ONE MILLION FOUR HUNDRED NINETY TWO THOUSAND SIX HUNDRED THIRTY THREE MARLON BRANDOS

BY VANCE AANDAHL

She liked the Brando type. The more there was of it, the better!

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Worlds of If Science Fiction, September 1962. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

Chester McRae. Good old Chet, best man in Accounting. Six feet tall, brown hair, brown eyes. Full of vim and vigor, that was good old Chet.

"God!" he screamed. "They're strangling me, the skunks!" He rose from bed, his face dripping with sweat and his hands trembling like a frightened child's. "They're killing me!" He ran to the bathroom and vomited. His wife was standing by the door when he finished, but he walked past her as if she didn't exist.

"Why, Chester! What's the matter with you?" she asked, trailing him into the bedroom. "I've never heard you talk like that before!" For a moment she stood watching him in numb silence. "For goodness' sake, Chester, why are you getting dressed at three o'clock in the morning?"

"None of your business," he mumbled, setting a firm upper lip and gazing at her with lizard-cold Marlon Brando eyes. He picked up his tie, laughed at it with careless ease and threw it across the room. "See you around, baby," he hissed, zipping up his trousers and walking past her.

"Chester McRae! Where are you going at this time of night? You've got to go to work tomorrow! Don't you love me any more? Chester...."

But her words echoed emptily through Chester McRae's pleasant little suburban home. Chester was no longer present.

Bartholomew Oliver. Good old Barth, best man on a duck hunt since the guy who invented shotguns. Five foot ten, weak chin, gambler's mustache. Good man with small-town girls, too.

"Hey, Thelma," he said. "You know what I think?"

"Go to sleep."

"I think it'd be funnier than hell if I left you flat."

"What kind of wisecrack is that? And what do you think you're doing?"

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