“Well…no.”
“What gets me, Clevum,” Robar went on, “is that he could be elected so easily. He’s got everything; a good sound platform that you can stir people up with, the correct background, a grand way of speaking, and the most beautiful appearance that a candidate ever had. Compared with Old Bat Ears, he’s a natural. It ought to be just one-two-three. But Bat Ears will be re-elected, sure as shootin’.”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” mourned Clevum. “We’re going to take such a shellacking as nobody ever saw. 1 thought for a while that we would make the grade, but now — Did you see what the King’s Men said about him this morning?”
“That dirty little sheet — What was it?”
“Besides some nasty cracks about Atlantis gold, they accused him of planning to destroy the Murian home and defile the sanctity of Murian womanhood. They called upon every red-blooded one hundred per cent Murian to send this subversive monster back where he came from. Oh, it stank! But the yokels were eating it up.”
“Sure they do. That’s just what I mean. The governor’s gang slings mud all the time, but if we sling any mud about governor Vortus, Talus throws a fit. His idea of a news story is a nifty little number about comparative statistics of farm taxes in the provinces of Mu…What are you drawing now, Dolph?”
“This.” He held up a ghoulish caricature of Governor Vortus himself, with his long face, thin lips, and high brow, atop of which rested the tall crimson governor’s cap. Enormous ears gave this sinister face the appearance of a vulture about to take flight. Beneath the cartoon was the simple caption:
BAT EARS FOR GOVERNOR
“There!” exclaimed Robar, “that’s what this campaign needs. Humor! If we could plaster that cartoon on the front page of Mu Regenerate and stick one under the door of every voter in the province, it ‘ud be a landslide. One look at that mug and they’d laugh themselves sick-and vote for our boy Talus!”
HE held the sketch at arm’s length and studied it, frowning: Presently he locked up. “Listen, dopes — Why not do it? Give me one last edition with some guts in it. Are you game?”
Clevum looked worried. “Well…I don’t know…What are you going to use for money? Besides, even if Oric would crack loose from the dough, how would we get an edition of that size distributed thai; well? And even if we did get it done, it might boomerang on us-the opposition would have the time and money to answer it.”
Robar looked disgusted. “That’s what a guy gets for having ideas in this campaign-nothing but objections, objections!”
“Wait a minute, Robar,” Dolph interposed. “Clevum’s kicks have some sense to them, but maybe you got something. The idea is to make Joe Citizen laugh at Vortus, isn’t it? Well, why not fix up some dodgers of my cartoon and hand ’em out at the polling places on election day?”
Robar drummed on the table as he considered this. “Umm, no, it wouldn’t do. Vortus’ goon squads would beat the hell out of our workers and high jack our literature.”
“Well, then how about painting some big banners with old Bat Ears on them? We could stick them up near each polling place where the voters couldn’t fail to see them.”
“Same trouble. The goon squads would have them down before the polls open.”
“Do you know what, fellows,” put in Clevum, “what we need is something big enough to be seen and too solid for Governor’s plug-uglies to wreck. Big stone statues about two stories high would be about right.”
Robar looked more pained than ever. “Clevum, il you can’t be helpful, why not keep quiet? Sure, statues would be fine-if we had forty years and ten million simoleons.”
“Just think, Robar.” Dolph jibed, with an irritating smile, “if your mother had entered you for the priesthood, you could integrate all the statues you want-no worry, no trouble, no expense.”
“Yeah, wise guy, but in that case I wouldn’t be in politics — Say!”
” ‘S trouble?”
“Integration! Suppose we could integrate enough statues of old Picklepuss — “