The Metrognome and Other Stories

THE METROGNOME

1 don't have many memories of New York City from the time before my family moved to Los Angeles, because we left New York when I was only five. I vaguely recall a huge fountain in the Bronx where my friends and I used to play despite the DO NOT CLIMB UPON signs. I remember a school and playground suspended between heaven and earth. I think of a water pistol my grandfather bought me that took the form of a bright red jet plane.

And I remember riding the subway. The tube, the underground, the metro.

The treat of treats was riding in the first car. On the New York subway the engineer's cab is set off to the side of the first car, allowing a few passengers to sit right up in front and stare down the tracks. I remember sitting in awe as the train accelerated, gazing at a dark winding tunnel whose sole features (to a five-year-old with limited perception) were thin threads of metal track aced bright, intensely bright lights. Directional and warning lights of laser-sharp red, green, and yellow. When the train reached speed, the lights blurred. If you squinted hard enough, they became streaks of red and green fire, a condition known as the preadolescent Doppler effect.

What else might dwell in such depths one did not know, could not imagine. No living soul was ever spotted stalking those ancient tunnels. There were only the lights and the darkness and the occasional side tunnel yawning like a whale's mouth off to one side or the other. A separate world exists beneath the streets of New York.

Today I know that London is much the same, and Moscow, and all the other great cities that can boast subterranean transportation networks. All that vast space devoid of life save for occasional cylinders of bored people rocketing through them at high speed on their way to work or home.

Always seemed such an awful waste.

Charlie Dimsdale stared at the man in front of him. Even under ordinary circumstances Charlie Dimsdale would have stared at the man in front of him. However, this confrontation was taking place in the lowest level of the 52nd Street Bronx subway line, a good many meters beneath the hysterical surface of Manhattan. It was just short of preordained that Charlie Dimsdale would stare at the man in front of him.

The man in front of Charlie Dimsdale stood slightly over a meter high. He was broad out of all proportion in selected places. His head especially was even larger than that of a normal-sized man. Its most notable feature was a proboscis that would be flattered by the appellation bulbous. This remarkable protuberance was bordered by a pair of huge jet-black eyes that hid beneath black eyebrows a Kodiak bear would have been proud of. Two enormous floppy ears, the shape and color of dried apricots, fluttered sideways from the head, their span a truly impressive sight.

The pate itself was as bald and round as the bottom of a china teacup. A good portion of it was covered by a jaunty red beret set at a rakish angle to the left. Huge black muttonchop whiskers rambled like a giant caterpillar across his face.

Arms that were too long for the short torso ended in thick, stubby fingers. Black hair, well cultivated, grew there in profusion. In addition to the beret, he wore a double-breasted pinstripe jacket with matching trousers. His black oxfords were immaculately polished.

Had such a confrontation occurred anywhere else in the world with an appropriate Dimsdale substitute, it is likely that said Dimsdale substitute would have fainted quickly away. Charlie Dimsdale, however, merely gulped and took a step backward.

After all, this was New York.

The little man put his hirsute hands on his hips and stared back at Charlie with undisguised disgust.

"Well, you've seen me. Now what are you going to do about it?"

"Seen you? Do? Look, mister, I'm only . . . MY name's Charles Dimsdale. I'm second assistant inspector to the under-commissioner for subway maintenance and repair. There's a misaligned track down here. We've had to make three consecutive computer reroutings up top (this was official slang, of course) for three different trains. I'm to see what the trouble is and to try and correct it, is all."

Charlie was a rather pleasant if unspectacular appearing young man. He might even have been considered attractive if it weren't for his mousy attitude and those glasses. They weren't quite thick enough to double as reactor shielding.

"Uh . . . did I just see you walk out of that wall?"

"Which wall?" the man asked.

"That wall, behind you."

"Oh, that wall."

"Yes, that wall. I didn't think there was an inspection door there, but . . . "

"There isn't. I did."

"That's impossible," said Charlie reasonably. "People don't go around walking through walls. It isn't done. Even Mr. Broadhare can't walk through walls."

"I don't doubt it."

"Then how can you ~ stand there and maintain you walked through that wall?"

"I'm not human. I'm a gnome. A metrognome, to be specific."

"Oh. I guess that's okay, then."

At that point, New Yorker or no, Charlie fainted.

When he came to, he found himself staring into a pair of slightly glowing coal-black eyes. He almost fainted again, but surprisingly powerful arms assisted him to his feet.

"Now, don't do that to me again," said the gnome.

"It's very rude and disconcerting. You might have hit your head on the rail and hurt yourself."

"What rail?" asked Charlie groggily.

"That one, there, in the middle."

"Ulp!" Charlie took several steps back until he was standing on the walkway. "You're right. I really could have hurt myself. I won't do it again." He looked disapprovingly at the gnome. "You aren't helping things any, you know. Why don't you vanish? There're no such things as gnomes. Even in New York. Especially in New York. "

"Ha!" grunted the gnome. He said it in such a way as to imply that among those assembled, there was one possessed of about as many brains as a stale pretzel. The big, soft kind, with plenty of salt. Someone was full of dough. Charlie had no trouble isolating him.

"Look," he said imploringly, "you simply can't be!"

"Then how the deuce am l?" The gnome stuck out a hairy paw. "Look, my name's Van Groot."

"Charmed," said Charlie, dazedly shaking the proffered palm.

Here I am, he thought, thirty meters below the ground in the middle of Manhattan, shaking hands with a character who claims to be out of the Brothers Grimm named Van Groot who wears Brooks Brothers suits.

But he had seen him walk out of a wall.

This suggested two possibilities.

One, it was really happening and there were indeed such creatures as .gnomes. Two, he'd been breathing subway exhaust fumes too long and was operating on only one cylinder. At the moment he inclined to the latter explanation.

"I know how you must feel," said Van Groot sympathetically. "Come along with me for a bit. The exercise should clear your head. Even if, De Puyster knows, there's probably not much in it, anyway. "

"Sure. Why not? Oh, wait a minute. I've got to find and clear that blocked switch."

"Which switchover is it?" the gnome inquired.

"Four-six-three. It's been jumped to indicate a blocked track, and thus the computer automatically-"

"I know."

"-several alternate programs . . .you know?"

"Sure. I'm the one who set it."

"You reset it? You can't do that!"

Van Groot said "Ha!" again, and Charlie decided that if nothing else he was not overwhelming this creature with his precision of thought.

"Okay. Why did you move it?"

"It was interfering with the smooth running of our mine carts."

"Mine carts! There aren't any mi-" he hesitated. "I see. It was interfering with your mine carts." Van Groot nodded approvingly. Charlie had to hop and skip occasionally to keep up with the gnome's short but brisk stride.

"Uh, why couldn't your mine carts just go over the switch when it was correctly set?"

"Because," the gnome explained, as one would to a child, "that way, the metal kept whispering 'blocked! blocked!' This upset the miners. They work very closely with metal, and they're sensitive to it. With the switch thrown this way, the rails murmur 'open, open,' and the boys feel better."

"But that seems like such a small thing."

"It is," said Van Groot.

"That's not very polite."

"Now, why should we be polite? Do you ever hear anyone say, 'Let's take up a collection for needy gnomes'? Is there a Save the Gnomes League? Or a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Gnomes? When was the last time you heard of someone doing something for a gnome; any gnome!" Van Groot was getting excited. His ears flapped, and his whiskers bristled. "Canaries and fruit-fly researchers can get government money, but us? All we ask are our unalienable rights to life, liberty, plenty of fights, and booze!"

This isn't getting me anywhere, thought Charlie cogently.

"I admit it seems inequitable." Van Groot seemed to calm down a little. "But I'd still appreciate it if you'd let me shift-the track back the way it belongs."

"I told you, it would be inconvenient. You humans never learn. Still, you seem like such a nice, pleasant sort . . . for a human. Properly deferential, too. I may consider it. Just consider it, mind."

"That's very decent of you. Uh (how does one make small talk with a gnome?), nice weather we're having, isn't it?" Someone had thrown a beer can out of a subway car window. Charlie stepped down off the walkway to remove the can from the tracks.

"Not particularly."

"I thought all you people lived in Ireland and places like that."

"Ireland, my myopic friend, is cold, wet, rainy, uncivilized, and full of crazy American emigres. About the only thing you can mine there in quantity is peat. Speaking as a miner, let me tell you that it's pretty hard to take pride in your profession when all you mine is peat. Did you ever see a necklace made of peat? A queen's tiara? And it takes a lousy facet. Ireland! That's our trade, you know. We're mostly miners and smiths."

"Why?"

"That's about the stupidest question I've ever heard."

"Sorry. "

"Do you think we'd ignore a whole new world and leave it to you humans? When your noisy, sloppy, righteous ancestors paddled across, we came, too. Unobtrusively, of course. Why, there were gnomes with Washington at Valley Forge! With Jones on the-"

"Well, I can certainly understand that," said Charlie hastily, "but I thought you preferred the country life."

"By and large most of us do. But you know how it is. The world's becoming an urban society. We have to change, too. I've got relatives upstate you wouldn't believe. They still think they can live like it's Washington Irving's day. Reactionaries."

Charlie tried to conceive of a reactionary gnome and failed.

"And good gem mines are getting harder and harder to find out in the country. All the surface ones are being turned into tourist traps. It's hard enough to find a decent place to sleep anymore, what with one petroleum engineer after another doing seismic dowsing. Any idiot could tell you there's no oil at ninety percent of the places they try. But will they learn? No! So it's boom, boom, boom, night after night. The subways are mild and consistent by contrast."

"Whoa. You mean you do mining . . . right here in Manhattan?"

''Under Manhattan. Oh, we've found some excellent spots! Go down a little ways and the gem-bearing rock is plentiful. Check your New York history. Excavators often turn up fair-quality stones. But no one bothers to dig farther because their glass tomb or pyramid or whatever is on a deadline. Tourmaline, beryl, the quartz gems . . . they've turned up in the foundations of some pretty famous buildings. The rarer, more valuable stuff is buried farther down. Even so, the Empire State Building almost did become a mine. But we got to the driller who found the diamonds."

Charlie swallowed.

"And there's plenty of scrap metal. We turn it into scepters and things. Mostly to keep in practice. There isn't much of a market for cast-iron scepters."

"I can imagine," said Charlie sympathetically.

"Still, you never know when you'll need a good scepter. Or a proper Flagan-flange.'

"Pardon my ignorance-"

"I've been doing that for half an hour."

"-but what is a Flagan-flange?"

"Oh, they're used to attract . . . but never mind About that scrap metal and such. We're very concerned about our environment. Gnomes are good for the ecology."

"Uh." Charlie was running a possible scenario through his mind. He saw himself reporting to Undercommissioner Broadhare. "I've fixed that jammed switch, sir. The gnomes moved it because it was interfering with their mine carts. But I don't want you to prosecute them because they're good for the ecology."

"Right, Dimsdale. Just stand there. Everything's going to be all right."

Oh, yeah.

"But I would have imagined . . ." He waved an uncertain hand at Van Groot. "Well, just look at yourself!"

The gnome did. "What did you expect? Green leaves, lederhosen, and a feather cap? You know, Manhattan is one of the few places in the world where we can occasionally slip out and mix with humans without starting a riot. Always at night, of course. Are you sure you haven't seen any of us? We're very common around Tines Square and the theater district."

Charlie thought. Below the Flatiron Building at one A.M.? On a bench in Washington Square? A glimpse here, a reflection in a window there? Who would notice?

After all, this was New York.

"I see. Do all you city gnomes-"

"Metrognomes," corrected Van Groot placidly.

"Do all you metrognomes dress like that?"

"Sharp, isn't it? Cost me a pretty penny, too. Double knit, special cut, of course. I can't exactly wear something right off the rack. No, it depends on your job. I'm sort of an administrator. An executive, if you will. Dress also depends on where you live. The gnomes that work under Dallas affect Stetsons and cowboy boots. Those that live under Miami are partial to sun shorts and big dark glasses. And you –should seethe gnomes that live under a place called the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles!" He shook his Boschian baldness. "We're here."

They'd halted in front of a switching section of track. Charlie could see the red warning light staring steadily up-tunnel, a baleful bloody eye.

The silence was punctuated abruptly by a low-pitched rumbling like thunder. It grew steadily to a groundshaking roar.

A clumsy, huge old-fashioned mine cart, built to half scale, came exploding out of the far wall. Two gnomes were pushing it from behind while another pulled and guided the front. The lead gnome had pure white hair and a three-foot beard that trailed behind him like a pennant.

The cart careened crazily down and over the tracks, threatening to overturn every time it hit the ground. Somehow it seemed to flow over the rails. The three gnomes wore dirty coveralls and miners' hard hats with carbide lamps. The cart was piled high with gleaming, uncut gemstones and what looked like an archaic washer/dryer. The lead gnome had just enough time for a fast wave to them before the apparition disappeared into the near wall. The rumble died away slowly. It reminded Charlie of the sound his garbage disposal made when it wanted to be petulant.

"Well, what are you waiting for? Switch it back."

"What?" said Charlie dazedly. "You mean I can?"

"Yes. Now hurry up, before I change my mind."

Charlie stumbled over and threw the manual switch. The heavy section of track slid ponderously into place, and the warning light changed to a beneficent leafy green. It would show green now on the master layout in the controller's office.

"Now," said Van Groot wish enough force to startle Charlie, "you owe me a favor!"

"Yeah. Sure. Uh . . . what did you have in mind?" said Charlie apprehensively, calling up images of bloodsucking and devil sacrifice.

"I don't mind telling you that things have been getting rather edgy down here. What with one skyscraper after another going up. And now you're expanding the subways again. I can't promise what might happen. One of these days someone's going to drive a shaft right down into one of our diggings and we'll have another strike on our hands."

"Happen? Strike?"

"Boy, you sure are eloquent when you get humming. Sure. Gnomes aren't known for their even tempers, you know. When gnomes go on strike, they've got nothing to do but cause mischief. The last one we had was back in . . ." He murmured a date that momentarily had no meaning to Charlie.

Then, "Hey, wasn't that the week of the big blackout, across the northeast?"

"Well, you know how strikes spread. The boys under Pittsburgh and Boston got together with some power plant gnomes and . . . It was a terrible mess! Most awkward! "

"Awkward! Good grief, another few days of that and . "

Van Groot nodded soberly. "Exactly. Some of us finally appealed to the boys' reason, moral fiber, and good nature. When that didn't work, we got most of 'em dead drunk, and the executive committee repaired a lot of the damage."

"No wonder the engineers could never figure out what caused it."

"Oh, they made up excuses. Didn't stop them from taking credit for fixing the trouble," said Van Groot. "But then, who expects gratitude from humans?"

"You expect something like that might happen again? That would be awful!"

The gnome shrugged. "That depends on your point of view." He flicked away cigar ash daintily. "As a matter of fact, it so happens that this new addition to your system-"

"It's not my system!"

"Yes. Anyhow, we've got a pretty nice chrysoberyl and emerald mine-"

"Emerald mine!"

"-right under the intersection of Sixth Avenue and 16th Street. That mean anything to you?"

"Why no, I . . . no, wait a minute. That's where . . . ?" He goggled at Van Groot.

"Yep. The new Bronx-Manhattan tunnel is going through just south of there. That's not the problem. It's the new express station that's set to go in-"

"Right over your mine," whispered Charlie.

"The boys are pretty upset about it. They read the Times. It's a pretty explosive situation, Dimsdale. Explosive." He looked hard at Charlie.

"But what do you expect me to do? I'm only second assistant inspector to the undercommissioner for subway maintenance and repair. I haven't got the power to order changes in things like station locations and routings and stuff! "

"That's not my problem," said Van Groot. –

"But they're scheduled to start blasting for that station . . . my God, the day after tomorrow!"

"That's what I hear." Van Groot sighed. "Too bad. I don't know what'll happen this time. There's been talk of getting together with the Vermont and New Hampshire gnomes. They want to pour maple syrup into all the telephone cables and switches between Great Neck and Ottawa. A sticky situation, I can tell you!"

"But you can't-" Van Groot looked at Charlie as though he were examining a special species of earthworm.

"Yes, you can."

"That's better," said Van Groot. "I'll do what I can. But while I disagree with the boys' methods, I sympathize with their sentiments. They took an emerald out of there once that was . . . " He paused. "Best I can give you is about twenty-four hours. No later than twelve o'clock tomorrow night."

"Why twelve?" asked Charlie inanely.

"It's traditional. If you've managed to help any, I'll meet you back here. If not, go soak your head."

"Look, I told you, I'm only a second assistant to-"

"I remember. I'm not responsible for your failings. Your problem."

"Tomorrow's Saturday. On Sundays I always call my mother in Greenville. If you gum up the telephone lines, I won't be able to."

"And the chairman of the board of General Computers, who usually calls his mistress in Geneva on Sunday mornings, won't be able to, either," said Van Groot. "It'll be a very democratic crisis. Remember, midnight tomorrow."

Puffing mightily on the cigar and ignoring Charlie's entreaties, the gnome executive disappeared into the near wall of the tunnel.

The morning was cool and clear. On Saturday mornings Charlie usually went first to the Museum of Natural History. Then off to the Guggenheim to see if anything new had come in during the week. From there it was down to the Village for a quick tour through Heimacker's Acres of Books bookstore. Then home, where he would treat himself to an expensive TV dinner instead of the usual fried chicken or Swiss steak. Out to a film or concert and then home. .

Today, however, his schedule was markedly altered. He went to the museum on time. The usual thrill wasn't there. Even the exhibits of northwestern Indian dugouts failed to excite him as they usually did. Instead of envisioning himself perched in the bow, harpoon poised for the whale kill, he saw himself crouched in the rear, paddling furiously to escape the hordes of angry gnomes that were chasing him in birchbark canoes. And when he looked at the always imposing skeleton of the Tyrannosaurus Rex and saw Undercommissioner Broadhare's sour puss in the grinning skull, he decided it was definitely time to depart.

He made up a speech. He'd walk straight into Commissioner Feely's office, powerful and insistent, and say, "Look here, Feely. You've got to shift the new Sixth Avenue station from the north to the south side of the tracks, because if you don't, the gnomes will destroy our great telephone network with maple syrup and-"

Charlie moaned.

He was still moaning when he stumbled out of the museum. The stone lions that guarded the portals watched him go. He headed for the Guggenheim out of habit but found himself instead wandering aimlessly through Central Park.

Let's see. He could sneak into the planning office and burn the station blueprints. No, that wouldn't do. They were bound to have plenty of copies. Charlie had to fill out three copies of a form himself just to requisition a box of paper clips.

He could sneak into the station site and try to sabotage the construction machinery. That would delay things for awhile. Except he didn't think he knew enough about the machinery to successfully bust any of it. He'd never been very mechanically inclined. In fact, he'd failed handicrafts miserably in high school. Everything he had tried to make had turned out to be a napkin holder.

How about using the site to stage a rally for the admission of Nationalist China to the UN? That was always sure to draw a noisy, rambunctious crowd. They might even sabotage the construction gear themselves! He knew a friend who was faintly associated with the John Birch Society who might . . . no, that wouldn't work. Rightist radicals would hardly be the group to get to try to halt construction of anything.

Besides, they were all only temporary. Delaying tactics. Also, he could go to jail for any one of them. A prospect that enthralled him even less than missing his regular Sunday call to his mother in Greenville.

Dinnertime rolled around, and he still hadn't thought of anything. He was reminded of the real world by the smell of incinerating frozen veal cordon bleu. The delicately carbonized odor permeated his tiny living room.

The unappetizing result in his stove was not calculated to improve his humor, already bumping along at a seasonally low ebb.

What he did was most unusual. For Charlie it was unique. He dug down, deep, deep into the bowels of his cupboards, past countless cans of Mr. Planter's peanuts, down past an immaculate cocktail shaker, never used since its purchase three years ago, down past things better left unmentioned, until he found a hair of the dog.

Never more than a social drinker-mostly at official company functions-Charlie thought a few sips might sharpen his thoughts. It seemed to work for old Agent X-14 regularly every Friday evening on channel 3. So he sipped delicately and carefully. For variety, he alternated bottles. They were friendly dogs, indeed. Warm and cuddly, like a Maltese. Shortly thereafter they were rather more like a couple of playful Saint Bernards. And very shortly thereafter he was in no condition to aspire to any analogies at all.

Actually, he hadn't intended to get drunk. It was, however, an inescapable by-product of his drinking. He ran out of sippables in what seemed indecently short order.

He threw on his raincoat-it wasn't raining, but you never knew, he thought belligerently-and headed in search of more follicles of the pooch. It was sheer good fortune he didn't start for the pound.

On the way he had the fortune and misfortune to encounter Miss Overshade in the hallway. Miss Overshade occupied the apartment across the hall from Charlie, on the good side of the building. She was a local personality of some note, being the weather lady on the early news on channel 8. She had at one time been voted Miss Continental Shelf by the Port of New York Authority and currently held the title Miss High-Pressure Area from the New York Council of Meteorologists.

In point of fact she actually was constructed rather along the lines of an especially aesthetic gathering of cumulus clouds. She noticed Charlie, sort of.

"Good evening, Mister . . . uh, Mister . . ."

"Dimsdale," mumbled Charlie. "Dimsdale."

"Oh, yes! How are you, Mister Dimsdale?" Without pausing to learn if he was on the brink of a horrible death, she vanished into her apartment. That voice was calculated to bring on the monsoon. For all she cares, he thought, I might as well be a . . . a gnome.

He hurried down the stairs, insulting the elevator.

At seven sharp Charlie was perusing the soluble delights of an aged and not-so-venerable establishment known as Big Swack's Bar. Currently, he existed in a state of blissful inebriation that followed a thin path betwixt nirvana and hell. For the nonce, nirvana prevailed.

Charlie had a thought, grappled with it. It was brought on by something Van Groot had said. He looked at it hard, piercingly, turning it over in his mind and searching for cracks. It squirmed, trying to get away. He was careful, because he'd seen other things tonight that hadn't been at all real. This thought, however, was.

He left so fast, he forgot to collect the change from his last drink. An occasion that so astonished the proprietor, "Big Swack"-whose real name was Hochmeister-that he talked of nothing else for days afterward.

"Jonson, Jonson! Bill Jonson!" Charlie hammered unmelodically on the door.

Bill Jonson was a sandy-haired, rather sandy-faced young geologist who occasionally shared with Charlie a pallid sandwich in the equally pallid Subway Authority cafeteria. He did not need minutes to observe that his friend was not his usual bland self.

"Charlie? What the hell's the matter with you?"

Now, Charlie was somewhat coherent because on the way up to his friend's abode he'd had enough sense to ingest three Sober-ups. These were chased downstream consecutively by water, half a Pepsi, and an orange drink of sufficient sweetness to destroy any self-respecting molar inside a month. As a result, his mind cleared at the expense of his stomach, which was starting to cloud over.

"Listen, Bill! Can you take a . . . a sounding, a reading, a . . . you know. To determine if there's something special in the ground? Like a big hollow place?"

"I suspect a big hollow place, and it's not in the ground. Come back tomorrow maybe, Charlie, huh? I've got company, you know?" He sort of tried a half grin, half blink. It made him look like a man suffering an attack of the galloping gripes.

"Bill, you've got to take this sounding! You can take one? I've heard you mention it before. Pay attend-hic!-man! This is important! Think of the telephone company!"

"I'd rather not. I got my bill two days ago. Now, be a good chap, Charlie, and run along. It can wait till Monday. And I have got company."

Charlie was desperate. "Just answer me. Can you take a sounding?"

"You mean test the substrata, like I do for the Subway Authority?"

"Yeah! That!" Charlie danced around excitedly. This did not inspire Bill to look on his friend with favor.

"You've got to take one for me!"

"A reading? You're drunk!"

"Certainly not!"

"Then why are you leaning to the left like that?"

"I've always been a liberal. Listen, you know the new station they're planning to build for the extended Bronx-Manhattan line? The one at Sixth and 16th?"

"I've heard about it. That's more your department than mine, you know."

"Indirectly. You've got to come down and take a reading there. Now, tonight. I . . . I've reason to suspect that the ground there is unstable."

"You are crazy. There's no real unstable ground in Manhattan unless you count some of the bars in the Village. It's practically solid granite. Do you have any idea what time it is, anyway?" He looked pointedly at his watch. "My God, it's nearly eight-thirty!"

This unsubtle hint did not have the intended effect on Charlie.

"My God," he echoed, looking in the general vicinity of his own timepiece, "it is nearly eight-thirty! We've got to hurry! We've only got till twelve!"

"I'm beginning to think you've got even less than that," said Bill.

"Who does?" came a mellifluous voice from behind the door.

"Who's that?" Charlie asked, trying to peer over his friend's shoulder.

"The television. Now look, go on home and I'll do whatever you ask. Monday, huh? Please?"

"Nonsense, Bill," said the voice. The door opened wider. A young lady in rather tight slacks and sweater came into view behind Bill. "Why don't you invite your friend in? Charlie, wasn't it?"

"Still is," said Charlie.

"I can't think of a single reason," said Bill in a tone that would have sufficed to tan leather. He opened the door with great reluctance, and Charlie slipped inside.

"Hi. My name's Abigail," the girl chirped.

"Abigail?" said Charlie in disbelief.

"Abigail," replied Bill, nodding slowly.

"My name's Charlie," said Charlie.

"I know."

"You do? Have we met before?"

"Get to the point," said Bill.

"Abigail, you've got to help me. I must enlist Bill's inexhaustible fount of scientific knowledge. In an enterprise that is vital to the safety of the city of New York!" Abigail's eyes went wide. Bill's got hard, like dumdum bullets.

"I have reason to believe," he continued conspiratorially, "that the ground at Sixth Avenue and 16th Street is unstable. If this is not proved tonight, lives will be endangered! But I must buttress my theory with fact."

"Don't swear. Gee, that fantastic! Isn't that fantastic, Bill?"

"It sure is," Bill replied. In a minute he would fantasize her further by strangling his own friend right before her fantasized eyes.

Charlie began to prowl around the living room, his own oculars darting right to left. "Well, don't just stand there, Bill! We've got to assemble your equipment. Now. Don't you agree, Abigail?"

"Oh, yes. Hurry, Bill, let's do!"

"Yes;" murmured Bill tightly. "Just let me get my hat and my coat." He took another look at his friend. "Is it raining out?"

Charlie was on his hands and knees, peering under the couch. "Raining out? Don't be absurd! Of course it isn't raining out. What makes you think it's raining out?"

"Nothing," said Bill. "I can't imagine where I got the idea."

Sixth Avenue and 16th Street was not a very busy intersection, even late on a Saturday night. Especially since it had been blocked off in spots by the construction machinery. On the other hand, it wasn't exactly a dark alley, either. The winos, comfortably tucked into their favorite corners, were no problem. But there were enough pedestrians about to make Bill feel uncomfortable and conspicuous with his heavy field case.

"Why can't we go in there?" he asked, pointing to an assemblage of heavy earth movers.

"Because the construction area is protected by a three-meter-high wire fence topped with three rows of barbed wire with triple alarms on the gates and is patrolled by vicious large-fanged guard dogs, is why."

"Oh," said Bill.

"Can't you do whatever you have to do right here?" asked Abigail.

"Yeah, you're not going to set off a very big explosion, are you?" Charlie blurted.

It is true that Charlie was still fairly intelligible. But the effects of the Sober-ups were wearing off, and he tended to talk rather louder than normal.

So the word "explosion" did have the useful effect of sending several couples scurrying to the other side of the street and clearing a broad space around them.

"For cryin' out loud," whispered Bill, "will you shut up about explosions! You want to get us arrested?" He turned to survey the wooden fence that closed off the vacant lot behind them. "There's bound to be a loose board or a gate in this fence. All I'm going to do inside is set off the smallest cap I've got. You'll get the briefest reading I can take, and that's it!"

While Bill and Charlie screened her from the street, Abigail slipped under the hinged plank they'd found. Charlie followed, and Bill came last, after slipping through his field kit. They stood alone in the empty lot.

"Oooo, isn't this exciting!" Abigail whispered.

"One of the most thrilling nights of my life," growled Bill. He'd long since resigned himself to the fact that the only way he was going to get rid of his friend, short of homicide, was to go through with this idiocy.

"Only let's be ready to get out of here quick, huh? I don't feel like trying to explain to any of New York's finest what I'm doing taking seismic readings in a vacant lot at nine o'clock Saturday night."

"Is it that late already?" yelled Charlie, oblivious to his friend's attempts to shush him. "Hurry, hurry!"

"Anything, if you'll only shut up!" Bill moaned nervously. The others watched while he proceeded to dig a small hole with a collapsible spade. He put something from his case into it, then filled in the dirt, tamping it down tightly with the flat of the spade. He walked back to them, trailing two thin wires.

"This is exciting!" said Abigail. Bill gave her a pained look while Charlie fairly hopped with impatience.

Bill hit the small push-button device the wires led from. There was a muffled thump! Clods of earth were thrown several meters into the tepid air of the New York night. They were accompanied by a non-organic shoe and several tong-empty tuna fish cans.

"Well?" asked Charlie. He said it several times before he realized Bill couldn't hear him through the earphones. Finally he tapped him on the shoulder. "How long will it take?"

"Too long," said Bill, mooning at Abigail, who was inspecting the midget crater. "It was a very small bang. I've got to amplify and reamplify the results and wait for a proper printout from the computer. Maybe an hour, maybe two."

"That is too long!" Charlie whimpered piteously.

"That-is-too-bad!" Bill was just about at the end of his good humor.

"Well, okay, but hurry it up, will you?"

Bill chewed air and didn't reply.

"I don't believe it!" There was a peculiar expression on the young geologist's face.

"What is it, what's happened?" said Abigail.

Bill turned slowly from his instruments, looked up at Charlie.

"You were right. Son of a bitch, you were right! I don't believe it, but . . . unstable! Geez, there's a regular cave down there!"

"Will it affect the tunnel?"

"No, not the line, but as for putting a station down here . . . The whole thing could collapse under other sections of the block. And I couldn't begin to predict what blasting here might do. I don't think anyone would get hurt, but the added expense . . . to ensure the safety of the crane operators and such . . ."

"Now, that would be serious," said Charlie. "Hey, what time is it?"

" 'Bout twenty to twelve," Bill replied, glancing down at his watch.

Charlie looked askance at his watch. "Heavens, it's twenty to twelve! I've got to run! See you soon, Bill!"

"Not likely," the geologist murmured.

"And thanks, thanks a million! You'll report your results to the commissioner's office, won't you?"

"Yeah, sure!" shouted Bill as his friend slipped through the loose board. No reason not to. He'd get a lot of credit for his foresight in detecting the faulted area. Maybe a paper or journal article out of it, too. And he'd take it after what he'd gone through tonight.,

"Now, don't be bitter," whispered Abigail, kissing him selectively. "You were marvelous! It wasn't that difficult. Besides, I think it was fun. And different. I've never been invited out for a seismic reading before."

Bill squinted glumly into the bright light that had settled on them. "And you'll be the first girl to be arrested for it, too." He sighed, kissing her right back.

"Van Groot! Hey, Van Groot!" Charlie had been stumbling through the tunnel for what seemed like hours. He'd wandered off and on the inspectors' walkway, unmindful of the fact that at any moment a train could have come roaring down the subterranean track to squash him like a bug.

"Here, gnome, here, gnome!" That sounded even worse. If he ran into a night inspector, he might be able to alibi away "Van Groot!" He didn't think he was clever enough to explain away "Here, gnome!"

Could he? Well, could he?

"De Puyster!" came a familiar voice. "Stop that shouting! I can hear you."

"Van Groot! I've found you!"

"Eureka," the gnome said dryly. "I'd sure be distressed if you'd found me and I turned out to be someone else."

Tonight the gnome administrator was wearing blue sharkskin. The beret was gone, replaced by a gunmetal-blue turban. A gold silk handkerchief protruded from the jacket pocket, matched to the gold shoes of water buffalo hide.

"Well?"

Charlie tried to catch his breath. It occurred to him that the steady diet of booze and exercise he'd been existing on all night did not go together like, say, chocolate chip and cookie.

"It's . . . it's all right! Everything's going to be okay. You can tell the relatives up north they can leave their maple syrup in the trees and not black out cities or any of that kind of stuff! Your mine won't be harmed."

"Why, that's merry marvelous!" said Van Groot. "How ever did you manage it? I admit I didn't have much confidence in you."

"Friend . . . friend of mine will present enough evidence to the Subway Planning Board showing that the ground, the area for the proposed station, is unstable. Unsuitable for practical excavation. If they think it'll cost them another five bucks, they'll move it to the south side of the tunnel. It was all a matter of just using the fact of your mine, not trying to pretend it wasn't there. They don't know it's a mine, of course."

"Seismic test?"

"Yeah. How did you know?"

"Reasonable. Three of my best pick-gnomes reported in earlier this evening with migraines."

"Sorry."

"Don't give it no mind. Serves 'em right." Van Groot chuckled with satisfaction.

"Anyway," Charlie continued, "lives, time, and difficulty cannot stop the New York Subway Authority. But money . . . yeah, your mine is safe, all right."

"And so are your phone lines. So is that of the chairman of the board of General Computers."

"It'll be an express station, anyway. It shouldn't bother you too much," Charlie added. He was getting groggy again. His stomach and brain were ganging up on him.

"You've done very well, indeed, my boy: I'm surprised at you. It's been a long time since any human traded favors with us:"

"Aw, I'll bet you set the whole thing up. Anyway, I've got to be honest about it. I didn't do it for you. I didn't do it for me, either. I-I did it-" And here he stood very tall, straight, and patriotic. "-for the telephone company!" It was all he could do not to salute.

"Bravo! I wish there was something we could give you. A little token, a remembrance. I don't suppose you could use a nice scepter."

"I'm afraid not. No coronations for a month at least. I'm going on the wagon."

"Too bad. Well, here. Take this, anyway."

"Sure," said Charlie agreeably. The gnome thrust something into his raincoat pocket. "So long, Veen Grat! It was nice knowing you. Stop up at my place sometime. Play a couple games o' gi . . . o' gin!"

"I may do that," replied Van Groot. "Some night. I'll bring my own djinn."

Charlie was halfway up the tunnel when he whirled at a sudden thought and shouted back. "Hey, Van Greet!"

"Yes?" The voice floated down faintly from the distant blackness.

"What did you give me?"

"Why, a Flagan-flange, of course."

Charlie giggled as he thought about it. He couldn't stop giggling. However, it wasn't so funny. This made him nervous, and he stopped. He was just about to enter into a symbiotic relationship with his mattress when there was a knock at his door. It repeated insistently. It refused to go away.

Grumbling, he stumbled blindly to the door and peered through the peephole-no one just opens his door at two in the morning in New York. Suddenly he was sure he'd actually gone to sleep four hours ago and was now dreaming. But he opened the door.

It was Miss High-Pressure Area.

She had a robe draped loosely over a nightgown no self-respecting spider would hake owned up to. Cumulus formations were disturbingly apparent.

"Can I come in, Mister . . . uh . . ."

"Dimsdale," mumbled Charlie. "Charlie Dimsdale." He took two steps backward. Since he was still holding on to the knob, the door came with him.

She stepped inside, closed it behind her. The robe opened even more. So did Charlie's pupils. Proportionately.

"You're going to think I'm just terrible (this was a blatant falsehood), but . . ." She was staring at him in the strangest way. "I really can't . . . explain it. But, well, if you could just . . ."

She took a quick step forward and threw her arms around him. For someone out of practice, Charlie reacted well. She whispered something in his ear. It wasn't a weather report. What she said, softly, was, "It'll be okay. He thinks I'm in Geneva."

Charlie hung on and directed her into the apartment, kicking the door shut behind them. He listened gravely.

Now he knew what a Flagan-flange attracted.