Part 3

"Only that the Security Council meeting's been postponed to tomorrow, she says. Will you ask Collie about that? I want to tell John Hyatt he's just lost a staffer."

Collie checked and confirmed that the meeting had been put off and gave us a story to that effect.

Soon afterward the Gov-alien cavalcade reached the Waldorf and holed up for the night. Reb Sylvester, who had been assigned to the Presidential party, gave us the word that the lid was on, meaning that Josh had told the press there'd be no more news today. Gov was putting the finishing touches to his speech and the Monolithians were preparing theirs.

It was turning out to be the dullest big story of the century.

"Mark my words," Stew reminded me.

"Which ones?" I asked him. "That it's a complete bust, or that it's going to erupt?"

Stew merely grinned.

Fortunately for the file, a good torso murder turned up in a coin locker at Grand Central and that occupied us until it was time for me to go catch my bus.

4 (JULY 25, FRI.)

We come from a world where we have known incredible standards of excellence....

--Thornton Wilder

President Allison, the dozen aliens, and their entourage rolled smoothly down to United Nations headquarters in their limousines and were whizzed up to the 38th-floor skyscraper office of Nils Nilsen.

They ignored a ramshackle group of writers who were picketing in UN Plaza. Two of the writers wore beards and all of them looked self-conscious. One of the placards they carried said: SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS' GUILD--ALIENS UNFAIR TO SCIENCE FICTION. Another said: SPACEMEN GO HOME; YOU'RE RUINING OUR RACKET. A handful of subteenagers, clutching copies of _Galaxy_ and _Fantasy & Science Fiction_, gave them an occasional cheer and occasionally a new arrival sought an autograph. The UN police looked on tolerantly. One of them said: "Poor guys. First sputniks. Then Moon rockets. Now this."

The President, the Secretary-General and the aliens, each of whom had picked up a dispatch case to go with his Earth-style suit, came down the elevator and went to the Security Council chamber.

The Council was called to order. Allison read his speech proposing membership for Monolithia. The chief delegate of the space nation was invited to address the Council. He read his speech, five hundred words of platitudes which didn't deviate by a comma from the advance copy Eurydice Playfair had delivered to the wire service overnight.

The Council voted unanimously, 11 to 0, to recommend that Monolithia be admitted. The Council adjourned and Nils Nilsen called the General Assembly into extraordinary session for that afternoon. The Assembly met at 3 P.M., unanimously voted Monolithia in, then adjourned until its regular September session.

The UN thus became an interplanetary organization, with Monolithia pledged to uphold its peaceful humanitarian aims.

It had been an easy story for the desk to handle and we had it all wrapped up before my relief came in.

Then Riddie called and said the aliens had scheduled their first press conference for 6 P.M. in her suite at the Waldorf. I asked John Hyatt if he wanted me to cover it.

"I don't think you need bother, Sam," he said. "The reinforcements from Chicago arrived this morning. We'll send Red Melville and a couple of his juniors to help Reb. They haven't had a big story since the Chicago fire."

"Okay, John. I'd as soon watch it on television."

As I was driving home from the end of the bus line I heard on the car radio that Congress had voted to give the Monolithians the freedom of the United States. The Senate, reassured by the aliens' acceptance of the principles of the UN, had originated the bill and the House immediately shouted it through. The President signed it on his return from New York, saying it gave him great pleasure inasmuch as it granted the visitors from space all the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship.

Mae fixed us an armchair buffet and we ate while we watched the press conference on TV.

There was the usual milling around at the start. I saw Reb Sylvester, putting in overtime, and Red Melville and a few other reporters I recognized from the wire services and papers. Eurydice Playfair and two of the aliens sat at a table on which was a cluster of microphones. An announcer for the television network was describing what we were seeing and giving us background information we already knew.

"I see your friend Eurydice is doing all right for herself," Mae said, full of those overtones a wife has for any female in the office who is under sixty.

"Mn," I said. "She quit us. Shh."

The television announcer made some introductory remarks, then Riddie made some and introduced one of the aliens (who were wearing their Young Men's suits) as Mr. Reev. She spelled the name.

"Are there any questions?" she asked, and there was a roar of laughter as dozens of hands shot up.

Reev, smiling, indicated the AP man, who asked where exactly Monolithia was.

Reev began an involved answer which Riddie interrupted, saying a fact sheet containing technical data would be distributed after the press conference.

The UPI man asked what Reev's exact title was.

"Permanent representative to the United Nations from Monolithia," he replied.

WW's Reb Sylvester, apparently referring to Stew Macon's piece on the definition of monolithic, noted that this referred to any massive homogeneous whole, such as a state or an organization. "Is there any significance to this term," he asked, "which as you know has been applied in the past to the government of the Soviet Union?"

"We have no connection with the Soviet Union," Reev said, "except those we have established with it and more than eighty other countries through the United Nations." He added with a smile: "As your definitions note, we are homogenized, like your milk."

Amid laughter, Reb asked: "Would you describe your government as a democratic one?"

"Utterly," Reev said. There was no trace of accent in his speech. The clicking Ian McEachern had noticed in the voice of the Monolithian he had spoken to on the phone at Burning Tree was entirely absent, as if they had perfected their study of English.

A Canadian Press man noted that "reeve" is a term his country uses for the president of a village or town council, and asked if there was any significance in the fact that Reev's name was almost identical. Reev looked baffled, but Riddie said it was merely coincidence. The CP man then asked the name of the other Monolithian.

"Jain," he said, spelling it. He added with a smile: "No significance; it's just a name."

A man from Reuters asked if the Monolithians were aware that President Allison had signed a bill making them honorary citizens of the United States.

"We are grateful for that," Reev said. "But I think you will find that the new law bestows full, not honorary, citizenship."

"Are you prepared to live up to the laws of the United States?" an unidentified reporter asked.

"Fully," Reev replied. "And to those of the United Nations. Not only to the letter but to the spirit of the law."

"Do you believe those laws to be fair?"

"The Constitution of the United States and the Charter of the United Nations appear to be the most perfect examples of humanitarian principles we have encountered anywhere in our travels," Reev said. Jain nodded agreement.

"How many of you are there?" an NBC man asked.

"Twelve of us here in New York," Reev said. "An equal number at Burning Tree. Then, of course, there are hundreds of us in each of the mother ships."

"The mother ships? What are they?"

"The craft which actually made the interstellar journey. They are moored, as some of your press accounts have indicated, outside your atmosphere."

"How far out?"

"As far out as the Moon, but exactly opposite it, on the other side of the Earth."

"Is that why we had no warning of your approach from the observatory on the Moon?"

"Probably. That's the way we planned it."

"Are those ships armed?"

"All our craft are armed, but only with defensive weapons. We travel only in peace and molest only those who would molest us."

There was a stir among the reporters, and a man from _Missiles and Rockets Magazine_ asked for a description of the weapons.

"I am afraid that is what you would term classified information. Our representatives and those of your Defense Department and the United Nations Secretariat have scheduled a meeting to discuss possible exchange of information touching on these weapons--which I emphasize are strictly defensive in nature."

"Are you armed personally?" the AP man asked.

"We do not carry concealed weapons, if that's what you mean," Reev said. "But we are capable of defending ourselves against any attack on ourselves or our friends. I don't wish to sound ungrateful, but the elaborate security guard provided for us and your President when he traveled with us was quite superfluous."

"I don't suppose," one of the television men said, "you'd be willing to give us a demonstration of your defense weapon? It'd make quite a graphic picture for the television audience."

"We'd be glad to," Reev said, "if you could suggest a way."

"Well," the TV man said, looking around the room, "I could throw one of these big, glass Waldorf ashtrays at you...."

"Now wait a minute," one of the other reporters said. "We don't want glass shrapnel flying around the room."

"No one will be hurt," Reev said. "You will see. I suggest you focus one of your cameras here." He indicated a spot about two feet in front of his face.

"Okay," the TV man said. He picked up the ashtray, which was a good eight inches in diameter, and hefted it.

"Empty the cigarette butts first, at least," someone said.

The TV man asked Reev: "Ready?"

"Ready."

The TV man let fly. The heavy ashtray sailed directly at Reev's face. About a foot from it, the ashtray appeared to hit, or sink into, an invisible shield. It did not shatter, but seemed to fuse, increasing its diameter but decreasing its thickness. It became the size of a pizza platter, but exceedingly thin. It continued to grow in diameter, becoming fainter and fainter. Then it disappeared completely.

When the hubbub of amazed comment had subsided Reev smiled and said: "Nobody hurt, I trust?"

One of the reporters in the first row said, "No, but I'd swear it's quite a bit hotter up here."

"True. That usually happens when matter is changed into energy."

"Can you be more explicit?"

"Sorry, no."

"Would you have the same protection against a bullet?"

"Entirely the same."

"How much warning do you need to put it into effect?"

"None. It takes effect at the first sight of danger."

"Would it work against a bomb?"

"Yes."

"A _hydrogen_ bomb?"

"Yes."

"Then you're invulnerable."

"Completely."

"Well," a reporter said, "I'm awfully glad you're on our side."

A ripple of nervous laughter went through the crowded room.

5 (JULY 26, SAT.)

It's too hot in New York, or else it's too cold. But hot or cold--somebody's always pushing you.

--Joe Frisco

Saturday was my day off and Mae and I drove into New York. We had tickets to a matinee. I switched on the car radio.

"Get some music," Mae said.

"I want to see what's on the news."

"Can't you ever relax?"

"I'm relaxed. I don't have to do anything except listen."

"Promise me you won't go into the office," Mae said. "I want to see that play."

"I have no intention of going to the office," I said. "Not unless there's an earthshaker."

"That's what I mean. Let somebody else handle it for a change. You're not the only man who can do the job."

"Listen," I said. "Here's something."

A commentator on one of the independent stations was saying the Monolithians apparently had made a number of secret agreements with the United States and the United Nations. The American public was being kept in the dark about many things they had a right to know. It was obvious from the alien's press conference yesterday that they were being more frank with the public than the people's own government officials. The defense-weapon demonstration to the nation on television was only one example.

I recognized the voice, which continued on a note of agitation:

"Here is a bulletin just handed to me. A Monolithian spokesman disclosed today that the first two-dozen aliens who landed on Earth have been joined by at least two hundred--I repeat, at least two hundred--more.

"This disclosure was made in answer to a question, reinforcing this commentator's belief that our own government is keeping us in the dark about matters of which we have every right to know the true facts."

"As opposed to the false facts?" I muttered, my copy-reader's instincts affronted.

"Shh," Mae said. "Listen!"

"The Monolithians, on the other hand, appear to be willing to answer almost any nonscientific question put to them, giving at least the appearance of candor which our own officials so sadly lack," the commentator went on.

"The question then arises whether it would be truer to say that our government is _allied_ with the aliens, as our officials claim, or whether it is _collaborating_ with them, having capitulated to their unknown military strength in a sort of interplanetary Munich."

Mae gasped.

"Clearly it is the aliens who are acting with confidence, publicizing their movements, while the U.S. government shows a curious unwillingness to keep its own people--you and me--informed. Can it be that the government itself is in the dark about these vitally important matters? Can it be that our own government is acting as the tool of the aliens, having secretly surrendered to a power the like of which this Earth has never known?"

Mae had been listening in mounting alarm. "Do you think he's right?" she asked me. "Is it possible?"

"That's old Clyde Fitchburn, the noted viewer with alarm," I told her. "Don't take him too seriously."

"He can't be making it all up," she said. "Can he?"

"Only about 99 percent of it," I said. "He still hasn't got back to his one little true fact--that two hundred more aliens have landed."

I switched to another station.

"... playing host today to nearly ten times as many aliens as originally landed on Earth," an announcer on one of the network stations was saying.

"Now listen," I said to Mae. "This is news, not an editorial."

"A Monolithian spokesman said the new arrivals--two hundred of them, all male--had landed in a second scout ship, at about midnight, in Central Park, at the northern end of the reservoir.

"The spokesman said in a statement, quote, 'The second contingent arrived in response to the invitation implicit in the law signed yesterday giving the Monolithians U.S. citizenship.' Unquote.

"At nine o'clock this morning, when the stores opened, the Monolithians arrived in a fleet of taxicabs in the midtown area, where they went in separate groups to the different men's clothing stores--Bond, Howard, Ripley, Rogers Peet and Brooks Brothers--and to the men's departments of such department stores as Stern's, Gimbels and Macy's. Here they outfitted themselves in Earth-style clothing, which they charged to the Monolithian Embassy, and left by foot, mingling with the crowds on the sidewalk.

"Dressed like typical New Yorkers, most of them virtually disappeared--that is, they lost their identity as aliens and became indistinguishable from the average male New Yorker.

"The Monolithian spokesman said in answer to a question that their purpose was that of any visitor to New York--to see the sights of the city and become acquainted with its customs."

"There," I said to Mae. "That doesn't sound quite as bad as Fire-Eater Fitchburn's account, does it?"

My wife seemed relieved, but she wouldn't admit it. "They're probably playing it down," she said.

The newscaster said, "Reporters were late on the scene, but if eye witness accounts of passersby are to be believed, the aliens split up into groups of two or three and visited such places as Woolworth's, book stores, movie houses, the Empire State Building, the Planetarium, and took rides on buses and subways."

Mae said, "I'm not sure I'd like it if one of them sat next to us at the play."

"How would you tell?" I asked her.

"I'd know," she said. "Somehow. I'm sure I would."

"Well," I said, "you let me know and we'll interview him at intermission."

We crossed the George Washington Bridge, went down the West Side Highway and found a place to park on Sixth Avenue in the upper thirties. We had half an hour before curtain time and I asked Mae if she would like a drink.

"I think I would," she said. "I seem to have a slight case of the jitters."

We found a quiet place about a block from the theater and sat at the bar in the air-conditioned dimness. I had a Scotch and soda and Mae had a gin and tonic.

"Had any aliens for customers?" I asked the bartender as I paid for the drinks.

"Not so's I noticed," he said. "At least nobody tried to charge it to the Monolithian Embassy. We got a strictly cash trade here."

He went to serve another customer and a well-dressed young man came in and sat down on the vacant stool next to Mae.

"Sam," she whispered, nudging me.

"What?"

"Here's one."

"Where?"

"Right next to me," she whispered. "Look at his clothes. They're brand new."

The bartender went to the new arrival and said, "What'll it be?"

"What do you have?" Mae's neighbor asked.

"Anything you want," the bartender said. "Whiskey, bourbon, Scotch, gin, vodka. Soda, ginger ale, Seven-up. The combinations are limitless."

"I'll have a Scotch and Seven-Up," the stranger said.

The bartender didn't blink an eye. "Yes, sir," he said, and proceeded to blend the two strange ingredients.

"Scotch and Seven-Up!" Mae said to me. "He must be one of them. Who ever heard of such a thing?"

"That's pretty circumstantial evidence," I said.

"Change seats with me, Sam," she said. "I'm getting nervous again."

"Okay," I said. "Want another drink?"

"Definitely." She swallowed the rest of her first one as she slid onto my stool.

"Two more of the same," I told the bartender.

"Coming up," he said. "Right after this Scotch and Seven-Up." He gave me a shrug.

"Say something to him," Mae whispered, meaning my new neighbor at the bar.

"Like what? Shall I ask him what he thinks of American women?"

"You're the newsman," she said. "You ought to know what to ask him."

"This is my day off," I reminded her.

"Go on. Ask him."

"Okay."

I waited till his concoction had been served to him, then said:

"Pretty good drink, Scotch and Seven-Up."

He looked at me in what seemed to be embarrassment. "I don't know, really," he said. "First time I ever had it."

"Stranger in town?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact. Got in only last night."

"Where from?"

"You wouldn't have heard of the place," he said.

("See! I told you!" Mae whispered.)

"I don't know," I said. "I've heard of lots of places: Medicine Hat, Ephrata, Chestnut Bend, Gallipolis, Moses Lake, Lackawack...."

"None of those," he said, as if he were playing a quiz game. "It's a little place in Missouri called Joplin."

"That's easy. I got my Signal Corps training near there during the war."

"You don't say!"

("Ask him where he got the new suit," Mae persisted.)

"Where'd you get the new suit?" I asked him.

"Bond's," he said. "You know, under the waterfall in Times Square? It looked so cool. They have an artificial waterfall on top of the building. It used to be Pepsi-Cola's."

("Ask him what time," Mae said.)

"What time?"

"About nine o'clock," he said. "When it opened. Why?"

("Why?" I asked Mae.)

("Ask him if he saw the aliens in there then.")

"Did you see the aliens in there then?"

"I saw a bunch of men come in in bearskins or something like," he said. "I thought it was an advertising stunt."

("He thought it was an advertising stunt," I told Mae.)

("Doesn't he listen to the radio?" she asked.)

"Don't you listen to the radio?" I asked him.

"The radio?"

"The aliens from Monolithia were getting outfitted in Bond's at nine A.M., according to the radio," I told him without benefit of Mae.

"Is that who they were? Well, well."

He drank his Scotch and Seven-Up at one gulp, making a face over it, and said, "I've got to get going. I have a ticket for a show at 2:30."

("What show?" Mae asked.)

"What show?" I asked him.

He mentioned the new Rodgers & Hammerstein musical. "I'm meeting my wife there. Would you like to see a picture of her and the kids?" He took out his wallet to show me. In addition to the snapshot I saw his Missouri driver's license and an old draft card.

"Nice-looking family," I said.

"Thanks. Got to run now. My wife has the other ticket and I'm meeting her at the seats. Can't get lost that way, I figure. Pleasure talking to you. You, too, ma'am."

He left and I said to Mae: "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Are you satisfied he's not an alien?"

"I don't know. How come he's wearing his new suit the same day he bought it? You always have to wait a week or ten days for alterations."

"Maybe he didn't need any alterations and they cuffed the pants while he waited. At least he won't be sitting next to you in the theater."

"How did he get tickets to that? Are you sure you couldn't do any better than the revival of _Where's Charley_?"

"Not on short notice. He probably paid scalper's prices on the expense account. We'd better start."

We left the bar.

"I guess he won't be," Mae said, backing up the conversation in the way she has. "But for my nerves' sake there'd better not be another man in a new suit sitting next to me, even if he has got a good explanation."

"The odds are against it," I said as we stood at the corner of 44th Street and Broadway and waited at the _Don't Walk_ sign. "Just divide two hundred into several million."

The _Walk_ sign flashed on. We were in a group of about fifteen law-abiding pedestrians who started across the street. We had almost reached the other side when somebody yelled, "Look out!"

A big long convertible with a grinning idiot behind the wheel was not only failing to yield the right of way to pedestrians but was making an illegal right turn onto Broadway from the cross street.

I grabbed Mae and hauled her ahead to the curb.

"Damn fool!" I hollered at the driver, who kept on going, blowing his horn.

Everybody scrambled to safety except one young man who hadn't seen or heard, or else had supreme faith in his rights as a pedestrian. The convertible was heading straight at him.

"He'll get hit!" somebody yelled. A traffic cop blew his whistle. A woman screamed. Mae, unable to look, buried her face in my shoulder. The pedestrian never broke his casual stride.

The massive chromed bumper was only inches from him when it began to disintegrate.

First the bumper, then the grille and the oversized fender, then the right front tire dissolved in a shimmering film.

As the tire disappeared, the momentum of the car sent it ahead into what was obviously the protective shield surrounding one of the aliens.

More of the car vanished and it came to a grinding stop, its underside providing the brake as it plowed into the asphalt.