The Non-Statistical Man by Raymond F. Jones

told her his feeling about Magruder and his theoretical explanation for the Professor’s behavior. “Magruder’s found something with the potency of atomic energy—and he’s using it to light a bonfire. It has to be taken out of his hands and put to proper use. That’s my concern now—but I feel the need of more development for myself before trying to take it away from him.”
    “I think you’re right in wanting to exploit his discovery, but I’m not sure Magruder’s activities are entirely in error. After all, he brought it to your attention through these methods.”
    “Yes, but a direct approach would have been a whole lot more effective; and any good results are only incidental. His basic purpose is destructive. He told me so, himself.”
    “What are you going to do?”
    Bascomb shook his head. “I don’t know. I thought maybe you could help me there. I try to think ahead on it, but I get nothing but fog and fuzz. I can’t seem to grasp any plan of action for myself. I don’t get that intuitive feel about anything except that I must protect Magruder from Hap Johnson right now, in order to save his discovery.
    “Later, there can be lectures, courses, a school maybe —not the kind of thing Magruder has been doing, but a straightforward presentation showing what his actual discovery is and what it can do. That’s the approach we’ll make, I think.”
    “But there’ll be effects that will startle and shock people—”
    “We’ll prepare them; we’ll lay it on the line and let them know exactly what to expect—not sneak up on them without any warning the way Magruder is doing.”
    “What about such things as your insurance business? It will be bankrupt in time.”
    “That’s the obvious conclusion, but I don’t think it’s necessarily the right one—for the simple reason that insurance company people can also have the same advantage.”
    “It would be a stalemate then,” said Sarah. “People would apply for policies only when they needed them, and the insurance companies would turn them down on the basis of knowing claims would soon be made.”
    “It would turn into a kind of savings and loan institution,” Bascomb answered. “People could plan far enough ahead for coming emergencies. Insurance companies could cover them by accepting savings, and malting loans for amounts beyond them—such loans being repayable in some manner. It’s the only way it would ever work.”
    “But so many other things, too. There’ll be the public schools, the courts and juries.” She gave a small gasp. “There’s Zad Clementi Charles—”
    Bascomb’s mind shifted to thoughts of the alleged kid-nap-murderer, whose trial had been headline news in their town for weeks. “Clementi—?” he said. Then the sad, sure intuitive awareness made itself felt in his mind. “Yeah,” he said. “There’s Clementi; he didn’t do it, but they’ll take a vote on it and decide to hang him for it. Twelve good men and true—in the statistical world you can multiply ignorance by a constant and get truth.”
    Sarah had straightened, her eyes staring through the window to the garden beyond. “We could help,” she said in a whisper, “if we knew the right answer—”
    Bascomb shook his head. “I can’t get it; there’s only the fog and fuzz. Have you got it?”
    Sarah shook her head bitterly. “No—I don’t know how to reach it yet. I wonder if it will be like this always—so many things you know exist, just beyond your fingertips?”

8

    In a kind of fierce desperation, they returned to Magruder’s manuals during the following evenings. They swallowed the green and orange and yellow and brown pills with conscious intensity, as if this would increase the potency of the chemicals.
    They attended Magruder’s lectures and drank up every precious word he spoke. Bascomb tried to shear through the overburden of wordage and digest the meat; Sarah refused to worry about this, taking it all at face value.
    The