YOUNG ENG. (Shakes foot of ladder.) No! No, Sky Manager, no!
OLD MAN. (Looks down curiously.) What is this? A mere stripling challenges the caretaker of the heavens? Enter unkempt young radical through trap door in stage.
RADICAL. (Sneeringly) Take it down.
YOUNG ENG. There’s never been a more brilliant, beautiful star!
RADICAL. There’s never been a bloodier, blacker one!
OLD MAN. (Looks perplexedly from the two men to the star and back.) Hmmmm. Are you prepared to appeal the fate of this star with reason rather than emotion? My duties require that I be the sworn enemy of emotion. YOUNG ENG. I am!
RADICAL. I, too. (Smiles.) And I promise to take very little of your time.
CLOSE QUARTER-SPHERES.
OPEN QUARTER-SPHERES.
A tall judge’s rostrum now surrounds the old man’s ladder. The old man wears a judge’s wig and robes. The radical and the young engineer are similarly robed and wigged after the fashion of English barristers.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE. Ў@Ў@Ў@Oyez, oyez, oyez! The Court of Celestial Relations is now in session! Ў@Ў@Ў@ OLD MAN. (Bangs with gavel.) Order in the court. The prosecution will proceed.
RADICAL. (Offensively ingratiating.) Your honor, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the prosecution will show that the star in question is as tarnished – nay, black! – as any ever hung in the heavens. I will call but one witness, but that witness in effect is a million witnesses, each of whom could tell the same sordid tale, tell the unvarnished truth in the same simple words from the heart. I’d like to call John Averageman to the stand.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE. John Averageman, John Averageman. Take the stand, please. Enter John Averageman through trap door in stage floor. (He is slightly pudgy, shy, middle-aged, endearing. His clothes are cheap, verging on being comical. He is in awe of the court, and has perhaps had a couple of drinks to bolster his nerve.)
RADICAL. (Touches John’s arm.) I’m looking out for you, John. Take your time about answering. Don’t let them rattle you. Let me do the thinking, and you’ll be all right.
OFFSTAGE
VOICE. Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
JOHN. (Looks questioningly at radical.) Do I?
RADICAL. You do.
RADICAL. John, suppose you tell the court what you did before the war, before this new star arose to spoil, to besmirch the heavens.
JOHN. I was a machinist in the Averagetown Works of the Averagetown Manufacturing Company.
RADICAL. And now?
JOHN. I’m in the Reconstruction and Reclamation Corps, sir. Shovelman First Class.
RADICAL. Suppose, for the edification of the court, you tell us what you made before the star arose, and what you make now.
JOHN. (Stares upward, remembering and computing with difficulty.) Well, sir, when the defense work and all got going before the war, seems to me I could make better’n a hundred a week with overtime. Best week I ever had, I guess, was about a hundred and forty-five dollars. Now I get thirty a week.
RADICAL. Uh-huh. In other words, as that star went up, your income dropped. To be exact, John, your income dropped about eighty per cent.
YOUNG ENG. (Jumps to feet impulsively, likably.) Your honor, I –
OLD MAN. Wait until the cross-examination.
YOUNG ENG. Yessir. Sorry, sir.
RADICAL. I think we’ve made it amply clear that the American standard of living has tumbled eighty per cent. (His features assume an annoyingly pious expression.) But enough of merely materialistic considerations. What has the ascent of this star meant to John Averageman in terms of his spirit? John, tell the court what you told me. Remember? About the engineers and managers –
JOHN. Yessir. (Looks hesitantly at young engineer.) No offense, sir –
RADICAL. (Prodding.) The truth can never be spoken without someone getting hurt, John. Go right ahead.
JOHN. Well, sir, it hurts a man a lot to be forgotten. You know – to have the fellers in charge, the engineers and managers, just sort of look right through him like they don’t see him. A guy likes to know somebody thinks enough of him to look out for him.
YOUNG ENG. (Urgently) Your honor!