A Stone and a Spear

BY RAYMOND F. JONES
Illustrated by JOHN BUNCH
Given: The future is probabilities merging into one certainty. Proposition: Can the probabilities be made improbables so that the certainty becomes impossible?
From Frederick to Baltimore, the rolling Maryland countryside lay under a fresh blanket of green. Wholly unaware of the summer glory, Dr. Curtis Johnson drove swiftly on the undulating highway, stirring clouds of dust and dried grasses.
Beside him, his wife, Louise, held her blowing hair away from her face and laughed into the warm air. Dr. Dell isn't going to run away. Besides, you said we could call this a weekend vacation as well as a business trip.
Curt glanced at the speedometer and eased the pressure on the pedal. He grinned. Wool-gathering again.
What about?
I was just wondering who said it first—one of the fellows at Detrick, or that lieutenant at Bikini, or—
Said what ? What are you talking about?
That crack about the weapons after the next war. He—whoever it was—said there may be some doubt about what the weapons of the next war will be like, but there is absolutely no doubt about the weapons of World War IV. It will be fought with stones and spears. I guess any one of us could have said it.
Louise's smile grew tight and thin. Don't any of you ever think of anything but the next war— any of you?
How can we? We're fighting it right now.