| “REPENT, HARLEQUIN!” | SAID THE | TICKTOCKMAN924, ISSEWTTAL ELLISON the ones who poured the very best butter over the cams and of the culture, Not unti he had become a note springs become obvious that somehow, someway, y, a celebrity, perhaps even a hero for (what ly tagged) “an emotionally disturbed segment of ey turn it over to the Ticktockman and his legal n, because it was the very world it was, and they ¢ would happen —possibly a strain of disease ow, suddenly, reborn in a system whe ily had forgotten, had n allowed to become too real Now he had form and He had become a personality, so "m many decacle wething they had of the ut there it was, and there he was, a very lity. In certain circles — middle-class circles — ion. Anarchistic. Shameful. In ta where thought is subjugated But down below, ah, down below, saints an ad and Napoleon; ce of Aces); Jesus; a Jomo Kenyatta, ike socially-altuned Shipwreck Kellys, every tening to dislodge the wealthy, powerful and —he was considered a menace; grace; a peril. He was known down the fine, to the very heart. ‘meat core, but the important reactions were high above and far below Atthe very top, at the very bottom, So his file was turned over, along with his tin late, to the office of the Ticktockman, ‘The Tiektockman: very much over six feet "n things went timewise, The Ticktockman, les of the hierarchy, where fear was generated, ‘Ticktockman, But no one called iggering: those I, niceties, propri irheroes and vi 1d; a Dick Bong: ( ‘You don’t cal mask, is capable of reve mana hated name, not when that ig the minutes, the hours, the: life, He was called the Master Timekeeper to way. We Tiektockman with genuine softy time-card I'm holding in my left hand h he is, not who he is. The cardi nel is also named, but not whom named, merely Before Lean exercise proper revocation, [have to know why th To his staff, I the loguers, all the finks,. ‘ho is this Harlequin?” heard him utter at hecommex, but not any case, But even speech they had e loggers, the finks, we mineez, who ustally weren't around to know, they scurried to find out. Wh wove the third level of the city, he crouched on the I mum-frame platform of the air-boat (foot! ait-boat, swizzleskidl is what it was, with a tow-rack jerry-rigged) and he stared down at the neat Mondrian arrangement of the but n, going home, An elfin grin spread across his peared fora moment shrugged with sx and threw boat dropped. He skimmed ov feet to erease the large ears — agga-wugga. It was a minor tumbled, sending parcels every red features, and his dimples hatch of auburn swalk, purposely dropping a few of fashion, and —inserting thumbs ue, rolled his eyes and went wugga- n. One pedestrian skittered and mn he swirled away on a vagrant breeze; and was go he rounded the comice of the lestepped up onto the slow-strip and intof'a Busby Berkeley film of the antec advanced across the strips ostrich-wall ) J, and there wassa tooth back there on the left sce. He dipped, skimmed, and swooped ind then, inching about on the air-boat, home-nade pouring that kept his cargo from dumping prematurely. An as he pulled frough-pins, the ai-boat slid over the factory workers artl one Iuundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of elly heans cascaded! dawn the expres Jelly jcorice and grape and raspberry and mint and round and sinooth crunchy ontside and soft me le and sugary and bouncing tumbling clttring clattering skitering felon the heads and‘with quite-mad coocoo newness, Jelly b 's howled and laughed and were pelted, and broke | ranks, and the jelly beans managed to work their way into the mec of the slidewalks after which there was a hideous sera} of a million fingernails rasped down a quarter of a1 ng and a sputt everyone was dumped t amble, still aughing and poppiny into their mouths. It was a bo jae le was thrown off by seven Quotas were delayed by inoperative s He had tapped the first domino in the hike , the others had fal cd been seven minutes’ worth of disrupted. tiny matter, one hardly worthy of note, but ina society where driving, force was order and n and attention to the elock, reverence of the gods of the passage of time, it was a disaster of major importan So he was ordered to appear before the Ticklockmn. It was broadcast annel of the ations web. He was ordered to be nit on time. And they waited, and they waited, but Imost ten-thirty, at which time he merely sa «all been waiting since seven, he question remained: Who i n (more important of the two) w: is position, where a laughing, irresponsib bberwocky and jive could disruptour entire economic and a hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of jelly bean up and count the accounted for—no years. Where did h That's another good question, More than likely it will never be swered fo your complete satistaction. But then, how many questions ever are? uddle you know. Here desk pad. Day for day, and turn each day. 9:00—open the mail. 9:45—appointment with planning commission board. 10:30— “I'm sorry, Miss Grant, but the time for interviews was set ‘at 2:50, and it's almost five now. I'm sorry you're late, but those are the rules. You'll have to wait till next year to submit application for this college again.” And so ina. undays f Holidays, at “t couldict wait, Fred I had-to be at Pierre Cart youd mect me nner the clock inthe terminal at 2:45, and.yon wereiit there, 0 head.to go ot. Youre alionys late, Ered. {pcb thar te cul have seed dup together, but ast ns swell, 1 took-the order alone... Anil so it goes, Dear Mr. and Mis. Atterley: In reference to your son Gerold’s constant tardiness, ! am afraid we will have to suspend him from school unless some more rellable method! can be instituted guaranteeing he will ative classes on time. Granted he is an exemplary student, and his marks are high 1g of the schedules of this schoo! makes it impractical to maintain him in a system where the other children seem capable of getting where they are supposed to be on time and soit goes, ‘YOU CARNOT VOTE UNLESS YOU APPEAR AT :45 au "I DONT CARE IF THE SCRIPT IS GOOD, | NEED IT THURSDAY? CHECK-OUT TIME IS 2:00 rm. “The jobs taken. S y "You gothere la YOUR SALARY HAS BEEN DOCKED FOR TWENTY MINUTES TIME LOST, ‘God, what time ‘ve gotta run” goes. And so it goes, And so it goes. And so it goes goes goes 3008 tick tock tick tock tick tock and one day we no longer le 've time and we are slaves of the schedule, worshippers of928 the sun's passing, system wi becomes a sin, ‘Then a crime. EFFECTIVE 15 JULY 2389 12:00:00 midnight, the office of the Master Timekeeper will require all citizens to submit their time- cards and cardioplates for processing. In accordance with Statute 555-7-SGH-999 governing the revocation of time per capita, all cardioplates will be keyed to the individual holder and— ‘What they had done was devise a of lifea person could have, If he was ten minutes late, he lost ten m ‘was proportionately worth more revocat ‘and he would be “turned off” at high noon on Monday, please straighten your affairs, sir, madame or bisex. And so, by th “Now that is really disgy showed him the wanted poster.” all, this isn’t the Day of the Desperado. A wanted post “You know,” Pretty Alice noted, “you speak with a great deal of sn Pretty Alice nprobable, After ny,” equin, humbly, «do be sorry. You're always saying, V'm sorry’ You have such “Vm sorry,” hesaid again, then pur momentarily. He hadn’t wanted to say rose, rins fora moment. “Ihave to for an exit line, “Well, you speak wi inflection, foo!” Pretty Alice rolled her pretty eyes heavenward. “You're ridiculous. The lamming the door, which sighed shut ick petulantl an exhalation “Vit be back tle knock, and Pretty Alice got up wi he door. He stood thes d her these dumb things? and went off to be late once mo aakoays right: He shrugged aga fF the Fire rockets that said: 1 115th annual International Medical Association Invocation at 8: ly. I do hope you will all be able t ind they were hauled up, kic ing, high above the heater’s floor. The Harlequin laughed and laughed, and clave, roared ‘s apologies with exaggerated bowing and posturing, and a merry time was had by all, who thought the Harlequin was a regular foofaraw in fancy pants; all that is, but the authorities, who had been sent ont by the office of the Ticktockman; they hung there like so much dockside cargo, hauled up above thi /* totally unrelated in every way to what save thatit illustrates the Ticktockman’s power and import, aman named mnal “look of he knew what it was, were a glass slide tinged with bo prayed it was not for her. Let it be for Marsh, she thought, brutally, or one of the kids, but not for me, please dear God, not for sn she opened it, and it zoas for Marsh, and she was at one930 ‘Tu Essvriat. Ei and the same time horrified and relieved. The next trooper in the line -amed, “Marshall! Termination, whattl we do, whatil we do, Marshall omigodmarshall...” and in their home that night was the sound of tearing, paper and fear, and the stink of madness went up the flue and there was nothing, absolutely nothing they could do about it. miles away, and the office of ths and Marshall Delahanty keeled over, running, and and 0p} e blood dried up on its way to his brain, and he was dead t roles till she could remarry. Which isthe end of the footnote, and all the point that need be ace, except don't lqugh, because that is what would happen to th niflever the Ticktockman found out his real name. Itisn’tfunny) shopping level of the city was thronged with the Thursday-colors of the buyers. Women in canary yellow chitons and men in pseudo- loon pant lips, everyone pointed and stared, and “Why let them order you about? Why let them tell you to hurry and scurry like ants or maggots? Take your time! Saunter a while! Enj luva way to die, slowly, by degrees. . .down with, Fiektockmant Who's the nut? most of the shoppers wanted to know. Who's the nut oh wow I'm gonna be late 1 ‘And the construction gang on the Shopping Center received an urgent order from the office ofthe Master Timekeeper that the dangerous ern time on their construction schedule, but the Ticktockman managed to pu the proper threads of governmental webbing, and they were told to cease work andl ca Soa dozen and more burly workers platforms, releasing, the a-gray plates, and Alter the debacle (in wh personal safely, no one was set id vanished. , and the shopping cycle was ig needs of the system measures were taken to accelerate day, but it got bogged down and fes and not nearly en io was off, wh too many meant that the poy ses and cases of sp% case only every three or fot ssh industries felt it, Don't come back till you have him!” the Ticktockman said, very. ly, extremely dangeroush ey used cardioplate crossofts. y. They used stiktytes. They used wy used torment. They used torture, They used finks, wey used cops. They used searchéeseizure, They used fallaton. They used betterment incentive, They used fingerprints. They used the Bertillon system. They used cunt used Raoul They used t inology. ‘And what the hell: they caught him, Afterall, his name was Everelt C, Marm, and he wasn’t much to begin with, excepta man who had no sense of time. in’t help much. They used applied physics, “Repent, Harlequi tockman, “Get stuffed!” the Harlequin replied, sneering, “You've been late a total of sixty-three years, five months, three weeks, days, twelve hours, forty-one minutes, fifty-nine seconds, point oh three six one one one microseconds, You've used up everything you can, isto turn you off.” weone else. I'd rather be dead that live in th a bogeyman like you.” dumb world -an’t adjust. You: “Unstrap me, and IIL fit my fi “You're a nonconformist.” “That didn’t used to be “Ibis now. Live in the we “that “Not everyone thinks t peo}and most of the peo} true, F interested, iamed Pretty Alice told us who you were.” wen do italready, and stop arguing with me.” I'm not going to turn you off." “You're an idiot! “Repent, Harleg "Get stuffed.” id the Ticktocki im to Coventry. And in Coventry they worked him over, It was just like what they did to Winston Smith in Niner Ei which wasa book none of them knew about, but the techniques are re quite ancient, and so they did itto Bverett C, Mar; and one day, quite a {ong time later, the Harlequin appeared on the communications web, appearing elfinand dimpled and bright-eyed, and notatall brainwashed, and he said te had been wrong, that it was a good, a very good thing indeed, to belong, to be right on time hip-ho and away we go, and everyone stared up at him on the public screens that covered an entire well, you see, he was just a nut and if that's the way the system is run, then Jets do it that way, because it doesn’t pay to fight city hall, or in this case, the Tiektockman, So Everett C, Marm was destroyed, which was a loss, because of what ‘Thoreau said earlier, but you can’t make an omelet fow eggs, and in every revolution afew die who shouldn't, but they have to, because that’s the way it happens, and if you make only a then it seems to be worthwhile, Or, to make the point luci is mask, nec, mrnee, “That's ridiculous!” murmured the Ticktockman b “Check your watch.” And then he went into his office ‘mrmee, inrmee