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diff --git a/26741-8.txt b/26741-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2103700 --- /dev/null +++ b/26741-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,671 @@ +Project Gutenberg's I'm a Stranger Here Myself, by Dallas McCord Reynolds + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: I'm a Stranger Here Myself + +Author: Dallas McCord Reynolds + +Release Date: October 1, 2008 [EBook #26741] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK I'M A STRANGER HERE MYSELF *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + _One can't be too cautious about the + people one meets in Tangier. They're all + weirdies of one kind or another. + Me? Oh,_ + + _I'm A Stranger + Here Myself_ + +By MACK REYNOLDS + + +The Place de France is the town's hub. It marks the end of Boulevard +Pasteur, the main drag of the westernized part of the city, and the +beginning of Rue de la Liberté, which leads down to the Grand Socco and +the medina. In a three-minute walk from the Place de France you can go +from an ultra-modern, California-like resort to the Baghdad of Harun +al-Rashid. + +It's quite a town, Tangier. + +King-size sidewalk cafes occupy three of the strategic corners on the +Place de France. The Cafe de Paris serves the best draft beer in town, +gets all the better custom, and has three shoeshine boys attached to the +establishment. You can sit of a sunny morning and read the Paris edition +of the New York _Herald Tribune_ while getting your shoes done up like +mirrors for thirty Moroccan francs which comes to about five cents at +current exchange. + +You can sit there, after the paper's read, sip your expresso and watch +the people go by. + +Tangier is possibly the most cosmopolitan city in the world. In native +costume you'll see Berber and Rif, Arab and Blue Man, and occasionally a +Senegalese from further south. In European dress you'll see Japs and +Chinese, Hindus and Turks, Levantines and Filipinos, North Americans and +South Americans, and, of course, even Europeans--from both sides of the +Curtain. + +In Tangier you'll find some of the world's poorest and some of the +richest. The poorest will try to sell you anything from a shoeshine to +their not very lily-white bodies, and the richest will avoid your eyes, +afraid _you_ might try to sell them something. + +In spite of recent changes, the town still has its unique qualities. As +a result of them the permanent population includes smugglers and +black-marketeers, fugitives from justice and international con men, +espionage and counter-espionage agents, homosexuals, nymphomaniacs, +alcoholics, drug addicts, displaced persons, ex-royalty, and subversives +of every flavor. Local law limits the activities of few of these. + +Like I said, it's quite a town. + + * * * * * + +I looked up from my _Herald Tribune_ and said, "Hello, Paul. Anything +new cooking?" + +He sank into the chair opposite me and looked around for the waiter. The +tables were all crowded and since mine was a face he recognized, he +assumed he was welcome to intrude. It was more or less standard +procedure at the Cafe de Paris. It wasn't a place to go if you wanted to +be alone. + +Paul said, "How are you, Rupert? Haven't seen you for donkey's years." + +The waiter came along and Paul ordered a glass of beer. Paul was an +easy-going, sallow-faced little man. I vaguely remembered somebody +saying he was from Liverpool and in exports. + +"What's in the newspaper?" he said, disinterestedly. + +"Pogo and Albert are going to fight a duel," I told him, "and Lil Abner +is becoming a rock'n'roll singer." + +He grunted. + +"Oh," I said, "the intellectual type." I scanned the front page. "The +Russkies have put up another manned satellite." + +"They have, eh? How big?" + +"Several times bigger than anything we Americans have." + +The beer came and looked good, so I ordered a glass too. + +Paul said, "What ever happened to those poxy flying saucers?" + +"What flying saucers?" + +A French girl went by with a poodle so finely clipped as to look as +though it'd been shaven. The girl was in the latest from Paris. Every +pore in place. We both looked after her. + +"You know, what everybody was seeing a few years ago. It's too bad one +of these bloody manned satellites wasn't up then. Maybe they would've +seen one." + +"That's an idea," I said. + +We didn't say anything else for a while and I began to wonder if I could +go back to my paper without rubbing him the wrong way. I didn't know +Paul very well, but, for that matter, it's comparatively seldom you ever +get to know anybody very well in Tangier. Largely, cards are played +close to the chest. + + * * * * * + +My beer came and a plate of tapas for us both. Tapas at the Cafe de +Paris are apt to be potato salad, a few anchovies, olives, and possibly +some cheese. Free lunch, they used to call it in the States. + +Just to say something, I said, "Where do you think they came from?" And +when he looked blank, I added, "The Flying Saucers." + +He grinned. "From Mars or Venus, or someplace." + +"Ummmm," I said. "Too bad none of them ever crashed, or landed on the +Yale football field and said _Take me to your cheerleader_, or +something." + +Paul yawned and said, "That was always the trouble with those crackpot +blokes' explanations of them. If they were aliens from space, then why +not show themselves?" + +I ate one of the potato chips. It'd been cooked in rancid olive oil. + +I said, "Oh, there are various answers to that one. We could probably +sit around here and think of two or three that made sense." + +Paul was mildly interested. "Like what?" + +"Well, hell, suppose for instance there's this big Galactic League of +civilized planets. But it's restricted, see. You're not eligible for +membership until you, well, say until you've developed space flight. +Then you're invited into the club. Meanwhile, they send secret missions +down from time to time to keep an eye on your progress." + +Paul grinned at me. "I see you read the same poxy stuff I do." + +A Moorish girl went by dressed in a neatly tailored gray jellaba, +European style high-heeled shoes, and a pinkish silk veil so transparent +that you could see she wore lipstick. Very provocative, dark eyes can be +over a veil. We both looked after her. + +I said, "Or, here's another one. Suppose you have a very advanced +civilization on, say, Mars." + +"Not Mars. No air, and too bloody dry to support life." + +"Don't interrupt, please," I said with mock severity. "This is a very +old civilization and as the planet began to lose its water and air, it +withdrew underground. Uses hydroponics and so forth, husbands its water +and air. Isn't that what we'd do, in a few million years, if Earth lost +its water and air?" + +"I suppose so," he said. "Anyway, what about them?" + +"Well, they observe how man is going through a scientific boom, an +industrial boom, a population boom. A boom, period. Any day now he's +going to have practical space ships. Meanwhile, he's also got the H-Bomb +and the way he beats the drums on both sides of the Curtain, he's not +against using it, if he could get away with it." + +Paul said, "I got it. So they're scared and are keeping an eye on us. +That's an old one. I've read that a dozen times, dished up different." + +I shifted my shoulders. "Well, it's one possibility." + +"I got a better one. How's this. There's this alien life form that's way +ahead of us. Their civilization is so old that they don't have any +records of when it began and how it was in the early days. They've gone +beyond things like wars and depressions and revolutions, and greed for +power or any of these things giving us a bad time here on Earth. They're +all like scholars, get it? And some of them are pretty jolly well taken +by Earth, especially the way we are right now, with all the problems, +get it? Things developing so fast we don't know where we're going or how +we're going to get there." + + * * * * * + +I finished my beer and clapped my hands for Mouley. "How do you mean, +_where we're going_?" + +"Well, take half the countries in the world today. They're trying to +industrialize, modernize, catch up with the advanced countries. Look at +Egypt, and Israel, and India and China, and Yugoslavia and Brazil, and +all the rest. Trying to drag themselves up to the level of the advanced +countries, and all using different methods of doing it. But look at the +so-called advanced countries. Up to their bottoms in problems. Juvenile +delinquents, climbing crime and suicide rates, the loony-bins full of +the balmy, unemployed, threat of war, spending all their money on +armaments instead of things like schools. All the bloody mess of it. +Why, a man from Mars would be fascinated, like." + +Mouley came shuffling up in his babouche slippers and we both ordered +another schooner of beer. + +Paul said seriously, "You know, there's only one big snag in this sort +of talk. I've sorted the whole thing out before, and you always come up +against this brick wall. Where are they, these observers, or scholars, +or spies or whatever they are? Sooner or later we'd nab one of them. +You know, Scotland Yard, or the F.B.I., or Russia's secret police, or +the French Sűreté, or Interpol. This world is so deep in police, +counter-espionage outfits and security agents that an alien would slip +up in time, no matter how much he'd been trained. Sooner or later, he'd +slip up, and they'd nab him." + +I shook my head. "Not necessarily. The first time I ever considered this +possibility, it seemed to me that such an alien would base himself in +London or New York. Somewhere where he could use the libraries for +research, get the daily newspapers and the magazines. Be right in the +center of things. But now I don't think so. I think he'd be right here +in Tangier." + +"Why Tangier?" + +"It's the one town in the world where anything goes. Nobody gives a damn +about you or your affairs. For instance, I've known you a year or more +now, and I haven't the slightest idea of how you make your living." + +"That's right," Paul admitted. "In this town you seldom even ask a man +where's he's from. He can be British, a White Russian, a Basque or a +Sikh and nobody could care less. Where are _you_ from, Rupert?" + +"California," I told him. + +"No, you're not," he grinned. + +I was taken aback. "What do you mean?" + +"I felt your mind probe back a few minutes ago when I was talking about +Scotland Yard or the F.B.I. possibly flushing an alien. Telepathy is a +sense not trained by the humanoids. If they had it, your job--and +mine--would be considerably more difficult. Let's face it, in spite of +these human bodies we're disguised in, neither of us is humanoid. Where +are you really from, Rupert?" + +"Aldebaran," I said. "How about you?" + +"Deneb," he told me, shaking. + +We had a laugh and ordered another beer. + +"What're you doing here on Earth?" I asked him. + +"Researching for one of our meat trusts. We're protein eaters. Humanoid +flesh is considered quite a delicacy. How about you?" + +"Scouting the place for thrill tourists. My job is to go around to these +backward cultures and help stir up inter-tribal, or international, +conflicts--all according to how advanced they are. Then our tourists +come in--well shielded, of course--and get their kicks watching it." + +Paul frowned. "That sort of practice could spoil an awful lot of good +meat." + + +THE END + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ December 1960. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. 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