Philip Dick: Time Out of Joint

A lovely shiny red Tucker sedan sailed majestically by her. Both she and Sammy gazed after it.

"I do envy that woman," she murmured. The Tucker was as radical a car as the VW, and at the same time wonderfully styled. But of course it was too large to be practical. Still...

Maybe next year, she thought. When it's time to trade in this car. But you don't trade in VWs; you keep them forever.

At least the trade-in is high on VWs. We can get back our equity. At the street, the red Tucker steered out into traffic.

"Wow!" Sammy said.

She said nothing.

At seven-thirty that evening Ragle Gumm glanced out the living room window and spied their neighbors, the Blacks, groping through the darkness, up the path, obviously over to visit. The street light behind them outlined some object that Junie Black carried, a box or a carton. He groaned.

"What's the matter?" Margo asked. Across the room from him, she and Vic watched Sid Caesar on television.

"Visitors," Ragle said, standing up. The doorbell rang at that moment. "Our neighbors," he said. "I guess we can't pretend we're not here."

Vic said, "Maybe they'll go when they see the TV set on." The Blacks, ambitious to hop up to the next crotch of the social tree, affected a loathing for TV, for anything that might appear on the screen, from clowns to the Vienna Opera performance of Beethoven's _Fidelio_. Once Vic had said that if the Second Coming of Christ were announced in the form of a plug on TV, the Blacks would not care to be involved. To that, Ragle had said that when World War Three began and the H-bombs started falling, their first warning would be the conelrad signal on the TV set... to which the Blacks would respond with jeers and indifference. A law of survival, Ragle had said. Those who refused to respond to the new stimulus would perish. Adapt or perish... version of a timeless rule.

"I'll go let them in," Margo said. "Since neither of you are willing to bestir yourselves." Scrambling up from the couch she hurried to the front door and opened it. "Hello!" Ragle heard her exclaim. "What's this? What is it? Oh -- it's hot."

Bill Black's youthful, assured voice: "Lasagne. Put on some hot water--"

"I'll fix café espresso," Junie said, passing through the house to the kitchen with the carton of Italian food.

Hell, Ragle thought. No more work for tonight. Why, when they get on some new kick, do they have to trot it over here? Don't they know anybody else?

This week it's café espresso. To go with last week's fad: lasagne. Anyhow, it dovetails. In fact it probably tastes very good... although he had not gotten used to the bitter, heavy Italian coffee; to him it tasted burned.

Appearing, Bill Black said pleasantly, "Hi, Ragle. Hi, Vic." He had on the ivy-league clothes customary with him these days. Button-down collar, tight pants... and of course his haircut. The styleless cropping that reminded Ragle of nothing so much as the army haircuts. Maybe that was it: an attempt on the part of sedulous young sprinters like Bill Black to appear regimented, part of some colossal machine. And in a sense they were. They all occupied minor status posts as functionaries of organizations. Bill Black, a case in point, worked for the city, for its water department. Every clear day he set off on foot, not in his car, striding optimistically along in his single-breasted suit, beanpole in shape because the coat and trousers were so unnaturally and senselessly tight. And, Ragle thought, so obsolete. Brief renaissance of an archaic style in men's clothing... seeing Bill Black legging it by the house in the morning and evening made him feel as if he were watching an old movie. And Black's jerky, too-swift stride added to the impression. Even his voice, Ragle thought. Speeded up. Too high-pitched. Shrill.

But he'll get somewhere, he realized. The odd thing in this world is that an eager-beaver type, with no original ideas, who mimes those in authority above him right to the last twist of necktie and scrape of chin, always gets noticed. Gets selected. Rises. In the banks, in insurance companies, big electric companies, missile-building firms, universities. He had seen them as assistant professors teaching some recondite subject -- survey of heretical Christian sects of the fifth century -- and simultaneously inching their path up with all their might and main. Everything but sending their wives over to the administration building as bait...

And yet, Ragle rather liked Bill Black. The man -- he seemed young to him; Ragle was forty-six, Black no more than twenty-five -- had a rational, viable outlook. He learned, took in new facts and assimilated them. He could be talked to; he had no fixed store of morals, no verities. He could be affected by what happened.

For instance, Ragle thought, if TV should become acceptable in the top circles, Bill Black would have a color TV set the next morning. There's something to be said for that. Let's not call him "non-adaptive," just because he refuses to watch Sid Caesar. When the H-bombs start falling, conelrad won't save us. We'll all perish alike.

"How's it going, Ragle?" Black asked, seating himself handily on the edge of the couch. Margo had gone into the kitchen with Junie. At the TV set, Vic was scowling, resentful of the interruption, trying to catch the last of a scene between Caesar and Carl Reiner.

"Clued to the idiot box," Ragle said to Black, meaning it as a parody of Black's utterances. But Black chose to accept it on face value.

"The great national pastime," he murmured, sitting so that he did not have to look at the screen. "I'd think it would bother you, in what you're doing."

"I get my work done," Ragle said. He had got his entry off by six.

On the TV set, the scene ended; a commercial appeared. Vic shut off the set. Now his resentment turned toward advertisers. "Those miserable ads," he declared. "Why's the volume level always higher on ads than on the program? You always have to turn it down."

Ragle said, "The ads usually emanate locally. The program's piped in over the co-ax, from the East."

"There's one solution to the problem," Black said.

Ragle said, "Black, why do you wear those ridiculous-looking tight pants? Makes you look like a swabbie."

Black smiled and said, "Don't you ever dip into the _New Yorker_? I didn't invent them, you know. I don't control men's fashions; don't blame me. Men's fashions have always been ludicrous."

"But you don't have to encourage them," Ragle said.

"When you have to meet the public," Black said, "you're not your own toss. You wear what's being worn. Isn't that right, Victor? You're out where you meet people; you agree with me."

Vic said, "I wear a plain white shirt as I have for ten years, and an ordinary pair of wool slacks. It's good enough for the retail-produce business."

"You also wear an apron," Black said.

"Only when I'm stripping lettuce," Vic said.

"Incidentally," Black said, "how's the retail sales index this month? Business still off?"

"Some," Vic said. "Not enough to matter, though. We expect it to pick up in another month or so. It's cyclic. Seasonal."

To Ragle, his brother-in-law's change of tone was clear; as soon as business was involved -- his business -- he became professional, close-mouthed, tactical in his responses. Business was never really off, and always on the verge of improving. And no matter how low the national index dropped, a man's personal individual business was unaffected. Like asking a man how he feels, Ragle thought. He has to say he feels fine. Ask him how business is, and he either automatically says terrible or improving. And neither means anything; it's just a phrase.

To Black, Ragle said, "How's the retail sale of water? Market holding firm?"

Black laughed appreciatively. "Yes, people are still bathing and washing dishes."