Homage
THE MEN WHO READ ISAAC ASIMOV by WILLIAM BRITTAIN
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called you here today to see if we could agree among ourselves on a sequence of five numbers." Paul Haskill, the local history teacher, got to his feet, his chair scraping against the bare floorboards of The Merry Tinker tavern. "But before formally presenting our guest, I think I should explain to him that the sole purpose of our little group is to emulate as far as possible an assemblage of men who exist only in the imagination and writings of Dr. Isaac Asimov."
Edgar Varsey, who'd come to Holcomb Mills to write a story for his newspaper, The Times-Herald, looked up quizzically at Haskill. His pencil was poised over the notebook in which he had been jotting impressions of the tavern and its occupants.
"Who?" the reporter asked.
"Asimo.v. That scientist fella who does all the writing." The voice of Jasper Zimmerman, a linesman for the Holcomb Mills Telephone Company, reminded Varsey of the chattering of a squirrel. There was nothing squirrel-like, however, about the other two men at the table. Gabriel Doone, the blacksmith, was huge, with muscles that bunched and rippled under his sweat-stained work shirt. And portly Sidney Warwick was the image of small-town respectability as befitted his position as president of the Holcomb Mills National Bank.
"A lot of Asimov's material is about science," said Haskill. "Several of his books are standard references over at our school."
"He's written about history too," Zimmerman put in.
181 "And mathematics." Numbers, especially as they related to money, were never far from the thoughts of banker Warwick.
"He writes good stories," rumbled Doone. "With rockets and robots and all kinds of exciting things. Better'n television."
Poetry, mythology, the Bible . . . the men tossed subjects at the astounded Varsey like verbal baseballs being peppered about a conversational infield until the reporter shook his head in dismay. "You mean one man has turned out all that?"
Haskill nodded. "Asimov's output is incredible."
"Not so." Zimmerman grinned. "All anyone would need is the ability to use both hands and both feet to keep four typewriters goin' at the same time."
"The Black Widowers, however, are of special interest to us." Haskill indicated Doone, Warwick, Zimmerman, and himself.
"The Black . . . what?" asked Varsey.
"In addition to his other works," Haskill explained, "Dr. Asimov has written a series of detective short stories. They concern a club called the Black Widowers—a group of men, most of whom have out-of-the-ordinary occupations, who meet monthly. At each meeting an invited guest is asked to pose a problem. The Black Widowers then attempt to solve it through a discussion which is carried on while postprandial drinks are served."
He turned toward the bar at the far end of the room. "And speaking of drinks, the sun's over the yardarm, and I could use one now. Anyone else?"
There was a chorus of assent from around the table.
"Findlay!" Haskill shouted. "A round for us here. Bourbon is traditional, Mr. Varsey. Okay with you?"
The reporter nodded. "Tell me more about the Black Widowers and you four," he said.
"It's five, including Findlay," said Haskill. "At any rate, while talking here one day we found we all shared an interest in the Black Widower stories. So we decided to meet from time to time, to solve problems just as they do."
"And how many problems have you solved?" asked Varsey.
The table was enveloped in sudden silence. Finally Doone cleared his throat. "You're the first, Mr. Varsey."
"Not that much happens in a small village like Holcomb Mills," added Warwick.
"We daydream a lot," Zimmerman mumbled.
The drinks arrived, carried by an astonishingly agile old man dressed in black, who put Varsey in mind of a cricket. "This is Findlay," said Warwick, "the proprietor of The Merry Tinker, and a charter member of our little group. He seldom offers an opinion, but when he does, he makes incredibly good sense."
"Verra fine o' ye tae say that, Mr. Warwick," said the elfin Findlay in accents reminiscent of plaid kilts, bagpipes, and heather. He passed out the drinks with spasmodic jerks of his hands, then returned to his place behind the bar.
Paul Haskill sipped from his glass and then rubbed his hands together expectantly. "Now then, Mr. Varsey. The problem. Pose it for us, if you please."
Varsey pocketed his notebook and got to his feet. "I guess you already know most of the background material," he began.
"Go over it anyway," urged Zimmerman. "From the beginning. If we're going to be like the Black Widowers, we've got to do things right."
Varsey shrugged good-naturedly. "Okay, here goes. Just up the street here in Holcomb Mills one of the biggest revolutions in retail selling in the country is now going on. The Value Today department store. That's the story I want to get for my newspaper."
"If Value Today gets any bigger," grumbled Doone, "there won't be a parking space in town during business hours."
"Davey Lotus—formerly David Lotocetto—owns the store," the reporter went on. "He was born and brought up right here in Holcomb Mills. As a kid he raised more hell than most, and everybody predicted he'd come to a bad end. But then, at the age of twenty-two, he got into a high-stake poker game."
"I remember it well," sighed Warwick. "He walked away with nearly three thousand dollars—a good part of it my money." "Yes, but much to the surprise of the townspeople Lotus didn't fritter away his winnings. Instead, he rented an old building that had once been the Grange Hall. Within a month he'd painted value today across the front of it, installed a couple of display windows, and stocked it with merchandise, most of it obtained on credit. He sold items usually not found in a small town—the latest fashions, quality sporting goods, exotic perfumes, and such. Essentially, Lotus had created a huge department store, much too large for a village this size.
"People laughed at him, expecting him to go bankrupt within a year. But Lotus had the last laugh. Soon customers were coming from all over the county, then the state, because of a sales gimmick he'd developed."
"He let folks dicker with the clerks over prices," chirped Zimmerman. "It was fun. And for a while we figured we was puttin' one over on ol' Davey. But he was too smart for that."
"Yes, he was," agreed Varsey. "Every item in the store had its price clearly marked. But after the price came a series of letters—for example, $7.00, VUY. Most people just thought it was a shipping code or something. Then, after several months, a clerk let the cat out of the bag what those letters meant. But by that time Lotus was well on his way to becoming a millionaire."
"The letters was really numbers," said Doone.
"Exactly. Davey Lotus used the letters of his own name and assigned to each of them a number. D was 1, A was 2, V was 3, and so on, right up to the final letter S, which was zero. $7.00— VUY meant that the article cost Lotus $3.95, and between $3.95 and $7.00 the clerk was entitled to do a little bargaining. Lotus never claimed the idea was original, but he turned it into a bundle of money.
"Eventually, of course, people caught on. The resulting national publicity didn't do Value Today any harm either, and by then Lotus was into his next selling gimmick—a rare gold coin placed in plain sight somewhere inside the store. For weeks people hunted, until at last it was found—glued to a display bottle of perfume, where it looked like part of the fancy label. Meanwhile, with all those people coming into the store, the cash registers were ringing merrily.
"Senior-citizen beauty contests, games, raffles—Lotus constantly promoted Value Today, and the store continued to thrive. But now he's come up with the greatest sales campaign of all."
"The safe," nodded Haskill.
"Yes," said Varsey. "An old safe which Lotus discovered in the basement of the building. The thing has a combination dial with one hundred numbers on it. Lotus set the combination and placed the safe in one of his display windows. Then he invited one and all to try and dial the correct five-number combination. The person who opens the safe door gets the thousand-dollar bill that Lotus has placed inside."
"Huh "grunted Warwick. "With a hundred numbers on the dial the possible variations are almost endless."
"Apparently the people lined up to try their luck don't agree with you," said Varsey. "They come in to open the safe, of course. But they're buying, gentlemen. They're also buying."
"That's the problem, then?" asked Zimmerman. "You want us to see if we can figure out what the correct combination is?"
"I do. My paper sent me down here to do a feature story on Lotus. One of the first people I contacted was Mr. Haskill here. As a history teacher, as well as the village's unofficial historian, I knew he'd have all the background information."
"I also suggested that if our group could figure out the safe's combination it would add reader interest," said Haskill.
"A moment, please," interrupted Warwick, the banker. "We're getting into difficulties here. When the Black Widowers confront a problem, there are clues, hints, inferences that can be made. But here we're presented with nothing but a dial with a hundred numbers on it, from which we're to pick five. Unfair, Mr. Varsey."
"Not as unfair as you think," replied Varsey. "I ran into Lotus out in front of his store and mentioned that very problem."
"What did he say?" asked Doone, the blacksmith. "He insists the numbers aren't random at all. There are clues."
"Clues?" Zimmerman sat up straighter in his chair. "Where?"
The reporter made an expansive wave of his hand. "Lotus pointed at those display windows of his. 'Right there,' he told me. I took pictures of both of them. Here, look at these."
From his pocket the reporter produced two color photographs. "Here's the left window," he said, holding up one photo. "You can see the safe—the name Mapes etched in the door is apparently the name of the manufacturer—and the line of people. Down in front of the safe are some fake bills and coins to stress the money angle."
He held up the second photograph. "And here's the other window. You'll note the huge telephone dial with the five silk scarves draped vertically through its holes. Above it is a sign that reads: 'From White to Bright, It's a Call to Fashion.' "
"What's that over on the other side of the window?" asked Warwick.
"A series of posters on sale in the stationery department. Great moments in American history. The Revolutionary War is represented by that painting of the three marching men. Then there's Woodrow Wilson, a prospector panning for gold, Charles Lindbergh, and finally, Babe Ruth."
Varsey placed both photographs on the table. "Well, there you have it, gentlemen. What is there in one or both of these pictures that would indicate the correct combination?"
Doone and Warwick took the picture of the safe and examined it closely. Zimmerman and Haskell showed equal interest in the scarves and posters.
Findlay was almost ignored as he brought a second round of drinks. At length Varsey broke the silence.
"Any ideas?"
There was a murmur of assent. The four men sat back in their chairs, each smiling confidently.
"You first, Gabriel," suggested Haskell.
The blacksmith rose ponderously."A fine piece of metalwork, that safe." He looked about as if daring someone to contradict him.
"We all yield to your knowledge of the subject, Gabriel," said Warwick. "But get on with your theory."
"The people who made that old safe were proud of their work," Doone continued. "Carved the company name right into the steel of the door. Not just painted on or a paper label like today's products. Mapes—a good name. An honest name."
"We agree, we agree," nodded Zimmerman, the phone-company linesman. "But what's the point you're havin' such trouble makin'?"
"Davey Lotus has the safe in his window. Why wouldn't he have the clue to the combination right on the safe itself? Right there on the door? The combination has five numbers. The name Mapes has five letters."
"But how—"Warwick began.
"Let him go on, Sidney," interrupted Haskill. "I see what he's driving at."
"If we find where each of the five letters comes in the alphabet, well have five numbers." Doone consulted a greasy bit of paper on which he'd scribbled some notes. "Like M is the thirteenth letter. A is the first. See what I mean?"
Varsey took out his notebook and looked up expectantly at Doone. "So your idea of the combination is—"
He quickly wrote down the blacksmith's answer:
13-1-16-5-19
"Who's next?" the reporter asked.
"I'll go, if I may," said Warwick. "Like Gabriel, I too was interested in the window containing the safe. But unlike him, I wasn't taken by the safe itself as much as the display of money."
"Ill bet you talk banking in your sleep, Sidney," said Zimmerman.
Warwick ignored the gibe. "The display of money includes both bills and coins. But why coins, since the money inside is said to be a thousand-dollar bill? Could there be some hidden meaning to the coins? Certainly not in the way they're displayed, just dumped in a pile." He paused dramatically.
Zimmerman groaned. "Sidney, you can say fewer things using more words than anybody else I know."
"Scoff if you will, Jasper. But when I saw the coins, it immediately struck me that America has exactly five coins which make up fractions of a dollar—the penny, the nickel, the dime, the quarter, and the half dollar. Five coins, gentlemen—one for each number of the combination. And each with a specific numerical value. It's quite obvious that my solution is the correct one."
Edgar Varsey put Warwick's solution directly under Doone's:
1-5-10-25-50 then, after a moment's hesitation, or 50-25-10-5-1
"Mr. Zimmerman?" he said when he'd finished. "Do you agree with either Mr. Doone or Mr. Warwick?"
"It ain't just their ideas I don't agree with," said Zimmerman. "I don't even think they were lookin' at the right window. There's only one place in either window where numbers actually appear. And that's on the big telephone dial with the scarves hangin' from it."
"And you accused me of always thinking about my work," chided Warwick. "I'll just bet you were itching to string a wire from that huge dial."
"You'll be sorry you said that when my numbers open the safe," Zimmerman commented.
"What numbers, Jasper?" asked Haskill.
"Look, the scarves are stuck through the five holes at the top of the dial—numbers 1 through 5. And they hang vertically, so each scarf covers a second numbered hole below. The 1 connects with the zero, the 2 with the 9, and so on. Furthermore, the right-hand scarf is white. The further left, the more colorful the scarf, until the last one—which covers the 5 and 6—is red."
"Yeah, we see that in the picture. But so what, Jasper?" queried Doone.
"The sign, Gabriel. The sign. 'From White to Bright.' That's how the numbers go. The white scarf covers the 1 and zero, making 10. That's the first number of the combination, and—"
Varsey made the next entry in his notebook:
10-29-38-47-56
"I guess now it's your turn, Paul." Varsey nodded in Haskill's direction.
"Like the rest of you, I may have let my work get in the way of my detecting," said the teacher. "I chose the same window Jasper did. But I was interested in those five posters on American history. And you know, it wasn't hard to assign a specific number to each of them."
"Oh?"Warwick asked. "How?"
"Take the first one—the painting. It's called 'The Spirit of '76.' Next, Woodrow Wilson. His Fourteen Points—his war aims—are known to any high-school student. Or at least they should be."
Varsey chuckled at the teacher's sternness. "Continue," he urged him.
"The prospector mining for gold?" Haskill went on. "A 'Forty-niner,' of course—the year of the California gold rush." He hummed a few bars of "Clementine," and his listeners nodded their agreement.
"And then Lindbergh. The Lone Eagle, the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. What could he represent except the number 1?
"Finally, Babe Ruth. And even though it was finally broken, who can ever forget his record number of home runs?"
"Sixty!" chimed in Warwick and Zimmerman together. "So there you have it, Edgar. Put my numbers in that book of yours with the rest of 'em." Varsey did just that:
76-14-49-1-60
"Come on," said the reporter, draining his glass and getting to his feet. "Let’s go down and get on that line to try the safe. We'll soon know which one of you has the right answer."
Two hours later the little group was back at their table in the taproom of The Merry Tinker. Full glasses mirrored despondent faces.
None of the suggested combinations had coaxed the safe's door to open.
"And we wanted to be like the Black Widowers," moaned Zimmerman. "I'm glad that Asimov fella ain't here at this meeting. I'd have to hide my face."
"A failure," said Warwick. "A complete fiasco."
"A bunch of dunderheads trying to be detectives," Doone murmured. "That's us."
"Hey, let's not be too hard on ourselves." Paul Haskill managed a weak smile. "At least we tried. That should get us a mention in your newspaper, huh, Edgar?"
Varsey shook his head. "The public wants to read about winners," he said. "Not losers."
The reporter pushed back his chair. "Well, it's been fun. But I've got to be getting back to—"
"Wait a bit. Wait a bit," came a reedy voice from beside him. Varsey turned and found himself looking at the seamed face of Findlay, the barman and proprietor of The Merry Tinker.
"I could nae let ye go till ye've heard from all of us," said Findlay. "Could I now, Mr. Varsey?"
"But everybody had a turn."
"I didn't. Ye see, trouble with these fellers is, they've nae read the Black Widower yarns thorough enough."
"Come again, Findlay?" said the reporter.
"They clean forgot, sir, that while most of the Black Widowers sit at table for the meal, there's one who's up and about the entire time."
"Henry the waiter," breathed Haskill. "Of course."
"Aye," said Findlay. "Henry. And while the others blather on at great length—just as you gentlemen have done—it's Henry as gets down to findin' the solutions. That waiter has an odd and refreshingly original way of lookin' at problems. Something I've been accused of meself."
"Wait a minute." Varsey eyed Findlay closely. "Are you saying you saw something in one of those windows that none of the rest of us saw?"
"Nae, not a bit of it." Findlay shook his head firmly. "Ye see, them windows ye've been examinin' with such care have naught tae do with the clue Davey Lotus was givin' out about the combination."
"But they have to! Lotus told me—" the reporter began.
"Sit down, Henry—ah—Findlay," interrupted Haskill, dragging up a chair from the next table. "Are you telling us you've got the right solution? What are the numbers? How did you get them? What do you mean—"
"Easy, Mr. Haskill. Now first, I'll remind ye all of one set of numbers ye've apparently overlooked. I'm speakin', of course, of the ones Davey Lotus assigned tae his name when he first opened his Value Today store. That story's still well known."
"Yeah, yeah," said Zimmerman impatiently. "D is 1, A is 2, right up to S is zero. And even if we paired em—12, 34, 56, and so forth—that idea was tried the first day Lotus put the safe in the window."
"And Lotus said the clue was in the windows." Varsey pounded the table positively. "When we talked in front of the store."
"Did he now?" replied Findlay. "Did he say that in so many words? I didn't get that impression when you first spoke of the conversation." Varsey wrinkled his brow thoughtfully. "No," he replied slowly. "When I asked him where the clues were, he just said, 'Right there.' But he pointed to the windows."
"Are ye certain sure?" asked Findlay. "Or did he just wave, like?" The little barman made a vague gesture with his hand toward the corner of the room. "Ez ye did yerself, when ye spoke of it earlier."
"Well—yes, that was about the way he did it," admitted the reporter. "But except for the windows, there's nothing special about that old building he could have been pointing to."
"With deepest respect," countered Findlay, "I submit there is something, Mr. Varsey. Ye could hardly uv missed it, standin' where the two o' ye was."
"Look, Findlay," said Warwick, "are you saying we've been studying those damned windows when Lotus was actually pointing to something else? What was it?"
"It was letters—ten uv 'em, tae be exact. At least a foot high. And they spell out the name of Davey Lotus' store—Value Today."
"You—you mean the store sign was the clue, Findlay? But how?"
"Don't it strike ye odd, sir, that every one o' them ten letters in Value Today is found somewhere in Davey Lotus' own name. Quite a coincidence, ain't it? Only I don't really think it is one. I think Davey had this little scheme in mind from the time he found the safe and opened the store. He named the place accordingly."
"Value Today," mused Haskill while the others buzzed excitedly. "Ten letters. Now if we break them down into two-letter groups—"
"Exactly, Mr. Haskill," grinned Findlay. "Take VA, for example. Now we assign numbers tae them letters, based on the way Davey first used his name to code prices. VA, therefore, becomes 32."
"And LU is 69, because L is the sixth letter in Davey's name, and U the ninth," added Varsey.
"Now ye have it, sirs." Findlay reached across the table and pulled a piece of paper from Varsey's notebook. "Unless I'm far off the mark, these numbers’ll open that safe."
He began to write with a stub of pencil: 32-69-48-71-25
Warwick leaped to his feet. "Come on. Let's go down there and give it a whirl."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when there was the sound of a door opening, then slamming shut. A thin lively woman darted into the room, looking about sharply. She spotted Findlay and hurried over to him. "I got it, Findlay! I got it!" she cried excitedly. "See?"
She reached into the depths of her ample purse and withdrew a rectangle of green paper. It bore a portrait of President Grover Cleveland, as well as the figure 1000 in all four corners.
"Gentlemen," said Findlay, "I'd like ye tae meet Dorrie, my wife. I sent her on ahead tae test me theory."
He peered slyly at the little group at the table. "I did nae think ye'd mind, since yer own interest was purely in the problem itself, not the money involved."
The others looked at one another ruefully, shaking their heads.
"There is one thing ye could do fer me though, Mr. Haskill."
"Anything, Findlay," said the teacher.
"Could ye find me the address uv the gude Dr. Asimov? I’d like tae write him a letter an' ask him tae extend tae each an' every one o' the Black Widowers me personal thanks."