Books Should Be Free Loyal Books Free Public Domain Audiobooks & eBook Downloads |
|
Measure for a Loner By: Jim Harmon (1933-2010) |
---|
![]()
MEASURE FOR A LONER By JIM HARMON
So, General, I came in to tell you I've found the loneliest man in the
world for the Space Force. How am I supposed to rate his loneliness for you? In Megasorrows or
Kilofears? I suspect I know quite a library on the subject, but you know
more about stripes and bars. Don't try to stop me this time, General. Now that you mention it, I'm not drunk. I had to have something to back
me up so I stopped off at the dispensary and stole a needle. I want you to get off my back with that kind of talk. I've got enough
there it bends me over like I had bad kidneys. It isn't any of King
Kong's little brothers. They over rate the stuff. It isn't the way
you've been riding me either. Never mind what I'm carrying. Whatever it
is and believe me, it is I have to get rid of it. Let me tell it, for God's sake. Then for Security's sake? I thought you would let me tell it, General. I've been coming in here and giving you pieces of it for months but now
I want to let you be drenched in the whole thing. You're going to take
it all. There were the two of them, the two lonely men, and I found them for
you. You remember the way I found them for you. The intercom on my blond desk made an electronic noise at me and the
words I had been arranging in my mind for the morning letters splattered
into alphabet soup like a printer dropping a prepared slug of type. I made the proper motion to still the sound. "Yes," I grunted. My secretary cleared her throat on my time. "Dr. Thorn," she said, "there's a Mr. Madison here to see you. He lays
claim to be from the Star Project." He could come in and file his claim, I told the girl. I rummaged in the wastebasket and uncrumpled the morning's facsimile
newspaper. It was full of material about the Star Project. We were building Man's first interstellar spaceship. A surprising number of people considered it important. Flipping from the
rear to page one, Wild Bill Star in the comics who had been blasting all
the way to forty first sub space universe for decades was harking back
to the good old days of Man's first star flight (which he had made
himself through the magic of time travel), the editor was calling the
man to make the jaunt the Lindbergh of Space, and the staff photographer
displayed a still of a Space Force pilot in pressure suit up front with
his face blotted out by an air brushed interrogation mark. Who was going to be the Lindbergh of Space? We had used up the Columbus of Space, the Magellan of Space, the Van
Reck of Space. Now it was time for the Lone Eagle, one man who would
wait out the light years to Alpha Centauri. I remembered the first Lindbergh. I rode a bus fifty miles to see him at an Air Force Day celebration when
I was a dewy eared kid. It's funny how kids still worship heroes who did
everything before they were even born. Uncle Max had told me about
standing outside the hospital with a bunch of boys his own age the
evening Babe Ruth died of cancer. Lindbergh seemed like an old man to me
when I finally saw him, but still active. Nobody had forgotten him. When
his speech was over I cheered him with the rest just as if I knew what
he had been talking about. But I probably knew more about what he meant then as a boy than I did
feeling the reality of the newspaper in my hands. Grown up, I could only
smile at myself for wanting to go to the stars myself. Madison rapped on my office door and breezed in efficiently. I've always thought Madison was a rather irritating man. Likable but
irritating. He's too good looking in an unassuming masculine way to
dress so neatly it makes him look like a mannequin. That polite way of
his of using small words slowly and distinctly proves that he loves his
fellow man even if his fellow always does have less brains or authority
than Madison himself... Continue reading book >>
|
Genres for this book |
---|
Literature |
Science |
Short stories |
eBook links |
---|
Wikipedia – Jim Harmon |
Wikipedia – Measure for a Loner |
eBook Downloads | |
---|---|
ePUB eBook • iBooks for iPhone and iPad • Nook • Sony Reader |
Kindle eBook • Mobi file format for Kindle |
Read eBook • Load eBook in browser |
Text File eBook • Computers • Windows • Mac |
Review this book |
---|