“He knew there was one circumstance, and one only, under which he could enjoy the girl without committing any sin. He decided to wait for it.
“A few months later, when the girl was out pasturing the buffalo, or feeding the silk worms, or something, she saw the lama coming running down the side of the hill toward her. He was in a terrific froth. When he got up to her, he made a certain request. ‘No,’ the girl answered, ‘my mother told me I mustn’t.’ You see, she was a well-brought-up girl.”
George was looking at Atkinson and frowning hard. “Go on,” he said.
“I am going on,” Atkinson answered. “The lama told her to go home and ask her mother if it wasn’t all right to do what the holy man told her. He said to hurry. So she did.
“When she came back the lama was sitting on the field in a disconsolate position. She told him it was all right, her mother had said to mind him. He shook his head. He said, ‘The Dalai Lama has just died. I thought you and I could cooperate to reincarnate him. Under the circumstances, it wouldn’t have been a sin. But now it’s too late. Heaven has willed otherwise. The job has already been attended to.’ And he pointed over to a corner of the field where two donkeys were copulating.
“The girl began to laugh. As I said, she was a well-brought-up girl, but she couldn’t help it. She laughed and laughed. She almost split her sides laughing. And the poor lama had to sit there listening while she laughed.
“You can’t excuse him, but you can understand it. He’d wanted her so much, he’d thought he was going to get her, and then those donkeys—Well, he began to curse. He began to curse those terrible, malign Tantrist curses. He’s been cursing ever since.
“Ever since 1920, he’s been cursing. Once in a while he pauses for breath, and we think things are going to get better, but he always starts in again. He says those dreadful Tantrist syllables over and over, and they go bonging around the world like the notes of enormous brass bells ringing disaster. War and famine and destruction and revolution and death—all in the Tantrist syllables. He knows, of course, that he’ll be punished by years and years of rebirths, the worst possible kind of karma, but he can’t help it. He just goes on saying those terrible syllables.”
George looked at him coldly. “Two Kinds of Time” he said.
“Hunh?”
“I said, you read that story in a book about China called Two Kinds of Time. I read it myself. The donkeys, the lama, the girl—they’re all in there. The only original part was what you said about Tantrist curses, and you probably stole that from someplace else.” George halted. After a moment he said passionately, “What’s the matter with everybody tonight?”
“Oh, foozle,” Atkinson replied lightly. “Om mani padme hum” He picked up his hat and left the bar.
After a minute or so, the two pipers followed him. That left George, the silent man in the corner, and the instrumentalist who had played on the drum. George decided to have one more drink. Then he’d go home.
The silent man who was leaning against the wall began to speak.
“They were all wrong,” he said.
George regarded him with nausea. He thought of leaving, but the bartender was already bringing his drink. He tried to call up enough force to say, “Shut up,” but heart failed him. He drooped his head passively.
“Did you ever notice the stars scattered over the sky?” the man in the corner asked. He had a deep, rumbling voice.
“Milky Way?” George mumbled. Better hurry and get this over with.
“The Milky Way is one example,” the stranger conceded.
“Only one. There are millions of worlds within the millions of galaxies.”
“Yeah.”
“All those millions of burning worlds.” He was silent for so long that George’s hopes rose. Then he said, “They look pretty hot, don’t they? But they’re good to eat.”
“Hunh?”
“The stars, like clams…”
“Beg your pardon,” George enunciated. He finished his drink. “Misjudged you. You’re original.”
The man in the corner did not seem to have listened. “The worlds are like clams,” he said rapidly, “and the skies at night present us with the glorious spectacle of a celestial clambake. They put them on the fire, and when they’ve been on the fire long enough, they open. They’re getting this world of yours ready. When it’s been on the fire a little longer, it’ll open. Explode.”
George realized that that last drink had been one too many. He didn’t believe what the man in the corner was saying. He wouldn’t. But he couldn’t help finding a dreadful sort of logic in it. “How’ju know this?” he asked feebly at last.
The man in the corner seemed to rise and billow. Before George’s horrified and popping eyes, he grew larger and larger, like a balloon inflating. George drew back on the bar stool; he was afraid his face would be buried in the vast unnatural bulk.
“Because,” said the inflating man in a high, twanging voice, “because I’m one of the clam-eaters!”
This horrid statement proved too much for George’s wavering sobriety. He blinked. Then he slid backward off the bar stool and collapsed softly on the floor. His eyes closed.
The billowing form of the clam-eater tightened and condensed into that of a singularly handsome young man. He was dressed in winged sandals and a winged hat; from his naked body there came a soft golden light.
For a moment he stood over George, chuckling at the success of his joke. His handsome, jolly face was convulsed with mirth. Then, giving George a light, revivifying tap on the shoulder with the herald’s wand he carried, the divine messenger left the bar.
AN EGG A MONTH FROM ALL OVER
When the collector from Consolidated Eggs found the mnxx bird egg on the edge of the cliff, he picked it up unsuspiciously. A molded mnxx bird egg looks almost exactly like the chu lizard eggs the collector was hunting, and this egg bore no visible sign of the treatment it had received at the hands of Jreel just before Krink’s hatchet men caught up with him. The collector was paid by the egg; everything that came along was grist to his mill. He put the molded mnxx bird egg in his bag.
George Lidders lived alone in a cabin in the desert outside Phoenix. The cabin had only one room, but at least a third of the available space was taken up by an enormous incubator. George was a charter member of the Egg-of-the-Month Club, and he never refused one of their selections. He loved hatching eggs.
George had come to Phoenix with his mother for her health. He had taken care of her faithfully until her death, and now that she was gone, he missed her terribly. He had never spoken three consecutive words to any woman except her in his life. His fantasies, when he was base enough to have any, were pretty unpleasant. He was forty-six.
On Thursday morning he walked into Phoenix for his mail. As he scuffled over the sand toward the post office substation, he was hoping there would be a package for him from the Egg-of-the-Month Club. He was feeling tired, tired and depressed. He had been sleeping badly, with lots of nightmares. A nice egg package would cheer him up.
The South American mail rocket, cleaving the sky overhead, distracted him momentarily. If he had enough money, would he travel? Mars, Venus, star-side? No, he didn’t think so. Travel wasn’t really interesting. Eggs… Eggs (but the thought was a little frightening), eggs were the only thing he had to go on living for.
The postmistress greeted him unsmilingly. “Package for you, Mr. Lidders. From the egg club. You got to brush for it.” She handed him a slip.