Mr. Swift and his Remarkable Thing

Mommababy was in the Kitchen making another version of pyschedelic stew. "Be inventive," urged the author of the recipe. The creative cook had responded to an advertisement in Hallucination, a West Coast periodical. "psychedelic stew and other way-out items! Send 98 cents in stamps. no beads!" The recipe and extras arrived in a plain brown wrapper; the latter included seeds for an indoor marijuana patch, plans for a love-in bash and a photgraph of Doctor Timothy leary in the nude.

Daddybaby was in town making scratch, without which no one can cook anything--not even an ordinary, square, $35-to-the-ounce golden layer cake. Frequently, he brooded on the good old days at Haight-Ashbury, where first he had made it big with Mommababy. That was the scene before she misplaced her pills. B.C., as they referred to the time before cop-out.

Frankiebaby, their five-year-old son and the result of Mommababy's absentmindedness, was floating on a striped mat at the far end of the swimming pool. He was Well within the orbit of Mommababy's eye.

"Frankiebaby," his mother shouted, "stay away from that end of the pool. Play over here. I don't want you sneaking into Mr. Swift's pad again--d' you hear?"

If only she'd leave the kitchen, he could slip through the thick wall of holyhocks. Then he and the old man could finish the project on which they had been intently working for almost six weeks.

The boy aimed his Anti-Establishment Laser Ray at his mother. "POO... . WOW... . Pfftsing!" he muttered. He slipped into the blue-green water and dove to the bottom to think about things.

Mommababy noticed this adorable little hostile gesture. She rushed to the slate blackboard over the stove and erased her shopping list. rebellion is maturing, she wrote in large bold letters. yes, indeed! Frankiebaby was expressing exactly the proper amount of hostility and she was determined to balance it with well-calculated permissiveness. Not too much, though! Erwin, her unfortunate little brother, had been a victim of that sort of excess.

"Don't think of nasty things. Think of flowersm," she trilled aloud. However, just one peep at those hollyhocks jolted her back into cruel reality. How much they bugged her! Such a loathsome pink! The color ruined the effect of the black-and-orange-tiled walk around the swimming pool. Much worse was the giddy, towering contraption behind them. She found herself staring at Mr. Swift's "thing." When she and Daddybaby had moved into their brand-new, completely decorated, split-level, ranch-type colonial, there had not been a trace of this scabrous tower of Junk.

On that very afternoon, three months ago, Mommababy had sauntered down to the rickety fence now so resplendent with sassy-face, grinning pink blossoms. She had wanted to be friendly. She waved to her neighbor. Mr. Swift was much too engrossed to notice her. He stood in the center of what appeared to be an octagonal plot of ground, pipes. planks, orange crates, small rocks and garlands of string indicating this peculiar shape. The eight corners were marked by rusted pikes driven into the hard earth, each one covered with tattered red, white and blue bunting. Mr. Swift walked along the borders. stopped occasionally to look at the sky or to scratch either his bare pate or his covered bottom. Mommababy called again. He looked up, gave her a blank stare and continued his computations. She heard him say, "Is the missing factor X?" This query was addressed to the big toe of his left foot, which, after wiggling and digging in the ground, came up at last, apparently without the answer, for the old man uttered, "Damination!" He began hopping around on his right leg with surprising agility for such an old bird. Really quite a sight! His clothes hung on his slender frame. He wore an antiquated cutaway, no longer black but rather irididescent. Around his waist there hung a silver chain and hooked to this odd belt were hammers, chisels, a screwdriver, a battered copper kettle and an empty bottle of Dr Pepper. Bare feet at right angles to torn striped trousrs seemed clown-white against the dark earth. The shiny top of his head reflected the bright sunshine and a tiny cloud of pink hair nestled over each ear.

The house behind him was a sagging waterfall of Victoriana. Gingerbread moldings swooped and sagged; cupolas tilted and leaned into the April wind; dormers toppled and chimney pots blackened by time huddled together like old hobos along the track of the spiked roof. The back porch groaned under piles of papers and magazines; enormous stacks of them rose up over broken railings and spilled into the yard. Three refrigerators, an old icebox and a moosehead clothes rack sat beside the Model T under the portecochere. A row of early-vintage radios littered the back steps. As for the windows, every single one was crammed and packed. In one, a mannequin wearing a lavender boa, a lace shawl and a huge, flowered hat surveyed with a hauteur and elegance the antices of the old man. In another, an old Victrola with a fluted flowerlike speaker sat surrounded by stacks of warped records. Bird cages, hatboxes, bouquets of faded silk flowers, fringed and beaded lamp shades, bicycle wheels, handle bars and thousands of empty cartons of Baby Ruths, Hershey bars and Jujubes threatened to burst through the glass of other windows. The whole house seemed ready to explode at the seams and the shingles ached from the inner pressure.

"Up, up and away ... how bee-oo-tiful, how bee-oo-tiful," Mommababy sang in a high soprano. She checked the oven temperature and saw that her stew was bubbling away. She tried not to look at the weird assemblage that hovered over the pool. It was fascinating. What in the name of the Maharishi was it supposed to be?

This companion piece of Mr. Swift's Victorian Gothic house was nearly 20 feet high. Struts, old rusted pipes, stacks of books, umbrellas and bits of wood and gingerbread molding had been stuck together to form an appalling, octogonal edifice. On the top, the old man was completing what looked like a bird's nest made of old clothing, straw and candy wrappers, Over this, metal hangers had been straightened out and intertwined to form a dome over which plastic sheets were stretched. Yesterday, he'd hauled up an incredibly heavy, battered Stromberg-Carlson Superheterodyne radio cabinet to the aerie. Earlier this morning, he'd ascended the peculiar scaffolding with an archaic gramophone strapped to his back.

The strains of I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen sung by John McCormack scratched over the flower fence, acorss the pool and sent Mommababy fleeing from the kitchen. She hurried into the living room and turned up a long-playing record of Sounds to Freak Out By. She did a few steps of the new Dahomey Dig, the lates dance craze. Feeling less up tight than she had all morning. she sat on the floor and practiced her yoga exercises.

Frankiebaby rushed Through the fence the minute his mother ran out of the kitchen. He stood in front of his own smaller version of the octagonal tower. It was not as high as the hollyhocks, therefore not visible unless one were actually in Mr. Swift's yard.

The old man climbed down to greet him. "The missing factor is Y."

"Did you say 'why'?" asked the child.

"No, laddiebuck, I said 'Y,"' Mr. Swift corrected him.

Frankiebaby continued to stuff small pieces of wool and straw into the smaller bird's nest atop the miniature replica of Mr. Swift's creation. "What happened to X?"

Mr. Swift picked up an empty box labeled chemico set. "Old buckaroo, I found X in this box. In fact, we're all set now. Here, here, old pal, old kid, straighten out these hangers." Mr. Swift tidied up one side of Frankiebaby's dome-shaped plastic cover. "Be certain that everything is scientifically sound--we don't want any trouble with this, may last and most ingenious invention."

"Is this old thing any good?" The child offered a dead mouse to Mr. Swift.

"Most remarkable! Nothing is wasted. Not one thing. Scienc does not allow for a vacuum. Don't ever forget N--the nitrogen factor. For what other reason have I saved everything? The accumulation of a lifetime now ready for utiliaztion. You've seen it all, kiddo. From the first issue of Popular Mechanics to the latest, my erector set given to me fifty-five years ago by my great-aunt Matilda, sixty years of Collier's, not one issue missing, and a kitchen full of Blue Stamps... my house a treasuretrove of priceless objects ... now finally assembled and ready. Aha, yes! Utilize, that's the U factor."

"But I like to know why," the boy persisted. The old man scratched his head. "Buddyboy, that makes two of us." "My mother's calling me. I gotta go now." Frankiebaby looked up at the old man. "When are we going to try... our ... you know." He put his finger to his lips.

Mr. Swift patted the child's head. "Tonight is Z... ." Then he whispered, "Zero hour."

Mommababy had almost reached the far end of the pool as her son came scrambling through the low shrubs under the hollyhocks.

"Frankiebaby, I tol' you, and I tol' you. There's something funny going on in there! Now you've asked for it. This time, I mean business. Go right to your room and get into bed. No supper for you tonight, Mr. Smartass!"

"That's OK by me, if you're making that crazy stew again."

She smoothed out her miniskirt. "Cool it, baby. You go to your room. Do you understand what the doctor is saying?"

"Oh, man, are you going to blow your mind again?" He dodged the blow his mother aimed at him and ran into the house.

Mommababy tingled with irritation. she must reread the Reverend Flonk's little pamphlet titled "Bringing Up your Child in the Space Age." No one knew (concluded on page 186) Mr. Swift (continued from page 104) that she had remained an undercover Presbyterian.

Daddybaby got home, changed into his Nehru jacket and joined Mommababy on the terrace.

"I think the old geek's smoking pot," he said, sniffing the air.

Mommababy handed him a sangria. "Nonsense! I don't want to think about him or that awful thing over there. Well, what did you do today to change the shape of things?" She tickled Daddybaby's chin.

"I got my tie caught in the Xerox machine and all the contracts came out covered with flowers."

"Groovy," Mommababy sang out.

"Where's Frankiebaby?"

"Don't mention him, either. I am so upset. I lost my temper and sent him to bed without supper."

"Freud says--"

Mommababy cast a scathing look at her spouse. "Freud is a square. Remember, we learned that on the Coast."

"What about prepuberty repressions?"

"I can't help them! Anyway, look where permissiveness got my little brother Erwin. You haven't forgotten that, have you?"

He hadn't.

"To think that no one stopped that poor child. For the love of Allen Ginsberg. I was only ten at the time and I could have told them it was all wrong--that the boy should have been stopped. But no! We sat around having dinner while Erwin sawed away at one leg of the table. There he was, buzzing and hacking through the heavy oak leg. They all pretended that it wasn't happening. By the time we got through with salad, the entire table was wobbling. Not one word was said by Father or Mother. Just after dessert, the tragedy happened. The whole damn thing crashed on top of him. Killed him instantly, too! Poor Erwin." Mommababy burst into tears.

"Now, now, that's an old hang-up Let's think about the good things--flowers, beards, sideburns and beads." Daddybaby looked dreamy.

"Yes." agreed Mommababy. "And trips and pot--all those lovely things b. c." She felt better immediately, so proud that she had remembered to use the initials.

After dinner, they popped into bed to watch television. Controversy proved to be a rewarding and stimulating hour. Gore Vidal and Jacqueline Susann discussed the literary merits of Myra Breckinridge and Valley of the Dolls. Before turning out the light, Mommababy wanted to make sure Frankiebaby was tucked in for the night.

"No. Don't be overprotective." Daddybaby was firm.

The lights hadn't been extinguished for more than 20 minutes when an earshattering pounding began, as though thousands of pneumatic drills were working full blast outside the house. It was followed by an enormous blast. Two flashes of light illuminated the room and another great explosion rocked the whole house. A smaller one ensued and set the bed to rocking back and forth.

Mommababy and Daddybaby clutched each other in the darkness.

"Frankie!" shricked the woman, bounding out of bed. She rushed into her son's room.

"He's gone!" she called. Daddybaby was on his way outdoors and they bumped into each other as they scrambled out onto the terrace.

At the far end of the pool, there was a great gaping hole in the fence. The hollyhocks were gone, the air stank of rotten eggs and burning cloth. The pool was littered with straw, leaves of magazines and a dead mouse. Two bicycle wheels rolled of the roof of the house and clattered to the ground behind them. When theyreached the scorched, smoking remains of the lence that had separated the two properties, they looked up. Two bright lights moved into the dark sky above them. Mommababy heard her son's voice yelling with delight. "All circuits A-OK!"

In the smoldering area that had been Mr. Swift's yard, they saw two burning patches, both octagonal in shape. Overhead, the two lights were getting smaller and smaller, as they soared upward.

"Do something!" screamed Mommababy. "I did not bring up my boy to become an unidentified flying object."

"What a trip!" Daddybaby gasped.

At Cape Kennedy, a message came through. "The UFO and the baby satellite have passed into outer space."

"Did you make contact?" The question crackled in the supersonic fighter pilot's ear.

"We heard someone singing. I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen and the... ."

There was some interference at the control center.

"Anything else?"

"Yes, sir. Two things. The first sounded like an old man. Almost blasted my cars. He shouted. 'Tom swift and the Remarkable moon projectH' ... then... ."

There was more static. "Then what?"

"A kid yelled. 'Over and out, baby.' "