“I must warn you,” Redwine said to Unk, “that when you go out among all those people you mustn’t say anything that would indicate that God took a special interest in you, or that you could somehow be of help to God. The worst thing you could say, for instance, would be something like, ‘Thank God for delivering me from all my troubles. For some reason He singled me out, and now my only wish is to serve Him.’
“The friendly crowd out there,” continued Redwine, “could turn quite ugly quite fast, despite the high auspices under which you come.”
Unk had been planning to say almost exactly what Redwine had warned him against saying. It had seemed the only proper speech to make. “What — what should I say?” said Unk.
“It has been prophesied what you will say,” said Redwine, “word for word. I have thought long and hard about the words you are going to say, and I am convinced they cannot be improved upon.”
“But I can’t think of any words — except hello — thank you — ” said Unk. “What do you want me to say?”
“What you do say,” said Redwine. “Those good people out there have been rehearsing this moment for a long time. They will ask you two questions, and you will answer them to the best of your ability.”
He led Unk through the airlock to the outside. The fire engine’s fountain had been turned off. The shouting and dancing had stopped.
Redwine’s congregation now formed a semicircle around Unk and Redwine. The members of the congregation had their lips pressed tightly together and their lungs filled.
Redwine gave a saintly signal.
The congregation spoke as one. “Who are you?” they said.
“I — I don’t know my real name,” said Unk. “They called me Unk.”
“What happened to you?” said the congregation. Unk shook his head vaguely. He could think of no apt condensation of his adventures for the obviously ritual mood. Something great was plainly expected of him. He was not up to greatness. He exhaled noisily, letting the congregation know that he was sorry to fail them with his colorlessness. “I was a victim of a series of accidents,” he said. He shrugged. “As are we all,” he said.
The cheering and dancing began again.
Unk was hustled aboard the fire engine, and driven on it to the door of the church.
Redwine pointed amiably to an unfurled wooden scroll over the door. Incised in the scroll and gilded were these words:
I WAS A VICTIM OF A SERIES OF ACCIDENTS,
AS ARE WE ALL.
Unk was driven on the fire engine straight from the church to Newport, Rhode Island, where a materialization was due to take place.
According to a plan that had been set up years before, other fire apparatus on Cape Cod was shifted so as to protect West Barnstable, which would be without its pumper for a little while.
Word of the Space Wanderer’s coming spread over the Earth like wildfire. In every village, town, and city through which the fire engine passed, Unk was pelted with flowers.
Unk sat high on the fire engine, on a two-by-six fir timber laid across the cockpit amidships. In the cockpit itself was the Reverend C. Homer Redwine.
Redwine had control of the fire engine’s bell, which he rang assiduously. Attached to the clapper of the bell was a Malachi made of high-impact plastic. The doll was of a special sort that could be bought only in Newport. To display such a Malachi was to proclaim that one had made a pilgrimage to Newport.
The entire Volunteer Fire Department of West Barnstable, with the exception of two non-conformists, had made such a pilgrimage to Newport. The fire engine’s Malachi had been bought with Fire Department funds.
In the parlance of the souvenir hawkers in Newport, the Fire Department’s high-impact plastic Malachi was a “genuwine, authorized, official Malachi.”
Unk was happy, because it was so good to be among people again, and to be breathing air again. And everybody seemed to adore him so.
There was so much good noise. There was so much good everything. Unk hoped the good everything would go on forever.