Various Fiction Read online

  THE next day I brought my wife into the city. With three days left to go, two really because you couldn’t count the Day itself, we figured we’d move into a good hotel, buy an armload of classical records and have our own private, quiet celebration. I thought we deserved it, although I could have been wrong.

  Frank was already at the store when we got there. He was all dressed up, and he had a suitcase with him.

  “What’s up, Frank?” I asked.

  “Well, Mr. Ostersen,” he said, “with only two days left, I’m going to go on my first airplane trip. I’m flying to Texas.”

  “Oh?” I asked.

  “Yessir,” Frank said. He shuffled his feet, as if he knew he was doing something foolish. But his face was set. He was waiting for me to tell him not to go.

  “I’m going out where I can ride a horse. Mr. Ostersen, I’ve always dreamed of going to Texas and riding a horse. It isn’t just the horses, I want the airplane ride too, and I want to see what all that land looks like. I was figuring on doing it this summer, on my vacation, but now—well, I’m going.”

  I walked to the back of the store and opened the safe. I had four thousand dollars there; the rest was in the bank. I came back and handed Frank two thousand.

  “Here, kid,” I said. “Buy a horse for me.” He just stared at me for a second, then dashed out. There wasn’t much to say. Besides, it. was an easy gesture. The stuff was as good as worthless. Might as well see the other fellow have a good time.

  For once my wife seemed to agree with me. She smiled.

  Minnie came in almost as soon as Frank left. She was all dressed up, too, in another dress she hadn’t bought in my store. There was a young fellow with her. He wasn’t good-looking or bad-looking; just the sort of fellow you’d see anywhere. But Minnie seemed to think he was something pretty special, to judge by the way she was clutching his arm.

  “Are you going to Texas too?” I asked.

  “Oh, no,” she said: “I’m getting married.”

  “Oh?” Jane asked.

  “Yes ma’am,” Minnie said. “Herb and I were going to wait ’til he finished dental school, so he shouldn’t be living off his parents. But now—She looked very cute, I must say. Her hair was a light blonde. It looked fine on her.

  “Here, Minnie,” my wife said. She took the other two thousand out of my hand and gave it to her. “Have a good time these last days.”

  “Hey!” I said, when Minnie and her young man had gone. “How about us? We’ll never be able to get in a bank. What’ll we do?”

  “Quit worrying,” Jane told me. “Don’t you believe in young love?” She found the one comfortable chair in the place—the one we reserve for customers—and sat down.

  “I’ve been too careful,” she said when she saw me looking at her.

  “I see,” I said.

  “And as far as money goes,” she continued. “Haven’t you any faith? The Lord will provide.”

  “That’s fine by me,” I said, and sat down beside her. The door opened, and in walked a short man. He was oldish, and dressed like a banker, but I knew right away he was in the dress line. There’s something about the dress line, you can always tell.

  “Not much business?” he asked.

  “Not much.” There hadn’t been a customer in all day—or all yesterday, now that I thought about it.

  “That’s understandable,” he told me. “It’s because everyone is storming the big stores, the expensive stores. Everyone wants to wear the best dresses on their last days.”

  “Sounds logical,” I said.

  “Logical, but not entirely right,” he said, frowning seriously through little pince-nez. “Why should the big, expensive stores drive the middle-class retailer out of business? I am here as a representative of Bonzelli’s—to reimburse you for your financial loss.” With that he dropped a thick manilla envelope on the counter, smiled, and left.

  “Bonzelli’s,” my wife commented coolly. “They’re—expensive.”

  Inside the envelope there was eight thousand dollars.

  THAT wasn’t the end of it.

  Strangers dropped in every few minutes, leaving money. After a while, I started handing it back. I went down the block to Ollie Bernstein’s store, with twenty thousand dollars in a paperbag. I met him on the way. He had a fistful of bills.

  “I’ve got a little gift for you, excompetitor,” he said. It was about fifteen thousand dollars. Everyone with money was handing it over, and getting it back from someone else.

  “I’ve got an idea,” I said. “How about the unfortunate?”

  “You mean the Bronx dress shops?” he asked.

  “No, I mean the derelicts, the bums. Why shouldn’t they share?”

  “Count me in for fifteen thousand,” he said without hesitation. We talked it over. Plans for going down to the Bowery and handing it out didn’t seem so good. The streets were still impossible, and I didn’t want to leave Jane for long. We finally decided to give it to the nearest church. They’d see it got into the proper hands.

  The church on 65th and Madison was closest, so we went right there and formed on the end of the line. It stretched halfway down the block, but it was moving fast.

  “I had no idea it was like this,” Ollie said. He shook his head. Perspiration was dripping from him. He was working harder handing out money than he had ever worked to make it in his life.

  “What kind of church is this?” he asked me.

  “I don’t know.” I tapped the man in front of me. “What kind of church is this, mac?”

  The man turned around. He was almost as big as Ollie but older, tireder looking. “How should I know?” he said. “I’m from Brooklyn.”

  We reached the inside of the church and a man took our money. He didn’t have time to thank us; there were too many behind, clamoring far their chance. The man just threw the bills on a table. Another man, a Reverend of some kind, was walking back and forth, picking up handfuls of it and carrying it off, then coming back for more. We followed him, just out of curiosity. I didn’t have any doubt they’d dispose of it in the right way, but a fellow likes to know where his charity is going. Besides, Jane would probably ask me.

  At the side entrance of the church there was a line of poorly clad, redfaced men. Their clothes were in tatters, but their faces were shining. The Reverend was handing each man a handful of bills, then rushing back for more.

  “Be simpler if they formed the line inside,” I said to Ollie as we headed back for our stores. “Just have the guys with money lined up in front of the guys without. Faster.”

  “Listen,” Ollie said. “You always have a middle man. Can’t avoid it.” He coughed three or four times. I could see that the strain was getting him. A man Ollie’s size shouldn’t run around handing out money that way.

  On my way back to the store someone handed me five thousand dollars. He just grinned, shoved it in my hands and hurried on. I did a double take. It was one of the bums who had just got it.

  Back in the store there was more money piled up on the counter. My wife was still in the same chair, reading a magazine.

  “It’s been piling up since you left,” she said.

  I threw my five thousand on the pile.

  “You should have heard the radio,” she said. “Congress passed about two dozen laws in the last hour. They’ve given everybody every right you could think of, and a few I never dreamed existed.”

  “It’s the age of the common man,” I told her.

  FOR an hour I stood at the door handing out money, but it was just plain foolishness. The streets were mobbed with people handing out the stuff. Everyone wanted to give it away. It was a game; the rich gave it to the poor, and the poor turned around and handed it back to the rich. By two o’clock it was impossible to tell who had been rich and who poor.

  In the meantime, Jane kept me posted on what was going on over the radio. Every country on the face of the earth was passing emancipation acts as quick as they could get a quorum together.
The age of the common man had really come in—two days before deadline.

  Jane and I left for lunch at three o’clock. We both knew it would be the last time we’d see the store. As a final gesture, we piled fifty thousand dollars or so on the counter, and left the doors open. It seemed the only thing we could do.

  We ate in an East Sixty-third street restaurant. The regular help had left, but people wandered in off the streets, cooked for a while, ate and left. Jane fixed a few dozen club sandwiches for our share, and then we ate. The next problem was where to sleep. I was sure all the hotels would be full, but we had to try. In an emergency we could sleep in the store.

  We walked into the Stanton-Carler, one of the biggest hotels in New York. There was a young man behind the main desk, reading The World as Will and Idea, by Schopenhauer.

  “Any chance of a room?” I asked him.

  “Here’s a pass key,” he said. “Take any vacant room you can find.”

  “How much?” I asked, fanning a few thousand dollar bills.

  “Are you kidding?” he said, and returned to his book. He looked like a very serious young man.

  We found a vacant room on the fifteenth floor, and sat down as soon as we were inside. Immediately, Jane jumped up again.

  “Records,” she said. “I want to spend the day before Judgment listening to good music.”

  I was dog-tired, but I wanted the same thing. Jane and I had never had enough time to listen to all the music we wanted to hear. Somehow, we had never gotten around to it.

  Jane wanted to go with me, but I thought, what with the jam New York was in, it would be easier if I went alone.

  “Lock the door until I get back,” I told her. “It may be the day before Judgment, but not everyone’s an angel yet.” She winked at me. She hadn’t winked in years.

  I scrambled through the crowd to a music store. It was deserted. I picked up a long-playing recorder and all the records I could carry. Then I came back. I had to walk to the fifteenth floor, because some guy was zooming up and down in one elevator, and the rest were out of order.

  “Put on the Debussey,” I told Jane when I got back, throwing myself in an armchair. It was a joy and a pleasure to be off my feet.

  That’s how we spent the rest of the day, and the evening. We played records. I had gotten some Bach, Debussey, Mozart, Hayden, and a few others I never heard of. I listened to more music in that day than I’d heard in five years previously.

  WE woke up late the next day, about one-thirty in the afternoon. I felt guilty. It didn’t seem right to sleep away the day before Judgment.

  “Seems as good as any other way,” Jane said. Perhaps she was right. Anyhow, we were both ravenously hungry. Jane’s feet were blistered, because she hadn’t moved around so much since we were courting.”

  “Stay put,” I said. “Your shitting knight will bring you lunch. My last good deed.”

  “Your first,” she told me, smiling.

  “Lock that door,” I said, and left. I just don’t trust people very much. I don’t know why. Even on the day before Judgment, I couldn’t trust everyone.

  The streets were empty when I finally got down. A few people were walking around, peering nervously over their shoulders. A few more had joyous smiles on their faces. But the streets were very bare. Cars, taxis and buses had been left haphazardly all over the street. The traffic lights were still clicking red and green, but there was no traffic to regulate.

  I saw no sign of a policeman, and remembered that I hadn’t seen any since shortly after the announcement. I didn’t know if I liked that, but I supposed that cops are human too. They might like to spend their last days with their families, also. And who was going to steal anything?

  It might be a good idea, I thought, to drop into a church and offer up a prayer. Not that it would make any difference, or even that I especially wanted to. But I thought Jane would like me to. I tried three churches, but they were all packed, with hundreds waiting outside. Now I knew where everybody was.

  I think I might have waited too, but Jane was expecting her lunch. I went on to a restaurant.

  On my way back with a bundle of food, five people stopped me and tried to give me money. They seemed desperate. They explained that they had to get rid of it—and they had no idea how to. After working for it all their lives, it didn’t seem right just to throw it away. And no one would take it now. They were really perplexed.

  One man in particular struck me.

  “Please take it, old man,” he said. “I’ve been unfortunate—I’ve accumulated so much of it, it’s almost impossible to dispose of it all. And I don’t want it on my—hands. I really don’t. Won’t you accept a portion of it?”

  I recognized him. He was an actor, and a well-known one. I had always enjoyed watching him, so I took a pile of bills off his hands, leaving it on the desk of the hotel. The young man who had been reading Schopenhauer was no longer there.

  Jane and I ate, and listened to some more music. We listened to it the rest of the day, and didn’t talk much. Towards evening Jane’s eyes were soft. I knew she was thinking back over our life. I thought back too. It didn’t seem so bad. Not really. I had made a few mistakes, but still not so bad.

  Night came, and we made supper out of leftovers. We didn’t want to go out for anything, and we didn’t want to go to sleep.

  “It’ll come just at dawn,” Jane said. I tried to tell her you can’t predict the ways of the Almighty, but she wasn’t going to sell out her woman’s intuition for anything. She was sure.

  That was a long night, and not a very good one. I felt as though I were a prisoner at the bar. It wasn’t a very good way to feel, but I was frightened. I suppose everybody was.

  Standing at the window I saw the first light of the false dawn. It was going to be a beautiful day over New York. There were no visible stars, but every light in the city was on, making stars of its own. It was as though the city was burning candles to the unknown.

  “Goodbye, Jane,” I said. I knew she was right. The announcement would come just at dawn. I hoped Minnie was in her husband’s arms; and Frank—I felt he was probably on a horse, standing up in the unfamiliar saddle and looking toward the East. I hoped he was.

  “Goodbye, dear,” Jane said, and kissed me. There was a cool breeze from the open window, and darkness in the sky. It was beautiful, at that moment. It should have ended just like that.

  “There will be a slight delay,” the voice said from behind my shoulder, as pleasant as ever, and as distant, “in settling the affairs of the inhabitants of the planet Earth. The final examination and departure will be held ten years from this date.”

  I stood at the window, my arm around Jane. We couldn’t say anything for perhaps ten minutes.

  “Well,” I said to her finally.

  “Well, well.”

  “Well,” she said. We were silent for a few more minutes. Then she said, “Well,” again.

  There was nothing else to say.

  I looked out the window. Below me the city was sparkling with lights; the sun was coming up, and everything was deadly quiet. The only sound I could hear was the buzzing of an electric sign. It sounded like a broken alarm clock, or like a time bomb, perhaps.

  “You’ll have to go back to work,” Jane said. She started to cry. “Although I suppose ten years is only a second in eternity. Only a second to Her.”

  “Less,” I said. “A fraction of a second. Less.”

  “But not to us,” Jane said.

  * * *

  It certainly should have ended there. Judgment day should have come, bringing with it whatever it brought. We were ready. All the wordly goods were disposed of, in New York and I suppose, in the rest of the world. But ten years was too long, too much a strain on goodness.

  We should have been able to carry on. There was no reason why not. We could have gone back to our jobs. The farmers were still on the farms, the grocers and clerks were still around.

  We could have done such a bang-up j
ob of it. We could have pointed to that ten years with pride, and said, “You see! Our recorded history of thousands of years of avarice, cruelty and hate isn’t the whole story. For ten years were good and clean and noble. For ten years we were brothers!”

  Unfortunately, it wasn’t that way.

  The farmers didn’t want to go back to their farms, and the grocers didn’t want to return to their groceries. Oh, some did. Many did, for a while. But not for long. Everyone talked about high ideals, but it was just talk, just like before.

  For six months Jane and I struggled along, not getting much to eat, frightened by the mobs that surged around New York. Finally, we decided to move out. We joined the exodus leaving New York, drifted through Pennsylvania, and headed North.

  The country was disrupted, but it pulled itself together again, after a fashion. Thousands were starving, then millions. Some had food, but they weren’t very willing to share it. They were figuring what they’d do for ten years, if they shared their food. Money they’d still hand out in basketfuls. It wasn’t worth anything. In nine months a million dollars wouldn’t buy a rotten turnip.

  As time passed, fewer and fewer stayed on the job. The money they got wouldn’t buy anything. Besides, why work when the end was so near? Why work for someone else?

  In about a year there was the Bulgaria incident. An American in Sophia disappeared. He just vanished. The American Embassy complained. They were told to go home. The Bulgarians didn’t want any interference for their last nine years of existence. Besides, they added that they didn’t know where the man was. Maybe they were telling the truth. People vanish even here.

  Anyhow, after our third ultimatum we bombed them. The attack coincided with a bombing launched on us by China, who decided we were interfering with her trade with Japan.

  Great Britain was bombed, and bombed someone else. Everyone started bombing everyone else.

  I took Jane out of the city where we were staying, and headed for the open country. We ran and stumbled over the fields, with the roar of the planes above us. We hid in ditches. Jane was cut down by machine gun bullets in one raid. Perhaps she was fortunate. She missed the atom bombs the next week, and she missed the hydrogen bombs a week later.