For obvious reasons, since time-travel has yet to be invented as far aswe know, science fiction authors usually attribute it to the future. Yetthere is always the possibility that somewhere, somehow, somewhen, it hasalready been put to use. A possibility which Sammy Merwin here considersin highly intriguing and human terms. Let's go back with Coulter....
Most men of middle age would welcomea chance to live their lives a secondtime. But Coulter did not.
It wasn't much of a bump.The shock absorbers of the liquid-smoothconvertible neutralized allbut a tiny percent of the jarringimpact before it could reach theimported English flannel seat ofCoulter's expensively-tailoredpants. But it was sufficient to jolthim out of his reverie, trebly inducedby a four-course luncheonwith cocktails and liqueur, thenostalgia of returning to a hometownunvisited in twenty years andthe fact that he was driving westwardinto an afternoon sun.
Coulter grunted mild resentmentat being thus disturbed.Then, as he quickly, incredulouslyscanned the road ahead and thecar whose wheel was gripped byhis gloved hands, he narrowed hiseyes and muttered to himself,"Wake up! For God's sake snapout of it!"
The road itself had changed.From a twin-laned ten-car highway,carefully graded and landscapedand clover-leafed, it hadbecome a single-laned three-carthoroughfare, paved with tar insteadof concrete and high-crownedalong its center. Heswung the wheel quickly to avoidrunning onto a dirt shoulderhardened with ice.
Its curves were no longergraded for high-speed cars butwere scarcely tilted at all, whenthey didn't slant the wrong way.Its crossings were blind, level andunprotected by traffic lights. Neatunattractive clusters of mass-builthouses interspersed with occasionalclumps of woodland hadbeen replaced with long stretchesof pine woods, only occasionallyrelieved by houses and barns ofobviously antique manufacture.Some of these looked disturbinglyfamiliar.
And the roadside signs—all atonce they were everywhere. Herea weathered but still-legible littleBurma-Shave series, a woodenHorlick's contented cow, Socony,That Good Gulf Gasoline, theblack cat-face bespeaking CatspawRubber Heels. Here werethe coal-black Gold Dust twins,Kelly Springfield's Lotta Milespeering through a large rubbertire, a cocked-hatted boniface advertisingNew York's PrinceGeorge Hotel, the sleepy Fisk Tireboy in his pajamas and carrying acandle.
And then a huge opened bookwith a quill pen stuck in an inkwellalongside. On the right-handpage it said, United States TiresAre Good Tires and on the left,You are 3½ miles from Lincolnville.In 1778 General O'Hara,leading a British raiding party inland,was ambushed on this spotby Colonel Amos Coulter and hismilitia and forced to retreat withheavy loss.
Slowing down because the high-crownedroad was slippery withsun-melted ice, Coulter noted thatthe steering wheel respondedheavily. Then he saw suddenlythat it was smaller than he'd rememberedand made of blackrubber instead of the almond-huedplastic of his new convertible.And his light costly fabricgloves had become black leather,lined with fur!
A gong rang in his memory. Hehad driven this road many timesin years gone by, he had knownall these signs as quasi-landmarks,he had worn such gloves onewinter. There had been a littletriangular tear in the heel of theleft one, where he had snagged iton a nail sticking out of the garagewall. But that had been manyyears ago....
He looked