The Project Gutenberg eBook, Alarm Clock, by Everett B. Cole, Illustrated
by Van Dongen

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Title: Alarm Clock

Author: Everett B. Cole

Release Date: January 6, 2008 [eBook #24180]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

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Transcriber's note:

This e-text was produced from _Astounding Science Fiction_,
September, 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any
evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was
renewed.

ALARM CLOCK

by

EVERETT B. COLE

Illustrated by Van Dongen

_Most useful high explosives, like ammonium nitrate, are
enormously violent ... once they're triggered. But they will
remain seemingly inert when beaten, burned, variously
punished--until the particular shock required comes
along...._

Many years had passed since the original country rock had been broken,
cut and set, to form solid pavement for the courtyard at Opertal
Prison. And over those years the stones had suffered change as
countless feet, scuffing and pressing against once rough edges, had
smoothed the bits of rock, burnishing their surfaces until the light
of the setting sun now reflected from them as from polished mosaic.

As Stan Graham crossed the wide expanse from library to cell block,
his shoe soles added their small bit to the perfection of the age-old
polish.

He looked up at the building ahead of him, noting the coarse,
weathered stone of the walls. The severe, vertical lines of the mass
reminded him of Kendall Hall, back at the Stellar Guard Academy. He
smiled wryly.

There were, he told himself, differences. People rarely left this