The Sixth Science Fiction Megapack: 25 Classic and Modern Science Fiction Stories

by Arthur C. Clarke

  The general clicked his heels and bowed.

  “Education?” Everett asked suspiciously. “And he’s a general?”

  The Minister of the Interior explained that in his tranquil land military rank was largely honorary. “…in memory of our great liberator, who died in battle 112 years ago,” he added.

  Everybody sat down except the very large dark man, who stood with his hands in his pockets, and kept peering out of the windows. There was some further exchange of formalities, with flowery Raptarian solicitude for the good health, past, present, and future, of Mr. and Mrs. Maximus Everett. Then the Minister of the Interior spoke at length about what his government was doing for the Common Man, and about a President so well-beloved that no other had been elected for nearly 30 years—and throughout his speech the dove of peace cooed a gentle obbligato.

  The Everetts were enthralled. They saw the peaks and plains, the lush groves and verdant jungles of Raptaria. They beheld the clean, hard-working Raptarian peasant leading his chubby children to a new and splendidly-appointed school provided by a government whose watchwords were Benevolence and Progress.

  The Minister of the Interior paused, and the Everetts sighed longingly—and as they did so he rose suddenly to his feet, lifting a hand to heaven.

  “That is why we are here today,” he cried out. “So that you, Maximo Everett, can aid us in our great humane task! In our country we have a physicist, a good man. He tells us that his work confirms your wonderful discovery. Already we have formed a Frijole Control Commission!—Come to us! Though we are poor, you will have everything you need. You will be Vice-Minister of Education. You will work directly under General Troppo!”

  Having finished, the Minister of the Interior opened his arms in a magnificent gesture of ardent welcome, bowed, and sat down, quite winded by his exertions.

  “Ah, not under me!” expostulated General Troppo with equal fervor. “Not under me! Say rather as a colleague, a comrade!” He smiled, radiating good fellowship. “Of course,” he said to Everett, “you can make explosives?”

  Everett frowned, but before he had a chance to reply Mrs. Everett answered for him. “Mr. Everett could make an atomic bomb just as easy as pie,” she told the general, “but he doesn”t want to. He thinks they’re very destructive, and he can’t see any point to making them.”

  Everett nodded vigorously while the Raptarian dignitaries exchanged swift glances; then the Minister of the Interior stepped into the breach with hearty laughter. “My friend!” he exclaimed, as soon as his amusement had subsided. “My very good friend! I fear that you mistake the general’s meaning! What use would we, in poor Raptaria, ever have for an atomic bomb? But we have mines in our mountains. We must build dams across our so-swift rivers. We need many roads and bridges. That is the kind of explosives the Minister of Education means—for blasting! Is that not so, General?”

  “Yes, yes,” the general said hastily—

  “But of course,” smiled the Minister of the Interior, “for that—and for our national holiday, when the happy people celebrate with fireworks. That is why we may want a very few explosives, though we want power-plants even more.”

  “Power-plants?” echoed General Troppo. “Yes, yes.”

  “We-ell,” Everett said, scratching his head, “I guess that is sort of different.” He hesitated. “I…I won’t have to coach basketball, will I?” he asked diffidently.

  Some time has passed since the Everetts went to the Republic of Raptaria. As Vice-Minister of Education, Everett naturally did not have to bother with any of the details of his departure. Everything, including a Raptarian passport for two, had been arranged by the Minister of the Interior, and it all went off very smoothly—so smoothly, in fact, that for a long time even the Everetts’ neighbors did not know that they had moved out of town permanently. Nobody ever dreamed that they had gone abroad.

  Nobody. Not even Henry Myers, who happened to mention the Raptarian Republic when he delivered his weekly speech on world affairs in the assembly hall of Woodrow Wilson Union High School a few days ago.

  “…and by contrast,” he informed the student body, “we have news of another quiet, orderly election in Raptaria, a little country many of you may not even have heard about.”

  He paused, to smile benighly at the upturned faces. “A lucky little country, too,” he told them. “Too small to worry about the great quarrels that rend the world. Too poor,” he continued, “to follow any ways but those of peace.”

  That’s what he thinks.

  THE ULTROOM ERROR, by Jerry Sohl

  HB73782. Ultroom error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer out of 1609 complete, intact, but too near limit of 1,000 days. Next Kanad transfer ready. 1951. Reginald, son of Mr. and Mrs. Martin Laughton, 3495 Orland Drive, Marionville, Illinois, U. S. A. Arrive his 378th day. TB73782.

  * * * *

  Nancy Laughton sat on the blanket she had spread on the lawn in her front yard, knitting a pair of booties for the PTA bazaar. Occasionally she glanced at her son in the playpen, who was getting his daily dose of sunshine. He was gurgling happily, examining a ball, a cheese grater, and a linen baby book, all with perfunctory interest.

  When she looked up again she noticed a man walking by―except he turned up the walk and crossed the lawn to her. He was a little taller than her husband, had piercing blue eyes and a rather amused set to his lips. It was her brother, who lived in Kankakee.

  “Hello, Nancy,” he said.

  “Hello, Joe,” she answered.

  “I’m going to take the baby for a while,” he said.

  “All right, Joe.”

  He reached into the pen, picked up the baby. As he did so, the baby’s knees hit the side of the playpen and young Laughton let out a scream―half from hurt and half from sudden lack of confidence in his new handler. But this did not deter Joe. He started off with the child.

  Around the corner and after the man came a snarling mongrel dog, eyes bright, teeth glinting in the sunlight. The man did not turn as the dog threw itself at him, burying his teeth in his leg. Surprised, the man dropped the screaming child on the lawn and turned to the dog. Joe seemed off balance, and he backed up confusedly in the face of the snapping jaws. Then he suddenly turned and walked away, the dog at his heels.

  * * * *

  “I tell you, the man said he was my brother, and he made me think he was,” Nancy told her husband for the tenth time. “I don’t even have a brother.”

  Martin Laughton sighed. “I can’t understand why you believed him. It’s just―just plain nuts, Nancy!”

  “Don’t you think I know it?” Nancy said tearfully. “I feel like I’m going crazy. I can’t say I dreamt it because there was Reggie with his bleeding knees, squalling for all he was worth on the grass― Oh, I don’t even want to think about it!”

  “We haven’t lost Reggie, Nancy, remember that. Now why don’t you try to get some rest?”

  “You―you don’t believe me at all, do you, Martin?”

  When her husband did not answer, her head sank to her arms on the table, and she sobbed.

  “Nancy, for heaven’s sake, of course I believe you. I’m trying to think it out, that’s all. We should have called the police.”

  Nancy shook her head in her arms. “They’d―never―believe me either,” she moaned.

  “I’d better go and make sure Reggie’s all right.” Martin got up out of his chair and went to the stairs.

  “I’m going with you,” Nancy said, rising and coming over to him.

  “We’ll go up and look at him together.”

  * * * *

  They found Reggie peacefully asleep in his crib in his room upstairs. They checked the windows and tucked in the blankets. They paused in the room for a moment, and then Martin stole his arm around his wife and led her to the door.

  * * * *

  “As I’ve said, sergeant, this fellow hypnotized my wife. He made her think he was her brother. She doesn’t even have a brother. Then he tried
to get away with the baby.” Martin leaned down and patted the dog. “It was Tiger here who scared him off.”

  The police sergeant looked at the father, at Nancy, and then at the dog. He scribbled notes in his book.

  “Are you a rich man, Mr. Laughton?” he asked.

  “Not at all. The bank still owns most of the house. I have a few hundred dollars, that’s all.”

  “What do you do?”

  “Office work, mostly. I’m a junior executive in an insurance company.”

  “Any enemies?”

  “No… Oh, I suppose I have a few people I don’t get along with, like anybody else. Nobody who’d do anything like this, though.”

  The sergeant flipped his notebook closed. “You’d better keep your dog inside and around the kid as much as possible. Keep your doors and windows locked. I’ll see that a prowl car keeps an eye on the house. Call us if anything seems unusual or out of the way.”

  * * * *

  Nancy had taken a sedative and was asleep by the time Martin finished cleaning the .30-.30 rifle he used for deer hunting. He put it by the stairs, ready for use, fully loaded, leaning it against the wall next to the telephone stand.

  The front door bell rang. He answered it. It was Dr. Stuart and another man.

  “I came as soon as I could, Martin,” the young doctor said, stepping inside with the other man. “This is my new assistant, Dr. Tompkins.”

  Martin and Tompkins shook hands.

  “The baby―?” Dr. Stuart asked.

  “Upstairs,” Martin said.

  “You’d better get him, Dr. Tompkins, if we’re to take him to the hospital. I’ll stay here with Mr. Laughton. How’ve you been, Martin?”

  “Fine.”

  “How’s everything at the office?”

  “Fine.”

  “And your wife?”

  “She’s fine, too.”

  “Glad to hear it, Martin. Mighty glad. Say, by the way, there’s that bill you owe me. I think it’s $32, isn’t that right?”

  “Yes, I’d almost forgotten about it.”

  “Why don’t you be a good fellow and write a check for it? It’s been over a year, you know.”

  “That’s right. I’ll get right at it.” Martin went over to his desk, opened it and started looking for his checkbook. Dr. Stuart stood by him, making idle comment until Dr. Tompkins came down the stairs with the sleeping baby cuddled against his shoulder.

  “Never mind the check, now, Martin. I see we’re ready to go.” He went over to his assistant and took the baby. Together they walked out the front door.

  “Good-bye,” Martin said, going to the door.

  Then he was nearly bowled over by the discharge of the .30-.30. Dr. Stuart crumpled to the ground, the baby falling to the lawn. Dr. Tompkins whirled, and there was a second shot. Dr. Tompkins pitched forward on his face.

  A woman ran from the house, retrieved the now-squalling infant, and ran back into the house. Once inside, Nancy slammed the door, gave the baby to the stunned Martin, and headed for the telephone.

  “One of them was the same man!” she cried.

  Martin gasped, sinking into a chair with the baby. “I believed them,” he said slowly and uncomprehendingly. “They made me believe them!”

  * * * *

  “Those bodies,” the sergeant said. “Would you mind pointing them out to me, please?”

  “Aren’t they―aren’t they on the walk?” Mrs. Laughton asked.

  “There is nothing on the walk, Mrs. Laughton.”

  “But there must be! I tell you I shot these men who posed as doctors. One of them was the same man who tried to take the baby this afternoon. They hypnotized my husband―”

  “Yes, I know, Mrs. Laughton. We’ve been through that.” The sergeant went to the door and opened it. “Say, Homer, take another look around the walk and the bushes. There’s supposed to be two of them. Shot with a .30-.30.”

  He turned and picked up the gun and examined it again. “Ever shoot a gun before, Mrs. Laughton?”

  “Many times. Martin and I used to go hunting together before we had Reggie.”

  The sergeant nodded. “You were taking an awful chance, shooting at a guy carrying your baby, don’t you think?”

  “I shot him in the legs. The other―the other turned and I shot him in the chest. I could even see his eyes when he turned around. If I hadn’t pulled the trigger then —” She shuddered. “I don’t want to remember it!”

  The patrolman pushed the door open. “There are no bodies out here, but there’s some blood. Quite a lot of blood. A little to one side of the walk.”

  The policemen went out.

  “Thank God you woke up, Nancy,” Martin said. “I’d have let them have the baby.” He reached over and smoothed the sleeping Reggie’s hair.

  Nancy, who was rocking the boy, narrowed her eyes.

  “I wonder why they want our baby? He’s just like any other baby. We don’t have any money. We couldn’t pay a ransom.”

  “Reggie’s pretty cute, though,” Martin said. “You will have to admit that.”

  Nancy smiled. Then she suddenly stopped rocking.

  “Martin!”

  He sat up quickly.

  “Where’s Tiger?”

  Together they rose and walked around the room. They found him in a corner, eyes open, tongue protruding. He was dead.

  * * * *

  “If we keep Reggie in the house much longer, he’ll turn out a hermit,” Martin said at breakfast a month later. “He needs fresh air and sunshine.”

  “I’m not going to sit on the lawn alone with him, Martin. I just can’t, that’s all. I’d be able to think of nothing but that day.”

  “Still thinking about it? I think we’d have heard from them again if they were coming back. They probably got somebody else’s baby by this time.” Martin finished his coffee and rose to kiss her good-bye. “But for safety’s sake I guess you’d better keep that gun handy.”

  The morning turned into a brilliant, sunshiny day. Puffs of clouds moved slowly across the summer sky, and a warm breeze rustled the trees. It would be a crime to keep Reggie inside on a day like this, Nancy thought.

  So she called Mrs. MacDougal, the next door neighbor. Mrs. MacDougal was familiar with what had happened to the Laughtons and she agreed to keep an eye on Nancy and Reggie and to call the police at the first sign of trouble.

  With a fearful but determined heart, Nancy moved the playpen and set it up in the front yard. She spread a blanket for herself and put Reggie in the pen. Her heart pounded all the while, and she watched the street for any strangers, ready to flee inside if need be.

  Reggie just gurgled with delight at the change in environment.

  This peaceful scene was disturbed by a speeding car in which two men were riding. The car roared up the street, swerved toward the parkway, tires screaming, bounced over the curb and sidewalk, straight toward the child and mother. Reggie, attracted by the sudden noise, looked up to see the approaching vehicle. His mother stood up, set her palms against her cheeks and shrieked.

  The car came on, crunched over the playpen, killing the child. The mother was hit and instantly killed, the force of the blow snapping her spine and tossing her against the house. The car plunged on into a tree, hitting it a terrible blow, crumbling the car’s forward end so it looked like an accordion. The men were thrown from the machine.

  * * * *

  “We’ll never be able to prosecute in this case,” the states attorney said. “At least not on a drunken driving basis.”

  “I can’t get over it,” the chief of police said. “I’ve got at least six men who will swear the man was drunk. He staggered, reeled and gave the usual drunk talk. He reeked of whiskey.”

  The prosecutor handed the report over the desk. “Here’s the analysis. Not a trace of alcohol. He couldn’t have even had a smell of near beer. Here’s another report. This is his physical exam made not long afterwards. The man was in perfect health. Only variations are he
had a scar on his leg where something, probably a dog, bit him once. And then a scar on his chest. It looked like an old gunshot wound, they said. Must have happened years ago.”

  “That’s odd. The man who accosted Mrs. Laughton in the afternoon was bitten by their dog. Later that night, she said she shot the same man in the chest. Since the scars are healed, it obviously couldn’t be the same man. But there’s a real coincidence for you. And speaking of the dog bite, the Laughton dog died that night. His menu evidently didn’t agree with him. Never did figure what killed him, actually.”

  “Any record of treatment on the man she shot?”

  “The men. You’ll remember, there were two. No, we never found a trace of either. No doctor ever made a report of a gunshot wound that night. No hospital had a case, either―at least not within several hundred miles―that night or several nights afterwards. Ever been shot with .30-.30?”

  The state attorney shook his head. “I wouldn’t be here if I had.”

  “I’ll say you wouldn’t. The pair must have crawled away to die God knows where.”

  “Getting back to the man who ran over the child and killed Mrs. Laughton. Why did he pretend to be drunk?”

  It was the chief’s turn to shake his head. “Your guess is as good as mine. There are a lot of angles to this case none of us understand. It looks deliberate, but where’s the motive?”

  “What does the man have to say?”

  “I was afraid you’d get to him,” the chief said, his neck reddening. “It’s all been rather embarrassing to the department.” He coughed self-consciously. “He’s proved a strange one, all right. He says his name is John Smith and he’s got cards to prove it, too―for example, a social security card. It looks authentic, yet there’s no such number on file in Washington, so we’ve discovered. We’ve had him in jail for a week and we’ve all taken turns questioning him. He laughs and admits his guilt―in fact, he seems amused by most everything. Sometimes all alone in his cell he’ll start laughing for no apparent reason. It gives me the creeps.”

  The states attorney leaned back in his chair. “Maybe it’s a case for an alienist.”