More Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Outstanding Stories of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction

^{HARVEY JACOBS} Dress Rehearsal

SAM DERBY FELT OLD, even up there when time was an ice cube. He tried a knee bend and gave it up when his knees cracked like dice. Xarix appeared on the wall screen just as Sam Derby recovered his posture and let out a grunt.

“Are you stable?” Xarix said.

“I’m fine!” Sam said. “How are you?”

“It’s time for the dress rehearsal,” Xarix said. “Will you transport to the Green Theater?”

“You mean the Blue Theater, don’t you?”

“The Green Theater. The children are performing in the Blue Theater.”

“Ah, the kiddies, yes.”

Some kiddies, Sam Derby thought to himself. He once knew a man named Louie who carried pictures of two apes in his wallet. When somebody asked him about his family, he showed the pictures of the young apes and beamed when the somebody told him what a lovely family he had. Up there the apes would look like gods. What they called kiddies wouldn’t serve for bait back home. Sam Derby often wondered about the kind of sex that produced such results. Yuch. Still, they loved their offspring. Chip off the old block, like that. To each his own.

The capsule came to Sam Derby’s door. He got in and pressed the circular button marked The Green Theater. The capsule hummed and moved. It was a nice feeling to be inside, warm, vibrated, moving, and no meter ticking off a dime every few seconds to remind you of time and your own heartbeat.

Sam Derby, a senior citizen, with a First Indulgence classification, had the right to be gently lifted from the capsule and aimed at the door of the Green Theater. Xarix waited for him. As the doors of the Green Theater slid apart, Xarix appeared like a developing photograph.

“So, Professor,” Xarix said, “how do you feel about the approach of Minus Hour.”

“Not Minus Hour,” Sam Derby said. “Zero Hour. You’re the one who should set an example.”

“God yes,” Xarix said. “If one of my students said that, I would have him boiled in… oil?”

“Oil is correct,” Sam Derby said. “Where is everybody?”

“Supply,” Xarix said. “They’ll be here at the drop of a hat.”

“Good. Well said,” Sam Derby said.

“Thank you. I like that expression, at the drop of a hat. I have this vision of hats dropping. It amuses me.”

“You have a nice sense of humor.”

“I think so. Yes. I could have been a schpritzer.”

“Not exactly a hundred percent,” Sam Derby said. “A man who gives a schpritz is a comic. A comic is a schpritzer. Say, ‘I could have been a comic.’ It’s a lot better.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Xarix and Sam Derby went to the podium at the front of the Green Theater.

“What do you want from me today?” Sam Derby said. “I can’t tell them much more.”

“I thought a kind of pep talk was in order. Good luck, go get ’em, half time in the locker room. Do it for the old Prof. You know what I’m after.”

“I’ll do that. When does the next class start?”

“Not for a week. You have yourself a vacation, a well-deserved holiday, Sam.”

“Sam? What happened to Professor?”

“Under the circumstances I felt justified in using the familiar. We’ve worked together twelve solstices.”

“Use what you want,” Sam Derby said. “I wasn’t complaining. In fact, I’m flattered. I was just surprised. I began to feel disposable.”

“Disposable?”

“Like a tissue. I finished my work. The class is graduating, in a manner of speaking. How do I know there’s another class? How do I know you won’t dispose of me?”

“But that’s ridiculous. You’re one of us.”

“It’s nice of you to say so.”

“Tell me,” Xarix said, “are you sorry you came?”

“No,” Sam Derby said. “I must admit, when you first came to get me, I wasn’t so happy.”

“You had a clear choice.”

“Choice? You said I had a choice. But when one of us sees one of you for the first time coming from noplace, not the most beautiful thing in the universe, no insult intended, choice isn’t choice. I was scared out of my rectum.”

“Surprise is our schtik. The startle effect.”

“You startled. Now that I’m here, now that I’ve had time to think things over, I’m really glad I flew up here. I like it here.”

“Good.”

“Besides, what did I have down there? Did I have respect? Honors? Medals? I had Social Security. I had a pension from the guild. The people who saw my work were dropping like flies. One day before you came I went to three funerals one after the other, bang, bang, bang.”

“Alevai. Rest in peace.”

“Wait. No alevai. Alevai is it should happen.”

“Whoops.”

“Whoops. If one of them said whoops, you would give him such a knock with the ray his kishkas would burn.”

“There’s an advantage to executive status,” Xarix said. “Sam, do you think they’ll be successful?”

“Why not? You send one here, one there, they have papers, they have skills, and they know how to behave. It’s amazing how they look, exactly like people. Who should find out what they’re up to? You got no problem with the spies. Your problem might be that Earth is already taken over by meshuganas. Maybe from another planet. I never met a producer, an agent, a successful man who couldn’t be from Mars.”

“Why Mars?”

“A figure of speech.”

“Ah.”

“I keep asking myself. Xarix, why you want Earth?”

“Because it’s there.”

“So all this trouble, spies, saboteurs, chazzerai, because it’s there?”

“Sufficient reason.”

“Sufficient reason. Be gazoont.”

“Amen.”

“You could say that. In all my years on stage I never would believe such a plot. Never. Too fantastic. So who knew?”

“We knew. Our computers knew. When we asked them the name of the man for the job, Sam, your card came out with two others. Stanislavski and Lee Strasberg. One was dead, and the other is too much with the guttural noises, the schlepping and yutzing. Out of all the actors past or present, your card came out, Sam Derby.”

“It’s nice to know. Nobody on Earth even remembers there was a theater on Second Avenue.”

“Let me say that for an alien you’ve dedicated yourself wonderfully well to our purposes. We had the human forms down pat. We had the technicalities worked out. But nuances of manner, subtleties of speech, are all important. Only you could impart such wisdom.”

“Wisdom. There is a word. Xarix, I’ll tell you, don’t worry yourself. Your people, whatever you call it, will blend like a snowflake on white bread. Down there, anybody will swear they’re just like everybody else. They have the tools.”

“Thanks to you, Sam. Professor.”

“So.”

When the students came, there was much excitement. Take off was only hours away. The combination of youth, travel, and purpose produced a familiar tension. Sam Derby stood on the podium delivering his pep talk and feeling some of the excitement himself.

“Remember, you’re going to take over a planet, not to play pinochle. Do what I told you, be discreet, and the magic word is to blend in the soup. Now, let me hear all together in unison, what you say when you meet a person of rank and power.”

“Oy vay, vots new, hello, howdy doo?”

“Good. Now, in sexual encounter, what is the correct approach?”

“Hey, dollink, let’s schtup, don’t futz, hurry up.”

“Wonderful. And for you in the diplomatic corps, very important, when you run into a prince, a king, a president, let’s hear it.”

“Honorable Ganef, it’s a real Watergate to make the acquaintance of so illustrious a nebbish schlemiel nudnik putz as thyself. May you fornicate with a horse before the night falls.”

“Gorgeous,” Sam Derby said. “I’m proud of you. Go, and give my regards to Broadway.”

“You think they’re ready?” Xarix said.

“Ready for Freddy,” Sam Derby said. “If they learned my lessons and wave the arms you gave them, they’ll be accepted anyplace. Like brothers.”