“Probably nothing more than normal housewifely suspicion of a radically new idea,” he had muttered, “after washing dishes for years, to be told it’s no longer necessary! She can’t believe her Ewakleen dish is still the same after stripping the outer-most film of molecules after a meal. Have to hit that educational angle a bit harder—maybe tie it in with the expendable molecules lost by the skin during a shower.”
He’d penciled a few notes on the margin and flipped the whole problem onto the restless lap of Advertising and Promotion.
But then there had been the seasonal slump in furniture—about a month ahead of schedule. The surprising lack of interest in the Hebster Chubbichair, an item which should have revolutionized men’s sitting habits.
Abruptly, he could remember almost a dozen unaccountable disturbances in the market recently, and all in consumer goods. That fits, he decided; any change in buying habits wouldn’t be reflected in heavy industry for at least a year. The machine tools plants would feel it before the steel mills; the mills before the smelting and refining combines; and the banks and big investment houses would be the last of the dominoes to topple.
With its capital so thoroughly tied up in research and new production, his business wouldn’t survive even a temporary shift of this type. Hebster Securities, Inc., could go like a speck of lint being blown off a coat collar.
Which is a long way to travel from a simple little cigar store. Funatti’s jitters about growing Firstist sentiment are contagious! he thought.
If only Kleimbocher could crack the communication problem! If we could talk to the Aliens, find s ome sort of place for ourselves in their universe. The Firsters would be left without a single political leg!
Hebster realized they were in a large, untidy, map-splattered office and that his escort was saluting a huge, even more untidy man who waved their hands down impatiently and nodded them out of the door. He motioned Hebster to a choice of seats. This consisted of several long walnut-stained benches scattered about the room.
P. Braganza, said the desk nameplate with ornate Gothic flow. P. Braganza had a long, twirlable and tremendously thick mustache. Also, P. Braganza needed a hair-cut badly. It was as if he and everything in the room had been carefully designed to give the maximum affront to Humanity Firsters. Which, considering their crew-cut, closely shaven, “Cleanliness is next to Manliness” philosophy, meant that there was a lot of gratuitous unpleasantness in this office when a raid on a street demonstration filled it with jostling fanatics, antiseptically clean and dressed with bare-bones simplicity and neatness.
“So you’re worrying about Firster effect on business?”