STRANGE SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY OMNIBUS (4 page)

“Of course, Mr. Disney,” Ludeveccio said,. not wishing to appear pushy by calling him ‘Walt.’ My name is Ludeveccio. My mother only gave me one name. My father’s name was Medici, he added proudly. He was from one of the most distinguished families in Florence.”

“I’m glad to meet you Ludeveccio,” Mr. Disney said. “Tell me, you said your father came from Florence. Is that Florence, Italy?”

“Why yes, of course.” He recognized the use of the name Italy, although generally it had not been used in Sicily. “Can you tell me where we are? I’ve been traveling, and when I met you on the beach I was actually uncertain of my location..”

“We’re in southern California, close to Hollywood.”

This did not make sense to Ludeveccio. He had a good knowledge of geography as it was known back in Sicily, but clearly he was a considerable distance from his home. Possibly, he could ascertain in what time he was in. Not wanting to mention the time machine, he decided to probe the subject indirectly.

“Do you know which day it is?” he inquired.

“Why yes, it’s April Seventeenth,” Mr. Disney said.

This was of no help. “I wonder if you could tell me the full date, including the year. As you noted, my English is not as good as it should be, and I’d like to be able to use it correctly.”

“Of course,” Mr. Disney said. “It’s April seventeenth, nineteen twenty-eight.”

Nineteen twenty-eight. Ludeveccio realized that he had traveled almost eight hundred years into the future.

“My God,” Mr. Disney suddenly exclaimed, putting down his cup of coffee. “I almost forgot. I have a meeting today with the studio. I have to get dressed and be there by ten.” He hurriedly put his cup on the table and started to get dressed. “I have to make a good impression,” he said. Ludeveccio was unsure if Mr. Disney was talking to him or to himself. “But what can I tell them?” he asked. “I still don’t have any good idea in my head.’

Ludeveccio was sorry Mr. Disney was so agitated. “Can I help you?” he asked. “I wish you could, Mr. Disney” said sorrowfully. I’ve been trying to think up a story line for a cartoon full length cartoon movie. I just can’t think of one. That’s why I was so drunk yesterday. I’ve just become so depressed.”

“Let me try,” the mouse answered. His mother had always told him to offer a helping hand whenever needed. “It would help me I understood what you mean by cartoonist and movie.”

“I forgot you’re not from Hollywood,” Mr. Disney said thoughtfully. “I forgot you’re from Italy. I guess they haven’t developed cartoonists or movies there. A cartoonist,” he explained, is a type of artist. Only he doesn’t draw exactly how a person looks but exaggerates some feature, usually to make his drawing humorous. Such as making a man’s large ears even larger or a man’s sharp nose even larger. A movie,” he went on, “is a series of pictures showing movements, each one a little bit later in time, drawn so as to give the impression of the person shown moving. The word is actually a contraction of the name, moving pictures.”

“I think I understand,” said Ludevecchio. But why do you want to make fun of a person by exaggerating some flaw in his appearance?”

“Generally, we draw cartoons of political officials, to show our disapproval of their actions or policies. Occasionally, we may draw a cartoon of an animal, such as the lion to represent the British Empire. The problem is I’ve been asked to propose a cartoon movie about an animal. I can’t think of what animal to use or what the story line would be.”

“That doesn’t seem an insurmountable obstacle,” the mouse answered thoughtfully. “I suppose under some circumstances, some people might consider me to be an animal. I would be pleased to assist you by serving as a model for a cartoon. Nothing really exciting has ever happened to me, but I have a good imagination and could probably suggest a story line or two.”

Walt Disney looked as though an inspiration had just hit him in the face. He grabbed a sketch pad and charcoal, eyed Ludeveccio for a minute, and then began drawing furiously. When he finished he showed the mouse what he had drawn. It was of what appeared to be a mouse, but one standing up on his back legs. Ludeveccio had occasionally taken that position, but it was not really comfortable for him. The mouse’s ears also far too big, Ludeveccio supposed in an effort to make it amusing. It was really difficult, the mouse thought, to understand the human sense of humor. Probably, the oddest part of the cartoon was that Mr. Disney had dressed the mouse in a short garment covering his legs down to the knees, gloves and shoes. Since mice are protected by their fur and do not need garments the way humans do, Ludevecchio assumed this also was supposed to be funny.

To be polite, Ludevecchio smiled and nodded his approval. He hoped that Mr. Disney was a better judge of human humor than he was. Mr. Disney then took back the pad and carefully colored the sketch, using water colors. The mouse in the sketch was colored the same as Ludeveccio’s own fur, but the gloves were white, the shoes yellow and the pants green. Once again, Ludeveccio yielded to Mr. Disney’s superior knowledge of people.

Mr. Disney finished dressing, put the sketchpad into a briefcase, and walked to the cottage door. “Wish me luck, Ludevecchio,” he said. If I can’t sell this to the studio, we’re both going to be out on the street. The door closed and the mouse began pacing the floor, in a state of great apprehension. From time to time, he would try to divert himself by climbing on to the table and staring out at the beach and ocean. To no avail. Each second was an hour, each hour an eternity.

By studying the position of the sun through the cottage window, Ludeveccio realized that it was now late afternoon, and Mr. Disney had still not returned. He prayed that the human had not become so depressed at having his proposal rejected that he had gone out and gotten intoxicated again. The mouse was also frightfully hungry. If he could have been sure of opening without breaking it the large metal cabinet Mr. Disney had referred to as the refrigerator and securing more cream, he would have done so, though he certainly would not have eaten any more of that awful stuff Mr. Disney called American cheese.

When he was on the brink of going out on to the beach and seeing if Mr. Disney was lying down in the surf drunk, he heard the cottage door open. Mr. Disney entered a gigantic grin on his face. “We did it!” he explained. “The studio loved the idea. They signed me to a great contract and gave me a big cash advance. How can I ever thank you? Naturally, we’ll split the cash fifty-fifty.”

“There’s no need for that, Mr. Disney” the mouse replied. “After all, what’s your success is my success. All I ask is that you give me a good home and feed me good cheese and cream every day.”

“That goes without saying,” Mr. Disney replied. He opened a paper bag he had I his pocket. “I could tell you didn’t care for the American cheese,” he said. “The reason I am so late is that I tried to buy some good Italian cheese for you. None of the stores I tried had any. I was about to give up when I passed one of new Italian restaurants that have opened up. I entered and explained my problem. The chef was most helpful. He sold me a bit of a cheese he called pecorino. When I said I had never heard of it he explained that it is made from sheep’s milk and is very popular in Sicily.

Mr. Disney sliced a bit of the cheese and put it on a saucer in front of Ludeveccio. The mouse tasted it and smiled. It was the best cheese he had had in a long time. Back in the happy days when Roger II was king of Sicily, the mouse had occasionally had the opportunity to gather a piece or two of it. The cheese brought back the happy days he had passed at the palace.

Mr. Disney, meanwhile, had removed his sketch pad from the brief case and opened it for Ludeveccio. “The studio,” he explained, generally liked my idea, but made a few suggested changes. Under the circumstances, I thought it was wiser to accept them all. I’m afraid they thought your fur not colorful enough and proposed I make it black. Similarly, they didn’t like your shorts colored green and wanted them to be black, with yellow buttons. Is that acceptable to you?”

“Of course,” Ludeveccio answered. He certainly didn’t want to call Mr. Disney any trouble.

“I’m afraid there is still one other change,” Mr. Disney said carefully. “I didn’t like it. If you wish, I will go back to the studio and try and get them to change their mind.” From his demeanor, the mouse could sense Mr. Disney hoped he wouldn’t have to take this step. Ludeveccio wondered what horrible disclosure Mr. Disney was about to make.

“Naturally,” Mr. Disney continued, “I proposed we call the hero of the cartoon Ludeveccio, after you. They objected. Said it was too foreign. Then I suggest Medici, after your father. They liked that better, but still thought it too foreign sounding for American audience. They anglicized it to Mickey and want to call the hero Mickey Mouse.” Ludeveccio, thought for a minute. “I agree,” he said quietly.

The rest is history. The first Mickey Mouse cartoon proved to be a great financial success and many more cartoon movies and comic strips featuring the mouse followed. The cartoon studio bearing his name flourished and he became a multi-millionaire many times over. Today is still exists as one of America’s largest companies. Walt Disney and Ludeveccio move to a grand new home Walt Disney purchased in Hollywood, although they kept the little beach cottage for vacations.

Walt Disney and the mouse became such good friends that Ludeveccio began referring to Walt Disney by his first name and he affectionately called the mouse by the nickname Lou. Every day, Ludeveccio dined on the finest of Italian cheeses and he slept every night in a little bed, on satin sheets. As a treat for the mouse, when time permitted, Walt Disney would carry Ludeveccio concealed in his jacket pocket to the Pasadena campus of Cal Tech, where he would drop the mouse for the day. Ludeveccio would go to one of the seminar rooms used by the advanced engineering and physics classes to audit the discussions, concealing himself behind the books in a bookcase. On several occasions, when the professor mistakenly declared there was no possibility of time travel, Ludeveccio was tempted to voice his objection. However, he always managed to hold his tongue, aware that humans do not take kindly to being corrected by a mouse.

He mouse lived a very long and very happy life. At last, as it must to all mice, death came for Ludeveccio. As the end drew near, Walt Disney took Ludeveccio to the little cottage on the beach, and placed the mouse’s bed on a table so that he could look out and view the beach and ocean he loved so well. On Ludeveccio’s final night, Walt Disney did not leave his side, holding Ludeveccio’s hand and softly weeping. He did not want to say goodbye to his best friend, to whom he owed so much.

Shortly after dawn, Ludeveccio opened his eyes to take a last look at the beach and ocean. The sight was always dear to his heart. It brought back the memory of his arrival in California and his meeting with Walt Disney. Closing his eyes, he said more to himself than to Walt Disney, “I have had the most wonderful life any mouse could possibly have. I now pray that the most merciful God will permit me to enter Mouse Heaven. He then breathed his last, an expression of complete satisfaction on his face.

There is only one sad footnote to the story of Ludeveccio’s life. His time machine, the only time machine ever invented on this earth, vanished from the beach on the day of the mouse’s arrival, washed away by the tide. The machine, which could have contributed so much to human knowledge, now sits on the ocean floor some miles off the California coast. It was last viewed by human eyes in 1948, when a diver came across it while checking on an offshore oil drilling platform. He actually picked it up and examined it. Owing to the advanced state of deterioration and its tiny mouse size, he failed to appreciate its potential value and deposited it on the ocean floor, where it remains to this day.

The shade of John Wilkes Booth was unhappy. This was not surprising. The souls of the damned in Hell are supposed to be unhappy. But the shade of the late actor was so unhappy that it aroused attention. One day, Satan sent for him.

“You’re giving Hell a bad name,” he declared. “You’re supposed to be miserable here because of the punishments we inflict. Instead, you’re making yourself unhappy. That’s against all the rules and I urge you to brace yourself and cheer up. Let us be the ones who make you unhappy.”

The damned soul of Booth looked even more sorrowful at these words. “I’ll try to do what I can,” he said, “But I don’t think it will do any good. I’m just so miserable.”

Satan’s nonexistent heart was, of course not touched. Still he was interested. “What seems to be your personal trouble?” he inquired.

“I was a great Shakespearean actor,” Booth said. “But today, nobody remembers that fact. All they think about is that I assassinated Abraham Lincoln.”

“Well after all, you did do that,” came back the Arch Fiend.

“O.K., O.K., so I did do that,” admitted Booth. “One little mistake. Everyone makes mistakes. Lincoln wasn’t very nice to his wife Mary,” I recall. “And I believe that as a lawyer, he got several murderers acquitted by fooling the jury. Anyhow, they named a monument after him. Nobody has ever named anything after me.”

“Well what do you expect me to do about that?” demanded Satan. “Nobody ever claimed that life is fair. Are you hoping I will give you a pass to Heaven? Don’t be foolish. Take your medicine like a man. Follow the proper procedures, and let us make you as miserable as your deeds in life require.”

Satan’s words did not have the desired effect on Booth. Instead the late actor began a lengthy soliloquy from “The Merchant of Venice.”

More to shut him up that anything else, Satan asked, “Do you have any practical remedy to suggest?”

“All I want is a chance to defend myself,” Booth said with a hangdog air. “Why don’t you let me post a clarification of my story on a bulletin board in Hell?”

Eager to end the conversation, and wishing to ward off another Shakespearean soliloquy, the arch fiend agreed. “Just write out what you want to say, and I’ll take a look at it. As long as it sticks to the facts, it should be acceptable.”