Part 8

Joy Linx spelled her last name for me, emphasizing that it had no "y," and took off her glasses. She said to call her Joy. You can say all you want about glasses not hiding a girl's beauty, but Joy was much more of a looker without them. "I'm near-sighted," she said, "and they're heavy."

"I approve," I said. "How long have you been with Peerless Promotions, Joy?"

"With the aliens, you mean? You can speak frankly. They hired me last Friday and I started today. How about you, Mr. Kent?"

I told her to call me Sam, but decided not to say, as I was tempted to, that I wasn't sure I was _with_ the aliens, exactly, even though I was on their payroll. "I started today, too, officially," I said. "It's been very pleasant work so far. Another Scotch?"

"Just one more," she said, and we smiled at each other a bit stiffly and tentatively.

I ordered the second round and the lunch, trying not to look at the prices. They were academic, of course, considering the expense money in my pocket, but I couldn't help contrasting this with my hectic lunches at World Wide--often a sandwich brought down from the cafeteria and eaten on the desk with a cup of office-brewed coffee--total cost under half a dollar.

I risked telling Joy about this. You never know what kind of reception such a sad little anecdote may have and I was relieved when she laughed with genuine understanding.

"I used to do the same thing," she said. "Only I brought my own sandwich. I liked egg salad on whole wheat."

"I'm a liverwurst and swiss cheese on rye man myself. With lettuce and mustard. Who were you with before Peerless?"

"A theatrical agency. I had some far-fetched dream of becoming an actress by association one day."

"You've certainly got the looks for it."

"Thanks, Sam, but I'm afraid my only talent lies in being a secretary."

I made some gallant reply, then asked what she did, exactly, for Frij--alias Addison Madison.

"Isn't that a scream of a name?" Joy said. "So far all he's told me is that I'm to be his Girl Friday--I guess he picked that up when he was studying his role. And to take you out to lunch. It's a fine job." Joy looked straight at her plate of _beef au jus_ and said, "I suppose you're married."

"Yes," I said, looking at my scallops.

"Just like to get the facts. I'm divorced, myself. Incompatibility. Linx is his name. I kept it because it's more euphonious, professionally, than Kaplan."

"I see."

"I wish you much better luck, Sam."

"Thanks," I said, and almost told her Mae was pregnant. For some reason I didn't. I don't think it was entirely because I was reluctant to compare her unhappy state with my excellent one. Joy was a very pretty girl indeed. "Thanks," I said again, and left it at that. "How about another drink?"

"Okay." She looked up and smiled. "Forgive the personal history."

"Not at all." I got the waiter's eye and ordered, and a bus boy took away the plates. "Tell me about this cocktail party. Who all's coming?"

"Some of everybody, I gather. Everybody who is anybody, that is."

"Oh? Big names?" I didn't know anything about the social life of the aliens, come to think of it. So far all I was familiar with was their public appearances, in a news sense, and their cloak-and-dagger intrigues, such as locking me up in that air-conditioned dungeon.

"The biggest," Joy said. "You'll see. They've been mingling like mad."

"What for, I wonder."

"Your guess is as good as mine. Ten times better, probably."

"Will you be going to the party?"

"Yes. In my Girl Friday capacity. Wearing my glasses, so I can recognize people across the room, and seeing that Addison Madison shakes hands with everybody."

"How about shaking hands with me now, just in case you're too busy later?"

"I won't be," Joy smiled. But she put her hand in mine. I neglected to give it back right away.

Then the drinks came and after a while Joy put her glasses on and we took a cab back to the office. She sat on her side and I sat on mine and we talked about the weather. It was hot.

* * * * *

The party had got to the point where everybody seemed to be talking at once. Enough liquor had been consumed for the initial tentativeness to have worn off and the Monolithians were no longer standing apart as they had been at the beginning. It was impossible to tell who was from where, except that the women were all from Earth, presumably, and I heard several variations on the question "Are you one of Them or one of Us?"

The din of the talk, the overworked air conditioners and the mechanics of barkeeping made every conversation a private one within its own area, even though it was carried on at the top of the voice.

"I'm one of us," I shouted to a short, stout martini fellow who cornered me in an alcove where I'd gone to put out a cigarette. "Sam Kent, World Wide." I'd forgotten for the moment that I'd resigned.

"John Blobber," the martini said. "I'm with the Yarbutta people." That's what it sounded like. "Good name, Sam. Sam Clemens, Sam Goldwyn, Sam Spade. Lots of people named Sam. Sam Levene, Sam Behrman--good American name."

"I never thought it wasn't, Mr. Yarbutta," I told him, trying to edge away.

"No. John Blasher," he said, approximately. "I'm _with_ the Yollawa people."

"Oh, sure. I guess I've heard about them."

"Make tunsleys," he said, waving his glass dangerously in my vicinity. "Business very good, at the moment, thanks to the Monolithians." He set his glass down on the little wooden table that held the ashtray I'd sought out, knocked on the wood and picked up his glass. "Sam F.B. Morse--great inventor. Sam Lincoln, great preshident."

"I think you've got that last one wrong," I said, backing off. "Fellow named Abe, he was, I believe. Look, Mr. Blasher, you just reminded me--I've got to see Abe Copeless about that story in Hammerslam this morning. You know the one I mean."

I left him nodding in polite confusion. At the bar I got a fresh Scotch and turned around to find myself trapped in a group playing Real Names.

"You with the Scotch," a red-haired woman said. "You can't go till you tell us who Archibald Leach is."

"Cary Grant," I said instantly out of my storehouse of copy-reader's lore. I tried to go, but the woman put a hand on my drinking arm and said, "Oh, this is one we've got to keep. I'll bet you don't know Joe Yule, Junior."

"Why, madam," I said, "everyone knows Mickey Rooney."

"This man is a gem," the woman--she was a gin and tonic--said.

"Arlington Brugh?"

"S. Arlington Brugh," I corrected. "Robert Taylor. Now may I go?" I smiled, so she wouldn't think my rude question was rude.

"Not a chance, my dear boy. You're an absolute fount. Irwin, give him that one that stumped us before." Irwin was a tall, lean Screwdriver.

"Lucille LeSueur," he said defiantly, wrinkling an eyebrow.

"Joan Crawford," I told him instantly.

The gin-and-tonic lady shrieked with glee--"That's right! We all guessed Lucille Ball. How do you do it?"

"It's really very simple," I said modestly. "You see, I'm their lawyer and they have no secrets from me."

"I doubt that very much," the third Real Names player said frostily. He was a Bloody Mary and I figured it served him right. "James Stewart," he said, as if he were playing the ace of spades. "Let's see you get out of that."

"You're doing it backwards," the gin lady said reprovingly.

"No, I'm not," the Bloody Mary man insisted.

"No, he's not," I said, lifting my Scotch and her arm for a sip. "That's Stewart Granger. And Charles Pratt is Boris Karloff and Rita Hayworth is Margarita Cansino, and Roy Rogers is Leonard Slye and--if you will unhand me, my good woman--Frederick Bickel is Fredric March."

"Don't let him get away," she shrieked. "He's priceless!"

But I did get away. I weaved my way among clusters of people who were making sounds of our time touching on Lorca, Kerouac, Glenn Gould, Lenny Bernstein, Brendan Behan, Sinatra, Astaire, Gielgud, Philip, Kennedy, Marlon, Ingrid, and Marilyn, and found myself cheek by jowl with my old friend Eurydice Playfair, who used to be a newspaperwoman herself.

My Real Names ploy, which I had been savoring along with my umpteenth Scotch, turned to ashes as it recalled itself forcibly to me that I was no better than dear Riddie, having sold out to the aliens myself.

"Dear boy!" she said. "Where _have_ you been keeping yourself?"

"Between you and me, Riddie," I said, "between the devil and the deep blue tax collector, up to just about now. Can I get you a drink?"

This is one way of vanishing. You just don't come back from the bar. It's understandable at such a conclave. But Riddie was not to be put off that easily.

"I'm well fixed, Samuel, my old," she said, waving three-quarters of a bourbon on the rocks at me. "What I want to know is who's running the store, now that Kent and double-you double-you have phfft? Not old pinchpurse Hyatt, surely?"

"I have put all those mundane cares behind me," I said in an attempt to be sprightly. "Greater things are afoot."

"How very true," she said. Riddie was dressed to the hilt in a lamé thing that clung to her well-preserved curves. "I'm delighted you've got yourself a handhold. There's room enough for all."

"Listen, Riddie," I said, "I know you can't tell the Monolithians without a scorecard, they're so assimilable, but what the good hell is the object of all this? For what greater gain is the tab being picked up? What's the deal, old pal? Spill, will you?"

"You're too suspicious, Sam. This is conviviality rampant. We drink and be merry and ask not the reason why. Live, man! Pluck the daisies while you may. How _is_ Mae, by the way?"

"Just fine," I said. "Just absolutely fine. That's an interesting philosophy you have there, about plucking."

Riddie gave me a close look. "How many have you had, my friend? How about a sandwich?"

"Don't worry," I told her. "I'm not going to disgrace anybody. I've had three, is all." Besides miscounting I was ignoring the three I'd had at lunch with Joy Linx.

"Well, maybe," Riddie said. She acknowledged a high sign from somebody (an alien?) at the other side of the room and said quickly, "Don't worry about a thing. If you have any problems, just take them to Mox or Frij. Or me. I've got to run now, Sammy."

And she was off.

I made for the farther bar across the room, where I'd spotted Joy Linx.

Joy had changed from her severe lunchtime suit into a low-cut black satin which matched her hair and did all kinds of things for her figure. I cannot tell a lie and say I hadn't noticed this figure heretofore, but hadn't had the opportunity to notice it to such advantage. Bee-lining, I reached her side.

"Your recent acquaintance presents his compliments," I said, "and don't you look lovely."

Joy smiled hello and said, "You look just the same as at the Algonquin, which is all one could ask. Do you know Mr. Masters? Mr. Kent, formerly of World Wide--Mr. Masters of Hollywood and all over."

Everybody knew Spookie Masters, the comedian, singer, dancer, dramatic actor and husband of beautiful women.

"Not personally," I said, shaking hands, "but I'm a long-time fan. How do you do."

"It's a pleasure, Kent," Masters said. "Joy tells me she's taken the vows and joined the Martians. I envy her. Their coming is probably the most exciting thing that's happened since the wheel."

"They're a pretty lively bunch, all right," I said. "I don't know where it's all going to end, but it should be fun while it lasts."

"They sure beat the beatniks," Spookie Masters said, and I remembered that he'd been on a beatnik and bongo drums kick for a while. "I've got half a mind to take out a card myself. Who's the head alien, Joy? Where do I get the poop?"

"I think you're pulling my leg, Spookie," she said ("Love to," he said), "but if you're serious I'll speak to Frij. Just what is it you'd like to do?"

"Oh, just be an altar boy. Sit at the feet of the high priests and absorb their philosophy. I did that in Tibet once and I've never got over it. There's something more to life than chasing the old dollar. I've learned that much."

This Spookie Masters was a pretty charming guy. He was about forty, maybe five-feet-ten, and slender. Not handsome, but honest-faced.

A sort of cult had grown up around him. Spookie Masters was more than a million-a-year (net) entertainer. He was, to innumerable moviegoers and TV fans, a way of life. They'd followed his career from his beginning as a poor boy whose father had died in the electric chair. They knew about his several marriages to, and subsequent divorces from, some of the world's most glamorous women. They'd followed his rise to fame and plunge to obscurity and his comeback.

They knew about his coterie of big-name hangers-on, and they parroted the group's own special language. They marveled that his intimates and admirers included not only the mayor of a big city, the head of the philosophy department of an Ivy League university, the president of one of the world's biggest industries and the pretty sister of a reigning queen, but that he also had plenty of time for people who rode in subways and went to ball games and boxing matches. Spookie usually dressed like a prince, but when the whim took him he got into sport shirt, dungarees and sneakers and lounged through the streets, keeping in touch, as it were, with the life he'd known before fame struck. He'd browse in book stores, talk to panhandlers and sit in the bleachers and boo the Yankees. He had a man-next-door face and wasn't often recognized when he didn't want to be.

Spookie, Joy and I had wandered off the subject of the Monolithians and were discussing old movie stars when somebody banged a gong to get attention, then announced:

"Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States."

15 (AUG. 5, TUES.)

The deliberate aim at Peace very easily passes into its bastard substitute, Anaesthesia.

--Alfred North Whitehead

It was about one o'clock in the morning. I'd called Mae shortly after nine to tell her I was delayed and not to wait up for me. The party apparently was still going strong, but diffused. The Monolithians had provided a number of side rooms for their guests to retire to from time to time to recuperate and freshen up before returning for more food, drink and talk. It was no Roman orgy--there were no beds in the rooms, for one thing--but it gave every indication of lasting till dawn.

I was sitting with my feet up on a couch. I'd loosened my tie and was drinking black coffee. I was beat.

Joy Linx came in. "Better start pulling yourself together. The President wants to see you."

"Me? Now? Why?"

"He's in the mood, I guess," Joy said. "I am but the bearer of the tidings. Are you sober?"

"Disgustingly," I said. "Where is he?"

"I'll take you there. Some party, eh, Sam?"

I couldn't agree that the party was in any way spectacular except in length, so I merely grunted. It had been sort of fun before President Allison arrived, and I'd enjoyed meeting Spookie Masters. But after Gov got there it collapsed into a formal gathering of anticipatory groups standing awkwardly and waiting for the President to notice them. After an hour or so of this I had fled to one of the recuperation rooms.

My face was a bit bristly with one o'clock shadow, but my tie was back in place and I asked Joy if I looked presentable. She ran her hand through my hair, presumably to tidy a cow-lick, and said, "You'll do nicely. Good luck, Sam. I hear he's very easy to talk to."

It was kind of her; I _was_ feeling a bit nervous. I'd never had a great deal of respect, politically, for Gov Allison, but it's one thing to be a distant critic and another to be ushered into a Presence.

"Thanks," I said. "Which way?"

Joy led me down the hall and around a corner to a door outside which two men stood with seeming casualness. Secret Service, I supposed. They nodded and one of them opened the door for us when Joy said, "Mr. Sam Kent."

There was one other man in the room with the President. I recognized him as Rupert Marriner, the Secretary of State. Joy introduced me to Marriner, who introduced me to the President. Allison said, "How do you do," and I said something like, "It's a great pleasure, sir," and then Joy and Marriner left and I was alone with the President.

It was a medium-sized room equipped with a desk and straight chair, two easy chairs, a couch, a sideboard on which stood a big tray with bottles, glasses, an ice bucket and soda, a bookcase with sets of books uniformly bound (I noticed later that they were the complete works of Zane Grey and Edgar Wallace) and a Remington painting, or excellent reproduction, on the wall. Allison sat down in one of the easy chairs and invited me to take the other.

"Forgive the hour, Sam, but I wanted to see you here where we could have a private chat rather than in the White House for the first time, where there always seems to be something of an urgent nature coming up to take my attention and leaving me little time for the niceties, as I am sure you'll appreciate," the President said in one of his usual marathon sentences.

"Of course, sir," I said. "An excellent idea."

"First let me say this," he said: "There's no need to stand on formality with me in private. I'm a plain man, having been raised on a farm in Indiana and having mingled with all kinds in my calling, before politics, as a country lawyer. So when we're together alone--that is to say like now, in private--I want you to call me Gov. I've always been called Gov, though I never held the office of Governor, as you probably know (though I ran for it in, let me see, I think it was 1948, and was pretty soundly beaten by that fellow what's-his-name), and Gov I want to be to my friends and associates except when the formalities of the occasion so decree. Will you go along with that, Sam? It will make us both more comfortable and engender a closer working arrangement, I feel."

"Yes, sir," I said. "That's fine--Gov." I felt thoroughly uncomfortable and hitched around in my chair. I wished I'd shaved. Allison himself looked spruce and freshly pressed, and his pink cheeks showed no trace of recent growth.

"Why don't we both have a drink, Sam?" Allison said. "If you wouldn't mind pouring me a vodka and orange juice or something, and you have whatever you'd like, I think we'll break the ice a bit faster. I don't particularly like vodka, but a man in my job has to beware the breath of scandal, to coin a phrase, and I do mean breath."

He smiled, and I smiled back dutifully as I got up and went to the sideboard. I made him his orange blossom and took myself a healthy hooker of Scotch, with a bit of soda.

"Now we're relaxed," Allison said, smacking his lips over a big swallow. "It's good to kick your shoes off, so to speak, and settle down among friends. You're probably wondering how I happened to pick you for the job of press secretary. A natural curiosity. Let me say this, before I go any further: I've heard of you. Your work has come to my attention now and again and of course I have an acquaintance with the Washington people on the staff of World Wide--McEachern and Sylvester among others. I know you to be a professional, and I think I can pay you no higher compliment."

The President paused for another swallow of his orange blossom and I said, "Thank you, sir."

"Gov," he said, smiling.

"Gov," I said. "Yes, sir."

"Naturally, when Josh was forced by the exigencies of the situation to bow out, I looked around for someone to fill his shoes. You were very highly recommended to me. I decided on the spot that you would be the man, without even having to see you. You're a smart lad and maybe you can guess who recommended you."

"The aliens?"

"Right the first time." Allison took a long swallow and handed me his empty glass. "If you don't mind."

I finished my own and went to the sideboard and made us two fresh ones. Vodka, in addition to being odorless, is supposed to be tasteless, so I gave Gov a double one, hoping he wouldn't notice and that he'd drop a few clues to the state of interplanetary affairs. I made my second Scotch a weak one.

"Here you are, Gov," I said, handing him his glass. I was getting into the groove.

"That's the stuff, Sammy boy," the President said. He'd probably had a few before he saw me. "Now, as I told you, I'm in the habit of speaking plainly. I see no reason to change that habit with you, here, now this minute, especially since one of your jobs, as press secretary, is to project the Presidential image the way people want it seen, regardless of what I really am."

The President took a long drink and went on. "You're a bright boy, as I've mentioned, and you may have suspected the truth about me. Lots of people have, but, frankly, as long as the press goes on exercising its self-censorship and it doesn't come out in print until after I've gone--and that may not be too long now--I frankly don't give a damn. What I'm doing is coasting through my second term. Under the Constitution I can't be elected again, and let me tell you this: if anybody should propose re-amending it, I'll fight it."

"I think I know how you feel," I said, to give him time to take another drink.

"Of course you do," he said, having drunk. "Now let me go on. I've worked as hard as I had to for nearly six years, but now I'm tired. I'm 68 years old and there's never been a time in the last thirty years when I wasn't up to here in public office of one kind or another. It's a very tiring thing, that kind of responsibility, and I'm sick of it."

"I can understand that, sir," I said. I added quickly, "Gov."

"That's better," he said. He handed me his glass. "Not so much orange juice this time, Sam. Too much acid's bad for the system."

He went on talking while I fixed him his third drink. I decided to nurse mine along, though I went through the motions of freshening it.