VICTORIOUS FAILURE
From Victorious Failure by Bryce Walton
23 minute read
With good reason, Professor H. Klauson hesitated; his wife's arms were holding him with a strangely insistent urgency and fear. He tried to disengage himself, but not with much enthusiasm. Although he had not admitted it to anyone but the Presidium's psycho-medic staff, he was afraid, too. Desperately and helplessly afraid. "Howard, please." Her pale blue eyes were wide, staring into his with that intimacy only someone loved completely and without compromise ever sees. "Don't go back to the Laboratories, Howard. Don't ever go back again." He smiled, unsuccessfully. He had never been able to hide anything from Lin. "But, dear, this is ridiculous. We're scientists! We're not frightened by vague, intangible fears." Her hands tightened on his shoulders. "We're scientists; so let us admit the obvious. Something doesn't want you to ever complete your research, Howard. We've worked together for ten years, and now you're right on the verge...
THE TREASURE IN THE FOREST
From Thirty Strange Stories by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
13 minute read
The canoe was now approaching the land. The bay opened out, and a gap in the white surf of the reef marked where the little river ran out to the sea; the thicker and deeper green of the virgin forest showed its course down the distant hill-slope. The forest here came close to the beach. Far beyond, dim and almost cloudlike in texture, rose the mountains, like suddenly frozen waves. The sea was still save for an almost imperceptible swell. The sky blazed. The man with the carved paddle stopped. “It should be somewhere here,” he said. He shipped the paddle and held his arms out straight before him. The other man had been in the fore part of the canoe, closely scrutinising the land. He had a sheet of yellow paper on his knee. “Come and look at this, Evans,” he said. Both men spoke in low tones, and...
TWO WORLDS FOR ONE
From Two Worlds For One by George O. (George Oliver) Smith
15 minute read
Without preamble, the door swung open with a rush and a man ran into the office. He was waving a paper in one hand, but this was not the only evidence of his excitement; aside from the waved paper and his obviously breathless appearance, the man spoke as soon as he was within sight of the other man behind the desk. "Professor Milton has resigned!" The man behind the desk smiled resignedly. "Don't be too concerned, Doctor Harris. Professor Milton has resigned before; he always comes back." Doctor Harris shook his head. His agitation did not diminish, despite the calm composure of the man behind the desk. "Doctor Edwards," he explained, "you don't really understand. He—" "Look, Harris," replied Doctor Edwards, dropping the formality of title, "is there anything we can do about it?" "No," admitted Harris uncomfortably. "But you don't know what he'll be doing next." He handed the...
The Marrying Monster
From The Marrying Monster by Claus Stamm
12 minute read
Goro put down his tools and relaxed into a pile of wood shavings, his back against a half-finished bathtub. To enjoy the evening cool, he told himself, wiping his face with a blue and white rag. Actually, he wanted to postpone the evening meal. Either the rice would be overcooked to a sticky goo or he would be picking hard, underdone kernels out of his teeth all night. And bean soup, when he made it, always had things swimming in it that had no business there. A night insect went weep-weep-weep . The sound, the night falling, and the thought of his own cooking made him think of his dead wife. "She was a good cook, poor thing," he thought out loud. "My, my—how I miss her." He gave a deep sigh. Oh, to have a wife again—a jolly, round wife and a good cook. Just like the old one...
CHAPTER IV.
From After Dark by Wilkie Collins
7 minute read
Signor Andrea D’Arbino, searching vainly through the various rooms in the palace for Count Fabio d’Ascoli, and trying as a last resource, the corridor leading to the ballroom and grand staircase, discovered his friend lying on the floor in a swoon, without any living creature near him. Determining to avoid alarming the guests, if possible, D’Arbino first sought help in the antechamber. He found there the marquis’s valet, assisting the Cavaliere Finello (who was just taking his departure) to put on his cloak. While Finello and his friend carried Fabio to an open window in the antechamber, the valet procured some iced water. This simple remedy, and the change of atmosphere, proved enough to restore the fainting man to his senses, but hardly—as it seemed to his friends—to his former self. They noticed a change to blankness and stillness in his face, and when he spoke, an indescribable alteration in...
A CATASTROPHE
From Thirty Strange Stories by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
13 minute read
The little shop was not paying. The realisation came insensibly. Winslow was not the man for definite addition and subtraction and sudden discovery. He became aware of the truth in his mind gradually, as though it had always been there. A lot of facts had converged and led him to conviction. There was that line of cretonnes—four half pieces—untouched, save for half-a-yard sold to cover a stool. There were those shirtings at 4¾ d. —Bandersnatch, in the Broadway, was selling them at 2¾ d. —under cost, in fact. (Surely Bandersnatch might let a man live!) Those servants’ caps, a selling line, needed replenishing, and that brought back the memory of Winslow’s sole wholesale dealers, Helter, Skelter, & Grab. Why! How about their account? Winslow stood with a big green box open on the counter before him when he thought of it. His pale grey eyes grew a little rounder, his...
SALES TALK
From Sales Talk by H. F. Cente
26 minute read
There are two things to know about a salesman, the first being that his present job is just to tide him over until the position he is really fitted for comes along. Big Bill Bennett was no exception to this first rule. Nor was he an exception to the second, of which more later. Just back from the Moon on a block selling assignment, he lounged into his branch office an hour late and told his boss that, though it hurt his unmarred conscience to quit when the whole corporation would feel the loss, this was it. His boss, who knew that Bill was as indispensable to Always-Stitch Sewing Machines as a bent needle, pretended great sorrow and wanted to know what Bill was going to do. "Well," said Bill, throwing it at him, "I'm going into the future. I've inherited a time-machine." "An alarm clock, no doubt?" "Don't be...
PIERRETTE TELLS HER STORY
From The Count's Chauffeur by William Le Queux
13 minute read
Pierrette Dumont—for that was her name, she told me—proved a most charming and entertaining companion, and could, I found, speak English quite well. She had lived nearly seven years in England—in London, Brighton, and other places—and as we set the car along that beautiful road that runs for so many miles beside the Yonne, she told me quite a lot about herself. Her admiration for M’sieur Bellingham was very pronounced. It was not difficult to see that this pretty girl, who, I supposed, had escaped from her convent, was madly in love with the handsome Bindo. The Count was a sad lady-killer, and where any profit was concerned was a most perfect lover, as many a woman possessed of valuable jewels had known to her cost. From the pretty Pierrette’s bright chatter, I began to wonder whether or not she was marked down as a victim. She had met the...
Luna Escapade
From Luna Escapade by H. B. (Horace Bowne) Fyfe
23 minute read
With over an hour to go before he needed to start braking for his landing on Luna, Pete Dudley sat at the controls of the rocket freighter and tried to think of anything else that needed checking after his spinning the ship. He drummed absently with the fingers of his right hand upon the buckle of the seat strap which restrained him from floating out of the padded acceleration seat. "Let's see, tail's right out there in front. I got the angle perfect. Guess everything's okay." He noticed his fingers drumming, and stopped. "Cut that out!" he told himself. "Get nervous now and Jack'll be sending some other vacuum on the next Mars run. There's Ericsson dead center in the screen, waiting for you to plop down beside the domes. You couldn't miss a crater that size if you tried." He leaned back and stared speculatively at the curving tip...
Prize Ship
From Prize Ship by Philip K. Dick
32 minute read
General Thomas Groves gazed glumly up at the battle maps on the wall. The thin black line, the iron ring around Ganymede, was still there. He waited a moment, vaguely hoping, but the line did not go away. At last he turned and made his way out of the chart wing, past the rows of desks. At the door Major Siller stopped him. "What's wrong, sir? No change in the war?" "No change." "What'll we do?" "Come to terms. Their terms. We can't let it drag on another month. Everybody knows that. They know that." "Licked by a little outfit like Ganymede." "If only we had more time. But we don't. The ships must be out in deep-space again, right away. If we have to capitulate to get them out, then let's do it. Ganymede!" He spat. "If we could only break them. But by that time—" "By that time...
The Barrier
From The Barrier by Bryce Walton
15 minute read
His features were twisted by the acceleration, and his sanity seemed to have gone. There were maybe ten or fifteen people to see him off. They weren't cheering. They stood in the gray curtain of rain, hunched over with their hands in their storm-coat pockets. Behind them was the vague bulk of the Experimental Station. And beyond that, invisible in the night, were the mountains he would never see again. "O.K., Stevens. This is it." So what? Stevens clanked as he turned toward the "Coffin." He was encased in a bulging metal pressure suit and his head was a big alloy bubble. No one smiled. No one raised a hand to say goodbye. Doris would, of course, say goodbye, if she were here. She wasn't here. She didn't even know about his volunteering. Major Kanin nodded stiffly. His gray eyes wrinkled. "Good luck, Stevens," he said dutifully. It was meaningless....
Imitation of Death
From Imitation Of Death by Lester Del Rey
29 minute read
Max Fleigh's heavy jowls relaxed and he chuckled without humor as he examined the knots that bound the man at his feet. Quite impersonally, he planted the toe of his boot in Curtis' ribs, listened to the muffled grunt of pain, and decided that the gag was effective. For once, Slim had done a good job, and there was nothing wrong. It was probably unnecessary, anyway, but there could be no bungling when the future of the Plutarchy was at stake. Incompetence had cost them an empire once, and there would be no third opportunity. The stupid democracies that had called themselves a World Union had colonized the planets and ruled them without plan. And when Mars, Venus, and the Jovian Worlds had revolted and set up a Planet Council, all that Earth could do was to come crawling to it, begging polite permission to join what they should have...