Dead End
By WALLACE MACFARLANE
Illustrated by DAVID STONE
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Galaxy Science Fiction January 1952.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Sparing people's feelings is deadly.
It leads to—no feelings, no people!
Scientist William Manning Norcross drank his soup meticulously andscooped up the vegetables at the bottom of the cup, while his attentionwas focused on the television screen. He watched girls swimming information as he gnawed the bone of his steak. He stolidly ate thebaked potato with his fingers when the girls turned around, displaying"Weejees Are Best" signs pasted to their shapely backs. The finalflourish was more formation swimming, where they formed a wheel underwater, swimming past the camera to display in individual letters stuckto their bare midriffs: "Wonderful Weejees!"
Norcross chuckled appreciatively when a fat old man swam afterthem with an "Is That Right?" strung across his behind. Youngmen followed him, each carrying a one-word card that spelled:"You—Bet—It's—Right—Don't—Be—Left—Buy—Weejees—!" The sceneended on the surface. The grotesque old man was far in back, while theyoung men caught the young women, and together they kicked up a cloudof spray in the distance, which by a trick of photography mounted tothe sky and the words swept around the globe in monstrous letters:"BUY WEEJEES!"
The dessert was apple pie, and Scientist Norcross turned the screento the "Abstractions" channel. Watching the colors and patterns formin response to the music, he finished the pie and licked his fingersappreciatively. He pressed a stud to reveal the mirror wall before heactivated the molecular cleanup.
Not many people would do that. It was not contrary to morals, exactly,but it was like scratching in public, and it took a scientific mind tostudy the human form unshaken, immediately after ingestion. There waspie on his tunic and gravy in his hair and a smear of grease from cheekto ear. With no sign of squeamishness, he smeared beet juice on hisnose and studied the effect before he depressed the "Clear" stud.
He stretched and stood up while the tray disappeared, then turnedand glanced in the mirror again. Nothing on him. Clean. He yawnedluxuriantly before he tapped the "Finish" panel on the door and steppedforth, an immaculate and well-fed gentlemen of the year 2512.
He had a well-trained sense of humor, and a smile crossed his lipsas he thought of the terror a 21st Century man would feel in such aneating chamber. When he pressed the clear button, the barbarian wouldbe clean—really, sterilely clean—for the first time in his life, andwithout clothes, too. Oh, what a jape that would be, for the molecularcleanup would immediately disintegrate such abominations as the furof animals, and much clothing 400 years ago was actually made of suchthings as sheep hair.
He bowed to a pretty woman just entering a cubicle and thoughtdefiantly that a scientific mind afforded much amusement. There was noillusion in his icy clear thoughts, for they were not befogged by moralquestions.
With a sigh, Scientist William Manning Norcross returned to thedifficult problem he had set aside while having lunch. The garden citywas beautiful o