The Richest Man in Levittown

MARGERY tried putting the phone back on the hook, but it immediately rang again. She kicked the stand, picked up the phone and said: “Hang up, will you? We don’t want any!” She slammed the phone down to break the connection and took it off the hook again.

The doorbell rang.

“My turn,” I said, and put down the paper-it looked as though I never would find out what the National League standings were. It was Patrolman Gamelsfelder.

“Man to see you, Mr. Binns. Says it’s important.” He was sweating-you could see the black patches on his blue shirt. I knew what he was thinking . We had air conditioning and money, and he was risking his life day after day for a lousy policeman’s pay, and what kind of a country was this anyhow? He’d said as much that afternoon.

“It might be important to him, but I don’t want to see anybody. Sorry, officer.” I closed the door.

Margery said: “Are you or are you not going to help me change the baby?”

I said cheerfully: “I’ll be glad to, dear.” And it was true-besides being good policy to say that, since she was pretty close to exploding. It was true because I wanted something to do myself. I wanted some nice, simple, demanding task like holding a one-year-old down with my knee in the middle of his chest, while one hand held his feet and the other one pinned the diaper. I mean, it was nice of Uncle Otto to leave me the money, but did they have to put it in the paper?

The doorbell rang again as I was finishing. Margery was upstairs with Gwennie, who took a lot of calming down because she’d had an exciting day, and because she always did, so I stood the baby on his fat little feet and answered the door myself. It was the policeman again. “Some telegrams for you, Mr. Binns. I wouldn’t let the boy deliver them.”

“Thanks.” I tossed them in the drawer of the telephone stand. What was the use of opening them? They were from people who had heard about Uncle Otto and the money, and who wanted to sell me something.

“That fellow’s still here,” Patrolman Gamelsfelder said sourly. “I think he’s sick.”

“Too bad.” I tried to close the door.

“Anyway, he says to tell Cuddles that Tinker is here.”

I grabbed the door. “Tell Cud…”

“That’s what he said.” Gamelsfelder saw that that hit me, and it pleased him. For the first time he smiled.

“What-what’s his name?”

“Winston McNeely McGhee,” said Officer Gamelsfelder happily, “or anyway that’s what he told me, Mr. Binns.”

I said, “Send the son of a-Send the fellow in,” I said, and jumped to get the baby away from the ashtray where Margery had left a cigarette burning. Winnie McGhee-it was all I needed to finish off my day.

He came in holding his head as though it weighed a thousand pounds. He was never what you’d call healthy-looking, even when Margery stood me up at the altar in order to elope with him. It was his frail, poetic charm, and maybe he still had that, and maybe he didn’t, but the way he looked to me, he was sick, all right. He looked like he weighed a fast hundred pounds not counting the head; the head looked like a balloon. He moaned, “Hello, Harlan, age thirty-one, five-eleven, one seventy-three. You got an acetylsalicylic acid tablet?”

I said, “What?” But he didn’t get a chance to answer right away because there was a flutter and a scurry from the expansion attic and Margery appeared at the head of the stairs. “I thought-” she began wildly, and then she saw that her wildest thought was true. “You!” She betrayed pure panic-fussing with her hair with one hand and smoothing her Bermuda shorts with the other, simultaneously trying to wiggle, no-hands, out of the sloppy old kitchen apron that had been good enough for me.

McGhee said pallidly, “Hello. Please, don’t you have an acetylsalicylic acid tablet?”

“I don’t know what it is,” I said simply.

Margery chuckled ruefully. “Ah, Harlan, Harlan,” she said with fond tolerance, beaming lovingly at me as she came down the stairs. It was enough to turn the stomach of a cat.

“You forget, Winnie. Harlan doesn’t know much chemistry. Won’t you find him an aspirin, Harlan? That’s all he wants.”

“Thanks,” said Winnie with a grateful sigh, massaging his temples.

I went and got him an aspirin. I thought of adding a little mixer to the glass of water that went with it, but there wasn’t anything in the medicine chest that looked right, and besides it’s against the law. I don’t mind admitting it, I never liked Winnie McGhee, and it isn’t just because he swiped my bride from me. Well, she smartened up after six months, and then, when she turned up with an annulment and sincere repentance-well, I’ve never regretted marrying her. Or anyway, not much. But you can’t expect me to like McGhee. My heavens, if I’d never seen the man before I’d hate his little purple guts on first contact, because he looks like a poet and talks like a scientist and acts like a jerk.

I started back to the living room and yelled: “The baby!”

Margery turned away from simpering at her former husband and sprang for the puppy’s dish. She got it away from the baby, but not quite full. There was a good baby-sized mouthful of mixed milk and dog-biscuit that she had to excavate for, and naturally the baby had his way of counter-attacking for that.

“No bite!” she yelled, pulling her finger out of his mouth and putting it in hers. Then she smiled sweetly. “Isn’t he a darling, Winnie? He’s got his daddy’s nose, of course. But don’t you think he has my eyes?”

“He’ll have your fingers too, if you don’t keep them out of his mouth,” I told her.

Winnie said: “That’s normal. After all, with twenty-four paired chromosomes forming the gamete, it is perfectly obvious that the probability of inheriting none of his traits from one parent-that is, being exactly like the other-is one chance in 8,388,608. Ooh, my head.”

Margery gave him a small frown. “What?”

He was like a wound-up phonograph. “That’s without allowance for spontaneous mutation,” he added. “Or induced. And considering the environmental factors in utero-that is, broad-spectrum antibiotics, tripling of the background radiation count due to nuclear weapons, dietary influences, et cetera-yes, I should put the probability of induced mutation rather high. Yes. Perhaps of the order of-“

I interrupted. “Here’s your aspirin. Now, what do you want?”

“Harlan!” Margery said warningly.

“I mean-well, what do you want?”

He leaned his head on his hands. “I want you to help me conquer the world,” he said.

Crash-splash. “Go get a mop!” Margery ordered; the baby had just spilled the puppy’s water. She glared at me and smiled at Winnie. “Go ahead,” she coaxed. “Take your nice aspirin, and we’ll talk about your trip around the world later.”

But that hadn’t been what he had said.

Conquer the world. I heard it plain as day. I went to fetch the mop, because that was as good a way as any to think over what to do about Winston McNeely McGhee. I mean, what did I want with the world? Uncle Otto had already bequeathed me the world, or anyway as much of it as I ever hoped to own.

When I came back Winnie was tottering around the room, followed at a respectful distance by my wife holding the baby. She was saying to the prospective conqueror of all the world:

“How did you hear about Harlan’s good lu-About the tragic loss of his dear uncle, I mean?”

He groaned, “I read it in the paper.” He fiddled aimlessly with the phone.

“It’s all for the best, I say,” said Margery in a philosophic tone, carving damp graham-cracker crumbs out of the baby’s ear. “Dear Otto lived a rich and full life. Think of all those years in Yemen! And the enormous satisfaction it must have given him to be personally responsible for the installation of the largest petroleum-cracking still west of the Suez!”

“East, my dear. East. The Mutawakelite Kingdom lies just south of Saudi Arabia.”

She looked at him thoughtfully, but all she said was, “Winnie, you’ve changed.”

And so he had; but for that matter so had she. It was not like Margery to be a hypocrite. Simpering over her ex-husband I could understand-it wasn’t so bad; she was merely showing the poor guy how very much better off she was than she ever would have been with him. But the tragic loss of my dear uncle had never occasioned a moment’s regret in her-or in me; the plain fact of the matter is that until the man from the Associated Press called up she didn’t even know I had an Uncle Otto. And I had pretty nearly forgotten it myself. Otto was the brother that my mother’s family didn’t talk about. How were they to know that he was laying up treasures of oil and gold on the Arabian Peninsula?

The phone rang; Winnie had thoughtlessly put it back on the hook. “No!” Margery cried into it, hardly listening, “We don’t want any uranium stock! We’ve got closets full!”

I said, taking advantage of the fact that her attention was diverted: “Winnie. I’m a busy man. How about you telling me what you want?” He sat down with his head on his hands and made a great effort.

“It’s-difficult,” he said, speaking very slowly. Each word came out by itself, as though he had to choose and sort painfully among all the words that were rushing to his mouth. “I-invented something. You understand? And when I heard about you inheriting money-“

“You thought you could get some of it away from me,” I sneered.

“No!” He sat up sharply-and winced and clutched his head. “I want to make money for you.”

“We’ve got closets full,” I said gently.

He said in a desperate tone, “But I can give you the world, Harlan. Trust me!”

“I never have-“

“Trust me now! You don’t understand, Harlan. We can own the world, the two of us, if you’ll just give me a little financial help. I’ve invented a drug that gives me total recall.”

“How nice for you,” I said, reaching for the knob of the door.

But then I began to think.

“Total recall?” I asked.

He said, sputtering with eagerness, “The upwelling of the unconscious! The ability to remember everything-the eidetic memory of an idiot savant and the indexing system of a quiz winner. You want to know the first six kings of England? Egbert, Etheiwulf, Ethelbald, Ethelbert, Ethelred and Alfred. You want to know the mating call of a ruff-necked grouse?” He demonstrated the call of the ruff-necked grouse.

“Oh,” said Margery, coming back into the room with the freshly diapered baby. “Bird imitations.”

“And more!” cried Winnie. “Do you know about the time the United States had two presidents?”

“No, but-“

“March the third,” he said. “Eighteen seventy-seven. Rutherford B. Hayes-I’d better say Rutherford Birchard Hayes-was about to succeed Grant, and he was sworn in a day early. I ought to explain that-“

“No,” I said. “Don’t explain.”

“Well, how about this? Want me to name the A.B.C. bowling champions from 1931 to date? Clack, Nitschke, Hewitt, Vidro, Brokaw, Gagliardi, Anderson-oh, wait a minute. I forgot 1936. That’s Warren. Then Gagliardi, Anderson, Danek-“

“Winnie,” I said, “cut it out, will you? This has been a tough day.”

“But this is the key to conquering the world!”

“Hah,” I said. “You’re going to bore everybody to death by naming bowling champions?”

“Knowledge is power, Harlan.” He rested his head on his palms briefly. “But it does make my head ache.”

I took my hand off the knob of the door.

I said grudgingly, “Sit down, Winnie. I admit you’ve got me interested. I can’t wait to hear what the swindle is.”

“Harlan!” warned Margery.

Winnie said: “There’s no swindle, I promise you. But think what it can mean! Knowledge is power, Harlan, as I say. Why, with my super-brain we can outwit the rulers of any country anywhere. We can own the world! And-money, you say? Knowledge is money too. For instance-” he winked-“worried about taxes? I can tell you the minority opinion in U. S. Govt. v. Oosterhagen, 486 Alabama 3309. There’s a loophole there you could drive an armored truck through!”

Margery sat down with a cigarette in the long, long holder I’d bought her to square a beef the year after we were married. She looked at me and then at the cigarette; and it penetrated, and I raced over with a match.

“Thank you, darling,” she said throatily.

She had changed herself as well as the baby. She now wore something more suitable for a co-heiress of a big fat hunk of money entertaining an ex-husband. It was a gold lamé housecoat, and she had bought it, within an hour of the time the Associated Press man had called, on a charge account we’d never owned until the early editions of the papers hit the stores around Levittown.

And that reminded me. Money. Who needed money? What was the use of inheriting all that loot from Uncle Otto if I couldn’t throw Winnie out on his ear?

Politeness made me temporize: “All this is very interesting, Winnie, but-“

“Harlan, the baby!” Margery yelled. “Get him out of the pretzels!”

I did, while Winnie said faintly behind me: “The shape of a pretzel represents children’s arms folded in prayer-or so it was thought in the seventh century. A good pretzel bender can bend more than thirty-five a minute. Of course, machines are faster.”

I said, “Winnie-“

“Like to know the etymology of the word ‘navy’? Most people think it has something to do with sailors.”

“Winnie, listen to me-“

“It doesn’t, though. It comes from the laborers on the Inland Navigation Canals-eighteenth-century England, you know. Well, the laborers-“

I said firmly, “Winnie, go away.”

“Harlan!”

“You stay out of this, Margery,” I told her. “Winnie’s after my dough, that’s all. Well, I haven’t had it long enough to want to throw it away. Besides, who wants to rule the world?”

“Well…” Margery said thoughtfully.

“With all our money?” I cried. “Who needs it?”

Winnie clutched his head. “Oh,” he moaned. “Wait, Harlan. All I need is a stake. I’ve got the long-term cycles of every stock on the Exchange down in my head-splits and dividends and earnings records since nineteen ought four! I know the private brokers’ hand signals on the Curb-wave up for buy, wave down for sell; look, see how my fingers are bent? That means the spread between bid and asked is three-eighths of a point. Give me a million dollars, Harlan!”

“No.”

“Just a million, that’s all. You can spare it! And I’ll double it in a week, quadruple it in a month-in a year we’ll have a billion. A billion dollars!”

I shook my head. “The taxes-“

“Remember U. S. Govt. v. Oosterhagen!” he cried. “And that’s a bare beginning. Ever think what a billion dollars could do in the hands of a super-genius?” He was talking faster and faster, a perfect diarrhea of words, as though he couldn’t control the spouting. “Here!” he yelled, clutching at his temple with one hand, pulling something out of his pocket with the other. “Look at this, Harlan! It’s yours for a million dollars-no, for a hundred thousand. Yes, a hundred thousand dollars and you can have it! I’ll sell it for that, and then I won’t split with you-we’ll both be super-geniuses. Eh? Fair enough?”

I was trapped by my own curiosity. “What is it?” I asked. He waved it at me-a squat little bottle, half-filled with pale capsules.

“Mine,” he said proudly. “My hormone. It’s a synapse-relaxer. One of these and the blocks between adjoining cells in your brain are weakened for an hour. Three of them, for every twenty pounds of body weight, and you’re a super-genius for life. You’ll never forget! You’ll remember things you think have passed out of your recollection years ago! You’ll recall the post-partum slap that started you breathing, you’ll remember the name of the nurse who carried you to the door of your father’s Maxwell. Oh, Harlan, there is simply no limit to-“

“Go away,” I said, and pushed him.

Patrolman Gamelsfelder appeared like a genie from a lamp.

“Thought so,” he said somberly, advancing on Winnie McGhee. “Extortion’s your game, is it? Can’t say I blame you, brother, but it’s a trip to the station house and a talk with the sergeant for you.”

“Just get rid of him,” I said, and closed the door as Winnie was challenging the cop to name an opera by Krenek, other than Johnny Spielt Auf.

Margery put the baby down, breathing hard.

She said: “Scuffling and pushing people around and bad manners. You weren’t like this when we were married, Harlan. There’s something come over you since you inherited that money!”

I said, “Help me pick these things up, will you?” I hadn’t pushed him hard, but all the same those pills had gone flying.

Margery stamped her foot and burst into tears. “I know how you feel about poor Winnie,” she sobbed, “but it’s just that I’m sorry for him. “Couldn’t you at least be polite? Couldn’t you at least have given him a couple of lousy hundred thousand dollars?”

“Watch the baby,” I warned her. At the head of the stairs Gwennie appeared, attracted by the noise, rubbing her eyes with her fists and beginning to cry.

Margery glared at me, started to speak, was speechless, turned her back and hurried up to comfort Gwennie.

I began to feel the least little bit ashamed of myself.

I stood up, patting the baby absent-mindedly on the head, looking up the stairs at the female half of our household. I had been, when you stopped to think of it, something of a clunk.

Item: I had been rough on poor old Winnie. Suppose it had been I who discovered the hormone, and needed a few lousy hundred thousand, as Margery put it so well, as a stake in order to grasp undreamed-of wealth and power? Well, why not? Why shouldn’t I have given it to him? The poor fellow was evidently suffering the effects of the hormone wearing off as much as from any hangover. I could have been more kind, yes.

And, item: Margery did have a tough time with the kids and all, and on this day of all days she was likely to be excited.

And, item: I had just inherited a bloody mint!

Why wasn’t I-the thought came to me with sudden appalling clarity-using some of Uncle Otto’s money to make life easier for all of us?

I galloped up the steps two at a time. “Margery,” I cried. “Margery, I’m sorry!”

“I think you should-” she began and then looked up from Gwennie and saw my face.

I said: “Look, honey. Let’s start over. I’m sorry about poor Winnie, but forget him, huh? We’re rich. Let’s start living as though we were rich! Let’s go out, just the two of us-it’s early yet! We’ll grab a cab and go into New York-all the way by cab, why not? We’ll eat at the Colony, and see My Fair Lady from the fifth row on the aisle-you can get quite good seats, they tell me, for a hundred bucks or so. Why not?”

Margery looked up at me, and suddenly smiled. “But-” she patted Gwennie’s head. “The kids. What about them?”

“Get a baby-sitter,” I cried. “Mrs. Schroop’ll be glad of the work.”

“But it’s such short notice-“

“Margery,” I said, “we don’t inherit a fortune every night. Call her up.”

Margery stood up, holding Gwennie, beginning to smile. “Why,” she said, “that sounds like fun, Harlan! Why not, as you say? Only-do you remember Mrs. Schroop’s number?”

“It’s written down,” I told her.

“No, that was on the old directory.” She frowned. “You’ve told it to me a thousand times. It isn’t listed in her own name-it’s her son-in-law. Oh, what is that number…”

A thin voice from down the stairs said: “Ovington Eight Zero Zero Fourteen. It’s listed under Sturgis, Arthur R., number Forty-one Universe Avenue.”

Margery looked at me, and I looked at Margery.

I said sharply: “Who the devil said that?”

“I did, Daddy,” said the owner of the voice, all of twenty-eight inches tall, appearing at the foot of the steps. He had to use one hand to steady himself, because he didn’t walk so very well; in the other hand he held the squat glass bottle that Winnie McGhee had dropped.

The bottle was empty.

Well, we don’t live in Levittown any more-of course.

Margery and Gwennie and I have tried everything-changing our name, dyeing our hair, even plastic surgery once. It didn’t work, so we had the same surgeon change us back.

People keep recognizing us.

What we mostly do now is cruise up and down the coast of the U.S.J.I. in our yacht, inside the twelve-mile limit. When we need supplies we send some of the crew in with the motor launch. That’s risky, yes. But it isn’t as risky as landing in any other country would be; and we just don’t want to go back to J.I.-as they’ve taken to calling it these days. You can’t blame us. How would you like it?

I wish he’d leave us alone.

The way it goes, we just cruise up and down, and every once in a while he remembers us and calls up on the ship-to-shore. He called yesterday, matter of fact. He said: “You can’t stay out there forever, Daddy. Your main engines are due for a refit after eleven months, seven days of running and you’ve been gone ten months, six. What are you using for dairy products? The load you shipped in Jacksonville must have run out last Thursday week. There isn’t any point in your starving yourself. Besides, it’s not fair to Gwennie and Mom. Come home. We’ll make a place for you in the government.”

“Thanks,” I said. “But no thanks.”

“You’ll be sorry,” he warned, pleasantly enough. And he hung up.

Well, we should have kept him out of those pills.

I guess it was my fault. I should have listened when old Winnie-heaven rest his soul, wherever he is-said that the lifetime dose was three tablets for every twenty pounds of body weight. The baby only weighed twenty-four pounds then-last time we’d taken him to the pediatrician; naturally, we couldn’t take him again after he swallowed the pills. And he must’ve swallowed at least a dozen.

But I guess Winnie was right.

At the very least, the world is well on its way to being conquered now. The United States fell to Juvens Imperator, as he calls himself (and I blame Margery for that-I never used Latin in front of the kid) in eighteen months, after his sensational coup on the $256,000 Question, and his later success in cornering soybean futures and the common stock of United States Steel. The rest of the world is just a matter of time. And not very much time, at that. And don’t they just know it, though; that’s why we daren’t land abroad.

But who would have thought it?

I mean, I watched his inauguration last October, on the television. The country has had some pretty peculiar people running it, no doubt. But did you ever think you’d live to see the oath of office administered to my little boy, with one hand upraised and the thumb of the other in his mouth?

Table of Contents

Start