Robert Heinlein: The Puppet Masters

I put on the kit they gave me and somebody handed me a jump bag, already packed. The Old Man had evidently been in Cosmetics, too; his skull was now covered by crisp curls of a shade just between pink and white. They had done something to his face, for the life of me I could not tell just what-but we were all three clearly related by blood and were all of that curious sub-race, the redheads.

"Come, Sammy," he said. "Time is short. I'll brief you in the car." We went up by a route I had not known about and ended up on the Northside launching platform, high above New Brooklyn and overlooking Manhattan Crater.

I drove while the Old Man talked. Once we were out of local control he told me to set it automatic on Des Moines, Iowa. I then joined Mary and "Uncle Charlie" in the lounge. He gave us our personal histories briefly and filled in details to bring us up to date. "So here we are," he concluded, "a merry little family party-tourists. And if we should happen to run into unusual events, that is how we will behave, as nosy and irresponsible tourists might."

"But what is the problem?" I asked. "Or do we play this one entirely by ear?"

"Mmmm . . . possibly."

"Okay. But when you're dead, it's nice to know why you're dead, I always say. Eh, Mary?"

"Mary" did not answer. She had that quality, rare in babes and commendable, of not talking when she had nothing to say. The Old Man looked me over, his manner not that of a man who can't make up his mind, but rather as if he were judging me as I was at that moment and feeding the newly acquired data into the machine between his ears.

Presently he said, "Sam, you've heard of 'flying saucers'."

"Huh? Can't say that I have."

"You've studied history. Come, now!"

"You mean those? The flying-saucer craze, 'way back before the Disorders? I thought you meant something recent and real; those were mass hallucinations."

"Were they?"

"Well, weren't they? I haven't studied much statistical abnormal psychology, but I seem to remember an equation. That whole period was psychopathic; a man with all his gaskets tight would have been locked up."

"But this present day is sane, eh?"

"Oh, I wouldn't go so far as to say that." I pawed back through the unused drawers of my mind and found the answer I wanted. "I remember that equation now-Digby's evaluating integral for second and higher order data. It gave a 93.7 percent certainty that the flying-saucer myth, after elimination of explained cases, was hallucination. I remember it because it was the first case of its type in the history of science in which the instances had been systematically collected and evaluated. Some sort of a government project, God knows why."

The Old Man looked benignly avuncular. "Brace yourself, Sammy. We are going to inspect a flying saucer today. Maybe we'll even saw off a piece for a souvenir, like true tourists."

"Seen a newscast lately?" the Old Man went on.

I shook my head. Silly question-I'd been on leave.

"Try it sometime," he suggested. "Lots of interesting things on the 'casts. Never mind. Seventeen hours-" he glanced at his finger watch and added, "-and twenty-three minutes ago an unidentified spaceship landed near Grinnell, Iowa. Type, unknown. Approximately disc-shaped and about one hundred fifty feet across. Origin, unknown, but-"

"Didn't they track a trajectory on it?" I interrupted.

"They did not," he answered, spacing his words. "Here is a photo of it taken after landing by Space Station Beta."

I looked it over and passed it to Mary. It was as unsatisfactory as a telephoto taken from five thousand miles out usually is. Trees looking like moss . . . a cloud shadow that loused up the best part of the pie . . . and a gray circle that might have been a disc-shaped space ship and could just as well have been an oil tank or a water reservoir. I wondered how many times we had bombed hydroponics plants in Siberia, mistaking them for atomic installations.

Mary handed the pic back. I said, "Looks like a tent for a camp meeting to me. What else do we know?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing! After seventeen hours! We ought to have agents pouring out of their ears!"

"Ah, yes. We did have. Two within reach and four that were sent in. They failed to report back. I dislike losing agents, Sammy, especially with no results."

Up to then I had not stopped to wonder about the Old Man himself being risked on a job-it had not looked like risk. But I had a sudden cold realization that the situation must be so serious that the Old Man had chosen to bet his own brain against the loss of the organization-for he was the Section. Nobody who knew him doubted his guts, but they did not doubt his horse sense, either. He knew his own value; he would not risk himself unless he believed coldly that it would take his own skill to swing it and that the job had to be done.

I felt suddenly chilly. Ordinarily an agent has a duty to save his own neck, in order to complete his mission and report back. On this job it was the Old Man who must come back-and after him, Mary. I stood number three and was as expendable as a paper clip. I didn't like it.

"One agent made a partial report," the Old Man went on. "He went in as a casual bystander and reported by phone that it must be a space ship although he could not determine its motive power. We got the same thing from the newscasts. He then reported that the ship was opening and that he was going to try to get closer, past the police lines. The last thing he said was, 'Here they come. They are little creatures, about-' Then he shut off."

"Little men?"

"He said, 'creatures'."

"Peripheral reports?"

"Plenty of them. The Des Moines stereocasting station reported the landing and sent mobile units in for spot cast. The pictures they sent out were all fairly long shots, taken from the air. They showed nothing but a disc-shaped object. Then, for about two hours, no pictures and no news, followed later by close ups and a new news slant."

The Old Man shut up. I said, "Well?"

"The whole thing was a hoax. The 'space ship' was a sheet metal and plastic fraud, built by two farm boys in some woods near their home. The fake reports originated with an announcer with more sense of humor than good judgment and who had put the boys up to it to make a story. He has been fired and the latest 'invasion from outer space' turns out to be a joke."

I squirmed. "So it's a hoax-but we lose six men. We're going to look for them?"

"No, for we would not find them. We are going to try to find out why triangulation of this photograph-" He held up the teleshot taken from the space station. "-doesn't quite jibe with the news reports-and why Des Moines stereo station shut up for a while."

Mary spoke up for the first time. "I'd like to talk with those farm boys."

I roaded the car about five miles this side of Grinnell and we started looking for the McLain farm-the news reports had named Vincent and George McLain as the culprits. It wasn't hard to find. At a fork in the road was a big sign, professional in appearance: THIS WAY TO THE SPACESHIP. Shortly the road was parked both sides with duos and groundcars and triphibs. A couple of hastily built stands dispensed cold drinks and souvenirs at the turn-off into the McLain place. A state cop was directing traffic.

"Pull up," directed the Old Man. "Might as well see the fun, eh?"

"Right, Uncle Charlie," I agreed.

The Old Man bounced out with only a trace of limp, swinging his cane. I handed Mary out and she snuggled up to me, grasping my arm. She looked up at me, managing to look both stupid and demure. "My, but you're strong. Buddy."

I wanted to slap her, but gave a self-conscious smirk instead. That poor-little-me routine from an agent, from one of the Old Man's agents. A smile from a tiger.