Time Waits for Winthrop by William Tenn Page A

to who shall do it—I am certain I don’t have to draw a diagram when it comes to selecting the one of us most capable of dealing with a complex piece of futuristic machinery.”
    They all stared at Dave Pollock, who swallowed hard and inquired hoarsely, “You mean me?”
    “Certainly I mean you!” Mr.
    Mead said. “You’re the longhaired scientific expert around here.”
    “I’m a teacher, that’s all, a high-school science
teacher
. And you know how I feel about having anything to do with the Oracle Machine. As far as I’m concerned, it’s the one aspect of this civilization that’s most decadent. Why, I’d rather—”
    “My stomach didn’t turn over when I had to go in and have an argument with that crazy Mr. Winthrop?” Mrs. Brucks broke in. “I liked watching one minute a pair rompers, the next minute I don’t know what, an evening gown he starts wearing? And that crazy talk—smell this from a Mars, taste this from a Venus—you think maybe, Mr. Pollock, I enjoyed myself? But somebody had to do, so I did. All we’re asking you is a try. A try you can make.”
    “A nd I can assure you,” Mary Ann Carthington put in swiftly, “that Gygyo Rablin is absolutely and completely the last person on Earth I would go to for a favor. It’s a personal matter and I’d rather not discuss it now, if you don’t mind, but I would die, positively
die
, rather than go through that again. I did it, though, because there was the teensiest chance it would help us all get home again. I don’t think we’re asking too much of you. I don’t think so one little bit.”
    Mr. Mead nodded. “I agree with you, young lady. Storku is a man I haven’t seen eye to eye with since we’ve arrived and I’ve gone out of my way to avoid him, but to have to get involved in that unholy Shriek Field madness in the bargain—” He brooded for a while over some indigestible mental fragment, then, as his cleated golf shoes began wriggling about lovingly on his feet, shook himself determinedly and went on. “It’s time you stopped shooting off your mouth, Pollock, and got down to plain brass tacks. Einstein’s theory of relativity isn’t going to get us back to good old 1958 and neither is your Ph.D. or M.A. or whatever. What we need now is action, action with a capital
A
and no ifs, no ands, no buts.”
    “All right, all right. I’ll do it.”
    “And another thing.” Mr. Mead rolled a wicked little thought pleasurably to and fro in his mind for a moment or two before letting it out. “You take the jumper. You said yourself we don’t have the time to do any walking and that’s doubly true right now, when we’re
right up against the dead line
. I don’t want to hear any whining and any whimpering about the jumper making you sick. If Miss Carthington and I could take it, so can you.”
    Dave Pollock rallied. “You think I won’t? I’ve done most of my traveling here by jumper. I’m not afraid of mechanical progress—just so long as it’s genuine
progress
. Of course I’ll take the jumper.”
    He signaled for one with a microscopic return of his old swagger. When it appeared, he walked under it with shoulders squared. Let them all watch how a rational, science-minded man goes about things. And anyway, using the jumper wasn’t nearly as upsetting to him as it seemed to be to the others. He could take jumpers in stride.
    That was infinitely more than he could say for the Oracle Machine.
    For that reason, he had himself deposited outside the building which housed the machine. A bit of a walk and he might be able to get his thoughts in order. The only trouble was, the sidewalk had other ideas. Silently, obsequiously, but nonetheless firmly. It began to move under his feet as he started walking around the squat, slightly quivering structure. It rippled him ahead at a pace somewhat faster than the one he set, changing its direction as soon as he changed his.
    P ollock looked around at the empty streets and shrugged with