My dear Doctor,
Permit me to introduce myself. I am a son of Mr and Mrs John Adams Smith of
Cincinnati, Ohio, where my father is a tool and die maker. I am a senior at the
School of Mines of the University of Missouri at Rolla, Missouri. I was given your
name and address by judge Orville Sperling, of Toledo, Ohio, Executive Secretary of
the Howard Foundation. Judge Sperling tells me that he has written to you about me.
If I may do so, I will call on you and Mrs Johnson on Sunday afternoon the
seventeenth of April. Then, if you permit, I ask to be presented to your daughter
Miss Maureen Johnson for the purpose of offering myself as a possible suitor for her
hand in marriage.
I welcome any investigation you tare to make of me and I will answer fully and
frankly any questions you put to me.
I look forward to your reply. I remain, sir,
Faithfully your servant,
Brian Smith
Page 41
Heinlein, Robert A – To Sail Beyond the Sunset.txt
Father said, ‘See, my dear daughter? Your knight comes riding.’
‘Probably has two heads. Father, it’s no good. I shall die an old maid, at the age
of ninety-seven.’
‘Not a fussy old maid, I trust. What shall I tell Mr Smith?’
‘Oh, tell him Yes. Tell him I’m drooling with eagerness.’
‘Maureen.’
‘Yes, Father. I’m too young to be cynical, I know. Quel dommage. I will straighten
up and give Mr Brian Smith my best smile and approach the meeting with cheerful
optimism. But I have grown a bit jaundiced. That last orang-utang -‘
(That ape had tried to rape me, right on Mother’s sofa, just as soon as Mother and
Father went upstairs. He then left abruptly, clutching bis crotch. My study of
anatomy had paid off.)
‘I’ll tell him that we will welcome him. Sunday the seventeenth. That’s two weeks
from tomorrow.’
I greeted Sunday the seventeenth with little enthusiasm. But I did stay home from
church and prepared a picnic lunch, and grabbed the chance for an extra bath. Mr
Smith turned out to be presentable and well spoken, if not especially inspiring.
Father grilled him a bit and Mother offered him coffee; about two we got away –
Daisy and a family buggy, with his livery stable nag left in our barn.
Three hours later I was certain that I was in love.
Brian made a date to come back on the first of May. He had final examinations to get
out of the way in the meantime.
One week later, Sunday 24 April 1898, Spain declared war on the United States.
Chapter 5 – Exit from Eden
This is not a bad jail, as jails go. I was in a much worse one, in Texas,
seventy-odd years back on my personal time line. In that one the cockroaches slugged
it out with each other for a thin chance of finding a few crumbs on the floor, there
was no hot water at any time, and the screws were all cousins of the sheriff. Bad as
that joint was, wetbacks used to sneak across the Rio and break a window or mo in
order to get themselves locked up, so they could fatten up for the winter. That says
something about Mexican jails that I don’t care to investigate.
Pixel comes to see me almost every day. The guards can’t figure out how he does it.
They all like him and he has given several of them his conditional approval. They
fetch titbits in to him; he deigns to eat some of their tribute.
The warden heard about Pixel’s Houdini talents, came to my cell, happened to show up
when Pixel was making a call on me, tried to pet him and got nipped for his
presumption not hard enough to break the skin, but the message was clear.
The warden told me (ordered me) to be sure to let him know ahead of time when Pixel
went in or out; he wanted to see how Pixel managed to sneak past and not set off
alarm. I told him that no mortal man or woman could predict what a cat would do