Irving E. Cox

“ He was swinging his arms and shouting, but the noise of the falling box had already frightened the bear away.
Walt stood in the moonlight, smiling foolishly.
"I guess I came too late," he said.
"I'm quite sure the bear would have left of its own accord, Walt. They're always quite tame in the national parks, you know." As soon as she said it, she knew it was a mistake. Even though he had done nothing, it would have cost her little to thank him. The words had come instinctively; she hadn't thought how her answer would affect him. Walt turned on his heel stiffly and walked back to his tent. ”

“ But again the machine read the real meaning behind the pleasant words.
"So you've finally lost your man, Miss Kent. The way you dished out the orders, it's a wonder he stayed around as long as he did. And a pity: you're an attractive woman. You should make some man a good wife."
They all thought that. The whole camp had been watching her, laughing at her. Bertha felt helpless and alone. She needed—wanted—someone else; it surprised her when she faced that fact.
Then it dawned on her: the camper was right; the blonde was right. She had lost Walt through her own ridiculous bull-headedness. ”

“ In the process the Translator somehow got twisted around, for the chute dragged it back vertically through the coil of wire. It touched the wall of the cylinder, and the whole machine exploded.
It was impossible to save anything from the wreckage. But as a physicist I assure you, Bill, the transposition of matter into light is, in terms of our present science, a physical impossibility. It is certainly not the sort of invention that could have been produced by a senile old man, pottering around in a home laboratory. ”

“ In other words, Price had expected to transpose the atomic structure of solid matter into light, and later to reconstruct the original matter again. Now don't assume, Bill, that Price was wandering around in a senile delusion of fourth dimensional nonsense. The theory may be sound. Our present knowledge of the physical world makes the basic structure of matter more of a mystery than it has ever been. ”

“ Her hope had been so high when school closed; this year was going to be different!
"Are you going anywhere this summer?" Miss Emmy asked after the last faculty meeting in June.
"To Yosemite for a couple of weeks, I think."
"The Park's always crowded. ”