Raphael Rick - Make Mine Homogenized.pdf - Raphael Rick - allforjesus2001

Make Mine Homogenized

Rick, Raphael

Published: 1960

Type(s): Short Fiction, Science Fiction

Source: http://gutenberg.org

Also available on Feedbooks for Rick:

• Code Three (1963)

• A Filbert Is a Nut (1959)

check the copyright status in your country.

Note: This book is brought to you by Feedbooks.

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Anyone looking for guaranteed sound science will have to look else-

where. But if it's fun you want … try the world's most potent eggnog!

"Shoo," Hetty Thompson cried, waving her battered old felt hat at the

clucking cluster of hens eddying around her legs as she plowed through

the flock towards the chicken house. "Scat. You, Solomon," she called

out, directing her words at the bobbing comb of the big rooster strutting

at the edge of the mob. "Don't just stand there like a satisfied cowhand

after a night in Reno. Get these noisy females outta my way." She batted

at the hens and they scattered with angry squawks of protest.

Hetty paused in the doorway of the chicken house to allow her eyes to

become accustomed to the cool gloom after the bright glare of the ranch

yard. She could feel the first trickles of sweat forming under the man's

shirt she was wearing as the hot, early morning Nevada sun beat down

on her back in the doorway.

Moving carefully but quickly through the nests, she reached and

groped for the eggs she knew would be found in the scattered straw. As

she placed each find carefully in the bucket she carried, her lips moved

in a soundless count. When she had finished, she straightened up and

left the chicken house, her face reflecting minor irritation.

Again the hens swirled about her, hoping for the handfuls of cracked

corn she usually tossed to them. On the other side of the yard Solomon

stepped majestically along the edge of the vegetable garden, never cross-

ing the hoed line separating garden from yard.

"You'd better stay over there, you no-account Lothario," Hetty

growled. "Five eggs short this morning and all you do is act like you

were just the business agent for this bunch of fugitives from a dumpling

pot." Solomon cocked his head and stared Hetty down. She paused at the

foot of the backporch steps and threw the rooster a final remark. "You

don't do any better than this you're liable to wind up in that pot your-

self." Solomon gave a scornful cluck. "Better still, I'll get me a young

rooster in here and take over your job." Solomon let out a squawk and

took out at a dead run, herding three hens before him towards the chick-

en house.

With a satisfied smile of triumph, Hetty climbed the steps and crossed

to the kitchen door. She turned and looked back across the yard towards

the barn and corrals.

"Barneeeeey," Hetty yelled. "Ain't you finished with that milking yet?"

"Comin' now, Miz Thompson," came the reply from the barn. Hetty let

the screen door slam behind her as she walked into the kitchen and

placed the bucket of eggs on the big work table. She had her arm up to

wipe her moist forehead on the sleeve of her shirt when she spotted the

golden egg lying in the middle of the others in the galvanized bucket.

She froze in the arm-lifted position for several seconds, staring at the

dully glowing egg. Then she slowly reached out and picked it up. It was

slightly heavier than a regular egg, but for the dull, gold-bronze metallic

appearance of the shell, looked just like any of the other twenty-odd eggs

in the bucket. She was still holding it in the palm of her hand when the

kitchen door again slammed and the handy man limped into the room.

He carried two pails of milk across the kitchen and set them down near

the sink.

"Whatcha lookin' at, Miz Thompson?" Barney Hatfield asked.

Hetty frowned at the egg in her hand without answering. Barney

limped around the side of the table for a closer look. Sunlight streaming

through the kitchen windows glinted on the shell of the odd egg.

Barney's eyes grew round. "Now ain't that something," he whispered in

awe.

Hetty started as though someone had snapped their fingers in front of

her staring eyes. Her normal look of practical dubiousness returned.

"Huh," she snorted. "Even had me fooled for a second. Something

wrong with this egg but it sure is shootin' ain't gold. One of them fool

hens must of been pecking in the fertilizer storeroom and got herself an

overdose of some of them minerals in that stuff.

"What are you staring at, you old fool," she glared at Barney. "It ain't

gold." Hetty laid the egg at one side of the table. She walked to the sink

and took a clean, two-gallon milk can from the drainboard and set it in

the sink to fill it from the pails of rich, frothy milk Barney had brought in

the pails.

"Sally come fresh this morning, Miz Thompson," he said. "Got herself a

real fine little bull calf."

Hetty looked at the two pails of milk. "Well, where's the rest of the

milk, then?"

"That's Queenie's milk," Barney said. "Sally's is still out on the porch."

"Well bring it in before the sun clabbers it."

"Can't," Barney said.

Hetty swung around and glared at him. "What do you mean, you

can't? You suddenly come down with the glanders?"

"No'm, it's just that Sally's milk ain't no good," he replied.

A frown spread over Hetty's face as she hoisted one of the milk pails

and began pouring into the can in the sink. "What's wrong with it, Bar-

ney? Sally seem sick or something?" she asked.

Barney scratched his head. "I don't rightly know, Miz Thompson. That

milk looks all right, or at least, almost all right. It's kinda thin and don't

have no foam like you'd expect milk to have. But mostly, it sure don't

smell right and it danged well don't taste right.

" Phooey. " He made a face at the memory of the taste. "I stuck my finger

in it when it looked kinda queer, and took a taste. It shore tasted lousy."

"You probably been currying that mangey old horse of yours before

you went to milking," Hetty snorted, "and tasted his cancerous old hide

on your fingers. I've told you for the last time to wash your hands before

you go to milking them cows. I didn't pay no eighteen hundred dollars

for that prize, registered Guernsey just to have you give her bag fever

with your dirty hands."

"That ain't so, Miz Thompson," Barney cried indignantly. "I did too,

wash my hands. Good, too. I wuzn't near my horse this morning. That

milk just weren't no good."

Hetty finished pouring the milk into the cans and after putting the

cans in the refrigerator, wiped her hands on her jeans and went out onto

the porch, Barney trailing behind her. She bent over and sniffed at the

two milk pails setting beside the door. " Whew ," she exclaimed, "it sure

does smell funny. Hand me that dipper, Barney."

Barney reached for a dipper hanging on a nail beside the kitchen door.

Hetty dipped out a small quantity of the milk, sipped, straightened up

with a jerk and spewed the milk out into the yard. "Yaawwwk," she

spluttered, "that tastes worse 'n Diesel oil."

She stirred distastefully at the swirling, flat-looking liquid in the pails

and then turned back to the kitchen. "I never saw the like of it," she ex-

claimed. "Chickens come out with some kind of sorry-looking egg and

now, in the same morning, an eighteen hundred dollar registered, fresh

Guernsey gives out hogwash instead of milk." She stared thoughtfully

across the yard at the distant mountains, now shimmering in the hot,

midmorning sun. "Guess we could swill the hogs with that milk, rather'n

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