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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/32324-h.zip b/32324-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cb168f1 --- /dev/null +++ b/32324-h.zip diff --git a/32324-h/32324-h.htm b/32324-h/32324-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0e01e3c --- /dev/null +++ b/32324-h/32324-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1516 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<!-- $Id: header.txt 236 2009-12-07 18:57:00Z vlsimpson $ --> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Sam, This Is You, by Murray Leinster. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} + +.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; +} /* page numbers */ + +.linenum { + position: absolute; + top: auto; + left: 4%; +} /* poetry number */ + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +.sidenote { + width: 20%; + padding-bottom: .5em; + padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; + padding-right: .5em; + margin-left: 1em; + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; + color: black; + background: #eeeeee; + border: dashed 1px; +} + +.bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + +.bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + +.bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + +.br {border-right: solid 2px;} + +.bbox {border: solid 2px;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +.u {text-decoration: underline;} + +.caption {font-weight: bold;} + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; +} + +.figleft { + float: left; + clear: left; + margin-left: 0; + margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 1em; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +.figright { + float: right; + clear: right; + margin-left: 1em; + margin-bottom: + 1em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-right: 0; + padding: 0; + text-align: center; +} + +/* Footnotes */ +.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + +.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + +.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + +.fnanchor { + vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: + none; +} + +/* Poetry */ +.poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + text-align: left; +} + +.poem br {display: none;} + +.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + +.poem span.i0 { + display: block; + margin-left: 0em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i2 { + display: block; + margin-left: 2em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + +.poem span.i4 { + display: block; + margin-left: 4em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's Sam, This is You, by William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sam, This is You + +Author: William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +Illustrator: Mel Hunter + +Release Date: May 10, 2010 [EBook #32324] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAM, THIS IS YOU *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + +<h1>SAM, THIS IS YOU</h1> + +<h2>By MURRAY LEINSTER</h2> + +<h3>Illustrated by MEL HUNTER</h3> + +<p>[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from Galaxy Science Fiction +May 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. +copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="sidenote">Sam had led a peaceful and impecunious life—until a voice +cut in on a phone and said: Sam, this is You</div> + + +<p>You are not supposed to believe this story, and if you ask Sam Yoder +about it, he is apt to say that it's all a lie. But Sam is a bit +sensitive about it. He does not want the question of privacy to be +raised again—especially in Rosie's hearing. And there are other +matters. But it's all perfectly respectable and straightforward.</p> + +<p>It could have happened to anybody—well, almost anybody. Anybody, say, +who was a telephone lineman for the Batesville and Rappahannock +Telephone Company, and who happened to be engaged to Rosie, and who had +been told admiringly by Rosie that a man as smart as he was ought to +make something wonderful of himself. And, of course, anybody who'd taken +that seriously and had been puttering around on a device to make private +conversations on a party-line telephone possible, and almost had the +trick.</p> + +<p>It began about six o'clock on July second, when Sam was up a telephone +pole near Bridge's Run. He was hunting for the place where that party +line had gone dead. He'd hooked in his lineman's phone and he couldn't +raise Central, so he was just going to start looking for the break when +his phone rang back, though the line had checked dead.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Startled, he put the receiver to his ear. "Hello. Who's this?"</p> + +<p>"Sam, this is you," a voice replied.</p> + +<p>"Huh?" said Sam. "What's that?"</p> + +<p>"This is you," the voice on the wire repeated. "You, Sam Yoder. Don't +you recognize your own voice? This is you, Sam Yoder, calling from the +twelfth of July. Don't hang up!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Sam hadn't even thought of hanging up. He was annoyed. He was up a +telephone pole, trying to do some work, resting in his safety belt and +with his climbing irons safely fixed in the wood. Naturally, he thought +somebody was trying to joke with him, and when a man is working is no +time for jokes.</p> + +<p>"I'm not hanging up," said Sam dourly, "but you'd better!"</p> + +<p>The voice was familiar, though he couldn't quite place it. If it talked +a little more, he undoubtedly would. He knew it just about as well as he +knew his own, and it was irritating not to be able to call this joker by +name.</p> + +<p>The voice said, "Sam, it's the second of July where you are, and you're +up a pole by Bridge's Run. The line's dead in two places, else I +couldn't talk to you. Lucky, ain't it?"</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>"Whoever you are," Sam said formidably, "it ain't going to be lucky for +you if you ever need telephone service and you've kept wasting my time. +I'm busy!"</p> + +<p>"But I'm you!" insisted the voice persuasively. "And you're me! We're +both the same Sam Yoder, only where I am, it's July twelfth. Where you +are, it's July second. You've heard of time-traveling. Well, this is +time-talking. You're talking to yourself—that's me—and I'm talking to +myself—that's you—and it looks like we've got a mighty good chance to +get rich."</p> + +<p>Then something came into Sam's memory and every muscle in his body went +taut and tight, even as he was saying to himself, "It can't be!"</p> + +<p>But he'd remembered that if a man stands in a corner and talks to the +wall, his voice will sound to him just the way it sounds to somebody +else. Being in the telephone business, he'd tried it and now he did +recognize the voice. It was his. His own. Talking to him. Which, of +course, was impossible.</p> + +<p>"Look," said hoarsely, "I don't believe this!"</p> + +<p>"Then listen," the voice said briskly. And Sam's face grew red. It +burned. His ears began to feel scorched. Because the voice—<i>his</i> +voice—was telling him strictly private matters that nobody else in the +world knew. Nobody but himself and Rosie.</p> + +<p>"Quit it!" groaned Sam. "Somebody might be listening! Tell me what you +want and ring off!"</p> + +<p>The voice told him what it wanted. His own voice. It sounded pleased. It +told him precisely what it wanted him to do. And then, very kindly, it +told him exactly where the two breaks in the line were. And then it rang +off.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>He sweated when he looked at the first of the two places. A joining was +bad and he fixed that. It was where his voice had said it would be. And +that was as impossible as anything else.</p> + +<p>When he'd fixed the second break, Sam called Central and told her he was +sick and was going home, and that if there were any other phones that +needed fixing today, people were probably better off without phone +service, anyhow.</p> + +<p>He went home and washed his face, and made himself a brew of coffee and +drank it, and his memory turned out to be unimpaired. Presently he heard +himself muttering.</p> + +<p>So he said defiantly, "There ain't any crazy people in my family, so it +ain't likely I've gone out of my head. But God knows nobody but Rosie +knows about me telling her sentimental that her nose is so cute, I +couldn't believe she ever had to blow it! Maybe it was me, talking to +myself!"</p> + +<p>Talking to oneself is not abnormal. Lots of people do it. Sam missed out +the conclusion to be drawn from the fact that he'd answered himself +back.</p> + +<p>He reasoned painfully, "If somebody drove over to Rappahannock, past +Dunnsville, and telephoned back that there was a brush fire at +Dunnsville, I wouldn't be surprised to get to Dunnsville and find a +brush fire there. So if somebody phones back from next Tuesday that Mr. +Broaddus broke his leg next Tuesday—why, I shouldn't be surprised to +get to next Tuesday and find he done it. Going to Rappahannock, past +Dunnsville, and going to next Thursday, past next Tuesday, ain't so much +difference. It's only the difference between a road-map and a calendar."</p> + +<p>Then he began to see implications. He blinked.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir!" he said in awe. "I wouldn't've thought of it if I hadn't +told myself on the telephone, but there <i>is</i> money to be made out of +this! I must be near as smart as Rosie thinks I am! I'd better get that +dinkus set up!"</p> + +<p>He'd more or less half-heartedly worked out an idea of how a party-line +telephone conversation could be made private, and just out of instinct, +you might say, he'd accumulated around his house a lot of stuff that +should have been on the phone company's inventory. There were condensers +and transmitters and selective-ringing bells and resistances and the +like. He'd meant to put some of them together some day and see what +happened, but he'd been too busy courting Rosie to get at it.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Now he did get started. His own voice on the telephone had told him to. +It had warned him that one thing he had intended wouldn't work and +something else would. But it was essentially simple, after all. He +finished it and cut off his line from Central and hooked this gadget in. +He rang. Half a minute later, somebody rang back.</p> + +<p>"Hello!" said Sam, quivering. He'd broken the line to Central, remember. +In theory, he shouldn't have gotten anybody anywhere. But a very +familiar voice said "Hello" back at him, and Sam swallowed and said, +"Hello, Sam. This is you in the second of July."</p> + +<p>The voice at the other end said cordially that Sam had done pretty well +and now the two of them—Sam in the here and now and Sam in the middle +of the week after next—would proceed to get rich together. But the +voice from July twelfth sounded less absorbed in the conversation than +Sam thought quite right. It seemed even abstracted. And Sam was at once +sweating from the pure unreasonableness of the situation and conscious +that he rated congratulation for the highly technical device he had +built. After all, not everybody could build a time-talker!</p> + +<p>He said with some irony, "If you're too busy to talk—"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you," replied the voice from the twelfth of July, gratified. +"I am kind of busy right now. You'll understand when you get to where I +am. Don't get mad, Sam. Tell you what—you go see Rosie and tell her +about this and have a nice evening. Ha-ha!"</p> + +<p>"Now what," asked Sam cagily, "do you mean by that 'ha-ha'?"</p> + +<p>"You'll find out," said the voice. "Knowin' what I know, I'll even +double it. Ha-ha, ha-ha!"</p> + +<p>There was a click. Sam rang back, but got no answer. He may have been +the first man in history to take an objective and completely justified +dislike to himself.</p> + +<p>But presently he grumbled, "Smart, huh? Two can play at that! I'm the +one that's got to do things if we are both goin' to get rich."</p> + +<p>He put his gadget carefully away and combed his hair and ate some cold +food around the house and drove over to see Rosie. It was a night and an +errand which ordinarily would have seemed purely romantic. There were +fireflies floating about, and the Moon shone down splendidly, and a +perfumed breeze carried mosquitoes from one place to another. It was the +sort of night on which, ordinarily, Sam would have thought only of +Rosie, and Rosie would have optimistic ideas about how housekeeping +could, after all, be done on what Sam made a week.</p> + +<p>They got settled down in the hammock on Rosie's front porch, and Sam +said expansively, "Rosie, I've made up my mind to get rich. You ought to +have everything your little heart desires. Suppose you tell me what you +want so I'll know how rich I've got to get."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Rosie drew back. She looked sharply at Sam. "Do you feel all right?"</p> + +<p>He beamed at her. He'd never been married and he didn't know how crazy +it sounded to Rosie to be queried on how much money would satisfy her. +There simply isn't any answer to the question.</p> + +<p>"Listen," said Sam tenderly. "Nobody knows it, but tonight Joe Hunt and +the Widow Backus are eloping to North Carolina to get married. We'll +find out about it tomorrow. And day after tomorrow, on the Fourth of +July, Dunnsville is going to win the baseball game with Bradensburg, +seven to five, all tied till the ninth inning, and then George Peeby is +going to hit a homer with Fred Holmes on second base."</p> + +<p>Rosie stared at him. Sam explained complacently. The Sam Yoder in the +middle of the week after next had told him what to expect in those +particular cases. He would tell him other things to expect. So Sam was +going to get rich.</p> + +<p>Rosie said, "Sam! Somebody was playing a joke on you!"</p> + +<p>"Yeah?" Sam answered comfortably. "Who else but me knows what you said +to me that time you thought I was mad at you and you were crying out +back of the well-house?"</p> + +<p>"Sam!"</p> + +<p>"And nobody else knows about that time we were picnicking and a bug got +down the back of your dress and you thought it was a hornet."</p> + +<p>"Sam Yoder!" wailed Rosie. "You never told anybody about that!"</p> + +<p>"Nope," said Sam truthfully. "I never did. But the me in the week after +next knew. He told me. So he had to be me talking to me. Couldn't've +been anybody else."</p> + +<p>Rosie gasped. Sam explained all over again. In detail. When he had +finished, Rosie seemed dazed.</p> + +<p>Then she said desperately, "Sam! Either you've t-told somebody else +everything we ever said or did together, or else—there's somebody who +knows every word we ever said to each other! That's awful! Do you really +and truly mean to tell me—"</p> + +<p>"Sure I mean to tell you," said Sam happily. "The me in the week after +next called me up and talked about things nobody knows but you and me. +Can't be no doubt at all."</p> + +<p>Rosie shivered. "He—he knows every word we ever said! Then he knows +every word we're saying now!" She gulped. "Sam Yoder, you go home!"</p> + +<p>Sam gaped at her. She got up and backed away from him.</p> + +<p>"D-do you think," she chattered despairingly, "that I—that I'm g-going +to talk to you when s-somebody else—listens to every w-word I say +and—knows everything I do? D-do you think I'm going to <i>m-marry</i> you?"</p> + +<p>Then she ran away, weeping noisily, and slammed the door on Sam. Her +father came out presently, looking patient, and asked Sam to go home so +Rosie could finish crying and he could read his newspaper in peace.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>On the way back to his own house, Sam meditated darkly. By the time he +got there, he was furious. The him in the week after next could have +warned him about this!</p> + +<p>He rang and rang and rang, on the cut-off line with his gadget hooked in +to call July the twelfth. But there was no answer.</p> + +<p>When morning came, he rang again, but the phone was still dead. He +loaded his tool-kit in the truck and went off to work, feeling about as +low as a man could feel.</p> + +<p>He felt lower when he reported at the office and somebody told him +excitedly that Joe Hunt and the Widow Backus had eloped to North +Carolina to get married. Nobody would have tried to stop them if they +had prosaically gotten married at home, but they had eloped to make it +more romantic.</p> + +<p>It wasn't romantic to Sam. It was devastating proof that there was +another him ten days off, knowing everything he knew and more besides, +and very likely laughing his head off at the fix Sam was in. Because, +obviously, Rosie would be still more convinced when she heard this news. +She'd know Sam wasn't crazy or the victim of a practical joke. He had +told the truth.</p> + +<p>It wasn't the first time a man got in trouble with a woman by telling +her the truth, but it was new to Sam and it hurt.</p> + +<p>He went over to Bradensburg that day to repair some broken lines, and +around noon, he went into a store to get something to eat. There were +some local sportsmen in the store, bragging to each other about what the +Bradensburg baseball team would do to the Dunnsville nine.</p> + +<p>Sam said peevishly, "Huh! Dunnsville will win that game by two runs!"</p> + +<p>"Have you got any money that agrees with you?" a local sportsman +demanded pugnaciously. "If you have, put it up and let somebody cover +it!"</p> + +<p>Sam wanted to draw back, but he had roused the civic pride of +Bradensburg. He tried to temporize and he was jeered at. In the end, +philosophically, he dragged out all the money he had with him and bet +it—eleven dollars. It was covered instantly, amid raucous laughter. And +on the way back to Batesville, he reflected unhappily that he was going +to make eleven dollars out of knowing what was going to happen in the +ninth inning of that ball game, but probably at the cost of losing +Rosie.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>He tried to call his other self that night again. There was no more +answer than before. He unhooked the gadget and restored normal service +to himself. He rang Rosie's house. She answered the phone.</p> + +<p>"Rosie," Sam asked yearningly, "are you still mad at me?"</p> + +<p>"I never was mad at you," said Rose, gulping. "I'm mad at whoever was +talking to you on the phone and knows all our private secrets. And I'm +mad at you if you told him."</p> + +<p>"But I didn't have to tell him! He's me! All he has to do is just +remember! I tried to call him last night and again this morning," he +added bitterly, "and he don't answer. Maybe he's gone off somewheres. +I'm thinking it might be a—a kind of illusion, maybe."</p> + +<p>"You told me there'd be an elopement last night," retorted Rosie, her +voice wobbling, "and there was. Joe Hunt and the Widow Backus. Just like +you said!"</p> + +<p>"It—it could've been a coincidence," suggested Sam, not too hopefully.</p> + +<p>"I'm—w-waiting to see if Dunnsville beats Bradensburg seven to five +tomorrow, tied to the ninth, with George Peeby hitting a homer then with +Fred Holmes on second base. If—if that happens, I'll—I'll die!"</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked Sam.</p> + +<p>"Because it'll mean that I can't m-marry you ever, because somebody +else'd be looking over your shoulder—and we wouldn't ever be by +ourselves all our lives—night or day!"</p> + +<p>She hung up, weeping, and Sam swore slowly and steadily and with venom +while he worked to hook up his device again—which did not make a +private conversation on a party line, but allowed a man to talk to +himself ten days away from where he was. And then Sam rang, and rang, +and rang. But he got no answer.</p> + +<p>The following day, in the big fourth of July game, Dunnsville beat +Bradensburg seven to five. It was tied to the ninth. Then George Peeby +hit a homer, with Fred Holmes on second base. Sam collected his +winnings, but grimly, without joy.</p> + +<p>He stayed home that night, worrying, and every so often trying to call +himself up on the device he had invented and been told—by himself—to +modify. It was a nice gadget, but Sam did not enjoy it. It was a nice +night, too. There was moonlight. But Sam did not enjoy that, either.</p> + +<p>Moonlight wouldn't do Sam any good so long as there was another him in +the middle of the week after next, refusing to talk to him so he could +get out of the fix he was in.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Next morning, though, the phone woke him. He swore at it out of habit +until he got out of bed, and then he realized that his gadget was hooked +in and Central was cut off. He made it in one jump to the instrument.</p> + +<p>"Hello!"</p> + +<p>"Don't fret," said his own voice patronizingly. "Rosie's going to make +up with you."</p> + +<p>"How in blazes d'you know what she's going to do?" raged Sam. "She won't +marry me with you hanging around! I've been trying to figure out a way +to get rid of you—"</p> + +<p>"Quiet!" commanded the voice on the telephone irritably. "I'm busy. I've +got to go collect the money you've made for us."</p> + +<p>"<i>You</i> collect money? <i>I</i> get in trouble and <i>you</i> collect money?"</p> + +<p>"I have to," his voice said with the impatient patience of one speaking +to a small idiot child, "before you can have it. Listen here. Where you +are, it's Wednesday. You're going over to Dunnsville today to fix some +phones. You'll be in Mr. Broaddus' law office about half-past ten. You +look out the window and notice a fella setting in a car in front of the +bank. Notice him good!"</p> + +<p>"I won't do it," said Sam defiantly. "I ain't taking any orders from +you! Maybe you're me, but <i>I</i> make money and <i>you</i> collect it. For all I +know you spend it before I get to it! I'm quitting this business right +now. It's cost me my own true love and all <i>my</i> life's happiness and to +hell with you!"</p> + +<p>"You won't do it?" his own voice asked nastily. "Wait and see!"</p> + +<p>So, that morning, the manager told Sam, when he reported for work, to +drive over to Dunnsville and check on some lines there. Sam balked. He +said there were much more important lines needing repair elsewhere. The +manager explained politely to Sam that Mr. Broaddus over in Dunnsville +had been taken drunk at a Fourth of July party and fallen out of a +window. He'd broken his leg, so it was a Christian duty to make sure he +had a telephone in working order in his office, and Sam could get over +there right away or else.</p> + +<p>On the way to Dunnsville, Sam morosely remembered that he'd known about +Mr. Broaddus' leg. He had told himself about it on the telephone.</p> + +<p>At half-past ten, he was fixing Mr. Broaddus' telephone when he +remembered about the man he was supposed to get a good look at, sitting +in a car in front of the bank. He made an angry resolution not, under +any circumstances, to glance outside of the lawyer's office. He +meditated savagely that, by this resolution, the schemes of his other +self in the future were abolished.</p> + +<p>Naturally, he presently went to the window and looked to see what he was +abolishing.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>There was a car before the bank with a reddish-haired man sitting in it. +A haze came out of the exhaust, showing that the motor was running. None +of this impressed Sam as remarkable. But as he looked, two other men +came running out of the bank. One of them carried a bag and both of them +had revolvers out and they piled into the car and the reddish-haired man +gunned it and it was abruptly a dwindling speck in a cloud of dust, +getting out of town.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus3.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Three seconds later, old Mr. Bluford, president of the bank, came out +yelling, and the cashier came after him, and it was a first-rate bank +robbery they were yelling about. The men in the get-away car had +departed with thirty-five thousand dollars.</p> + +<p>All of it had taken place so fast that Sam hardly realized what had +happened when he went out to see what it was all about, and was +instantly seized upon to do some work. The bankrobbers had shot out the +telephone cable out of town with a shotgun, so word couldn't get ahead +of them. Sam was needed to re-establish communications with the outside +world.</p> + +<p>He did, absorbedly reflecting on the details of the robbery as he'd +heard them. He was high up on a telephone pole and the sheriff and +enthusiastic citizens were streaking past in cars to make his labors +unnecessary, when the personal aspect of all this affair hit him.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus4.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>"Migawd!" gasped Sam, shocked. "That me in the middle of next week told +me to come over here and watch a bank robbery! But he didn't let on what +was going to happen so's I could stop it!" He felt an incredulous +indignation come over him. "I woulda been a hero!" he said resentfully. +"Rosie woulda admired me! <i>That other me is a born crook!</i>"</p> + +<p>Then he realized the facts. The other him was himself, only a week and a +half distant. The other him was so far sunk in dastardliness that he +permitted a crime to take place, feeling no more than sardonic +amusement.</p> + +<p>And there was nothing he himself could do about it! He couldn't even +tell the authorities about this depraved character! They wouldn't +believe him unless he could get his other self on the telephone to admit +his criminality. Even then, what could they do?</p> + +<p>Sam felt what little zest had been left in living go trickling out of +his climbers. He looked into the future and saw nothing desirable in it.</p> + +<p>He painstakingly finished the repair of the shot-out telephone line, but +then he went down to his truck and drove over to Rosie's house.</p> + +<p>There was but one thing he could do.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Rosie came suspiciously to the the door.</p> + +<p>"I come to tell you good-by, Rosie," said Sam. "I just found out I'm a +criminal, so I aim to go and commit my crimes far away from my home and +the friends who never thought I'd turn out this way. Good-by, Rosie."</p> + +<p>"Sam!" said Rosie. "What's happened now?"</p> + +<p>He told her about the bank robbery and how his own self—in the week +after next—had known it was going to happen, and told Sam to go watch +it without giving him information by which it could have been stopped.</p> + +<p>"He knew it after it happened," said Sam bitterly, "and he could've told +me about it before! He didn't, so he's a accessory to the crime. And he +is me, which makes me a accessory, too. Good-by, Rosie, my own true +love! You'll never see me again!"</p> + +<p>"You set right down here," Rosie ordered firmly. "You haven't done a +thing yet, so it's that other you who's a criminal. You haven't got a +thing to run away for!"</p> + +<p>"But I'm going to have! I'm doomed to be a criminal! It's that me in the +week after next! There's nothing to be done!"</p> + +<p>"Says who? <i>I'm</i> going to do something!"</p> + +<p>"Like what?" asked Sam.</p> + +<p>"I'm going to reform you," said Rosie, "before you start!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>She was a determined girl, that Rosie. She marched inside and put on her +blue jeans, then went to her father's woodshed where he kept his tools +and got a monkey wrench and stuck it in her hip pocket.</p> + +<p>When she came to the truck, Sam said, "What's the idea, Rosie?"</p> + +<p>"I'm riding around with you," replied Rosie, with a grim air. "You won't +do anything criminal with me on hand! And if that other you starts +talking to you on the telephone, I'm going to climb that pole and tell +him where he gets off!"</p> + +<p>"If anybody could keep me from turning criminal," acknowledged Sam, +"it'd be you, Rosie. But that monkey wrench—what's it for?"</p> + +<p>Rosie climbed into the seat beside him.</p> + +<p>"You start having criminal ideas," she told him, "and you'll find out! +Now you go on about your business and I and the monkey wrench will look +after your morals!"</p> + +<p>This tender exchange happened only an hour or so after the robbery and +there was plenty of excitement around. But Sam went soberly about his +work as telephone lineman. Rosie simply rode with him as a—well, it +wasn't as a bodyguard, but a sort of M.P. escort—Morals Police. Where +he worked on a line, he called the central office to report, and he +heard about the hunt for the bank robbers, and told Rosie.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>It was good fortune that he'd been in Dunnsville when the robbery +happened, because his prompt repair of the phone wires had spoiled the +robbers' get-away plans. They hadn't gone ten miles from Dunnsville +before somebody fired a load of buckshot at them as their car roared by +Lemons' Store. They were past before they realized they'd been shot at. +But the buckshot had punctured the radiator, and two miles on, they were +stuck.</p> + +<p>They pushed their car off the road behind some bushes and struck out on +foot, and the sheriff ran right past their car without seeing it. Then +rain began to fall and the bank robbers were wet and scared and +desperate. They knew there'd be roadblocks set up everywhere and they +had that bag of money—part bills, but a lot of it silver—and all of +Tidewater was up in arms.</p> + +<p>Taking evasive action, they hastily stuffed their pockets with small +bills—there were no big ones—but dared not take too much lest the +pockets bulge. They hid the major part of their loot in a hollow tree. +They separated, going to nearby towns—while rain fell heavily and +covered their trails—and went to bed with chest colds. They felt +miserable. But the rain washed away the scent they had left and +bloodhounds couldn't do a thing.</p> + +<p>None of this was known to Sam, of course. Rosie had taken charge of him +and she kept charge. She rode with him all the afternoon of the robbery. +When quitting time came, he took her home and prepared to retire from +the scene.</p> + +<p>But she said grimly, "Oh, no, you don't! You're staying right here! +You're going to sleep in my brother's room, and my pa is going to put a +padlock on the door so you don't go roaming off to call up that +no-account other you and get in more trouble!"</p> + +<p>"I might mess things up if I don't talk to him," Sam objected.</p> + +<p>"He's messed things up enough by talking to you! The idea of repeating +our private affairs! He hadn't ought to know them! And I'm not sure," +she said ominously, "that you didn't tell him! If you did, Sam Yoder—"</p> + +<p>Sam didn't argue that point, for there was no argument to make. He was +practically meek until he discovered after supper that the schedule for +the evening was a game of cribbage played in the living room where +Rosie's mother and father were.</p> + +<p>He mentioned unhappily to Rosie that they were acting like old married +people without the fun of getting that way, but he said that only once. +Rosie glared at him. And when bedtime came, she shooed him into her +brother's room and her father padlocked him in.</p> + +<p>He did not sleep well.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Next morning, there was Rosie in her blue jeans with a monkey wrench in +her pocket, ready to go riding with him. She did. And the next day. And +the next. Nothing happened. The state banking association put up five +thousand dollars reward for the bank robbers and the insurance company +put up some more, but there wasn't a trace of the criminals.</p> + +<p>There wasn't a trace of criminality about Sam, either. Rosie rode with +him, but they exchanged not one single hand-squeeze, nor one melting +glance, nor did they even play footsie while they were eating lunch in +the truck outside a filling station. Their conduct was exemplary and it +wore on Sam. Possibly it wore on Rosie, too.</p> + +<p>One day Sam said morosely, as he chewed on a ham sandwich at lunch, +"Rosie, I'm crazy about you, but this feels like I been divorced without +ever even getting married first."</p> + +<p>And Rosie snapped, "If I told you how I feel, that other you in the week +after next would laugh his fool head off. So shut up!"</p> + +<p>Things were bad, and they got no better. For nearly a week, Rosie rode +everywhere with Sam in his truck. They acted in a manner which Rosie's +parents would in theory have approved, but didn't even begin to believe +in. They did nothing the world could not have watched without their +being embarrassed, and they said very little that all the world would +not have been bored to hear.</p> + +<p>It must have been the eleventh of July when they almost snapped at each +other and Rosie said bitterly, "Let me drive a while. I need to put my +mind on something that it don't make me mad to think about!"</p> + +<p>"Go ahead," Sam invited gloomily. He stopped the truck and got out the +door. "I don't look for any happiness in this world any more, anyway."</p> + +<p>He went around to the other side of the truck while she slid to the +driver's seat.</p> + +<p>"Tomorrow's going to be the twelfth," she said. "Do you realize that?"</p> + +<p>"I hadn't given it much thought," admitted Sam, "but what's the +difference?"</p> + +<p>"That's the day where the other you was when he called you up the first +time."</p> + +<p>"That's right," said Sam morbidly. "It is."</p> + +<p>"And so far," added Rosie, jamming her foot viciously down on the +accelerator, "I've kept you honest. If you change into a scoundrel +between now and tomorrow—"</p> + +<p>She changed to second gear. The truck jerked and bounced.</p> + +<p>"Hey!" cried Sam. "Watch your driving!"</p> + +<p>"Don't you tell me how to drive!"</p> + +<p>"But if I get killed before tomorrow—"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Rosie changed gear again, but too soon. The truck bucked, and she jammed +down the accelerator again, and it almost leaped off the road.</p> + +<p>"If you get killed before tomorrow," raged Rosie, "it'll serve you +right! I've been thinking and thinking and thinking. And even if I stop +you from being a crook, there'll always be that—other you—knowing +everything we say and do." She was hitting forty miles an hour and +speeding up. "So there'd still be no use. No hope, anyway."</p> + +<p>She sobbed, partly in fury and partly in grief. And the roadway curved +sharply just about there and she swung the truck crazily around it—and +there was a car standing only halfway off the road.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus5.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Sam grabbed for the steering wheel, but there wasn't time. The light +half-truck, still accelerating, hit the parked car with the noise of +dozens of empty oil-drums falling downstairs. The truck slued around, +bounced back, and then it charged forward and slammed into the parked +car a second time. Then it stalled.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/illus6.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Somebody yelled at Sam. He got out of the truck, looking at the damage +and trying to figure out how it was that neither he nor Rosie had been +killed, and trying worriedly to think how he was going to explain to the +telephone company that he'd let Rosie drive.</p> + +<p>The voice yelled louder. Right at the edge of the woodland, there was a +reddish-haired character screaming at him and tugging at his hip pocket. +The words he used were not fit for Rosie's shell-like ears—even if they +probably came near matching the way she felt. The reddish-haired man +said more nasty words at the top of his voice. His hand came out of his +hip pocket with something glittering in it.</p> + +<p>Sam was swinging when the glitter began and he connected before the gun +fired. There was a sort of squashy, smacking sound and the +reddish-haired man lay down quietly in the road.</p> + +<p>"Migawd!" said Sam blankly. "This was the fella in front of the bank! +He's one of those robbers!"</p> + +<p>He stared. There was a loud crashing in the brushwood. The accident had +happened at the edge of some woodland, and Sam did not need a high I.Q. +to know that the friends of the red-haired man must be on the way.</p> + +<p>A second later, he saw them. Rosie was just getting out of the car then. +She was very pale and there wasn't time to tell her to get started up if +possible and away from there.</p> + +<p>One of the two running men was carrying a canvas bag with the words BANK +OF DUNNSVILLE on it.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>The men came at Sam, meanwhile expressing opinions of the state of +things, of Sam, of the Cosmos—of everything but the weather—in terms +even more reprehensible than the first man had used.</p> + +<p>They saw the reddish-haired man lying on the ground. One of them—he'd +come out into the road behind the truck and was running toward +Sam—jerked out a pistol. He was about to use it on Sam at a range of +something like six feet when there was a peculiar noise behind him. It +was a sort of hollow <i>klunk</i> which, even at such a time, needed to have +attention paid to it. He jerked his head around to see.</p> + +<p>The <i>klunk</i> had been made by Rosie's monkey wrench, falling imperatively +on the head of the second man to come out of the woods. She had carried +it to use on Sam, but she used it instead on a total stranger. He fell +down and lay peacefully still.</p> + +<p>Then Sam swung a second time, at the second man to draw a pistol on him.</p> + +<p>Then there was only the sweet singing of birds among the trees and the +whirrings and other insect-noises of creatures in the grass and +brushwood.</p> + +<p>Presently there were other noises, but they were made by Rosie. She +wept, hanging onto Sam.</p> + +<p>He unwound her arms from around his neck and thoughtfully went to the +back of the truck and got out some phone wire and his pliers. He +fastened the three strangers' hands together behind them, and then their +feet, and he piled them in the back of the light truck, along with the +money they had stolen.</p> + +<p>They came to, one by one, and Sam explained severely that they must +watch their language in the presence of a lady. The three were so dazed, +though, by what had befallen them that the warning wasn't really +necessary.</p> + +<p>Rosie's parents would have been pleased at how completely proper their +behavior was, while they took the three bank robbers into town and +turned them over to the sheriff.</p> + +<p>That night, Rosie sat out on the porch with Sam and they discussed the +particular event of the day in some detail. But Rosie was still +concerned about the other Sam. So Sam decided to assert himself.</p> + +<p>About half-past nine, he said firmly, "Well, Rosie, I guess I'd better +be getting along home. I've got to try one more time to call myself up +on the telephone and tell me to mind my own business."</p> + +<p>"Says who?" demanded Rosie. "You're staying locked up right here tonight +and I'm riding with you tomorrow. If I kept you honest this far, I can +keep it up till sundown tomorrow! Then maybe it'll stick!"</p> + +<p>Sam protested, but Rosie was adamant—not only about keeping him from +being a crook, but from having any fun to justify his virtue.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>She shooed him into her brother's room and her father locked him in. And +Sam did not sleep very well, because it looked as though virtue wasn't +even its own reward.</p> + +<p>He sat up, brooding. It must have been close to dawn when the obvious +hit him. Then he gazed blankly at the wall and said, "Migawd! O'course!"</p> + +<p>He grinned, all by himself, practically from head to foot. And at +breakfast, he hummed contentedly as he stuffed himself with pancakes and +syrup, and Rosie's depressed expression changed to a baffled alarm.</p> + +<p>He smiled tenderly upon her when she came doggedly out to the truck, +wearing her blue jeans and with the monkey wrench in her pocket. They +started off the same as any other day and he told her amiably, "Rosie, +the sheriff says we get five thousand dollars reward from the bankers' +association, and there's more from the insurance company, and there's +odd bits of change offered for those fellas for past performances. We're +going to be right well off."</p> + +<p>Rosie looked at him gloomily. There was still the matter of the other +Sam in the middle of the week after next. And just then, Sam, who had +been watching the telephone lines beside the road as he drove, pulled +off the road and put on his climbing irons.</p> + +<p>"What's this?" asked Rosie frightenedly. "You know—"</p> + +<p>"You listen," said Sam, completely serene.</p> + +<p>He climbed zestfully to the top of the pole. He hooked in the little +gadget that didn't make private conversations possible on a party line, +but did make it possible for a man to talk to himself ten days in the +future.</p> + +<p>Or the past.</p> + +<p>"Hello!" said Sam, up at the top of the telephone pole. "Sam, this is +you."</p> + +<p>A voice he knew perfectly well sounded in the receiver.</p> + +<p>"<i>Huh? Who's that?</i>"</p> + +<p>"This is you," said Sam. "You, Sam Yoder. Don't you recognize your own +voice? This is you, Sam Yoder, calling from the twelfth of July. Don't +hang up!"</p> + +<p>He heard Rosie gasp, all the way down there in the banged-up telephone +truck. Sam had seen the self-evident, at last, and now, in the twelfth +of July, he was talking to himself on the telephone. Only instead of +talking to himself in the week after next, he was talking to himself in +the week before last—he being, back there ten days before, working on +this very same telephone line on this very same pole. And it was the +same conversation, word for word.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>When he came down the pole, rather expansively, Rosie grabbed him and +wept.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Sam!" she sobbed. "It was you all the time!"</p> + +<p>"Yeah," said Sam complacently. "I figured it out last night. That me +back there in the second of July, he's cussing me out. And he's going to +tell you about it and you're going to get all wrought up. But I can make +that dumb me back yonder do what has to be done. And you and me, Rosie, +have got a lot of money coming to us. I'm going to carry on through so +he'll earn it for us. But I'm warning you, Rosie, he'll be back at my +house waiting for me to talk to him tonight, and I've got to be home to +tell him to go over to your house. I'm goin' to say 'ha-ha, ha-ha' at +him."</p> + +<p>"A-all right," said Rosie, wide-eyed. "You can."</p> + +<p>"But I remember that when I call me up tonight, back there ten days ago, +I'm going to be right busy here and now. I'm going to make me mad, +because I don't want to waste time talking to myself back yonder. +Remember? Now what," asked Sam mildly, "would I be doing tonight that +would make me not want to waste time talking to myself ten days ago? You +got any ideas, Rosie?"</p> + +<p>"Sam Yoder! I wouldn't! I never heard of such a thing!"</p> + +<p>Sam looked at her and shook his head regretfully. "Too bad. If you +won't, I guess I've got to call me up in the week after next and find +out what's cooking."</p> + +<p>"You—you <i>shan't</i>!" said Rosie fiercely. "I'll get even with you! But +you shan't talk to that—" Then she wailed. "Darn you, Sam! Even if I do +have to marry you so you'll be wanting to talk to me instead of that +dumb you ten days back, you're not going to—you're not—"</p> + +<p>Sam grinned. He kissed her. He put her in the truck and they rode off to +Batesville to get married. And they did.</p> + +<p>But you're not supposed to believe all this, and if you ask Sam Yoder +about it, he's apt to say it's all a lie. He doesn't want to talk about +private party lines, either. And there are other matters. For instance, +Sam's getting to be a pretty prominent citizen these days. He makes a +lot of money, one way and another. Nobody around home will ever bet with +him on who's going to win at sports and elections, anyhow.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sam, This is You, by William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAM, THIS IS YOU *** + +***** This file should be named 32324-h.htm or 32324-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/3/2/32324/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sam, This is You + +Author: William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +Illustrator: Mel Hunter + +Release Date: May 10, 2010 [EBook #32324] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAM, THIS IS YOU *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + SAM, THIS IS YOU + + By MURRAY LEINSTER + + Illustrated by MEL HUNTER + +[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from Galaxy Science Fiction +May 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. +copyright on this publication was renewed.] + + +[Sidenote: Sam had led a peaceful and impecunious life--until a voice +cut in on a phone and said: Sam, this is You] + +You are not supposed to believe this story, and if you ask Sam Yoder +about it, he is apt to say that it's all a lie. But Sam is a bit +sensitive about it. He does not want the question of privacy to be +raised again--especially in Rosie's hearing. And there are other +matters. But it's all perfectly respectable and straightforward. + +It could have happened to anybody--well, almost anybody. Anybody, say, +who was a telephone lineman for the Batesville and Rappahannock +Telephone Company, and who happened to be engaged to Rosie, and who had +been told admiringly by Rosie that a man as smart as he was ought to +make something wonderful of himself. And, of course, anybody who'd taken +that seriously and had been puttering around on a device to make private +conversations on a party-line telephone possible, and almost had the +trick. + +It began about six o'clock on July second, when Sam was up a telephone +pole near Bridge's Run. He was hunting for the place where that party +line had gone dead. He'd hooked in his lineman's phone and he couldn't +raise Central, so he was just going to start looking for the break when +his phone rang back, though the line had checked dead. + +[Illustration] + +Startled, he put the receiver to his ear. "Hello. Who's this?" + +"Sam, this is you," a voice replied. + +"Huh?" said Sam. "What's that?" + +"This is you," the voice on the wire repeated. "You, Sam Yoder. Don't +you recognize your own voice? This is you, Sam Yoder, calling from the +twelfth of July. Don't hang up!" + + * * * * * + +Sam hadn't even thought of hanging up. He was annoyed. He was up a +telephone pole, trying to do some work, resting in his safety belt and +with his climbing irons safely fixed in the wood. Naturally, he thought +somebody was trying to joke with him, and when a man is working is no +time for jokes. + +"I'm not hanging up," said Sam dourly, "but you'd better!" + +The voice was familiar, though he couldn't quite place it. If it talked +a little more, he undoubtedly would. He knew it just about as well as he +knew his own, and it was irritating not to be able to call this joker by +name. + +The voice said, "Sam, it's the second of July where you are, and you're +up a pole by Bridge's Run. The line's dead in two places, else I +couldn't talk to you. Lucky, ain't it?" + +[Illustration] + +"Whoever you are," Sam said formidably, "it ain't going to be lucky for +you if you ever need telephone service and you've kept wasting my time. +I'm busy!" + +"But I'm you!" insisted the voice persuasively. "And you're me! We're +both the same Sam Yoder, only where I am, it's July twelfth. Where you +are, it's July second. You've heard of time-traveling. Well, this is +time-talking. You're talking to yourself--that's me--and I'm talking to +myself--that's you--and it looks like we've got a mighty good chance to +get rich." + +Then something came into Sam's memory and every muscle in his body went +taut and tight, even as he was saying to himself, "It can't be!" + +But he'd remembered that if a man stands in a corner and talks to the +wall, his voice will sound to him just the way it sounds to somebody +else. Being in the telephone business, he'd tried it and now he did +recognize the voice. It was his. His own. Talking to him. Which, of +course, was impossible. + +"Look," said hoarsely, "I don't believe this!" + +"Then listen," the voice said briskly. And Sam's face grew red. It +burned. His ears began to feel scorched. Because the voice--_his_ +voice--was telling him strictly private matters that nobody else in the +world knew. Nobody but himself and Rosie. + +"Quit it!" groaned Sam. "Somebody might be listening! Tell me what you +want and ring off!" + +The voice told him what it wanted. His own voice. It sounded pleased. It +told him precisely what it wanted him to do. And then, very kindly, it +told him exactly where the two breaks in the line were. And then it rang +off. + + * * * * * + +He sweated when he looked at the first of the two places. A joining was +bad and he fixed that. It was where his voice had said it would be. And +that was as impossible as anything else. + +When he'd fixed the second break, Sam called Central and told her he was +sick and was going home, and that if there were any other phones that +needed fixing today, people were probably better off without phone +service, anyhow. + +He went home and washed his face, and made himself a brew of coffee and +drank it, and his memory turned out to be unimpaired. Presently he heard +himself muttering. + +So he said defiantly, "There ain't any crazy people in my family, so it +ain't likely I've gone out of my head. But God knows nobody but Rosie +knows about me telling her sentimental that her nose is so cute, I +couldn't believe she ever had to blow it! Maybe it was me, talking to +myself!" + +Talking to oneself is not abnormal. Lots of people do it. Sam missed out +the conclusion to be drawn from the fact that he'd answered himself +back. + +He reasoned painfully, "If somebody drove over to Rappahannock, past +Dunnsville, and telephoned back that there was a brush fire at +Dunnsville, I wouldn't be surprised to get to Dunnsville and find a +brush fire there. So if somebody phones back from next Tuesday that Mr. +Broaddus broke his leg next Tuesday--why, I shouldn't be surprised to +get to next Tuesday and find he done it. Going to Rappahannock, past +Dunnsville, and going to next Thursday, past next Tuesday, ain't so much +difference. It's only the difference between a road-map and a calendar." + +Then he began to see implications. He blinked. + +"Yes, sir!" he said in awe. "I wouldn't've thought of it if I hadn't +told myself on the telephone, but there _is_ money to be made out of +this! I must be near as smart as Rosie thinks I am! I'd better get that +dinkus set up!" + +He'd more or less half-heartedly worked out an idea of how a party-line +telephone conversation could be made private, and just out of instinct, +you might say, he'd accumulated around his house a lot of stuff that +should have been on the phone company's inventory. There were condensers +and transmitters and selective-ringing bells and resistances and the +like. He'd meant to put some of them together some day and see what +happened, but he'd been too busy courting Rosie to get at it. + + * * * * * + +Now he did get started. His own voice on the telephone had told him to. +It had warned him that one thing he had intended wouldn't work and +something else would. But it was essentially simple, after all. He +finished it and cut off his line from Central and hooked this gadget in. +He rang. Half a minute later, somebody rang back. + +"Hello!" said Sam, quivering. He'd broken the line to Central, remember. +In theory, he shouldn't have gotten anybody anywhere. But a very +familiar voice said "Hello" back at him, and Sam swallowed and said, +"Hello, Sam. This is you in the second of July." + +The voice at the other end said cordially that Sam had done pretty well +and now the two of them--Sam in the here and now and Sam in the middle +of the week after next--would proceed to get rich together. But the +voice from July twelfth sounded less absorbed in the conversation than +Sam thought quite right. It seemed even abstracted. And Sam was at once +sweating from the pure unreasonableness of the situation and conscious +that he rated congratulation for the highly technical device he had +built. After all, not everybody could build a time-talker! + +He said with some irony, "If you're too busy to talk--" + +"I'll tell you," replied the voice from the twelfth of July, gratified. +"I am kind of busy right now. You'll understand when you get to where I +am. Don't get mad, Sam. Tell you what--you go see Rosie and tell her +about this and have a nice evening. Ha-ha!" + +"Now what," asked Sam cagily, "do you mean by that 'ha-ha'?" + +"You'll find out," said the voice. "Knowin' what I know, I'll even +double it. Ha-ha, ha-ha!" + +There was a click. Sam rang back, but got no answer. He may have been +the first man in history to take an objective and completely justified +dislike to himself. + +But presently he grumbled, "Smart, huh? Two can play at that! I'm the +one that's got to do things if we are both goin' to get rich." + +He put his gadget carefully away and combed his hair and ate some cold +food around the house and drove over to see Rosie. It was a night and an +errand which ordinarily would have seemed purely romantic. There were +fireflies floating about, and the Moon shone down splendidly, and a +perfumed breeze carried mosquitoes from one place to another. It was the +sort of night on which, ordinarily, Sam would have thought only of +Rosie, and Rosie would have optimistic ideas about how housekeeping +could, after all, be done on what Sam made a week. + +They got settled down in the hammock on Rosie's front porch, and Sam +said expansively, "Rosie, I've made up my mind to get rich. You ought to +have everything your little heart desires. Suppose you tell me what you +want so I'll know how rich I've got to get." + + * * * * * + +Rosie drew back. She looked sharply at Sam. "Do you feel all right?" + +He beamed at her. He'd never been married and he didn't know how crazy +it sounded to Rosie to be queried on how much money would satisfy her. +There simply isn't any answer to the question. + +"Listen," said Sam tenderly. "Nobody knows it, but tonight Joe Hunt and +the Widow Backus are eloping to North Carolina to get married. We'll +find out about it tomorrow. And day after tomorrow, on the Fourth of +July, Dunnsville is going to win the baseball game with Bradensburg, +seven to five, all tied till the ninth inning, and then George Peeby is +going to hit a homer with Fred Holmes on second base." + +Rosie stared at him. Sam explained complacently. The Sam Yoder in the +middle of the week after next had told him what to expect in those +particular cases. He would tell him other things to expect. So Sam was +going to get rich. + +Rosie said, "Sam! Somebody was playing a joke on you!" + +"Yeah?" Sam answered comfortably. "Who else but me knows what you said +to me that time you thought I was mad at you and you were crying out +back of the well-house?" + +"Sam!" + +"And nobody else knows about that time we were picnicking and a bug got +down the back of your dress and you thought it was a hornet." + +"Sam Yoder!" wailed Rosie. "You never told anybody about that!" + +"Nope," said Sam truthfully. "I never did. But the me in the week after +next knew. He told me. So he had to be me talking to me. Couldn't've +been anybody else." + +Rosie gasped. Sam explained all over again. In detail. When he had +finished, Rosie seemed dazed. + +Then she said desperately, "Sam! Either you've t-told somebody else +everything we ever said or did together, or else--there's somebody who +knows every word we ever said to each other! That's awful! Do you really +and truly mean to tell me--" + +"Sure I mean to tell you," said Sam happily. "The me in the week after +next called me up and talked about things nobody knows but you and me. +Can't be no doubt at all." + +Rosie shivered. "He--he knows every word we ever said! Then he knows +every word we're saying now!" She gulped. "Sam Yoder, you go home!" + +Sam gaped at her. She got up and backed away from him. + +"D-do you think," she chattered despairingly, "that I--that I'm g-going +to talk to you when s-somebody else--listens to every w-word I say +and--knows everything I do? D-do you think I'm going to _m-marry_ you?" + +Then she ran away, weeping noisily, and slammed the door on Sam. Her +father came out presently, looking patient, and asked Sam to go home so +Rosie could finish crying and he could read his newspaper in peace. + + * * * * * + +On the way back to his own house, Sam meditated darkly. By the time he +got there, he was furious. The him in the week after next could have +warned him about this! + +He rang and rang and rang, on the cut-off line with his gadget hooked in +to call July the twelfth. But there was no answer. + +When morning came, he rang again, but the phone was still dead. He +loaded his tool-kit in the truck and went off to work, feeling about as +low as a man could feel. + +He felt lower when he reported at the office and somebody told him +excitedly that Joe Hunt and the Widow Backus had eloped to North +Carolina to get married. Nobody would have tried to stop them if they +had prosaically gotten married at home, but they had eloped to make it +more romantic. + +It wasn't romantic to Sam. It was devastating proof that there was +another him ten days off, knowing everything he knew and more besides, +and very likely laughing his head off at the fix Sam was in. Because, +obviously, Rosie would be still more convinced when she heard this news. +She'd know Sam wasn't crazy or the victim of a practical joke. He had +told the truth. + +It wasn't the first time a man got in trouble with a woman by telling +her the truth, but it was new to Sam and it hurt. + +He went over to Bradensburg that day to repair some broken lines, and +around noon, he went into a store to get something to eat. There were +some local sportsmen in the store, bragging to each other about what the +Bradensburg baseball team would do to the Dunnsville nine. + +Sam said peevishly, "Huh! Dunnsville will win that game by two runs!" + +"Have you got any money that agrees with you?" a local sportsman +demanded pugnaciously. "If you have, put it up and let somebody cover +it!" + +Sam wanted to draw back, but he had roused the civic pride of +Bradensburg. He tried to temporize and he was jeered at. In the end, +philosophically, he dragged out all the money he had with him and bet +it--eleven dollars. It was covered instantly, amid raucous laughter. And +on the way back to Batesville, he reflected unhappily that he was going +to make eleven dollars out of knowing what was going to happen in the +ninth inning of that ball game, but probably at the cost of losing +Rosie. + + * * * * * + +He tried to call his other self that night again. There was no more +answer than before. He unhooked the gadget and restored normal service +to himself. He rang Rosie's house. She answered the phone. + +"Rosie," Sam asked yearningly, "are you still mad at me?" + +"I never was mad at you," said Rose, gulping. "I'm mad at whoever was +talking to you on the phone and knows all our private secrets. And I'm +mad at you if you told him." + +"But I didn't have to tell him! He's me! All he has to do is just +remember! I tried to call him last night and again this morning," he +added bitterly, "and he don't answer. Maybe he's gone off somewheres. +I'm thinking it might be a--a kind of illusion, maybe." + +"You told me there'd be an elopement last night," retorted Rosie, her +voice wobbling, "and there was. Joe Hunt and the Widow Backus. Just like +you said!" + +"It--it could've been a coincidence," suggested Sam, not too hopefully. + +"I'm--w-waiting to see if Dunnsville beats Bradensburg seven to five +tomorrow, tied to the ninth, with George Peeby hitting a homer then with +Fred Holmes on second base. If--if that happens, I'll--I'll die!" + +"Why?" asked Sam. + +"Because it'll mean that I can't m-marry you ever, because somebody +else'd be looking over your shoulder--and we wouldn't ever be by +ourselves all our lives--night or day!" + +She hung up, weeping, and Sam swore slowly and steadily and with venom +while he worked to hook up his device again--which did not make a +private conversation on a party line, but allowed a man to talk to +himself ten days away from where he was. And then Sam rang, and rang, +and rang. But he got no answer. + +The following day, in the big fourth of July game, Dunnsville beat +Bradensburg seven to five. It was tied to the ninth. Then George Peeby +hit a homer, with Fred Holmes on second base. Sam collected his +winnings, but grimly, without joy. + +He stayed home that night, worrying, and every so often trying to call +himself up on the device he had invented and been told--by himself--to +modify. It was a nice gadget, but Sam did not enjoy it. It was a nice +night, too. There was moonlight. But Sam did not enjoy that, either. + +Moonlight wouldn't do Sam any good so long as there was another him in +the middle of the week after next, refusing to talk to him so he could +get out of the fix he was in. + + * * * * * + +Next morning, though, the phone woke him. He swore at it out of habit +until he got out of bed, and then he realized that his gadget was hooked +in and Central was cut off. He made it in one jump to the instrument. + +"Hello!" + +"Don't fret," said his own voice patronizingly. "Rosie's going to make +up with you." + +"How in blazes d'you know what she's going to do?" raged Sam. "She won't +marry me with you hanging around! I've been trying to figure out a way +to get rid of you--" + +"Quiet!" commanded the voice on the telephone irritably. "I'm busy. I've +got to go collect the money you've made for us." + +"_You_ collect money? _I_ get in trouble and _you_ collect money?" + +"I have to," his voice said with the impatient patience of one speaking +to a small idiot child, "before you can have it. Listen here. Where you +are, it's Wednesday. You're going over to Dunnsville today to fix some +phones. You'll be in Mr. Broaddus' law office about half-past ten. You +look out the window and notice a fella setting in a car in front of the +bank. Notice him good!" + +"I won't do it," said Sam defiantly. "I ain't taking any orders from +you! Maybe you're me, but _I_ make money and _you_ collect it. For all I +know you spend it before I get to it! I'm quitting this business right +now. It's cost me my own true love and all _my_ life's happiness and to +hell with you!" + +"You won't do it?" his own voice asked nastily. "Wait and see!" + +So, that morning, the manager told Sam, when he reported for work, to +drive over to Dunnsville and check on some lines there. Sam balked. He +said there were much more important lines needing repair elsewhere. The +manager explained politely to Sam that Mr. Broaddus over in Dunnsville +had been taken drunk at a Fourth of July party and fallen out of a +window. He'd broken his leg, so it was a Christian duty to make sure he +had a telephone in working order in his office, and Sam could get over +there right away or else. + +On the way to Dunnsville, Sam morosely remembered that he'd known about +Mr. Broaddus' leg. He had told himself about it on the telephone. + +At half-past ten, he was fixing Mr. Broaddus' telephone when he +remembered about the man he was supposed to get a good look at, sitting +in a car in front of the bank. He made an angry resolution not, under +any circumstances, to glance outside of the lawyer's office. He +meditated savagely that, by this resolution, the schemes of his other +self in the future were abolished. + +Naturally, he presently went to the window and looked to see what he was +abolishing. + + * * * * * + +There was a car before the bank with a reddish-haired man sitting in it. +A haze came out of the exhaust, showing that the motor was running. None +of this impressed Sam as remarkable. But as he looked, two other men +came running out of the bank. One of them carried a bag and both of them +had revolvers out and they piled into the car and the reddish-haired man +gunned it and it was abruptly a dwindling speck in a cloud of dust, +getting out of town. + +[Illustration] + +Three seconds later, old Mr. Bluford, president of the bank, came out +yelling, and the cashier came after him, and it was a first-rate bank +robbery they were yelling about. The men in the get-away car had +departed with thirty-five thousand dollars. + +All of it had taken place so fast that Sam hardly realized what had +happened when he went out to see what it was all about, and was +instantly seized upon to do some work. The bankrobbers had shot out the +telephone cable out of town with a shotgun, so word couldn't get ahead +of them. Sam was needed to re-establish communications with the outside +world. + +He did, absorbedly reflecting on the details of the robbery as he'd +heard them. He was high up on a telephone pole and the sheriff and +enthusiastic citizens were streaking past in cars to make his labors +unnecessary, when the personal aspect of all this affair hit him. + +[Illustration] + +"Migawd!" gasped Sam, shocked. "That me in the middle of next week told +me to come over here and watch a bank robbery! But he didn't let on what +was going to happen so's I could stop it!" He felt an incredulous +indignation come over him. "I woulda been a hero!" he said resentfully. +"Rosie woulda admired me! _That other me is a born crook!_" + +Then he realized the facts. The other him was himself, only a week and a +half distant. The other him was so far sunk in dastardliness that he +permitted a crime to take place, feeling no more than sardonic +amusement. + +And there was nothing he himself could do about it! He couldn't even +tell the authorities about this depraved character! They wouldn't +believe him unless he could get his other self on the telephone to admit +his criminality. Even then, what could they do? + +Sam felt what little zest had been left in living go trickling out of +his climbers. He looked into the future and saw nothing desirable in it. + +He painstakingly finished the repair of the shot-out telephone line, but +then he went down to his truck and drove over to Rosie's house. + +There was but one thing he could do. + + * * * * * + +Rosie came suspiciously to the the door. + +"I come to tell you good-by, Rosie," said Sam. "I just found out I'm a +criminal, so I aim to go and commit my crimes far away from my home and +the friends who never thought I'd turn out this way. Good-by, Rosie." + +"Sam!" said Rosie. "What's happened now?" + +He told her about the bank robbery and how his own self--in the week +after next--had known it was going to happen, and told Sam to go watch +it without giving him information by which it could have been stopped. + +"He knew it after it happened," said Sam bitterly, "and he could've told +me about it before! He didn't, so he's a accessory to the crime. And he +is me, which makes me a accessory, too. Good-by, Rosie, my own true +love! You'll never see me again!" + +"You set right down here," Rosie ordered firmly. "You haven't done a +thing yet, so it's that other you who's a criminal. You haven't got a +thing to run away for!" + +"But I'm going to have! I'm doomed to be a criminal! It's that me in the +week after next! There's nothing to be done!" + +"Says who? _I'm_ going to do something!" + +"Like what?" asked Sam. + +"I'm going to reform you," said Rosie, "before you start!" + + * * * * * + +She was a determined girl, that Rosie. She marched inside and put on her +blue jeans, then went to her father's woodshed where he kept his tools +and got a monkey wrench and stuck it in her hip pocket. + +When she came to the truck, Sam said, "What's the idea, Rosie?" + +"I'm riding around with you," replied Rosie, with a grim air. "You won't +do anything criminal with me on hand! And if that other you starts +talking to you on the telephone, I'm going to climb that pole and tell +him where he gets off!" + +"If anybody could keep me from turning criminal," acknowledged Sam, +"it'd be you, Rosie. But that monkey wrench--what's it for?" + +Rosie climbed into the seat beside him. + +"You start having criminal ideas," she told him, "and you'll find out! +Now you go on about your business and I and the monkey wrench will look +after your morals!" + +This tender exchange happened only an hour or so after the robbery and +there was plenty of excitement around. But Sam went soberly about his +work as telephone lineman. Rosie simply rode with him as a--well, it +wasn't as a bodyguard, but a sort of M.P. escort--Morals Police. Where +he worked on a line, he called the central office to report, and he +heard about the hunt for the bank robbers, and told Rosie. + + * * * * * + +It was good fortune that he'd been in Dunnsville when the robbery +happened, because his prompt repair of the phone wires had spoiled the +robbers' get-away plans. They hadn't gone ten miles from Dunnsville +before somebody fired a load of buckshot at them as their car roared by +Lemons' Store. They were past before they realized they'd been shot at. +But the buckshot had punctured the radiator, and two miles on, they were +stuck. + +They pushed their car off the road behind some bushes and struck out on +foot, and the sheriff ran right past their car without seeing it. Then +rain began to fall and the bank robbers were wet and scared and +desperate. They knew there'd be roadblocks set up everywhere and they +had that bag of money--part bills, but a lot of it silver--and all of +Tidewater was up in arms. + +Taking evasive action, they hastily stuffed their pockets with small +bills--there were no big ones--but dared not take too much lest the +pockets bulge. They hid the major part of their loot in a hollow tree. +They separated, going to nearby towns--while rain fell heavily and +covered their trails--and went to bed with chest colds. They felt +miserable. But the rain washed away the scent they had left and +bloodhounds couldn't do a thing. + +None of this was known to Sam, of course. Rosie had taken charge of him +and she kept charge. She rode with him all the afternoon of the robbery. +When quitting time came, he took her home and prepared to retire from +the scene. + +But she said grimly, "Oh, no, you don't! You're staying right here! +You're going to sleep in my brother's room, and my pa is going to put a +padlock on the door so you don't go roaming off to call up that +no-account other you and get in more trouble!" + +"I might mess things up if I don't talk to him," Sam objected. + +"He's messed things up enough by talking to you! The idea of repeating +our private affairs! He hadn't ought to know them! And I'm not sure," +she said ominously, "that you didn't tell him! If you did, Sam Yoder--" + +Sam didn't argue that point, for there was no argument to make. He was +practically meek until he discovered after supper that the schedule for +the evening was a game of cribbage played in the living room where +Rosie's mother and father were. + +He mentioned unhappily to Rosie that they were acting like old married +people without the fun of getting that way, but he said that only once. +Rosie glared at him. And when bedtime came, she shooed him into her +brother's room and her father padlocked him in. + +He did not sleep well. + + * * * * * + +Next morning, there was Rosie in her blue jeans with a monkey wrench in +her pocket, ready to go riding with him. She did. And the next day. And +the next. Nothing happened. The state banking association put up five +thousand dollars reward for the bank robbers and the insurance company +put up some more, but there wasn't a trace of the criminals. + +There wasn't a trace of criminality about Sam, either. Rosie rode with +him, but they exchanged not one single hand-squeeze, nor one melting +glance, nor did they even play footsie while they were eating lunch in +the truck outside a filling station. Their conduct was exemplary and it +wore on Sam. Possibly it wore on Rosie, too. + +One day Sam said morosely, as he chewed on a ham sandwich at lunch, +"Rosie, I'm crazy about you, but this feels like I been divorced without +ever even getting married first." + +And Rosie snapped, "If I told you how I feel, that other you in the week +after next would laugh his fool head off. So shut up!" + +Things were bad, and they got no better. For nearly a week, Rosie rode +everywhere with Sam in his truck. They acted in a manner which Rosie's +parents would in theory have approved, but didn't even begin to believe +in. They did nothing the world could not have watched without their +being embarrassed, and they said very little that all the world would +not have been bored to hear. + +It must have been the eleventh of July when they almost snapped at each +other and Rosie said bitterly, "Let me drive a while. I need to put my +mind on something that it don't make me mad to think about!" + +"Go ahead," Sam invited gloomily. He stopped the truck and got out the +door. "I don't look for any happiness in this world any more, anyway." + +He went around to the other side of the truck while she slid to the +driver's seat. + +"Tomorrow's going to be the twelfth," she said. "Do you realize that?" + +"I hadn't given it much thought," admitted Sam, "but what's the +difference?" + +"That's the day where the other you was when he called you up the first +time." + +"That's right," said Sam morbidly. "It is." + +"And so far," added Rosie, jamming her foot viciously down on the +accelerator, "I've kept you honest. If you change into a scoundrel +between now and tomorrow--" + +She changed to second gear. The truck jerked and bounced. + +"Hey!" cried Sam. "Watch your driving!" + +"Don't you tell me how to drive!" + +"But if I get killed before tomorrow--" + + * * * * * + +Rosie changed gear again, but too soon. The truck bucked, and she jammed +down the accelerator again, and it almost leaped off the road. + +"If you get killed before tomorrow," raged Rosie, "it'll serve you +right! I've been thinking and thinking and thinking. And even if I stop +you from being a crook, there'll always be that--other you--knowing +everything we say and do." She was hitting forty miles an hour and +speeding up. "So there'd still be no use. No hope, anyway." + +She sobbed, partly in fury and partly in grief. And the roadway curved +sharply just about there and she swung the truck crazily around it--and +there was a car standing only halfway off the road. + +[Illustration] + +Sam grabbed for the steering wheel, but there wasn't time. The light +half-truck, still accelerating, hit the parked car with the noise of +dozens of empty oil-drums falling downstairs. The truck slued around, +bounced back, and then it charged forward and slammed into the parked +car a second time. Then it stalled. + +[Illustration] + +Somebody yelled at Sam. He got out of the truck, looking at the damage +and trying to figure out how it was that neither he nor Rosie had been +killed, and trying worriedly to think how he was going to explain to the +telephone company that he'd let Rosie drive. + +The voice yelled louder. Right at the edge of the woodland, there was a +reddish-haired character screaming at him and tugging at his hip pocket. +The words he used were not fit for Rosie's shell-like ears--even if they +probably came near matching the way she felt. The reddish-haired man +said more nasty words at the top of his voice. His hand came out of his +hip pocket with something glittering in it. + +Sam was swinging when the glitter began and he connected before the gun +fired. There was a sort of squashy, smacking sound and the +reddish-haired man lay down quietly in the road. + +"Migawd!" said Sam blankly. "This was the fella in front of the bank! +He's one of those robbers!" + +He stared. There was a loud crashing in the brushwood. The accident had +happened at the edge of some woodland, and Sam did not need a high I.Q. +to know that the friends of the red-haired man must be on the way. + +A second later, he saw them. Rosie was just getting out of the car then. +She was very pale and there wasn't time to tell her to get started up if +possible and away from there. + +One of the two running men was carrying a canvas bag with the words BANK +OF DUNNSVILLE on it. + + * * * * * + +The men came at Sam, meanwhile expressing opinions of the state of +things, of Sam, of the Cosmos--of everything but the weather--in terms +even more reprehensible than the first man had used. + +They saw the reddish-haired man lying on the ground. One of them--he'd +come out into the road behind the truck and was running toward +Sam--jerked out a pistol. He was about to use it on Sam at a range of +something like six feet when there was a peculiar noise behind him. It +was a sort of hollow _klunk_ which, even at such a time, needed to have +attention paid to it. He jerked his head around to see. + +The _klunk_ had been made by Rosie's monkey wrench, falling imperatively +on the head of the second man to come out of the woods. She had carried +it to use on Sam, but she used it instead on a total stranger. He fell +down and lay peacefully still. + +Then Sam swung a second time, at the second man to draw a pistol on him. + +Then there was only the sweet singing of birds among the trees and the +whirrings and other insect-noises of creatures in the grass and +brushwood. + +Presently there were other noises, but they were made by Rosie. She +wept, hanging onto Sam. + +He unwound her arms from around his neck and thoughtfully went to the +back of the truck and got out some phone wire and his pliers. He +fastened the three strangers' hands together behind them, and then their +feet, and he piled them in the back of the light truck, along with the +money they had stolen. + +They came to, one by one, and Sam explained severely that they must +watch their language in the presence of a lady. The three were so dazed, +though, by what had befallen them that the warning wasn't really +necessary. + +Rosie's parents would have been pleased at how completely proper their +behavior was, while they took the three bank robbers into town and +turned them over to the sheriff. + +That night, Rosie sat out on the porch with Sam and they discussed the +particular event of the day in some detail. But Rosie was still +concerned about the other Sam. So Sam decided to assert himself. + +About half-past nine, he said firmly, "Well, Rosie, I guess I'd better +be getting along home. I've got to try one more time to call myself up +on the telephone and tell me to mind my own business." + +"Says who?" demanded Rosie. "You're staying locked up right here tonight +and I'm riding with you tomorrow. If I kept you honest this far, I can +keep it up till sundown tomorrow! Then maybe it'll stick!" + +Sam protested, but Rosie was adamant--not only about keeping him from +being a crook, but from having any fun to justify his virtue. + + * * * * * + +She shooed him into her brother's room and her father locked him in. And +Sam did not sleep very well, because it looked as though virtue wasn't +even its own reward. + +He sat up, brooding. It must have been close to dawn when the obvious +hit him. Then he gazed blankly at the wall and said, "Migawd! O'course!" + +He grinned, all by himself, practically from head to foot. And at +breakfast, he hummed contentedly as he stuffed himself with pancakes and +syrup, and Rosie's depressed expression changed to a baffled alarm. + +He smiled tenderly upon her when she came doggedly out to the truck, +wearing her blue jeans and with the monkey wrench in her pocket. They +started off the same as any other day and he told her amiably, "Rosie, +the sheriff says we get five thousand dollars reward from the bankers' +association, and there's more from the insurance company, and there's +odd bits of change offered for those fellas for past performances. We're +going to be right well off." + +Rosie looked at him gloomily. There was still the matter of the other +Sam in the middle of the week after next. And just then, Sam, who had +been watching the telephone lines beside the road as he drove, pulled +off the road and put on his climbing irons. + +"What's this?" asked Rosie frightenedly. "You know--" + +"You listen," said Sam, completely serene. + +He climbed zestfully to the top of the pole. He hooked in the little +gadget that didn't make private conversations possible on a party line, +but did make it possible for a man to talk to himself ten days in the +future. + +Or the past. + +"Hello!" said Sam, up at the top of the telephone pole. "Sam, this is +you." + +A voice he knew perfectly well sounded in the receiver. + +"_Huh? Who's that?_" + +"This is you," said Sam. "You, Sam Yoder. Don't you recognize your own +voice? This is you, Sam Yoder, calling from the twelfth of July. Don't +hang up!" + +He heard Rosie gasp, all the way down there in the banged-up telephone +truck. Sam had seen the self-evident, at last, and now, in the twelfth +of July, he was talking to himself on the telephone. Only instead of +talking to himself in the week after next, he was talking to himself in +the week before last--he being, back there ten days before, working on +this very same telephone line on this very same pole. And it was the +same conversation, word for word. + + * * * * * + +When he came down the pole, rather expansively, Rosie grabbed him and +wept. + +"Oh, Sam!" she sobbed. "It was you all the time!" + +"Yeah," said Sam complacently. "I figured it out last night. That me +back there in the second of July, he's cussing me out. And he's going to +tell you about it and you're going to get all wrought up. But I can make +that dumb me back yonder do what has to be done. And you and me, Rosie, +have got a lot of money coming to us. I'm going to carry on through so +he'll earn it for us. But I'm warning you, Rosie, he'll be back at my +house waiting for me to talk to him tonight, and I've got to be home to +tell him to go over to your house. I'm goin' to say 'ha-ha, ha-ha' at +him." + +"A-all right," said Rosie, wide-eyed. "You can." + +"But I remember that when I call me up tonight, back there ten days ago, +I'm going to be right busy here and now. I'm going to make me mad, +because I don't want to waste time talking to myself back yonder. +Remember? Now what," asked Sam mildly, "would I be doing tonight that +would make me not want to waste time talking to myself ten days ago? You +got any ideas, Rosie?" + +"Sam Yoder! I wouldn't! I never heard of such a thing!" + +Sam looked at her and shook his head regretfully. "Too bad. If you +won't, I guess I've got to call me up in the week after next and find +out what's cooking." + +"You--you _shan't_!" said Rosie fiercely. "I'll get even with you! But +you shan't talk to that--" Then she wailed. "Darn you, Sam! Even if I do +have to marry you so you'll be wanting to talk to me instead of that +dumb you ten days back, you're not going to--you're not--" + +Sam grinned. He kissed her. He put her in the truck and they rode off to +Batesville to get married. And they did. + +But you're not supposed to believe all this, and if you ask Sam Yoder +about it, he's apt to say it's all a lie. He doesn't want to talk about +private party lines, either. And there are other matters. For instance, +Sam's getting to be a pretty prominent citizen these days. He makes a +lot of money, one way and another. Nobody around home will ever bet with +him on who's going to win at sports and elections, anyhow. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sam, This is You, by William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAM, THIS IS YOU *** + +***** This file should be named 32324.txt or 32324.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/3/2/32324/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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