The World is Mine by Henry Kuttner

Author:Henry Kuttner [Kuttner, Henry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sci Fi Short Story
Publisher: Astounding Science Fiction
Published: 1943-06-21T00:00:00+00:00

Gallegher televised Rufus Hellwig, on the chance that he might induce the tycoon to part with some of his fortune, but without success. Hellwig was recalcitrant. “Show me,” he said. “Then

Ill give you a blank check.”

“But I need the money now,” Gal-legher insisted. “I can’t give you what you want if I’m gassed for murder.”

“Murder? Who’d you kill?” Hell-wig wanted to know.

“I didn’t kill anybody. I’m being framed—”

“So am I. But I’m not falling, this time. Show me results. I make you no more advances, Gallegher.”

“Look. Wouldn’t you like to be able to sing like a Caruso? Dance like Nijinsky? Swim like Weissmuller? Make speeches like Secretary Parkinson? Make like Houdini?”

“Have you got a snootful!” Hellwig said ruminatively, and broke the beam. Gallegher glared at the screen. It looked as though he’d have to go to work, after all.

So he did. His trained, expert fingers flew, keeping pace with his keen brain. Liquor helped, liberating his demon subconscious. When in doubt, he questioned the Lybblas. Nevertheless the job took time.

He didn’t have all the equipment he needed, and ’vised a supply company, managing to wangle sufficient credit to swing the deal on the cuff. He kept working. Once he was interrupted by a mild little man in a derby who brought a subpoena, and once Grandpa wandered in to borrow five credits. The circus was in town, and Grandpa, as an old big-top enthusiast, couldn’t miss it.

“Want to come along?” he inquired.”1 might get in a crap game with some of the boys. Always got on well with circus people, somehow. Won five hundred once from a bearded lady. Nope? Well, good luck.”

He went away, and Gallegher returned to his mental hookup device. The Lybblas contentedly stole cookies and squabbled amicably about the division of the world after they’d conquered it. The machine grew slowly but inevitably.

As for the time machine itself, occasional attempts to turn it off proved only one thing: it had frozen into stasis. It seemed to be fixed in a certain definite pattern, from which it was impossible to budge it. It had been set to bring back Gallegher’s variable corp>es. Until it had fulfilled that task, it stubbornly refused to obey additional order. “There was an old maid from Van-ccuver” Gallegher murmured absently. “Let’s see. I need a tight beam here—Yeah. She jumped on his knee with a chortle of glee—If I vary the receptor-sensibility on the electromagnetic current—Hm-m-m—And nothing on Earth could remove ‘er. Yeah, that does it.”

It was night. Gallegher hadn’t l>een conscious of the passing of hours. The Lybblas, bulging with filched cookies, had made no complaint, except occasional demands for more milk. Gallegher had drunk steadily as he worked, keeping his subconscious to the fore. He hadn’t realized till now that he was hungry. Sighing, he looked at the completed mental hookup device, shook his head, and opened the door. The back yard lay empty before him.

Or—

No, it was empty. No more corpses just yet. Time-variable pattern h was still in operation.

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