The Man Who Fell to Earth

“My God.” he said, “this film is more than unusual. You can see that. You’re a chemist — a better chemist than I am. Can’t you see the techniques this thing implies? My Lord, barium salts and a gaseous developer!” He suddenly remembered the roll of film still in his hand, and held it out as if it were a snake, or a holy relic. “It’s as if we were… as if we were cave men, scratching fleas out of our armpits, and one of us found a… a roll of toy caps…” And then, in an instant, it struck him like a physical blow in the chest and, pausing in his speech a second he thought, Good holy God — that roll of caps! “…and threw them in the fire. Think of the tradition, the technical tradition, that went into making a strip of paper with little gunpowder pods in a neat row, so that we could hear the little pop, pop, pop! Or if you gave an ancient Roman a wrist-watch, and he knew what a sundial was…” He didn’t finish the comparison, thinking now of that roll of caps, how they had gone off so loudly, had not smelt of gunpowder at all.

Canutti smiled coldly. “Well, Nate, you’re very eloquent. But I wouldn’t get so worked up over a thing that some hot research team thought up.” He tried to sound humorous, to joke away the disagreement. “I doubt we’ve been visited by men of the future. Not, at least, to sell us camera film.”

Bryce stood up, clenching the film box in his hand. He spoke softly. “Hot research team, the devil! And for all I know — the way this film doesn’t use a single chemical technique from over a hundred years of development in photography — this process might be extraterrestrial. Or there’s a genius hiding somewhere in Kentucky who’s going to be selling us perpetual motion machines next week.” Abruptly, he turned, sick of the interview, and began walking toward the door.

Like a mother calling after a child who leaves in a tantrum, Canutti said. “I wouldn’t talk about extraterrestrial too much, Nate. Of course, I understand what you mean….”

“Of course you do,” Bryce said, leaving.

He went directly home on the afternoon monorail, and began looking — or, rather, listening — for small boys with cap guns.

6

Five minutes after he left the airport he realized that he had made a serious mistake. He should not have attempted to come this far south in the summer time, no matter how necessary it was. He could have sent Farnsworth, sent someone, to buy property, to make arrangements. The temperature was over ninety and, being physically unable to perspire, his body having been designed for temperatures in the forties, he was sick almost to unconsciousness in the back seat of the airport limousine that drove him, grinding his still gravity-sensitive body against its hard cushions, into downtown Louisville.

But, in more than two years on earth and with the ten years of physical conditioning he had undergone before leaving Anthea, he was able to endure the pain and keep himself, by force of will, grimly, although confusedly, conscious. He was able to get from the limousine into the hotel lobby, and from the lobby up the elevator — relieved that it was a smooth-running, slow elevator — and into his third-floor room, where he fell on the bed the moment the bellboy had left him to himself. After a moment he managed to get to the air-conditioner and set it for very cold. Then he fell back on the bed. It was a good air-conditioner; it was based on a group of patents he had leased to the company that made it. In a short while the room became sufficiently comfortable for him, but he left the machine on, thankful that his contribution to the science of refrigeration had managed to make the ugly little boxes, so necessary to him, noiseless.

It was noon, and after a while he called room service and had a bottle of Chablis and some cheese sent up to him. He had only recently begun drinking wine, pleased to find that it had, apparently, the same effect on him as it did on men of Earth. The wine was good, although the cheese was a little rubbery. He turned on the television set, which also operated on W. E. Corp, patents, and settled back in an armchair, determined, if he could do nothing else this hot afternoon, to enjoy himself.