George didn't like the idea of little red frogs
raining down on him from a clear sky. But a pretty
girl falling into his arms was quite another matter!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
December 1950
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
"_We shall pick up an existence by its frogs.... Wise men have tried
other ways. They have tried to understand our state of being, by
grasping at its stars, or its arts, or its economics. But, if there is
an underlying oneness of all things, it does not matter where we begin,
whether with stars, or laws of supply and demand, or frogs, or Napoleon
Bonaparte. One measures a circle, beginning anywhere._"
--_Charles Fort, LO!_
* * * * *
It was raining. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, but it was raining.
George wished it were raining cats and dogs, but it wasn't. Anything
would be better than this. It was raining frogs. Little red frogs.
It was strictly a local rain. The frogs seemed to germinate from a
spot somewhere above George's head, and then they spread out and came
tumbling down in a cone-shaped area some fifteen feet across. The worst
part of it was that George was in the center of the cone.
[Illustration: It was as if a hole had opened in space, pouring forth
the stream of red frogs....]
The frogs fell on him. They seemed to be concentrated most heavily
in the center of the cone, and a good percentage of them landed on
him--mostly on his head--and then bounced off to fall on the sand.
George didn't like it.
He moved. He got up off the sand and ran half a dozen paces closer to
the surf, but he still felt the little red frogs striking him. The spot
was still directly, over his head; George was not sure how high up. He
was still the center of the cone.
"Myra! Hey, Myra," George called his wife. He could see her head
bobbing up and down in the waves and the powerful strokes of her arms
through the water showed George that she had heard him call. But she
would be angry. As soon as he shouted, the frogs stopped falling. First
the downpour became a drizzle, and then there were no frogs at all.
Myra would be very angry. She was all wrapped up in this new idea of
hers, and she would be angry. If he hadn't yelled, more frogs would
have fallen--and there's no telling what else, George thought.
The Bikini suit was not in style this year, but Myra wore it because
she knew she looked good in it. George watched her run toward him and
watched her shake her dark hair loose after she removed the bathing
cap. Then he looked at her figure and he knew it was good, so good that
he unconsciously felt the spare tire beginning to blossom out around
his waist, and he blushed. That was another trouble, he always blushed.
Not only that, but he was very fair-skinned. They could spend the
entire summer at their seaside bungalow in this secluded area, and Myra
would be bronzed like an Indian maiden. But George would turn red and
then he would peel. Then he would turn red all over again and then he
would peel again. And he had freckles all over.
But he stopped thinking of that now. It was a general consideration.
The specific consideration bothered him more: there was one circular
area of little red frogs, fifteen feet across. Then there was a trail
of little red frogs on the sand, five running steps long. And then
there was another fifteen foot circle of them. Most of the frogs were
still, but some of them hopped about, and soon the circles had become
irregular areas.
Myra came up to him breathlessly. "Oh, George!" she cooed. "You're
magnificent, really magnificent. Frogs this time. Little red frogs.
You're so--so _Fortean_."
George sighed. He had a lot of friends, and many of them complained
because their wives would call this or that thing Freudian. But
they had sympathy: a lot of men had wives riding the Freudian
merry-go-round. This was worse. To Myra things were _Fortean_. George
had seen pictures of this man Fort--a nice enough looking guy with a
cherubic face and a ruddy complexion, a turned up nose and big bushy
eyebrows. A mild, harmless man. He had passed away; for some twenty
years now he had been dead. But he could impress people. His work had
impressed Myra.
He thought we're _property_, or things are teleported from one place
to another, or we're being fished for, or you can tell a world by its
frogs, or science is whacky and word-nutty and sophistic hooey....
George had heard it all dozens of times. Myra had told him. Myra had
told him so much that he thought he knew Fort's philosophy by heart.
A lot of ridiculous hog-wash--until the rain. How could he call it
ridiculous now?
* * * * *
"See?" Myra said triumphantly. "See, George? This time it's frogs.
Yesterday it was beetles, and the day before, those little birds--and
everything was red."
"Maybe they're communists," George suggested feebly.
"Oh--"
"Well, that's as good an explanation as any."
"No, it's not. Red is the predominant color of whatever world they come
from, so they're red. Or else it could just be coincidence, but I doubt
that. And I told you you were a good catalyst."
"So I'm a good catalyst. So I can make rain. They could have used me
back East a few months ago--if they wanted a rain of frogs."
"Or beetles or birds," Myra reminded him.
"Yeah. Beetles and birds, too." George said this matter-of-factly,
but then he felt his knees start to tremble. It was the inevitable
after-effect. This was _strange_. It couldn't be happening to him. It
never rained that kind of rain, even if Fort had said that it did, and
even if Myra believed that Fort was right. How could it rain like that?
George knew what caused rain, and by no stretch of his imagination
could organic matter be the result. Any sort of organic matter. And
least of all little red frogs. He always associated frogs with mud--and
the idea of little red frogs coming from the sky was too incredible to
consider.
But there were the frogs on the beach.
George stroked the sand gingerly with the toes of one foot, clearing
frogs away until he had room to sit down. He sat.
One of the little red frogs jumped into his lap, and he stood up
again--so fast that he almost upended Myra.
"My gosh, George. You may be a good catalyst, but after that you're
hopeless. That's where I come in."
George was sorry he had decided to play along with his wife. She had
given him a test, and that part he enjoyed, for all he did was shoot
dice for several hours. Something about psychokinesis, Myra said. And
George scored high. So high that Myra had cried: "You're positively
Fortean!"
And then had come the birds, the beetles, and the frogs. All red.
"Listen," George said. "This is the last time. This is positively the
last time."
"The last time? Last time for what?"
"The last time that I let you use me as a--a catalyst. I can't go
around making it rain like that. We're in a deserted spot out here, so
it isn't too bad. But what if this happened when people were around?
What then?"
"Silly, why do you think we came to this bungalow for the summer? And
besides, even if people were around, why would they think _you_ caused
the rain? If you insist on calling it rain."
George did not like the way she said _you_. It was as if he didn't
amount to much--but she always spoke to him like that. He knew he was
no world-beater. He had an adequate job and he made an adequate salary,
but he just didn't stack up like some of the men he knew. Or some of
the men Myra knew. It always got him angry when she said _you_ that way.
"What do you mean, why should they think I caused the rain? Who else
can cause it, that's what I want to know? Who else can cause it?"
She smiled, and if it was a smile of triumph, George pretended not to
notice it. "That's what I mean," she said, putting her arms around his
neck. "You're so wonderful. Only you can cause it. Let's go into the
house, George."
He grunted and he disentangled her arms. Then he took her hand and
walked back across the sand to the house. And he held his head very
high so he wouldn't have to look at all the little frogs on the beach.
* * * * *
They sat in the living room and the sun was setting, throwing long
shadows across the room through the big picture window. George sipped
his bourbon and then he put his glass down. Two drinks on an empty
stomach always put that dreamy feeling in his head. He wanted to get up
and pour himself another, but it was so pleasant just sitting here and
thinking of nothing that he decided against it.
"You're ready now," Myra told him. "Oh, you're really perfect now.
Remember, George, just think of nothing. Don't think of a thing. Lean
back, relax, and keep your mind a blank. It shouldn't be too hard."
There was that undertone of scorn again, but now George didn't feel
like doing a thing about it. She was right: it wouldn't be too hard. He
had had his two drinks of bourbon, and now he would just sit back and
relax, like Myra told him. Besides, he had nothing to worry about. It
couldn't very well rain anything inside the house.
"It's just like the poltergeists," Myra was saying, but George hardly
heard her. "There are so many cases of poltergeist phenomena on record,
of the little mischievous ghosts who throw dishes or stones or who
cause pointless little accidents. And in each case, there's a catalyst.
Usually it's a little child, and more often than not, a girl, but
that isn't always the case. The important thing is, there has to be a
catalyst."
"That's me," George said proudly.
"Yes, that's you. My George, the best damn catalyst that ever lived."
Myra had had her bourbon, too. "You know, science always explains away
the poltergeists, but they do a pretty awful job of it. A lot of people
aren't satisfied. Like Fort. Like me."
Was that a compliment? Was any of it a compliment? George thought so,
but he couldn't be sure. His mind was fading into a pleasant haze of
deep red, like the sunset. His eyes were opened and he was looking into
the sunset, and that's why he saw the deep red. But then he noted a
fact which would have startled him, only it didn't now. He was tired
and he closed his eyes and still the deep red persisted, stronger than
ever. It didn't startle him because he was too perfectly relaxed, and
because the deep red was so soothing....
"Were you calling me?" the voice said.
* * * * *
George jumped up. He thought he had heard the voice, but he couldn't be
sure. Now the sun had set completely and a heavy dusk settled over the
room.
"What did you say, George? George, did you ask me anything?"
George said no, he didn't, and he got some slight satisfaction from the
fact that Myra's voice sounded frightened. But then a slow chill crept
up his spine and spread all over his body. Myra had heard the voice too.
"Well, were you calling me? Come, come, I haven't got all day, and if
you weren't calling me, then I'll go home."
George gulped, and he heard Myra choke off a little whimper in her
throat. Then George smiled. Hell, one of their friends from down the
beach had come, and he decided to act mysterious here in the darkness.
It was Andy. Andy would play practical jokes like that. Andy, the life
of the party.
George strode jauntily to the light switch. "Hah, hah, had us fooled
for a minute, Andy old boy. And nope, the answer is that we didn't call
you. But you're always welcome here, you know that. Come on and join us
in some bourbon."
His hand was on the light switch now, and he flicked it up. The room
was bathed in the pale white of the fluorescent lamps, and George
turned around to say hello to Andy.
He stood in the center of the room. He stood there regarding George
with a half smile on his lips, a playful smile. You couldn't tell his
age and there was nothing special about his features. But the half
smile remained on his lips like something permanent. He was definitely
not Andy.
"As you can see, I'm not this Andy person."
"No. You're not," said George.
"Now, then. Who called me? Which one of you called me?"
Myra's voice was husky. The way it sometimes was at night, after a few
drinks. The way George liked it. Only now she was scared. "I guess we
both--called you."
"I wouldn't have come myself, of course, except that the message was so
urgent. The call has never come out that strong before. I'm not just
speaking about that from memory, of course. I'm king now but I haven't
been around that long. There are records--and your call is twice as
strong as any of the others. I could have sent an assistant, naturally,
but I figured if the call was this strong I'd come myself."
* * * * *
Humor him, George thought. He's just a nut who came in off the beach.
Only the reasoning was lousy. It stank. The door was locked and the big
picture window was locked from the inside, so he could not have come in
off the beach. George sighed.
"This is silly," the man was saying. "You put through such an urgent
call that I come here myself. Then, when I arrive, no one will tell me
what for."
"I know!" Myra cried. "You're from the world of the red frogs."
"What say?"
"I said you're from the world of the red frogs. You rained."
"Yes, I reign. I've been reigning for eleven years now, ever since my
father died. Actually, though, it's open to question. While I'm the
titular head, there's my wife to consider. She does a lot of reigning
herself. In fact, she'll be pretty angry when she learns I answered
the call myself. Below my dignity or some such thing. She always wants
me to be dignified, but that's stupid, because she's anything but
dignified herself. You know, I often think it isn't any fun to be king."
"That's nice," George said.
"I mean," Myra said, "you _rained_. Rained--r-a-i-n-e-d, like the
frogs."
"Oh, the frogs. Yes, they would come through first, of course.
Something about making sure the co-ordination is right. A messenger
could go straight through at once, but that would be dangerous, and
if the co-ordination were off, he'd be a sorry mess. Frogs or bugs or
sometimes birds, we send anything through to make sure. Anyway, what do
you want?"
"Now that you mention it, I don't know. I guess we don't want anything.
We were just experimenting," Myra explained.
"Experimenting? Will you stop kidding? With a call as strong as that,
experimenting? I wasn't born yesterday, sister. Look, don't be afraid
of my wife. She doesn't know where I've gone and it will be some time
before she can find me, so tell me the truth."
"That's the truth. I knew we'd get something, but I didn't know what.
We got you. My husband is very psychokinetic."