—And He Built a Crooked House

“All right. Now listen—a tesseract has eight cubical sides, all on the outside. Now watch me. I’m going to open up this tesseract like you can open up a cubical pasteboard box, until it’s flat. That way you’ll be able to see all eight of the cubes.” Working very rapidly he constructed four cubes, piling one on top of the other in an unsteady tower. He then built out four more cubes from the four exposed faces of the second cube in the pile. The structure swayed a little under the loose coupling of the clay pellets, but it stood, eight cubes in an inverted cross, a double cross, as the four additional cubes stuck out in four directions. “Do you see it now? It rests on the ground floor room, the next six cubes are the living rooms, and there is your study, up at the top.”

Bailey regarded it with more approval than he had the other figures. “At least I can understand it. You say that is a tesseract, too?”

“That is a tesseract unfolded in three dimensions. To put it back together you tuck the top cube onto the bottom cube, fold those side cubes in till they meet the top cube and there you are. You do all this folding through a fourth dimension of course; you don’t distort any of the cubes, or fold them into each other.”

Bailey studied the wobbly framework further. “Look here,” he said at last, “why don’t you forget about folding this thing up through a fourth dimension—you can’t anyway—and build a house like this?”

“What do you mean, I can’t? It’s a simple mathematical problem—”

“Take is easy, son. It may be simple in mathematics, but you could never get your plans approved for construction. There isn’t any fourth dimension; forget it. But this kind of a house—it might have some advantages.”

Checked, Teal studied the model. “Hm-m-m—Maybe you got something. We could have the same number of rooms, and we’d save the same amount of ground space. Yes, and we would set that middle cross-shaped floor northeast, southwest, and so forth, so that every room would get sunlight all day long. That central axis lends itself nicely to central heating. We’ll put the dining room on the northeast and the kitchen on the southeast, with big view windows in every room. Okay, Homer, I’ll do it! Where do you want it built?”

“Wait a minute! Wait a minute! I didn’t say you were going to build it for me—”

“Of course I am. Who else? Your wife wants a new house; this it it.”

“But Mrs. Bailey wants a Georgian house—”

“Just an idea she has. Women don’t know what they want—”

“Mrs. Bailey does.”

“Just some idea an out-of-date architect has put in her head. She drives a new car, doesn’t she? She wears the very latest styles—why should she live in an eighteenth century house? This house will be even later than this year’s model; it’s years in the future. She’ll be the talk of the town.”

“Well—I’ll have to talk to her.”

“Nothing of the sort. We’ll surprise her with it. Have another drink.”

“Anyhow, we can’t do anything about it now. Mrs. Bailey and I are driving up to Bakersfield tomorrow. The company’s bringing in a couple of wells tomorrow.”

“Nonsense. That’s just the opportunity we want. It will be a surprise for her when you get back. You can just write me a check right now, and your worries are over.”

“I oughtn’t to do anything like this without consulting her. She won’t like it.”

“Say, who wears the pants in your family anyhow?”

The check was signed about halfway down the second bottle.

Things are done fast in southern California. Ordinary houses there are usually built in a month’s time. Under Teal’s impassioned heckling the tesseract house climbed dizzily skyward in days rather than weeks, and its cross-shaped second story came jutting out at the four corners of the world. He had some trouble at first with the inspectors over these four projecting rooms but by using strong girders and folding money he had been able to convince them of the soundness of this engineering.

By arrangement, Teal drove up in front of the Bailey residence the morning after their return to town. He improvised on his two-tone horn. Bailey stuck his head out the front door. “Why don’t you use the bell?”

“Too slow,” answered Teal cheerfully. “I’m a man of action. Is Mrs. Bailey ready? Ah, there you are, Mrs. Bailey! Welcome home, welcome home. Jump in, we’ve got a surprise for you!”

“You know Teal, my dear,” Bailey put in uncomfortably.

Mrs. Bailey sniffed. “I know him. We’ll go in our own car, Homer.”

“Certainly, my dear.”

“Good idea,” Teal agreed; “ ’sgot more power than mine; we’ll get there faster. I’ll drive, I know the way.” He took the keys from Bailey, slid into the driver’s seat, and had the engine started before Mrs. Bailey could rally her forces.

“Never have to worry about my driving,” he assured Mrs. Bailey, turning his head as he did so, while he shot the powerful car down the avenue and swung onto Sunset Boulevard, “it’s a matter of power and control, a dynamic process, just my meat—I’ve never had a serious accident.”