Cue for Quiet Read online

  Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

  Transcriber's Note:

  This etext was produced from Space Science Fiction May and July 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

 

  CUE FOR QUIET

  BY T. L. SHERRED

  ILLUSTRATED BY ORBAN

  After too many years, T. L. Sherred returns with a story that gets our SPACE SPECIAL rating. It's the story of a man with a headache--who found a cure for it! And the cure gave him more power than any man could dream of.

  * * * * *

  So I had a headache. The grandfather of all headaches. You try workingon the roof line sometime, with the presses grinding and the overheadcranes wailing and the mechanical arms clacking and grabbing at yourinner skull while you snap a shiny sheet of steel like an armoredpillowcase and shove it into the maw of a hungry greasy ogre. Noise.Hammering, pounding, shrieking, gobbling, yammering, incessant noise.And I had a headache.

  This headache had all the signs of permanency. It stayed with me whenI slid my timecard into an empty slot that clanged back at me, when Iskittered across a jammed street of blowing horns and impatient buseswith brakedrums worn to the rivets, when I got off at my corner andstood in the precarious safety of a painted island in a whirring stormof hurtling hornets. It got even worse when I ate dinner and tried toread my paper through the shrill juvenile squeals of the housingproject where I live surrounded by muddy moppets and, apparently,faithless wives and quarrelsome spouses. The walls of my Quonset areno thicker than usual.

  When Helen--that's my wife--dropped the casserole we got for a weddingpresent from her aunt and just stood there by the kitchen sink cryingher eyes out in frustration I knew she finally had more of a mess toclean up than just the shattered remains of a brittle bowl. I didn'tsay a word. I couldn't. I shoved the chair across the room and watchedit tilt the lamp her mother bought us. Before the lamp hit the floormy hat was on my head and I was out the door. Behind me I heard atleast one pane of the storm door die in a fatal crash. I didn't lookaround to see if it were the one I'd put in last Sunday.

  * * * * *

  Art was glad to see me. He had the beer drawn and was evening the foambefore the heavy front door had shut us off from the street. "Been awhile, Pete. What's new?"

  I was glad to see him, too. It was quiet in there. That's why I goeight blocks out of my way for my beer. No noise, no loud talking oryou end up on the curb; quiet. Quiet and dark and comfortable and youmind your own business, usually. "Got any more of those little boxesof aspirin?"

  He had some aspirin and was sympathetic. "Headache again? Maybe youneed a new pair of glasses."

  I washed down the pills and asked for a refill on the beer. "Maybe,Art. What do you know that's new?"

  Nothing. We both knew that. We talked for a while; nothing important,nothing more than the half-spoken, half-grunted short disjointedphrases we always repeated. Art would drift away and lean on the otherend of the bar and then drift back to me and at the end of each tripthere would be clean ashtrays and the dark plastic along the bar wouldgleam and there would be no dregs of dead drinks and the rows of freshglasses would align themselves in empty rows on the stainless steel ofthe lower counter. Art's a good bartender when he wants to be. I heldup my empty glass.

  "One more, Art. Got the radio section of the paper?"

  He handed it to me. "Might be something on the television."

  * * * * *

  We both laughed. We both feel the same way about television, but hehas to have a set in his business for week-end football or baseballgames. A big set he has, too, with an extra speaker for the far end ofthe bar for the short beer trade. I found the program I wanted andshowed Art the listing.

  He looked at it. "Strauss ... that's that waltz music," and I noddedand he went over to the radio and found the station. These smallstations can't sell every minute of their time for commercials,although they try, and every once in a while they run through a solidhour of Strauss or Bing Crosby or Benny Goodman. I like Strauss.

  And there I sat drinking beer and eating stale popcorn when I shouldhave been home with Helen, listening to quiet violins and mutedbrasses when I should have been doing something noisy and instructive.In my glass I could see whatever I wanted, wherever I would. I madecircular patterns on the bar and drew them into a grotesque mass withfingers wet with the silver condensation of bubbles drawn magicallythrough impervious crystal. Then Art turned off the radio.

  He was apologetic, but he still turned off the radio. In answer to myunspoken question he shrugged and indicated Freddie. Freddie likestelevision. He likes dog acts and circus bands and bouncing clowns. Hewatches the commercials with an innocent unjaundiced eye. Sometimes hesings along with the animated bakers and cooks and gas stations at thetop of his boyish beery baritone. He sings loud, and he likes histelevision the same way.

  Art flipped up the lid of the television and stood there long enoughto make sure the picture, whatever it was, would be in focus. Then hecame back to me and poured another. Hesitating, he added anothersmaller glass. I can't afford that stuff on what I make. Where I mademy mistake was taking it. We each had another. And another. Theheadache got worse.

  Ivan and Jack came in, and, when they heard the blast of sound, camedown to my end of the bar where, although the extra speaker isoverhead, you don't have to look at the source of the noise. Arthanded us a deck of cards and a piece of chalk to keep score and westarted to play euchre. You don't have to think to play euchre, whichis good. It's about the only game you can play with sign language, theonly game for a noisy bar. So we played euchre, and at ten-thirty Ivanand Jack left me alone to face the music. The little cords at the napeof my neck were tight as wires, the temple areas near my eyes weresoft and tender and sore to the touch, and my head was one big snaredrum.

  That was when Freddie half-shouted to Art to get the Roller Derby onChannel Seven and--so help me!--to turn it up a little louder. Thecards fell out of my hand and onto the table. I took out a cigaretteand my lighter slipped out of my tight fingers and fell on the floorand I bent over to pick it up. My head swelled to twice its size, myglasses slid down a little on my sweaty nose, and the tiny red veinsin my eyes grew from a thread to a rope to a flag to a tapestry ofcrimson rage and the noise abruptly stopped. And Art began to bellow.I stood up. The television set was smoking.

  * * * * *

  Well, it was fast while it lasted. Art didn't really need the firedepartment. There wasn't any flame to speak of. Someone pulled theplug from the wall and rolled the set out and used the handextinguisher on the burnt innards of the set and with the rear exhaustfan going the last of the bitter smoke was drifting out before thesirens pulled up in front. The firemen were relieved, not angry, asthey always are, and Art in his misery was thoughtful enough to slip asquare bottle in the pocket of the lieutenant in charge. It was coldoutside, at that. Freddie said so, when he left; there was no reasonto stay at Art's any more when most other bars would have the RollerDerby. I watched him go, and mentally cursed the bearings in his newcar. Well, fairly new. I went home. Helen was in bed when I got there,probably asleep. She was still probably asleep when I left for work inthe morning. She gets like that.

  The next day at Art's there was a big space lighter in color than thesurrounding wall where the television set had stood. I asked Artabout it.

  He didn't know. The serviceman had come out and
collected it, cluckingin dismay at the mess the extinguisher had left. No, no idea whatcaused it. Short circuit wouldn't make it that bad; fuses should haveblown first. They'd find it, though. Art hoped it wouldn't be thepicture tube; that wasn't covered in his service policy, and thosetubes in that size cost money. Anything else was covered. At that, hewas better off than Freddie.

  I looked up. "What's the matter with Freddie?"

  He told me. Freddie had ruined his motor on the way home last night.What hadn't blown out the exhaust pipe had gone out the hood, andright after his ninety-day guarantee had expired.

  I remembered what I had thought of last night. "How did he do that?"

  Art didn't know. He had been driving along and--that was it. The carwas in the garage with nothing left between the radiator and thefirewall and Freddie was trying to get something out of the insurancecompany. Fat chance, too, with that