Short Stories by Robert A. Heinlein Vol 2 Part 94

"BBITISH-IRAN TALKS STILL DEAD-LOCKED".

"FASTER-THAN-LIGHT WEAPON PROMISED".

"TYPHOON DOUBLING BACK ON MANILA".

"MAKBIAGE SOLEMNIZED ON FLOOB OF HUDSONNew York,

13 July, In a specially-constructed diving suit built for two,

Merydith Smithe, caf6 society headline girl, and Prince

Augie Schleswieg of New Vork and the Riviera were united today by Bishop Dalton in a service televised with the aid of the Navy's ultra-new"

As the Year of the Jackpot progressed Breen took melan- choly pleasure in adding to the data which proved that the curve was sagging as predicted. The undeclared World War continued its b.l.o.o.d.y, blundering way at half a dozen spots around a tortured globe. Breen did not chart it; the head- lines were there for anyone to read. He concentrated on the odd facts in the other pages of the papers, facts which, taken singly, meant nothing, but taken together showed a disastrous trend.

He listed stock market prices, rainfall, wheat futures, but it was the "silly season" items which fascinated him. To be sure, some humans were always doing silly thingsbut at what point had prime damfoolishness become common- place? When, for example, had the zombie-like professional models become accepted ideals of American womanhood?

What were the gradations between National Cancer Week and National Athlete's Foot Week? On what day had the

American people finally taken leave of horse sense?

Take transvestismmale-and-female dress customs were arbitrary, but they had seemed to be deeply rooted in the culture. When did the breakdown start? With Marlene Die- trich's tailored suits? By the late forties there was no "male" article of clothing that a woman could not wear in public- but when had men started to slip over the line? Should he count the psychological cripples who had made the word

"drag" a byword in Greenwich Village and Hollywood long before this outbreak? Or were they "wild shots" not belong- ing on the curve? Did it start with some unknown normal man attending a masquerade and there discovering that skirts actually were more comfortable and practical than trousers? Or had it started with the resurgence of Scottish nationalism reflected in the wearing of kilts by many

Scottish-Americans?

Ask a lemming to state his motives! The outcome was in front of him, a news story. Transvestism by draft-dodgers had at last resulted in a ma.s.s arrest in Chicago which was to have ended in a giant joint trialonly to have the deputy prosecutor show up in a pinafore and defy the judge to submit to an examination to determine the judge's true s.e.x.

The judge suffered a stroke and died and the trial was postponedpostponed forever in Breen's opinion; he doubted that this particular blue law would ever again be enforced.

Or the laws about indecent exposure, for that matter. The attempt to limit the Gypsy-Rose syndrome by ignoring it had taken the starch out of enforcement; now here was a report about the All Souls Community Church of Spring- field: the pastor had reinst.i.tuted ceremonial nudity. Prob- ably the first time this thousand years, Breen thought, aside from some screwball cults in Los Angeles. The reverend gentleman claimed that the ceremony was identical with the "dance of the high priestess" in the ancient temple of

Kamak.

Could bebut Breen had private information that the

"priestess" had been working the burlesque & nightclub cir- cuit before her present engagement. In any case the holy leader was packing them in and had not been arrested.

Two weeks later a hundred and nine churches in thirty- three states offered equivalent attractions. Breen entered them on his curves.

This queasy oddity seemed to him to have no relation to the startling rise in the dissident evangelical cults through- out the country. These churches were sincere, earnest and poorbut growing, ever since the War. Now they were multiplying like yeast. It seemed a statistical cinch that the

United States was about to become G.o.dstruck again. He correlated it with Transcendentalism and the trek of the

Latter Day Saintshmm . . . yes, it fitted. And the curve was pus.h.i.+ng toward a crest.

Billions in war bonds were now falling due; wartime mar- riages were reflected in the swollen peak of the Los Angeles school population. The Colorado River was at a record low and the towers in Lake Mead stood high out of the water.

But the Angelenos committed slow suicide by watering lawns as usual. The Metropolitan Water District commis- sioners tried to stop it.i.t fell between the stools of the police powers of fifty "sovereign" cities. The taps remained open, trickling away the life blood of the desert paradise.

The four regular party conventionsDixiecrats, Regular

Republicans, the other Regular Republicans, and the Demo- cratsattracted scant attention, as the Know-Nothings had not yet met. The fact that the "American Rally," as the

Know-Nothings preferred to be called, claimed not to be a party but an educational society did not detract from their strength. But what was their strength? Their beginnings had been so obscure that Breen had had to go back and dig into the December 1951 filesbut he had been approached twice this very week to join them, right inside his own officeonce by his boss, once by the janitor.

He hadn't been able to chart the Know-Nothings. They gave him chills in his spine. He kept column-inches on them, found that their publicity was shrinking while their numbers were obviously zooming.

Krakatau blew up on July i8th. It provided the first im- portant trans.p.a.cific TV-cast; its effect on sunsets, on solar constant, on mean temperature, and on rainfall would not be felt until later in the year. The San Andreas fault, its stresses unrelieved since the Long Beach disaster of 19331 continued to build up imbalancean unhealed wound run- ning the full length of the West Coast. PelBe and Etna erupted; Mauna Loa was still quiet.

Flying saucers seemed to be landing daily in every state.

No one had exhibited one on the groundor had the De- partment of Defense sat on them? Breen was unsatisfied with the off-the-record reports he had been able to get; the alcoholic content of some of them had been high. But the sea serpent on Ventura Beach was real; he had seen it. The troglodyte in Tennessee he was not in a position to verify.

Thirty-one domestic air crashes the last week in July . , . was it sabotage? Or was it a sagging curve on a chart? And that neo-polio epidemic that skipped from Seattle to New

York? Time for a big epidemic? Breen's chart said it was.

But how about B.W.P Could a chart know that a Slav bio- chemist would perfect an efficient virus-and-vector at the right time? Nonsensel

But the curves, if they meant anything at all, included

"free will"; they averaged in all the individual "wills" of a statistical universeand came out as a smooth function,

Every morning three million "free wills" flowed toward the center of the New York megapolis; every evening they flowed out againall by "free will," and on a smooth and predictable curve.

Ask a lemming! Ask (dl the lemmings, dead and alive- let them take a vote on it! Breen tossed his notebook aside and called Meade, "Is this my favorite statistic?"

"Potty! I was thinking about you."

"Naturally. This is your night off."

"Yes, but another reason, too. Potiphar, have you ever taken a look at the Great Pyramid?"

"I haven't even been to Niagara Falls. I'm looking for a rich woman, so I can travel."

"Yes, yes, I'll let you know when I get my first million, but-"

"That's the first time you've proposed to me this week."

"Shut up. Have you ever looked into the prophecies they found inside the pyramid?"

"Hub? Look, Meade, that's in the same cla.s.s with astrologystrictly for squirrels. Grow up."

"Yes, of course. But Potty, I thought you were interested in anything odd. This is odd."

"Oh. Sorry. If it's 'silly season' stuff, let's see it."