The Year's Best Science Fiction 10

Dick Wilson describes himself as “a sometime novelist (three published and one going begging), but still basically a newsman”—although his job is now on the other side of the news fence, as chief of the news bureau at Syracuse University. He served his apprenticeship in sci-fi-fan amateur publications, and “on the rim of the copy desk at Fairchild Publications.” He got into newswork proper during World War II, when he was assigned (somewhere in New Guinea) to “pasting up Terry and the Pirates comic strips on the backs of old aerial photographs,” because they contained more up-to-date information than the official news.

He has worked on wire-service news desks in Chicago, Washington, and New York, for Transradio Press and then Reuters. “The Carson Effect” grew out of his own experience at the New York Reuters desk, trying to write a “forward-throwing” story for London on the eve of Caryl Chessman’s execution in California.

Andrew Grey sat tensely at the national news desk of The New York Times, remembering the last time he had been asked to write an impossible story.

He had been, then, in New York, and therefore North American, correspondent for an overseas wire service, European Press. A celebrated case at the time was that of Zeb Speed, a convicted killer who had spent a dozen years in the death house at Utah’s state prison while he prepared appeal after appeal based on his careful research in the prison library. Finally Speed’s resources appeared to be exhausted and the governor set the next day, a Friday, for Speed’s execution.

But Speed spent Thursday addressing last-ditch appeals to the Vatican, the White House, to every senator and to each of the Supreme Court justices. There were new developments every hour. Grey was trying frantically to keep up with the story, swallowing aspirin and black coffee as he revised and re-topped, when Paris sent him a service message requesting a forward-looking story under Friday’s date.

This request reached Grey at six p.m. He was in New York, covering the story from the machines of the American press services, making an occasional long-distance telephone call, and drawing on his knowledge of Utah’s death house, seen a year ago when he had covered a riot at the prison.

He knew the kind of story Paris wanted: a simple, straightforward piece with “today” in the first sentence. It might read:

SALT LAKE CITY, Feb. 4 (EP)—Zeb Speed, his last appeal denied, was due to choose whether he would die today by the hangman’s noose or by a squad of riflemen aiming at a tag pinned over his heart.

Speed, part-Indian convicted killer of 12 whose claim that his trial was unconstitutional, bolstered by appeals researched in the prison library . . .

That was what Euro wanted. The only trouble was that midnight, European time, being six p.m. New York time, was only four p.m. Utah time. There were Still eight hours of Thursday remaining for Zeb Speed. Anything Andy Grey wrote as a Friday story before midnight Utah time (eight a.m., Paris time) would be science fiction.

Not being a writer in that genre, he sent Euro a service message which read: “Regret fast-breaking developments in Utah, where it only four p.m. make tomorrow-dated story out of question. Propose cabling spot developments, leaving rewrite desk do forward-throwing piece as feel warranted.”

It was exactly this sense of caution which got Andrew Grey fired from his European Press job (Speed’s last appeal was denied and he was executed on Friday, choosing the firing squad) and hired by The New York Times.

Now Andy Grey sat hunched over his portion of the Times’ national news desk, trying to write, as responsibly as he could, a story far more difficult. A copy boy dropped the latest fragment of the story in front of him. He already had more facts than he needed. There were bits and pieces from all over.

When you hear the tone, it will be exactly 10:26 a.m., Eastern Standard Time.

Douglas Roche tried to walk casually from the door of the bank to the waist-high tables where the deposit and withdrawal slips were kept.

He’d never done anything like this before. He took a deep breath, wiped his sweating palms on the sides of his coat and picked up a pen. He printed on the back of a withdrawal slip: “Give me $10,000 in medium size bills. Don’t do anything crazy, this bottle is full of nitro.”

Roche was thirty-four years old, married, with three kids. He had a job that paid him $127 a week before deductions. He also had a mortgage, a second mortgage, a car, a deepfreeze, a new TV, a power lawn mower, a revolving charge account with three-figure balance, new storm windows and a bill three months overdue at the high-priced grocery store that delivered and gave credit.

He had two dollars and eighteen cents and a subway token in his pocket and his wife had just gone to the hospital to have an operation. They had let her in without payment in advance only because he promised to bring $200 at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. He didn’t have hospitalization; that had been one of the things he’d economized on. He’d also heard that surgeons charged up to a thousand dollars for a laminectomy. He hadn’t yet discussed fees with doctors. Oh, yes, there was the bookmaker. Roche owed him fifty bucks.

Doug Roche was no bank robber. He was just a man driven to the wall. But now he was a bank robber.

He got into the shortest line; only one person was ahead of him at the teller’s window. But the person was a woman with a wad of books and papers in her hand which she handed to the teller one by one: a deposit in the checking account; a payment on the personal loan; a deposit in the savings account; a money order to be cashed; a dollar in the Christmas Club. Finally she was finished.

Doug Roche thought for the last time of walking away. But there was nowhere to walk to. He shoved the note across the counter and opened his fist to show the little bottle containing a colorless liquid. It was only water, of course.

The teller looked up from the note and Roche made a small threatening motion with the bottle. At the same time he began to regret that he had demanded so much. Two thousand dollars would have got him out of his immediate troubles. Ten thousand might get him a bullet in the back from some hidden guard.

But the teller said: “Sure. Don’t worry; I won’t do anything foolish.” He began taking bills out of the drawer and stuffing them in a big manila envelope. Roche saw the wrappers on the wads of bills: $1,000; $5,000; $3,000; $50,000.

Almost hysterically, he said in a strangled voice: “That’s enough!”

“One more,” the teller said, and shoved in a thin stack whose wrapper said $100,000.

Roche tried to keep his voice steady as he said: “Okay. Don’t ring the alarm till I’m out the door or I throw the bottle right at you.

“Don’t worry,” the teller said again. Then he said: “God bless you.”

Roche, perspiring, so nervous that he nearly dropped the manila envelope, turned and walked toward the door. It took all his determination not to run. He went out into the shopping crowds, turned a corner and walked fast. He went into a department store and out the exit on the far end and took the subway out to Queens. But nobody chased him.

He got home and locked the door and pulled down the the shades. He put the manila envelope on the kitchen table and got a can of beer from the refrigerator and peeled it open. He took a big swig and lit a cigarette and counted his money.

. . . two hundred and twenty-three thousand six hundred and fifty dollars. $223,650.