Transcriber's Note:

This etext was produced from Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy January 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

THE DICTATOR

 By

 Milton Lesser

Ellaby's society was a perfect democracy, where all men were equal. But some still wanted more personal attention, and they got it, like—

ust looking at Ellaby, you could tell he was going places. He was five feet nine inches tall and weighed a hundred and fifty pounds. He had an I. Q. of ninety-eight point five-seven, less than four hundredths off the mode. His hair was mousey and worn slightly long for a man, slightly short for a woman. Back in High Falls, where he was born, he was physically weaker than sixty percent of the men but stronger than sixty percent of the women.

He had been in training since his twentieth birthday to assassinate the Dictator. Ellaby was now thirty years old.

Dorcas Sinclair met Ellaby at the pneumo-station. She was too big and strapping for a woman, but otherwise not unattractive with her lusterless hair, slightly thick-featured face, small sagging bosom and heavy-calved legs.

"I'll take your bags," she told Ellaby, and led him from the station. She walked quickly, but not too quickly. You always had to find the happy medium, thought Ellaby. For Ellaby, finding the happy medium had always come easy. Ten years ago, when Ellaby had been graduated from the High Falls secondary school, the four words MOST LIKELY TO SUCCEED had been printed under his picture in the yearbook. It was expected by everyone: young Ellaby had learned his three R's—rules, rights, responsibilities—satisfactorily. Ellaby had neither excelled nor failed: he was by nature a first class citizen.

Running to keep up with the too big, too long-legged Dorcas Sinclair who was carrying one of his suitcases in each hand, Ellaby was led from the pneumo-station. The splendid, unimaginative geometric precision of the Capitol stretched out before him in the dazzling summer sunlight, the view serving as a leaven for Ellaby's usually 

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