The Visitors (v1.0)

50. THE UNITED STATES

There was talk at breakfast tables.

"Herb, I always told you. Some good, I said, would come of the visitors. I always told you that, but you didn't think so. And now they'll be giving us free cars."

"There ain't nothing free. Not in this world, there ain't nothing free. You pay, one way or another, for everything you get."

"But the paper says so."

"The paper doesn't know. That's just what the paper thinks. The piece in the paper says it might be so. I won't count on no free car until I see it standing in the driveway."

"And it doesn't need any gasoline. It doesn't even need a road. You can fly it if you want to."

"There'll be bugs in it. Just you wait and see. There's bugs in all new models. And this flying business. Just try to fly it and you'll break your neck."

"You never believe nothing. Nothing good, that is. You're just a cynic. All you believe is bad. The paper says the visitors are doing it out of gratitude."

"Just tell me, Liza, what I've ever done for a visitor. Why should they feel gratitude to me? I ain't turned a hand to help one."

"Not gratitude to you, Herb. Not to you personally. Anyone you ever helped would die of shock. No one expects you to be any help at all. They'd fall down dead if you were any help. The visitors feel grateful to all of us just because we're here, just because we live on this planet. They want to do something for us. Not just for you, but for everyone.

There was talk in the ghetto streets.

"Hey, man, you hear about them cars?"

"What cars?"

"Them ears the visitors are about to give us."

"There ain't nobody going to give us cars."

"It says so in the paper."

"Not us, man. Maybe some honkeys will get some cars. We won't get no cars. All we'll get is screwed."

"Maybe it'll be different this time. Them visitors are different kinds of folk. Maybe they won't screw us."

"Listen, man, get rid of that idea. Everybody screws us."

And in an assembly worker's home in a Detroit suburb:

"Joe, you think it's true about the cars?"

"I don't know. How should I know? It's just what the paper says. The paper could be wrong."

"But if it isn't wrong? What if it isn't wrong? What if there really will be cars?"

"Christ, Jane, how should I know?"

"You would lose your job. A lot of people would lose their jobs. Ford and Chrysler and all the other companies can't go on making cars if there are free cars being handed out."

"The visitor-ears might not be any good. Run for a while and stop and once they stop, what do you do for repairs? They're just some new-fangled idea. Maybe some new advertising gimmick. I don't think the visitors are making them. Someone else is making them and some PR jerk has cooked up this story to attract attention. Some day them PR people will carry things too far and maybe this is it."

"You can't lose your job, Joe. We can't afford to have you lose your job. There's the house payments and the car payments and the kids need winter clothes."

"Don't worry so much, Jane. There have been all these flashy foreign cars and the assembly line keeps running."

"But these aren't foreign ears, Joe. And they are free."

"There ain't nothing free," said Joe.

There was subdued panic in the banks, in the board rooms, in the unmanned brokerage offices. In a surge of selling on foreign exchanges, the dollar dropped spectacularly. The British and French governments scheduled a hurried joint consultation. The West German government officially called for support of the United States by other nations of the world. Strange stirrings took place behind the Kremlin walls, but foreign correspondents, even the old Moscow hands, had only a confused idea of what might be going on.

On Capitol Hill, in Washington, out of a flurry of meaningless motion, some sentiment developed for the drafting of a bill that would make it illegal for citizens to accept any sort of gifts from aliens. And a rumor grew.

"What do you know about this report that there has been a weapons test?" Senator Knox asked Senator Davenport when the two met just outside the chamber.

"Very little," said Davenport. "I just now got wind of it."

"How it got out, I don't know," said Knox. "It's supposed to be top secret."

"There may be nothing to it," said Davenport.

"I can't believe that to be true," said Knox. "It seems to be authentic. I'm beginning to think we should back the administration on this visitor issue. No matter how we stand on other matters. If we've got something from the visitors.

"I'm inclined to go along with you," said Davenport. "Seems to me we should stay hanging in there. Although, I still am not too sure how much credence to give the rumor."

"Just on the chance that it is true," said Knox, "I would favor doing what we can. In the area of national security, we can't let the country down."

On a small river in the wilds of Minnesota, Frank Norton bent to the paddle, heading for the bridge where he had parked his car.