* * * * *
A wave of neck-clutching passed over the crowd. Cold breezes, I expect.
Or hot ones, in some cases. Tom Jones leaped up with a cry and sat down
again abruptly.
"Did you see anything?" Ray asked.
I shook my head. Where, I wondered, was the good old science fiction
cameraderie? If I'd been the lucky one, I would have let the crowd
in--well, a few of them, anyway--given them jobs and palaces and
things. Not that they would have been grateful, probably, the
treacherous, undependable, neurotic bums....
They were looking nervous now. There had been that little burst of
activity after a long pause (even the chandelier seemed to be swinging
slowly to rest), and now the--call it the stillness--was more than they
could stand. I felt it, too: that building up of tension. Whoever it
was, was getting tired of little things.
A horrible jangling welled out of Burgeon's guitar case; it sounded
like a bull banjo with the heaves. Ned jumped, dropped his cigarette
holder, got the case open and I guess put his hand on the strings; the
noise stopped. That eliminated him ... or did it?
Take it another way. What would the guy have to be like who would waste
a marvel like this on schoolboy pranks at a Medusa Christmas party? Not
Jibless, I thought--he abominates practical jokers. Bierce didn't seem
to be the type, either, although you could never tell; the damnedest
wry stories get hatched occasionally in that lean ecclesiastic skull.
Duchamp was too staid (but was I sure?); MacKean was an enigma. Gamble?
Just maybe. Burgeon? Jones? It could be either, I thought, but I
wasn't satisfied.
I glanced at Ray again, and mentally crossed him off for the second or
third time. Ray's an honorable man, within his own complicated set of
rules; he might mislead me, with pleasure, but he wouldn't give me the
lie direct.
But I had the feeling that the answer was square in front of me, and I
was blind to it.
The meeting was just now getting around to the idea that somebody
present was responsible for all the nonsense. This shows you the
trouble with committees.
A shocking idea hit me abruptly; I grabbed Ray by the coatsleeve. "Ray,
this cockeyed weather--I just remembered. _Suppose it's local._"
His eyes widened; he nodded reluctantly. Then he stiffened and snapped
his fingers at somebody squatting just below us--the invisible fan,
Harry Somebody. I hadn't even noticed him there, but it's Ray's
business to know everything and keep track of everybody--that's why
he's up on his hill.
The fan came over. Ray handed him something. "Here is some change,
Harry--run out and call up the weather bureau. Find out whether this
freak weather is local or not, and if it is, just where the boundaries
are. Got that?"
Harry nodded and went out. He was back only a couple of minutes
later. "I got the Weather Bureau all right. They say it's local--just
Manhattan and Queens!"
Something snapped. I did a fast jig on the piano top, slipped and
came crashing down over the keys, but I hardly noticed it. I got a
death-grip on Ray's trouser leg. "Listen! If he can do that--he doesn't
have to be in the same room. Doesn't Gamble live out in--"
There were cries of alarm over by the open courtyard window. The room
was suddenly full of cats--brindle ones, black ones, tabbies, white
ones with pink ribbons around their necks, lunatic Siamese.
After them came dogs: one indistinguishable wave of liquid leaping
torsos, flying ears, gullets. In half a second the room was an incident
written by Dante for the Mutascope.
I caught a glimpse of a terrier bounding after two cats who were
climbing Samwitz' back; I saw Duchamp asprawl, pipe still in his mouth,
partially submerged under a tidal eddy of black and white. I saw
Tom Q. rise up like a lighthouse, only to be bowled over by a
frantically scrambling Leigh MacKean.
Ray touched my arm and pointed. Over by the far wall, his back against
it, Gamble stood like a slightly potbound Viking. He was swinging that
massive briefcase of his, knocking a flying cat or dog aside at every
swipe. Two women had crawled into his lee for shelter; he seemed to be
enjoying himself.
Then the briefcase burst. It didn't just come open; it flew apart like
a comedy suitcase, scattering a whirlwind of manuscript paper, shirts,
socks--and nothing else.
The tide rushed toward the window again: the last screech and the last
howl funneled out. In the ringing silence, somebody giggled. I couldn't
place it, and neither could Ray, I think--then. Stunned, I counted
scratched noses.
Samwitz was nowhere in sight; the crowd had thinned a good deal, but
all of the eight, thank heaven, were still there--MacKean sitting
groggily on a stranger's lap, Werner Kley nursing a bloody nose,
Tom Q., camera still dangling from his neck, crawling carefully on
hands and knees toward the door....
He reached it and disappeared. An instant later, we heard a full chorus
of feminine screams from the lobby, and then the sound of an enormous
J. Arthur Rank-type gong.
Ray and I looked at each other with a wild surmise. "_Tom_ lives in
Queens!" he said.
I scrambled down off the piano and the platform, but Ray was quicker.
He darted into the crowd, using his elbows in short, efficient jabs. By
the time I got to the door he was nowhere in sight.
The lobby was full of large powdery women in flowered dresses, one of
them still shrieking. They slowed me down, and so did tripping over one
of those big cylindrical jardinieres full of sand and snipes. I reached
the street just in time to see Ray closing the door of a cab.
I hadn't the wind to shout. I saw his cheerful face and Tom's in the
small yellow glow of the cab light; I saw Tom Q. raise the camera, and
Ray put out his hand to it. Then the cab pulled away into traffic, and
I watched its beady red tail lights down the avenue until they winked
out of sight.
* * * * *
Some time later, walking down the cold morning street, I discovered
there was somebody with me, keeping step, not saying anything. It was
Harry Er-Ah.
He saw I had noticed him. "Some party," he remarked.