The Zap Gun by Philip K. Dick Page B

Lanferman said.
    "Sure, Jack. Mr. Lanferman."
    "How, in that strange brain of yours, do you conceive a method by which you can advertise? This would be a high-cost item at every level, especially at retail. You couldn't merchandise it through one buyer for a chain of autodepts. It would have to go to cog-class families and be exposed in cog mags. And that's expensive."
    "Hmm," Klug said.
    Lars spoke up. "Klug, let me ask you something."
    "Mr. Lars." Klug extended his hand eagerly.
    "Do you honestly believe that a war-game constitutes a morally adequate product to deliver over to children? Can you fit this into that theory of yours about 'ameliorating' the iniquities of modern—"
    "Oh wait," Klug said, raising his hand. "Wait, Mr. Lars."
    "I'm waiting." He waited.
    "Through capture the child learns the futility of war."
    Lars eyed him skeptically. Like hell he does, he thought.
    "I mean it." Vigorously, Klug's head bobbed up and down in a convinced determined nod of self-assent. "Listen, Mr. Lars; I know the story. Temporarily, I admit it, my firm is in bankruptcy, but I still have cog inside knowledge. I understand, and I'm sympathetic. Believe me. I'm really very, totally sympathetic; I couldn't agree more with what you're doing. Honestly."
    "What am I doing?"
    "I don't merely mean you, Mr. Lars, although you're one of the foremost—" Klug groped urgently for the means to express his fervid ideas, now that he had ensnared an audience. To Klug, Lars observed, an audience consisted of anyone above the number of zero, and above the age of two. Cog and pursap alike; Klug would have pleaded with them all. Because what he was doing, what he wanted, was so important.
    Pete Freid said, "Make a model for some simple toy, Klug." His tone was gentle. "Something the autodept networks can market for a couple of beans. With maybe one moving part. You'd run off a few thousand for him, wouldn't you, Jack? If he brought in a really simple piece?"
    To Vincent Klug he said, "Give me specs and I'll build the prototype for you and maybe get a cost analysis." To Jack he quickly explained, "I mean on my own time, of course."
    Sighing, Lanferman said, "You can use our shops. But please for God's sake don't kill yourself trying to bail out this guy. Klug was in the toy business, and a goddam failure, before you were out of college. He's had a hatful of chances and muffed every one."
    Klug stared at the floor drearily.
    "I'm one of the foremost what?" Lars asked him.
    Without raising his head Klug said, "The foremost healing and constructive forces in our sick society. And you, who are so few, must never be harmed."
    After a suitable interval Lars, Pete Freid and Jack Lanferman howled with laughter.
    "Okay," Klug said. With a sort of miserable, beaten-dog, philosophic slumped shrug he began gathering up his twelve tiny soldiers and his Monitor-citadel. He looked ever increasingly glum and deflated, and clearly he was going to leave—which, for him, was unusual. In fact unheard of.
    Lars said, "Don't interpret our reaction as—"
    "It's not misunderstood," Klug said in a faraway voice. "The last thing any of you wants to hear is that you're not pandering to the sick inclinations of a depraved society. It's easier for you to pretend you've been bought by a bad system."
    "I never heard such strange logic in my life," Jack Lanferman said, genuinely puzzled. "Have you, Lars?"
    Lars said, "I think I know what he means, only he's not able to say it. Klug means that we're in weapons design and manufacture and so we feel we've got to be tough. It's our great and bounden duty, as the Common Prayer Book says. People who invent and implement devices that blow up other people should be cynical. Only the fact is we're loveable."
    "Yes," Klug said, nodding. "That's the word. Love is the basis of your lives, all three of you. You all share it, but especially you, Lars. Compare yourselves to the dreadful police and military agencies who are the real and awful