"Then one day I became annoyed with him; without just cause I must admit, merely because I was not getting any positive results; and I handled him rather roughly. Within seconds I sliced open a finger. My irritation mounted and later I went to shove him rudely aside and down I went, giving my head a nasty crack on the edge of a lab bench. I felt wonderful as I sat in pain on the floor, sopping the blood out of my eyes. With the blow an idea had come to me and I felt I at last knew what Wims was and the factor that triggered his dangerous potential. For weeks afterward, under carefully controlled conditions, I was as nasty to him as I dared be. It took my most delicate judgment to avoid fatal injury but I managed to doc.u.ment the world"s first known _accident p.r.o.ne inducer_. I call him h.o.m.o Causacadere, the fall causer, whose activator is hostility.
"We have always had the accident p.r.o.ne, the person who has a psychological proclivity for having more than his share of mishaps. Wims is an individual who can make an accident p.r.o.ne of _anyone_ who threatens his well being and survival. This boy, who, as indicated by the tests, hasn"t an unkind thought for any creature on this planet, has an unconscious, reactive, invulnerable defense against persons who exhibit even the slightest hostility toward him. The energies of their own hostility are turned against them. The greater the hostility, the more accidents they have and the more serious they become. And the increase in accidents gives rise to an increase in hostility and so it goes in an ever widening circle of dislocation and destruction.
"As a scientist I would have preferred to take the many months, perhaps years, necessary to investigate this phenomenon thoroughly, however these are critical times and I was possessed with an inspired idea on how we might utilize this phenomenon against the enemies of the free world. Through a colleague on the Scientific Advisory Council I got the President"s ear and he decided to let us try, on the basis, I"m certain, that the best way to handle screwball scientists is to allow them one or two harmless, inexpensive insanities in the hope that they will make an error and discover something useful.
"Through the good offices of General Fyfe, who was apprised of our plan, Wims was s.n.a.t.c.hed into the Army, commissioned and sent to Burma to be captured. Intelligence advises that he has been taken to Moscow which is for him, an American officer ostensibly on a secret mission, the most hostile environment extant." t.i.tus shook his head. "I suppose I should feel sorry for those poor Russians. They don"t have a chance."
"Sorry for them!" Fyfe bl.u.s.tered. "Think what I"ve had to go through.
Those ridiculous orders; couldn"t explain to anyone. All my people think that I"ve lost my mind. Felt like a fool giving that idiot a battlefield commission during a training exercise."
"It was necessary to give him some rank," t.i.tus explained. "The Communists wouldn"t expect a private to be sent on a secret mission; they just wouldn"t bother to interrogate him. Now an officer, whose return was specially requested the day following his capture would seize their attention and surely they would apply their nasty pressures to find out why. He hasn"t been returned through the regular monthly exchange and they even deny having captured him which seems to indicate that the plan is working."
An admiral stirred and shifted under his crust of gold. "How long have they had him?"
"Six weeks."
"And nothing"s happened yet," the admiral commented. "My guess is that we could sit here for six years and nothing would come of such a barnacle-brained scheme."
An Air Force general spoke up in the breezy jargon of the youngest service. "I"m with the old man from the sea on this one," he said as the admiral winced. "I just don"t see spending billions for alphabet bombs and then warming our tails on them while these psycho-noseys move in and try to fight these sand-lot wars with voodoo and all that jazz."
An aide hurried in from the adjoining message center and handed the chairman a paper. Everybody waited in silence while the chairman seemed to take an unusually long time to read it. Finally he looked up and said. "This is a special relay from the President"s office and since it concerns us all I"ll read it aloud." He held the paper up and read, "Apropos of your present conference with Dr. t.i.tus, it may please the General Staff to learn that the Russian Communist Party newspaper, _Pravda_, has just denounced the newspaper of the Red Army, _Izvestia_, as a tool of the decadent, warmongering, capitalist ruling circles of the imperialist Western bloc. Other evidence of severe internal upheaval of a nature favorable to the West is pouring in through news channels and being confirmed by State and CIA sources. Congratulations, Dr.
t.i.tus."
Dr. t.i.tus arose with unconcealed triumph. "Gentlemen, apparently my hypothesis is correct. The disintegration that will crumble our enemies has already begun. Our secret weapon is a stunning success!"
The crusted admiral looked sourly at t.i.tus. "Of course you"re only a.s.suming that this Wims person is responsible. We"ll never really know."
"Why won"t we?" t.i.tus demanded. "You speak of him as if he were dead or doomed and I tell you he is no such thing. Don"t you understand? He cannot be harmed! And when he gets back here, as he will, he"ll tell us himself exactly what and how it happened."
The aide rushed in with another message. "Again from the President," he announced. "It has been confirmed by CIA," he began reading aloud, "that two weeks ago a group of Chinese officials in a Russian aircraft landed at a Finnish airfield. It is now known definitely that an ostensibly ill member of their group who was put aboard their plane in a stretcher was in reality a young American officer. Among other things, this explains the eighteen contradictory Five Year Plans announced by Peiping this week. CIA says they are going the way of the Russians. Again congratulations, Dr. t.i.tus."
"Well, General Fyfe," t.i.tus said, smiling at him, "perhaps you now feel somewhat differently about this Wims business, hm-m-m?"
Fyfe roared, unable to contain himself any longer: "Do you _really_ believe that rot you"ve been feeding us? You have the audacity to credit yourself with the downfall of two powerful nations, even if it does happen? You think your insane ditherings about an incompetent halfwit has anything to do with anything? You may have bamboozled the President, after all he"s only a civilian, but you"re not about to fool me! These are perilous times and I have no use for you professors and your crazy, useless theories. Now why don"t you get out of here and let us do our job, trying to keep this planet from blowing up in our faces!"
For the first time in his life Dr. t.i.tus flew into an unreasoning fury.
How could this fat, uniformed mountain of stupidity still contrive to deny the facts and dare speak to him the way he did? And after what he had just accomplished! His rage boiled over and t.i.tus rushed at Fyfe, his fist already striking ahead. He never touched the general.
Unaccountably he got tangled in his own legs and fell heavily to the floor. When he tried to rise hot pain burned in his ankle. He sat there staring up in astonishment at Fyfe, hulking over him.
It had happened so swiftly no one had yet spoken or moved.
"YOU!" t.i.tus screeched incredulously, pointing directly at Fyfe. "You of all people!" And t.i.tus sat there on the floor rubbing his injured ankle and he laughed and laughed till the tears came.
THE END