Electro-episoded in A.D. 2025

[Publisher’s note: Humor, we have been told by some of our critics, can never amount to much in scientifiction. If we may let a secret out of the bag, the Editor has been on a rampage, lately, to find a scientifiction story in which there really could be a subtle humor without weakening the narrative. Well, we believe we have found it in this tale, which not only has all of the above-mentioned qualifications, but a fine O. Henry ending thrown in for good measure. Only when you have read it for the second time will you appreciate it to its fullest extent.]

If Lieutenant-Colonel Algernon Sidney St. Johnstone, N.Y.N.G., had been in a normal condition, he would certainly have been aware of a peculiar buzzing sensation in the region of his upper left-hand vest pocket; but unfortunately it so happened that his actual physical state was most emphatically sub-normal. Still he could hardly avoid the suspicion that something out of the ordinary had disturbed him; and, with blinking eyes, he searched the apartment for possible inordinate things.

The first to attract his attention was a neatly folded copy of the eleven o’clock edition of the Hourly Bulletin, bearing the date: “Tuesday, January 7, 2025”; which, with its “up-to-the-minute” Wall street market quotations, lay unread upon the desk before him. This he swept to the floor with an impatient sweep of his arm!

Next his left hand instinctively sought, with practiced precision, a black bottle on a side-desk close by. Holding the bottle to the light, his eyes told him that it was empty. Tipping it upside down above his wide-open mouth, his tongue repeated the information with emphasis. Dejectedly keeping the bottle before him, he glared in an insane fury at two green labels--one the trade mark of a by-gone century, and the other a “Bottled in Bond” stamp dated: “July 1, 1916”--which his wisdom told him were both forgeries.

Then, as the topographical details of his “den” became clearer to his blurred vision, his eyes picked out the recumbent form of his correctly attired and correctly featured valet slumbering peacefully and audibly in a Morris chair in the far corner--and this under the very nose of his master! Instantly the bottle was hurled at the valet’s head!--and the latter promptly proved his trained efficiency in the art of sleeping “with one eye open,” by automatically and unnecessarily dodging.

Finally Algernon’s superheated emotions found vent in speech. Glaring savagely at his valet, he said:

“Shay you varlet!--”

He paused and chuckled for a moment at the humor of the “pun”--then he repeated loudly: “Shay you varlet, wake up! Lishen t’me. You gesh bishy on ’phone, tell thash booshlegger hosh-thief o’ mine ’f ’ee shends me more schtuff like thish, I shee nash’nal head booshlegger’s trust ’nd gesh him fired. Thash schtuff kill ’mule! You tell’sh him t’ shave money ’ee shpends on labels ’n buy shumpin’ fit f schen’lemen’s schtomach. Thash schtuff kill ’mule!”

The valet fixed one eye on his master, the other being blackened and fully closed, and answered promptly and precisely:

“Yes, sir! As you say, sir! But, begging your pardon, sir, the gentleman sent word yesterday that you should not drink any of that, as it was dangerous. He said, begging your pardon, sir, that the goods they make for the common people had been sent you by mistake. He apologized most profusely.”

Algernon turned on his valet in a fury.

“’N you lesh me kill m’self wish thash schtuff?” he cried. “Thash schtuff kill ’mule.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” replied the valet, “I did object to the best of my ability. But you resisted most violently, blackening my eye and knocking me unconscious into this chair, so that I only recovered just as you spoke a moment ago. That poison must have temporarily deranged your intellect, sir.”

“Thash it! S’poison d’ranged in’lect. Thash schtuff kill ’mule. S’too bad! Here, s’take thish.” And Algernon took a bill from his pocket and tossed it at his valet.

For a moment he sat quietly as if in a profound study, and then another idea struck him.

“Shay you schrimp! Whash shtaring t’me like owl for?” he said, addressing the valet. “Gesh bishy on ’phone, tell booshlegger-dog shend me ’nozzer case quick. S’tell him I got awfu’ thirst.”

“Yes, sir! As you say, sir,” replied the valet with alacrity. “But, begging your pardon, sir, the gentleman did promise to send another case yesterday; and, begging your pardon, sir, I believe he would have done so, if the federal officers had not raided him and put him in jail.”

For a moment Algernon stared at his valet in a speechless rage that partly sobered him. Then the words came in a torrent of choice but incoherent invective.

“Whazzat!” he cried. “Thosh--curs gesh my booshlegger! I gesh them quick!”

He paused a second for breath, eyeing his valet the while with maudlin profundity, and then he continued:

“Shay you monkey-face’ weptile, whash shtaring me for?” he exploded. “Gesh bishy! Gesh bishy on ’phone. Use p’vate code. Tell nash’nal schief t’ call hish dogs of my booshlegger a’ once. Tell him I get his scalp shure. Tell him thish Alg’non Shid’ey Shaint Shons’one. Y’un’erstan’? Alg’non Shid’ey Shain’ Shons’one!”

With a “Yes, sir! At once, sir! As you say, sir!” the valet obeyed promptly, and was soon buried in his master’s private code-book; while Algernon, now considerably sobered by his rage, became fully conscious of the peculiar buzzing sensation in the region of his upper left-hand vest pocket--and of the fact that this buzzing indicated beyond a doubt that his fiancee, Esmeralda Clementine Jones-Bronson, desired to communicate with him.

Well versed as he was in the art of “managing” the “female-of-the-species” in the infinite variety of moods to which she is addicted, a quizzical smile played for a moment around his lips as he realized that his inadvertent delay in answering his Esmeralda’s “call,” had accidentally turned out a masterstroke. She had “ridden her high horse” in the recent row, had flaunted a daring defiance of his most earnest wishes in his very face, and had finished by throwing her engagement-ring contemptuously at his feet! Presumably she was contrite now, and ready for a reconciliation. But he well knew that, if he would not be bullied through life by his future wife, he must maintain the upper hand throughout the engagement period; and--his delay in answering would have a chastening effect!