Subversive, Mack Reynolds [mobile ebook reader .TXT] 📗

"Now, see here, Frank—" The bureau head looked at him anxiously.

Tracy said, impatience there, "Chief, you're going to have to let your field men use their discretion. I tell you, this thing is a potential snowball. I'll play it cool. Arrange things so that there'll be no scandal for the telly-reporters. But we've got to chill this one quickly, or it'll be on a coast to coast basis before the year is out. They're even talking about going into automobiles."

The Chief winced, then said unhappily, "All right, Tracy. However, mind what I said. Curb those roughnecks of yours."

It proved considerably easier than Frank Tracy had hoped for. Adam Moncure's national headquarters turned out to be in a sparsely settled area not far from Woodstock, Illinois. The house, in the passé ranch style, must have once been a millionaire's baby, what with an artificial fishing lake in the back, a kidney shaped swimming pool, extensive gardens and an imposing approach up a corridor of trees.

"Right up to the front door," Tracy growled to the operative driving the first hover-car of their two-vehicle expedition. "The quicker we move, the better." He turned his head to the men in the rear seat. "We five will go in together. I don't expect trouble, they'll have had no advance warning. I made sure of that. Jerry has equipment in his car to blanket any radio sending. We'll take care of phones in the house. No rough stuff, we want to talk to these people."

One of the men growled, "Suppose they start shooting?"

Tracy snorted. "Then shoot back, of course. But just don't you start it. I shouldn't have to tell you these things."

"Got it," one of the others said. He shifted his shoulders to loosen the .38 Recoilless in its holster.

At the ornate doorway, the cars, which had been moving fast, a foot or so off the ground, came to a quick halt, settled, and the men disgorged, guns in hand.

Tracy called to the occupants of the other vehicle, "On the double. Surround the house. Don't let anybody leave. Come on, boys."

They scurried down the flagstone walk, banged on the door. It was opened by a houseman who stared at them uncomprehendingly.

"The occupants of this establishment are under arrest," Tracy snapped. He flashed a gold badge. "Take me to Adam Moncure." He turned to his men and gestured with his head. "Take over, boys. Jerry, you come with me."

The houseman was terrified, but not to the point of being unable to lead them to a gigantic former living room, now converted to offices.

There was an older man, and four assistants. All in shirt sleeves in concession to the mid-western summer, none armed from all Tracy could see. They looked up in surprise, rather than dismay. The older man snapped, "What is the meaning of this intrusion?"

Jerry chuckled sourly.

Frank Tracy said, "You're all under arrest. Jerry, herd these clerks, or whatever they are, into some other room. Get any other occupants of the house together, too. And watch them carefully, confound it. Don't underestimate these people. And make a search for secret rooms, cellars, that sort of thing."

"Right," Jerry growled.

The older of the five Freer Enterprises men was on his feet now. He was a thin, angry faced type, gray of hair and somewhere in his sixties. "I want to know the meaning of this!" he roared.

"Adam Moncure?" Tracy said crisply.

"That is correct. And to what do I owe this cavalier intrusion into my home and place of business?"

Jerry, at pistol point, was herding the four assistants from the room, taking the houseman along with them.

Tracy looked at Moncure, speculatively, then dipped into his pockets for pipe and tobacco. He gestured to a chair with his head. "Sit down, Mr. Moncure. The jig is up."

"The jig?" the other blurted in a fine rage. "I insist—"

"O.K., O.K., you'll get your explanation." Tracy sat down on a couch himself and sized up the older man, even as he lit his pipe.

Moncure, still breathing heavily in his indignation, took control of himself well enough to be seated. "Well, sir?" he bit out.

Tracy said curtly, "Frank Tracy, Bureau of Economic Subversion."

"Bureau of Economic Subversion!" Moncure said indignantly. "What in the name of all that's holy is the Bureau of Economic Subversion?"

Tracy pointed at him with the pipe stem. "I'll ask a few questions first, please. How many branches of your nefarious outfit are presently under operation?"

The other glared at him, but Tracy merely returned the pipe to his mouth and glowered back.

Finally Moncure snapped, "There is no purpose in hiding any of our affairs. We have opened preliminary offices only in Chicago and New York. Freer Enterprises is but in its infancy."

"Praise Allah for that," Tracy muttered sarcastically.

"And thus far we have dealt only in soap. However, as our organization gets under way we plan to branch out into a score, and ultimately hundreds of products."

Tracy said, "You can forget about that, Moncure. Freer Enterprises comes to a halt as of today. Do you realize that your business tactics would lead to a complete collapse of gainful employment and eventually to a depression such as this nation has never seen before?"

"Exactly!" Moncure snapped in return.

It was Tracy's turn to react. His eyes widened, then narrowed. "Do you mean that you are deliberately attempting to undermine the economy of the United States of the Americas? Remember, Mr. Moncure, you are under arrest and anything you say may be held against you."

"Undermine it!" Moncure said heatedly. "Bring it crashing to the ground is the better term. There has never been such an abortion developed in the history of political economy."

He came to his feet again and began storming up and down the room. "A full three quarters of our employed working at nothing jobs, gobbledygook jobs, non-producing jobs, make-work jobs, red-tape bureaucracy jobs. At a time when the nation is supposedly in a breakneck economic competition with the Soviet Complex, we put our best brains into advertising, entertainment and sales, while they put theirs into science and industry."

He stopped long enough to shake an indignant finger at the surprised Tracy. "But that isn't the worst of it. Have you ever heard of planned obsolescence?"

Tracy acted as though on the defensive. "Well ... sure ..."

"In the Soviet Complex, and, for that matter, in Common Europe and other economic competitors of ours, they simply don't believe in planned obsolescence and all its related nonsense. Razor blades, everywhere except in this country, don't go dull after two or three shaves. Cars don't fall apart after two or three years, or even become so out of style that the owner feels that he's losing status by being seen in it, the owners expect to keep them half a lifetime. Automobile batteries don't go to pieces after eighteen months, they last for a decade. And on and on!"

The old boy was really unwinding now. "Nor is even that the nadir of this socio-economic hodge-podge we've allowed to develop, this economy of production for sale, rather than production for use." He stabbed with his finger. "I think one of the best examples of what was to come was to be witnessed way back at the end of the Second War. The idea of the ball-bearing pen was in the air. The first one to hurry into production gave his pen a tremendous build-up. It had ink enough to last three years, it would make many carbon copies, you could use it under water. And so on and so forth. It cost fifteen dollars, and there was only one difficulty with it. It wouldn't write. Not that that made any difference because it sold like hotcakes what with all the promotion. He wasn't interested in whether or not it would write, but only in whether or not it would sell." Moncure threw up his hands dramatically. "I ask you, can such an economic system be taken seriously?"

"What's your point?" Tracy growled dangerously. He'd never met one this far out, before.

"Isn't it obvious? Continue this ridiculous economy and we'll lose the battle for men's minds. You can't have an economic system that allows such nonsense as large scale unemployment of trained employees, planned obsolescence, union featherbedding, and an overwhelming majority of those who are employed wasting their labor on unproductive employment."

Tracy said, "Then if I understand you correctly, Freer Enterprises was deliberately organized for the purpose of undermining the economy so that it will collapse and have to be reorganized on a different basis."

"That is exactly correct," Moncure said defiantly. "I am devoting my whole fortune to this cause. And there is nothing in American law that prevents me from following through with my plans."

"You're right there," Tracy said wryly. "There's nothing in American law that prevents you. However, you see, I have no connection whatsoever with the American government." He slipped the gun from its holster.

Frank Tracy made his way wearily into LaVerne's domain. She looked up from the desk. "Everything go all right, Mr. Tracy?"

"I suppose so. Tell Comrade Zotov that I'm back from Chicago, please."

She clicked switches, said something into an inner-office communicator, then looked up again. "He'll see you immediately, Mr. Tracy."

Pavel Zotov looked up from his endless paperwork and wheezed the sigh of a fat man. He correctly interpreted the expression of his field operative. "Pour us a couple of drinks, Frank, or would you rather have it Frol, today?"

His best field man grunted as he walked over to the bar. "Vodka, eh? Chort vesmiot how tired one can become of this everlasting bourbon." He reached into the refrigerator compartment and brought forth a bottle of iced Stolichnaya. He poured two three-ounce charges and brought them back to his bureau chief's desk.

They toasted silently, knocked back the colorless spirit. Pavel Zotov said, "Well, Frol?"

The man usually called Frank Tracy said, "The worst case yet. This one had quite a clear picture of the true situation. He saw the necessity—given their viewpoint, of course—of getting out of the fantastic rut their economy has fallen into." He ran his hand over his mouth in a gesture of weariness. "Chief, do you have any idea of how long it would take us to catch up to them, if we ever did, if they really turned this economy on full blast, as an alternative to their present foul-up?"

"That's why we're here," the Chief said heavily. "What did you do?"

The man sometimes called Tracy told him.

Zotov winced. "I thought I ordered you—"

"You did," the man called Tracy told him curtly, "but what alternative was there? The fire will completely destroy the records. I have the names and addresses of all the others connected with Freer Enterprises. We'll have to arrange car accidents, that sort of thing."

The fat man's lips worked. "We can't get by with this indefinitely, Frol. With such blatant tactics, sooner or later their C.I.A. or F.B.I. is going to get wind of us."

Tracy came to his feet angrily. "What alternative have we? We've been sent over here to do a job. We're doing it. If we're caught, who knows better than we that we're expendable? If you don't mind, I'm going on home."

As he left the office, through the secret door that led through the innocuous looking garage, the man they called Frank Tracy was inwardly thinking, "Zotov might be my superior, and a top man in the party, but he's too soft for this job. Perhaps I'd better send a report back to Moscow on him."