Time Out of Joint

five

Bill Black parked his '57 Ford in the reserved slot in the employees' lot of the MUDO -- Municipal Utility District Office -- building. He meandered up the path to the door and inside the building, past the receptionist's desk, to his office.

First he opened the window, and then he removed his coat and hung it up in the closet. Cool morning air billowed into the office. He inhaled deeply, stretched his arms a couple of times, and then he dropped himself into his swivel chair and wheeled it around to face his desk. In the wire basket lay two notes. The first turned out to be a gag, a recipe clipped from some household column describing a way to fix a casserole of chicken and peanut butter. He tossed the recipe into the wastebasket and lifted out the second note; with a flourish he unfolded it and read it.

_Man at the house tried to call Bridgeland, Sherman, Devonshire, Walnut, and Kent field numbers._

I can't believe it, Black thought to himself. He stuck the note in his pocket, got up from his desk and went to the closet for his coat, closed the window, left his office and walked down the corridor and past the receptionist's desk, outside onto the path, and then across the parking lot to his car. A moment later he had backed out onto the street and was driving downtown.

Well, you can't have everything in life perfect, he said to himself as he drove through the morning traffic. I wonder what it means. I wonder how it could have happened.

Some stranger could have stepped in off the street and asked to use the phone. Oh? What a laugh that was.

I give up, he said to himself. It's just one of those deadly things that defies analysis. Nothing to do but wait and see what took place. Who made the call, why, and how.

What a mess, he said to himself.

Across the street from the back entrance of the _Gazette_ building he parked and got out of his car, stuck a dime in the parking meter, and then entered the _Gazette_ offices by the back stairs.

"Is Mr. Lowery around?" he asked the girl at the counter. "I don't think he is, sir," the girl said. She moved toward the switchboard. "If you want to wait, I'll call around and see if they can locate him."

"Thanks," he said. "Tell him it's Bill Black."

The girl tried various offices and then said to him, "I'm sorry, Mr. Black. They say he hasn't come in yet, but he ought to be in soon. Do you want to wait?"

"Okay," he said, feeling glum. He threw himself down on a bench, lit a cigarette, and sat with his hands folded.

After fifteen minutes he heard voices along the hall. A door opened and the tall, lean, baggy-tweed figure of Stuart Lowery put in its appearance. "Oh, hello Mr. Black," he said in his reasonable fashion.

"Guess what was waiting for me in my office," Bill Black said. He handed Lowery the note. Lowery read it carefully.

"I'm surprised," Lowery said.

"Just a freak accident," Black said. "One chance in a billion. Somebody printed up a list of good restaurants and stuck it in his hat, and then he got into one of the supply trucks and rode on in, and while he was unloading stuff from the truck the list fell out of his hat." A notion struck him. "Unloading cabbages, for instance. And when Vic Nielson started to carry the cabbages into the storage locker, he saw the list and said to himself, Just what I need; a list of good restaurants. So he picked it up, carried it home, and pasted it on the wall by the phone."

Lowery smiled uncertainly.

"I wonder if anyone wrote down the numbers he called," Black said. "That might be important."

"Seems to me that one of us will have to go over to the house," Lowery said. "I wasn't planning to go again until the end of the week. You could go this evening."

"Do you suppose we could have been infiltrated by some traitor?"

"Successful approach," Lowery said.

"Yes," he said.

"Let's see if we can find out."

"I'll drop over tonight," Black said. "After dinner. I'll take over something to show Ragle and Vic. By then I can whip up some sort of thing." He started to leave and then he said, "How'd he do on his entries for yesterday?"

"Seemed to be all right."

"He's getting distraught again. The signs are all there. More empty beer cans on the back porch, a whole bagful of them. How can he guzzle beer and work at the same time? I've watched him at it for three years, and I don't understand it."

Dead-pan, Lowery said, "I'll bet that's the secret. It's not in Ragle; it's in the beer."

Nodding good-bye, Black left the _Gazette_ building.

On the drive back to the MUDO building, one thought kept returning to him. There was just that one possibility that he could not face. Everything else could be handled. Arrangements could be made. But--

Suppose Ragle was becoming sane again?

That evening, after he left the MUDO building, he stopped by a drugstore and searched for something to buy. At last his attention touched on a rack of ball-point pens. He tore several of the pens loose and started out of the store with them.

"Hey, mister!" the clerk said, with indignation.

"I'm sorry," Black said. "I forgot." That certainly was true; it had slipped his mind, for a moment, that he had to go through the motions. From his wallet he took some bills, accepted change, and then hurried out to his car.

It was his scheme to show up at the house with the pens, telling Vic and Ragle that they had been mailed to the waterworks as free samples but that city employees weren't allowed to accept them. You fellows want them? He practiced to himself as he drove home.

The best method was always the simple method.

Parking in the driveway he hopped up the steps to the porch and inside. Curled up on the couch, Junie was sewing a button on a blouse; she ceased working at once and looked up furtively, with such a flutter of guilt that he knew she had been out strolling with Ragle, holding hands and exchanging vows.

"Hi," he said.

"Hi," Junie said. "How'd it go at work today?"

"About the same."

"Guess what happened today."

"What happened today?"

Junie said, "I was down at the launderette picking up your clothes and I ran into Bernice Wilks, and we got to talking about school -- she and I went to Cortez High together -- and we drove downtown in her car and had lunch, and then we took in a show. And I just got back. So dinner is four frozen beef pies." She eyed him apprehensively.

"I love beef pies," he said.

She got up from the couch. In her long quilted skirt and sandals and wide-collared blouse with the medal-sized buttons she looked quite charming. Her hair had been put up artfully, a coil tied at the back in a classical knot. "You're real sterling," she said, with relief. "I thought you'd be mad and start yelling."

"How's Ragle?" he said.

"I didn't see Ragle today."

"Well," he said reasonably, "how was he last time you saw him?"

"I'm trying to remember when I last saw him."

"You saw him yesterday," he said.

She blinked. "No," she said.

"That's what you said last night."

Doubtfully, she said, "Are you sure?"

This was the part that annoyed him; not her slipping off into the hay with Ragle, but her making up sloppy tales that never hung together and which only served to create more confusion. Especially in view of the fact that he needed very badly to hear about Ragle's condition. The folly of living with a woman picked for her affability. She could be counted on to blunder about and do the right thing, but when it came time to ask her what had happened, her innate tendency to lie for her own protection slowed everything to a halt. What was needed was a woman who could commit an indiscretion and then talk about it. But too late to reshape it all, now.

"Tell me about old Ragle Gumm," he said.

Junie said, "I know you have your evil suspicions, but they only reflect projections of your own warped psyche. Freud showed how neurotic people do that all the time."

"Just tell me, will you," he said, "how Ragle is feeling these days. I don't care what you've been up to."

That did the trick.

"Look," Junie said, in a thin, deranged voice that carried throughout the house. "What do you want me to do, say I've been having an affair with Ragle, is that it? All day long I've been sitting here thinking; you know what about?"

"No," he said.

"I possibly might leave you, Bill. Ragle and I may go somewhere together."

"Just the two of you? Or along with the Little Green Man?"

"I suppose that's a slur on Ragle's earning capacity. You want to insinuate that he can't support both himself and I."

"The hell with it," Bill Black said, and went into the other room, by himself.

Instantly Junie materialized in front of him. "You really have contempt because I don't have your educational background," she said. Her face, stained with tears, seemed to blur and swell. She did not look so charming, now.

Before he could phrase an answer, the door chimes sounded.

"The door," he said.

Junie stared at him and then she turned and left the room. He heard her open the front door and then he heard her voice, brisk and only partially under control, and another woman's voice.

Curiosity made him tag along after her.

On the porch stood a large, timid-looking, middle-aged woman in a cloth coat. The woman carried a clipboard, a leather binder, and on her arm was an armband with an insigne. The woman droned on to Junie in a monotone, and at the same time she fumbled in the binder.

Junie turned her head. "Civil Defense," she said.

Seeing that she was too upset to talk, Black stepped up to the door and took her place. "What's this?" he said.

The timidity on the middle-aged woman's face increased; she cleared her throat and in a low voice said, "I'm sorry to bother you during the dinner hour, but I'm a neighbor of yours, I live down the street, and I'm conducting a door-to-door campaign for CD, Civil Defense. We're badly in need of daytime volunteers, and we wondered if there might be anyone at home at your house during the day who could volunteer an hour or so during the week of his or her time...."

Black said, "I don't think so. My wife's home, but she has other commitments."

"I see," the middle-aged woman said. She recorded a few notes on a pad, and then smiled at him humbly. Evidently she took no for an answer the first time around. "Thank you anyhow," she said. Lingering, clearly not knowing how to make her exit, she said, "My name is Mrs. Keitelbein, Kay Keitelbein. I live in the house on the corner. The two-story older house."

"Yes," he said, closing the door slightly.

Returning, this time with a handkerchief to hold against her cheek, Junie said in a wavering voice, "Maybe the people next door can volunteer. He's home during the day. Mr. Gumm. Ragle Gumm."

"Thank you, Mrs.--" the woman said, with gratitude.

"Black," Bill Black said. "Good night, Mrs. Keitelbein." He shut the door and switched on the porch light.

"All day," Junie said. "Siding salesmen, brush salesmen, home reducing systems." She gazed at him bleakly, making first one shape and then another from her handkerchief.

"I'm sorry we quarreled," he said. But he still had not gotten any dope out of her. The ins and outs of residential daytime intrigues... wives were worse than politicians.

"I'll go look at the beef pies," Junie said. She went off in the direction of the kitchen.

Hands in his pockets he trailed after her, still determined to pick up what information he could.

Stepping from the sidewalk onto the path of the next house, Kay Keitelbein felt her way to the porch and rang the bell.

The door opened and a plump, good-natured man in a white shirt and dark, unpressed slacks greeted her.

She said, "Are... you Mr. Gumm?"

"No," he said. "I'm Victor Nielson. Ragle is here, though. Come on inside." He held the door open for her and she entered the house. "Sit down," he said, "if you want. I'll go get him."

"Thank you very much, Mr. Nielson," she said. She seated herself near the door, on a straight-backed chair, her binder and literature on her lap. The house, warm and pleasant, smelled of dinner. Not such a good time to drop by, she told herself. Too close to the dinner hour. But she could see the table in the dining room; they had not sat down yet. An attractive woman with brown hair was setting the table. The woman glanced at her questioningly. Mrs. Keitelbein nodded back.

And then Ragle Gumm came along the hall toward her.

A charity drive, he decided as soon as he saw her. "Yes?" he said, steeling himself.

The drab, earnest-faced woman arose from the chair. "Mr. Gumm," she said, "I'm sorry to bother you, but I'm here for CD. Civil Defense."

"I see," he said.

She explained that she lived down the street. Listening, he wondered why she had selected him, not Vic. Probably because of his fame. He had got a number of proposals in the mail, proposals that he contribute his winnings to causes that would survive him.

"I am at home during the day," he admitted, when she had finished. "But I'm working. I'm self-employed."

"Just an hour or two a week," Mrs. Keitelbein said.

That didn't seem like much. "Doing what?" he said. "I don't have a car, if you're thinking of drivers." Once the Red Cross had come by appealing for volunteer drivers.

Mrs. Keitelbein said, "No, Mr. Gumm, it's a class in instruction for disaster."

That struck him as being apt. "What a good idea," he said.

"Pardon me?"

He said, "Instruction for disaster. Sounds fine. Any special kind of disaster?"

"CD works whenever there's a disaster from floods or windstorms. Of course, it's the hydrogen bomb that we're all so concerned about, especially now that the Soviet Union has those new ICBM missiles. What we want to do is train individuals in each part of the city to know what to do when disaster strikes. Administer first aid, speed the evacuation, know what food is probably contaminated and what food isn't. For instance, Mr. Gumm, each family should lay in a seven-day store of food, including a seven-day store of fresh water."

Dubious still, he said, "Well, leave me your number and I'll give it some thought."

With her pencil Mrs. Keitelbein wrote out her name, address, and phone number at the bottom of a pamphlet. "Mrs. Black next door suggested your name," she said.

"Oh," he said. And it occurred to him instantly that Junie saw it as a means by which they could meet. "A number of individuals from this neighborhood will be attending instruction, I take it," he said.

"Yes," Mrs. Keitelbein said. "At least we hope they will."

"Put me down," he said. "I'm sure I can make it to class one or two hours a week."

Thanking him, Mrs. Keitelbein departed. The door closed after her.

Good for Junie, he said to himself.

And now dinner.

"You mean you signed up?" Margo demanded, as they seated themselves at the table.

"Why not?" he said. "It's common sense and patriotic."

"But you're over your head in your contest."

"Couple hours a week won't make any difference," he said. "You make me feel guilty," Margo sighed. "I've got nothing to do all day, and you have. I should go. Maybe I will."

"No," he said, not wanting her along. Not if it was going to work out as a means of seeing Junie. "You're not invited. Just me."

"That seems unfair," Vic said. "Can't women be patriots?" Sammy spoke up, "I'm a patriot. Back in the clubhouse we've got the best atomic cannon in the United States, and it's trained on Moscow." He created explosion-noises in the back of his mouth.

"How's the crystal set coming?" Ragle said.

"Swell," Sammy said. "It's finished."

"What have you picked up?"

"Nothing so far," Sammy said, "but I'm just about to."

"You let us know when you do," Vic said.

"I just have a few adjustments to complete," Sammy said.

After Margo had cleared the dinner dishes away and brought in the dessert, Vic said to Ragle, "Make any progress today?"

"I got it off at six," he answered. "As usual."

"I mean the other business," Vic said.

Actually he had done very little. The contest work had tied him up. "I started listing the separate facts in the magazines," he said. "Under different categories. Until I get it broken down and listed there's not much I can say." He had set up twelve categories: polities, economics, movies, art, crime, fashions, science, etc. "I got to looking up the different auto dealers in the white section, under their brand names. Chevrolet, Plymouth, DeSoto. They're all listed except one."

"Which one?" Vic said.

"Tucker."

"That's strange," Vic said.

"Maybe the dealer has some personal title," Ragle said. "Such as 'Norman G. Selkirk, Tucker Dealer.' But anyhow, I pass it along to you for what it's worth."

Margo said, "Why do you use the name 'Selkirk'?"

"I don't know," he said. "Just selected at random."

"There's no random," Margo said. "Freud has shown that there's always a psychological reason. Think about the name 'Selkirk.' What does it suggest to you?"

Ragle thought about it. "Maybe I saw the name when I was going through the phone book." These damn associations, he thought. As in the puzzle clues. No matter how hard a person tried, he never got them under control. They continued to run him. "I have it," he said finally. "The man that the book _Robinson Crusoe_ was based on. Alexander Selkirk."

"I didn't know it was based on anything," Vic said.

"Yes," he said. "There was a real castaway."

"I wonder why you thought of that," Margo said. "A man living alone on a tiny island, creating his own society around him, his own world. All his utensils, clothes--"

"Because," Ragle said, "I spent a couple of years on such an island during World War Two."

Vic said, "Do you have any theory yet?"

"About what's wrong?" Ragle inclined his head toward Sammy, who was listening.

"It's okay," Vic said. "He's been following the whole thing. Haven't you, McBoy?"

"Yes," Sammy said.

With a wink to Ragle, Vic said to his son, "Tell us what's wrong, then."

Sammy said, "They're trying to dupe us."

"He heard me say that," Margo said.

"Who's trying to dupe us?" Vic said.

"The -- enemy," Sammy said, after hesitating.

"What enemy?" Ragle said.

Sammy considered and finally said, "The enemy that's everywhere around us. I don't know their names. But they're everywhere. I guess they're the Reds."

To the boy, Ragle said, "And how are they duping us?"

With confidence, Sammy said, "They've got their dupe-guns trained on us dead center."

They all laughed. Sammy colored and began playing with his empty dessert dish.

"Their atomic dupe-guns?" Vic said.

Sammy muttered, "I forget if they're atomic or not."

"He's way ahead of us," Ragle said.

After dinner Sammy went off to his room. Margo did the dishes in the kitchen, and the two men adjourned to the living room. Almost at once the doorbell rang.

"Maybe it's your pal Mrs. Keitelbein back," Vic said, going to the door.

Standing on the porch was Bill Black. "Hi," he said, entering the house. "I've got something for you fellows." He tossed Ragle a couple of objects, which Ragle caught. Ball-point pens, and good ones by their look. "Couple for you, too," Black said to Vic. "Some firm up north mailed them to us, but we can't keep them. Against a city ruling involving gifts. You have to either eat it up, smoke it up, or drink it up the day you got it, or you can't keep it."

"But it's all right to give them to us," Vic said, examining the pens. "Well thanks, Black. I can use these down at the store."

I wonder, Ragle wondered. Should we say anything to Black? He managed to catch his brother-in-law's eye. There seemed to be a nod of approval there, so he said, "You got a minute?"

"I guess so," Black said.

"There's something we want to show you," Vic said.

"Sure," Black said. "Let's see it."

Vic started off to get the magazines, but Ragle suddenly said, "Wait a minute." To Black he said, "Have you ever heard of somebody named Marilyn Monroe?"

Black, at that, got an odd, secretive look on his face. "What is this?" he drawled.

"Have you or haven't you?"

"Sure I have," he said.

"He's a phony," Vic said. "He thinks it's some gag and he doesn't want to bite."

"Give us an honest answer," Ragle said. "There's no gag."

"Of course I've heard of her," Black said.

"Who is she?"

'She-" Black glanced into the other room to see if either Margo or Sammy could hear. "She has about the biggest build there is." He added, "She's a Hollywood actress."

I'll be darned, Ragle thought.

"Stay here," Vic said. He went off and returned with the picture magazine. Holding it so Black couldn't see it, he said, "What picture has she made that's supposed to be her best?"

"That's a matter of opinion," Black said.

"Just name one, then."

Black said, "_The Taming of the Shrew_."

Both Ragle and Vic examined the article, but there was no mention of her having done the Shakespeare comedy.

"Name another," Vic said. "That one isn't listed."

Black gestured irritably. "What is this? I don't get to the movies very much."

Ragle said, "According to this article, she's married to an important playwright. What's his name?"

Without hesitation, Black said, "Arthur Miller." Well, Ragle decided, there goes all of that.

"Why haven't we heard of her, then?" he asked Black.

Snorting with derision, Black said, "Don't blame me."

"Has she been famous long?"

"No. Not particularly. You remember Jane Russell. That big build-up about _The Outlaw_."

"No," Vic said. Ragle also shook his head.

"Anyhow," Black said, clearly perturbed but trying not to show it, "they've got the machinery going. Making a star out of her overnight." He stopped talking and came over to see the magazine. "What is this?" he asked. "Can I look at it, or is it secret?"

"Let him see it," Ragle said.

After he had studied the magazine Black said, "Well, it's been a few years. Maybe she's dropped out of sight already. But when Junie and I were going together, before we were married, we used to go to the drive-in movies, and I remember seeing this _Gentlemen Prefer Blondes_ that the article mentions."

In the direction of the kitchen, Vic shouted, "Hey honey -- Bill Black's heard of her."

Margo appeared, drying a blue willow plate. "Has he? Well then I guess that clears that up."

"Clears what up?" Black asked.

"We had a theory we were experimenting with," Margo said.

"What theory?"

Ragle said, "It seemed to the three of us that something had gone wrong."

"Where?" Black said. "I don't get what you mean."

None of them said anything, then.

"What else have you got to show me?" Black said.

"Nothing," Ragle said.

"They found a phone book," Margo said. "Along with the magazines. Part of a phone book."

"Where did you find all these?"

Ragle said, "What the hell do you care?"

"I don't care," Black said. "I just think you're out of your mind." He sounded more and more angry. "Let's have a look at the phone book."

Vic got the book and handed it to him. Black sat down and leafed through it, with the same frenetic expression on his face. "What's there about this?" he said. "It's from upstate. They don't use these numbers any more." He slapped the book shut and tossed it on the table; it started to slide off, to the floor, and Vic rescued it. "I'm surprised at the three of you," Black said. "Especially you, Margo." Reaching out his hand he grabbed the phone book away from Vic, got to his feet, and started to the front door. "I'll bring this back to you in a day or so. I want to go through it and see if I can track down some kids Junie went to Cortez High with. There's a whole flock of them she can't find; they're probably married by now. Mostly girls." The front door closed after him and he was gone.

"He certainly got upset," Margo said after a pause.

"Hard to know what to make of that," Vic said.

Ragle wondered if he ought to go after Bill Black and get the telephone book back. But apparently it was worthless. So he did not.

Hopping mad, Bill Black flung open the front door of his house and ran past his wife to the phone.

"What's wrong?" Junie asked. "Did you have a fight with them? With Ragle?" She came up close beside him as he dialed Lowery's number. "Tell me what happened. Did you have it out with Ragle? I want to know what he said. If he said there had ever been anything between us, he's a liar."

"Beat it," he said to her. "Please, Junie. For Christ's sake. This is business." He glared at her until she gave up and went off.

"Hello," Lowery's voice sounded in his ear.

Black squatted on his haunches, holding the receiver close to his mouth so that Junie couldn't hear. "I was over there," he said. "They got their hands on a phone book, a current or nearly current one. I've got it, now. I managed to wangle it away from them; I still don't know how."

"Did you find out where they got it?"

"No," he admitted, "I got sore and left. It really threw me, walking in there and having them say, 'Hey Black -- you ever heard of a woman named Marilyn Monroe,' and then trotting out a couple of battered, weather-beaten old magazines and flashing them in my face. That was a miserable few minutes." He was still trembling and perspiring; holding the phone with his shoulder he succeeded in getting his cigarettes and lighter from his pocket. The lighter slipped from his hand and rolled out of reach; he gazed after it resignedly.

"Oh I see," Lowery said. "They don't have Marilyn Monroe. It didn't get fitted in."

"No," he said.

"You say the magazines and phone book were weatherbeaten."

"Yes," he said. "Very."

"Then they must have found them in a garage or outdoors. I think probably in that old bombed-out armory the county used to maintain. The rubble is still there; you people never cleared it."

"We can't!" Black said. "It's county property; it's up to them. And anyhow there's nothing there. Just cement blocks and the drainage system that carried off the r.a. wastes."

"You better get a city work truck and a few men and pave those lots. Put a fence up."

"We've been trying to get permission from the county," he said. "Anyhow I don't think they found the stuff there. If they did -- and I say if -- it's because somebody salted the ground, there."

"Enriched, you mean," Lowery said.

"Yes, a few nuggets."

"Maybe so."

"So if we pave over the lots, whoever they are will just enrich a little closer home. And why would Vic or Margo or Ragle be poking around those lots? They're half a mile across town, and--" Then he recalled Margo's petition. That possibly explained it. "Maybe you're right," he said. "Forget it." Or the boy Sammy. Well, it didn't matter. He had the phone book back.

"You don't think they looked up anything in it while they had it, do you?" Lowery said. "Besides the numbers they tried to call."

Black knew what he meant. "Nobody looks themselves up," he said. "That's the one thing nobody ever turns to, his own number."

"You have the book there?"

"Yes."

"Read me what he would have found."

Balancing the phone, Bill Black turned the tattered, watercrumbled pages of the phone book until he got to the Rs. There it was, all right.

Ragle Gumm Inc., Branch 25 Kentwood 6 0457

Between 5 P.M. and 8 A.M. Walnut 4 3965

Shipping dept. Roosevelt 2 1181

Floor One Bridgefield 8 4290

Floor Two Bridgefield 8 4291

Floor Three Bridgefield 8 4292

Receiving dept. Walnut 4 3882

Emergency Sherman 1 9000

"I wonder what he would have done if he had happened to turn to it," Black said.

"God only knows. Gone into a catatonic coma, most likely." Black tried to imagine the conversation, if Ragle Gumm had found the number and called it -- any of the numbers listed under Ragle Gumm Inc. Branch 25. What a weird conversation that would be, he thought. Almost impossible to imagine.