Climate—Disordered

The President of the Chamber of Commerce of Wheedonville by the Sea was stately and rather terrifying in his measured wrath. Nor was his peroration against the dapper young-old man who sat at the foot of the long mahogany conference table lessened by the knowledge that he had the full support of the rest of that august body.

But Wiley Cordes, on whom all this anger was focussed, appeared singularly uncowed by the disfavor in which he basked. As a seasoned resort promotion expert he was not unacquainted with municipal ire. So many unforeseen factors could send resort trade swarming to the wrong resort—as had happened in this case.

Having talked himself into the fat job of putting Wheedonville on the map as the sea-side town where vacationers would have the amusement world at their feet, he had been forced to sit by and watch the bulk of the available tourist vacation trade pass to Burden Bay, sixty miles to the south. It was too bad, of course, but a fellow could only do so much.

"... and despite your definite assurance—in fact your promise—that retail trade in Wheedonville by the Sea would pick up a minimum of twenty-five per cent, in the year you entered the employment of this Chamber, it has decreased by more than thirty per cent. In this same period the retail trade in Burden Bay has risen by almost forty per cent. I and the Chamber whose spokesman I am would appreciate an explanation."

Gathering the skirts of his morning coat carefully to avoid unsightly wrinkles, the President sat down. The silence which followed his sonorous harangue could have been scooped up with a spatula. Eight pairs of eyes remained fixed with suspicion upon the object of his address.

With a sigh, Wiley Cordes got to his feet. Hands in pockets he leaned against the table, jingling the change and keys his fingers found. He was going to have to make this good or be out of a very soft, high paying job. Fortunately, he had an idea.

"When I undertook to lift your resort trade here in Wheedonville by the Sea above that of Burden Bay," he began with an air of good humor that drew no response from the grave men listening to him, "I could not, of course, foresee that Mrs. Quinlan in our rival metropolis was going to give birth to quintuplets."

He paused, let it sink in. "Nor could I look into a crystal ball and learn that Wheedonville by the Sea was going to be cursed with five straight weeks of fog and rain at the height of the season. And it is hardly my fault that the Burden Coastal Oil Refineries should bring in five gushers."

"Granted, Cordes," said the President, speaking without arising. "But we cannot continue indefinitely against such buffets of fortune—not and pay twenty-five thousand dollars a year for protection against ill luck—without receiving an iota of protection."

"Your sentiments touch me deeply," said Cordes. "And I should not have been worthy of your more than generous salary if I had not studied the problem thoroughly and come to this meeting with a plan which should speedily put an end to the difficulties under which all of us have been laboring."

Cordes paused to let this sink in. He knew, as do all talented pitch men, when he had his audience hooked. The expression in the eight pairs of eyes upon him was still uniform—but it flashed a uniformity of hope.

"Gentlemen," he went on, "the summer season draws rapidly to its close. It has not been successful. But Wheedonville by the Sea and Burden Bay have both built their reputations as resort cities, much like that of Atlantic City, upon the warmth of climate and water in fall and spring. I propose to make Wheedonville by the Sea the only mild-weather resort in this entire section of coastline."

"And just how do you propose to do this?" asked one of the members, his interest aroused above his incredulity. In simple words Wiley Cordes told them. At first there were a few protests upon humanitarian grounds. But they were not enduring. After all the Chamber of Commerce was a collection of hard-headed businessmen. Furthermore they were hard-pressed businessmen. Their ultimate approval was unanimous, as was their vow to mutual secrecy. There was little else they could do.

Cold weather was a factor in Cordes' scheme. But cold weather descends in occasional unseasonable snaps upon the balmiest of resort climate. Even in Florida and Texas there has been snow during recent years. For once the luck ran for Cordes and his quasi-desperate employers.

Early upon a morning in late September, less than a week after the showdown meeting, a plane took off, not from the Wheedonville Municipal Airport but from a private field that lurked less prosperously and publicly in the resort city's villa-studded suburbs.

The plane, a converted Mitchell B-25 AAF bomber, was piloted by Wiley Cordes himself—aviation was among his numerous personal accomplishments. There were bombs in the bomb bay—but bombs of a type not yet seen in war. Millions of pellets of dry ice were so stowed away that they could be sowed high in the atmosphere by continued pressure upon a release trigger in the cockpit.

The cloud formations were just right—with heavy layers above the target area and little wind. The temperature, in the high thirties at ground level, was below zero two miles up. After getting a sight through the cloud strata, Wiley Cordes began to sow his snow.

Back and forth he flew for the better part of an hour, bombarding the clouds with ice pellets to make snow. He had timed his flight with care so that no other plane would be aloft when he reached the sky above the rival Burden Bay resort—no others took off once the snow storm began. Incoming planes were routed to Wheedonville by the Sea.

Wiley Cordes listened to the reports on his radio as he flew back to the secluded airport outside of Wheedonville. From the tenor of the announcers it was clearly evident that no one suspected the snowstorm had been deliberately induced by the hand of man. After taxiing his ex-bomber into the hangar, he got out of flying togs and drove to the Wheedonville City Club, where the members of the Chamber of Commerce were waiting.

If the mood of their previous meeting had been glum, today joy was unconfined. Old whiskey was brought out, and a special banquet served by close-mouthed club attendants. The radio was left on, and each report of the inexplicable snowstorm which had brought a halt to the Burden Bay autumn season was the occasion for a toast.

"The man who really deserves our thanks," said the President, lifting his glass to Wiley Cordes. A chorus of "Hear, hear" greeted his salute. Wiley, entering into the spirit of the occasion, waxed enthusiastic when he was given the floor after cigars were passed.

"It is my belief," he went on, "that by repeatedly inducing snow to fall over our neighbor city I can ultimately reduce its mean temperature by the very emanation of cold from the snow covered ground to a point where it will remain colder than normal throughout the fall, winter and spring.

"Furthermore," he added, his well-preserved face alight with optimism, "I see no reason why we should limit ourselves to snowstorms. The same dry ice treatment, given to the right cloud formation above Burden Bay when opportunity offers, should produce a certain percentage of rainy weekends and holidays. I can truthfully say that our worries are over."

"Keep it up, and you'll find a welcome surprise in your pay envelope, Wiley," said the President, beaming. The arrival of the afternoon papers from Burden Bay was the signal to cease all speech making for a good gloat.

The journalists of Wheedonville by the Sea's ancient rival, beneath a commendable effort to gloss over the disaster, were really crying catastrophe. Coming without warning, the baby blizzard—for it had amounted almost to that—had literally caught them with their plants down.

Damage, it was hinted in stories hastily killed for later editions, would almost certainly run high into millions. Hotel reservations for the usually equable autumn months were already being canceled. As if to prove it never snowed but it poured, the Oil Refinery chose that day to announce the failure of a sixth gusher and resultant passing of a dividend.

Three days later, when clouds again moved in on the coastline, Wiley Cordes took to the air with another load of dry ice pellets. And once again he did his dirty work undetected and with disastrous results for Burden Bay.

On his third trip, because of a low current of warm air of whose existence he was not informed, Wiley came in with a rain storm that washed away most of the snow. But his fourth, fifth and sixth one-plane raids more than made up for this lapse.

Wiley Cordes and Wheedonville by the Sea were riding high. Hotels were packed and concessions were booming. The public relations expert found his salary raised an added hundred dollars a week. There was laughter at a Chamber meeting over a Burden Bay picture release showing a couple of pretty girls in ski clothes backed by a slide made of the defunct oil gushers.

"I'll get the chorus of Mike Todd's new musical down here next weekend and put them on water skis in bathing suits," promised the laughing Wiley Cordes. Of course he knew it could not last forever. But he saw no reason for the run of good fortune to come to an early end. He had planned and executed his scheme too well.

So he was not pleased to discover another plane above the clouds on his next trip over Burden Bay. Still, it was something that had to happen. He merely cruised on innocently and was relieved when the other ship—a big four-motored flying boxcar—disappeared through the clouds. Then he swung back and did his stuff.

There was another plane above the clouds over Burden Bay.

He saw the plane on three more occasions as he placed snowstorms accurately over hapless Burden Bay and its presence began to worry him. But the pilot gave no indication that he knew what Wiley was up to and the discreet young public relations counsellor decided not to mention it to the men who were backing his scheme.

As a result of this step and of his own pre-occupation with promoting the balmy atmosphere of Wheedonville by the Sea, he was really caught off-guard when disaster finally struck. As fall merged into winter the reservations totals for Wheedonville hotels fell off far more sharply than it should have—especially with Burden Bay out of the picture.

It was the President of the Chamber of Commerce who broke the news to Wiley Cordes, after summoning him to his office in early December. There he simply tossed a telegram at his high powered promoter. No words were needed to explain his mood—it was evident enough from the jut of his beetling gray brows and the bayonet-angle of his Corona Corona.

"Read this," he said laconically. "Read it and pack."

Startled, Wiley complied, felt himself go gray and sick and shaky as he scanned the contents of the wire.

It read: