THE YOKEL By WALTER M. MILLER, JR. The time: 1987. The place: Florida. America is struggling back from the effects of World War III. It is a divided country now, with the big cities held by scientists and technicians, and with all rural sections overrun by ruthless gangs seeking plunder and the eventual conquest of the cities themselves. Into this maelstrom comes Sam Wuncie, cynical, hard-bitten and with but one ambition: to stay alive. Circumstance puts him deep in the hands of the deadly Colonel MacMahon and the unfathomable Zella Richmond. It is from this strange pair that Sam eventually learns there is far more to life than keeping death at a distance. No good science-fiction magazine should go to press without at least one exciting novelette crammed with action. Here's a pip! HE STOOD in front of the dimly lighted saloon idly rolling a half dollar across the back of his knuckles, a dark young man in dirty overalls, unshaven and unkempt. He gazed with dull eyes at the gloomy street, debris-littered, with clogged sewers and rusting, flat-tired automobiles, with shabby loiterers and tallow lamps burning atop the electric streetlight standards. The small city, once of 15,000 population, had only recently gotten the tallow lamps. Progress, real progress. A dame wandered past and he glanced at her indifferently?a frowsy tomato with glint-eyes and rag-hair. She saw the half dollar dancing across his skilled knuckles. She stopped. "Got a light, Mister?" Her purring tone offered a proposition. "Climb a light-pole, Sister. It's on the city." She eyed the coin. "I've got change." "Then use it to call a taxi. Scram." She laughed; evidently it was a good joke. She gazed hungrily into the saloon and moistened her lips. "Buy me a glass of swill, huh?" "I wouldn't blow you the foam off my beer. Beat it, Gertie. Your time's used up. I'm a busy man." She hissed an insult, spat at him, and darted away. He grumbled irritably and wiped the spittle out of his eyes. He dropped the half dollar in his pocket and shuffled into the bar. Customers were scarce. A rag-bag with a gray head was asleep on the floor; nobody bothered to pick it up. A gaunt young man with a festered neck and a blind eye was talking to himself at the bar. The sleazy wheezer who committed the drinks shuffled to meet the newcomer. "Hi, Wuncie. Got dough?" "Yeah, gimme a ?" "Show me." Sam Wuncie cursed and jingled his pocket. "Wanna bite one to make sure?" "Nah, I trust ya. Who'd you roll for it?" "Picked beans for Gardland, Nosey. Gimme a drink." "What'll you have?" Wuncie glowered at him. "Frozen Daiquiri!" he snapped. The bartender shrugged. "Just thought I'd ask. Wait'll I get the siphon." There was a galvanized washtub set up on a box on the bar. Nosey dropped one end of a rubber hose in it and sucked on the other end. Then he pinched it off and stuck it in a glass. The glass filled slowly with a murky brown liquid. "What's in this batch, Nosey? Bird nests?" Nosey grinned reflectively. "Can't remember. Old Lady keeps six tubs working. Whatever she can get goes in." Wuncie took the glass with a shudder and tossed Nosey a dime. He peered at the murky fluid distastefully. "You suck the hose and still live. Guess I'll chance it." He gulped the drink and made a face. "Prunes. Damn rotten prunes." "Don't like it, don't drink it," Nosey muttered irritably. "I like it. It's a club." "Have another?" "Yeah." "You're a real patriot, Wuncie," the bartender said as he came back with the glass. "A smart boy like you could cross over and be drinking good liquor, eating good food, wearing decent clothes." "Yeah, everybody's a real patriot," he answered sourly. "Everybody that can't pass the test and be a traitor." "Nuts, you could pass, Wuncie. What'd you used to do before the war?" "Dropped earthworms down little girls' backs." "Just a kid, huh? Well ? you could pass." "The only place left to pass is out. Gimme another." A man slipped quietly in the-door, looked around quickly, then sidled onto a seat at the end of the bar. He was panting slightly, and his eyes were nervous. One cheek was covered with a patch bandage. Nosey approached him with a deepening frown. The customer showed him a handful of coins. Nosey shook his head. "Lemme see under that patch first," he grunted. 'It's on a bad spot, Joe." The man looked stricken. "I ? it's only a cut. Cut myself shaving." "Take it off. Let me look." The man licked his lips. "You got me wrong, Mister." "Show me." "Doc said not to lift it." " Doc? For a shaving cut?" The man slipped off the stool. Nosey reached for a butcher knife. The man backed toward the door. "You got me wrong. I'm no crosser." Nosey grasped the blade of the knife as if to throw it. The man yelped and fled. Nosey came back cursing. "Cheek was branded, bigawd! The sneaky bastard!" Wuncie's laugh was icy. "What were you saying about being tested?" "I said you could pass. I didn't say you should." "If I got tested and failed, would you run me off with a butcher knife?" "Yer damned right I'd get after you!" "That's what I meant. Everybody's a real patriot. Nobody wants to be tested. Patriotic reasons, of course." "If you're going to tell me what's wrong with the world," Nosey growled, "it'll cost you a dime a minute." "It'll only take a second. Brains ? that's what's wrong with the world." "Huh? Whose ? the committee' s?" Nosey frowned and scratched his uncombed thatch. "Nope, ours. We're freak animals, Nosey. We're like the goldfish with butterfly fins, or a saber-tooth tiger with fangs so long he can't open his mouth wide enough, or a deer with antlers so long they tangle in the brush. Nature overdid us, Nosey. A brain is a tool for survival, but she overdid it and we got all bogged down in our own gray matter." "You're getting tight, Wuncie." "Yeah. And that's why. I've got about as much use for an active cortex as a baboon has for a blue behind." He shoved his glass across the bar. "Here, gimme the deactivator." The bartender shrugged and reached for the siphon hose. He paused suddenly and glanced toward the door. There was a brief silence. "Come in," he offered gruffly. Three men stepped inside and stood peering around suspiciously in the dim lamplight. One of them carried a length of rope at his belt, and the rope was knotted into a noose. Another wore a long sheath-knife. The third carried a short joint of iron pipe. One man went to look behind the bar. A second made a slow circuit of the saloon, opening every door for a glance inside. The third rolled the rag-bag over with his foot for a glance at his face. The rag-bag groaned. "Go back to sleep, Pop." The inspection was finished in silence. The man with the rope approached Nosey. "You seen a man with a bandage on his cheek lately?" Nosey moistened his lips and glanced at Wuncie. Wuncie's smile was bitter, but cynically indifferent. The man with the rope frowned impatiently and glanced at his aides. "Reckon we should allow a blind barkeep to stay in business?" They grinned and shook their heads. "I think I saw him," Nosey sputtered hastily. "You think? The hustler that works this street saw him come in here." "Yeah, I saw him. I think it's the guy. Bandage on his cheek." "Clever lad!" the ropeman said sarcastically. "What did he say? What did he do?" "Tried to buy a drink. I saw the bandage and ran him off." The ropeman nodded at his colleagues. "Doesn't know we've spotted him yet," he muttered. They started outside, but the ropeman paused to look back at Wuncie. "Care to join us, Citizen?" Wuncie gave the man a fishy stare, then turned to inspecting his nails. "Citizen, I spoke to you." "Yeah? Damn polite of you, bud. Noblesse oblige, I guess." The ropeman hooked his thumbs in his belt and took two slow steps forward. "You sure are a smart boy! Maybe you're from the other side." "Go buy your brain back, Mister!" Wuncie snarled. "If your butt's for sale, you'll need it." The ropeman darkened. He glanced over his shoulder. "Hold it a minute, boys. I got a live one." The other men wandered back inside. They stood with hands on hips, watching with cold eyes. The ropeman leaned on the bar, staring hostilely at Sam. "What's your name, fellow?" "Thaddeus Twench!" Sam snapped. "Where you born?" "I wasn't born. The judge gave me this sentence." "You talk like an urban." "What if I am?" "Lots of urbans turn tech, go across." "You see a brand on my cheek?" "You might have passed the test and got in. You might be a double-crosser." "There's no such thing. Anybody bright enough to pass stays in." "Maybe you'd like to be bright enough." "Maybe." The man had been fiddling with the rope. His hand lashed out viciously, and the heavy knot clubbed Sam across the temple. The stool toppled and Wuncie crashed to the floor. "Teach him." Heavy boots stamped across the floor. Then they stamped on Wuncie. He howled until a hard heel jammed against his windpipe. Then his skull exploded. A moment later, he was being slapped awake; he roared and struck out blindly. He grabbed a handful of shirtfront. "Down, Rover! It's me!" barked Nosey's voice. He peered around at a foggy room. It was empty. "Where ??" "You been asleep awhile." "How long?" "Long enough to draw flies. Go home." Wuncie picked himself up weakly and staggered to lean on the bar. "Need a drink," he hissed, shaking his groggy head and exploring his bruises. "Show me your dough?" " Hell, you know ? you saw . . ." He paused and felt in his pockets. He looked glum...
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