I had no patience with it now, for I was eager to get started on my new project. My mind was filled with a multitude of things I had to do—rent an old shack to be used as my first workshop, buy machinery, tools, and raw materials, perhaps even hire some part-time labor. So it was quite by accident that as I was rushing from the pawnshop, the card in one hand, counting my money, that I ran into the path of a speeding car.
For an instant, a horrible thought flashed across my mind: the devil was about to collect my soul before I had a chance to pay him off!
But then the car swerved to miss me, skidded, and went up onto the sidewalk and crashed into the porch of a tenement building. Gasoline flooded from the vehicle’s tank and caught fire. The apartment dwellings were old and dry, and they went up like tinderwood. Before the fire department could do anything, the entire block was destroyed. There were a few injuries, but miraculously no one was killed.
That night in my hotel room I happened to glance at the pawnshop ticket. The number had changed. Instead of the original $1,000.00, the figure was $999.00, I recalled what the pawnbroker had told me: “You don’t repay us with money, but with had deeds.”
I was astonished, not so much at the magical change in the number on the ticket, but that destruction of so many buildings, coupled with the various injuries sustained by several persons, was worth a mere one dollar. At that rate, I’d have to set fire to nine hundred ninety-nine more buildings in order to pay my debt.
That was nonsense, I decided, and immediately dismissed the thought. When I had a thousand dollars in profits from my venture, I’d pay off the loan, adding whatever interest was due.
I rented the shack, bought what tools I needed, invested money in raw materials, and worked night and day to build up my little business. Within six months, I had to move to a larger location. I’d hired three full-time employees. I was making a good living, and I had several thousand dollars in my bank account. I withdrew twelve hundred of the savings and returned to the pawnshop where I’d “hocked my soul.”
Or I tried to. I went back to the same location. Still across the street were the charred ruins of the tenements which had not been replaced. But there was no pawnshop. According to neighbors, there never had been one there. It was my imagination, they said. The pawn ticket, however, was very real, and on it I read the statement that I would not be allowed to redeem my soul under any circumstances except those specified. That’s when I decided to read the fine print in the contract.
There was just no getting around it. I had to do bad deeds, if I wanted to get my soul back. Actually, assuming there was such a thing as a soul and a person as the devil and a place called Hell, it seemed logical that Satan would want such things written into a contract. It was his purpose on Earth to do evil deeds, or to have them done, and according to the fine print every little bit helped. For example, if once a day I kicked a dog on the street, it might not register right away on the card, but it would all add up over the years.
To tell the truth, I wasn’t totally convinced just then to take all this at face value. During six months, the number had remained at the $999.00 figure, not budging. Of course, I’d been too busy at honest labor to do anything bad, even accidentally. At the rate I was going, I’d never do enough evil to pay off my debt before I died—and then it would be too late.
I put the thought from my mind. After all, I was a young man, and death seemed so distant as to be nonexistent. I threw myself wholeheartedly into my work, hardly bothering even with the simple pleasures of life.
Except for Mary, that is.
She was a pretty thing, with soft brown hair, liquid eyes, a pert nose, rich red lips. She was quite innocent when she came to work for me at the plant because I needed some office help. Would you believe she had to support a sick mother? Oh, it was a marvelous set-up. I think she genuinely liked me, but even then she might not have done what I wanted if I hadn’t intimated she might be fired otherwise. The poor girl needed the money, even the modest stipend I gave her every week. Besides, I told her I loved her and that we’d get married some day when the factory was built up enough.
And the silly goose had to go and get pregnant! She came to me in tears, saying she couldn’t have an illegitimate child and I’d have to marry her. I told her I didn’t have to do any such thing. I said she was probably fooling around with dozens of other fellows. I told her to go find the true father and not to bother me any more. To make doubly sure she kept away, I fired her.
I learned later that she took her own life, and shortly thereafter her mother grew worse and also died. I didn’t think it was my fault, but apparently my friends in the pawnshop did, for they gave me a credit of one hundred dollars for the two lives.
I began to take the ticket and the contract more seriously after that. I mean, just on the off chance there was something to this devil and soul business. I read the fine print on back of the card carefully. It didn’t spell out all the credits available, but it made it clear that human life was at a premium, and the more I could make that human suffer, the more credit I got.
Which, by the way, Davis, is why I intend torturing you before I kill you. I’m sure you can see my logic in that.
Anyway, I realized happily that it wouldn’t really be going out of my way to do bad deeds. It was common in the business world then just as it is now. In fact, I suspect many big businessmen have sold their souls to the devil and are now doing bad deeds in the name of industry in order to redeem their pledges. And along the way, I could do a few things when the opportunities presented themselves.
For example, I went to church. That surprises you, does it? Well, you won’t be surprised when you hear the reason. When they passed the plate, instead of putting something in it, I always took something out. Stealing was worth a few points, but stealing from the devil’s opposition was even better. Not enough, perhaps, to register immediately as a credit on my pawn ticket, but it all added up, as the fine print insisted.
If only I’d been in munitions, I could’ve had my debt wiped out long ago. Or even if I’d been in the service, maybe I could’ve tossed a few grenades in the right spots to pile up some credits; unfortunately, the head-shrinkers decided I was unfit for military duty, whatever that meant. So I had to do it the hard way, a little at a time.
I kicked dogs whenever they came within booting range, littered places that had do-not-litter signs, laid off my employees just before Christmas, broke windows when no one was looking, let the air out of tires—and so on. It got so I never let an opportunity pass without taking advantage of it, no matter how small it might be. Compared to me, Ebenezer Scrooge was a fairy godmother.
And every once in a while, the figure on the ticket would change, sometimes only a penny at a time. But then, I was a young man, and I had plenty of time. At least, that’s what I thought. But the years went by so swiftly. My bank balance built up into the millions. I own five factories turning out electronic equipment for the government and private industry. I have a big home and several cars.
And now, I’m very close to dying, and I still owe the devil fifty dollars and seventy-three cents.
“So you see,” Jonathan Carver said to the manacled young man, “why I must kill you. I must torture you seventy-three cents’ worth and then destroy your fifty-dollar body. Perhaps, because you have a wife and children who will be distraught and penniless, I have some leeway, but I can’t afford to take any chances. It’s nothing personal, Davis, I want you to understand that.”
James Davis wet his lips. “Wait. You’re making a mistake. You wouldn’t be doing a bad deed killing me.”