After the third round, the entire block clove in two—Just as the eye appeared and yelled **Disqualified!
—One succeeded in time! the Snurp cried. —Not disqualified!
The eye peered down. **Correction: Approved.
The Snurp relaxed, relieved.
Buddy hoped there would not be much more of this. The splitting was fun in its way, but his stomach was growling.
Only six contestants remained.
**Final phase. Petrified Poplar, veneer grain.
The wood appeared. It was monstrous: a yard wide, and as hard as rock. Buddy found three suitable stress points, but they were impervious to his wedges. It would take far more strength than he possessed to make headway there—and it looked as though three wedges would have to be pounded at once, to unlock this complex boulder.
At the next block a muscular doglike contestant circled the chunk with his front paws, heaved it up, placed three wedges points-up on the block with his prehensile tail, turned over the chunk and dropped it on top of them. It shattered into thirds, spraying pebbles. //Time! his second called jubilantly.
Buddy gazed at his own stump with dismay. He could never do that! The wood was twenty times his own weight.
He tried the little hatchet on it, hoping for the best. The blade rebounded from the surface, leaving only a scratch. He tried to swing the axe, but this was even worse. He had gotten nowhere, and time was passing.
—One must turn the—the Snurp began.
**Disqualified! the inspector eye said immediately. **No advice permitted from the sideline during the phase.
And the wood vanished, and Buddy had to step back, disappointed and humiliated. He had really wanted to split that ponderous segment—the biggest slice of wood he had ever seen or imagined.
—Why did not one turn the poplar over to reveal the veneer-ravel point? the Snurp demanded furiously. —One was intolerably stupid!
Buddy took this as a rebuke. He bore up in silence, as he had learned to do under the constant abuse of his sisters, but he was miserable inside.
The inspector eye appeared.
**This contestant places sixth, raw score, it said. **Award ratio now being calculated. What is contestant's maturity index?
—One must provide the information, the Snurp told Buddy.
"Can I go home now? I'm hungry."
—How mature is one? Of what physical/mental duration, relative to the adult of the species?
Buddy looked at the Snurp in perplexity. "What?"
—How old?
"Oh, I'm four."
—That would be four sidereal revolutions of one's planet about its star, the Snurp said to the eye. —This species is mature at fifteen or twenty revolutions.
The metal eye focused on Buddy. **One quarter or one fifth of maturity? Standard for this tournament is one half. That would place contestant at par times two plus. First on index, despite failure on final phase.
—The winner! the Snurp cried joyously.
**However, contestant is beneath tournament age of consent. Provide evidence of parental permission.
—Conditions were too pressing to obtain—
"Can I go home now? Everybody'll be mad when they find I'm gone."
**Conditions too pressing? Violation of regulations, Snurptegian agent. Your species has bad recruitment record.
—Unintentional! Oversight! Misunderstanding!
"Can I go home now?" All this talk reminded him too much of the bickering of his sisters.
**Immediately, the eye said grimly. **There will be a full investigation.
And suddenly Buddy was standing beside the chopping block behind his house, alone. That ** was certainly prompt!
"There you are, you little brat!" one of his middle sisters exclaimed. "Oh, are you going to get it! You're late for supper and Mom's beside herself!"
That meant a spanking, gleefully delivered by massed sibling might. Buddy managed to bite two fingers, but otherwise got the worst of it. Afterwards, he received some leftover food.
At bedtime Dad came to see him. "Whatever mischief did you get into today, Son?" he asked in his pleasant man-to-man way.
"Wood split." Generally, it was safe to tell things to Dad.
"Would split what, Son?"
"Purple Ash. Scorch Punk. And funny things—but the last one was too big. And hard. And I was hungry."
"That's very interesting, Son. You have a fine imagination."
"The Snurp took me. In the washing machine."
"But if you try to tell a story like that to your mother—"
Buddy understood that he was being gently reprimanded. Dad didn't believe him.
"Keep my wedge, Dad?"
"Certainly, Son." Dad reached out for the small red section of metal. "Where did you find that?"
"I stole it from the wood split."
Dad's face became grave. "You will have to return it, Son. Right now. Stealing is wrong."
Dad could be just as unreasonable as Buddy's sisters, when he put his mind to it. Reluctantly, Buddy led the way out into the dark and toward the chopping block. "The Snurp was here, Dad. He took me to the wood split. Where I stole the wedge."
"You're sure, Son?" The tone was dangerous.
"And the eye sent me back. Here."
Dad sighed. "That's not exactly a story I can accept, Son."
It sounded suspiciously like another spanking. Buddy didn't know what to say.
Then a light appeared above the chopping block. It was the eye! **Regret uninformed decision, it said. **Investigation discloses Snurptegian agent at fault. Immature should not have been disqualified.
Dad's hand was on Buddy's shoulder, and it clenched painfully. "Is this the owner of the wedge?"
"Yes, Dad."
"Then give it back."
Buddy held out the wedge. "Here. I stole it."
**Can not alter decision after the fact, the eye said. **Innocent immature was exploited by Snurptegian field agent. Tournament forwards regrets. Herewith, consolation prize: permit to compete in next regional junior championship tournament, and matched set of samples.
In the dim light shining from the house, or perhaps it was the glow around the eye, Buddy saw a pile of wood rise from nothing. Some chunks reflected the light metallically and some glowed on their own. Elegant wood, faerie wood—all he could ever split. Purple Ash, Vinegar Maple, Scorch Punk—and even the monstrous Petrified Poplar. And countless other exotic varieties amounting to at least a cord. The alien tools were there too—axe, maul, hatchet, wedges.
Dad looked, amazed. "My son was spanked—for telling the truth."
**The Snurptegian agent was spanked too, the eye said. **Trust consolation is adequate.
"No," Dad said. "My boy will not accept goods he has not earned. Take back your shipment."
**As desired, the eye said. The wood vanished. **Respects.
"Respects," Dad replied. The eye winked out.
Buddy was left with nothing. He began to cry.
"It was a payoff," Dad explained gently, as they walked back to the house. "You'll have many opportunities in life to earn your way properly. You wouldn't want to prejudice it all by accepting something like this now, would you?"
"Wood you?" Buddy repeated, not comprehending.
Not then.
HARD SELL
I was, as I have hinted before, phasing out of short fiction by 1971, because the editors were too picky and too free with diddles in my text, and the pay was inadequate. Editors claim they are chronically desperate for decent stories, but they often don't seem to know such stones when they see them. John Campbell of Analog bounced this one because he said it was right on target, therefore not really fiction. But I wrote six stories in this series, to form a novel in the aggregate, as I had done with the eight Prostho Plus stories. You guessed it: the magazines showed little interest, but finally Galaxy Publications picked up the first three—and rejected the last three. And no book publisher wanted the novel Hard Sell. This was a hard sell indeed! Were the stories inferior? Well, you can judge for yourself; they got stronger as they went, so that some of my best efforts were wasted on the market. The titles were: 1. "Hard Sell" 2. "Black Baby" 3. "Hurdle" 4. "Death" 5. "Life" 6. "Libel." The first and third are published here. Once again I had shown too much oomph for the market—and I was pretty well fed up with that market.