A Zloor for Your Trouble!

Lost Sci-Fi Short Stories from the 40s, 50s and 60s

By: Mack Reynolds

Narrated by: Scott Miller

Prescott stood to make a young fortune if he could capture a Martian zloor - dead or alive! Was there a catch to it? Only for the hunter!

"Keep my size out of it," I snapped. I indicated with a thumb a little statuette on my desk. "The guy my mother named me after was pint-size too. He got along all right."

He looked over at Bonaparte. "Ummm," he said. "Napoleon was a big name once - but he's only a bust now."

"Listen, you're asking for a bust yourself. Why don't you run along? I'm busy."

He ignored me, found a chair that had nothing but a few magazines on it, tossed them to the floor, and sat down. "Your name was brought up because you're the smallest professional hunter on Earth. It'd save a few thousand credits in getting you to Mars and back."

"What in kert are you talking about?" I growled.

"The government wants a specimen, at least one, of a zloor."

"A what?"

"A zloor. A small Martian animal."

I scowled at him. "And just why does the government want a zloor?"

"That's a secret."

"Okay. I'll tell you another secret. Somebody else can catch the government a zloor. I've never been off Earth and I haven't any particular hankering to go now."

"I doubt you could have got one anyway."

I said easily, "If anyone else could catch it, I could."

He reached for the doorknob, "I'd lay a thousand credits against that," he said. He began to leave.

"Wait a minute, buddy. Are you just sounding off or have you got a thousand credits you don't care what happens to?"

He turned and faced me. "I am willing to wager a thousand credits that you can't capture a zloor."

"How big are they?"

"About the size of a rabbit."

I glowered at him. "They very fast, or very poisonous, or what?"

He shrugged. "They can't run quite as fast as a common Terran hare, and I understand they're quite gentle."

"Then why haven't they been captured?"

©2021 Scott Miller (P)2021 Scott Miller

good old SF

entertaining. in the tradition of early SF. humorous and sly. what more can you say.