There Will Be School Tomorrow Read online

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  _You will possibly shudder, but you will certainly remember for a long time, this story of what happens when Tomorrow's gently implacable teachers are faced with a problem for which there seems to be only one solution...._

  there will be school tomorrow

  _by ... V. E. Thiessen_

  There is a quiet horror to this story from Tomorrow....

  Evening had begun to fall. In the cities the clamor softened along thestreets, and the women made small, comfortable, rattling noises in thekitchens. Out in the country the cicadas started their singing, and thecool smell began to rise out of the earth. But everywhere, in the citiesand in the country, the children were late from school.

  There were a few calls, but the robotic telephone devices at the schoolsgave back the standard answer: "The schools are closed for the day. Ifyou will leave a message it will be recorded for tomorrow."

  The telephones between houses began to ring. "Is Johnny home from schoolyet?"

  "No. Is Jane?"

  "Not yet. I wonder what can be keeping them?"

  "Something new, I guess. Oh, well, the roboteachers know best. They willbe home soon."

  "Yes, of course. It's foolish to worry."

  The children did not come.

  After a time a few cars were driven to the schools. They were met by therobots. The worried parents were escorted inside. But the children didnot come home.

  And then, just as alarm was beginning to stir all over the land, therobots came walking, all of the robots from the grade schools, and thehigh schools, and the colleges. All of the school system walking, withthe roboteachers saying, "Let us go into the house where you can sitdown." All over the streets of the cities and the walks in the countrythe robots were entering houses.

  "What's happened to my children?"

  "If you will go inside and sit down--"

  "What's happened to my children? Tell me now!"

  "If you will go inside and sit down--"

  Steel and electrons and wires and robotic brains were inflexible. Howcan you force steel to speak? All over the land the people went insideand sat nervously waiting an explanation.

  There was no one out on the streets. From inside the houses came thesound of surprise and agony. After a time there was silence. The robotscame out of the houses and went walking back to the schools. In thecities and in the country there was the strange and sudden silence oftragedy.

  The children did not come home.

  * * * * *

  The morning before the robots walked, Johnny Malone, the Mayor's son,bounced out of bed with a burst of energy. Skinning out of his pajamasand into a pair of trousers, he hurried, barefooted, into his mother'sbedroom. She was sleeping soundly, and he touched one shoulderhesitantly.

  "Mother!"

  The sleeping figure stirred. His mother's face, still faintly shiny withhormone cream, turned toward him. She opened her eyes. Her voice wasirritated.

  "What is it, Johnny?"

  "Today's the day, mommy. Remember?"

  "The day?" Eyebrows raised.

  "The new school opens. Now we'll have roboteachers like everyone else.Will you fix my breakfast, mother?"

  "Amelia will fix you something."

  "Aw, mother. Amelia's just a robot. This is a special day. And I want mydaddy to help me with my arithmetic before I go. I don't want theroboteacher to think I'm dumb."

  His mother frowned in deepening irritation. "Now, there's no reason whyAmelia can't get your breakfast like she always does. And I doubt if itwould be wise to wake your father. You know he likes to sleep in themorning. Now, you go on out of here and let me sleep."

  Johnny Malone turned away, fighting himself for a moment, for he knew hewas too big to cry. He walked more slowly now and entered his father'sroom. He had to shake his father to awaken him.

  "Daddy! Wake up, daddy!"

  "What in the devil? Oh, Johnny." His father's eyes were sleepily bleak."What in thunder do you want?"

  "Today's the first day of roboteachers. I can't work my arithmetic.Will you help me before I go to school?"

  His father stared at him in amazement. "Just what in the devil do youthink roboteachers are for? They're supposed to teach you. If you knewarithmetic we wouldn't need roboteachers."

  "But the roboteachers may be angry if I don't have my lesson."

  Johnny Malone's father turned on one elbow. "Listen, son," he said. "Ifthose roboteachers give you any trouble you just tell them you're theMayor's son. See. Now get the devil out of here. What's her name--thatservorobot--Amelia will get your breakfast and get you off to school.Now suppose you beat it out of here and let me go back to sleep."

  "Yes, Sir." Eyes smarting, Johnny Malone went down the stairs to thekitchen. It wasn't that his parents were different. All the kids werefed and sent to school by robots. It was just that--well today seemedsort of special. Downstairs Amelia, the roboservant, placed hot cerealon the table before him. After he had forced a few bites past thetightness in his throat, Amelia checked the temperature and his clothingand let him out the door. The newest school was only a few blocks fromhis home, and Johnny could walk to school.

  * * * * *

  The newest school stood on the edge of this large, middlewestern city.Off to the back of the school were the towers of the town, greatmonolithic skyscrapers of pre-stressed concrete and plastic. To thefront of the school the plains stretched out to meet a cloudy horizon.

  A helio car swung down in front of the school. Two men and a woman gotout.

  "This is it, Senator." Doctor Wilson, the speaker, was with thegovernment bureau of schools. He lifted his arm and gestured, a lean,tweed-suited man.

  The second man, addressed as Senator, was bulkier, grey suited andpompous. He turned to the woman with professional deference.

  "This is the last one, my dear. This is what Doctor Wilson calls thegreatest milestone in man's education."

  "With the establishing of this school the last human teacher is gone.Gone are all the human weaknesses, the temper fits of teachers, theirignorance and prejudices. The roboteachers are without flaw."

  The woman lifted a lorgnette to her eyes. "_Haow_ interesting. But afterall, we've had roboteachers for years, haven't we--or have we--?" Shemade a vague gesture toward the school, and looked at the brown-suitedman.

  "Yes, of course. Years ago your women's clubs fought againstroboteachers. That was before they were proven."

  "I seem to recall something of that. Oh well, it doesn't matter." Thelorgnette gestured idly.

  "Shall we go in?" the lean man urged.

  The woman hesitated. Senator said tactfully, "After all, Doctor Wilsonwould like you to see his project."

  The brown-suited man nodded. His face took on a sharp intensity. "We'remaking a great mistake. No one is interested in educating the childrenany more. They leave it to the robots. And they neglect the children'straining at home."

  The woman turned toward him with surprise in her eyes. "But really,aren't the robots the best teachers?"

  "Of course they are. But confound it, we ought to be interested in whatthey teach and how they teach. What's happened to the old PTA? What'shappened to parental discipline, what's happened to--"

  He stopped suddenly and smiled, a rueful tired smile. "I suppose I'm afanatic on this. Come on inside."

  They passed through an antiseptic corridor built from dull greenplastic. The brown-suited man pressed a button outside one of theclassrooms. A door slid noiselessly into the hall. A robot stood beforethem, gesturing gently. Th
ey followed the robot into the classroom. Atthe head of the classroom another robot was lecturing. There weredrawings on a sort of plastic blackboard. There were wire models on thedesk in front of the robot. They listened for a moment, and for a momentit seemed that the woman could be intrigued in spite of herself.

  "Mathematics," Doctor Wilson murmured in her ear. "Euclidean Geometryand Aristotelean reasoning. We start them young on these old schools ofthought, then use Aristotle and Euclid as a point of departure for ourintermediate classes in mathematics and logic."

  "REAHLLY!" The lorgnette studied Doctor Wilson. "You mean there areseveral kinds of geometry?"

  Doctor Wilson nodded. A