Dark Benediction

Thornier smiled sourly toward the main aisle, his eyes traveling after the waddling figure of the theater manager. When D’Uccia disappeared beneath the rear balcony, he resumed his sweeping.

“I don’t see why you don’t get a sales job, Thorny,” Rick ventured, returning to his work. “A good salesman is just an actor, minus the temperament. There’s lots of demand for good actors, come to think of it. Politicians, top executives, even generals—some of them seem to make out on nothing but dramatic talent. History affirms it.”

“Bah! I’m no schauspieler.” He paused to watch Rick adjusting the Maestro, and slowly shook his head. “Ease your conscience, Richard,” he said finally.

Startled the technician dropped his screwdriver, looked up quizzically. “My conscience? What the devil is uneasy about my conscience?”

“Oh, don’t pretend. That’s why you’re always so concerned about me. I know you can’t help it that your… your trade has perverted a great art.”

Rick gaped at him in disbelief for a moment. “You think I—” He choked. He colored angrily. He stared at the old ham and began to curse softly under his breath.

Thornier suddenly lifted a. finger to his mouth and went shhhhh! His eyes roamed toward the back of the theater.

“That was only D’Uccia on the stairs,” Rick began. “What—?”

“Shhhh!”

They listened. The janitor wore a rancid smile. Seconds later it came-first a faint yelp, then Bbbrroommmpb!

It rattled the booth windows. Rick started up frowning.

“What the—?”

“Shhhh!”

The jolting jar was followed by a faint mutter of profanity.

“That’s D’Uccia. What happened?”

The faint mutter suddenly became a roaring stream of curses from somewhere behind the balconies.

“Hey!” said Rick. “He must have hurt himself.”

“Naah. He just found my resignation, that’s all. See? I told you I’d quit.”

The profane bellowing grew louder to the accompaniment of an elephantine thumping on carpeted stairs.

“He’s not that sorry to see you go,” Rick grunted, looking baffled.

D’Uccia burst into view at the head of the aisle. He stopped with his feet spread wide, clutching at the base of his spine with one hand and waving a golden lily aloft in the other.

“Lily gilder!” he screamed. “Pansy painter! You fancypantsy bona! Come out, you fonny fenny boy!”

Thornier thrust his head calmly through the control-booth window, stared at the furious manager with arched brows. “You calling me, Mr. D’Uccia?”

D’Uccia sucked in two or three gasping breaths before he found his bellow again.

“Thornya!”

“Yes, sir?”

“Itsa finish, you hear?”

“What’s finished, boss?”

“Itsa finish. I’ma go see the servo man. Pma go get me a swip-op machine. You gotta two wiks notice.”

“Tell him you don’t want any notice,” Rick grunted softly from nearby. “Walk out on him.”

“All right, Mr. D’Uccia,” Thornier called evenly. D’Uccia stood there sputtering, threatening to charge, waving the lily helplessly. Finally he threw it down in the aisle with a curse and whirled to limp painfully out. “Whew!” Rick breathed. “What did you do?” Thornier told him sourly. The technician shook his head.

“He won’t fire you. He’ll change his mind. It’s too hard to hire anybody to do dirty-work these days.”

“You heard him. He can buy an autojan installation. ‘Swip-op’ machine.”

“Baloney! Dooch is too stingy to put out that much dough. Besides, he can’t get the satisfaction of screaming at a machine.”

Thornier glanced up wryly. “Why can’t he?”

“Well—” Rick paused. “Ulp!… You’re right. He can. He came up here and bawled out the Maestro once. Kicked it, yelled at it, shook it—like a guy trying to get his quarter back out of a telephone. Went away looking pleased with himself, too.”

“Why not?” Thorny muttered gloomily. “People are machines to D’Uccia. And he’s fair about it. He’s willing to treat them all alike.”

“But you’re not going to stick around two weeks, are you?”

“Why not? It’ll give me time to put out some feelers for a job.”

Rick grunted doubtfully and turned his attention back to the machine. He removed the upper front panel and set it aside. He opened a metal canister on the floor and lifted out a foot-wide foot-thick roll of plastic tape. He mounted it on a spindle inside the Maestro, and began feeding the end of the tape through several sets of rollers and guides. The tape appeared wormeaten-covered with thousands of tiny punch-marks and wavy grooves. The janitor paused to watch the process with cold hostility.

“Is that the script-tape for the ‘Anarch?’” he asked stiffly.

The technician nodded. “Brand new tape, too. Got to be careful how I feed her in. It’s still got fuzz on it from the recording cuts.” He stopped the feed mechanism briefly, plucked at a punchmark with his awl, blew on it, then started the feed motor again.

“What happens if the tape gets nicked or scratched?” Thorny grunted curiously. “Actor collapse on stage?”