"Maybe. But it gave me an idea."
"Oh?"
"Yeah. The idea is this: Could the world get knocked out that way?
Suppose it did. Suppose everybody ran into something they couldn't
take. Would they just run in a closed circle? Would they take a single
day, like Marsetti took the sixth round, and just repeat it over and
over again?"
Ernie scowled and stopped. They were outside the plant door. "Boy," he
said, "you are a bug, ain't you? What are you trying to give me?"
"Just an idea, Ernie."
The suspicion that Jory was needling him came back. "Well, I don't
like it," Ernie said scornfully. "In fact, I think it's nuts." He
paused to think of something else to say, then shrugged and turned.
"I'll see you later. I got to get in to work."
* * * * *
And now here he was, Ernie thought, sitting in his own room with
Jory's face looking at him out of the blue screen.
_The whole day has been nuts_, Ernie told himself.
"Hello, Ernie," Jory's voice repeated tiredly. "Hello, Ernie....
Hello, Ernie--"
Ernie threw his beer can on the floor. Foam spewed out and soaked the
rug. "All right," Ernie bellowed, "All right--Hello!"
Jory stopped. He put his hand to his head and looked excited. He was
wearing earphones, Ernie saw.
"Ernie!" Jory said. "Do you see me?" He looked blindly out of the
screen.
In his rage, Ernie nearly kicked in the face of the set. "Yes, I see
you! What are you trying to pull?"
Jory turned excitedly to someone beside him, but off the screen. "I've
got him," he said quickly. "He's awake." He turned and faced Ernie.
"Look, Ernie, I can't see you but we've got a microphone in your room.
I can hear every word you say. Now sit down for a minute and let me
explain."
"You'd better," Ernie said ominously.
"Are you sitting?"
"Yeah, I'm sitting. Get on with it."
"I've been on your screen every night for the past week, Ernie. We
took over the station. And we've been broadcasting to you on all
channels for the past week."
Ernie shook his head. "You're nuts," he mumbled.
"It's true, Ernie."
"But--" A thought struck him. "Hey, are other people getting this on
their sets?"
"Everyone in the city, Ernie. But they aren't seeing it. As far as we
can tell they think they're watching their usual programs. Everyone is
in a trance, Ernie. They just go through the same motions over and
over. It was the same with the engineers here. We just pushed them
aside. They're tied up now. We're keeping them under drugs. We had to
do that. When they were loose they just tried to get back at the
controls. But that was all, they never really saw us."
Ernie shook his head again. "Wait a minute. Let me get my head
clear--O.K., now you say everybody is in some kind of trance. _Why?_"
"I tried to make you see it today. The world is stuck. It's stuck in
this God-forsaken one day! We don't know why. Some of us--just a
few--have known it all along. But even we can't remember what caused
it."
"You mean it's happening everywhere?"
"Yes. Or not happening, I guess you'd say. We're not getting reports
from overseas ... not any that are any different from the first
Wednesday. So it must be the same over there. It's the whole world,
Ernie."
"Wait a minute. Let me think." After a moment, he got up, went into
the kitchen and got another beer.
"O.K., I'm ready," he said as he came back. "Now, why did you guys
pick me? How many of you are there?"
"Just a handful ... no more than twenty. We're scattered all across
the country. We picked you because you're a test case, Ernie. One of
us is a psychologist.
"He says you're a common denominator. If we could break you out of it,
then we could get through to a whole cross section of people."
Ernie grunted and sipped his beer. "A common denominator, huh?
Thanks, pal. You mentioned drugs. I guess you can go anywhere? Just
walk past people and never be seen?"
"That's right."
Ernie laughed scornfully. "You've got a good deal. Why louse it up?
What do you stand to gain?"
Jory shook his head. "You're wrong, Ernie. For one thing, everything
is slowly running down. Miners go to the same part of the mine each
day and send out nothing but empty cars. The same thing is happening
all across the country, in farms, in factories, in hospitals--"
Ernie got up. "Keep talking," he said.
"Hospitals are hideous these days, Ernie. Don't go near a surgeon. All
he can do are the same operations he performed on the first Wednesday.
If you're the wrong height, the wrong weight, or just there at the
wrong time, he'll cut you to pieces.
"Homes burn to the ground. And nobody tries to get out of them. The
fire department is no good. It's stuck in that first Wednesday.
"We broke off broadcasting last night. We had to fight an apartment
house fire. There are only three of us here in the city. We didn't
save anyone. What could we do? We were lucky that we kept it from
spreading.
"We need help, Ernie. We need it badly--"
Absently, Ernie said, "Yeah, I see that all right." He kept pacing.
"I don't know if I can make you understand how important you are right
now, Ernie. With you helping, we can isolate the thing that triggered
you out of this. We can use it as a technique on whole groups of
people. The world will begin moving again. At last, things will begin
to change."
"Yeah--" Ernie stopped and looked at the rug beside his dresser. He
had found what he had been looking for. He picked the microphone up.
And pulled loose the wires.