Murray Leinster's "The Fourth-Dimensional Demonstrator" (short story, time travel, humor, free): The ultimate material replication machine!

Title of this amusing story refers to a gadget that "demonstrates the fourth dimension" - or rather, that it's possible to travel along the fourth dimension, time, the way we can travel along the 3 spatial dimensions. But the application of time travel is ingenious.

Take a currency note. Put it on the platform of the machine. Press a button. After the lapse of a few seconds, you still have your note. Plus a copy of this same note that was when the button was pressed! Copy of the note from past has been pulled to now - so you now have two notes!

There is much fun with replication of notes, gold, pet kangaroos, girl friends, cops, ...

Protagonist is Pete Davidson, who inherited the machine from his inventor uncle Robert who'd made it & is now dead. He is indignant that uncle left the useless contraption instead of money, until the possibilities of contraption start emerging.

Collected in.

1. Murray Leinster's collection "A Logic Names Joe", ed Eric Flint.
2. "The Best of Murray Leinster", ed J J Pierce.

Fact sheet.

First published: Astounding, December 1935.
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Rating: A
Related: All stories of Murray Leinster.