“There could be a mint in it, Joe!”
“That’s what I thought, too. That’s why I’m willing to give you ten per cent…”
“Now look here,” squawked Lewis. “You can’t pull a deal like that. I wouldn’t touch it for less than fifty.”
“I’m letting you in on it,” I said, “because you’re a neighbour. I don’t know beans about this technical business. I’m getting stuff I don’t understand and I need some help to find out what it is, but I can always go to someone else…”
It took us three drinks to get the details settled—35 per cent for him, 65 for me.
“Now that that’s settled,” I said, “suppose you tell me what you found.”
“Found?”
“That block I gave you. You wouldn’t have tom down here and had the drinks all set up and waiting if you hadn’t found something.”
“Well, as a matter of fact…”
“Now just a minute,” I warned him. “We’re going to put this in the contract—any failure to provide full and complete analysis…”
“What contract?”
“We’re going to have a contract drawn up, so either of us can sue the other within an inch of his life for breaking it.”
Which is a hell of a way to start out a business venture, but it’s the only way to handle a slippery little skate like Lewis.
So he told me what he’d found. “It’s an emotions gauge.
That’s awkward terminology, I know, but it’s the best I can think of.”
“What does it do?”
“It tells how happy you are or how sad or how much you hate someone.”
“Oh, great,” I said, disappointed. “What good is a thing like that? I don’t need a gauge to tell me if I’m sore or glad or anything.”
He waxed practically eloquent. “Don’t you see what an instrument like that would mean to psychiatrists? It would tell more about patients than they’d ever be willing to tell about themselves. It could be used in mental institutions and it might be important in gauging reactions for the entertainment business, politics, law-enforcement and Lord knows what else.”
“No kidding! Then let’s start marketing!”
“The only thing is…”
“Yes?”
“We can’t manufacture them,” he said frustratedly. “We haven’t got the materials and we don’t know how they’re made.
You’ll have to trade for them.”
“I can’t. Not right away, that is. First I’ve got to be able to make the Traders understand what I want, and then I’ll have to find out what they’re willing to trade them for.”
“You have some other stuff?”
“A few things.”
“You better turn them over to me.”
“Some that could be dangerous. Anyhow, it all belongs to me. I’ll give you what I want, when I want and…”
We were off again.
We finally wound up by adjourning to an attorney’s office.
We wrote up a contract that is probably one of the legal curiosities of all time.
I’m convinced the attorney thought, and still thinks, both of us are crazy, but that’s the least of my worries now.
The contract said I was to turn over to Lewis, for his determination of its technical and merchandisable nature, at least 90 per cent of certain items, the source of which I alone controlled, and with the further understanding that said source was to remain at all times under my exclusive control. The other 10 per cent might, without prejudice, be withheld from his examination, with the party of the first part having sole authority to make determination of which items should constitute the withheld 10 per cent.
Upon the 90 per cent of the items supplied him, the party of the second part was to make a detailed analysis, in writing, accompanied by such explanatory material as was necessary to the complete understanding of the party of the first part, within no more than three months after receipt, at the end of which time the items reverted solely to the ownership of the party of the first part. Except that such period of examination and determination might be extended, under a mutual agreement made in writing, for any stated time.
Under no circumstances should the party of the second part conceal from the party of the first part any findings he might have made upon any of the items covered by the agreement, and that such concealment, should it occur, should be considered sufficient cause for action for the recovery of damages. That under certain conditions where some of the items might be found to be manufacturable, they could be manufactured under the terms of clauses A, B and C, section XII of this agreement.
Provisions for a sales organization to market any of said items shall be set up and made a part of this agreement. That any proceeds from such sales shall be divided as follows: 65 per cent to the party of the first part (me, in case you’ve gotten lost, which is understandable), and 35 per cent to the party of the second part (Lewis); costs to be apportioned accordingly.
There were a lot more details, of course, but that gives you an idea.
We got home from the attorney’s office, without either of us knifing the other, and found Marge over at my place. Lewis went in with me to have a look at the desk.
Apparently the Trader had received the ABC book all right and had been able to understand why it was sent, for there, lying on the desk, was a picture cut out of the book. Well, not cut out, exactly—it looked more as though it had been burned out.
The picture on the desk was Z for zebra.
Lewis stared worriedly at it. “Now we’re really in a fix.”
“Yeah,” I admitted. “I don’t know what the market price is, but they can’t be cheap.”
“Figure it out—-expedition, safari, cages, ship, rail, fodder, keeper. You think we can switch him to something else?”
“I don’t see how. He’s put in his order.”
Bill came wandering in and wanted to know what was up.
When I glumly told him, he said cheerfully, “Aw, that’s the whole trick in trading, Pop. If you got a bum jack-knife you want to trade, you unload it on somebody who doesn’t know what a good knife is like.”
Lewis didn’t get it, but I did. “That’s right! He doesn’t know a zebra is an animal, or, if he does, how big it is!”
“Sure,” Bill said confidently. “All he saw was a picture.”