"It's uncanny the way all those cars suddenly stopped when our bus broke down," Marge said as we waited for the picture to come on. "Any day now this civilization of ours will get so complicated a bus breaking down someplace will bring the whole thing to a halt. Then where will we be?" "Elmer says silly-zation is doomed!" Doreen put in happily. The way she rolled the word out made me stare at her. Marge only nodded. "That's what Elmer says, all right," she agreed, a trifle grim. "Why does Elmer say silly-zation is doomed?" I asked Doreen. "Because it's getting hotter." The kid gave it to me straight. "All the ice at the North Pole is gonna melt. The ocean is gonna rise two hundred feet. Then everybody who doesn't live on a hill is gonna be drownded. That's what Elmer says and Elmer isn't ever wrong." [Illustration: Illustrated by CAVAT] Doreen they called her! Why not Cassandra? The stuff kids spout these days! I gave her a foolish grin. I wanted Marge to get the idea I was really a family man at heart. "That's very interesting, Doreen. Now look, there's the baseball game. Let's watch, shall we?" We weren't very late after all. It was the top half of the second inning, the score one to one, Erskine in trouble with two men on and only one down. The colors were beautiful. Marge and I were just settling back to watch when Doreen wrinkled her nose. "I saw that game yesterday!" she announced. "You couldn't have, sweetheart," I told her. "Because it's only being played today. The world's first ball game ever broadcast in color." "There was a game on Elmer's TV," Doreen insisted. "The picture was bigger and the colors prettier, too." "Absolutely impossible." I was a little sore. I hate kids who tell fibs. "There never was a game broadcast in color before. And, anyway, you won't find a color tube this big any place outside of a laboratory." "But it's true, Bill." Marge looked at me, wide-eyed. "Elmer only has a little seven-inch black and white set his uncle gave him. But he's rigged up some kind of lens in front of it, and it projects a big color picture on a white screen." I saw that she was serious. My eyes bugged slightly. "Listen," I said, "who is this Elmer character? I want to meet him!" "He's my cousin from South America," Doreen answered. "He thinks grownups are stupid." She turned to Marge. "I have to go to the bathroom," she said primly. "Through that door." Marge pointed. Doreen trotted out, clutching her hat box. * * * * * "Elmer thinks grownups are stupid?" I howled. "Listen, how old is this character who says silly-zation is doomed and can convert a black and white broadcast into color?" "He's thirteen," Marge told me. I goggled at her. "Thirteen," she repeated. "His father is some South American scientist. His mother died ten years ago." I sat down beside her. I lit a cigarette. My hands were shaking. "Tell me about him. _All_ about him."