The Man Who Fell to Earth

Newton seemed not to hear this. His tone was gentle, warm. “I understand, in fact, that you are the best man in the United States with patents. Also that you are very expensive.”

“Yes. I’m good.”

“Fine.” the other said. He reached down beside his chair and lifted his briefcase.

“And what do you want?” Farnsworth looked at the clock again.

“I would like to plan some things with you.” The tall man was taking an envelope from his case.

“Isn’t it pretty late?”

Newton had opened the envelope and he now withdrew a thin sheaf of bills, wrapped with a rubber band. He looked up and smiled genially. “Would you please come and get these? It is very difficult for me to walk. My legs.”

Annoyed, Farnsworth pulled himself up from his chair, walked to the tall man, took the money, returned, and sat down. They were thousand-dollar bills.

“There are ten of them,” Newton said.

“You’re being pretty damn melodramatic, aren’t you?” He put the stack into the pocket of his lounging-jacket. “Now what’s this for?”

“For tonight,” Newton said. “For about three hours of your close attention.”

“But why, for heaven’s sake, at night?”

The other shrugged his shoulders casually. “Oh, several reasons. Privacy is one of them.”

“You could have had my attention for less than ten thousand dollars.”

“Yes. But I also wanted to impress you with the… importance of our talk.”

“Well.” Farnsworth settled back in his chair. “Let’s talk.”

The thin man seemed relaxed, but he did not lean back. “First,” he said, “how much money do you make a year, Mr. Farnsworth?”

“I’m not on salary.”

“Well then. How much money did you make last year?”

“All right. You’ve paid for it. About one hundred forty thousand.”

“I see. You are, as these things go, then, wealthy?”

“Yes.”

“But you’d like more?”

This was becoming ridiculous. It was like a cheap television program. But the other man was paying; it was best to go along with it. He took a cigarette from a leather case and said, “Of course I’d like more.”

Newton leaned just a bit forward this time. “A great deal more, Mr. Farnsworth?” he said, smiling, beginning to enjoy the situation enormously.

This was television too, of course, but it got across. “Yes,” he said, and then, “Cigarette?” He held the case out to his guest.

Ignoring the offer, the man with the white, curly hair said, “I can make you very rich, Mr. Farnsworth, if you can devote your next five years entirely to me.

Farnsworth kept his face expressionless, lit his cigarette while his mind worked rapidly, turning this whole strange interview over, puzzling with the situation, with the slim possibility of this man’s offer being sane. But the man, freak that he might be, had money. It would be wise to play along for a while. The maid came in with a silver tray with glasses and ice.

Newton took his glass of water from the tray gingerly, and then held it with one hand while he withdrew an aspirin box from his pocket with the other, flipped it open with his thumb, and dropped one of the pills into the water. The pill dissolved, white and murky. He held the glass and watched it for a moment, and then began sipping, extremely slowly.

Farnsworth was a lawyer; he had an eye for detail. He saw instantly that there was something odd about the aspirin box. It was a common object, obviously a box of Bayer aspirin; but there was something about it that was wrong. And something was not right about the way that Newton was sipping the water, slowly, careful not to spill a drop — as if it were precious. And the water had clouded from one aspirin; that seemed wrong. He would have to try it with an aspirin later, when the man was gone, and see what happened.

Before the maid left, Newton asked her to take his briefcase to Farnsworth. When she had gone he took a last, loving sip and set his glass, still nearly full, beside him on the table. “There are some things in the briefcase I’d like you to read.”

Farnsworth opened the bag, found a thick sheaf of papers and pulled them out on to his lap. The paper, he noticed immediately, had an unusual feel. Extremely thin, it was hard and yet flexible. The top sheet consisted mostly of chemical formulas neatly printed in bluish ink. He shuffled through the rest; circuit diagrams, charts, and schematic drawings of what appeared to be plant equipment. Tools and dies. At a glance, some of the formulas seemed familiar. He looked up. “Electronics?”

“Yes. Partly. You are familiar with that kind of equipment?”

Farnsworth did not answer. If the other man knew anything about him at all, he knew that he had fought half a dozen battles, as leader of a group of nearly forty lawyers, for the corporate life of one of the largest electronics-parts manufacturing combines in the world. He began reading the papers….

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