The Year's Best Science Fiction 10

By the time he had finished a second can of beer he had counted the money five times. It always came to the same amount. Just under a quarter of a million dollars. He felt numb.

After a while he took a ten-dollar bill from one of the stacks and put the rest in a paper bag, which he hid under the sink among other paper bags containing potatoes and onions.

He went out intending to buy a bottle of whiskey and get drunk. Instead he came back with a take-out order from a Chinese restaurant and ate his first full meal in days.

Later he took out the money and counted it again. Minus the ten dollars, it came to $223,640. He began to laugh and couldn’t stop himself. For a long time he laughed hysterically, lying on the bed and muffling his face in the pillow.

Finally he got up, washed, shaved and put on a clean shirt. He took $200, put the rest back under the sink and went to see his wife in the hospital.

When you hear the tone, it will be exactly 2:17 p.m., Eastern Standard Time.

Freida Barring—some of the older women in the office called her Theda Bara in fun, as she was anything but a glamor girl—went hesitantly to the head bookkeeper’s cubicle. She was nervous because the expense money she wanted to collect was a whole $3.65 and the man who’d authorized it had quit a month ago. He had forgotten to sign a petty-cash slip. It would be Freida’s word against the company’s.

What happened was that the assistant sales manager, the man who’d quit, had asked her to take a cab downtown and pick up some papers he needed right away. He’d told her to have the cab wait and it had waited what seemed to Freida a long time.

It was a complicated story to have to explain and she dreaded the ordeal she faced with the head bookkeeper of Schlarf & Son, a man notoriously reluctant to part with a nickel.

But today the head bookkeeper, a gray-haired man in his fifties, was almost jovial. “Ah, Miss Barring,” he said. “What can we do for you? Sit down, sit down.”

Freida sat on the edge of the chair and said: “It’s about a petty-cash slip. I had to take a cab for Mr. Westfall— this was before he left—and it’s $3.65. That includes a 35-cent tip and I laid it out, but if you don’t think I should have tipped the driver, then it’s only $3.30. I mean Mr. Westfall didn’t specifically say to tip him and maybe Schlarf & Son don’t authorize—”

The head bookkeeper held up a hand. “The tip is authorized, Miss Barring, of course. Here.” He opened a drawer and lifted the lid of a metal box filled with bills and change. “Three dollars and sixty-five cents even. Just sign this slip.”

Freida signed and took the money. She got up to go, tremendously relieved. This was wonderful. Now she could pay the electric-light bill before next payday, by which time they would have shut off the electricity.

“Don’t go, Miss Barring,” the head bookkeeper said. “There’s another little matter we can settle as long as you’re here.” He smiled in a sad-kind way which filled Freida with dread. Were they going to fire her for her audacity in demanding the cab fare? Had they found out about the half dozen boxes of paper clips she’d taken home to make that stupid mobile hanging from the ceiling of her kitchenette?

But the head bookkeeper was saying: “. . . your pension plan. We find you’ve overpaid your share by $34 a year. And since you’ve been with Schlarf & Son a trifle over 12 years, we owe you $414.80. Plus interest, of course.”

He began counting out the money in twenties and tens. It made quite a pile on the desk.

“I hope you don’t mind taking it in cash, Miss Barring,” he said. “You see, our check-writing machine has broken down.”

In a daze, Freida took the money and put it in her bag.

“And now, Miss Barring, Mr. Schlarf has asked me if you’ll show that you forgive him by taking the rest of the day off.”

Freida stammered: “But it’s only two-thirty . ..”

“To be sure. But Mr. Schlarf thought you might have some shopping to do. A new hat, maybe. You have a beautiful day for it.”

When you hear the tone, it will be exactly 3:49 p.m., Eastern Standard Time.

Billy Boyce, aged six, was going shopping. He had saved up seventy-four cents to buy his mother a birthday present. His sister, aged fourteen, gave him twenty-six cents more, which made it an even dollar, and said she’d pay the sales tax.

They were on Fifth Avenue and had walked past many fascinating windows. There was a five-and-ten around the corner.

“Do I hafta go to the five-and-ten?” Billy asked. “Do I haf ta?”

“You’ve only got a dollar,” his big sister said. “Where do you want to go—to Tiffany’s?”

“Sure, Tiffany’s,” Billy said. It sounded nice.

Eunice, his sister, thought why not? She was going to be fifteen soon and in a few years she’d be eighteen and maybe by then somebody would have proposed. She’d never been to Tiffany’s or anywhere like it. It would be a good idea to see what they had, just in case. She could always tell the clerk that she was just humoring her little brother.

“As a special favor to you, Billy,” Eunice said, “we’ll go to Tiffany’s. But don’t be disappointed if you don’t have enough money. They’re expensive in there.”

“Okay,” Billy said, “but I got a whole dollar.”

Such nice things they had! Rings and necklaces and brooches (Eunice called them broaches) and earrings and pendants and lockets and especially rings and necklaces.

“I want that one for mommy,” Billy said, pointing to a glittering diamond necklace resting in a velvet box. There was a discreet price tag: $6,760 plus F. T.

Eunice smiled at the clerk to show she was humoring her little brother. The clerk smiled back. “It is nice, isn’t it?” he said. “We’re having a special on that one today.”

She could imagine. Even at 10% off it would be . . . 6,760 minus 676 equaled whatever it equaled, plus 10% back on for the federal tax.

“Do you have anything a little . . . you know, not quite so gaudy?” she asked, to show him that it was a question of taste, not price.

“This is, if I may say so, not gaudy,” the clerk said. “And if the young man really wants it for his mother...”

“I want it,” Billy said. “I got a whole dollar.”

The clerk smiled and Eunice was mortified.

“That’s not quite enough,” the clerk said. “You see, there’s the ten percent federal tax and the four percent sales tax. I’m afraid this necklace comes to one dollar and fourteen cents.”

“But I only got a dollar,” Billy said. Eunice was glaring at the clerk.

“Perhaps,” he said, “the young man would care to have us spread the payments over three months—say forty cents down and forty cents a month for the next two months? That would include the credit charge.”

“Don’t kid him, mister,” Eunice said. “He’s just a little boy.” She was so embarrassed. “Don’t you have a nice...sweater clasp or something?”

“No, miss,” the clerk said, smiling. “We have nothing like that in my section. And I am anxious to make this sale. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll pay the federal tax myself. That leaves it at a dollar four. Do you have four cents you might lend him?”

Eunice was a woman of the world, as she had often told herself. There are times when you must seize the opportunity or call the bluff. She took a nickel out of her pocket-book and put it on the counter. “There,” she said. “We’ll take it, Mr. Smarty Pants. Give him your dollar, Billy.”

Billy dutifully took the crumpled bill out of his pocket and put it on the counter. “Could you wrap it up nice?” he asked.