A chorus of outrage echoed in the rafters. It hadn't occurred to the members that primitive exhibit A would be themselves; to wit, the genus Earth businessman; sub-species, go-getter. Jerry emerged from the resulting argument somewhat battered, but with what any experienced advertising man would recognize as a victory. His copy was to run in five per cent of the space, keyed. Now all he had to do was prove in dollars and cents that he knew more about mass sales psychology than his clients, which was, of course, a cinch.
In spite of translation into a more civilized language, Jerry's five per cent of the space out-pulled the tamer ninety-five per cent by better than ten to one. Thereafter, his clients swallowed their pride, voted him a free hand, and contented themselves with raking in the shekels from a steady stream of handsome and rich extraterrestrial tourists.
After Jerry's tourist promotion had been running two years, the U.S. Post Office broke down and printed an issue of three-cent stamps commemorating the influx, showing the goddess Terra with welcoming arms open to the starred heavens. Jerry Jergins, the second advertising man in history to achieve the distinction of having Uncle Sam plug his product on a stamp, thereby entered the most select circles of his chosen profession.
Jerry bought enough of the stamps to paper the walls of his swank and spacious penthouse offices, for the benefit of the swarm of tourists who invaded the place daily during afternoon open-house hours. They all wanted to see an advertising agency; to them, this phenomenon was the essence of that primitive planet, Earth. Jerry had recorded a lecture on primitive Earth customs which issued from concealed loudspeakers, and filled display cases with exhibits of primitive Earth culture, emphasizing the aspects he felt these extraterrestrials would find most exotic.
Considering the fact that Jerry had managed to learn little about the Federated Planets that was not utterly essential to the mechanics of his advertising campaign there, he had done a pretty good job of "getting on the customer's side of the counter." Every tourist Jerry talked to had been conditioned, by some unrevealed but apparently foolproof process, not to repeat the Ambassador's error of mentioning Matter Repositors, or other aspects of life on the Federated Planets that might cause repercussions on Earth. Even tourist children couldn't be bribed with lollypops. Tourists talked a great deal, in fluent idiomatic Earth English, yet somehow said very little.
But Jerry knew at least one thing—he was stirring emotions that lay so deep under layers and layers of civilization that these shining, perfect people hadn't known they were capable of feeling them, until they visited Earth. He was getting under their smooth skins, just as surely as the monotone of a Haitian drum-beat gets under the skin of a New Yorker.
One of the display cases contained the working tools of gangsterism—sawed-off shotguns, blackjacks, a model of a bullet-proof automobile, a news photo of the St. Valentine's Day massacre, a clipping about police payoffs from houses of gambling and prostitution, another about blindness resulting from wood alcohol. The shot-glasses of authentic antique bootleg gin that stood on top the cases were often smelled but never sampled.