Imaginative Tales #5

About this issue

Robert Bloch's "The Miracle of Ronald Weems" is a humorous science-fiction story set in a department store. Ronald Weems, a timid, sheltered assistant buyer in Ladies' Lingerie at Lacey's Department Store, has spent five years bored with his work and his repressed life governed by rigid propriety instilled by his deceased maiden aunts. He harbors unexpressed romantic feelings for Amy Cooper, a toy department clerk. While navigating the absurdities of retail life—including his boss Quentin Bickerstaff's obsession with moving overstocked brassieres—Ronald encounters a precocious child examining a chemistry set imported from Germany. The story employs deadpan comedy through department store detail and social satire about conformity and emotional repression. The narrative voice frequently breaks character to comment on Ronald's predicament, though the OCR text becomes fragmented toward the conclusion.