The next day Mr. and Mrs. McCardle dropped in at the Empire State Building. A receptionist in the lobby was buffing her nails under a huge portrait of His Majesty. A beautifully lettered sign displayed the words with which His Majesty had decreed that P.Q.P. be enacted: “Ow Racken Theah’s a Raht Smaht Ah-dee, Boys.”
“Where do we sign up, please?” asked George.
The receptionist pawed uncertainly through her desk. “I know there’s some kind of book,” she said as she rummaged, but she did not find it. “Well, It doesn’t matter. They’ll give you everything you need in Room 100.”
“Will I sign up there?” asked George nervously, conditioned by a lifetime of red tape and uncomiQrtable without it.
“No,” said the receptionist.
“But for the tests—”
“There aren’t any tests.”
“Then the interviews, the deep probing of our physical and psychological fitness for parenthood, cur heredity—”
“No interviews.”
“But the evaluation of our financial and moral standing without which no permission can be—”
“No evaluation. Just Room 100.” She resumed buffing her nails.
In Room 100 a cheerful woman took a Toddler out of a cabinet, punched the non-reversible activating button between its shoulderblades, and handed it to Mrs. McCardle with a cheery: “It’s all yours, madame. Return with it in three months and, depending on its condition, you will, or will not, be issued a breeding permit. Simple, isn’t it?”
“The little darling!” gurgled Mrs. McCardle, looking down into the Toddler’s pretty face.
It spit in her eye, punched her in the nose and sprang a leak.
“Gracious!” said the cheerful’ woman. “Get it out of our nice clean office, if you please.”
“How do you work it?” yelled Mrs. McCardle, juggling the Toddler like a hot potato. “How do you turn it off?”
“Oh, you can’t turn it off,” said the woman. “And you’d better not swing it like that. Rough handling goes down on the tapes inside it and we read them in three months and now if you please, you’re getting our nice office all wet—”
She shepherded them out.
“Do something, George!” yelled Mrs. McCardle. George took the Toddler. It stopped leaking and began a ripsaw scream that made the lighting fixtures tremble.
“Give the poor thing to me!” Mrs. McCardle shouted. “You’re hurting it holding it like that—”
She took the Toddler back. It stopped screaming and resumed leaking.
It quieted down in the car. The sudden thought seized them both—too quiet? Their heads crashed together as they bent simultaneously over the glassy-eyed little object. It laughed delightedly and waved its chubby fists.
“Clumsy oaf!” snapped Mrs. McCardle, rubbing her head.
“Sony, dear,” said George. “But at least we must have got a good mark out of it on the tapes. I suppose it scores us good when it laughs.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Probably,” she said. “George, do you think if you fell heavily on the sidewalk—?”
“No,” said George convulsively. Mrs. McCardle looked at him for a moment and held her peace. I (“Note, young gentlemen,” said the history professor, “the turning point, the seed of rebellion.” They noted.)
The McCardles and the Toddler drove off down Sunrise Highway, which was lined with filling stations; since their ’98 Landcruiser made only two miles to the gallon, it was not long before they had to stop at one.
The Toddler began its ripsaw shriek when they stopped. A hollow-eyed attendant shambled over and peered into the car. “Just get it?” he asked apathetically.
“Yes,” said Mrs. McCardle, frantically trying to joggle the Toddler, to change it, to burp it, to do anything that would end the soul-splitting noise.
“Half pint of white 90-octane gas is what it needs,” mumbled the attendant. “Few drops of SAE 40 oil. Got one myself. Two weeks to go. I’ll never make it. I’ll crack. I’ll—I’ll . . .” He tottered off and returned with the gasoline in a nursing bottle, the oil in an eye-dropper.
The Toddler grabbed the bottle and began to gulp the gas down contentedly.
“Where do you put the oil?” asked Mrs. McCardle.
He showed her.
“Oh,” she said.
“Fill her up,” said George. “The car, I mean. I …
ah … I’m going to wash my hands, dear.”