Henry Still

When Consumption means prosperity, when the
Pulitzer Prize is awarded to advertising copy,
when the Salesman is the most respected citizen
in the land.... What chance has a non-consumer?

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Worlds of If Science Fiction, August 1956.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

On his way home from the concert, Perry Mansfield whistled a pleasant melody from an old Stravinsky classic. But then, troubled by his conscience and that of his psychiatrist, he stopped to study the program again.

What was that modern symphony? Oh yes, "The Flivver". The music was supposed to have its roots in antiquity when someone started converting the metal wealth of the earth on an assembly line. Those screeching noises were drill presses and lathes and automatic hammers. The syrupy melody was the saintly salesman who disbursed the wealth of gadget and machine like melted butter across the bread of the land.

Perry tried to like it. But he didn't. And that disturbed him. It meant his psychotherapy wasn't working. Dr. Stone would run him through the mechanical analyzer again and scold over the results.

His simple act of walking home instead of riding an anti-gravity putterseat labeled him as a misfit. But it seemed silly to rent a flying stool just to travel two blocks.

The fact was, he liked to walk.

Perry sighed, discouraged, as he waited for the fluorescent scanner to identify his insides and open his front door.

It opened. The lights came on. Recorded music, somewhat tuned to his mood, poured from concealed amplifiers.

And then he noticed the note clipped to the door.

His hand trembled as he took it down. The beautiful pastel gray of the enclosing envelope was an anachronism itself, and therefore marked unmistakably its almost priestly origin.

The platinum engraved card inside said simply:

A Master Salesman has chosen you for his next call.

Perry placed the note carefully on a plastic table. He inhaled deeply and held it for a moment to steady his nerves.

A Master salesman. No one of that stature had ever called upon him before. It was an honor like—like a mayor or a bishop. It meant he had attained top level on the universal measuring stick—an A-number-1-plus-plus credit rating.

The prospect should have saturated him with pleasure. But, like the sharp new music, it didn't.

This card also meant he was expected to buy something. Something big and expensive. And he didn't want or need something big and expensive.

He wished they'd leave him alone.

Perry clapped his hand to his mouth as though someone might have heard the thought.

What was wrong with him anyway? He wasn't a recluse. He wanted to indulge and enjoy the polished luxury of his world. He wanted to be conventional. He was young and handsome and tall and dark. He had a good job. He had a pleasant and comfortable legal arrangement with a girl in the next block.

But truly, what he had was all he wanted.

He glanced at the card on the table. He could always say no. It wouldn't be easy, but he could say no.

Perry thumbed through the Pulitzer prize winning work for 2087 which had been delivered yesterday as part of his book club subscription. He had seen it already, of course, in a dozen magazines and a hundred copies of his facsimile newspaper. It was the advertising copy for Cor-T-Zan foundation garments. But he didn't need a corset and the spartan simplicity of the fragile, lovely words bored him.

He switched on television. A phrenetic band was hammering out the new top jingle on the Hit Parade:

Perry switched off the set.

He was alone. He could be honest with himself. The whole damned business irritated him. If he was out of step with the times, to hell with the times.

Mr. Master Salesman didn't even say when he would call. You were expected to sit on the edge of your chair, waiting for the great man to appear.

Finally Perry decided what he'd do. He'd simply not open the door when the MS came knocking.

Upon that decision, he slept well.

Sometime later he dreamed of frying bacon over an open fire in the woods, although he hadn't been out to the park in three years.

When he opened his eyes, the sun was up. He still smelled bacon frying.

Perry crawled out of bed, fumbled into his robe and followed his nose to the kitchen-bar.

There, in his favorite chair, sat a handsomely-dressed, distinguished man with florid complexion, iron gray hair and a fashionable paunch.

Strips of bacon were frying on the bright, spotless steel of the cooking shield.

"How did you get in here?" Perry asked crossly.

"Serve-All does all," his visitor said cryptically and smiled the smile that's known around the world. Perry would have no opportunity to shut out the Master Salesman. He was in.

"You are Mr. Mansfield?"

"Yes sir," Perry said, uncertain of decorum.

"My name is Marlboro," the MS said in melodius tones. "Master is the proper term used in addressing us. Please sit down."

"Yes, Master," Perry said. He felt like a fool and sat down.

"Breakfast will be served in a few moments," Marlboro said. "I hope you don't mind, I examined your excellent library before you came in." He pulled a volume off the shelf. "This is a beautiful old first edition. Wherever did you find it?"

It was Perry's copy of "Basic Sales Techniques" with Burton footnotes on vacuum cleaner sales charts for the last half of the 20th century.

"I've read it, of course," Marlboro continued, "but I've never owned a copy." He caressed the dogeared cardboard cover. "Isn't it fantastic? In that barbaric century the customers sometimes refused to buy from our predecessors in the Guild. It seems impossible that anyone could have been so crude as to turn away one of those sturdy pioneers at the door."

Perry shifted uncomfortably. He had been prepared to turn away one of the Great Men at his door.

"Ah!" Marlboro exclaimed. "Your bacon is ready, young man."

At a flick of the salesman's finger, the golden strips of meat lifted into the air and floated to an absorbent mat on the table. Perry stared. Not a bubble of fat had fallen to the floor in passage.

"How did you do that?"

"Serve-All does all," the MS said coyly.

"Mine doesn't," Perry said.

"Of course not!" Marlboro moved deftly into the opening. "You need a new one."

So he had tumbled for the first trap. Perry blushed and ate a piece of bacon.

The Master hefted an object to the table top. It was a hemisphere about 18 inches in diameter, smooth and featureless except for a handle on the curved top. It was painted psychological green.

"This is the new Serve-All," Marlboro said glibly. "Notice its smooth unobtrusive shape. No working parts exposed, but inside is a mass of circuits and servos around a baby reactor ready to do everything for you."

"The bacon," Perry persisted. "How?"

He was aware that the first step in successful selling is to arouse curiosity. But he was confident he could refuse to buy, though it be contrary to convention and good taste.

"Fingers of energy," the MS said. "Invisible, sensitive fingers of energy reach out of here—" He tapped the Serve-All dome. "—and they'll do anything that needs doing, at your mental command. Right now this one's tuned to me, but a minor adjustment will fit it to your personal needs. Here, let me show you something else."

Perry felt a gentle, firm pressure on his left cheekbone. It moved down his cheeks, across his upper lip and up the other side. Then under his chin.

Marlboro whipped out a pocket mirror.

Perry had just been shaved.

"See?" the Master beamed. "Wonderful isn't it?" Perry nodded. That was calculated to put him in a yes mood.

While they talked the Serve-All cleared the breakfast clutter and cleaned the cooking shield without visible remains or waste. Marlboro pulled a contract pad out of his pocket.

"I presume I can put you down for one of these."

"I don't need it," Perry said. "My old one is good enough."

"Ridiculous!" Marlboro said indignantly and then chuckled good-humoredly. "Oh, I see what you're doing. You're trying some of the old tricks from the 20th century. Well, I like a game of wits, too. Look what else this model will do."

While Perry watched, the Serve-All repaired a broken knob on a plastic chest, cleaned the rug and etched a mural of a voluptuous nude on one blank wall.

"If you'll excuse me," Perry murmured, "it's time for me to go to work."

"Of course, of course," the Master laughed jovially.

In rapid succession a comb dressed Perry's hair, his robe and pajamas were whisked off and his street clothes came floating out of the closet on more invisible fingers of energy.

Before he knew it, he was ready for work.

"I really must be going, too," Marlboro said, "if you'll just sign here."

"How much is it?"

The Master Salesman sighed.

"You're really very difficult. It's $9,785, plus tax."

"I can't afford it."

"Now, Mr. Mansfield. A joke's a joke. If your credit rating wasn't the finest, I wouldn't be here. I know, and you know, your income is mortgaged for only 15 more years and your life expectancy is at least 50."

Perry moved uneasily toward the bathroom. An invisible finger of energy opened the door for him.

"If you don't mind," he said angrily, "this is something I'm quite capable of doing for myself." He slammed the door.

But the Serve-All flushed the toilet for him.

When he emerged, Marlboro's patience also was gone.

"Sign," he said firmly.

"I don't want it."

"Young man," the Master said thinly. "You don't realize what dangerous ground you're on. If you do not cease this rudeness at once, I'll report you to the council."

"Report and be damned! I don't need your gadget and I'm not going to buy it. Now get out!"

Marlboro was blue with rage. He backed uncertainly toward the door and stopped.

"This borders on sacrilege," he whispered. "You'll hear from me again. Soon."

Perry slammed that door, too, and walked jauntily to work.

He heard from the Master Salesman again—exactly two hours later. The message tube delivered a summons ordering him into City Court. That afternoon.

Perry went. He had never been in court before. He was frightened and regretful that he had been so abrupt with Marlboro. But he resented the invasion of his privacy and to bolster his courage, he built that anger into a fair rage by the time he reached the courtroom.

Marlboro was there. A judge was there. And on each of two tables squatted a metal box with voice tubes. A bailiff guided him to his table and placed the voice tube in his hand.

"You're late Mr. Mansfield," the judge snapped. "Justice must be swift and you're impeding it." He lifted a printed card and scanned it near-sightedly for a moment. "You're here charged with violating the public interest by failing to purchase an item which you are able to consume and which you can afford to buy."

"There's no law against—" Perry began indignantly.

"Don't tell me your troubles, young man," the judge interrupted. "That's what your lawyer's for." His gesture indicated the metal box. Perry held the voice tube dumbly. The bailiff leaned over his shoulder.

"You tell your side of the story in there," he whispered.

Marlboro was muttering rapidly and at great length into his "lawyer." Perry did likewise, relating all he could remember of the morning fiasco. When he finished, the machine whirred, whistled and harrumphed twice before spewing out several yards of perforated tape.

The plaintiff's counsel did the same, except the tape was longer.

"Now Mr. Bailiff," the judge said, "you may bring in the jury."

Perry was no longer surprised when the jury was rolled in. It was a large gray analog computor mounted on wheels. The judge stepped down from the bench and fed in the two conflicting tapes.

The jury digested the information noisily.

"It's an old model," the judge apologized, but just then a white card popped out on a small metal tray. The bailiff delivered it to the judge.

He studied the card. Perry's heart thumped painfully during the calculated period of suspense.

"As you attempted to inform the court earlier, Mr. Mansfield," the judge said somberly, "there is no law in the land which forces you to buy any item from our distinguished colleagues of distribution." Perry's heart brightened and he slid back from the edge of the chair.

"However," the judge peered down, "it has been held by many courts that when the public interest is to be served by the individual purchase of a piece of merchandise which that individual can consume and which that individual is able to buy without financial hardship, then that individual must sacrifice his emotional reluctance to the good of society."

The jurist paused thoughtfully.

"I think, Mr. Mansfield, that you should relearn the basic tenets of our society and economy. First, Consumption is Prosperity and that derives from the ancient law of Supply and Demand. S & D means, in simple terms, that when there is a supply of something, a demand must be created to consume it. That is why we have Master Salesmen. That is why they are the staunchest and most highly-respected citizens in our land."

He bowed to Marlboro who assumed a benevolent smile.

"This court decrees," the judge said sternly, "that you are to purchase an item known as the 2087 Serve-All from Master Salesman Marlboro and customary steps will be taken to attach your future salary to satisfy the stipulated payment schedule. Court dismissed."

Perry was too stunned to move. His petty rebellion had collapsed into a pot of embarrassment. He was vaguely aware of Marlboro shaking his hand with a moist, jovial palm.

"No hard feelings, young man," the MS said. "It was really quite interesting. I haven't had a case like this in five years."

The condescension stirred Perry's anger again.

"I demand an appeal!"

The judge was leaving the bench, but he turned back.

"Appeal bond is $2000."

"No appeal," Perry said glumly.

He walked home. The 2087 Serve-All was there waiting for him, in the middle of his living room floor.

Marlboro had tied a gay red ribbon around it to cheer him.

He wasn't cheered. The thing must have been delivered even while he was in court. There had never been a doubt that he would lose the case. Rage began to crawl its acid path through his stomach again.

The Serve-All was tuned to him now. It removed his hat and coat and put them in the closet. It loosened his tie, patted a sofa cushion to his shape and brought him a drink.

Perry might just possibly have adjusted to the situation, but the Serve-All was over anxious.

He liked to sip a drink. But when he lifted the glass to his lips, an invisible finger of energy pushed helpfully on the bottom.

Perry strangled.

When he recovered, his rage had crystallized in a definite course of action.

He looked at the Serve-All and he looked at his hands. Not enough. He needed something much more. His memory of history recalled such items as an axe and a sledge hammer, but such no longer existed.

But the plastic table had legs of substantial heft. A low growl rose in his throat as he grabbed the table and ripped it to pieces.

The dismayed Serve-All scuttled across the room to repair the damage.

Perry fended it off with his new club and then smashed downward, again and again, delighting in the screech of crushed metal and the tinkling death of transistors, vacuum tubes and servos.