initial commit of ebook 30014HEAD main

author: Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> 2025-10-14 19:52:58 -0700
committer: Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> 2025-10-14 19:52:58 -0700
commit: 8405fceea7d17dcbe5ebb6da8d7bbc9abbf7f7c0 (patch)
tree: 2bf44a6a268b8655373f73b0350e999deb554392 /30014-h
4 files changed, 508 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/30014-h/30014-h.htm b/30014-h/30014-h.htm
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e4468da
--- /dev/null
+++ b/30014-h/30014-h.htm
@@ -0,0 +1,508 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
+    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" />
+    <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" />
+    <title>
+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Native Son, by T. D. Hamm
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css">
+
+    p {margin-top: .75em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: .75em;}
+    h1,h2,.hd1 {text-align: center;}
+    h1 {margin-top: 0;}
+    h2 {font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.5;}
+    hr {width: 65%; margin: 2em auto; visibility: hidden;}
+    body {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+    img {border: none;}
+    a:link,a:visited {text-decoration: none;}
+    p.cap:first-letter {float: left; margin-right: .05em; padding-top: .05em; font-size: 300%; line-height: .8em; width: auto;}
+    .dcap {text-transform: uppercase;}
+    .bk1 {background: url("images/001.png") top left no-repeat; width: 600px; height: 390px; margin: 0 auto; overflow: hidden;}
+    .bk2 {padding-top: 190px; padding-left: 270px;}
+    .bk3 {margin: 2em auto; width: 25em;}
+    .bk3 p {text-indent: 2em;}
+    .figt {float: left; clear: left; margin: 15px; padding: 0; width: 146px;}
+    .trn {border: solid 1px; margin: 3em 15%; min-height: 230px;}
+    .trn p {margin: 15px;}
+    .sp1 {font-size: 120%;}
+    .hd1 {margin-top: 2em;}
+
+    </style>
+  </head>
+<body>
+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30014 ***</div>
+
+<div class="bk1"><div class="bk2"><h1><span class="sp1">NATIVE SON</span></h1>
+
+<h2><i>By<br />
+T. D. Hamm</i></h2></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk3"><p><big><b>Tommy hated Earth, knowing his mother
+might go home to Mars without him. Worse,
+would a robot secretly take her place?...</b></big></p></div>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Tommy</span> Benton, on his first
+visit to Earth, found the
+long-anticipated wonders of
+twenty-first-century New York
+thrilling the first week, boring and
+unhappy the second week, and at
+the end of the third he was definitely
+ready to go home.</p>
+
+<p>The never-ending racket of traffic
+was torture to his abnormally
+acute ears. Increased atmospheric
+pressure did funny things to his
+chest and stomach. And quick
+and sure-footed on Mars, he struggled
+constantly against the heavy
+gravity that made all his movements
+clumsy and uncoordinated.</p>
+
+<p>The endless canyons of towering
+buildings, with their connecting
+Skywalks, oppressed and smothered
+him. Remembering the endless
+vistas of <i>rabbara</i> fields beside a
+canal that was like an inland sea,
+homesickness flooded over him.</p>
+
+<p>He hated the people who stared
+at him with either open or hidden
+amusement. His Aunt Bee, for
+instance, who looked him up and
+down with frank disapproval and
+said loudly, "For Heavens sake,
+Helen! Take him to a <i>good</i> tailor
+and get those bones covered up!"</p>
+
+<p>Was it his fault he was six inches
+taller than Terran boys his age,
+and had long, thin arms and legs?
+Or that his chest was abnormally
+developed to compensate for an
+oxygen-thin atmosphere? I'd like
+to see <i>her</i>, he thought fiercely,
+out on the Flatlands; she'd be
+gasping like a canal-fish out of
+water.</p>
+
+<p>Even his parents, happily riding
+the social merry-go-round of Terra,
+after eleven years in the Martian
+flatlands, didn't seem to understand
+how he felt.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you <i>like</i> Earth, Tommy?"
+queried his mother anxiously.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh ... it's all right, I guess."</p>
+
+<p>"... 'A nice place to visit' ..."
+said his father sardonically.</p>
+
+<p>"... 'but I wouldn't live here
+if they gave me the place!' ..."
+said his mother, and they both
+burst out laughing for no reason
+that Tommy could see. Of course,
+they did that lots of times at
+home and Tommy laughed with
+them just for the warm, secure
+feeling of belonging. This time
+he didn't feel like laughing.</p>
+
+<p>"When <i>are</i> we going home?" he
+repeated stubbornly.</p>
+
+<p>His father pulled Tommy over
+in the crook of his arm and said
+gently, "Well, not right away,
+son. As a matter of fact, how
+would you like to stay here and
+go to school?"</p>
+
+<p>Tommy pulled away and looked
+at him incredulously.</p>
+
+<p>"I've <i>been</i> to school!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes," admitted his father.
+"But only to the colony schools.
+You don't want to grow up and
+be an ignorant Martian sandfoot
+all your life, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I do! I <i>want</i> to be a Martian
+sandfoot. And I want to go
+home where people don't <i>look</i> at
+me and say, 'So this is your little
+Martian!'"</p>
+
+<p>Benton, Sr., put his arm around
+Tommy's stiffly resistant shoulders.
+"Look here, old man," he
+said persuasively. "I thought you
+wanted to be a space engineer.
+You can't do that without an education
+you know. And your Aunt
+Bee will take good care of you."</p>
+
+<p>Tommy faced him stubbornly.
+"I don't want to be any old spaceman.
+I want to be a sandfoot like
+old Pete. And I want to go
+home."</p>
+
+<p>Helen bit back a smile at the
+two earnest, stubborn faces so
+ridiculously alike, and hastened to
+avert the gathering storm.</p>
+
+<p>"Now look, fellows. Tommy's
+career doesn't have to be decided
+in the next five minutes ... after
+all, he's only ten. He can make
+up his mind later on if he wants
+to be an engineer or a <i>rabbara</i>
+farmer. Right now, he's going to
+stay here and go to school ...
+<i>and</i> I'm staying with him."</p>
+
+<p>Resolutely avoiding both crestfallen
+faces, Helen, having shepherded
+Tommy to bed, returned to
+the living room acutely conscious
+of Big Tom's bleak, hurt gaze at
+her back.</p>
+
+<p>"Helen, you're going to make
+a sissy out of the boy," he said at
+last. "There isn't any reason
+why he can't stay here at home
+with Bee."</p>
+
+<p>Helen turned to face him.</p>
+
+<p>"Earth <i>isn't</i> home to Tommy.
+And your sister Bee told him he
+ought to be out playing football
+with the boys instead of hanging
+around the house."</p>
+
+<p>"But she knows the doctor said
+he'd have to take it easy for a year
+till he was accustomed to the
+change in gravity and air-pressure,"
+he answered incredulously.</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. She also asked me,"
+Helen went on grimly, "if I
+thought he'd be less of a freak as
+he got older."</p>
+
+<p>Tom Benton swore. "Bee always
+did have less sense than the
+average hen," he gritted. "My
+son a freak! Hell's-bells!"</p>
+
+<p>Tommy, arriving at the hall
+door in time to hear the tail-end
+of the sentence, crept back to bed
+feeling numb and dazed. So even
+his father thought he was a freak.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">The</span> last few days before parting
+was one of strain for all of
+them. If Tommy was unnaturally
+subdued, no one noticed it; his
+parents were not feeling any great
+impulse toward gaiety either.</p>
+
+<p>They all went dutifully sight-seeing
+as before; they saw the
+Zoo, and went shopping on the
+Skywalks, and on the last day
+wound up at the great showrooms
+of "Androids, Inc."</p>
+
+<p>Tommy had hated them on
+sight; they were at once too human
+and too inhuman for comfort.
+The hotel was full of them, and
+most private homes had at least
+one. Now they saw the great incubating
+vats, and the processing
+and finally the showroom where
+one of the finished products was
+on display as a maid, sweeping
+and dusting.</p>
+
+<p>"There's one that's a dead-ringer
+for you, Helen. If you were a
+little better looking, that is." Tommy's
+dad pretended to compare
+them judicially. Helen laughed,
+but Tommy looked at him with a
+resentfulness. Comparing his mother
+to an Android....</p>
+
+<p>"They say for a little extra you
+can get an exact resemblance.
+Maybe I'd better have one fixed
+up like you to take back with me,"
+Big Tom added teasingly. Then
+as Helen's face clouded over, "Oh,
+hon, you know I was only kidding.
+Let's get out of here; this place
+gives me the collywobbles. Besides,
+I've got to pick up my watch."</p>
+
+<p>But his mother's face was still
+unhappy and Tommy glowered sullenly
+at his father's back all the
+way to the watch-shop.</p>
+
+<p>It was a small shop, with an
+inconspicuous sign down in one
+corner of the window that said
+only, "KRUMBEIN&mdash;watches," and
+was probably the most famous
+shop of its kind in the world. Every
+spaceman landing on Terra
+left his watch to be checked by
+the dusty, little old man who was
+the genius of the place. Tommy
+ranged wide-eyed about the clock
+and chronometer crammed interior.
+He stopped fascinated before the
+last case. In it was a watch ...
+but, <i>what</i> a watch! Besides the
+regulation Terran dial, it had a
+second smaller dial that registered
+the corresponding time on Mars.
+Tommy's whole heart went out to
+it in an ecstasy of longing. He
+thought wistfully that if you could
+know what time it was there, you
+could imagine what everyone was
+doing and it wouldn't seem so far
+away. Haltingly, he tried to explain.</p>
+
+<p>"Look, Mom," he said breathlessly.
+"It's almost five o'clock
+at home. Douwie will be coming
+up to the barn to be fed. Gosh, do
+you suppose old Pete will remember
+about her?"</p>
+
+<p>His mother smiled at him reassuringly.
+"Of course he will,
+silly. Don't forget he was the one
+who caught and tamed her for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Tommy gulped as he thought of
+Douwie. Scarcely as tall as himself;
+the big, rounded, mouselike
+ears, and the flat, cloven pads
+that could carry her so swiftly
+over the sandy Martian flatlands.
+One of the last dwindling herds of
+native Martian douwies, burden-carriers
+of a vanished race, she
+had been Tommy's particular pride
+and joy for the last three years.</p>
+
+<p>Behind him, Tommy heard his
+mother murmur under her breath,
+"Tom ... the watch; <i>could</i> we?"</p>
+
+<p>And his Dad regretfully, "It's
+a pretty expensive toy for a
+youngster, Helen. And even a
+<i>rabbara</i> raiser's bank account has
+limits."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, dear; it was silly of
+me." Helen smiled a little ruefully.
+"And if Mr. Krumbein has
+your watch ready, we <i>must</i> go.
+Bee and some of her friends are
+coming over, and it's only a few
+hours 'till you ... leave."</p>
+
+<p>Big Tom squeezed her elbow
+gently, understandingly, as she
+blinked back quick tears. Trailing
+after them, Tommy saw the little
+by-play and his heart ached. The
+guilt-complex building up in him
+grew and deepened.</p>
+
+<p>He knew he had only to say,
+"Look, I don't mind staying. Aunt
+Bee and I will get along swell," and
+everything would be all right again.
+Then the terror of this new and
+complex world&mdash;as it would be
+without a familiar face&mdash;swept
+over him and kept him silent.</p>
+
+<p>His overwrought feelings expressed
+themselves in a nervously
+rebelling stomach, culminating in
+a disgraceful moment over the
+nearest gutter. The rest of the
+afternoon he spent in bed recuperating.</p>
+
+<p>In the living room Aunt Bee
+spoke her mind in her usual, high-pitched
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"It's disgraceful, Helen. A boy
+his age.... None of the <i>Bentons</i>
+ever had nerves."</p>
+
+<p>His mother's reply was inaudible,
+but on the heels of his father's
+deeper tones, Aunt Bee's
+voice rose in rasping indignation.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Well!</i> I never! And from my
+own brother, too. From now on
+don't come to me for help with
+your spoiled brat. Good-<i>bye</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>The door slammed indignantly,
+his mother chuckled, and there was
+a spontaneous burst of laughter.
+Tommy relaxed and lay back happily.
+Anyway, that was the last of
+Aunt Bee!</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">The</span> next hour or two passed in
+a flurry of ringing phones, people
+coming and going, and last-minute
+words and reminders. Then
+suddenly it was time to leave. Dad
+burst in for a last quick hug and a
+promise to send him pictures of
+Douwie and her foal, due next
+month; Mother dropped a hasty
+kiss on his hair and promised to
+hurry back from the Spaceport.
+Then Tommy was alone, with a
+large, painful lump where his heart
+ought to be.</p>
+
+<p>The only activity was the almost
+noiseless buzzing as the hotel
+android ran the cleaner over the
+living room. Presently even that
+ceased, and Tommy lay relaxed
+and inert, sleepily watching the
+curtains blow in and out at the
+open window. Thirty stories above
+the street the noises were pleasantly
+muffled and remote, and his
+senses drifted aimlessly to and fro
+on the tides of half-sleep.</p>
+
+<p>Drowsily his mind wandered
+from the hotel's android servants
+... to the strictly utilitarian mechanical
+monstrosity at home,
+known affectionately as "Old
+John" ... to the android showroom
+where they had seen the one
+that Dad said looked like Mother....</p>
+
+<p>He jolted suddenly, sickeningly
+awake. Suppose, his mind whispered
+treacherously, suppose that
+Dad <i>had</i> ordered one to take
+Mom's place ... not on Mars,
+but <i>here</i> while she returned to
+Mars with him. Suppose that instead
+of Mom he discovered one
+of those <i>Things</i> ... or even worse,
+suppose he went on from day to
+day not even knowing....</p>
+
+<p>It was a bad five minutes; he
+was wet with perspiration when he
+lay back on his pillows, a shaky
+smile tugging at the corners of his
+mouth. He had a secret defense
+against the Terror. He giggled a
+little at the thought of what Aunt
+Bee would say if she knew.</p>
+
+<p>And what had brought him back
+from the edge of hysteria was the
+triumphant knowledge that with
+the abnormally acute hearing bred
+in the thin atmosphere of Mars,
+no robot ever created could hide
+from him the infinitesimal ticking
+of the electronic relays that gave
+it life. Secure at last, his overstrung
+nerves relaxed and he slid
+gratefully over the edge of sleep.</p>
+
+<p>He woke abruptly, groping after
+some vaguely remembered
+sound. A soft clicking of heels
+down the hall.... Of course, his
+mother back from the Spaceport!
+Now she would be stopping at his
+door to see if he were asleep. He
+lay silently; through his eyelashes
+he could see her outlined in the
+soft light from the hall. She was
+coming in to see if he was tucked
+in. In a moment he would jump
+up and startle her with a hug, as
+she leaned over him. In a moment....</p>
+
+<p>Screaming desperately, he was
+out of bed, backing heedlessly
+across the room. He was still
+screaming as the low sill of the
+open window caught him behind
+the knees and toppled him thirty
+stories to the street.</p>
+
+<p>Alone in the silent room, Helen
+Benton stood dazed, staring
+blindly at the empty window.</p>
+
+<p>Tommy's parting gift from his
+father slid from her hand and lay
+on the carpet, still ticking gently.</p>
+
+<p>It was 9:23 on Mars.</p>
+
+<p class="hd1">The End</p>
+
+<div class="trn"><div class="figt"><a href="images/002-2.jpg"><img src="images/002-1.jpg" width="146" height="200" alt="" title="" /></a></div>
+
+<p><big><b>Transcriber's Note:</b></big></p>
+
+<p>This etext was produced from <i>Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy</i> July 1953.
+Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
+copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and
+typographical errors have been corrected without note.</p></div>
+
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30014 ***</div>
+</body>
+</html>
diff --git a/30014-h/images/001.png b/30014-h/images/001.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6c4269b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/30014-h/images/001.png
diff --git a/30014-h/images/002-1.jpg b/30014-h/images/002-1.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..329ae67
--- /dev/null
+++ b/30014-h/images/002-1.jpg
diff --git a/30014-h/images/002-2.jpg b/30014-h/images/002-2.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3427cdb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/30014-h/images/002-2.jpg
author	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-14 19:52:58 -0700
committer	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-14 19:52:58 -0700
commit	8405fceea7d17dcbe5ebb6da8d7bbc9abbf7f7c0 (patch)
tree	2bf44a6a268b8655373f73b0350e999deb554392 /30014-h