The Project Gutenberg EBook of Perchance to Dream, by Richard Stockham

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Title: Perchance to Dream

Author: Richard Stockham

Illustrator: Kelly Freas

Release Date: June 17, 2010 [EBook #32859]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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PERCHANCE TO DREAM

By Richard Stockham

Illustrated by Kelly Freas

[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from IF Worlds of Science
Fiction May 1954. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

[Sidenote: _If you wish to escape, if you would go to faraway places,
then go to sleep and dream. For sometimes that is the only way...._]

All along the line of machines, the men's hands and arms worked like the
legs of spiders spinning a web. They wound wire and hammered bolts, tied
knots and welded pieces of steel and fitted gears. They did not look at
each other or sing or whistle or talk or laugh.

And then--he made a mistake.

Instantly he stepped back and a trouble shooter moved into his place.
The trouble shooter's hands flew over the controls.

The trouble shooter finished and the workman took his place. His arms
moved ceaselessly again.

He was a tall man, slim and wiry, his dress identical to that of the
others--grey coveralls that fit like tights.

Suddenly a red light flashed in his eyes and he began to tremble. He
took two steps backward. The trouble shooter moved into the empty space.

The man stood for a moment, like a soldier at attention, turned and
walked smartly toward the mouth of a corridor.

The silence was like a motion picture with a dead sound track. There was
only motion--and him walking down the line of machines where the hands
reached out, working, working.

In the corridor now, he looked straight ahead, marching. The walls
glowed like water beneath a shallow sea.

He raised his arm, felt the door strike and the heel of his hand; felt
it swing open;