"No time," I said. "We're due at the school at nine-thirty."
"It won't hurt to be a few minutes late. This is important, Bart."
We have a good marriage, and I don't quarrel with Celia's wishes. But
this meant another delay, and I could already see half the morning
shot, what with the meeting in the principal's office, and afterwards
perhaps taking Freddie out for a soda or something to make him feel
secure and loved. What a lot of trouble that boy was getting into
lately.
I wheeled out of traffic and feathered down to the roof of the 1st
National. A conveyer belt carried our ship toward the teller's window.
Celia opened her purse and withdrew a bank form. "Here, I think you'll
have to sign this, darling."
I voiced my irritation. "Withdraw it in your own name. It's a joint
account. Personally, I don't understand how you can need more money
when I just gave you four hundred yesterday."
"This is a very large amount," said Celia softly. "Bank requires it."
"How much?" I asked suspiciously.
"Ten thousand." She was staring at me intently with her almond-shaded
eyes. Her full red lips were parted in the faintest trace of a smile,
as her neat brown-pencilled eyebrows arched slightly in amused defiance.
She was daring me to ask the obvious question. Hell, I thought, I can
afford it. I signed the form and passed it back to her.
We were at the teller window. She scribbled on the sheet and handed it
to the clerk.
"Now," I said, feeling that I'd fulfilled the code of gallantry, "may I
ask what you need it for?"
"Certainly, dear. I'm giving it to the Mendelsohns as a going-away
present. Tonight at their farewell party."
"What! Ten thousand credits? Are you insane! The Mendelsohns mean
nothing to me." I was so upset that I kicked the degravity pedal and we
started to rise from the roof. I brought us down with a thud.
"They mean a lot to me," said Celia calmly. "They used to mean a lot to
you too."
"But ten thousand!" I protested. "What do you think I am, a millionaire
philanthropist?"
"It is a lot of money," Celia agreed placatingly. "But the Mendelsohns
are leaving tomorrow for Primus Gladus. We'll never see them again."
"So what!" I said heatedly. "Thousands of people go to the stars as
colonists. Thousands of failures like the Mendelsohns think their luck
will change on another planet. Does this mean that--"
"Bart, consider," said Celia. "If they had remained here on Earth
as our friends, there would have been many occasions in a lifetime
when I would have sent them remembrances. The birth of children.
Anniversaries. Graduations. Confirmations, bar mitzvahs, wedding
presents. Funeral wreaths. All I've done now is roll up all those gifts
of a lifetime into one farewell present, of a size that will help them
a little on their new world."
"I've cut off a lot of heads for that money. Grain brokerage is a
brutal profession, what with thirty billion mouths clamoring for food,
and the government keeping speculation in a straight-jacket, and that
insurrection on Venus, the granary of the solar system, making wheat
futures a nightmare. This kind of generosity leaves me cold. I had more
to say on the subject, but the bank teller spoke up to Celia.
"Your identification, please?"
Celia showed him her wrist plate.
"Ah, Mrs. Sponsor, I'm sorry to inconvenience you, but this is such a
large amount that we'll need your husband's personal verification. Bank
rules, you know."
"This is my husband."
My irritation mounted. "I'm Sponsor," I said to the teller, flourishing
my wrist band. "What's the difficulty?"
"Ah, Mr. Sponsor, would you like to step in a moment and speak to our
chief cashier?"
"I haven't time," I blurted sharply. "Give my wife the money!" We were
already ten minutes late to our school appointment.
The teller looked abashed and hesitant.
"Look here," I demanded, "if we don't get better service around here
I'll take my account elsewhere!"
That did it. He fussed around and finally handed Celia the bundle which
she had some trouble fitting into her purse. "Small denominations,"
she explained. I gunned our car peevishly, I must admit, and the
acceleration shoved her back into the seat rest. We were ten minutes
late already. I should have called my office.
We soared into air above old Chicago, the part rebuilt after World War
III. The lake claimed a good share of the blast area, of course, but
that's what makes our city so unusually beautiful now. Four hundred
tiny islands dot the lakefront, some connected by causeways, others
reachable only by aircar or boat.
"Why are you so cross?" said Celia, taking the offensive the way women
do when they've pulled some outrageous stunt.
"Look, you can't have it both ways. You can give them the money, but
you can't get me to say I like the idea."
"Solly Mendelsohn was once your closest friend."
"Solly is a poor competitor, Celia. Let's face up to it. He has
brains. He once showed signs of being a brilliant soil chemist, but he
washed out of school. And then he became a fertilizer salesman, and
he couldn't make a go of that. And after that he took up hydroponic
farming, but he wasn't a success at that either. No wonder he wants to
try another planet!"
"Solly has had a lot of personal misfortunes."
"That's an excuse all the shlubs use. No. The fact is, he just can't
compete. And unless you compete in this world, you're dead."
Below on its own crescent-shaped island lay Chicago Classical School. I
put our ship into a fast elevator dive. "My sympathies," I added, "go
to Dolores. She's a bright, attractive kid. Keen competitor. She didn't
deserve a shlub for a husband." I paused. "And about that party they're
giving tonight. I'm not going."
* * * * *
Chicago Classical was frankly a boarding school for privileged kids.
It taught the first six years, and no better I'm sure than the public
schools of Chicago. But there was social distinction. The contacts
would be good for Freddie later on. Freddie boarded there five days
a week and came home to us on weekends, uncommunicative about his
experiences, but happy to go romping with me in the woods and ravine
adjoining our estate near Mason City. Unfortunately, that wasn't too
often. Competitive pressure kept me in Chicago sometimes three or four
weeks at a stretch.
When they gave the first graders a word-picture test, Celia once told
me, Freddie had represented the word _father_ by the symbols of a bald
head, pipe and briefcase. After that, whenever I couldn't get home on
Saturday or Sunday, I made an effort to have lunch with the boy in
Chicago at least once during the week. But of course you can't get to
know your son very well that way.
"Just what is this trouble Freddie's involved in?" I asked as we
descended. "Why don't you keep me better informed on the boy?"
"I try to, but when have you had time to listen? I usually see you at
our cocktail parties for clients, or else at three in the morning when
you drop into bed too exhausted to get into pajamas."
"Well, this matter with the principal. Are you sure it's so serious?"
"They never ask for both parents unless it is," Celia assured me,
glancing soberly at the school buildings as we came to earth.
We parked, I noticed, alongside a dark blue official car, with the
municipal seal, and the initials S.T.A.R.S. "Never heard of that one,"
I told Celia as we walked to the main dormitory and administration
building.
The place was a gloomy gray, vine-covered neo-gothic structure
which ignored almost a thousand years of architectural progress. An
old-fashioned electric eye opened the door. Inside, the building
smelled like stale bread, musty linen and floor varnish, combined with
a dash of urine. The interior lighting was unnaturally bright, it
seemed to me, like in a surgical arena. The only harmonious note was
struck by the mural in the vestibule. One entire wall was covered by
an allegorical painting of sports, professions, and industry, with the
phrase COMPETE OR PERISH emblazoned boldly across the top.