Stories by R. A. Lafferty Vol 1 Part 18

The midget was mad. The animal had more presence of mind; she lay down quietly and died. That was all she could do considering the state she was in.

"Who is census chief now?" asked the mad midget. "Is Mr. Marshal's little boy the census chief?"

"Mr. Marshal is, yes. Who are you? How do you know of Marshal? And what is that which you are pulling out of your pants -- if they are pants?"

"Census list. Names of everyone in town. I had to steal it."

"It looks like microfilm-the writing is so small. And the roll goes on and on. There must be a million names here."

"Little bit more, little bit more. I get two bits a name."

They got Marshal there. He was very busy, but he came. He had been given a deadline by the mayor and the citizen's group. He had to produce a population of ten thousand persons for High Plains, Texas. This was difficult, for there weren't that many people in the town. He had been working hard on it, though. But he came when the police called him.

"You Marshal's little boy?" the mad midget asked him. "You look just like your father."

"That voice -- I should know that voice even if it's cracked to pieces," said Marshall. "That has to be Manuel's voice."

"Sure, I'm Manuel, just like when I left thirty-five years ago."

"You can't be Manuel -- shrunk three feet and two hundred pounds and aged a million."

"You look here at my census slip, Mr. Marshal. It says I'm Manuel.

And here are nine more of the regular people, and one million of the little people. I couldn't get the little ones on the regular forms. I had to steal their list."

"You can't be Manuel," said Marshal.

"He can't be Manuel," said the big policemen and the little policemen.

"Maybe not then. I thought I was. Who am I then? Let's look at the other papers to see which one I am."

"No, you can't be any of them either, Manuel. And you surely can't be Manuel."

"Give him a name anyhow and get him counted," said the head of the citizens' group. "We got to get to that ten thousand mark."

"Tell us what happened, Manuel -- if you are -- which you aren't -- but tell us."

"After I counted the regular people, I went to count the little people. I took a spade and spaded the top off their town to get in. But they put an encanto on me and made me and Mula run a treadmill for thirty-five years."

"Where was this, Manuel?"

"At the Little People Town -- Nuevo Danae. But after thirty-fiveyears, the encanto wore off, and Mula and I stole the list of names and ran away."

"But where did you really get this list of so many names written so small, Manuel?"

"Suffering saddle sores, Marshal, don't ask the little bug so many questions! You got a million names in your hand. Certify them! Send them in!

There's enough of us right here to pa.s.s a resolution. We declare that place annexed forthwith. This will make High Plains the biggest town in Texas."

So Marshal certified the names and sent them in to Was.h.i.+ngton. This gave High Plains the largest percent increase of any city in the nation -- but it was challenged. There were some soreheads in Houston who said that it wasn't possible -- that High Plains had nowhere near that many people and that there must have been a miscount.

In the days that the argument was going on, they cleaned up and fed Manuel -- if it were he -- and tried to get from him a cogent story.

"How do you know it was thirty-five years, Manuel?"

"On the treadmill, it seemed like thirty-five years."

"It could have been only about three days."

"How come I'm so old then?"

"We don't know that Manuel. We sure don't know that. How big were these people?"

"Who knows. A finger long, maybe two."

"And what is their town?"

"It's an old prairie dog town that they fixed up. You have to dig down with a spade to get to the streets."

"Maybe they really were prairie dogs, Manuel. Maybe the heat got you and you only dreamed that they were little people."

"Prairie dogs can't write as good as on that list," said Manuel.

"Prairie dogs can't write hardly at all."

"That's true. The list is hard to explain. And such odd names on it, too."

"Where is Mula? I don't see Mula since I came back."

"Mula just lay down and died, Manuel."

"Gave me the slip. Why didn't I think of that? I'll do it too. I'm too worn out for anything else."

"Before you do, Manuel, just a couple of last questions."

"Make them real fast then. I'm on my way."

"Did you know there little people were there before?"

"Oh sure. Everybody in the Santa Magdalena see them. Eight, nine people know they are there. 'Who wants to be laughed at?' they say. They never talked about it."

"And, Manuel, how do we get to the place? Can you show us on a map?"

Manuel made a grimace and died quietly. He didn't understand those maps, and he took the easy way out. They buried him -- not knowing for sure whether be was Manuel or not. There wasn't much of him to bury.

It was the same night -- very late, and after he had been asleep -- that Marshal was awakened by the ring of an authoritative voice. He was being harangued by a four-inch-tall man on his bedside table -- a man of dominating presence and acid voice.

"Come out of that cot, you clown! Give me your name and station!"

"I'm marshal, and I suspect that you're a late pig sandwich. I shouldn't eat so late."

"Say 'Sir' when you reply to me! I am no pig sandwich and I do not commonly call on fools. Get on your feet, you clod!" Wondering, Marshal did.

"I want the list that was stolen. Don't gape. Get it! Don't stall, don't stutter. Get me that tax list! It isn't words I want from you.

"Listen, you cicada," said Marshal with his last bravery, "I'll take you and --"

"You will not! You will notice that you are now paralyzed from theneck down. I suspect that you were always so from there up. Where is it?"

"S -- sent it to Was.h.i.+ngton."

"You bug-eyed behemoth! Do you realize what a trip that will be? You grandfather of inanities, it will be a pleasure to destroy you.

"I don't know what you are," said Marshal. "I don't believe you even belong on the world."

"Not belong on the world? We own the world. We can show written t.i.tle to the world. Can you?"

"I doubt it. Where did you get the t.i.tle?"

"We got it from a promoter of sorts, a con man really. I have to admit that we were taken, but we were in a spot and needed a world. He said that the larger bifurcates were too stupid to be a nuisance. We should have known that the stupider the creature the more of a nuisance it is."

"I have decided the same thing about the smaller the creature. We may have to fumigate that old mountain mess."

"Oh, you can't harm us. We're too powerful. But we can obliterate you in an instant.

"Hah!" exploded Marshal.

"Say 'hah, sir' when you address me. Do you know the place in the mountain that is called Sodom?"

"I know the place. It was caused by a large meteor."

"It was caused by one of these," said the small creature, and what he held up was the size of a grain of sand. "There was another city of you bug-eyed beasts there," continued the small martinet. "You wouldn't know about it. It's been a few hundred years. We decided it was too close. Now I have decided that you are too close."

"A thing that size couldn't crack a walnut," said Marshal.

"You floundering fop, it will blast this town flat."

"And if it does, what will happen to you?"

"Nothing. I don't even blink for things like that. I haven't time to explain it to you, you gaping goof. I have to get to Was.h.i.+ngton."

It may be that Marshal did not believe himself quite awake. He certainly didn't take the threat seriously enough. For, in a manner still not understood, the little man did trigger it off.

When the final count was in, High Plains did not have the highest percentage gain in the Nation. Actually it showed the sharpest decline of any town -- from 7313 to nothing. It is believed that High Plains was destroyed by a giant meteor. But there are eight, nine people in the Santa Magdalena who know what really happened, and they won't tell.

They were going to make a forest preserve out of the place, except that it has no trees worthy of the name Now it is proposed to make it the Sodom and Gomorrah State Park from the two mysterious scenes of desolation there just seven miles apart.

It is an interesting place, as wild a region as you will ever find, and is recommended for the man who has seen everything.

THE TRANSCENDENT TIGERS.

This was the birthday of Carnadine Thompson. She was seven years old. Thereby she left her childhood behind her, and came into the fullness of her powers. This was her own phrase, and her own idea of the importance of the milestone.

There were others, mostly adult, who thought that she was a peculiarly backward little girl in some ways, though precocious in others.

She received for her birthday four presents: a hollow, white rubber ball, a green plastic frog, a red cap and a little wire puzzle.

She immediately tore the plastic frog apart, considering it a child's toy. So much for that.

She put on the cap, saying that it had been sent by her Genie as asymbol of her authority. In fact none of them knew who had sent her the red cap. The cap is important. If it weren't important, it wouldn't he mentioned.

Carnadine quickly worked the wire puzzle, and then unworked it again. Then she did something with the hollow, white rubber ball that made her mother's eyes pop out. Nor did they pop all the way in again when Carnadine undid it and made it as it was before.

Geraldine Thompson had been looking pop-eyed for a long time. Her husband had commented on it, and she had been to the doctor for it. No medical reason was found, but the actual reason was some of the antics of her daughter Carnadine.

"I wonder if you noticed the small wire puzzle that I gave to my daughter," said Tyburn Thompson to his neighbor, H. Horn.

"Only to note that it probably cost less than a quarter," said Horn, "and to marvel again at the canny way you have with coin. I wouldn't call you stingy, Tyburn. I've never believed in the virtues of understatement.

You have a talent for making stingy people seem benevolent."

"I know. Many people misunderstand me. But consider that wire puzzle. It's a very simple-appearing puzzle, but it's twenty-four centuries old. It is unworkable, of course, so it should keep Carnadine occupied for some time. She has an excess of energy. This is one of the oldest of the unworkable puzzles."

"But, Tyburn, she just worked it," said his wife Geraldine.

"It is one of the nine impossible apparatus puzzles listed by Anaximandros in the fifth century before the common era," continued Tyburn.

"And do you know, in all the centuries since then, there have been only two added to the list."

"Carnadine," said her mother, "let me see you work that again."

Carnadine worked it again.

"The reason it is unworkable," said Tyburn, "though apparent to me as a design engineer, may not be so readily apparent to you. It has to do with odds and evens of lays. Many of the unworkable cla.s.sic puzzles are cordage puzzles, as is this actually. It is a wire miniature of a cordage puzzle. It is said that this is the construction of the Gordian knot. The same, however, is said of two other early cordage puzzles."

"But she just worked it, Tyburn, twice," said the wife.

"Stop chattering, Geraldine. I am explaining something to Horn. Men have spent years on the puzzle, the Engineering Mind and the recognition of patent impossibility being less prevalent in past centuries. And this, I believe, is the best of all the impossible ones. It is misleading. It looks as though there would surely be a way to do it."

"I just believe that I could do it, Tyburn," said Horn.

"No, you could not. You're a stubborn man, and it'd drive you crazy.