Get Smart 8 - Max Smart Loses Control (17 page)

“Max, if you’ll let me go . . .”

“Tell me! Tell me!”

“Max, it isn’t your fault. It’s just that Number One is still grinding out love poetry. And, in that condition, she’s of no use to us anymore. But, don’t blame yourself.”

Max released the Chief’s lapels. “Why should I blame myself?” he asked.

“You shouldn’t.”

“Then why did you say I shouldn’t?” Max asked. “If you really thought I shouldn’t, you wouldn’t even have mentioned it.”

“All right, Max. If it’ll make you feel better, pretend I didn’t say it.”

Max thought for a moment. “It isn’t my fault,” he decided. “No matter what anybody says, it isn’t my fault. All I did was rescue her and bring her back. That was a good thing to do. It wasn’t a bad thing. So why should I feel guilty? I shouldn’t. I have no reason in this world to feel guilty.” He sighed deeply. “Tell me, Chief—how can I make it up to her?”

“Make what up to her, Max?”

“Whatever it was that I did that makes me feel so guilty.”

“Max, there isn’t anything you can do,” the Chief replied. “Apparently there’s nothing anybody can do. Our scientists have been working over her ever since you brought her back, but they haven’t accomplished a thing. She’s still as lovesick as before.”

“Can’t they kind of work around the problem, Chief?”

“Not very easily,” the Chief replied. “Just to test her, they asked her to design a new air defense system. And she advised them to ring the country with butterfly nets.”

“I don’t get the connection,” Max said.

“That’s because you’re not a female,” 99 said. “I understand it, Max. Butterflies are sort of romantic. When you were young and you went on a picnic out into the country with your best girl, didn’t you notice the butterflies?”

“I guess I did, now that you mention it,” Max replied. “Only, in those days, we called them ants.”

“Oh, Max! You’re not a bit romantic!”

“Chief, maybe it would help if we took Hymie over to her,” Max said. “I still think she has a crush on him.”

“Ways and Means tried that, Max—remember?” Hymie said. “It didn’t work. She didn’t pay any attention to me. She just went right on turning out that garbage.”

“Let’s give it one more try, anyway,” Max said. “What’ve we got to lose?”

“Well . . .” the Chief said. He turned to Hymie. “If you have no objections . . .” he said.

Hymie shrugged. “What choice do I have?” he replied. “I’m only a machine.”

The Chief, Max, 99 and Hymie got into Max’s car and drove to the installation where Number One was being treated. As they approached Number One’s quarters, they were met by a scientist in a white coat.

“How’s the patient?” the Chief asked.

“No change,” the scientist replied glumly. “Right now, she’s working on the forty-ninth stanza of an ode in celebration of blind dates.”

“She
is
sick!” 99 said.

“Have you tried a diet of fruit juices?” Max asked.

“Something like that—considering the fact that she’s a machine,” the scientist replied. “She’s getting nothing but lemon oil.”

“How about an aspirin?” Max asked.

“Thanks—I think I will,” the scientist replied. “This case has given me a splitting headache.”

Max dug into his pocket and handed the scientist a tablet. “This may ease it,” he said. “Then, on the other hand, it may cure it permanently. Lots of luck.”

“We came over,” the Chief explained to the scientist, “because we think we may have the solution to the problem. As you know, Hymie and Number One were once steadies. We thought—”

“But that’s all over,” the scientist broke in.

“How can you be so positive about that?” Max asked. “Maybe Number One isn’t finished with Hymie at all. Maybe she’s just being coy. Maybe she just wants him to be the first to apologize.”

“Apologize for what, Max?” 99 asked.

“Don’t ask me,” Max replied. “I wasn’t even there. Ask Hymie.”

99 turned to Hymie. “Apologize for what?” she asked.

“I didn’t do a thing,” Hymie replied.

“There you are—that’s it,” Max said. “She wanted you to do something, Hymie, and you didn’t. No wonder she’s angry. Now, go in there and apologize.”

“For what, Max?”

“For nothing.”

Hymie shrugged. “Well, if you think it’ll help . . .”

Followed by the scientist, Hymie entered Number One’s quarters. A moment later, there was a clanging, a hissing, a rattling, and a banging. Then Hymie came rushing out, with the scientist right behind him.

“Wow!” Max said. “I saw her when you opened the door. She’s really steamed up about something, isn’t she? Was it something Hymie didn’t apologize for?”

“He didn’t get a chance,” the scientist reported. “The instant she set eyes on him, she went into a tantrum.”

“That’s love for you,” Max said.

“Max, face it—it isn’t Hymie who’s the object of Number One’s affections,” 99 said. “We’ll probably never know who it really is. It might be some face that passed in the night.”

“She’s a lost cause, I’m afraid,” the scientist sighed.

“That’s very tragic,” Max said sadly. He looked at his watch. “However, I have a reservation on a flight to good old Wicky-Wacky-Woo. So, if you’ll excuse me . . .”

“I suppose we might as well all go,” the Chief said. “There’s nothing more we can do here.”

99 addressed the scientist. “What will happen to her?” she asked.

“In time, we’ll have to scrap her,” he replied.

Tears came to 99’s eyes.

“99 . . . do you mind?” Max said. “I don’t want to be late for my flight.”

“All right, Max.”

They returned to the car, then headed back toward Headquarters, where Max would drop the Chief, 99 and Hymie before driving on to the airport. But when they had gone no more than a block, a call came on Max’s radio for the Chief. The scientist was asking them all to return.

“I have a reservation,” Max protested.

“Max, don’t you even want to know what it’s about?” 99 asked.

“Couldn’t you write me a letter about it?”

“Max, turn this car around!” the Chief commanded. “That’s an order!”

When they reached the installation, they hurried to Number One’s quarters. The scientist was waiting for them. Instead of telling them why he had called them back, however, he whispered to the Chief, then led him into a conference room.

“You can mail that letter to me in care of the third little grass shack up from the beach,” Max said to 99, edging away.

“All right, Max. Try not to feel too guilty.”

“99! Will you stop that! This isn’t my fault!”

“Who said it was, Max?”

“You keep implying—”

The Chief and the scientist reappeared from the conference room.

“I have some good news,” the Chief announced. “Number One has revealed the object of her affections.”

“I knew it!” Max crowed. “It was Hymie all along, wasn’t it?”

The Chief shook his head. “Max,” he said, “do you remember exactly when it was that Number One began grinding out love poetry?”

“Of course,” Max replied. “We were all there. No, come to think of it, 99 wasn’t present. The way it happened was, Hymie and I were slipping up on Ways and Means, and all of a sudden my telephone began ringing. We found out later that it was at about that time that Number One went haywire.”

“That’s the way Number One described it,” the scientist said.

“You mean she’s talking again?” 99 asked.

“She had a few rational moments,” the scientist replied. “And we got the whole story.”

“Well, good,” Max said. “I’m glad the story is going to have a happy ending.” He began moving away. “If you’ll excuse me now . . . I have a date with Waikiki—the biggest sandbox in the world.”

“Max . . .” the Chief said. “I’m very sorry about this, but . . . your vacation is canceled, Max.”

Max returned. “That’s a very unfunny joke, Chief.”

“Max, it isn’t a joke. You’re needed here. I have an assignment for you. You see, Max, when Number One saw you in that laboratory at the Leg Up ranch, she— Well, Max . . . it was love at first sight.”

Max stared at him. “Me?”

The Chief nodded. “I’m assigning you to keep company with Number One, Max.”

“Chief! That’s preposterous! I’m a human, and she’s a machine!”

“Max, I know that. And you know that. But Number One doesn’t know that. Or, at least, if she does, she’s willing to overlook it.”

“Don’t worry, Max—it won’t last,” Hymie said. “She’s fickle.”

Max put a hand to his head. “Duty is duty,” he sighed. “If I have to, I suppose I have to.”

“Aren’t you feeling well, Max?”

“A little headache,” he replied. “Understandable, under the circumstances, I suppose.”

“You better go to her, Max,” the Chief said.

Max opened the door to Number One’s quarters. From inside came a happy clicking. Max dug into his pocket and got out a tablet, and, as he entered, popped it into his mouth. A moment after the door closed, there was a tremendous explosion.

“Let’s look on the bright side,” 99 said. “Maybe it was only Number One blowing a fuse.”

The Chief nodded. “Yes . . . that’s the way Max would have wanted it,” he agreed.

W
ILLIAM
J
OHNSTON
(1924-2010), author of many movie and TV tie-in novels was born January 11th, 1924 and passed away October 15th, 2010.

On January 4th, 2010, The International Association of Media Tie-in Writers
www://iamtw.org
announced it was bestowing The
Faust
, its Grand Master Award for excellence, to author William Johnston, the writer of over a hundred tie-in novels and the most prolific practitioner of the craft.

(From the January/February 2010 Newsletter - IAMTW)
The Newsletter of the International Association
of Media Tie-in Writers

IAMTW’s GRAND MASTER SCRIBE AWARD,
THE
FAUST,
GOES TO THE GENRE’S MOST
PROLIFIC PRACTITIONER

By David Spencer

The inarguable preeminent author of tie-ins, with more published tie-in titles to his credit (well more than 100) than any writer in the game before or since—the legendary and until now somewhat elusive William Johnston—will be honored by the IAMTW with a Faust Award, the honor bestowed upon Grand Masters. He is currently residing in San Jose, California, and will turn 86 on January 11th, 2010—a fitting number, as it is his series of novels based on the spy sitcom
Get Smart,
about Secret Agent 86 for CONTROL, which turned his byline into a virtual tie-in “brand” and thereafter defined the nature of his tie-in (and the largest proportion of his literary) career as the industry’s comedy specialist.

Johnston’s style is paradoxically recognizable, despite seeming matter of fact and transparent, his narration employing little reliance on metaphor, idiosyncratic locution or other literary manipulation. But the ostensible simplicity is utterly deceptive: for in the “serious” books, depth of characterization sneaks up on the reader, dialogue and internalization unusually nuanced, layered and when appropriate even subtle, with a psychological perception very ahead of its time.

Johnston’s humorous novels are a textbook lesson on comic timing in prose, possibly because he had some experience as an actor (a signature of his books is writing phone conversations as play-format dialogue exchanges, woodshedding redundant “he saids” and “she saids”).

He knew the wisdom and the technique of “simply” staying out of the way, and letting the tale be carried by action, dialogue, and an impeccable sense of cadence and rhythm. Plus his own unique brand of whimsy and wordplay.

Johnston’s career started in 1960 with the release of a hardcover comic murder mystery,
The Marriage Cage
(Lyle Stuart, reissued in paperback by Dell), which earned him a Best First Novel Edgar Award nomination from the Mystery Writers of America. Curiously, this did not lead immediately to more mystery novels (though he would write mystery tie-ins later in his career), but rather to a number of early 60s pulp titles for Monarch Books, which ranged from light comedy
(The Power of Positive Loving)
to medical romance (the
Doctor Starr
trilogy) to soft core racy
(Save Her for Loving, Teen Age Tramp, Girls on the Wing
).

The medical novels in particular either dovetailed with, or led to, his first tie-in commissions, which were for original novels based on medical dramas, such as
The Nurses
(Bantam),
Doctor Kildare
(Lancer and Whitman) and
Ben Casey.
These books, published between 1962 and 1964, were so successful that a cover variant on
The Nurses
includes a “2nd Big Printing” starburst; and his next (and it would seem last) original medical romance,
Two Loves Has Nurse Powell
(Neva Paperbacks) trumpets “From the author of
Ben Casey. ”

It’s likely that among these books, the
Doctor Kildare
title written for Whitman’s young audience line was a significant pivot point, because in 1965, Tempo Books (the Young Audience paperback imprint of Grosset & Dunlop) commissioned Johnston to write
Get Smart,
an original novel based on the spy satire sitcom starring Don Adams, Barbara Feldon, and Edward Platt, created by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. The first
Get Smart
book proved so staggeringly popular, going through multiple printings, that follow ups were immediately commissioned, leading to what would become a series of nine books over the course of the show’s five-season history.