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diff --git a/59394-0.txt b/59394-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..caba060 --- /dev/null +++ b/59394-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,303 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59394 *** + + + + + + + + + + + + + THE + margenes + + BY MIRIAM ALLEN DE FORD + + _The tiny, live, straw-colored circles + were mysterious but definitely harmless. + Yet they were directly responsible for + riots, revolution and an atomic war...._ + + [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from + Worlds of If Science Fiction, February 1956. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that + the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] + + +There is a small striped smelt called the grunion which has odd +egglaying habits. At high tide, on the second, third, and fourth nights +after the full of the moon from March to June, thousands of female +grunions ride in on the waves to a beach in southern California near +San Diego, dig tail-first into the soft sand, deposit their eggs, then +ride back on the wash of the next wave. The whole operation lasts about +six seconds. + +On the nights when the grunion are running, hordes of people used to +come to the beach with baskets and other containers, and with torches +to light the scene, and try to catch the elusive little fish in their +hands. + +They were doing that on an April night in 1960. In the midst of the +excitement of the chase, only a few of them noticed that something else +was riding the waves in with the grunions. + +Among the few who stopped grunion-catching long enough to investigate +were a girl named Marge Hickin and a boy named Gene Towanda. They were +UCLA students, "going together", who had come down on Saturday from Los +Angeles for the fun. + +"What on earth do you think these can be, Gene?" Marge asked, holding +out on her palms three or four of the little circular, wriggling +objects, looking like small-size doughnuts, pale straw in color. + +"Never saw anything like them," Gene admitted. "But then my major's +psychology, not zoology. They don't seem to bite, anyway. Here let's +collect some of them instead of the fish. That dingus of yours will +hold water. We can take them to the Marine Biology lab tomorrow and +find out what they are." + +Marge Hickin and Gene Towanda had started a world-wide economic +revolution. + +None of the scientists at the university laboratory knew what the +little live straw-colored circles were, either. In fact, after a +preliminary study they wouldn't say positively whether the creatures +were animal or vegetable; they displayed voluntary movement, but they +seemed to have no respiratory or digestive organs. They were completely +anomalous. + +The grunion ran again that night, and Gene and Marge stayed down to +help the laboratory assistants gather several hundred of the strange +new objects for further study. They were so numerous that they were +swamping the fish, and the crowds at the beach began to grumble that +their sport was being spoiled. + +Next night the grunion stopped running--but the little doughnuts +didn't. They never stopped. They came in by hundreds of thousands every +night, and those which nobody gathered wriggled their way over the land +until some of them even turned up on the highways (where a lot of them +were smashed by automobiles), on the streets and sidewalks of La Jolla, +and as far north as Oceanside and as far south as downtown San Diego +itself. + +The things were becoming a pest. There were indignant letters to the +papers, and editorials were written calling on the authorities to do +something. Just what to do, nobody knew; the only way to kill the +circular little objects from the sea seemed to be to crush them--and +they were too abundant for that to be very effective. + +Meanwhile, the laboratory kept studying them. + +Marge and Gene were interested enough to come down again the next +weekend to find out what, if anything, had been discovered. Not much +had: but one of the biochemists at the laboratory casually mentioned +that chemically the straw-colored circles seemed to be almost pure +protein, with some carbohydrates and fats, and that apparently they +contained all the essential vitamins. + +College student that he was, Gene Towanda immediately swallowed one of +the wriggling things down whole, as a joke. + +It tickled a little, but that wasn't what caused the delighted +amazement on his face. + +"Gosh!" he exclaimed. "It's delicious!" + +He swallowed another handful. + +That was the beginning of the great _margene_ industry. + +It was an astute reporter, getting a feature story on the sensational +new food find, who gave the creatures their name, in honor of the boy +and girl who had first brought the things to the attention of the +scientists. He dubbed them margenes, and margenes they remained. + +"Dr. O. Y. Willard, director of the laboratory," his story said in +part, "thinks the margenes may be the answer to the increasing and +alarming problem of malnutrition, especially in undeveloped countries. + +"'For decades now,' he said, 'scientists have been worried by the +growing gap between world population and world food facilities. +Over-farming, climatic changes caused by erosion and deforestation, the +encroachment of building areas on agricultural land, and above all the +unrestricted growth of population, greatest in the very places where +food is becoming scarcest and most expensive, have produced a situation +where, if no remedy is found, starvation or semi-starvation may be the +fate of half the Earth's people. The ultimate result would be the slow +degeneration and death of the entire human race. + +"'Many remedies have been suggested,' Dr. Willard commented further. +'They range from compulsory birth control to the production of +synthetic food, hydroponics, and the harvesting of plankton from the +oceans. Each of these presents almost insuperable difficulties. + +"'The one ideal solution would be the discovery of some universal food +that would be nourishing, very cheap, plentiful, tasty, and that would +not violate the taboos of any people anywhere in the world. In the +margenes we may have discovered that food.' + +"'We don't know where the margenes came from,' the director went on to +say, 'and we don't even know yet what they are, biologically speaking. +What we do know is that they provide more energy per gram than any +other edible product known to man, that everyone who has eaten them +is enthusiastic about their taste, that they can be processed and +distributed easily and cheaply, and that they are acceptable even to +those who have religious or other objections to certain other foods, +such as beef, among the Hindus or pork among the Jews and Mohammedans. + +"'Even vegetarians can eat them,' Dr. Willard remarked, 'since they are +decidedly not animal in nature. Neither, I may add, are they vegetable. +They are a hitherto utterly unknown synthesis of chemical elements in +living form. Their origin remains undiscovered.'" + +Naturally, there was no thought of feeding people on raw margenes. +Only a few isolated places in either hemisphere would have found live +food agreeable. Experiment showed that the most satisfactory way to +prepare them was to boil them alive, like crabs or lobsters. They could +then be ground and pressed into cakes, cut into convenient portions. +One one-inch-square cube made a nourishing and delicious meal for a +sedentary adult, two for a man engaged in hard physical labor. + +And they kept coming in from the Pacific Ocean nightly, by the million. + +By this time none of them had to be swept off streets or highways. The +beach where for nearly a century throngs had gathered for the sport of +catching grunion was off bounds now; it was the property of California +Margene, Inc., a private corporation heavily subsidized by the Federal +Government as an infant industry. The grunions themselves had to find +another place to lay their eggs, or die off--nobody cared which. The +sand they had used for countless millennia as an incubator was hemmed +in by factory buildings and trampled by margene-gatherers. The whole +beautiful shore for miles around was devastated; the university had +to move its marine biological laboratory elsewhere; La Jolla, once a +delightful suburb and tourist attraction, had become a dirty, noisy +honkytonk town where processing and cannery workers lived and spent +their off-hours; the unique Torrey Pines had been chopped down because +they interfered with the erection of a freight airport. + +But half the world's people were living on margenes. + +The sole possession of this wonderful foodstuff gave more power to +the United States than had priority in the atomic bomb. Only behind +the Iron Curtain did the product of California Margene, Inc. fail +to penetrate. _Pravda_ ran parallel articles on the same day, one +claiming that margenes--_brzdichnoya_--had first appeared long ago on a +beach of the Caspian Sea and had for years formed most of the Russian +diet; the other warning the deluded nations receiving free supplies as +part of American foreign aid that the margenes had been injected with +drugs aimed at making them weak and submissive to the exploitation of +the capitalist-imperialists. + +There was a dangerous moment at the beginning when the sudden sharp +decline in stocks of all other food products threatened another 1929. +But with federal aid a financial crash was averted and now a new high +level of prosperity had been established. Technological unemployment +was brief, and most of the displaced workers were soon retained for +jobs in one of the many ramifications of the new margene industry. + +Agriculture, of course, underwent a short deep depression, not only in +America but all over the world; but it came to an end as food other +than margenes quickly became a luxury product. Farmers were able to cut +their production to a small fraction of the former yield, and to get +rich on the dizzying prices offered for bread, apples, or potatoes. +And this increased the prosperity of the baking and other related +industries as well. + +In fact, ordinary food costs (which meant margene costs) were so low +that a number of the larger unions voluntarily asked for wage decreases +in their next contracts. California Margene, Inc. was able to process, +pack, and distribute margene cakes at an infinitesimal retail price, +by reason of the magnitude of the output. + +An era of political good feeling fell upon the western world, reflected +from the well-fed comfort of vast populations whose members never +before in their lives had had quite enough to eat. The fear of famine +seemed to be over forever, and with it the fear of the diseases and the +social unrest that follow famine. Even the U.S.S.R. and its satellites, +in a conciliatory move in the United Nations Assembly, suggested that +the long cold war ought to be amenable to a reasonable solution through +a series of amicable discussions. The western nations, assenting, +guessed shrewdly that the Iron Curtain countries "wanted in" on the +margenes. + +Marge Hickin and Gene Towanda, who had started it all, left college +for copywriting jobs with the agency handling the enormous margene +publicity; they were married a few months later. + +And the margenes continued to come in from the sea in countless +millions. They were being harvested now from the Pacific itself, near +the shoreline, before they reached the beach. Still no research could +discover their original source. + +Only a few scientists worried about what would happen if the margenes +should disappear as suddenly as they had arrived. Attempts at breeding +the creatures had failed completely. They did not undergo fission, +they did not sporulate, they seemed to have no sex. No methods of +reproduction known in the plant or animal kingdom seemed to apply +to them. Hundreds of them were kept alive for long periods--they +lived with equal ease in either air or water, and they did not take +nourishment, unless they absorbed it from their environment--but no +sign of fertility ever appeared. Neither did they seem to die of +natural causes. They just kept coming in.... + +On the night of May 7, 1969, not a single margene was visible in the +ocean or on the beach. + +They never came again. + +What happened as a result is known to every student of history. The +world-wide economic collapse, followed by the fall of the most stable +governments, the huge riots that arose from the frantic attempts to +get possession of the existing stocks of margene cakes or of the +rare luxury items of other edibles, the announcement by the U.S.S.R. +that it had known from the beginning the whole thing was a gigantic +American hoax in the interests of the imperialistic bloodsuckers, +the simultaneous atomic attacks by east and west, the Short War of +1970 that ruined most of what bombs had spared of the Earth, the slow +struggle back of the remnant of civilization which is all of existence +you and I have ever known--all these were a direct outgrowth of that +first appearance of the margenes on the beach near San Diego on an +April night in 1960. + +Marge and Gene Towanda were divorced soon after they had both lost +their jobs. She was killed in the hydrogen blast that wiped out San +Diego; he fell in the War of 1970. "Margene" became a dirty word +in every language on Earth. What small amount of money and ability +can be spared is, as everyone knows, devoted today to a desperate +international effort to reach and colonize another habitable planet of +the Solar System, if such there be. + + * * * * * + +As for the margenes, themselves, out of the untold millions that had +come, only a few thousand were lucky enough to survive and find their +way back to their overcrowded starting-point. In their strange way of +communication--as incomprehensible to us as would be their means of +nourishment and reproduction, or their constitution itself--they made +known to their kin what had happened to them. There is no possibility, +in spite of the terrific over-population of their original home and of +the others to which they are constantly migrating, that they will ever +come here again. + +There has been much speculation, particularly among writers of science +fiction, on what would happen if aliens from other planets should +invade Earth. Would they arrive as benefactors or as conquerors? Would +we welcome them or would we overcome and capture them and put them in +zoos and museums? Would we meet them in friendship or with hostility? + +The margenes gave us the answer. + +Beings from outer space came to Earth in 1960. + +And we ate them. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Margenes, by Miriam Allen de Ford + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59394 *** |