The Golden Age Of Science Fiction Vol Ii Part 121

"We get as much as we want," replied Manto carelessly.

"Gosh, I wish I did."

Miss Burton collected her brood. "Come together, children, I have something to say to you. Soon it will be time to go in and hear Mr. George. Now, if Mr. George is so kind as to entertain us, don't you think that it's only proper for us to entertain him?"

"We could put on our cla.s.s play!" yelled Barbara.

"Barbara's a fine one to talk," said Frances. "She doesn't even remember her lines."

"No, children, we mustn't do anything we can't do well. That wouldn't make a good impression. And besides, there is no time for a play. Perhaps Barbara will sing-"

"I can sing a 'Thank You' song," interrupted Frances.

"That would be nice."

"I can recite," added another little girl.

"Fine. How about you, Carolyn? You and your little friend, Doris. Can she act too?"

Carolyn giggled. "Oh, yes, she can act very well. I can act like people. She can act like animals." The laughing, girlish eyes evaded a dirty look from the little friend. "She can act like any kind of animal."

"She's certainly a talented child. But she seems so shy!"

"Oh, no," said Carolyn. "She likes to be coaxed."

"She shouldn't be like that. Perhaps, Carolyn, you and Doris can do something together. And perhaps, too, Mr. George will be pleased to see that your teacher also has talent."

"You, Miss Burton?"

Miss Burton coughed modestly. "Yes, children, I never told you, but I was once ambitious to be an actress too. I studied dramatics, and really, I was quite good at it. I was told that if I persevered I might actually be famous. Just think, your teacher might actually have been a famous actress! However, in my day, there were many coa.r.s.e people on the stage, and the life of the theater was not attractive-but perhaps we'd better not speak of that. At any rate, I know the principles of the dramatic art very well."

"G.o.d knows what I'll have to go through," said Curt. "And I don't see how I can take it sober."

"I don't see how they can take you drunk," replied Carol.

"Why go through with it at all? Why not call the whole thing quits?"

"Because people are depending on you. You always want to call quits whenever you run into something you don't like. You may as well call quits to your contract if that's the way you feel."

"And to your ten per cent, darling."

"You think I'd mind that. I work for my ten per cent, Curt, sweetheart. I work too d.a.m.n hard for that ten per cent."

"You can marry me and take it easy. Honest, Carol, if you treated me better, if you showed me I meant something to you, I'd give up drinking."

She made a face. "Don't talk nonsense. Take your outfit, and let's get ready to go. Unless you want to change here, and walk around dressed as a lion hunter."

"Why not? I've walked around dressed as worse. A drunk."

"Drunks don't attract attention. They're too ordinary."

"But a drunken lion hunter-that's something special." He went into the next room and began to change. "Carol," he called. "Do you like me?"

"At times."

"Would you say that you liked me very much?"

"When you're sober. Rarely."

"Love me?"

"Once in a blue moon."

"What would I have to do for you to want to marry me?"

"Amount to something."

"I like that. Don't you think I amount to something now? Women swoon at the sight of my face on the screen, and come to life again at the sound of my voice."

"The women who swoon at you will swoon at anybody. Besides, I don't consider that making nitwits swoon is a useful occupation for a real man."

"How can I be useful, Carol? No one ever taught me how."

"Some people manage without being taught."

"I suppose I could think how if I had a drink inside me."

"Then you'll have to do without thinking."

He came into the room again, powerful, manly, determined-looking. There was an expression in his eye which indicated courage without end, a courage that would enable him to brave the wrath of man, beast, or devil.

"How do I look?"

"Your n.o.ble self, of course. A poor woman's edition of Rudolph Valentino."

"I feel terrified. I don't know how I'm going to face those kids. If they were boys it wouldn't be so bad, but a bunch of little girls!"

"They'll grow up to be your fans, if you're still alive five years from now. Meanwhile, into each life some rain must fall."

"You would talk of water, when you know how I feel."

"Sorry. Come on, let's go."

The lecture hall resounded with giggles. And beneath the giggles was a steady undercurrent of whispers, of girlish confidences exchanged, of girlish hopes that would now be fulfilled. Miss Burton's cla.s.s was not the only one which had come to hear the famous actor-hunter describe his brave exploits. There were at least five others like it, and by some mistake, a cla.s.s of boys, who also whispered to each other, in manly superiority, and pretended to find amus.e.m.e.nt in the presence of so many of the fairer s.e.x.

In this atmosphere of giggles and whispers, Manto and Palit could exchange confidences without being noticed. Palit said savagely, "Why did you tell her that I could act too?"

"Why, because it's the truth. You're a very good animal performer. You make a wonderful dragon, for instance. Go on, Palit, show her what a fine dragon you can-"

"Stop it, you fool, before you cause trouble!"

"Very well, Palit. Did I tempt you?"

"Did you tempt me! You and your sense of humor!"

"You and your lack of it! But let's not argue now, Palit. Here, I think, comes the lion-hunter. Let's scream, and be as properly excited as every one else is."

My G.o.d, he thought, how can they keep their voices so high so long? My eardrums hurt already. How do they stand a lifetime of it? Even an hour?

"Go ahead," whispered Carol. "You've seen the script-go into your act. Tell them what a hero you are. You have the odds in your favor to start with."

"My lovely looks," he said, with some bitterness.

"Lovely is the word for you. But forget that. If you're good-you'll get a drink afterwards."

"Will it be one of those occasions when you love me?"

"If the moon turns blue."

He strode to the front of the platform, an elephant gun swinging easily at his side, an easy grin radiating from his confident, rugged face. The cheers rose to a shrill fortissimo, but the grin did not vanish. What a great actor he really was, he told himself, to be able to pretend he liked this.

An a.s.sistant curator of some collection in the zoo, a fl.u.s.tered old woman, was introducing him. There were a few laudatory references to his great talents as an actor, and he managed to look properly modest as he listened. The remarks about his knowledge of wild and ferocious beasts were a little harder to take, but he took them. Then the old woman stepped back, and he was facing his fate alone.

"Children," he began. A pause, a bashful grin. "Perhaps I should rather say, my friends. I'm not one to think of you as children. Some people think of me as a child myself, because I like to hunt, and have adventures. They think that such things are childish. But if they are, I'm glad to be a child. I'm glad to be one of you. Yes, I think I will call you my friends.

"Perhaps you regard me, my friends, as a very lucky person. But when I recall some of the narrow escapes I have had, I don't agree with you. I remember once, when we were on the trail of a rogue elephant-"

He told the story of the rogue elephant, modestly granting a co-hero's role to his guide. Then another story ill.u.s.trating the strange ways of lions. The elephant gun figured in still another tale, this time of a vicious rhinoceros. His audience was quiet now, breathless with interest, and he welcomed the respite from shrillness he had won for his ears.

"And now, my friends, it is time to say farewell." He actually looked sad and regretful. "But it is my hope that I shall be able to see you again-"

Screams of exultation, shrill as ever, small hands beating enthusiastically to indicate joy. Thank G.o.d that's over with, he thought. Now for those drinks-and he didn't mean drink, singular. Talk of being useful, he'd certainly been useful now. He'd made those kids happy. What more can any reasonable person want?

But it wasn't over with. Another old lady had stepped up on the platform.

"Mr. George," she said, in a strangely affected voice, like that of the first dramatic teacher he had ever had, the one who had almost ruined his acting career. "Mr. George, I can't tell you how happy you have made us all, young and old. Hasn't Mr. George made us happy, children?"

"Yes, Miss Burton!" came the shrill scream.

"And we feel that it would be no more than fair to repay you in some small measure for the pleasure you have given us. First, a 'Thank You' song by Frances h.e.l.ler-"

He hadn't expected this, and he repressed a groan. Mercifully, the first song was short. He grinned the thanks he didn't feel. To think that he could take this, while sober as a judge! What strength of character, what will-power!

Next, Miss Burton introduced another kid, who recited. And then, Miss Burton stood upright and recited herself.

That was the worst of all. He winced once, then bore up. You can get used even to torture, he told himself. An adult making a fool of herself is always more painful than a kid. And that affected elocutionist's voice gave him the horrors. But he thanked her too. His good deed for the day. Maybe Carol would have him now, he thought.

A voice shrilled, "Miss Burton?"

"Yes, dear?"

"Aren't you going to call on Carolyn to act?"

"Oh, yes, I was forgetting. Come up here, Carolyn, come up, Doris. Carolyn and Doris, Mr. George, are studying how to act. They act people and animals. Who knows? Some day they, too, may be in the movies, just as you are, Mr. George. Wouldn't that be nice, children?"

What the devil do you do in a case like that? You grin, of course-but what do you say, without handing over your soul to the devil? Agree how nice it would be to have those sly little brats with faces magnified on every screen all over the country? Like h.e.l.l you do.

"Now, what are we going to act, children?"

"Please, Miss Burton," said Doris. "I don't know how to act. I can't even imitate a puppy. Really I can't, Miss Burton-"

"Come, come, mustn't be shy. Your friend says that you act very nicely indeed. Can't want to go on the stage and still be shy. Now, do you know any movie scenes? s.h.i.+rley Temple used to be a good little actress, I remember. Can you do any scenes that she does?"

The silence was getting to be embarra.s.sing. And Carol said he didn't amount to anything, he never did anything useful. Why, if thanks to his being here this afternoon, those kids lost the ambition to go on the stage, the whole human race would have cause to be grateful to him. To him, and to Miss Burton. She'd kill ambition in anybody.

Miss Burton had an idea. "I know what to do, children. If you can act animals-Mr. George has shown you what the hunter does; you show him what the lions do. Yes, Carolyn and Doris, you're going to be lions. You are waiting in your lairs, ready to pounce on the unwary hunter. Crouch now, behind that chair. Closer and closer he comes-you act it out, Mr. George, please, that's the way-ever closer, and now your muscles tighten for the spring, and you open your great, wide, red mouths in a great, great big roar-"

A deep and tremendous roar, as of thunder, crashed through the auditorium. A roar-and then, from the audience, an outburst of terrified screaming such as he had never heard. The bristles rose at the back of his neck, and his heart froze.

Facing him across the platform were two lions, tensed as if to leap. Where they had come from he didn't know, but there they were, eyes glaring, manes ruffled, more terrifying than any he had seen in Africa. There they were, with the threat of death and destruction in their fierce eyes, and here he was, terror and helplessness on his handsome, manly, and bloodless face, heart unfrozen now and pounding fiercely, knees melting, hands- Hands clutching an elephant gun. The thought was like a director's command. With calm efficiency, with all the precision of an actor playing a scene rehea.r.s.ed a thousand times, the gun leaped to his shoulder, and now its own roar thundered out a challenge to the roaring of the wild beasts, shouted at them in its own accents of barking thunder.

The shrill screaming continued long after the echoes of the gun's speech had died away. Across the platform from him were two great bodies, the bodies of lions, and yet curiously unlike the beasts in some ways, now that they were dead and dissolving as if corroded by some invisible acid.

Carol's hand was on his arm, Carol's thin and breathless voice shook as she said, "A drink-all the drinks you want."

"One will do. And you."

"And me. I guess you're kind of-kind of useful after all."

Contents

THE JUDAS VALLEY.

By ROBERT SILVERBERG

Why did everybody step off the s.h.i.+p in this strange valley and promptly drop dead? How could a well-equipped corps of tough s.p.a.cemen become a field of rotting skeletons in this quiet world of peace and contentment? It was a mystery Peter and Sherri had to solve. If they could live long enough!