THE GREEN MILLENNIUM
FRITZ LEIBER
AN ACE BOOK
Ace Publishing Corporation
1120 Avenue of the Americas
New York, N.Y. 10036
Copyright, 1953, by Fritz Leiber
An Ace Book, by arrangement with the Author.
All Rights Reserved
[Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any
evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Cover by John Schoenherr.
For BOB, FRANK, HANK, GERT, and WENDELL
Printed in U.S.A.
The world Phil Gish lived in was not a pretty one, and Phil didn'tenjoy living in it. He was disillusioned, purposeless, hopeless, andhaunted by the fear that a robot would take over his job. But then Philwas a timid person, not much given to adventure seeking. If he hadn'tbeen so mild he might have found his kicks at All Amusements, thesyndicated playground where anyone could find fun, providing he had theproper sadistic and otherwise aberrated elements in his personality.But Phil was good—and bored.
And then one day a cat perched on his window—not an ordinary cat—agreen cat. For the first time in years Phil was happy. He promptlynamed the cat Lucky because he somehow knew that as long as the catstayed with him he'd feel fine. But Lucky didn't stay long. In a matterof minutes he had disappeared into All Amusements park. It was thenthat Phil became involved in a grotesque world, peopled with the mostextraordinary personalities. Just what the cat is and its ultimatemeaning is the secret of it all. You will be surprised.
I
Phil Gish woke up feeling as good as if all his previous life hadhappened to two other guys—poor, miserable clunks!
Usually his whip-cracking reflexes had him out of bed in a flash andjerking on his shorts and sockasins while he frantically hunted aroundfor the jar of beard-dissolving cream. But this time he was able tooutsmart all tyrannous nerve-impulses and keep his eyes closed in orderto enjoy the unprecedented sensation all to himself, not even sharingit with the advertisement-covered walls of his tiny bachelor apartment.
Why, it was simply wonderful, he decided after a bit. Outrageously,impossibly wonderful!
He actually felt as if this were not a world in which hot and coldwars had been gushing unpredictably for fifty years like temperamentalfaucets, in which the Federal Bureau of Loyalty and Fun Incorporatedruled the U. S. A. in the name of that drunken, hymn-singing farmer,President Robert T. Barnes, and in which (according to the KremlinNewsmoon, located on an earth-circling satellite vehicle) a new planwas being considered for exchanging the descendants of prisoners takenin the half-century-old Korean War.
And as if he, Phil Gish, weren't a luck-forsaken little guy who onwaking at eight o'clock this morning hadn't taken four sleeping pillsin order to kill the day and temporarily forget that he had just lostanother job to a robot who did it five times as fast and twice asaccurately, and that he'd had a blow-up because of it and been coldlyadvised to see a psychiatrist.
He took a long, luxurious breath. Even the air smelt and feltdifferent, as if dusted with some golden chemical that banished care.
He opened his eyes and looked down at his pale chest with the two lonehairs that were a sardonic last farewell from glorious jungle ape-hood.But this time the word that came to him was "slim," not "scrawny." Herather liked his body, he decided—a neat and compact, if not exactlyout-size, bit of tissue. He yawned, stretche