him agitatedly and trying to speak, but couldn’t get her mouth open. He realized her mouth must be taped shut with some transparent, non-reflecting material. Buck noticed and twisted her wrist while thoughtfully watching her face.

Carstairs concluded, “There’s not much more to say. You and you and you” – and he stabbed a gun muzzle at Jack, Cookie and Sacheverell -”are staying here with my friend Llewellyn. Dear little Mitz will stay here too that’s partly in case you get any funny ideas, clown. The rest of you are coming along with Buck and me on a thrill-packed trip to All Pleasures. According to what Mitz tells us, you all may have useful angles on catching this cat for us. Transportation’s out in front.”

Juno got up with a sullen shrug. Dion for once was very quiet. Phil found himself wondering whether or not Opperly and Dytie had avoided the hep-thugs.

Mary Akeley took the dolls depicting Moe Brimstine and Dr. Romadka, put them in a big handbag, caught up a bolero jacket, and calmly announced, “Well, I’m ready.”

THIRD MILLENNIUM THRILLS!

1000 FEET OF FREE-FALL!

RECORDED KISSES AND HUGS!

Cuddle Your Favorite Star

Better Than Handies

YOUR MIND CLEARED IN TEN MINUTES!

Relive Your Childhood

You’ll Feel Ripping as a Rocket!

TEST YOUR STRENGTH AGAINST A BEM!

KILL MARTIANS!

THROW ROCKS AT GLAMOR GIRLS!

FLUORESCENT TATTOOS!

THOSEwere a few of the signs that flared and blared at Phil as he was marched across the springy, rubberized, plasti-bottle strewn grounds of All Pleasures Amusement Park.

The government crack-down on Fun Incorporated had produced a few tangible changes in Double AP, as far as Phil could judge from his last visit. The burlesque juke boxes were padlocked, the rubberoid figures that would shimmy orgiastically for a quarter were shrouded from view. Dresses were perhaps an inch higher than usual on the bosoms of the girls working in concessions. There didn’t seem to be any shifty-eyed gents recruiting special parties to meet a gambling robot or enjoy some other form of illegal entertainment. In front of the side show someone was painting out the sign that read, “See the Woman With Four Mammary Glands!” Phil noticed Dion looking up at this defacement rather wistfully.

Yet there was an uneasiness in the park, and it wasn’t just that the crowd was light. Barkers called out too suddenly and stopped too soon. Customers hesitated uncomfortable in front of concessions, then shuffled morosely on. Over-age glamor girls ready to dodge rubber rocks, or have their bedclothes or skirts jerked off when a spaceball hit its planet-simulating target, were a trifle hysterical in the challenges they shrilled at passing patrons. The cries coming faintly from the top of the 1,000 foot drop in the Spaceship Ride weren’t the usual terrified but delighted squeals; they sounded more like wails.

Perhaps the fall of Fun Incorporated had caused people who pathetically treasured their thrills, or the money to be made from them, to wonder, “What next?” Perhaps President Barnes’s rambling apocalyptic speeches had finally taken effect, making people ask themselves what they were getting from the so-called pleasures of life, especially the more highly advertised ones. Perhaps the government directive just now being barked from the public news-speakers for the destruction of all cats had given people a “We’d be safer at home” feeling.

Or it may have been that the uneasiness at Double AP was part of a general feeling gripping America, a feeling that had been gathering power in the unconscious and just now burst into thought, a feeling that something that even the government couldn’t handle was stalking invisibly, whether for good or ill, behind each man.

Of course, for Phil the menacing stalkers were two very definite figures: Carstairs and Buck, who at the moment were shepherding their unwilling assistants through the pupil of one of several surrealistic eyes that served as the entrances to the Bug-Eyed Bar.

Tonight the gaudy tavern was emptier than the Park outside. Its famous Ten-G Highballs and Stun-Gun Cocktails were going begging. Its notoriously drink-hungry hostesses were conspicuous by their absence. The only two customers were being served soda pop by the smaller of the two bartenders, making it very simple for Juno, Phil, Mary and Dion to climb onto pneumo-barstools in front of the other bartender. Carstairs and Buck stood close behind them.

Phil found it difficult to believe that the man in front of them was Moe Brimstine. For one thing, his hair was red, even to the stubble on his cheeks and chin. For another, the eyes that Moe had always kept behind dark glasses were as small and squinting as a pig’s. And although the fugitive from the FBL must recognize several of them, he didn’t show it in any way that Phil could discern. He looked them all over stolidly, polishing the speckless bar with the immemorial soiled towel. For that matter, the whole bar looked much as a bar might have looked fifty or a hundred years before; robots could not supervise B-girls, nor had they ever been legalized as bouncers.