Has anyone read "Thunder in the Morning" from Ray's book "Driving Blind?" That story creeped me out for some reason. The story is about a guy who cleans the streets of his town using a street cleaner machine. The street cleaner guy was just doing his job one day/evening and he sees this rat run across the road. So he intentionally sucks up the rat with his machine. Then the rat starts talking to him. It seems to transigure into something bigger (possibly a human) and speaks. It is like the rat is an "animagus", just like Wormtail from the Harry Potter books. The rat changes into a human form and starts talking to the street cleaner guy. The guy starts asking the rat/creature/person questions and for some reason the rat/creature/person starts to lie to the street cleaner. Then the rat/creature/person starts to offer a bribe to the guy to let him out. The guy almost lets the rat/person/creature out, but then he thinks better of it. I imagined that if he let the rat/creature/person out, it might attack and kill him. Eventually the rat/person/creature dies inside the machine in rat form. Wouldn't that be totally creepy if that happened to you? Then the guy sees some kid carrying the dead rat the next morning. Yes, it was a wierd story, but I totally liked it! Plus, the more I thought about it, then I realized the animagus and Wormtail connection to Harry Potter. So do you think that was a new or old Bradbury story? Any other comments about it?

Although that story was first published in 1997 (in Driving Blind), it was written c.1947.

Thanks philnic,

I figured that story was old. It seems like the setting is Greentown and it reminds me of Dandelion Wine or Something Wicket This Way Comes. Anyone have comments about the rat creature that got sucked up by the machine? What was it? Was the rat just desperate to get out? Was the rat going to hurt the street cleaner guy? As always, best wishes.

I should have figured it as old as the subject matter is more from when he was writing Weird Tales.

Blind Henry

Something Wicket This Way Comes

wOw!
THIS must be it:

(just in case someone is wondering whattaheck that thing is...it is supposed to be a Star Wars wicket.)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Nard Kordell,

18_2.JPG.jpg (5 Kb, 10 downloads)

Or an alternate title for Stephen King's "The Shining," as the weapon of choice was from roque, which is played with wickets: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roque

It is foolish to expect perfect typing from "Blind" Henry. Cut me some slack on my typo, I'm blind afterall! I guess nobody has read the story, or else just thinks it was some rat. The more I think about it, the more I want to know what the creature was and what sort of intentions it might have had.

Nard, I think Ewoks are too big to fit into the street cleaner machine! Besides, everybody knows that Ewoks speak some form of forgotten language from SE Asia, they don't speak English.

Getting back to the story...the voice, the shape, and the size of the creature changes while it's inside the street cleaning machine. Humm, I'm guessing it was a person that could somehow change shape into a rat. At one point the rat/creature/person states that he's naked and wants the street cleaner guy to open up the machine so the guy can let him out and take a look at him. It even seems to offer some sort of sex to him if the guy lets him out.

It is a bizarre and disturbing story to me.

Boy, Blind Henry, you've got my curiosity up as I don't remember the story myself. I will give you my impression as soon as I re-read the story.

I put that in the "real or unreal" classification category. Was a real entity speaking to him from inside the machine, or some part of his own subconscious asking to be "let out" which he refused to let have full play?

Dandelion,

I guess one spin on the story is that the street cleaner guy is just going mental or he's on drugs and imagines the rat is talking to him. It seems to me like the rat physically changes form and becomes larger and bangs on the street cleaner machine lid and the rat's voice changes too. So I believe the rat is some form of entity that can change shape between rat and human. The creature also doesn't want to tell the street cleaner that he can transform for some reason and I find that really interesting. Again, I wonder what the creature's intentions would have been had it been released? Would if have run away as a rat? Would it have emerged as a human? Would it have been some totally bizarre half rat/half human creature? Would it have been naked? Would it have been violent? It is an odd story to me. Then add the element of it trying to bribe the guy by offering sex, money, and seeing it naked adds another element of creepyness.

If I were there I would have hit the creature with my cane. (Blind Henry)