Earth Unaware

get, and Ed looked gloomily at the reporter. He said finally, “I saw that article you did on gimmicked up style changes.”

Buzz De Kemp brought an eight inch long stogie from his jacket pocket and lit it. “Great stuff, eh? Actually…”

“No,” Ed said, completely ignored.

“…the practice goes back to the early sixties, when hovers were in their infancy. You know where I got that dope? From the old boy we were talking about the other night. He’s got more statistics on how our present affluent welfare state economic system is lousing up the nation…”

“Tubber!” Ed said.

“Sure, sure. Some of his data is dated a bit. Got a lot of it together back a decade ago. But it’s even more valid now than then. The last time I heard him talk he was on the country wasting its resources with disposables. Steaks and other meats that came in disposable frying pans. Muffins and biscuits in disposable baking tins. A throw away aluminium mousetrap; you don’t have to fool around with the mouse, you never even see it. You just throw away the whole unit. And plastic razors with the blade built in; use it once and throw it away.” Buzz laughed and drew on his stogie.

“Listen, all this aside. I heard him sounding off the same way the night Helen and I attended his meeting. But what I want to know is, did you ever hear him lay on a spell?”

The reporter scowled at him. “Do what?”

“Make with a curse. A hex. Put a spell on somebody.”

“Hey, the old boy’s not crazy. He’s just an old duck who’s viewing with alarm. Warning about the deluge to come. He wouldn’t really believe in curses, and even if he did, he certainly wouldn’t curse anybody.”

Ed finished his coffee. “Curse anybody ? The fact is he’s evidently cursed everybody. At least half of everybody. All women.”

Buzz De Kemp took his stogie from his mouth and pointed it at Ed Wonder. “Little Ed, you’re potted. Stoned. Swacked. Besides that, you don’t make sense. No sense.”

Ed Wonder had made up his mind to tell him. He had to tell somebody and he couldn’t think of anybody better. “All right,” he said. “Listen for a minute.”

It took more than a minute. During the process, Buzz De Kemp had ordered more coffee, but otherwise didn’t interrupt.

When Ed Wonder finally went silent, the newspaperman’s stogie had gone out. He lit it again. He thought about it, while Ed worked away at his coffee.

Buzz said finally, “It makes one beautiful story. We’ll exploit it together.”

“What?”

Buzz leaned over the table, pointing happily with the stogie. “It’s the Father Divine story all over again. Remember me telling you about Father Divine the other night?”

“What the devil has this got…”

“No, listen. Back in the early thirties, Father Divine was just one more evangelist picking up a scrubby living in Harlem. He only had maybe a hundred or so followers. So one day there was a knifing or something in his heaven and he was arrested and the judge gave him a mild sentence. However, a couple of reporters heard several of Father Divine’s followers say that the judge was flying into the face of disaster. That Father Divine would strike him dead. A day or so later the judge died of a heart attack. The reporters, seeing a story, went to interview the evangelist in his cell He played it straight, saying simply, ‘I hated to do it.’ Chum, believe me, when Father Divine came out of that jail, all Harlem was there on the street waiting for him.”

Ed demanded impatiently, “What in the devil…” Then he stopped short.

“Sure,” Buzz said urgently. “Don’t you get it? Old Tubber curses the vanity of women. Puts a hex on cosmetics and fancy styles in clothes. That sort of thing. And what happens the next day? The Homespun Look fad hits. Coincidence, of course, but what a coincidence.”

It was obvious now. “Yeah,” Ed said slowly, then, “but what did you mean about us exploiting it?”

The stogie was pointing for emphasis again. “Don’t be a kook. This is your chance of a lifetime. Up until now, on this offbeat program of yours you’ve had a bunch of freaks. Twitches who claim to have ridden in flying saucers, spiritualists who don’t have any luck raising spirits for you, faith healers who couldn’t take off a waft. But this time you’ve got it made. Go over and latch onto old man Tubber for your next show. He laid a hex on vanity and it worked. get it? It worked. And what’s more, he’s got witnesses. You witnessed it, Helen Fontaine witnessed it. Tubber’s daughter was there and a bunch of his followers. He’s got genuine bona fide witnesses that he cursed the vanity of women and the next day the Homespun Look took over. Can’t you see a story when it falls into your lap.”

“Holy smokes,” Ed said in awe.

“I’ll give you full coverage in the Times-Tribune. First build up to the program and then do a really good spread with lots of art, afterward. Maybe in the Sunday supplement.”

“Art?”

“Photographs, photographs—of Tubber and his tent, and his daughter. Tubber in the pose he assumes when he’s laying a hex on something. The works.”

He was carrying Ed Wonder away. With this sort of a show he might even get enough publicity to interest some sponsor. Why, he might even get his TV spot for it.

He said, “But I’ve got an ESP girl on for this Friday.”

“Bounce her. Postpone her. This is hot. You’ve got to use Tubber while this Homespun Look fad is new. It’ll be old hat in a couple of weeks. This is one style that the bigwigs aren’t going to let last. They can’t afford to. Department stores, beauty shops, cosmetic manufacturers are already howling. They want the President to give one of his famous Air-Conditioner Side chats, telling the women of the country they’re destroying prosperity.”

“Right!” Ed told him. “We’ll do it. I’ll have to get hopping. I’ll need to dig up some panelists to appear with him. Ask him questions, that sort of thing.”

“Me!” Buzz crowed. “I’ll be a panelist for you. I’ve listened to him half a dozen times. Then get Helen Fontaine to appear, since it was she who brought on the hex. Maybe we can get her to plead with him to reverse the spell.”

“Yeah,” Ed took it up. “And his daughter, Nefertiti. She’s as cute as a pair of cuff links. Nice voice too. We’ll work her in. She implied that old Tubber had made with a hex or two before, when he was speaking in wrath as she called it.”

Ed Wonder had the faintest twinge of misgiving on the way over to where Ezekiel Joshua Tubber had his tents pitched. What would Mulligan, and the Stephen Decatur Society have to say about opening the airwaves to the man that only the week before they were investigating for subversion? He decided he wouldn’t bother to tell the studio head. If he could get Helen Fontaine to appear on the show, Mulligan wouldn’t have much to say. And Buzzo was right, this was a program that was going to pull attention. The breaks, at long last, were coming Ed Wonder’s way.

They drew up to the parking area of the large empty lot the Tubber followers had appropriated for his stay in the vicinity, and Ed Wonder dropped the lift lever of the Volkshover and settled to the ground.

Buzz said, “Hey what’s going on? What’s going on?”

“It looks like they’re wrapping it up,” Ed said. “They’re pulling down the main tent.”

The scrambled out of the little hovercar and made their way in the direction of the activities.

Nefertiti Tubber spotted them first. She had emerged from the smaller of the two tents, carrying a coffeepot and four cups in her hands.

For some inane reason, there came to Ed Wonder’s mind a couple of lines he hadn’t thought of since high school.

Maud Miller, on a summer’s day, Raked the meadow, sweet with hay.

He said from the side of his mouth, “For the past couple of days I’ve been seeing this Homespun Look. For the first time I can say, on her it looks good.”

“On her it looks natural,” Buzz said back. “The rural simplicity bit.”