Subversive

"Subversive" is, in essence, a negative term—it

means simply "against the existent system."

It doesn't mean subversives all agree ...

by Mack Reynolds

Illustrated by Schoenherr

The young man with the brown
paper bag said, "Is Mrs. Coty in?"

"I'm afraid she isn't. Is there
anything I can do?"

"You're Mr. Coty? I came about
the soap." He held up the paper bag.

"Soap?" Mr. Coty said blankly.
He was the epitome of mid-aged
husband complete to pipe, carpet
slippers and office-slump posture.

"That's right. I'm sure she told
you about it. My name's Dickens.
Warren Dickens. I sold her—"

"Look here, you mean to tell
me in this day and age you go
around from door to door peddling
soap? Great guns, boy, you'd do
better on unemployment insurance.
It's permanent now."

Warren Dickens registered distress.
"Mr. Coty, could I come in
and tell you about it? If I can make
the first delivery to you instead of
Mrs. Coty, shucks, it'll save me
coming back."

Coty led him back into the living
room, motioned him to a chair and
settled into what was obviously his
own favorite, handily placed before
the telly. Coty said tolerantly,
"Now then, what's this about selling
soap? What kind of soap? What
brand?"

"Oh, it has no name, sir. That's
the point."

The other looked at him.

"That's why we can sell it for
three cents a cake, instead of
twenty-five." Dickens opened the
paper bag and fished out an ordinary
enough looking cake of soap
and handed it to the older man.

Mr. Coty took it, stared down at
it, turned it over in his hands. He
was still blank. "Well, what's
different about it?"

"There's nothing different about
it. It's the same as any other soap."

"I mean, how come you sell it
for three cents a cake, and what's
the fact it has no name got to do
with it?"

Warren Dickens leaned forward
and went into what was obviously
a strictly routine pitch. "Mr. Coty,
have you ever considered what
you're buying when they nick you
twenty-five cents on your credit
card for a bar of soap in an ultra-market?"

There was an edge of impatience
in the older man's voice. "I buy
soap!"

"No, sir. That's your mistake.
What you buy is a telly show, in
fact several of them, with all their
expensive comedians, singers, musicians,
dancers, news commentators,
network vice presidents, and
all the rest. Then you buy fancy
packaging. You'll note, by the
way, that our product hasn't even
a piece of tissue paper wrapped
around it. Fancy packaging designed
by some of the most competent
commercial artists and
motivational research men in the
country. Then you buy distribution.
From the factory all the way
to the retail ultra-market where
your wife shops. And every time
that bar of soap goes from one
wholesaler or distributor to another,
the price roughly doubles.
You also buy a brain trust whose
full time project is to keep you
using their soap and not letting
their competitors talk you into
switching brands. The brain trust,
of course, also works on luring
away the competitor's customers to
their product. Shucks, Mr. Coty,
practically none of that twenty-five
cents you spend to buy a cake of
soap goes for soap. So small a
percentage that you might as well
forget about it."

Mr. Coty was obviously taken
aback. "Well, how do I know this
nameless soap you're peddling is,
well, any good?"

Warren Dickens sighed deeply,
and in such wise that it was obvious
that he had so sighed before. "Sir,
there is no difference between
soaps. Oh, they might use a slightly
different perfume, or tint it a
slightly different color, but for all
practical purposes common hand
soap, common bath soap, is soap,
period. All the stuff the copy
writers dream up about secret ingredients
and health for your skin,
and cosmetic qualities, and all the
rest, is Madison Avenue gobbledygook
and applies as well to one
brand as another. As a matter of
fact, often two different soap companies,
supposedly keen competitors,
and using widely different
advertising, have their products
manufactured in the same plant."

Mr. Coty blinked at him. Shifted
in his chair. Rubbed his chin as
though checking his morning
shave. "Well ... well, then
where do you get your soap?"

"The same place. We buy in
fantastically large lots from one
of the gigantic automated soap
plants."

Mr. Coty had him now. "Ah,
ha! Then how come you sell it for
three cents a cake, instead of twenty-five?"

"I've been telling you. Our soap
doesn't even have a name, not to
mention an advertising budget.
Far from spending fortunes redesigning
our packaging every few
months in attempts to lure new
customers, we don't package the
stuff at all. It comes to you, in
the simplest possible wrapping,
through the mails. A new supply
every month. Three cents a cake.
No middlemen, no wholesalers,
distributors. No nothing except
soap at three cents a cake."

Mr. Coty leaned back in his
chair. "I'll be darned." He thought
it over. "Listen, do you sell anything
besides soap?"

"Not right now, sir. But soap
flakes are coming up next week
and I think we'll be going into
bread in a month or two."

"Bread?"

"Yes, sir, bread. Although we'll
have to distribute that by truck,
and have to have almost hundred
per cent coverage in a given section
before it's practical. A nickel a
loaf."

"Five cents a loaf! You can't
make bread for that much."

"Oh, yes we can. We can't
advertise it, package it, and pay
a host of in-betweens, is all. From
the bakery to you, period."

Mr. Coty seemed fascinated. He
said, "See here, what's the address
of your office?"

Warren Dickens shook his head.
"Sorry, sir. That's all part of it.
We have no swanky offices with
big, expensive staffs. We operate
on the smallest of shoestrings. No
brain trust. No complaint department.
No public relations. No
literature on how to beautify yourself.
No nothing, except good soap
at three cents a cake, plus postage.
Now, if you'll sign this contract,
we'll put you on our mailing list.
Ten bars of soap a month, Mrs.
Coty said. I brought this first
supply so you could test it and see
that the whole thing is bona fide."

Mr. Coty had to test it, but then
he had to admit he couldn't tell
any difference between the nameless
soap and the product to which he
was used. Eventually, he signed,
made the first payment, shook
hands with young Dickens and
saw him to the door. He said, in
parting, "I still wonder why you
do this, rather than dragging down
unemployment insurance like most
young men fresh out of school."

Warren Dickens screwed up his
face. This was a question that
wasn't routine. "Well, I make approximately
the same, if I stick
to it and get enough contracts.
And, shucks they're not hard to
get. And, well, I'm working, not
just bumming on the rest of the
country. I'm doing something,
something useful."

Coty pursed his lips and
shrugged. "It's been a long time
since anybody cared about that."
He looked after the young man as
he walked down the walk.

Then he turned and headed for
the phone, and ten years seemed to
drop away from him. He lit the
screen with a flick, dialed and
said crisply, "That's him, Jerry.
Going down the walk now. Don't
let him out of your sight."

Jerry's face was in the screen but
he was obviously peering down,
from the helio-jet, locating the
subject. "O.K., Tracy, I make him.
See you later." His face faded.

The man who had called himself
Mr. Coty, dialed again, not bothering
to light the screen. "All right,"
he said. "Thank Mrs. Coty and
let her come home now."

Frank Tracy worked his way
down an aisle of automated phono-typers
and other office equipment.
The handful of operators, their
faces bored, periodically strolled up
and down, needlessly checking that
which seldom needed checking.

He entered the receptionist's office,
flicked a hand at LaVerne
Sandell, one of the few employees
it seemed impossible to automate
out of her position, and said, "The
Chief is probably expecting me."

"That he is. Go right in, Mr.
Tracy."

"I'm expecting a call from one
of the operatives. Put it through, eh
LaVerne?"

"Righto."

Even as he walked toward the
door to the sanctum sanctorum,
he grimaced sourly at her. "Righto,
yet. Isn't that a bit on the maize
side? Doesn't sound very authentic
to me."

"I can see you don't put in your
telly time, Mr. Tracy. Slang goes
in cycles these days. They simply
don't dream up a whole new set
of expressions every generation
anymore because everybody gets
tired of them so soon. Instead,
older periods of idiom are revived.
For instance, scram is coming back
in."

He stopped long enough to look
at her, frowning. "Scram?"

She took him in quizzically,
estimating. "Possibly dust, or get
lost, was the term when you were
a boy."

Tracy chuckled wryly, "Thanks
for the compliment, but I go back
to the days of beat it."

In the inner office the Chief
looked up at him. "Sit down,
Frank. What's the word? Another
exponent of free enterprise, pre-historic
style?"

Frank Tracy found a chair and
began talking even while fumbling
for briar and tobacco pouch. "No,"
he grumbled. "I don't think so,
not this time. I'm afraid there
might be something more to it."

His boss leaned back in the
massive old-fashioned chair he affected
and patted his belly, as
though appreciative of a good meal
just finished. "Oh? Give it all to
me."

Tracy finished lighting his pipe,
flicked the match out and put it
back in his pocket, noting that he'd
have to get a new one one of these
days. He cleared his throat and
said, "Reports began coming in
of house to house canvassers selling
soap for three cents a bar."

"Three cents a bar? They can't
manufacture it for that. Will the
stuff pass the Health Department?"

"Evidently," Tracy said wryly.
"The salesman claimed it's the
same soap as reputable firms
peddle."

"Go on."

"We had to go to a bit of trouble
to get a line on them without
raising their suspicion. One of the
boys lived in a neighborhood that
was being canvassed for new customers
and his wife had signed up.
So I took her place when the salesman
arrived with her first delivery—they
deliver the first batch. I let
him think I was Bob Coty and
questioned him, but not enough to
raise his suspicions."

"And?"

"An outfit selling soap and
planning on branching into bread
and heavens knows what else. No
advertising. No middlemen. No
nothing, as the salesman said,
except standard soap at three cents
a bar."

"They can't package it for that!"

"They don't package it at all."

The Chief raised his chubby right
hand and wiped it over his face in
a stereotype gesture of resignation.
"Did you get his home office address?
Maybe there's some way of
buying them out—indirectly, of
course."

"No, sir. It seemed to be somewhat
of a secret."

The other's eyes widened. "Ridiculous.
You can't hide anything
like that. There's a hundred ways
of tracking them down before the
day is out."

"Of course. I've got Jerome Wiseman
following him in a helio-jet.
No use getting rough, as yet.
We'll keep it quiet ... assuming
that meets with your approval."

"You're in the field, Frank. You
make the decisions."

The phone screen had lighted up
and LaVerne's piquant face faded
in. "The call Mr. Tracy was expecting
from Operative Wiseman."

"Put him on," the Chief said,
lacing his plump fingers over his
stomach.

Jerry's face appeared in the
screen. He was obviously parked
on the street now. He said, "Subject
has disappeared into this office
building, Tracy. For the past fifteen
minutes he's kinda looked as
though the day's work was through
and since this dump could hardly
be anybody's home, he must be
reporting to his higher-up."

"Let's see the building," Tracy
said.

The portable screen was directed
in such manner that a disreputable
appearing building, obviously devoted
to fourth-rate businesses, was
centered.

"O.K.," Tracy said. "I'll be
over. You can knock off, Jerry.
Oh, except for one thing. Subject's
name is Warren Dickens. Just for
luck, get a complete dossier on
him. I doubt if he's got a criminal
or subversive record, but you never
know."

Jerry said, "Right," and faded.

Frank Tracy came to his feet and
knocked the rest of his pipe out
into the gigantic ashtray on his
boss' desk. "Well, I suppose the
next step's mine."

"Check back with me as soon
as you know anything more," the
Chief said. He wheezed a sigh as
though sorry the interview was
over and that he'd have to go back
to his desk chores, but shifted his
bulk and took up a sheaf of papers.

Just as Tracy got to the door, the
Chief said, "Oh, yes. Easy on the
rough stuff, Tracy. I've been hearing
some disquieting reports about
some of the overenthusiastic bullyboys
on your team. We wouldn't
want such material to get in the
telly-casts."

Lard bottom, Tracy growled inwardly
as he left. Did the Chief
think he liked violence? Did anyone
in his right mind like violence?

Frank Tracy looked up at the
mid-century type office building.
He was somewhat surprised that
the edifice still remained. Where
did the owners ever find profitable
tenants? What business could be
so small these days that it would
be based in such quarters? However,
here it was.

The lobby was shabby. There
was no indication on the list of
tenants of the firm he was seeking,
nor was there a porter. The elevator
was out of repair.

He did it the hard way, going
from door to door, entering, hat
in hand, apologetically, and saying,
"Pardon me. You're the people
who sell the soap?" They kept
telling him no until he reached
the third floor and a door to an
office even smaller than usual. It
was lettered Freer Enterprises and
even as he knocked and entered,
the wording rang a bell.

There was only one desk but it
was efficiently equipped with the
latest in office gadgetry. The room
was quite choked with files and
even a Mini-IBM tri-unit. The
man behind the desk was old-fashioned
enough to wear glasses,
but otherwise seemed the average
aggressive executive type you expected
to meet in these United
States of the Americas. He was possibly
in his mid-thirties and one
of those alert, over-eager characters
irritating to those who believe in
taking matters less than urgently.

He looked up and said snappily,
"What can I do for you?"

Tracy dropped into an easy-going
characterization. "You're
the people who sell the soap?"

"That is correct. What can I do
for you?"

Tracy said easily, "Why, I'd
like to ask you a few questions
about the enterprise."

"To what end, sir? You'd be
surprised how busy a man I am."

Tracy said, "Suppose I'm from
the Greater New York News-Times
looking for a story?"

The other tapped a finger on his
desk impatiently. "Pardon me, but
in that case I would be inclined to
think you a liar. The News-Times
knows upon which side its bread
is spread. Its advertisers include
all the soap companies. It does not
dispense free advertising through
its news columns."

Tracy chuckled wryly, "All
right. Let's start again." He
brought forth his wallet, flicked
through various identification cards
until he found the one he wanted
and presented it. "Frank Tracy is
the name," he said. "Department
of Internal Revenue. There seems to
be some question as to your corporation
taxes."

"Oh," the other said, obviously
taken aback. "Please have a chair."
He read the authentic looking, but
spurious credentials. Tracy took
the proffered chair and then sat
and looked at the other as though it
was his turn.

"My name is Flowers," the Freer
Enterprises man told him, nervously.
"Frederic Flowers. Frankly,
this is my first month at the job
and I'm not too well acquainted
with all the ramifications of the
business." He moistened his lips.
"I hope there is nothing illegal—"
He let the sentence fade away.

Tracy reclaimed his false identity
papers and put them back into his
wallet before saying easily, "I
really couldn't say, as yet. Let's
have a bit of questions and answers
and I'll go further into the matter."

Flowers regained his confidence.
"No reason why not," he said
quickly. "So far as I know, all is
above board."

Frank Tracy let his eyes go about
the room. "Why are you established,
almost secretly, you might
say, in this business backwoods of
the city?"

"No secret about it," Flowers
demurred. "Merely the cheapest
rent we could find. We cut costs
to the bone, and then shave the
bone."

"Um-m-m. I've spoken to one
of your salesmen, a Warren
Dickens, and I suppose he gave me
the standard sales talk. I wonder
if you could elaborate on your
company's policies, its goals, that
sort of thing."

"Goals?"

"You obviously expect to make
money, somehow or other, though
I don't see that peddling soap at
three cents a bar has much of a
future. There must be some further
angle."

Flowers said, "Admittedly, soap
is just a beginning. Among other
things, it's given us a mailing list
of satisfied customers. Consumers
who can then be approached for
future purchases."

Frank Tracy relaxed in his chair,
reached for pipe and tobacco and
let the other go on. But his eyes
had narrowed, coldly.

Flowers wrapped himself up in
his subject. "Mr. Tracy, you probably
have no idea of the extent to
which the citizens of Greater America
are being victimized. Let me
use but one example." He came
quickly to his feet, crossed to a
small toilet which opened off the
office and returned with a power-pack
electric shaver which he
handed to Tracy.

Tracy looked at it, put it back
on the desk and nodded. "It's the
brand I have," he said agreeably.

"Yes, and millions of others.
What did you pay for it?"

Frank Tracy allowed himself a
slight smirk. "As a matter of
fact, I got mine through a discount
outfit, only twenty-five dollars."

"Only twenty-five dollars, eh,
when the retail price is supposedly
thirty-five?" Flowers was triumphant.
"A great bargain, eh? Well,
let me give you a rundown, Mr.
Tracy."

He took a quick breath. "True,
they're advertised to retail at
thirty-five dollars. And stores that
sell them at that rate make a
profit of fifty per cent. The regional
supply house, before them, knocks
down from forty to sixty per cent,
on the wholesale price. Then the
trade name distributor makes at
least fifty per cent on the sales
to the regional supply houses."

"Trade name distributor?" Tracy
said, as though ignorant of what
the other was talking about. "You
mean the manufacturer?"

"No, sir. That razor you just
looked at bears a trade name of
a company that owns no factory
of its own. It buys the razors from
a large electrical appliances manufacturing
complex which turns out
several other name brand electric
razors as well. The trade name company
does nothing except market
the product. Its budget, by the way,
calls for an expenditure of six
dollars on every razor for national
advertising."

"Well, what are you getting at?"
Tracy said impatiently.

Frederic Flowers had reached his
punch line. "All right, we've
traced the razor all the way back
to the manufacturing complex
which made it. Mr. Tracy, that
razor you bought at a discount
bargain for twenty-five dollars cost
thirty-eight cents to produce."

Tracy pretended to be dumfounded.
"I don't believe it."

"It can be proven."

Frank Tracy thought about it
for a while. "Well, even if true, so
what?"

"It's a crime, that's so-what,"
Flowers blurted indignantly. "And
that's where Freer Enterprises
comes in. Very shortly, we're going
to enter the market with an electric
razor retailing for exactly one dollar.
No name brand, no advertising,
no nothing except a razor just as
good as though selling for from
twenty-five to fifty dollars."

Tracy scoffed his disbelief.
"That's where you're wrong. No
electric razor manufacturer would
sell to you. They'd be cutting
their own throats."

The Freer Enterprises official
shook his head, in scorn. "That's
where you're wrong. The same
electric appliance manufacturer
who produced that razor there
will make a similar one, slightly
different in appearance, for the
same price for us. They don't care
what happens to their product
once they make their profit from it.
Business is business. We'll be at
least as good a customer as any of
the others have ever been. Eventually,
better, since we'll be getting
electric razors into the hands of
people who never felt they could
afford one before."

He shook a finger at Tracy.
"Manufacturers have been doing
this for a long time. I imagine it
was the old mail-order houses that
started it. They'd get in touch with
a manufacturer of, say, typewriters,
or outboard motors, or whatever,
and order tens of thousands of
these, not an iota different from
the manufacturer's standard product
except for the nameplate.
They'd then sell these for as little
as half the ordinary retail price."

Tracy seemed to think it over for
a long moment. Eventually he said,
"Even then you're not going to
break any records making money.
Your distribution costs might be
pared to the bone, but you still
have some. There'll be darn little
profit left on each razor you sell."

Flowers was triumphant again.
"We're not going to stop at razors,
once under way. How about automobiles?
Have you any idea of
the disparity between the cost of
production of a car and what
they retail for?"

"Well, no."

"Here's an example. As far back
as about 1930 a barge company
transporting some brand-new cars
across Lake Erie from Detroit had
an accident and lost a couple of
hundred. The auto manufacturers
sued, trying to get the retail price
of each car. Instead, the court
awarded them the cost of manufacture.
You know what it came to,
labor, materials, depreciation on
machinery—everything? Seventy-five
dollars per car. And that was
around 1930. Since then, automation
has swept the industry and
manufacturing costs per unit have
dropped drastically."

The Freer Enterprises executive
was now in full voice. "But even
that's not the ultimate. After all,
cars were selling for as cheaply
as $425 then. Let's take some items
such as aspirin. You can, of course,
buy small neatly packaged tins of
twelve for twenty-five cents but
supposedly more intelligent buyers
will buy bottles for forty or fifty
cents. If the druggist puts out a
special for fifteen cents a bottle it
will largely be refused since the
advertising conditioned customer
doesn't want an inferior product.
Actually, of course, aspirin is
aspirin and you can buy it, in one
hundred pound lots in polyethylene
film bags, at about fourteen cents
a pound, or in carload lots under
the chemical name of acetylsalicylic
acid, for eleven cents a pound. And
any big chemical corporation will
sell you U.S.P. grade Milk of
Magnesia at about six dollars a
ton. Its chemical name, of course,
is magnesium hydroxide, or Mg(OH)₂,
and you'd have one thousand
quarts in that ton. Buying
it beautifully packaged and fully
advertised, you'd pay up to a
dollar twenty-five a pint in the
druggist section of a modern ultra-market."

Tracy had heard enough. He said
crisply, "All right, Mr. Flowers, of
Freer Enterprises, now let me ask
you something: Do you consider
this country prosperous?"

Flowers blinked. Of a sudden,
the man across from him seemed
to have changed character, added
considerable dynamic to his make-up.
He flustered, "Yes, I suppose so.
But it could be considerably more
prosperous if—"

Tracy was sneering. "If consumer
prices were brought down drastically,
eh? Mr. Flowers, you're
incredibly naïve when it comes to
modern economics. Do you realize
that one of the most significant
developments, economically speaking,
took place in the 1950s; something
perhaps more significant than
the development of atomic power?"

Flowers blinked again, mesmerized
by the other's new domineering
personality. "I ... I don't
know what you're talking about."

"The majority of employees in
the United States turned from blue
collars to white."

Flowers looked pained. "I
don't—"

"No, of course you don't or you
wouldn't be participating in a
subversive attack upon our economy,
which, if successful, would
lead to the collapse of Western
prosperity and eventually to the
success of the Soviet Complex."

Mr. Flowers gobbled a bit, then
gulped.

"I'll spell it out for you," Tracy
pursued. "In the early days of
capitalism, back when Marx and
Engels were writing such works
as Capital, the overwhelming majority
of the working class were
employed directly in production.
For a long time it was quite
accurate when the political cartoonists
depicted a working man
as wearing overalls and carrying
a hammer or wrench. In short,
employees who got their hands
dirty, outnumbered those who
didn't.

"But with the coming of increased
mechanization and eventually
automation and the second
industrial revolution, more and
more employees went into sales,
the so-called service industries, advertising
and entertainment which
has become largely a branch
of advertising, distribution, and,
above all, government which in
this bureaucratic age is largely
a matter of regulation of business
and property relationships. As
automation continued, fewer and
fewer of our people were needed
to produce all the commodities
that the country could assimilate
under our present socio-economic
system. And I need only point out
that the average American still
enjoys more material things than
any other nation, though admittedly
the European countries, and
I don't exclude the Soviet Complex,
are coming up fast."

Flowers said indignantly, "But
what's this charge that I'm participating
in a subversive—"

"Mr. Flowers," Tracy overrode
him, "let's not descend to pure
maize in our denials of the obvious.
If this outfit of yours, Freer Enterprises,
was successful in its fondest
dreams, what would happen?"

"Why, the consumers would be
able to buy commodities at a
fraction of the present cost!"

Tracy half came to his feet and
pounded the table with fierce emphasis.
"What would they buy them
with? They'd all be out of jobs!"

Frederic Flowers bug-eyed him.

Tracy sat down again and seemingly
regained control of himself.
His voice was softer now. "Our
social system may have its strains
and tensions, Mr. Flowers, but it
works and we don't want anybody
throwing wrenches in its admittedly
delicate machinery. Advertising
is currently one of the biggest
industries of the country. The
entertainment industry, admittedly
now based on advertising, is gigantic.
Our magazines and newspapers,
employing hundreds of thousands
of employees from editors right on
down to newsstand operators, are
able to exist only through advertising
revenue. Above all, millions
of our population are employed in
the service industries, and in distribution,
in the stock market, in
the commodity markets, in all the
other branches of distribution
which you Freer Enterprises people
want to pull down. A third of our
working force is now unemployed,
but given your way, it would be
at least two thirds."

Flowers, suddenly suspicious,
said, "What has all this to do with
the Department of Internal Revenue,
Mr. Tracy?"

Tracy came to his feet and smiled
ruefully, albeit a bit grimly.
"Nothing," he admitted. "I have
nothing at all to do with that
department. Here is my real card,
Mr. Flowers."

The Freer Enterprises man must
have felt a twinge of premonition
even as he took it up, but the effect
was still enough to startle him.
"Bureau of Economic Subversion!"
he said.

"Now then," Tracy snapped. "I
want the names of your higher ups,
and the address of your central
office, Flowers. Frankly, you're in
the soup. As you possibly know,
our hush-hush department has unlimited
emergency powers, being
answerable only to the President."

"I ... I've never even heard of
it." Flowers stuttered. "But—"

Tracy held up a contemptuous
hand. "Many people haven't," he
said curtly.

Frank Tracy hurried through the
outer office into LaVerne Sandell's
domain, and bit out to her, "Tell
the Chief I'm here. Crisis. And immediately
get my team together,
all eight of them. Heavy equipment.
Have a jet readied. Chicago.
The team will rendezvous at the
airport."

LaVerne was just as crisp. "Yes,
sir." She began doing things with
buttons and switches.

Tracy hurried into the Chief's
office and didn't bother with the
usual amenities. He snapped,
"Worse than I thought, sir. This
outfit is possibly openly subversive.
Deliberately undermining the
economy."

His superior put down the report
he was perusing and shifted his
bulk backward. "You're sure? We
seldom run into such extremes."

"I know, I know, but this could
be it. Possibly a deliberate program.
I've taken the initiative to have
Miss Sandell summon my team."

"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."