Sonny Read online

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  Transcriber's Note:

  This etext was produced from Analog Science Fact & Fiction April 1963. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

  SONNY

  Of course, no one actually knows the power of a thought. That is, the milli--or megawatts type of power ...

  by RICK RAPHAEL

  ILLUSTRATED BY JOHN SCHOENHERR

 

  * * * * *

  Private Jediah Cromwell was homesick for the first time since hisinduction into the Army. If he had gotten homesick on any of at leasta dozen other occasions during his first two weeks in the service, hemight never have gotten beyond the induction center. But the wondersand delights of his first venture beyond the almost inaccessible WestVirginia hills of his birth had kept him too awed and interested tothink about home.

  When Cletus Miller headed up the trail to Bluebird Gulch, Ma felt himcoming around the bend below the waterfall a mile across the gorge.She laid down her skinning knife and wiped her hands clean of theblood of the rabbits Jed had brought in earlier in the morning.

  "Sonny," she called to Jed, "trouble's acoming."

  Jediah crossed the corn patch to her side. "What kinda trouble, Ma?"

  "Cletus Miller's comin'," Ma Cromwell said. "He ain't been up heresince the week afore your Pa died. I don't know what it is but it'sbound to be trouble."

  A few minutes later Miller hallooed from the bottom of the gardenpatch, then trudged up to the cabin.

  "Set and rest, Cletus," Ma said. "Sonny, fetch Cletus a coolin' dip."Jed ambled down to the spring sluice and dippered out a pint of clear,mountain water.

  "Got mail fer you," Cletus said, waving an envelope. "Guvermint mail.Fer Sonny."

  Two weeks later, Jediah swung down the mountain to Owl Creek, carryinga small sack with his good clothes and shoes in it. The draft noticewas stuffed into his overall pockets along with biscuits and meat Mahad insisted he take.

  "Go along now, Sonny," she had directed him, "and don't you fret noneabout me. The corn's 'most ready. You got a good supply of firewoodin, more'n enought to last me all winter. If your guvermint need usCromwells to fight, then I reckon its our bounden duty. Your grandsireand greatgrandsire both wuz soldiers and if'n your Pa hadn't gone andgotten his leg busted and twisted afore the guvermint called him Ireckon he'd have been one, too. I've learned you all I can and you canread 'n write 'n do sums. Just mind your manners and come on home whenthey don't need you no more."

  In Owl Creek the first real part of the excitement hit Jed. He hadbeen as far as Paulsburg, twenty miles farther and that was almost asbig as the county seat at Madison. Now he was going to go even beyondMadison--right to the city. And then maybe the Army would send himmore places.

  The Army did.

  Everything had been wonderful, almost overwhelming, from the moment heboarded a bus for the first time in his life until he arrived at FortMcGruder. He could hardly believe the wealth of the government inissuing him so many clothes and giving him so much personal gear. Andwhile the food wasn't what Ma would have cooked, there was lots of it.He liked the other recruits who had ridden down to McGruder with him,even though a couple of the city fellows had been kind of teasing.

  He liked the barracks although his bunk mattress wasn't as soft asMa's eiderdown comforts. He liked everything--until the sergeant hadcussed at him this afternoon.

  Now Jed lay on his bunk and counted the springs on the upper bunkoccupied by Private Harry Fisher. It was close to eight o'clock andthe barracks were full of scores of young soldiers. A crap game wasgoing on three bunks away and across the aisle; another country boywas picking at a guitar. The bunk above sagged with the weight ofHarry Fisher, who was reading a book.

  Jed's mind kept coming back to the cussin' out he had gotten, just fornot knowing the Army insisted on a body wearing shoes no matter whathe was doing. Jed had never been cussed at before in his entire life.True, Ma never hesitated about taking a willow switch to him when hewas a young 'un, or a stob of kindling when he got older. But shealways whupped him in a gentle fashion, never losing her temper andalways explaining with each whistling swing of switch or club, justwhat he'd done wrong and why this was for the good of his immortalsoul.

  Thinking about Ma, Jed got homesick. He closed his eyes and lookedaround for Ma. She was stirring a pot of lye ashes over the fireplaceand when she felt Jed in the cabin she closed her eyes. "Sonny," shesaid, "you in trouble?"

  Lying on his bunk at Fort McGruder, Jed smiled happily and thoughtback an answer. "Nope, Ma. Jest got to wonderin' what you wuz doing."

  Whatever Ma was going to say was lost amid the yells and growls of themen in the barracks as the electricity went off. "Who turned thelights off?" Fisher cried from the top bunk. "It's not 'lights out'time yet."

  * * * * *

  The noise jerked Jed back to the present and his eyes opened. Thelights came on.

  "Where are the dice," one of the crapshooters barked. "I rolled aseven just when the lights went out."

  The noise died down and the game resumed. Fisher lay back on his bunkand went back to his book. Jed's mind reached out for home again."Ma," he called out, "you say something?"

  The lights went out and the yells went up throughout the two-storybarracks.

  Jed opened his eyes and the lights came on.

  At the end of the barracks, Corporal Weisbaum came out of his sacredlyprivate room and surveyed the recruits. "Awright," he roared, "sowhich one of you is the wise guy making with the lights?"

  "So nobody, corporal," a recruit sitting on the end bunk answered. "Sothe lights went out. Then they come back on. So who knows? Maybe theArmy ain't paying its light bills. I had a landlady back in Brooklynwho usta do the same thing anytime I got late with her rent mon...."

  "Shaddup," Weisbaum snarled. "Maybe it was power trouble. But if ithappens again and I find out one of you monkeys is bein' smart, thewhole platoon falls out and we'll get a little night air exercising."He stalked back into his room and slammed the door.

  The barracks buzzed angrily for a few moments. Jed sat up and peeredup at Fisher.

  "That there officer shorely don't talk very nice, you know thatHarry," Jed said.

  Fisher laid down the book and peered under his thick-rimmed glasses atthe lanky mountain boy.

  "How old are you, Jed," he asked.

  "Nineteen."

  "Lived up in the hills all those years?" Fisher inquired.

  "Yup," Jed replied. "This is the furthinest I've ever been." Hisnormally cheerful face fell slightly. "Kinda makes me lonesome in away, though. Folks back home jest plain don't talk thataway one to theother."

  Fisher leaned over the edge of his bunk. "Let me tell you something,Jed. Don't let talk like that worry you. First of all, he's noofficer. And second, he doesn't really mean it and it's just a way theArmy has of making men of us. You'll hear lots more and lots worsebefore you get back to those West Virginia hills of yours."

  Jed lay back down on the bunk. "Mebbe so," he admitted. "Don't mean Igotta like it much, though. Ma never talked thataway to me, no matterhow bad a thing I done."

  Jed closed his eyes and thought of home. Ought to say goodnight to Ma.He let his mind reach out to the cabin almost two states distant.

  The lights went out in the barracks, two of the crapshooters startedswinging at each other in the dark and the commotion drifted upwind tothe platoon sergeant's room in another barracks two buildings away.

  In the confu
sed yells and the shouting of Corporal Weisbaum, Jed gaveup trying to say goodnight to Ma and opened his eyes again.

  The lights in the barracks came back on just as Platoon SergeantMitchell walked in the front door.

  The two crapshooters were tangled in a heap in the center aisle of thebarracks, still swinging. Corporal Weisbaum had the Brooklyn recruitby the front of his T-shirt, waving a massive fist under the boy'snose.

  "AT EASE!" Mitchell boomed. The barracks shook and suddenly there wasquiet. "Now just what is going on here?" he demanded.

  Weisbaum released his grip on the recruit and the two brawlersscrambled to their feet. The corporal glared at