* * * * *
He slept late the next morning. He opened the package after breakfast.
When he did, his face grew white and his hands trembled slightly.
Forsythe had somehow guessed. And rubbed it in.
He looked at the small bottle closely and held it up to the light.
There wasn't any such thing, of course, no matter how hard he wished
there was. It was sheer quackery. A laboratory analysis would reveal
a bottle of sugar water. There wasn't any doubt but what Forsythe was
trying to peddle it, along with his fountain pens and carburetors.
Exhibit A against the Forsythe Company, he thought.
He crossed over to the telephone stand by the window. It was raining
out, a summer thunder shower where the clouds boiled black against the
sky and the rain beat against the glass with a hundred hands, trying to
force its way inside. A dull and gloomy day that went well with the way
he felt.
He dialed Wheeler.
"Ray? How's Forsythe?"
Wheeler's voice was dry.
"_I don't know, Fred. His office is cleaned out. He's disappeared. He
was gone by the time the cops got to his office last night._"
They would have to do the leg work all over again, Manning thought
slowly. But it shouldn't be hard to do. Pitchmen always stayed in the
same business, even if they had to get a different tent occasionally.
"What about the carburetor?"
Wheeler laughed a little bitterly.
"_I gave it to the kid to install in the car. He did. Claimed it
actually ran on water, but that's something we'll never know for sure.
Kid was in an accident this morning. Nothing happened to him but the
whole engine block is demolished. So's the carburetor._"
But Wheeler's son had claimed it actually worked, Manning thought
chaotically. That it was the real McCoy. And Jeff at the cigar store
had claimed the pens had actually worked, too.
What if it was all on the level? Oswego City, New America. There wasn't
any such place. Not yet, there wasn't. But sometime in the future? And
what better way of merchandising than selling goods at different times
in history, goods that fit right in with the times? You wouldn't want
to flood the market, of course, but you could make a tidy profit. In
money? Hell no. Hadn't the building agent said Forsythe was an antique
dealer?
Stoves, refrigerators, sports cars. In some future age they would be
valuable as ... antiques. Forsythe said he had been a huckster all
his life. Where? And when? Maybe hucksters like Forsythe had peddled
stainless steel swords and shields to the Roman legions. And maybe
a huckster had stopped by to see Gutenberg about a small matter of
printing paper....
And in his own age, hidden among all the ads for quack remedies and
miraculous gadgets, there were a few ads that were genuine. Some
people probably had carburetors that ran on water and some office
workers pens that never wore out and maybe some high school girl used a
lipstick that was going to last her the rest of her life.
And a time machine would explain where Forsythe got the carburetors and
other goods without having them delivered through the streets, and it
explained how he got rid of the stoves and refrigerators and goods that
came into his office.
Manning suddenly wished that Forsythe hadn't taken off. The man had
something now that would be a sure fire sale. And people needed it
desperately, far more than they needed gadgets or carburetors or pens
or hairbrushes.
Wheeler's voice was buzzing on the phone.
"_What do we do with the case now, Fred?_"
Manning glanced out the window again. It was a beautiful day, the
clouds were black velvet and the rain drops were diamonds.
He looked down at the small vial in his hand. The label read:
_Forsythe's Cancer Cure_.
The real McCoy.
Manning lifted the phone and spoke into it.
"We don't have a case any more, Ray." He paused, then said: "I just
swallowed Exhibit A."