Alas, Babylon

by Pat Frank

Ben Franklin drank a quart of milk a day and Peyton, his eleven-year-old sister, even more. He telephoned Golden Dew Dairy and revised his delivery order drastically upward. This was Randy’s first act to meet the emergency, and it was to prove the least useful.

It must have been pretty wonderful to have lived in the years, say, between 1870 and 1914, when

They killed my dog. She was a black poodle, Randy. Her name was Poupée Vivant. That means Livin’ Doll in French.