Michael Cathal 38 min read

Last off the space liner, a hundred-year-old man with prodigious energy locks away a box holding almost a mile of fine wire, four days of detailed instructions, compiled for a purpose all his own.

Michael Cathal's 1955 story is a sharp dystopian social-SF tale of wealth, age, and control. Clever, ominous golden-age SF. Read it for a story where a centenarian's meticulous recorded instructions hint at a scheme as vast and cold as his fortune.

In its time

Published in 1955, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

38 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).

Illustrated by

Mel Hunter