Then he saw that there was another entity in his presence confined
beneath a glass dome. It looked rather like a groundhog and had seven
fingers on each of its six limbs. But it was larger and hairier than the
glass one he had seen at the gift store. With four of its limbs it
tapped on an intricate keyboard in front of it.
"What is your name?" queried a metallic voice from a speaker on the
wall.
"I'm Jerry Newton. Got no middle initial," Pembroke said in a surly
voice.
"Occupation?"
"I work a lot o' trades. Fisherman, fruit picker, fightin' range fires,
vineyards, car washer. Anything. You name it. Been out of work for a
long time now, though. Goin' on five months. These here are hard times,
no matter what they say."
"What do you think of the Chinese situation?" the voice inquired.
"Which situation's 'at?"
"Where's Seattle?"
"Seattle? State o' Washington."
And so it went for about five minutes. Then he was told he had qualified
as a satisfactory surrogate for a mid-twentieth century American male,
itinerant type.
"You understand your mission, Newton?" the voice asked. "You are to
establish yourself on Earth. In time you will receive instructions. Then
you will attack. You will not see us, your masters, again until the
atmosphere has been sufficiently chlorinated. In the meantime, serve us
well."
He stumbled out toward the docks, then looked about for Mary Ann. He saw
her at last behind the ropes, her lovely face in tears.
Then she saw him. Waving frantically, she called his name several times.
Pembroke mingled with the crowd moving toward the ship, ignoring her.
But still the woman persisted in her shouting.
Sidling up to a well-dressed man-about-town type, Pembroke winked at him
and snickered.
"You Frank?" he asked.
"Hell, no. But some poor punk's sure red in the face, I'll bet," the
man-about-town said with a chuckle. "Those high-strung paramour types
always raising a ruckus. They never do pass the interview. Don't know
why they even make 'em."
Suddenly Mary Ann was quiet.
"Ambulance squad," Pembroke's companion explained. "They'll take her off
to the buggy house for a few days and bring her out fresh and ignorant
as the day she was assembled. Don't know why they keep making 'em, as I
say. But I guess there's a call for that type up there on Earth."
"Yeah, I reckon there is at that," said Pembroke, snickering again as he
moved away from the other. "And why not? Hey? Why not?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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