The Project Gutenberg EBook of No Pets Allowed, by M. A. Cummings

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Title: No Pets Allowed

Author: M. A. Cummings

Release Date: June 17, 2009 [EBook #29139]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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_M. A. Cummings (Monette to her friends) returns with another
hauntingly persuasive story of a Tomorrow that may not be as
gleaming as we hope. Her recent story, THE WEIRDIES, apparently
delighted some and startled others--and this in Los Angeles! What's
happening there?_

no
pets
allowed

_by M. A. CUMMINGS_

He didn't know how he could have stood the four months
there alone. She was company and one could talk to her ...

I can't tell anyone about it. In the first place, they'd never believe
me. And, if they did, I'd probably be punished for having her. Because
we aren't allowed to have pets of any kind.

It wouldn't have happened, if they hadn't sent me way out there to work.
But, you see, there are so many things I can't do.

I remember the day the Chief of Vocation took me before the council.

"I've tried him on a dozen things," he reported. People always talk
about me as if I can't understand what they mean. But I'm really not
_that_ dumb.

"There doesn't seem to be a thing he can do," the Chief went on.
"Actually, his intelligence seems to be no greater than that which we
believe our ancestors had, back in the twentieth century."

"As bad as that?" observed one of the council members. "You do have a
problem."

"But we must find something for him to do," said another. "We can't have
an idle person in the State. It's unthinkable."

"But what?" asked the Chief. "He's utterly incapable of running any of
the machines. I've tried to teach him. The only things he can do, are
already being done much better by robots."

There was a long silence, broken at last by one little, old council
member.

"I have it," he cried. "The very thing. We'll make him guard of the
Treasure."

"But there's no need of a guard. N