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diff --git a/old/52228-0.txt b/old/52228-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 1d75256..0000000 --- a/old/52228-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7152 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Search the Sky, by Frederik Pohl and -C. M. Kornbluth - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Search the Sky - -Author: Frederik Pohl - C. M. Kornbluth - -Release Date: June 3, 2016 [EBook #52228] -Last Updated: July 24, 2023 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEARCH THE SKY *** - - - - - By Frederik Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth - - - _THE SPACE MERCHANTS_ - _SEARCH THE SKY_ - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - SEARCH THE - SKY - - - - - by - Frederik Pohl - and - C. M. Kornbluth - - - - - BALLANTINE BOOKS · NEW YORK - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - COPYRIGHT, 1954, BY - FREDERIK POHL AND C. M. KORNBLUTH - LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUE CARD NO. 54-6478 - PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - - - BALLANTINE BOOKS, INC. - 404 Fifth Avenue, New York 18, N. Y. - - ------------------------------------ - - TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE - - - Extensive research did not uncover - any evidence that the U.S. copyright - on this publication was renewed. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - SEARCH THE - SKY - - - - -..... 1 - - -DECAY. - -Ross stood on the traders’ ramp, overlooking the Yards, and the word -kept bobbing to the top of his mind. - -Decay. - -About all of Halsey’s Planet there was the imperceptible reek of decay. -The clean, big, bustling, efficient spaceport only made the sensation -stronger. From where he stood on the height of the Ramp, he could see -the Yards, the spires of Halsey City ten kilometers away—and the -tumble-down gray acres of Ghost Town between. - -Ross wrinkled his nose. He wasn’t a man given to brooding, but the scent -of decay had saturated his nostrils that morning. He had tossed and -turned all the night, wrestling with a decision. And he had got up -early, so early that the only thing that made sense was to walk to work. - -And that meant walking through Ghost Town. He hadn’t done that in a long -time, not since childhood. Ghost Town was a wonderful place to play. -“Tag,” “Follow My Fuehrer,” “Senators and President”—all the ancient -games took on new life when you could dodge and turn among crumbling -ruins, dart down unmarked lanes, gallop through sagging shacks where you -might stir out a screeching, unexpected recluse. - -But it was clear that—in the fifteen years between childhood games and a -troubled man’s walk to work—Ghost Town had grown. - -Everybody knew that! Ask the right specialists, and they’d tell you how -much and how fast. An acre a year, a street a month, a block a week, the -specialists would twinkle at you, convinced that the acre, street, block -was under control, since they could measure it. - -Ask the right specialists and they would tell you why it was happening. -One answer per specialist, with an ironclad guarantee that there would -be no overlapping of replies. “A purely psychological phenomenon, Mr. -Ross. A vibration of the pendulum toward greater municipal compactness, -a huddling, a mature recognition of the facts of interdependence, -basically a step forward....” - -“A purely biological phenomenon, Mr. Ross. Falling birth rate due to -biochemical deficiency of trace elements processed out of our planetary -diet. Fortunately the situation has been recognized in time and my bill -before the Chamber will provide....” - -“A purely technological problem, Mr. Ross. Maintenance of a sprawling -city is inevitably less efficient than that of a compact unit. -Inevitably there has been a drift back to the central areas and the -convenience of air-conditioned walkways, winterized plazas....” - -Yes. It was a purely psychological-biological-technological- -educational-demographic problem, and it was basically a step forward. - -Ross wondered how many Ghost Towns lay corpselike on the surface of -Halsey’s Planet. Decay, he thought. Decay. - -But it had nothing to do with his problem, the problem that had kept him -awake all the night, the problem that blighted the view before him now. - -The trading bell clanged. The day’s work began. - -For Ross it might be his last day’s work at the Yards. - - * * * * * - -He walked slowly from the ramp to the offices of the Oldham Trading -Corporation. “Morning, Ross boy,” his breezy young boss greeted him. -Charles Oldham IV’s father had always taken a paternal attitude toward -his help, and Charles Oldham IV was not going to change anything that -Daddy had done. He shook Ross’s hand at the door of the suite and -apologized because they hadn’t been able to find a new secretary for him -yet. They’d been looking for two weeks, but the three applicants they -had been able to dredge up had all been hopeless. “It’s the damn -Chamber,” said Charles Oldham IV, winsomely gesturing with his hands to -show how helpless men of affairs were against the blundering -interference of Government. “Damn labor shortage is nothing but a damn -artificial scarcity crisis. Daddy saw it; he knew it was coming.” - -Ross almost told him he was quitting, but held back. Maybe it was -because he didn’t want to spoil Oldham’s day with bad news, right on top -of the opening bell. Or maybe it was because, in spite of a sleepless -night, he still wasn’t quite sure. - -The morning’s work helped him to become sure. It was the same monotonous -grind. - -Three freighters had arrived at dawn from Halsey’s third moon, but none -of them was any affair of his. There was an export shipment of jewelry -and watches to be attended to, but the ship was not to take off for -another week. It scarcely classified as urgent. Ross worked on the -manifests for a couple of hours, stared through his window for an hour, -and then it was time for lunch. - -Little Marconi hailed him as he passed through the traders’ lounge. - -Of all the juniors on the Exchange, Marconi was the one Ross found -easiest to take. He was lean and dark where Ross was solid and fair; -worse, he stood four ranks above Ross in seniority. But, since Ross -worked for Oldham, and Marconi worked for Haarland’s, the difference -could be waived in social intercourse. - -Ross suspected that, to Marconi as to him, trading was only a job—a dull -one, and not a crusade. And he knew that Marconi’s reading was not -confined to bills of lading. “Lunch?” asked Marconi. “Sure,” Ross said. -And he knew he’d probably spill his secret to the little man from -Haarland’s. - -The skyroom was crowded—comparatively. All eight of the usual tables -were taken; they pushed on into the roped-off area by the windows and -found a table overlooking the Yards. Marconi blew dust off his chair. -“Been a long time since this was used,” he grumbled. “Drink?” He raised -his eyebrows when Ross nodded. It made a break; Marconi was the one -usually who had a drink with lunch, Ross never touched it. - -When the drinks came, each of them said to the other in perfect -synchronism: “I’ve got something to tell you.” - -They looked startled—then laughed. “Go ahead,” said Ross. - -The little man didn’t even argue. Rapturously he drew a photo out of his -pocket. - -God, thought Ross wearily, Lurline again! He studied the picture with a -show of interest. “New snap?” he asked brightly. “Lovely girl——” Then he -noticed the inscription: _To my fiance, with crates of love._ “Well!” he -said, “Fiance, is it? Congratulations, Marconi!” - -Marconi was almost drooling on the photo. “Next month,” he said happily. -“A big, big wedding. For keeps, Ross—for keeps. With children!” - -Ross made an expression of polite surprise. “You don’t say!” he said. - -“It’s all down in black and white! She agrees to have two children in -the first five years—no permissive clause, a straight guarantee. Fifteen -hundred annual allowance per child. And, Ross, do you know what? Her -lawyer told her right in front of me that she ought to ask for three -thousand, and she told him, ‘No, Mr. Turek. I happen to be in love.’ How -do you like that, Ross?” - -“A girl in a million,” Ross said feebly. His private thoughts were that -Marconi had been gaffed and netted like a sugar perch. Lurline was of -the Old Landowners, who didn’t own anything much but land these days, -and Marconi was an undersized nobody who happened to make a very good -living. Sure she happened to be in love. Smartest thing she could be. Of -course, promising to have children sounded pretty special; but the -papers were full of those things every day. Marconi could reliably be -counted on to hang himself. He’d promise her breakfast in bed every -third week end, or the maid that he couldn’t possibly find on the labor -market, and the courts would throw all the promises on both sides out of -the contract as a matter of simple equity. But the marriage would stick, -all right. - -Marconi had himself a final moist, fatuous sigh and returned the photo -to his pocket. “And now,” he asked brightly, craning his neck for the -waiter, “what’s your news?” - -Ross sipped his drink, staring out at the nuzzling freighters in their -hemispherical slips. He said abruptly, “I might be on one of those next -week. Fallon’s got a purser’s berth open.” - -Marconi forgot the waiter and gaped. “Quitting?” - -“I’ve got to do something!” Ross exploded. His own voice scared him; -there was a knife blade of hysteria in the sound of it. He gripped the -edge of the table and forced himself to be calm and deliberate. - -Marconi said tardily, “Easy, Ross.” - -“Easy! You’ve said it, Marconi: ‘Easy.’ Everything’s so damned easy and -so damned boring that I’m just about ready to blow! I’ve got to do -something,” he repeated. “I’m getting nowhere! I push papers around and -then I push them back again. You know what happens next. You get soft -and paunchy. You find yourself going by the book instead of by your -head. You’re covered, if you go by the book—no matter what happens. And -you might just as well be dead!” - -“Now, Ross——” - -“Now, hell!” Ross flared. “Marconi, I swear I think there’s something -wrong with me! Look, take Ghost Town for instance. Ever wonder why -nobody lives there, except a couple of crazy old hermits?” - -“Why, it’s Ghost Town,” Marconi explained. “It’s deserted.” - -“And why is it deserted? What happened to the people who used to live -there?” - -Marconi shook his head. “You need a vacation, son,” he said -sympathetically. “That was a long time ago. Hundreds of years, maybe.” - -“But where did the people go?” Ross persisted desperately. “All of the -city was inhabited hundreds of years ago—the city was twice as big as it -is now. How come?” - -Marconi shrugged. “Dunno.” - -Ross collapsed. “Don’t know. You don’t know, I don’t know, nobody knows. -Only thing is, I care! I’m curious. Marconi, I get—well, moody. -Depressed. I get to worrying about crazy things. Ghost Town, for one. -And why can’t they find a secretary for me? And am I really different -from everybody else or do I just think so—and doesn’t that mean that I’m -insane?” - -He laughed. Marconi said warmly, “Ross, you aren’t the only one; don’t -ever think you are. I went through it myself. Found the answer, too. You -wait, Ross.” - -He paused. Ross said suspiciously, “Yeah?” - -Marconi tapped the breast pocket with the photo of Lurline. “She’ll come -along,” he said. - -Ross managed not to sneer in his face. “No,” he said wearily. “Look, I -don’t advertise it, but I was married once. I was eighteen, it lasted -for a year and I’m the one who walked out. Flat-fee settlement; it took -me five years to pay off the loan, but I never regretted it.” - -Marconi began gravely, “Sexual incompatibility——” - -Ross cut him off with an impatient gesture. “In that department,” he -said, “it so happens she was a genius. But——” - -“But?” - -Ross shrugged. “I must have been crazy,” he said shortly. “I kept -thinking that she was half-dead, dying on the vine like the rest of -Halsey’s Planet. And I must still be crazy, because I still think so.” - -The little man involuntarily felt his breast pocket. He said gently, -“Maybe you’ve been working too hard.” - -“Too hard!” Ross laughed, a curious blend of true humor and -self-disgust. “Well,” he admitted, “I need a change, anyhow. I might as -well be on a longliner. At least I’d have my spree to look back on.” - -“No!” Marconi said, so violently that Ross slopped the drink he was -lifting to his mouth. - -Ross looked hard at the little man—hard and speculatively. “No, then,” -he said. “It was just a figure of speech, of course. But tell me -something, won’t you, Marconi?” - -“Tell you what?” - -“Tell me why such a violent reaction to the word ‘longliner.’ I want to -know.” - -“Hell, Ross,” the little man grumbled, “you know what a longliner is. -Gutter-scrapings for crews; nothing for a man like you.” - -“I want to know more,” Ross insisted. “When I ask you what a longliner -is, what the crew do with themselves for two or three centuries, you -change the subject. You always change the subject! Maybe you know -something I don’t know. I want to know what it is, and this time the -subject doesn’t get changed. You don’t get off the hook until I find -out.” He took a sip of his drink and leaned back. “Tell me about -longliners,” he said. “I’ve never seen one coming in; it’s been fifteen -years or so since that bucket from Sirius IV, hasn’t it? But you were on -the job then.” - -Marconi was no longer a man in love or one of the few people whom Ross -considered to be wholly alive—like him. He was a hard-eyed little -stranger with a stubborn mouth and an ingratiating veneer. In short he -was again a trader, and a good one. - -“I’ll tell you anything I know,” Marconi declared positively, and -insincerely. “Tend to that fellow first though, will you?” He pointed to -a uniformed Yards messenger whose eye had just alighted on Ross. The man -threaded his way, stumbling, through the tables and laid a sealed -envelope down in the puddle left by Ross’s drink. - -“Sorry, sir,” he said crisply, wiped off the envelope with his -handkerchief and, for lagniappe, wiped the puddle off the table into -Ross’s lap. - -Speechless, Ross signed for the envelope on a red-tabbed slip marked -URGENT * PRIORITY * RUSH. The messenger saluted, almost putting his own -eye out, and left, crashing into tables and chairs. - -“Half-dead,” Ross muttered, following him with his eyes. “How the devil -do they stay alive at all?” - -Marconi said, unsmiling, “You’re taking this kick pretty seriously, -Ross. I admit he’s a little clumsy, but——” - -“But nothing,” said Ross. “Don’t try to tell me you don’t know -something’s wrong, Marconi! He’s a bumbling incompetent, and half his -generation is just like him.” He looked bitterly at the envelope and -dropped it on the table again. “More manifests,” he said. “I swear I’ll -start throwing tableware if I have to check another bill of lading. -Brighten my day, Marconi; tell me about the longliners. You’re not off -the hook yet, you know.” - -Marconi signaled for another drink. “All right,” he said. “Marconi tells -all about longliners. They’re ships. They go from the planet of one star -to the planet of another star. It takes a long time, because stars are -many light-years apart and rocket ships cannot travel as fast as light. -Einstein said so—whoever he was. Do we start with the Sirius IV ship? I -was around when it came in, all right. Fifteen years ago, and Halsey’s -Planet is still enjoying the benefits of it. And so is Leverett and Sons -Trading Corporation. They did fine on flowers from seeds that bucket -brought, they did fine on sugar perch from eggs that bucket brought. -I’ve never had it myself. Raw fish for dessert! But some people swear by -it—at five shields a portion. They can have it.” - -“The hook, Marconi,” Ross reminded grimly. - -Trader Marconi laughed amiably. “Sorry. Well, what else? Pictures and -music, but I’m not much on them. I do read, though, and as a reader I -say, God bless that bucket from Sirius IV. We never had a novelist like -Morris Halliday on this planet—or an essayist like Jay Waring. Let’s -see, there have been eight Halliday novels off the microfilms so far, -and I think Leverett still has a couple in the vaults. Leverett must -be——” - -“Marconi. I don’t want to hear about Leverett and Sons. Or Morris -Halliday, or Waring. I want to hear about longliners.” - -“I’m trying to tell you,” Marconi said sullenly, the mask down. - -“No, you’re not. You’re telling me that the longline ships go from one -stellar system to another with merchandise. I know that.” - -“Then what do you want?” - -“Don’t be difficult, Marconi. I want to know the facts. All about -longliners. The big hush-hush. The candid explanations that explain -nothing—except that a starship is a starship. I know that they’re -closed-system, multigeneration jobs; a group of people get in on Sirius -IV and their great-great-great-great-grandchildren come giggling and -stumbling out on Halsey’s Planet. I know that every couple of -generations your firm—and mine, for that matter—builds one with profits -that would be taxed off anyway and slings it out, stocked with seeds and -film and sound tape and patent designs and manufacturing specifications -for every new gimmick on the market, in the hope that it’ll be back long -after we’re dead with a similar cargo to enrich your firm’s and my -firm’s then-current owners. Sounds silly—but, as I say, it’s tax money -anyhow. I know that your firm and mine staff the ships with half a dozen -bums of each sex, who are loaded aboard with a dandy case of delirium -tremens, contracted from spending their bounty money the only way they -know how. And that’s just about all I know. Take it from there, Marconi. -And be specific.” - -The little man shrugged irritably. “That gag’s beginning to wear thin, -Ross,” he complained. “What do you want me to tell you—the number of -welds in Bulkhead 47 of ‘Starship 74’? What’s the difference? As you -said, a starship is a starship is a longliner. Without them the -inhabited solar systems would have no means of contact or commerce. What -else is there to say?” - -Ross looked suddenly lost. “I—don’t know,” he said. “Don’t you know, -Marconi?” - -Marconi hesitated, and for a moment Ross was sure he did know—knew -something, at any rate, something that might be an answer to the doubts -and nagging inconsistencies that were bothering him. But then Marconi -shrugged and looked at his watch and ordered another drink. - -But there was something wrong. Ross felt himself in the position of a -diagnostician whose patient willfully refuses to tell where it hurts. -The planet was sick—but wouldn’t admit it. Sick? Dying! Maybe he was on -the wrong track entirely. Maybe the starships had nothing to do with it. -Maybe there was nothing that Marconi knew that would fit a piece into -the puzzle and make the answer come out all clear—but Ghost Town -continued to grow acre by acre, year by year. And Oldham still hadn’t -found him a secretary capable of writing her own name. - -“According to the historians, everything fits nicely into place,” Ross -said, dubiously. “They say we came here ourselves in longliners once, -Marconi. Our ancestors under some man named Halsey colonized this place, -fourteen hundred years ago. According to the longliners that come in -from other stars, their ancestors colonized wherever they came from in -starships from a place called Earth. Where is this Earth, Marconi?” - -Marconi said succinctly, “Look in the star charts. It’s there.” - -“Yes, but——” - -“But, hell,” Marconi said in annoyance. “What in the world has got into -you, Ross? Earth is a planet like any other planet. The starship Halsey -colonized in was a starship like any other starship—only bigger. I -guess, that is—I wasn’t there. After all, what are the longliners but -colonists? They happen to be going to planets that are already -inhabited, that’s all. So a starship is nothing new or even very -interesting, and this is beginning to bore me, and you ought to read -your urgent-priority-rush message.” - -Ross felt repentant—knowing that that was just how Trader Marconi wanted -him to feel. He said slowly, “I’m sorry if I’m being a nuisance, -Marconi. You know how it is when you feel stale and restless. I know all -the stories—but it’s so damned hard to believe them. The famous -colonizing ships. They must have been absolutely gigantic to take any -reasonable number of people on a closed-circuit, multigeneration ride. -We can’t build them that big now!” - -“No reason to.” - -“But we couldn’t if we had to. Imagine shooting those things all over -the Galaxy. How many inhabited planets in the charts—five hundred? A -thousand? Think of the technology, Marconi. What became of it?” - -“We don’t need that sort of technology any more,” Marconi explained. -“That job is done. Now we concentrate on more important things. Learning -to live with each other. Developing our own planet. Increasing our -understanding of social factors and demographic——” - -Ross was laughing at last. “Well, Marconi,” he said at last, “that takes -care of that! We sure have figured out how to handle the social factors, -all right. Every year there are fewer of them to handle. Pretty soon -we’ll all be dead, and then the problem can be marked ‘solved.’” - -Marconi laughed too—eagerly, as if he’d been waiting for the chance. He -said, “Now that that’s settled, are you going to open your message? Are -you at least going to have some lunch?” - -The Yards messenger stumbled up to their table again, this time with an -envelope for Marconi. He looked sharply at Ross’s unopened envelope and -said nothing, pointedly. Ross guiltily picked it up and tore it open. -You could act like a sulky child in front of a friend, but strangers -didn’t understand. - -The message was from his office. RADAR REPORTS HIGH VELOCITY SPACECRAFT -ON AUTOCONTROLS. FIRST APPROXIMATION TRAJECTORY INDICATES INTERSTELLAR -ORIGIN. PROBABLE ETA YARDS 1500. NO RADIO MESSAGES RECEIVED. DON’T HAVE -TO TELL YOU TO GET ON THIS IMMEDIATELY AND GIVE IT YOUR BEST. OLDHAM. - -Ross looked at Marconi, whose expression was perturbed. “Bet I know what -your message says,” he offered with an uneasy quaver in his voice. - -Marconi said: “I’ll bet you do. Oldham’s radar setup on Sunward always -has been better than Haarland’s. Better location. Man, you are in -trouble! Let’s get out there and hope nobody’s missed you so far.” - -They grabbed sandwiches from the snack bar on the way out and munched -them while the Yards jeep took them to the ready line. Skirting the -freighters in their pits, slipping past the enormous overhaul sheds, -they saw excited debates going on. Twice they were passed by Yards -vehicles heading toward the landing area. Halfway to the line they heard -the recall sirens warning everybody and everything out of the ten seared -acres surrounded by homing and Ground-Controlled Approach radars. That -was where the big ones were landed. - -The ready line was jammed when they got there. Ships from one or another -of the five moons that circled Halsey’s planet were common; the moons -were the mines. Even the weekly liner and freighters from the colony on -Sunward, the planet next in from Halsey’s, were routine to the Yards -workers. But to anybody an interstellar ship was a sensation, a -once-or-twice-in-a-lifetime thrill. - -Protocols were uncertain. Traders argued about the first crack at the -strangers and their goods. A dealer named Aalborg said the only fair -system would be to give every trade there an equal opportunity to do -business—in alphabetical order. Everybody agreed that under no -circumstances should the man from Leverett and Sons be allowed to -trade—everybody, except the man from Leverett and Sons. He pointed out -that his firm was the logical choice because it had more and fresher -experience in handling interstellar goods than any other.... - -They almost mobbed him. - -It wasn’t merely money that filled the atmosphere with electric tingles. -The glamor of time-travel was on them. The crew aboard that ship were -travelers of time as well as space. The crew that had launched the ship -was dust. The crew that served it now had never seen a planet. - -There was even some humility in the crowd. There were thoughtful ones -among them who reflected that it was not, after all, a very great feat -to hitch a rocket to a shell and lob it across a few million miles to a -neighboring planet. It was eclipsed by the tremendous deed whose climax -they were about to witness. The thoughtful ones shrugged and sighed as -they thought that even the starship booming down toward Halsey’s -Planet—fitted with the cleverest air replenishers and the most -miraculously efficient waste converters—was only a counter in the game -whose great rule was the mass-energy formulation of the legendary -Einstein: that there is no way to push a material object past the speed -of light. - -A report swept the field that left men reeling in its wake. Radar Track -confirmed that the ship was of unfamiliar pattern. All hope that it -might be a starship launched from this very spot on the last leg of a -stupefying round trip was officially dead. The starship was foreign. - -“Wonder what they have?” Marconi muttered. - -“Trader!” Ross sneered ponderously. He was feeling better; the weight of -depression had been lifted for the time being, either by his confession -or the electric atmosphere. If every day were like this, he thought -vaguely.... - -“Let’s not kid each other,” Marconi was saying exuberantly. “This is an -event, man! Where are they from, what are they peddling? Do I get a good -cut at their wares? It could be fifty thousand shields for me in -commission alone. Lurline and I could build a tower house on Great Blue -Lake with that kind of money, with a whole floor for her parents! Ross, -you just don’t know what it is to really be in love. Everything -changes.” - -A jeep roared up and slammed to a stop; Ross blinked and yelled: “Here -it comes!” - -They watched the ground-controlled approach with the interest of -semiprofessionals and concealed their rising excitement with shop talk. - -“Whups! There goes the high-power job into action.” Marconi pointed as a -huge dish antenna swiveled ponderously on its mast. “Seems the -medium-output dishes can’t handle her.” - -“Maybe the high-power dish can’t either. She might be just plain shot.” - -“Standard, sealed GCA doesn’t get shot, my young friend. Not in a -neon-atmosphere tank it doesn’t.” - -“Maybe along about the fifth generation they forgot what it was and cut -it open with an acetylene torch to see what was inside.” - -“Bad luck for us in that case, Ross.” The ship steadied on a due-west -course and flashed across the heavens and over the horizon. - -“Somebody decided a braking ellipse or two was in order. What about line -of sight?” - -“No sweat. The GCA jockey—and I’d bet it’s Delafield himself—pushes a -button that hooks him into the high-power dish at every rocket field on -Halsey’s. It’s been all thought out. There’s a potential fortune aboard -that longliner and Fields Administration wants its percentage for -servicing and accommodating.” - -“Wonder what they have?” - -“I already asked that one, Ross.” - -“So you did.” - -They lapsed into silence until the rocket boomed in again from the east, -high and slow. The big dish swiveled abruptly and began tracking again. - -“He’ll try to bring her down this time. Yes! There go fore and -stabilizing jets.” - -Flame jutted from the silvery speck high in the blue; its apparent speed -slowed to a crawl. It vanished for a second as steering jets turned her -slowly endwise. They caught sight of the stern jets when they blasted -for the descent. - -It was uneventful—just the landing of a very, very big rocket. When a -landing is successful it is like every other successful landing ever -made. - -But the action that the field whirled into immediately following the -landing was far from routine. The bullhorns roared that all traders, -wipers, rubbernecks, and visitors were to get behind the ready lines and -stay there. All Class-Three-and-higher Field personnel were to take -stations for longliner clearance. The weapons and decontamination -parties were to take their stations immediately. Captain Delafield would -issue all future orders and don’t let any of the traders talk you out of -it, men. Captain Delafield would issue all future orders. - -Ross watched in considerable surprise as Field men working with drilled -precision broke out half a dozen sleek, needle-nosed guns from an -innocent-looking bay of the warehouse and manhandled them into position. -From another bay a large pressure tank was hauled and backed against the -lock of the starship. Ross could see the station medic bustlingly -supervise that, and the hosing of white gunk onto the juncture between -tank and ship. - -Delafield crossed the stretch from the GCA complex to the tank, vanished -into it through a pressure-fitted door and that was that. The tank had -no windows. - -Ross said to Marconi, wonderingly: “What’s all this about? There was Doc -Gibbons handling the pressure tank, there was Chunk Blaney rolling out a -God-damned cannon I never knew was there—how many more little secrets -are there that I don’t know about?” - -Marconi grinned. “They have gun drill once a month, my young friend, and -they never say a word about it. Let the right rabble-rouser get hold of -the story and he might sail into office on a platform of ‘Keep the -bug-eyed monsters off of Halsey’s Planet.’ You have to have reasonable -precautions, military and medical, though—and this is the straight -goods—there’s never been any trouble of either variety.” - -The conversation died and there was a long, boring hour of nothing. At -last Delafield appeared again. One of the decontamination party ran up -in a jeep with a microphone. - -“What’ll it be?” Ross demanded. “Alphabetic order? Or just a rush?” - -The announcement floored him. “Representative of the Haarland Trading -Corporation please report to the decontamination tank.” - -The representative of the Haarland Trading Corporation was Marconi. - -“Hell,” Ross said bitterly. “Good luck with them, whoever they are.” - -Marconi brooded for a moment and then said gruffly, “Come on along.” - -“You mean it?” - -“Sure. Uh—naturally, Ross, you’ll give me your word not to make any -commercial offers or inquiries without my permission.” - -“Oh. Naturally.” They started across the field and were checked through -the ready line, Marconi cheerfully presenting his identification and -vouching for Ross. - -Captain Delafield, at the tank, snapped, “What are you doing here, Ross? -You’re Oldham’s man. I distinctly said——” - -“My responsibility, Captain. Will that do it?” Marconi asked. - -Delafield snapped, “It’ll be your fundament if Haarland hears about it. -Actually it’s the damnedest situation—they _asked_ for Haarland’s.” - -Marconi looked frightened and his hand involuntarily went to his breast -pocket. He swallowed and asked, “Where are they from?” - -Delafield grimaced and said, “Home.” - -Marconi exploded, “Oh, no!” - -“That’s all I can get out of them. I suppose their trajectory can be -analyzed, and there must be books. We haven’t been in the ship yet. -Nobody goes in until it gets sprayed, rayed, dusted, and busted down -into its component parts. Too many places for nasty little mutant -bacteria and viruses to lurk.” - -“Sure, Captain. ‘Home,’ eh? They’re pretty simple?” - -“Happy little morons. Fifteen of them, ranging in age from one month to -what looks like a hundred and twenty. All they know is ‘home’ and ‘we -wish to see the representative of the Haarland Trading Corporation.’ -First the old woman said it. Then the next in line—he must be about a -hundred—said it. Then a pair of identical twins, fifty-year-old women, -said it in chorus. Then the rest of them on down to the month-old baby, -and I swear to God he tried to say it. Well, you’re the Haarland Trading -Corporation. Go on in.” - - - - -..... 2 - - -THEY were all naked. Why not? There’s no weather in a space ship. All of -them laughed when Ross and Marconi came in through the lock except the -baby, who was nursing at the breast of a handsome woman. Their laughter -was what attracted Ross immediately. Cheerful—no meanness in it. The -happy yelping of puppies at play with a red rubber bone. - -A stab went through him as the pleasure in their simple happiness turned -to recollection and recognition. His wife of a decade ago.... Ross -studied them with amazement, expecting to find her features in their -features, her figure in theirs. And failed. Yet they reminded him -inescapably of his miserable year with that half-a-woman, but they were -physically no kin of hers. They were just cheerful laughers who he knew -were less than human. - -The cheerful laughers exposed unblemished teeth in all their mouths, -including that of the hundred-and-twenty-year-old matriarch. Why not? If -you put calcium and fluorides into a closed system, they stay there. - -The old woman stopped laughing at them long enough to say to Marconi, -“We wish to see the representative of the Haarland——” - -“Yes, I know. I’m the representative of the Haarland Trading -Corporation. Welcome to Halsey’s Planet. May I ask what your name is, -ma’am?” - -“Ma,” she said genially. - -“Pleased to meet you, Ma. My name’s Marconi.” - -Ma said, bewildered, “You just said you were the representative of the -Haarland Trading——” - -“Yes, Ma, but that’s all right. Let’s say that’s my other name. Two -names—understand?” - -She laughed at the idea of two names, wonderingly. - -Marconi pressed, “And what’s the name of this gentleman?” - -“He isn’t Gentleman. He’s Sonny.” - -Sonny was a hundred years old. - -“Pleased to meet you, Sonny. And your name, sir?” - -“Sonny,” said a redheaded man of eighty or thereabouts. - -The identical-twin women were named The Kids. The baby was named Him. -The rest of the troop were named Girl, Ma, or Sonny. After introductions -Ross noticed that Him had been passed to another Ma who was placidly -suckling him. She had milk; it dribbled from the corner of the baby’s -mouth. “There isn’t another baby left in the ship, is there?” Ross asked -in alarm. - -They laughed and the Ma suckling the baby said: “There was, but she -died. Mostly they do when you put them into the box after they get born. -Ma here was lucky. Her Him didn’t die.” - -“Put them in the box? What box? Why?” - -Marconi was nudging him fiercely in the ribs. He ignored it. - -They laughed amiably at his ignorance and explained that the box was the -box, and that you put your newborn babies into it because you put your -newborn babies into it. - -A beep tone sounded from the ship. - -Ma said, “We have to go back now, The Representative of the Haarland -Trading Corporation Marconi.” - -“What for?” - -Ma said, “At regular intervals signaled by a tone of six hundred cycles -and an intermittent downward shifting of the ship lights from standard -illumination frequency to a signal frequency of 420 millimicrons, ship’s -operating personnel take up positions at the control boards for -recalibration of ship-working meters and instruments against the battery -of standard masters. We’ll be right back.” - -They trooped through the hatch, leaving Ross and Marconi staring at each -other in the decontamination tank. - -“Well,” Ross said slowly, “at last I know why the Longliner Departments -have their little secrets. ‘The box.’ I say it’s murder.” - -“Be reasonable,” Marconi told him—but his own face was white under the -glaring germicidal lamps. “You can’t let them increase without limit or -they’d all die. And before they died there’d be cannibalism. Which do -you prefer?” - -“Letting kids be born and then snuffing them out if a computer decides -they’re the wrong sex or over the quota is inhuman.” - -“I didn’t say I like it, Ross. But it works.” - -“So do pills!” - -“Pills are a private matter. A person might privately decide not to take -hers. The box is a public matter and the group outnumbers and overrules -a mother who decides not to use it. There’s your question of -effectiveness answered, but there’s another point. Those people are -sane, Ross. Preposterously naive, but sane! Saner than childless women -or sour old bachelors we both know who never had to love anything small -and helpless, and so come to love nobody but themselves. They’re sane. -Partly because the women get a periodic biochemical shakeup called -pregnancy that their biochemical balance is designed to mesh with. -Partly because the men find tenderness and protectiveness in themselves -toward the pregnant women. Mostly, I think, because—it’s something to -do. - -“Can you imagine the awful monotony of life in the ship? The work is -sheer rote and repetition. They can’t read or watch screentapes. They -were born in the ship, and the books and screentapes are meaningless -because they know nothing to compare them with. The only change they see -is each other, aging toward death. Frequent pregnancies are a Godsend to -them. They compare and discuss them; they wonder who the fathers are; -they make bets of rations; the men brag and keep score. The girls look -forward to their first and their last. The jokes they make up about -them! The way they speculate about twins! The purgative fear, even, -keeps them sane.” - -“And then,” Ross said, “‘the box.’” - -Staring straight ahead at the ship’s port Marconi echoed: “Yes. ‘The -box.’ If there were another way—but there isn’t.” - - * * * * * - -His breezy young boss, Charles Oldham IV, was not pleased with what Ross -had to report. - -“Asked for Haarland!” he repeated unbelievingly. “Those dummies didn’t -know where they were going or where they were from, but they knew enough -to ask for Haarland.” He slammed a ruler on his desk and yelled: -“God-damn it!” - -“Mr. Oldham!” Ross protested, aghast. For a superior to lose his temper -publicly was unthinkable; it covered you with embarrassment. - -“Manners be God-damned too!” Oldham screamed, breaking up fast. “What do -you know about the state of our books? What do you know about the -overhead I inherited from my loving father? What the hell do you know -about the downcurve in sales?” - -“These fluctuations——” Ross began soothingly. - -“Fluctuations be God-damned! I know a fluctuation when I see one, and I -know a long-term downtrend when I see one. And that’s what we’re riding, -right into bankruptcy, fellow. And now these God-damned dummies blow in -from nowhere with a consignment exclusively for Haarland—I don’t know -why I don’t get to hell out of this stupid business and go live in a -shack on Great Blue Lake and let the planet go ahead and rot.” - -Ross’s horror at the unseemly outburst was eclipsed by his interest at -noting how similarly he and Oldham had been thinking. “Sir,” he -ventured, “I’ve had something on my mind for a while——” - -“It can wait,” Oldham growled, collecting himself with a visible effort. -So there went his chance to resign. “What about customs? I know Haarland -hasn’t got enough cash to lay out. Who has?” - -Ross said glibly: “Usual arrangement, sir. They turn an estimated -twenty-five per cent of the cargo over to the port authority for -auction, the receipts to be in full discharge of their import tax. And I -suppose they enter protective bids. They aren’t wasting any -time—auction’s 2100 tonight.” - -“You handle it,” Oldham muttered. “Don’t go over one hundred thousand -shields. Diversify the purchases as much as possible. And try to sneak -some advance information out of the dummies if you get a chance.” - -“Yes, sir,” Ross said. As he left he saw Oldham taking a plastic bottle -from a wall cabinet. - -And that, thought Ross as he rode to the Free Port, was the first crack -he had ever seen in the determined optimism of the trading firm’s top -level. They were optimists and they were idealists, at least to hear -them tell it. Interplanetary trading was a cause and a mission; the -traders kept the flame of commerce alight. Perhaps, thought Ross, they -had been able to indulge in the hypocrisy of idealism only so long as a -population upcurve assured them of an expanding market. Perhaps now that -births were flattening out—some said the dirty word “declining”—they all -would drop their optimistic creed in favor of fang-and-claw competition -for the favors of the dwindling pool of consumers. - -And that, Ross thought gloomily, was the way he’d go himself if he -stayed on: junior trader, to senior trader, to master trader, growing -every year more paranoidally suspicious of his peers, less scrupulous in -the chase of the shield.... - -But he was getting out, of course. The purser’s berth awaited. And then, -perhaps, the awful depressions he had been enduring would lift off him. -He thought of the master traders he knew: his own man Oldham, none too -happy in the hereditary business; Leverett, still smug and fat with his -terrific windfall of the Sirius IV starship fifteen years ago; Marconi’s -boss Haarland—Haarland broke the sequence all to hell. It just wasn’t -possible to think of Haarland being driven by avarice and fear. He was -the oldest of them all, but there was more zest and drive in his -parchment body than in the rest of them combined. - -In the auction hall Ross found a seat near the velvet ropes. One of the -professional bidders lounging against a wall flicked him an almost -imperceptible signal, and he answered with another. That was that; he -had his man, and a good one. They had often worked together in the -commodity pits, but not so often or so exclusively that the bidder would -be instantly known as his. - -Inside the enclosure Marconi, seated at a bare table, labored over a -sheaf of papers with one of the “Sonnies” from the ship. Sonny was -wriggling in coveralls, the first clothes he had ever worn. Ross saw -they hadn’t been able to get shoes onto him. - -Who else did he know? Captain Delafield was sitting somberly within the -enclosure; Win Fraley, the hottest auctioneer on the Port, was studying -a list, his lips moving. Every trading firm was represented; the heads -of the smaller firms were there in person, not daring to delegate the -bidding job. Plenty of Port personnel, just there for the excitement of -the first longliner in fifteen years, even though it was well after -close of the business day. - -The goods were in sealed cases against the back wall as usual. Ross -could only tell that some of them were perforated and therefore ought to -contain living animals. Only the one Sonny from the starship crew was -there; presumably the rest were back on the ship. He wouldn’t be able to -follow Oldham’s orders to snoop out the nature of the freight from them. -Well, damn Oldham; damn even the auction, Ross thought to himself. His -mood of gloom did not lift. - -The auction was a kind of letdown. All that turmoil and bustle, -concentrated in a tiny arc around the velvet ropes, contrasted -unpleasantly with the long, vacant rows of dusty seats that stretched to -the back of the hall. Maybe a couple of centuries ago Ross would have -enjoyed the auction more. But now all it made him think of was the thing -he had been brooding about for a night and a day, the slow emptying of -the planet, the.... - -Decay. - -But, as usual, no one else seemed to notice or to care. - -Captain Delafield consulted his watch and stood up. He rapped the table. -“In accordance with the rules of the Trade Commission and the -appropriate governing statutes,” he droned, “certain merchandise will -now be placed on public auction. The Haarland Trading Corporation, -consignee, agrees and consents to divest itself of merchandise from -Consignment 97-W amounting by estimate of the customs authorities to -twenty-five per cent of the total value of all merchandise in said -consignment. All receipts of this auction are to be entered as excise -duties paid by the consignee on said merchandise, said receipts to -constitute payment in full on excise on Consignment 97-W. The clerk will -record; if any person here present wishes to enter an objection let him -do so thank you.” He glanced at a slip of paper in his hand. “I am -requested to inform you that the Haarland Trading Corporation has -entered with the clerk a protective bid of five thousand shields on each -item.” There was a rustle in the hall. Five thousand shields was a lot -of money. “Your auctioneer, Win Fraley,” said Captain Delafield, and sat -down in the first row of seats. - -The auctioneer took a long, slow swallow of water, his eyes gleaming -above the glass at the audience. Theatrically he tossed the glass to an -assistant, smacked his hands together and grinned. “Well,” he boomed -genially, “I don’t have to tell you gentlemen that somebody’s going to -get rich tonight. Who knows—maybe it’ll be you? But you can’t make money -without spending money, so without any further ado, let’s get started. I -have here,” he rapped out briskly, “Item Number One. Now you don’t know -and I don’t know exactly what Item Number One contains, but I can tell -you this, they wouldn’t have sent it two hundred and thirty-one lights -if they didn’t think it was worth something. Let’s get this started with -a rush, folks, and I mean with a big bid to get in the right mood. After -all, the more you spend here the less you have to pay in taxes,” he -laughed. “You ready? Here’s the dope. Item Number One——” His assistant -slapped a carton at the extreme left of the line. “——weight two hundred -and fifteen grams, net; fifteen cubic centimeters; one microfilm reel -included. Reminds me,” he reminisced, “of an item just about that size -on the Sirius IV shipment. Turned out to be Maryjane seeds, and I don’t -suppose I have to tell anybody here how much Mr. Leverett made out of -Maryjanes; I bet every one of us has been smoking them ever since. What -do you say, Mr. Leverett? You did all right last time—want to say ten -thousand as a first big bid on Item Number One? Nine thousand? Do I -hear——?” - -One of the smaller traders, not working through a professional bidder, -not even decently delegating the work to a junior, bid seventy-five -hundred shields. Like the spokesmen for the other big traders, Ross sat -on his hands during the early stages. Let the small fry give themselves -a thrill and drop out. The big firms knew to a fraction of a shield how -much the small ones could afford to bid on a blind purchase, and the -easiest way to handle them was to let them spend their budgets in a -hurry. Of course the small traders knew all this, and their strategy, -when they could manage it, was to hold back as long as possible. It was -a matter of sensing emotion rather than counting costs; of recognizing -the fraction of a second in which a little fellow made up his mind to -acquire an item and bidding him up—of knowing when he’d gone his limit -and letting him have it at a ruinous price. It was an art, and Ross, -despising it, knew that he did it very, very well. - -He yawned and pretended to read a magazine while the first six items -went on the block; the little traders seemed desperate enough to force -the price up without help. He bid on Item Seven partly to squeeze a runt -trader and partly to test his liaison with his professional bidder. It -was perfect; the pro caught his signal—a bored inspection of his -fingernails—while seeming to peek clumsily at the man from Leverett’s. - -Ross let the next two pass and then acquired three items in rapid -succession. The fever had spread to most of the bidders by then; they -were starting at ten thousand and up. One or two of the early birds had -spent their budgets and were leaving, looking sandbagged—as indeed they -had been. Ross signaled “take five” to his professional and strolled out -for a cup of coffee. - -On the way back he stopped for a moment outside the hall to look at the -stars and breathe. There were the familiar constellations—The Plowman, -the Rocket Fleet, Marilyn Monroe. He stood smoking a cigarette and -yearning toward them until somebody moved in the darkness near him. -“Nice night, Ross,” the man said gloomily. - -It was Captain Delafield. “Oh, hello, sir,” Ross said, the world -descending around him again like a too-substantial curtain. “Taking a -breather?” - -“Had to,” the captain growled. “Ten more minutes in that place and I -would have thrown. Damned money-grabbing traders. No offense, Ross; just -that I don’t see how you stand the life. Seems to have got worse in my -time. Much worse. You high-rollers goading the pee-wees into shooting -their wads—it didn’t use to be like that. Gallantry. Not stomping a -downed man. I don’t see how you stand it.” - -“I can’t stand it,” Ross said quietly. “Captain Delafield, you don’t -know—I’m so sick to death of the life I’m leading and the work I’m doing -that I’d do anything to get away. Mr. Fallon offered me a purser’s spot -on his ship; I’ve been thinking about it very seriously.” - -“Purser? A dirty job. There’s nothing to do except when you’re in port, -and then there’s so much to do that you never get to see the planet. I -don’t recommend it, Ross.” - -Ross grunted, thinking. If even the purser’s berth was no way out, what -was left for him? Sixty more years of waiting for a starship and -scheming how to make a profit from its contents? Sixty more years -watching Ghost Town grow by nibbles on Halsey City, watching the traders -wax in savagery as they battled for the ever-diminishing pool of -consumers, watching obscene comedies like Lurline of the Old Landowners -graciously consenting to wed Marconi of the New Nobodies? He said -wearily: “Then what shall I do, Captain? Rot here with the rest of the -planet?” - -Delafield shrugged, suprisingly gentle. “You feel it too, Ross? I’m glad -to hear it. I’m not sensitive, thank God, but I know they talk about me. -They say I quit the space-going fleet as soon as I had a chance to grab -off the port captaincy. They’re right; I did. Because I was frightened.” - -“Frightened? You?” Delafield’s ribbons for a dozen heroic rescues -gleamed in the light that escaped from the hall. - -“Sure, Ross.” He flicked the ribbons. “Each one of these means I and my -men pulled some people out of a jam they got into because of somebody’s -damned stupidity or slow reflexes or defective memory. No; I withdraw -that. The ‘Thetis’ got stove in because of mechanical failure, but all -the rest were human error. There got to be too many for me; I want to -enjoy my old age. - -“Ready to face that if you become a purser? I can tell you that if you -don’t like it here you won’t be happy on Sunward and you won’t like the -moons. And you most especially and particularly won’t like being a -purser. It’s the same job you’re doing now, but it pays less, offers you -a six-by-eight cubicle to work and live in, and gives you nothing -resembling a future to aim at. Now if you’ll excuse me I’d better get -back inside. I’ve enjoyed our talk.” - -Ross followed the captain gloomily. Nothing had changed inside; Ross -lounged in the doorway inconspicuously picking up the eye of his bidder. -Marconi was gone from the enclosure. Ross looked around hopefully and -found his friend in agitated conversation with an unrecognizable but -also agitated man at the back of the hall. Ross drifted over. Heads were -turning in the front rows. As Ross got within range he heard a couple of -phrases. “——in the ship. Mr. Haarland specially asked for you. Please, -Mr. Marconi!” - -“Oh, hell,” Marconi said disgustedly. “Go on. Tell him I’ll be there. -But how he expects me to take care of things here and——” He trailed off -as he caught sight of Ross. - -“Trouble?” Ross asked. - -“Not exactly. The hell with it.” Marconi stared indecisively at the -auctioneer for a moment. He said obscurely, “Taking your life isn’t -enough; he wants more. And I thought I’d be able to see Lurline tonight. -Excuse me, Ross. I’ve got to get over to the ship.” He hurried out. - -Ross looked wonderingly after him, caught the eye of his bidder, and -went back to work. By the time the auction was over and dawn was -breaking in the west, Oldham Trading had bought nine lots of -merchandise: three breathing, five flowering, and one a roll of -microfilm. Ross took his prizes to the office where Charles Oldham was -waiting, much the better for a few drinks and a long nap. - -“How much?” demanded Oldham. Evidently they were both supposed to ignore -his hysteria of the night before. - -“Fifty-seven thousand,” Ross said dully. - -“For nine lots? Good man! With any kind of luck at all——” And Oldham -babbled on and on. He wanted Ross to stay and view the microfilm -projection, stand by for a report from a zoologist and a botanist on the -living acquisitions. He pleaded weariness and Oldham became conciliatory -to the wonderful young up-and-comer who had bid in the merchandise at a -whopping bargain price. - -Ross dragged himself from the building, into a cab, and home. Morosely -undressing he lit a cigarette and brooded: well, that was it. What you’d -been waiting for since you were a junior apprentice. The starship came, -you had the alien prizes in your hands and you realized they were as -tawdry as the cheap gimcracks you export every week to Sunward. - -He stared out the window, over Ghost Town, to the Field. The sun was -high over the surrounding mountains; he imagined he could pick out the -reflected glimmer from the starship a dozen miles away. Marconi at least -got to examine the ship. Marconi might be there now; he’d been headed -that way when Ross saw him last. And evidently not enjoying it much. -Ross wondered vaguely if anybody really enjoyed anything. He stubbed out -his cigarette. - -As he fell asleep he was remembering what Delafield had told him about -the moons and the planet ports. His dreams were of the cities of other -planets, and every one of them was populated by aloof Delafields and -avaricious Oldhams. - - - - -..... 3 - - -“WAKE up, Ross,” Marconi was saying, joggling him. “Come on, wake up.” - -Ross thrust himself up on an elbow and opened his eyes. He said with a -tongue the size of his forearm in a dust-lined mouth: “Wha’ time is it? -Wha’ the hell are you doing here, for that matter?” - -“It’s around noon. You’ve slept for three hours; you can get up.” - -“Uh.” Ross automatically reached for a cigarette. The smoke got in his -eyes and he rubbed them; it dehydrated and seared what little healthy -tissue appeared to be left in his mouth. But it woke him up a little. -“What are you doing here?” he demanded. - -Marconi’s hand was involuntarily on his breast pocket again, the one in -which he carried Lurline’s picture. He said harshly: “You want a job? -Topside? Better than purser?” He wasn’t meeting Ross’s eye. His gaze -roved around the apartment and lighted on a coffee maker. He filled it -and snapped it on. “Get dressed, will you?” he demanded. - -Ross sat up. “What’s this all about, Marconi? What do you want, anyway?” - -Marconi, for his own reasons, became violently angry. “You’re the -damnedest question-asker I ever did meet, Ross. I’m trying to do you a -favor.” - -“What favor?” Ross asked suspiciously. - -“You’ll find out. You’ve been bellyaching to me long enough about how -dull your poor little life is. Well, I’m offering you a chance to do -something big and different. And what do you do? You crawfish. Are you -interested or aren’t you? I told you: It’s a space job, and a big one. -Bigger than being a purser for Fallon. Bigger than you can imagine.” - -Ross began to struggle into his clothes, no more than half -comprehending, but stimulated by the magic words. He asked, puzzling -sleepily over what Marconi had said, “What are you sore about?” His -guess was that Lurline had broken a date—but it seemed to be the wrong -time of day for that. - -“Nothing,” Marconi said grumpily. “Only I have my own life to live.” He -poured two cups of coffee. He wouldn’t answer questions while they -sipped the scalding stuff. But somehow Ross was not surprised when, -downstairs, Marconi headed his car along the winding road through Ghost -Town that led to the Yards. - -Every muscle of Ross’s body was stiff and creaky; another six hours of -sleep would have been a wonderful thing. But as they drove through the -rutted streets of Ghost Town he began to feel alive again. He stared out -the window at the flashing ruins, piecing together the things Marconi -had said. - -“Watch it!” he yelled, and Marconi swerved the car around a tumbled -wall. Ross was shaking, but Marconi only drove faster. This was crazy! -You didn’t race through Ghost Town as though you were on the pleasure -parkways around the Great Blue Lake; it wasn’t safe. The buildings had -to fall over from time to time—nobody, certainly, bothered to keep them -in repair. And nobody bothered to pick up the pieces when they fell, -either, until the infrequent road-mending teams made their rounds. - -But at last they were out of Ghost Town, on the broad highway from -Halsey City to the port. The administration building and car park was -just ahead. - -It was there that Marconi spoke again. “I’m assuming, Ross, that you -weren’t snowing me when you said you wanted thrills, chills, and change -galore.” - -“That’s not the way I put it. But I wasn’t snowing you.” - -“You’ll get them. Come on.” - -He led Ross across the field to the longliner, past a gaggle of -laughing, chattering Sonnies and Mas. He ignored them. - -The longliner was a giant of a ship, a blunt torpedo a hundred meters -tall. It had no ports—naturally enough; the designers of the ship -certainly didn’t find any reason for its idiot crew to look out into -space, and landings and takeoffs would be remote-controlled. Two hundred -years old it was; but its metal was as bright, its edges as sharp, as -the newest of the moon freighters at the other end of the hardstand. Two -hundred years—a long trip, but an almost unimaginably long distance that -trip covered. For the star that spawned it was undoubtedly almost as far -away as light would travel in two centuries’ time. At 186,000 miles per -second, sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour. Ross’s -imagination gave up the task. It was far. - -He stared about him in fascination as they entered the ship. He gaped at -sterile, gray-walled cubicles, each of which contained the same chair -and cot—no screen or projector for longliners. Ross remembered his rash -words of the day before about shipping out on a longliner, and -shuddered. - -“Here we are,” said Marconi stopping before a closed door. He knocked -and entered. - -It was a cubicle like the others, but there were reels stacked on the -floor and a projector. Sitting on the cot in a just-awakened attitude -was old man Haarland himself. Beady-eyed, Ross thought. Watchful. - -Haarland asked: “Ross?” - -“Yes, sir,” Marconi said. There was tension in his voice and attitude. -“Do you want me to stay, sir?” - -Haarland growled: “Good God, no. You can get out. Sit down, Ross.” - -Ross sat down. Marconi, carefully looking neither to right or left, went -out and closed the door. Haarland stretched, scratched, and yawned. He -said: “Ross, Marconi tells me you’re quite a fellow. Sincere, competent, -a good man to give a tough job to. Namely, his.” - -“Junior-Fourth Trader?” Ross asked, bewildered. - -“A little more dramatic than that—but we’ll come to the details in a -minute. I’m told you were ready to quit Oldham for a purser’s berth. -That’s ethical. Would you consider it unethical to quit Oldham for -Haarland?” - -“Yes—I think I would.” - -“Glad to hear it! What if the work had absolutely nothing to do with -trading and never brings you into a competitive situation with Oldham?” - -“Well——” Ross scratched his jaw. “Well, I think that would be all right. -But a Junior Fourth’s job, Mr. Haarland——” The floor bucked and surged -under him. He gasped, “What was that?” - -“Blastoff, I imagine,” Haarland said calmly. “We’re taking off. Better -lie down.” - -Ross flopped to the floor. It was no time to argue, not with the -first-stage pumps thundering and the preheaters roaring their threat of -an imminent four-G thrust. - -It came like thunder, slapping Ross against the floor plates as though -he were glued to them. He felt every tiny wrinkle in every weld he lay -on, and one arm had fallen across a film reel. He heaved, and succeeded -in levering it off the reel. It thwacked to the floor as though sandbags -were stacked meters-high atop it. - -Blackout came very soon. - -He awoke in free fall. He was orbiting aimlessly about the cubicle. - -Haarland was strapped to the cot, absorbed in manipulating the portable -projector, trying to thread a free-floating film. Ross bumped against -the old man; Haarland abstractedly shoved him off. - -He careened from a bulkhead and flailed for a grip. - -“Oh,” said Haarland, looking up. “Awake?” - -“Yes, awake!” Ross said bitterly. “What is all this? Where are we?” - -The old man said formally, “Please forgive my cavalier treatment of you. -You must not blame your friend Marconi; he had no idea that I was -planning an immediate blastoff with you. I had an assignment for him -which he—he preferred not to accept. Not to mince words, Ross, he quit.” - -“Quit his job?” - -The old man shook his head. “No, Ross. Quit much more than the job of -working for me. He quit on an assignment which is—I am sorry if it -sounds melodramatic—absolutely vital to the human race.” He suddenly -frowned. “I—I think,” he added weakly. “Bear with me, Ross. I’ll try to -explain as I go along. But, you see, Marconi left me in the lurch. I -needed him and he failed me. He felt that you would be glad to take it -on, and he told me something about you.” Haarland glowered at Ross and -said, with a touch of bitterness, “A recommendation from Marconi, at -this particular point, is hardly any recommendation at all. But I -haven’t much choice—and, besides, I took the liberty of calling that -pompous young fool you work for.” - -“Mister Haarland!” Ross cried, outraged. “Oldham may not be any prize -but really——” - -“Oh, you know he’s a fool. But he had a lot to say about you. Enough so -that, if you want the assignment, it’s yours. As to the nature of the -assignment itself——” Haarland hesitated, then said briskly, “The -assignment itself has to do with a message my organization received via -this longliner. Yes, a message. You’ll see. It has also to do with -certain facts I’ve found in its log which, if I can ever get this damned -thing working——There we are.” - -He had succeeded in threading the film. - -He snapped on the projector. On the screen appeared a densely packed -block of numerals, rolling up and being replaced by new lines as fast as -the eye could take them in. Haarland said, “Notice anything?” - -Ross swallowed. “If that stuff is supposed to mean anything to me,” he -declared, “it doesn’t.” - -Haarland frowned. “But Marconi said——Well, never mind.” He snapped off -the projector. “That was the ship’s log, Ross. It doesn’t matter if you -can’t read it; you wouldn’t, I suppose, have had much call for that sort -of thing working for Oldham. It is a mathematical description of the -routing of this ship, from the time it was space-launched until it -arrived here yesterday. It took a long time, Ross. The reason that it -took a long time is partly that it came from far away. But, even more, -there is another reason. We were not this ship’s destination! Not the -original destination. We weren’t even the first alternate—or the second -alternate. To be exact, Ross, we were the seventh choice for this ship.” - -Ross let go of his stanchion, floated a yard, and flailed back to it. -“That’s ridiculous, Mr. Haarland,” he protested. “Besides, what has all -this to do with——” - -“Bear with an old man,” said Haarland, with an amused gleam in his eye. - -There was very little he could do but bear with him, Ross thought -sourly. “Go on,” he said. - -Haarland said professorially, “It is conceivable, of course, that a -planet might be asleep at the switch. We could believe it, I suppose, if -it seemed that the first-choice planet somehow didn’t pick the ship up -when this longliner came into radar range. In that event, of course, it -would orbit once or twice on automatics, and then select for its first -alternate target—which it did. It might be a human failure in the GCA -station—once.” He nodded earnestly. “Once, Ross. Not six times. No -planet passes up a trading ship.” - -“Mr. Haarland,” Ross exploded, “it seems to me that you’re contradicting -yourself all over the place. Did six planets pass this ship up or didn’t -six planets pass this ship up? Which is it? And why would anybody pass a -longliner up anyhow?” - -Haarland asked, “Suppose the planets were vacant?” - -“What?” Ross was shaken. “But that’s silly! I mean, even I know that the -star charts show which planets are inhabited and which aren’t.” - -“And suppose the star charts are wrong. Suppose the planets have become -vacant. The people have died off, perhaps; their culture decayed.” - -Decay. Death and decay. - -Ross was silent for a long time. He took a deep breath. He said at last, -“Sorry. I won’t interrupt again.” - -Haarland’s expression was a weft of triumph and relief. “Six planets -passed this ship up. Remember Leverett’s ship fifteen years ago? Three -planets passed that one before it came to us. Nine different planets, -all listed on the traditional star charts as inhabited, civilized, -equipped with GCA radars, and everything else needed. Nine planets out -of communication, Ross.” - -Decay, thought Ross. Aloud he said, “Tell me why.” - -Haarland shook his head. “No,” he said strongly, “I want you to tell me. -I’ll tell you what I can. I’ll tell you the message that this ship -brought to me. I’ll tell you all I know, all I’ve told Marconi that he -isn’t man enough to use, and the things that Marconi will never learn, -as well. But why nine planets that used to be pretty much like our own -planet are now out of communication, that you’ll have to tell me.” - -Forward rockets boomed; the braking blasts hurled Ross against the -forward bulkhead. Haarland rummaged under the cot for space suits. He -flung one at Ross. - -“Put it on,” he ordered. “Come to the airlock. I’ll show you what you -can use to find out the answers.” He slid into the pressure suit, dived -weightless down the corridor, Ross zooming after. - -They stood in the airlock, helmets sealed. Wordlessly Haarland opened -the pet cocks, heaved on the lock door. He gestured with an arm. - -Floating alongside them was a ship, a ship like none Ross had ever seen -before. - - - - -..... 4 - - -PICTURE Leif’s longboat bobbing in the swells outside Ambrose Light, -while the twentieth-century liners steam past; a tiny, ancient thing, -related to the new giants only as the Eohippus resembles the horse. - -The ship that Haarland revealed was fully as great a contrast. Ross knew -spaceships as well as any grounder could, both the lumbering interplanet -freighters and the titanic longliners. But the ship that swung around -Halsey’s Planet was a midget (fueled rocket ships must be huge); its -jets were absurdly tiny, clearly incapable of blasting away from -planetary gravity; its entire hull length was unbroken and sheer (did -the pilot dare fly blind?). - -The coupling connections were being rigged between the ships. “Come -aboard,” said Haarland, spryly wriggling through the passage. Ross, -swallowing his astonishment, followed. - -The ship was tiny indeed. When Ross and Haarland, clutching handholds, -were drifting weightlessly in its central control cabin, they very -nearly filled it. There was one other cabin, Ross saw; and the two -compartments accounted for a good nine-tenths of the cubage of the ship. -Where that left space for the combustion chambers and the fuel tanks, -the crew quarters, and the cargo holds, Ross could not imagine. He said: -“All right, Mr. Haarland. Talk.” - -Haarland grinned toothily, his expression eerie in the flickering violet -light that issued from a gutter around the cabin’s wall. - -“This is a spaceship, Ross. It’s a pretty old one—fourteen hundred -years, give or take a little. It’s not much to look at, compared with -the up-to-date models you’re used to, but it’s got a few features that -you won’t find on the new ones. For one thing, Ross, it doesn’t use -rockets.” He hesitated. “Ask me what it does use,” he admitted, “and I -can’t tell you. I know the name, because I read it: nucleophoretic -drive. What nucleophoresis is and how it works, I can’t say. They call -it the Wesley Effect, and the tech manual says something about squared -miles of acceleration. Does that mean anything to you? No. How could it? -But it works, Ross. It works well enough so that this little ship will -get you where you’re going very quickly. The stars, Ross—it will take -you to the stars. Faster than light. What the top speed is I have no -idea; but there is a ship’s log here, too. And it has a three-month -entry—three months, Ross!—in which this little ship explored the solar -systems of fourteen stars.” - -Wide-eyed, Ross held motionless. Haarland paused. “Fourteen hundred -years,” he repeated. “Fourteen hundred years this ship has been floating -out here. And for all that time, the longliners have been crawling from -star to star, while little hidden ships like this one could have carried -a thousand times as much goods a million times faster. Maybe the time -has come to get the ships out of hiding. I don’t know. I want to find -out; I want you to find out for me. I’ll be specific, Ross. I need a -pilot. I’m too old, and Marconi turned it down. Someone has to go out -there——” he gestured to the blind hull and the unseen stars beyond—“and -find out why nine planets are out of communication. Will you do it?” - -Ross opened his mouth to speak, and a thousand questions competed for -utterance. But what he said, barely aloud, was only: “Yes.” - -The far-off stars—more than a thousand million of them in our galaxy -alone. By far the greatest number of them drifted alone through space, -or with only a stellar companion as utterly unlivable by reason of heat -and crushing gravity as themselves. Fewer than one in a million had a -family of planets, and most even of those could never become a home for -human life. - -But out of a thousand million, any fraction may be a very large number, -and the number of habitable planets was in the hundreds. - -Ross had seen the master charts of the inhabited universe often enough -to recognize the names as Haarland mentioned them: Tau Ceti II, Earth, -the eight inhabitable worlds of Capella. But to realize that this -ship—this ship!—had touched down on each of them, and on a hundred more, -was beyond astonishment; it was a dream thing, impossible but -unquestioned. - -Through Haarland’s burning, old eyes, Ross looked back through fourteen -centuries, to the time when this ship was a scout vessel for a -colonizing colossus. The lumbering giant drove slowly through space on -its one-way trip from the planet that built it—was it semi-mythical -Earth? The records were not clear—while the tiny scout probed each star -and solar system as it drew within range. While the mother ship was -covering a few hundred million miles, the scout might flash across -parsecs to scan half a dozen worlds. And when the scout came back with -word of a planet where humans could survive, they christened it with the -name of the scout’s pilot, and the chartroom labored, and the ship’s -officers gave orders, and the giant’s nose swerved through a half a -degree and began its long, slow deceleration. - -“Why slow?” Ross demanded. “Why not use the faster-than-light drive for -the big ships?” - -Haarland grimaced. “I’ve got to answer that one for you sooner or -later,” he said, “but let me make it later. Anyway, that’s what this -ship was: a faster-than-light scout ship for a real longliner. What -happened to the longliner the records don’t show; my guess is the -colonists cannibalized it to get a start in constructing homes for -themselves. But the scout ship was exempted. The captain of the -expedition had it put in an orbit out here, and left alone. It’s been -used a little bit, now and then—my great-grandfather’s father went clear -to 40 Eridani when my great-grandfather was a little boy, but by and -large it has been left alone. It had to be, Ross. For one thing, it’s -dangerous to the man who pilots it. For another, it’s dangerous to—the -Galaxy.” - -Haarland’s view was anthropomorphic; the danger was not to the immense -and uncaring galaxy, but to the sparse fester of life that called itself -humanity. - -When the race abandoned Earth, it was a gesture of revulsion. Behind -them they left a planet that had decimated itself in wars; ahead lay a -cosmos that, in all their searches, had revealed no truly sentient life. - -Earth was a crippled world, the victim of its playing with nuclear -fission and fusion. But the techniques that gave them a -faster-than-light drive gave them as well a weapon that threatened solar -systems, not cities; that could detonate a sun as readily as uranium -could destroy a building. The child with his forbidden matches was now -sitting atop a munitions dump; the danger was no longer a seared hand or -blinded eye, but annihilation. - -And the decision had been made: secrecy. By what condign struggles the -secrecy had been enforced, the secrecy itself concealed. But it had -worked. Once the radiating colonizers had reached their goals, the -nucleophoretic effect had been obliterated from their records and, -except for a single man on each planet, from their minds. - -Why the single man? Why not bury it entirely? - -Haarland said slowly, “There was always the chance that something would -go wrong, you see. And—it has.” - -Ross said hesitantly, “You mean the nine planets that have gone out of -communication?” - -Haarland nodded. He hesitated. “Do you understand it now?” he asked. - -Ross shook his head dizzily. “I’m trying,” he said. “This little ship—it -travels faster than light. It has been circling out here—how long? -Fourteen hundred years? And you kept it secret—you and your ancestors -before you because you were afraid it might be used in war?” He was -frowning. - -“Not ‘afraid’ it would be used,” Haarland corrected gently. “We knew it -would be used.” - -Ross grimaced. “Well, why tell me about it now? Do you expect me to keep -it secret all the rest of my life?” - -“I think you would,” Haarland said soberly. - -“But suppose I didn’t? Suppose I blabbed all over the Galaxy, and it was -used in war?” - -Haarland’s face was suddenly, queerly gray. He said, almost to himself, -“It seems that there are things worse than war.” Abruptly he smiled. -“Let’s find Ma.” - -They returned through the coupling and searched the longliner for the -old woman. A Sonny told them, “Ma usually hangs around the meter room. -Likes to see them blinking.” And there they found her. - -“Hello, Haarland,” she smiled, flashing her superb teeth. “Did you find -what you were looking for?” - -“Perfect, Ma. I want to talk to you under the seal.” - -She looked at Ross. “Him?” she asked. - -“I vouch for him,” Haarland said gravely. “Wesley.” - -She answered, “The limiting velocity is C.” - -“But C^2 is not a velocity,” Haarland said. He turned to Ross. “Sorry -to make a mystery,” he apologized. “It’s a recognition formula. It -identifies one member of what we call the Wesley families, or its -messenger, to another. And these people are messengers. They were -dispatched a couple of centuries ago by a Wesley family whose ship, for -some reason, no longer could be used. Why?—I don’t know why. Try your -luck, maybe you can figure it out. Ma, tell us the history again.” - -She knitted her brows and began to chant slowly: - - “In great-grandfather’s time the target was Clyde, - Rocketry firm and ores on the side. - If we hadn’t of seen them direct we’d of missed ’em; - There wasn’t a blip from the whole damn system. - That was the first. - Before great-grandfather’s day was done - We cut the orbit of Cyrnus One. - The contact there was Trader McCue, - But the sons o’ bitches missed us too. - That was the second. - My grandpa lived to see the green - Of Target Three through the high-powered screen. - But where in hell was Builder Carruthers? - They let us go by like all the others. - That was the——” - -“Ma,” said Haarland. “Thanks very much, but would you skip to the last -one?” - -Ma grinned. - - The Haarland Trading Corp. was last - With the fuel down low and going fast. - I’m glad it was me who saw the day - When they brought us down on GCA. - I told him the message; he called it a mystery, - But anyway this is the end of the history. - And it’s about time! - -“The message, please,” Haarland said broodingly. - -Ma took a deep breath and rattled off: “L-sub-T equals L-sub-zero e to -the minus-T-over-two-N.” - -Ross gaped. “That’s the message?” - -“Used to be more to it,” Ma said cheerfully “That’s all there is now, -though. The darn thing doesn’t rhyme or anything. I guess that’s the -most important part. Anyway, it’s the hardest.” - -“It’s not as bad as it seems,” Haarland told Ross. “I’ve asked around. -It makes a very little sense.” - -“It does?” - -“Well, up to a point,” Haarland qualified. “It seems to be a formula in -genetics. The notation is peculiar, but it’s all explained, of course. -It has something to do with gene loss. Now, maybe that means something -and maybe it doesn’t. But I know something that does mean something: -some member of a Wesley Family a couple of hundred years ago thought it -was important enough to want to get it across to other Wesley families. -Something’s happening. Let’s find out what it is, Ross.” The old man -suddenly buried his face in his hands. In a cracked voice he mumbled, -“Gene loss and war. Gene loss or war. God, I wish somebody would take -this right out of my hands—or that I could drop with a heart attack this -minute. You ever think of war, Ross?” - -Shocked and embarrassed, Ross mumbled some kind of answer. One might -think of war, good breeding taught, but one never talked about it. - -“You should,” the old man said hoarsely. “War is what this -faster-than-light secrecy and identification rigmarole is all about. -Right now war is impossible—between solar systems, anyhow, and that’s -what counts. A planet might just barely manage to fit an invading -multigeneration expedition at gigantic cost, but it never would. The -fruits of victory—loot, political domination, maybe slaves—would never -come back to the fitters of the expedition but to their remote -descendants. A firm will take a flyer on a commercial deal like that, -but no nation would accept a war on any such basis—because a conqueror -is a man, and men die. With F-T-L—faster-than-light travel—they might -invade Curnus or Azor or any of those other tempting dots on the master -maps. Why not? Take the marginal population, hop them up with patriotic -fervor and lust for booty, and ship them off to pillage and destroy. -There’s at least a fifty per cent chance of coming out ahead on the -investment, isn’t there? Much more attractive deal commercially speaking -than our present longliners.” - -Ross had never seen a war. The last on Halsey’s planet had been the -Peninsular Rebellion about a century and a half ago. Some half a million -constitutional psychopathic inferiors had started themselves an ideal -society with theocratic trimmings in a remote and unfruitful corner of -the planet. Starved and frustrated by an unrealistic moral creed they -finally exploded to devastate their neighboring areas and were quickly -quarantined by a radioactive zone. They disintegrated internally, -massacred their priesthood, and were permitted to disperse. It was -regarded as a shameful episode by every dweller on the planet. It wasn’t -a subject for popular filmreels; if you wanted to find out about the -Peninsular Rebellion you went through many successive library doors and -signed your name on lists, and were sternly questioned as to your age -and scholarly qualifications and reasons for sniffing around such an -unsavory mess. - -Ross therefore had not the slightest comprehension of Haarland’s -anxiety. He told him so. - -“I hope you’re right,” was all the old man would say. “I hope you don’t -learn worse.” - - * * * * * - -The rest was work. - -He had the Yard worker’s familiarity with conventional rocketry, which -saved him some study of the fine-maneuvering apparatus of the F-T-L -craft—but not much. For a week under Haarland’s merciless drilling he -jetted the ship about its remote area of space, far from the commerce -lanes, until the old man grudgingly pronounced himself satisfied. - -There were skull-busting sessions with the Wesley drive, or rather with -a first derivative of it, an insane-looking object which you could -vaguely describe as a fan-shaped slide rule taller than a man. There -were twenty-seven main tracks, analogues of the twenty-seven main -geodesics of Wesley Space—whatever they were and whatever that was. Your -cursor settings on the main tracks depended on a thirty-two step -computation based on the apparent magnitudes of the twenty-seven nearest -celestial bodies above a certain mass which varied according to yet -another lengthy relationship. Then, having cleared the preliminaries out -of the way, you began to solve for your actual setting on the F-T-L -drive controls. - -Somehow he mastered it, while Haarland, driving himself harder than he -drove the youth who was to be his exploring eyes and ears, coached him -and cursed him and—somehow!—kept his own complicated affairs going back -on Halsey’s Planet. When Ross had finally got the theory of the Wesley -Drive in some kind of order in his mind, and had learned all there was -to learn about the other worlds, and had cut his few important ties with -Halsey’s Planet, he showed up in Haarland’s planet-based office for a -final, repetitive briefing. - -Marconi was there. - -He had trouble meeting Ross’s eyes, but his handclasp was firm and his -voice warmly friendly—and a little envious. “The very best, Ross,” he -said. “I—I wish——” He hesitated and stammered. He said, in a flood, -“Damn it, I should be going! Do a good job, Ross—and I hope you don’t -hate me.” And he left while Ross, disturbed, went in to see old man -Haarland. - -Haarland spared no time for sentiment. “You’re cleared for space -flight,” he growled. “According to the visa, you’re going to Sunward—in -case anyone asks you between here and the port. Actually, let’s hear -where you _are_ going.” - -Ross said promptly, “I am going on a mission of exploration and -reconnaissance. My first proposed destination is Ragansworld; second -Gemser, third Azor. If I cannot make contact with any of these three -planets, I will select planets at random from the master charts until I -find some Wesley Drive families somewhere. The contacts for the first -three planets are: On Ragansworld, Foley Associates; on Gemser, the -Franklin Foundation; on Azor, Cavallo Machine Tool Company. F-T-L -contacts on other planets are listed in the appendix to the master -charts. The co-ordinates for Ragansworld are——” - -“Skip the co-ordinates,” mumbled Haarland, rubbing his eyes. “What do -you do when you get in contact with a Wesley Drive family?” - -Ross hesitated and licked his lips. “I—well, it’s a little hard——” - -“Dammit,” roared Haarland, “I’ve told you a _thousand_ times——” - -“Yessir, I know. All I meant was I don’t exactly understand what I’m -looking for.” - -“If I knew what you were to look for,” Haarland rasped, “I wouldn’t have -to send you out looking! Can’t you get it through your thick head? -_Something_ is wrong. I don’t know what. Maybe I’m crazy for bothering -about it—heaven knows, I’ve got troubles enough right here—but we -Haarlands have a tradition of service, and maybe it’s so old that we’ve -kind of forgotten just what it’s all about. But it’s not so old that -I’ve forgotten the family tradition. If I had a son, he’d be doing this. -I counted on Marconi to be my son; now all I have left is you. And -that’s little enough, heaven knows,” he finished bitterly. - -Ross, wounded, said by rote: “On landing, I will attempt at once to make -contact with the local Wesley Drive family, using the recognition codes -given me. I will report to them on all the data at hand and suggest the -need for action.” - -Haarland stood up. “All right,” he said. “Sorry I snapped at you. Come -on; I’ll go up to the ship with you.” - -And that was the way it happened. Ross found himself in the longliner, -then with Haarland in the tiny, ancient, faster-than-light ship which -had once been tender to the ship that colonized Halsey’s Planet. He -found himself shaking hands with a red-eyed, suddenly-old Haarland, -watching him crawl through the coupling to the longliner, watching the -longliner blast away. - -He found himself setting up the F-T-L course and throwing in the drive. - - - - -..... 5 - - -ROSS was lucky. The second listed inhabited planet was still inhabited. - -He had not quite stopped shuddering from the first when the approach -radar caught him. The first planet was given in the master charts as -“Ragansworld. Pop. 900,000,000; diam. 9400 m.; mean orbit 0.8 AU,” and -its co-ordinates went on to describe it as the fourth planet of a small -G-type sun. There had been some changes made: the co-ordinates now -intersected well inside a bright and turbulent gas cloud. - -It appeared that suppressing the F-T-L drive had not quite annihilated -war. - -But the second planet, Gemser—there, he was sure, was a world where -nothing was seriously awry. - -He left the ship mumbling a name to himself: “Franklin Foundation.” And -he was greeted by a corporal’s guard of dignified and ceremonially -dressed men; they smiled at him, welcomed him, shook his hand, and -invited him to what seemed to be the local equivalent of the -administration building. He noticed disapprovingly that they didn’t seem -to go in for the elaborate decontamination procedures of Halsey’s -Planet, but perhaps, he thought, they had bred disease-resistance into -their bloodlines. Certainly the four men in his guide party seemed hale -and well-preserved, though the youngest of them was not less than sixty. - -“I would like,” he said, “to be put in touch with the Franklin -Foundation, please.” - -“Come right in here,” beamed one of the four, and another said: - -“Don’t worry about a thing.” They held the door for him, and he walked -into a small and sybaritically furnished room. The second man said, -“Just a few questions. Where are you from?” - -Ross said simply, “Halsey’s Planet,” and waited. - -Nothing happened, except that all four men nodded comprehendingly, and -the questioner made a mark on a sheet of paper. Ross amplified, -“Fifty-three light years away. You know—another star.” - -“Certainly,” the man said briskly. “Your name?” - -Ross told him, but with a considerable feeling of deflation. He thought -wryly of his own feelings about the longlines and the far stars; he -remembered the stir and community excitement that a starship meant back -home. Still, Ross told himself. Halsey’s Planet might be just a back -eddy in the main currents of civilization. Quite possibly on another -world—this one, for instance—travelers from the stars were a -commonplace. The field hadn’t seemed overly busy, though; and there was -nothing resembling a spaceship. Unless—he thought with a sudden sense of -shock—those rusting hulks clumped together at the edge of the field had -once been spaceships. But that was hardly likely, he reassured himself. -You just don’t let spaceships rust. - -“Sex?” the man asked, and “Age?” “Education?” “Marital status?” The -questions went on for more time than Ross quite understood; and they -seemed far from relevant questions for the most part; and some of them -were hard questions to answer. “Tau quotient?” for instance; Ross -blinked and said, with an edge to his voice: - -“I don’t know what a tau quotient is.” - -“Put him down as zero,” one of the men advised, and the interlocutor -nodded happily. - -“Working-with-others rating?” he asked, beaming. - -Ross said with controlled irritation, “Look, I don’t know anything about -these ratings. Will you take me to somebody who can put me in touch with -the Franklin Foundation?” - -The man who was sitting next to him patted him gently on the shoulder. -“Just answer the questions,” he said comfortably. “Everything will be -all right.” - -Ross flared, “The hell everything will——” - -Something with electrified spikes in it hit him on the back of the neck. - -Ross yelled and ducked away; the man next to him returned a little rod -to his pocket. He smiled at Ross. “Don’t feel bad,” he said -sympathetically. “Go ahead now, answer the questions.” - -Ross shook his head dazedly. The pain was already leaving his neck, but -he felt nauseated by the suddenness and sharpness of it; he could not -remember any pain quite like that in his life. He stood up waveringly -and said, “Wait a minute, now——” - -This time it was the man on the other side, and the pain was about twice -as sharp. Ross found himself on the floor, looking up through a haze. -The man on his right kept the rod in his hand, and the expression on his -face, while in no way angry, was stern. “Bad boy,” he said tenderly. -“Why don’t you want to answer the questions?” - -Ross gasped, “God damn it, all I want is to see somebody! Keep your -dirty hands off me, you old fools!” And that was a mistake, as he -learned in the blessedly few minutes before he passed out completely -under the little rods held by the gentle but determined men. - -He answered all the questions—bound to a chair, with two of the men -behind him, when he had regained consciousness. He answered every one. -They only had to hit him twice. - -When they untied him the next morning, Ross had caught on to the local -folkways quite well. The fatherly fellow who released him said, “Follow -me,” and stood back, smiling but with one hand on one of the little -rods. And Ross was careful to say: - -“Yes, sir!” - -They rode in a three-wheeled car, and entered a barracks-like building. -Ross was left alone next to a bed in a dormitory with half a hundred -beds. “Just wait here,” the man said, smiling. “The rest of your group -is out at their morning session now. When they come in for lunch you can -join them. They’ll show you what to do.” - -Ross didn’t have too long to wait. He spent the time in conjecture as -confused as it was fruitless; he had obviously done something wrong, but -just what was it? - -If he had had twice as long he would have got no farther toward an -answer than he was: nowhere. But a noise outside ended his speculations. -He glanced toward the curiously shaped door—all the doors on this planet -seemed to be rectangular. A girl of about eighteen was peering inside. - -She stared at Ross and said, “Oh!” Then she disappeared. There were -footsteps and whispers, and more heads appeared and blinked at him and -were jerked back. - -Ross stood up in wretched apprehension. All of a sudden he was fourteen -years old again, and entering a new school where the old hands were -giggling and whispering about the new boy. He swore sullenly to himself. - -A new face appeared, halted for an inspection of Ross, and walked -confidently in. The man was a good forty years old, Ross thought; -perhaps a kind of overseer in this institution—whatever kind of -institution it was. He approached Ross at a sedate pace, and he was -followed through the door in single file by a couple score men and -women. They ranged in age, Ross thought wonderingly, from the leader’s -forty down to the late teens of the girl who had first peered in the -door, and now was at the end of the procession. - -The leader said, “How old are you?” - -“Why, uh——” Ross figured confusedly: this planet’s annual orbital period -was roughly forty per cent longer than his own; fourteen into his age, -multiplied by ten, making his age in their local calculations.... - -“Why, I’m nineteen of your years old, about. And a half.” - -“Yes. And what can you do?” - -“Look here, sir. I’ve been through all this once. Why don’t you go and -ask those gentlemen who brought me here? And can anybody tell me where -the Franklin Foundation is?” - -The fortyish fellow, with a look of outrage, slapped Ross across the -mouth. Ross knocked him down with a roundhouse right. - -A girl yelled, “Good for you, Junior!” and jumped like a wildcat onto a -slim, gray-haired lady, clawing, and slapping. The throng dissolved -immediately into a wild melee. Ross, busily fighting off the fortyish -fellow and a couple of his stocky buddies, noted only that the scrap was -youth against age, whatever it meant. - -“How _dare_ you?” a voice thundered, and the rioters froze. - -A decrepit wreck was standing in the doorway, surrounded by three or -four gerontological textbook cases only a little less spavined than he. -“Glory,” a girl muttered despairingly. “It would be the minister.” - -“What is the meaning of this brawl?” rolled from the wreck’s shriveled -lips in a rich basso—no; rolled, Ross noted, from a flat perforated -plate on his chest. There was a small, flesh-colored mike slung before -his lips. “Who is responsible here?” asked the golden basso. - -Ross’s fortyish assailant said humbly: “I am, sir. This new fellow -here——” - -“Manners! Speak when you’re spoken to.” - -Abjectly: “Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir.” - -“Silly fools!” the senile wreck hectored them. “I’m going to take no -official notice of this since I’m merely passing through. Luckily for -you this is no formal inspection. But you’ve lost your lunch hour with -your asinine pranks. Now get back to your work and never let me hear of -a disgraceful incident like this again from Junior Unit Twenty-Three.” - -He swept out with his retinue. Ross noted that some of the younger girls -were crying and that the older men and women were glaring at him -murderously. - -“We’ll teach you manners, you pup,” the foreman-type said. “You go on -the dye vats this afternoon. Any more trouble and you’ll miss a few -meals.” - -Ross told him: “Just keep your hands off me, mister.” - -The foreman-type expanded into a beam of pleasure. “I thought you’d be -sensible,” he said. “Everybody to the plant, now!” He collared a pretty -girl of about Ross’s age. “Helena here is working out a bit of insolence -on the dye vats herself. She’ll show you.” The girl stood with downcast -eyes. Ross liked her face and wondered about her figure. Whatever it was -like, it was covered from neck to knee by a loose shirt. But the older -women wore fitted clothes. - -The foreman-type led a grand procession through the door. Helena told -Ross: “I guess you’d better get in front of me in line. I go here——” She -slipped in deftly, and Ross understood a little more of what went on -here. The procession was in order of age. - -He had determined to drift for a day or two—not that he seemed to have -much choice. The Franklin Foundation, supposedly having endured a good -many years, would last another week while he explored the baffling mores -of this place and found out how to circumvent them and find his way to -the keepers of F-T-L on this world. Nobody would go anywhere with his -own ship—not without first running up a setting for the Wesley Drive! - -The line filed into a factory whose like Ross had never before seen. He -had a fair knowledge of and eye for industrial processes; it was clear -that the place was an electric-cable works. But why was the concrete -floor dangerously cracked and sloppily patched? Why was the big -enameling oven rumbling and stinking? Why were the rolling mills in a -far corner unsupplied with guards and big, easy-to-hit emergency -cutoffs? Why was the light bad and the air full of lint? Why did the -pickling tank fume and make the workers around it cough hackingly? Most -pointed of all, why did the dye vats to which Helena led him stink and -slop over? - -There were grimy signs everywhere, including the isolated bay where -braiding cord was dyed the standard code colors. The signs said things -like: AGE IS A PRIVILEGE AND NOT A RIGHT. AGE MUST BE EARNED BY WORK. -GRATITUDE IS THE INDEX OF YOUR PROGRESS TO MATURITY. - -Helena said girlishly as she took his arm and hooked him out of the -moving line: “Here’s Stinkville. Believe me, I’m not going to talk back -again. After all, one’s maturity is measured by one’s acceptance of -one’s environment, isn’t it?” - -“Yeah,” said Ross. “Listen, Helena, have you ever heard of a place -called the Franklin Foundation?” - -“No,” she said. “First you climb up here—golly! I don’t even know your -name.” - -“Ross.” - -“All right, Ross. First you climb up here and make sure the yarn’s -running over the rollers right; sometimes it gets twisted around and -then it breaks. Then you take one of the thermometers from the wall and -you check the vat temperature. It says right on the thermometers what it -should be for the different colors. If it’s off you turn that gas tap up -or down, just a little. Then you check the wringer rolls where the yarn -comes out. Watch your fingers when you do! The yarn comes in different -thicknesses on the same thread so you have to adjust the wringer rolls -so too much dye doesn’t get squeezed out. You can tell by the color; it -shouldn’t be lighter after it goes through the rolls. But the yarn -shouldn’t come through sloppy and drip dye on the floor while it travels -to the bobbin——” - -There was some more, equally uncomplicated. He took the yellow and green -vats; she took the red and blue. They had worked in the choking stench -and heat for perhaps three hours before Ross finished one temperature -check and descended to adjust a gas tap. He found Helena, spent and -gasping, on the floor, hidden from the rest of the shop by the bulky -tanks. - -“Heat knock you out?” he asked briskly. “Don’t try to talk. I’ll tote -you over by the wall away from the burners. Maybe we’ll catch a little -breeze from the windows there.” She nodded weakly. - -He picked her up without too much trouble, carried her three yards or so -to the wall, still isolated from the rest of the shop. She was ripely -curved under that loose shirt, he learned. He set her down easily, -crouching himself, and did not take his hands away. - -It’s been a long time, he thought—and she was responding! Whether she -knew it or not, there was a drowsy smile on her face and her body moved -a little against his hands, pleasurably. She was breathing harder. - -Ross did the sensible thing and kissed her. - -Wildcat! - -Ross reeled back from her fright and anger, his face copiously -scratched. “I’m dreadfully sorry,” he sputtered. “Please accept my -sincerest——” - -The flare-up of rage ended; she was sobbing bitterly, leaning against -the wall, wailing that nobody had ever treated her like that before, -that she’d be set back three years if he told anybody, that she was a -good, self-controlled girl and he had no _right_ to treat her that way, -and what kind of degenerate was he, not yet twenty and going around -kissing girls when _everybody_ knew you went crazy from it. - -He soothed her—from a distance. Her sobbing dropped to a bilious croon -as she climbed the ladder to the yellow vat, tears still on her face, -and checked its temperature. - -Ross, wondering if he were already crazy from too much kissing of girls, -mechanically resumed his duties. But she had responded. And how long had -they been working? And wasn’t this shift ever going to end? - -All the shifts ended in time. But there was a catch to it: There was -always another shift. After the afternoon shift on the dye vats came -dinner—porridge!—and then came the evening shift on the dye vats, and -then sleep. The foreman was lenient, though; he let Ross off the vats -after the end of the second day. Then it was kitchen orderly, and only -two shifts a day. And besides, you got plenty to eat. - -But it was a long, long way, Ross thought sardonically to himself, from -the shining pictures he had painted to himself back on Halsey’s Planet. -Ross the explorer, Ross the hero, Ross the savior of humanity.... - -Ross, the semipermanent KP. - -He had to admit it to himself: The expedition thus far had been a bust. -Not only was it perfectly clear that there no longer was a Franklin -Foundation on Gemser, but more had been lost than time and effort. For -Ross himself, he silently admitted, was as close to lost as he ever -wanted to be. He was, in effect, a prisoner, in a prison from which -there was no easy escape as long as he was cursed with youthfulness.... - -Of course, the implications of that were that there was a perfectly easy -escape in time. All he had to do was get old enough to matter, on this -insane planet. Ninety, maybe. And then he would be perfectly free to -totter out to the spaceport, dragoon a squad of juniors into lifting him -into the ship, and take off.... - -Helena was some help. But only psychologically; she was pleasant -company, but neither she nor anyone else in the roster of forty-eight to -whom he was permitted to speak had ever heard of the Franklin -Foundation, or F-T-L travel, or anything. Helena said, “Wait for -Holiday. Maybe one of the grownups will tell you then?” - -“Holiday?” Ross slid back and scratched his shoulder blades against the -corner of his bed. Helena was sprawled on the floor, half watching a -projected picture on the screen at the end of the dormitory. - -“Yes. You’re lucky, it’s only eight days off. That’s when Dobermann——” -she pointed to the foreman——“graduates; he’s the only one this year. And -we all move up a step, and the new classes come in, and then we all get -everything we want. Well, pretty near,” she amended. “We can’t do -anything _bad_. But you’ll see; it’s nice.” - -Then the picture ended, and it was calisthenics time, and then lights -out. Forty-eight men and women on their forty-eight bunks—the honor -system appeared to work beautifully; there had been no signs of sex play -that Ross had been able to see—slept the sleep of the innocent. While -Ross, the forty-ninth, lay staring into the dark with rising hope. - -In the kitchen the next morning he got more information from Helena. -Holiday seemed to be a cross between saturnalia and Boy’s Week; for one -day of the year the elders slightly relaxed their grip on the reins. On -that day alone one could Speak Before Being Spoken To, Interrupt One’s -Elders, even Leave the Room without Being Excused. - -Whee, Ross thought sourly. But still.... - -The foreman, Dobermann, once you learned how to handle him, wasn’t -such a bad guy. Ross, studying his habits, learned the proper -approach and used it. Dobermann’s commonest complaint was of -irresponsibility—irresponsibility when some thirty-year-old junior -was caught sneaking into line ahead of his proper place, -irresponsibility when Ross forgot to make his bed before stumbling -out in the dark to his kitchen shift, one awful case of -irresponsibility when Helena thoughtlessly poured cold water into -the cooking vat while it was turned on. There was a sizzle, a -crackle, and a puff of steam, and Helena was weeping over a broken -heating element. - -Dobermann came storming over, and Ross saw his chance. “That is very -irresponsible of you, Helena,” he said coldly, back to Dobermann but -entirely conscious of his presence. “If Junior Unit Twenty-Three was all -as irresponsible as you, it would reflect badly on Mr. Dobermann. You -don’t know how lucky you are that Mr. Dobermann is so kind to you.” - -Helena’s weeping dried up instantly; she gave Ross one furious glance, -and lowered her eyes before Dobermann. Dobermann nodded approvingly to -Ross as he waded into Helena; it was a memorable tirade, but Ross heard -only part of it. He was looking at the cooking vat; it was a -simple-minded bit of construction, a spiral of resistance wire around a -ceramic core. The core had cracked and one end of the wire was loose; if -it could be reconnected, the cracked core shouldn’t matter much—the wire -was covered with insulation anyhow. He looked up and opened his mouth to -say something, then remembered and merely stood looking brightly -attentive. - -“——looks like you want to go back to the vats,” the foreman was -finishing. “Well, Helena, if that’s what you want we can make you happy. -This time you’ll be by yourself, too; you won’t have Ross to help you -out when the going’s rough. Will she, Ross?” - -“No, sir,” Ross said immediately. “Sir?” - -Dobermann looked back at him, frowning. “What?” - -“I think I can fix this,” Ross said modestly. - -Dobermann’s eyes bulged. “Fix it?” - -“Yes, sir. It’s only a loose wire. Back where I come from, we all -learned how to take care of things like that when we were still in -school. It’s just a matter of——” - -“Now, hold on, Ross”; the foreman howled. “Tampering with a machine is -bad enough, but if you’re going to turn out to be a liar, too, you’re -going just too far! School, indeed! You know perfectly well, Ross, that -even I won’t be ready for school until after Holiday. Ross, I knew you -were a troublemaker, knew it the first day I set eyes on you. School! -Well, we’ll see how you like the school I’m going to send you to!” - -The vats weren’t so bad the second time. Even though the porridge was -cold for two days, until somebody got around to delivering a different -though equally worn-out cooking vat. - -Helena passed out from the heat three times. And when, on the third -time, Ross, goaded beyond endurance, kissed her again, there were no -hysterics. - - - - -..... 6 - - -FROM birth to puberty you were an infant. From puberty to Dobermann’s -age, a junior. For ten years after that you went to school, learning the -things you had neither the need nor the right to know before. - -And then you were Of Age. - -Being Of Age meant much, much more than voting, Ross found out. For one -thing, it meant freedom to marry—after the enforced sexlessness of the -junior years and the directed breeding via artificial insemination of -the Scholars. It meant a healthy head start on seniority, which carried -with it all offices and all power. - -It meant freedom. - -As a bare beginning, it meant the freedom to command any number of -juniors or scholars. On Ross’s last punitive day in the dye vats, a -happy ancient commandeered the entire staff to help set shrubs in his -front lawn—a good dozen acres of careful landscaping it was, and the -prettiest sight Ross had seen on this ugly planet. - -When they got back to the dye vats, the yellow and blue had boiled over, -and broken strands of yarn had fouled all the bobbins. Dobermann -raged—at the juniors. - -But then Dobermann’s raging came to an end forever. It was the night -before Holiday, and there was a pretty ceremony as he packed his kit and -got ready to turn Junior Unit Twenty-three over to his successor. -Everyone was scrubbed, and though a certain amount of license in regard -to neatness was allowed between dinner and lights out, each bunk was -made and carefully smoothed free of wrinkles. After half an hour of -fidgety waiting, Dobermann called—needlessly—for attention, and the -minister came in with his ancient retinue. - -The rich mechanical voice boomed out from his breastplate: “Junior -Dobermann, today you are a man!” - -Dobermann stood with his head bowed, silent and content. Junior Unit -Twenty-Three chanted antiphonally: “Good-by, Junior Dobermann!” - -The retinue took three steps forward, and the minister boomed, “Beauty -comes with age. Age is beauty!” - -And the chorus: “Old heads are wisest!” Ross, standing as straight as -any of them, faked the words with his lips and tongue, and wondered how -many repetitions had drilled those sentiments into Junior Unit -Twenty-Three. - -There were five more chants, and five responses, and then the minister -and his court of four were standing next to Dobermann. Breathing heavily -from his exertions, the minister reached behind him and took a book from -the hands of the nearest of his retinue. He said, panting, “Scholar -Dobermann, in the Book lies the words of the Fathers. Read them and -learn.” - -The chorus cried thrice, “The Word of the Fathers Is Law.” And then the -minister touched Dobermann’s hand, and in solemn silence, left. - -As soon as the elders had gone, the juniors flocked around Dobermann to -wish him well. There was excited laughter in the congratulations, and a -touch of apprehension too: Dobermann, with all his faults, was a known -quantity, and the members of Junior Unit Twenty-Three were beginning to -look a little fearfully at the short, redheaded youth who, from the next -day on, would be Dobermann’s successor. - -Ross promised himself: He can be good or bad, a blessing or a problem. -But he won’t be _my_ problem. I’m getting out of here tomorrow! - -Holiday. - -“Oh, it’s fun,” Helena told him enthusiastically. “First you get up -early to get the voting out of the way——” - -“Voting?” - -“Sure. Don’t they vote where you come from? I thought everybody voted. -That’s democracy, like we have it here.” - -He sardonically quoted one of the omnipresent wall signs: “THE HAPPINESS -OF THE MAJORITY MEANS THE HAPPINESS OF THE MINORITY.” He had often -wondered what, if anything, it meant. But Helena solemnly nodded. - -They were whispering from their adjoining cots by dim, false dawn -filtering through the windows on Holiday morning. They were not the only -whisperers. Things were relaxing already. - -“Ross,” Helena said. - -“Yes?” - -“I thought maybe you might not know. On Holiday if you, ah, want to do -that again you don’t have to wait until I faint. Ah, of course you don’t -do it right out in the open.” Overcome by her own daring she buried her -head under the coarse blanket. - -Fine, thought Ross wearily. Once a year—or did Holiday come once a -year?—the kids were allowed to play “Spin The Bottle.” No doubt their -elders thought it was too cute for words: mere tots of thirty and -thirty-five childishly and innocently experimenting with sex. Of course -it would be discreetly supervised so that nobody would Get In Trouble. - -He was quite sure Helena’s last two faints had been unconvincing -phonies. - - * * * * * - -The wake-up whistle blew at last. The chattering members of Junior Unit -Twenty-Three dawdled while they dressed, and the new foreman indulgently -passed out shabby, smutted ribbons which the girls tied in their hair. -They had sugar on their mush for breakfast, and Ross’s stomach came near -turning as he heard burbles of gratitude at the feast. - -With pushing and a certain amount of inexpert horseplay they formed a -column of fours and hiked from the hall—from the whole factory complex, -indeed, along a rubberized highway. - -Once you got out of the factory area things became pleasanter by the -mile. Hortatory roadside signs thinned out and vanished. Stinking -middens of industrial waste were left behind. And then the landscape was -rolling, sodded acres with the road pleasantly springy underfoot, the -air clean and crisp. - -They oohed and aahed at houses glimpsed occasionally in the -distance—always rambling, one-story affairs that looked spanking-new. - -Once a car overhauled them on the highway and slowed to a crawl. It was -a huge thing, richly upholstered within. A pair of grimlooking youths -were respectively chauffeur and footman; the passenger waved at the -troop from Junior Twenty-Three and grinned out of a fantastic landscape -of wrinkles. Ross gaped. Had he thought the visiting minister was old? -This creature, male or female, was _old_. - -After the car sped on, to the cheers of the marchers, there was happy -twittering speculation. Junior Twenty-Three didn’t recognize the Citizen -who had graciously waved to them, but they thought he—or she?—was -wonderful. So dignified, so distinguished, so learned, so gracious, so -democratic! - -“Wasn’t it sweet of him?” Helena burbled. “And I’m sure he must be -somebody important connected with the voting, otherwise he’d just vote -from home.” - -Ross’s feet were beginning to hurt when they reached the suburban -center. To the best of his recollection, they were no more than eight or -ten kilos from the field and his starship. Backtrack on the road to the -suburban center about three kilos, take the fork to the right, and that -would be that. - -Junior Twenty-Three reached a pitch of near-ecstasy marveling at the -low, spacious buildings of the center. Through sweeping, transparent -windows they saw acres of food and clothing in the shopping center; the -Drive-In Theater was an architectural miracle. The Civic Center almost -finished them off, with its statue of Equal Justice Under the Law (a -dignified beldame whose chin and nose almost met, leaning on a -gem-crusted crutch) and Civic Virtue (in a motorized wheelchair equipped -with an emergency oxygen tent, Lindbergh-Carrel auxiliary blood pump and -an artificial kidney). - -Merry oldsters were everywhere in their cars and wheelchairs, gaily -waving at the kids. Only one untoward incident marred their prevoting -tour of inspection. A thick-headed young man mistakenly called out a -cheerful: “Life and wisdom, ma’am!” to a beaming oldster. - -“Ma’am, is it?” the oldster roared through his throat mike and amplifier -in an unmistakable baritone. “I’ll ma’am you, you wise punk!” He spun -his wheelchair on a decishield, threw it into high and roared down on -the offender, running him over. The boy covered himself as well as he -could while the raging old man backed over him again and ran over him -again. His ordeal ended when the oldster collapsed forward in the chair, -hanging from his safety belt. - -The boy got up with tire marks on him and groaned: “Oh, lord! I’ve hurt -him.” He appealed hysterically: “What’ll I do? Is he dead?” - -Another Senior Citizen buzzed up and snapped: “Cut in his L-C heart, you -booby!” - -The boy turned on the Lindbergh-Carrel pump, trembling. The white-faced -juniors of Twenty-Three watched as the tubes to the oldster’s left arm -throbbed and pulsed. A massive sigh went up when the old man’s eyes -opened and he sat up groggily. “What happened?” - -“You died again, Sherrington,” said the other elder. “Third time this -week—good thing there was a responsible person around. Now get over to -the medical center this minute and have a complete checkup. Hear me?” - -“Yes, Dad,” Sherrington said weakly. He rolled off in low gear. - -His father turned to the youngster who stood vacantly rubbing the tire -marks on his face. “Since it’s Holiday,” he grated, “I’ll let this pass. -On any other day I would have seen to it that you were set back fifteen -years for your disgraceful negligence.” - -Ross knew by then what that meant, and shuddered with the rest. It -amounted to a death sentence, did fifteen additional years of the -grinding toil and marginal diet of a junior. - -Somewhat dampened they proceeded to the Hall of Democracy, a glittering -place replete with slogans, statues, and heroic portraits of the heroic -aged. Twenty-Three huddled together as it joined with a stream of -juniors from the area’s other factory units. Most of them were larger -than the cable works; many of them, apparently, involved more wearing -and hazardous occupations. Some groups coughed incessantly and were -red-eyed from the irritation of some chemical. Others must have been -heavy-manual-labor specialists. They were divided into the hale, whose -muscles bulged amazingly, and the dying—men and women who obviously -could not take the work but who were doing it anyway. - -They seated themselves at long benches, with push buttons at each -station. Helena, next to him, explained the system to Ross. Voting was -universal and simultaneous, in all the Halls of Democracy around the -planet and from all the homes of the Senior Citizens who did not choose -to vote from a Hall. Simultaneously the votes were counted at a central -station and the results were flashed to screens in the Centers and -homes. She said a number of enthusiastic things about Democracy while -Ross studied a sheet on which the candidates and propositions were -listed. - -The names meant nothing to him. He noted only that each of three -candidates for Chief of State was one hundred thirty years old, that -each of three candidates for First Assistant Chief was one hundred and -twenty-seven years old, and so on. Obviously the nominating conventions -by agreement named candidates of the same age for each office to keep it -a contest. - -Proposition One read: “To dismantle seven pediatric centers and apply -the salvage value to the construction of, and the funds no longer -required for their maintenance to the maintenance of, a new wing of the -Gerontological Center, said wing to be devoted to basic research in the -extension of human life.” - -Proposition Two was worse. Ross didn’t bother to read the rest of them. -He whispered hoarsely to Helena, “What next?” - -“Ssh!” She pointed to a screen at the front of the Hall. “It’s -starting.” - -A Senior Citizen of a very high rank (his face was entirely hidden by an -oxygen mask) was speaking from the screen. There was what seemed to be a -ritual speech of invocation, then he got down to business. “Citizens,” -he said through his throat mike, “behold Democracy in Action! I give you -three candidates for Chief of State—look them over, and make up your -minds. First, Citizen Raphael Flexner, age one century, three decades, -seven months, ten days.” Senior Citizen Flexner rolled on screen, spoke -briefly through his throat mike and rolled off. The first speaker said -again, “Behold Democracy in Action! See now Citizen Sheridan Farnsworth, -age one century, three decades, ten months, forty-two days.” Applause -boomed louder; some of the younger juniors yelled hysterically and -drummed their heels on the floor. - -Helena was panting with excitement, eyes bright on the screen. “Isn’t it -_wonderful_?” she gasped ecstatically. “Oh, look at _him_!” - -“Him” was the third candidate, and the first oldster Ross had seen whose -gocart was a wheeled stretcher. Prone and almost invisible through the -clusters of tubing and chromed equipment, Senior Citizen Immanuel -Appleby acknowledged his introduction—“Age one century, three decades, -eleven months and five days!” The crowd went mad; Helena broke from -Ross’s side and joined a long yelling snake dance through the corridors. - -Ross yelled experimentally as protective coloration, then found himself -yelling because everybody was yelling, because he couldn’t help it. By -the time the speaker on the screen began to call for order, Ross was -standing on top of the voting bench and screaming his head off. - -Helena, weeping with excitement, tugged at his leg. “Vote now, Ross,” -she begged, and all over the hall the cry was “Vote! Vote!” - -Ross reached out for the voting buttons. “What do we do now?” he asked -Helena. - -“Push the button marked ‘Appleby,’ of course. Hurry!” - -“But why Appleby?” Ross objected. “That fellow Flexner, for instance——” - -“Hush, Ross! Somebody might be listening.” There was sickening fright on -Helena’s face. “Didn’t you hear? We _have_ to vote for the best man. -‘Oldest Is Bestest,’ you know. That’s what Democracy _means_, the -freedom of choice. They read us the ages, and we choose which is oldest. -Now please, Ross, hurry before somebody starts asking questions!” - -The voting was over, and the best man had won in every case. It was a -triumph for informed public opinion. The mob poured out of the hall in -happy-go-lucky order, all precedences and formalities suspended for -Holiday. - -Helena grasped Ross firmly by the arm. The crowd was spreading over the -quiet acres surrounding the Center, each little cluster heedlessly -intent on a long-planned project of its own. Under the pressure of -Helena’s arm, Ross found himself swerving toward a clump of shrubbery. - -He said violently, “No! That is, I mean I’m sorry, Helena, but I’ve got -something to do.” - -She stared at him with shock in her eyes. “On Holiday?” - -“On Holiday. Truly, Helena, I’m sorry. Look, what you said last -night—from now till tomorrow morning, I can do what I want, right?” - -Sullenly, “Yes. I _thought_, Ross, that I _knew_ what——” - -“Okay.” He jerked his arm away, feeling like all of the hundred possible -kinds of a skunk. “See you around,” he said over his shoulder. He did -not look back. - -Three kilos back, he told himself firmly, then the right-hand fork in -the road. And not more than a dozen kilos, at the most, to the -spaceport. He could do it in a couple of hours. - -One thing had been established for certain: If ever there had been a -“Franklin Foundation” on this planet, it was gone for good now. -Dismantled, no doubt, to provide building materials for an eartrumpet -plant. No doubt the little F-T-L ship that the Franklin Foundation was -supposed to cover for was still swinging in an orbit within easy range -of the spaceport; but the chance that anybody would ever find it, or use -it if found, was pretty close to zero. If they bothered to maintain a -radar watch at all—any other watch than the fully automatic one set to -respond only to highvelocity interstellar ships—and if anyone ever took -time to look at the radar plot, no doubt the F-T-L ship was charted. As -an asteroid, satellite, derelict or “body of unknown origin.” Certainly -no one of these smug oldsters would take the trouble to investigate. - -The only problem to solve on this planet was how to get off it—fast. - -On the road ahead of him was what appeared to be a combination sex orgy -and free-for-all. It rolled in a yelling, milling mob of half a hundred -excited juniors across the road toward him, then swerved into the fields -as a cluster of screaming women broke free and ran, and the rest of the -crowd roared after them. - -Ross quickened his step. If he ever did get off this planet, it would -have to be today; he was not fool enough to think that any ordinary day -would give him the freedom to poke around the spaceport’s defenses. And -it would be just his luck, he thought bitterly, to get involved in a -gang fight on the way to the port. - -There was a squeal of tires behind him, and a little vehicle screeched -to a halt. Ross threw up a defensive arm in automatic reflex. - -But it was only Helena, awkwardly fumbling open the door of the car. -“Get in,” she said sourly. “You’ve spoiled _my_ Holiday. Might as well -do what _you_ want to do.” - - * * * * * - -“What’s that?” - -Helena looked where he was pointing, and shrugged. “Guard box,” she -guessed. “How would I know? Nobody’s in it, anyhow.” - -Ross nodded. They had abandoned the car and were standing outside a -long, seamless fence that surrounded the spaceport. The main gates were -closed and locked; a few hundred feet to the right was a smaller gate -with a sort of pillbox, but that had every appearance of being locked -too. - -“All right,” said Ross. “See that shed with the boxes outside it? Over -we go.” - -The shed was right up against the fence; the metal boxes gave a sort of -rough and just barely climbable foothold. Helena was easy enough to lift -to the top of the shed; Ross, grunting, managed to clamber after her. - -They looked down at the ground on the other side, a dozen feet away. -“You don’t have to come along,” Ross told her. - -“That’s just _like_ you!” she flared. “Cast me aside—trample on me!” - -“All right, all right.” Ross looked around, but neither junior nor elder -was anywhere in sight. “Hang by your hands and then drop,” he advised -her. “Get moving before somebody shows up.” - -“On Holiday?” she asked bitterly. She squirmed over the narrow top of -the fence, legs dangling, let herself down as far as she could, and let -go. Ross watched anxiously, but she got up quickly enough and moved to -one side. - -Ross plopped down next to her, knocking the wind out of himself. He got -up dizzily. - -His ship, in lonesome quiet, was less than a quarter of a mile away. -“Let’s go,” Ross panted, and clutched her hand. They skirted another -shed and were in the clear, running as fast as they could. - -Almost in the clear. - -Ross heard the whine of the little scooter before he felt the blow, but -it was too late. He sprawled on the ground, dragging Helena after him. - -A Senior Citizen with a long-handled rod of the sort Ross remembered all -too well was scowling down at them. “Children,” he rumbled through his -breast-speaker in a voice of awful disgust, “is this the way to act on -Holiday?” - -Helena, gibbering in terror, was beyond words. Ross croaked, “Sorry, -sir. We—we were just——” - -Crash! The rod came down again, and every muscle in Ross’s body -convulsed. He rolled helplessly away, the elder following him. Crash! -“We give you Holiday,” the elder boomed, “and——” crash “——you act like -animals. Terrible! Don’t you know that freedom of play on Holiday——” -crash “——is the most sacred right of every junior——” crash “——and heaven -help you——” crash “——if you abuse it!” - -The wrenching punishment and the caressing voice stopped together. Ross -lay blinking into the terrible silence that followed. He became -conscious of Helena’s weeping, and forced his head to turn to look at -her. - -She was standing behind the elder’s scooter, a length of wire in her -hand. The senior lay slumped against his safety strap. “Ross!” she -moaned. “Ross, what have I done? _I turned him off!_” - -He stood up, coughing and retching. No one else was in sight, only the -two of them and the silent, slack form of the old man. He grabbed her -arm. “Come on,” he said fuzzily, and started toward the starship. - -She hung back, mumbling to herself, her eyes saucers. She was in a state -of grievous shock, it was clear. - -Ross hesitated, rubbing his back. He knew that she might never pull out -of it. Even if she did, she was certain to be a frightful handicap. But -it was crystal-clear that she had declared herself on his side. Even if -the elder could be revived, the punishment in store for Helena would be -awful to contemplate.... - -Come what may, he was now responsible for Helena. - -He towed her to the starship. She climbed in docilely enough, sat -staring blankly as he sealed ship and sent it blasting off the face of -the planet. - - * * * * * - -She didn’t speak until they were well into deep space. Then the blank -stare abruptly clouded and she exploded in a fit of tears. Ross said -ineffectually, “There, there.” It had no effect; until, in its own time, -the storm ended. - -Helena said hoarsely, “Wh-what do I do now?” - -“Why, I guess you come right along with me,” Ross said heartily, cursing -his luck. - -“Where’s that?” - -“Where? You mean, where?” Ross scratched his head. “Well, let’s see. -Frankly, Helena, your planet was quite a disappointment to me. I had -hoped——Well, no matter. I suppose the best thing to do is to look up the -next planet on the list.” - -“What list?” - -Ross hesitated, then shrugged and plunged into the explanation. All -about the longliners and the message and faster-than-light travel and -the Wesley Families—and none of it, while he was talking, seemed -convincing at all. But perhaps Helena was less critical; or perhaps -Helena simply did not care. She listened attentively and made no -comment. She only said, at the end, “What’s the name of the next -planet?” - -He consulted the master charts. Haarland’s listing showed a place called -Azor, conveniently near at hand in the strange geodesics of the Wesley -Effect, where the far galaxies might be near at hand in the warped -space-lines, and the void just beyond the viewplates be infinitely -distant. The F-T-L family of Azor was named Cavallo; when last heard -from, they had been builders of machine tools. - -Ross told Helena about it. She shrugged and watched curiously as he -began to set up the F-T-L problem on the huge board. - - - - -..... 7 - - -THEY were well within detection range of Azor’s radar, if any, and yet -there had been no beeping signal that the planet’s GCA had taken over -and would pilot them down. Another blank? He studied the surface of the -world under his highest magnification and saw no signs that it had been -devastated by war. There were cities—intact, as far as he could tell, -but not very attractive. The design ran to huge, gloomy piles that -mounted toward central towers. - -Azor was a big world which showed not much water and a great deal of -black rock. It was the fifth of its system and reportedly had colonized -its four adjacent neighbors and their moons. - -His own search radar pinged. The signal was followed at once by a -guarded voice from his ship-to-ship communicator: “What ship are you? Do -you receive me? The band is 798.44.” - -He hastily dialed the frequency on his transmitter and called, “I -receive you. We are a vessel from outside your solar system, home planet -Halsey. We want to contact a family named Cavallo of the planet Azor -believed to be engaged in building machine tools. Can you help us?” - -“You are a male?” the voice asked cautiously. “In command or simply the -communicator?” - -“I’m a male and I’m in command of this vessel.” - -The voice said: “Then sheer off this system and go elsewhere, my -friend.” - -“What is this? Who are you?” - -“My name does not matter. I happen to be on watch aboard the prison -orbital station ‘Minerva.’ Get going, my friend, before the planetary -GCA picks you up.” - -Prison orbital station? A very sensible idea. “Thanks for the advice,” -he parried. “Can you tell me anything about the Cavallo family?” - -“I have heard of them. My friend, your time is running out. If you do -not sheer off very soon they will land you. And I judge from the tone of -your voice that it will not be long before you join the rest of us -criminals aboard ‘Minerva.’ It is not pleasant here. Good-by.” - -“Wait, please!” Ross had no intention at all of committing any crimes -that would land him aboard a prison hulk, and he had every intention of -fulfilling his mission. “Tell me about the Cavallo family—and why you -expect me to get in trouble on Azor.” - -“The time is running out, my friend, but—the Cavallo family of machine -tool builders is located in Novj Grad. And the crime of which all of us -aboard ‘Minerva’ were convicted is conspiracy to advocate equality of -the sexes. Now go!” - -The carrier-wave hum of the communicator died, but immediately there was -another electronic noise to fill the cabin—the beep of a GCA radar -taking over the sealed landing controls of the craft. - -Helena had been listening with very little comprehension. “Who was your -friend, Ross?” she asked. “Where are we?” - -“I think,” Ross said, “he _was_ my friend. And I think we are—in -trouble.” - -The ship began to jet tentative bursts of reaction mass, nosing toward -the big, gloomy planet. - -“That’s all right,” Helena said comfortably. “At least they won’t know I -disconnected a Senior Citizen.” She thought a moment. “They won’t, will -they? I mean, the Senior Citizens here won’t know about the Senior -Citizens there, will they?” - -He tried to break it to her gently as the ship picked up speed. “Helena, -it’s possible that the old people here won’t be Senior Citizens—not in -your planet’s sense. They may just be old people, with no special -authority over young people. I think, in fact, that we may find you -outranking older people who happen to be males.” - -She took it as a joke. “You are funny, Ross. Old means Senior, doesn’t -it? And Senior means better, wiser, abler, and in charge, doesn’t it?” - -“We’ll see,” he said thoughtfully as the main reaction drive cut in. -“We’ll see very shortly.” - - * * * * * - -The spaceport was bustling, busy, and efficient. Ross marveled at the -speed and dexterity with which the anonymous ground operator whipped his -ship into a braking orbit and set it down. And he stared enviously at -the crawling clamshells on treads, bigger than houses, that cupped -around his ship; the ship was completely and hermetically surrounded, -and bathed in a mist of germicides and prophylactic rays. - -A helmeted figure riding a little platform on the inside of one of the -clamshells turned a series of knobs, climbed down, and rapped on the -ship’s entrance port. - -Ross opened it diffidently, and almost strangled in the antiseptic -fumes. Helena choked and wheezed behind him as the figure threw back its -helmet and said, “Where’s the captain?” - -“I am he,” said Ross meticulously. “I would like to be put in touch with -the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company of Novj Grad.” - -The figure shook its long hair loose, which provided Ross with the -necessary clue: it was a woman. Not a very attractive-looking woman, for -she wore no makeup; but by the hair, by the brows and by the smoothness -of her chin, a woman all the same. She said coldly, “If you’re the -captain, who’s that?” - -Helena said in a small voice, “I’m Helena, from Junior Unit -Twenty-Three.” - -“Indeed.” Suddenly the woman smiled. “Well, come ashore, dear,” she -said. “You must be tired from your trip. Both of you come ashore,” she -added graciously. - -She led the way out of the clamshells to a waiting closed car. Azor’s -sun had an unpleasant bluish cast to it, not a type-G at all; Ross -thought that the lighting made the woman look uglier than she really had -to be. Even Helena looked pinched and bloodless, which he knew well was -not the case at all. - -All around them was activity. Whatever this planet’s faults, it was not -a stagnant home for graybeards. Ross, craning, saw nothing that was -shoddy, nothing that would have looked out of place in the best-equipped -port of Halsey’s Planet. And the reception lounge, or whatever it was, -that the woman took them to was a handsome and prettily furnished -construction. “Some lunch?” the woman asked, directing her attention to -Helena. “A cup of tribrew, maybe? Let me have the boy bring some.” -Helena looked to Ross for signals, and Ross, gritting his teeth, nodded -to her to agree. Too young the last time, too male this time; was there -ever going to be a planet where he mattered to anyone? - -He said desperately, “Madam, forgive my interruption, but this lady and -myself need urgently to get in touch with the Cavallo company. Is this -Novj Grad?” - -The woman’s pale brows arched. She said, with an effort, “No, it is -not.” - -“Then can you tell us where Novj Grad is?” Ross persisted. “If they have -a spaceport, we can hop over there in our ship——” - -The woman gasped something that sounded like, “Well!” She stood up and -said pointedly to Helena, “If you’ll excuse me, I have something to -attend to.” And swept out. - -Helena stared wide-eyed at Ross. “She must’ve been a real Senior -Citizen, huh?” - -“Not exactly,” said Ross despairingly. “Look, Helena, things are -different here. I need your help.” - -“Help?” - -“Yes, help!” he bellowed. “Get a grip on yourself, girl. Remember what I -told you about the planet I came from? It was different from yours, -remember? The old people were just like anybody else.” She giggled in -embarrassment. “They were!” he yelled. “And they are here, too. Old -people, young people, doesn’t matter. On my planet, the richest people -were—well, never mind. On this planet, women are the bosses. Get it? -Women are like elders. So you’ll have to take over, Helena.” - -She was looking at him with a puzzled frown. She objected, “But if women -are——” - -“They are. Never mind about that part of it now; just remember that for -the purposes of getting along here, you’re going to be my boss. You tell -me what to do. You talk to everybody. And what you have to say to them -is this: You must get to Novj Grad immediately, and talk to a -high-ranking member of the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company. Clear? Once we -get there, I’ll take over; everything will be under control then.” He -added prayerfully, “I hope.” - -Helena blinked at him. “I’m going to be your boss?” she asked. - -“That’s right.” - -“Like an elder bosses a junior? And it’s legal?” - -Ross started to repeat, “That’s right,” impatiently again. But there was -a peculiar look in Helena’s round eyes. “Helena!” he said warningly. - -She was all concern. “Why, what is it, Ross?” she asked solicitously. -“You look upset. Just leave everything to me, dear.” - - * * * * * - -They got started on the way to Novj Grad—not in their ship (the woman -had said there was no spaceport in Novj Grad), and not alone, so that -Ross could not confirm his unhappy opinion of Helena’s inner thoughts. -But at least they were on their way to Novj Grad in the Azorian -equivalent of a chartered aircraft, with Helena chatting happily with -the female pilot, and Ross sitting uncomfortably on a narrow, -upholstered strip behind. - -Everything he saw in Azor confirmed his first impressions. The planet -was busy and prosperous. Nobody seemed to be doing anything very -productive, he thought, but somehow everything seemed to get done. -Automatic machinery, he guessed; if women were to have any chance of -gaining the upper hand on a planet, most of the hard physical work would -have to be fairly well mechanized anyhow. And particularly on this -planet. They had been flying for six hours, at a speed he guessed to be -not much below that of sound, and fully half of the territory they -passed over was bare, black rock. - -The ship began losing altitude, and the pilot, who had been curled up in -a relaxed position, totally ignoring the aircraft, glanced at her -instrument panel. “Coming in for a landing,” she warned. “Don’t distract -me right now, dear, I’ve got a thousand things to do.” - -She didn’t seem to be doing any of them, Ross thought disapprovingly; -all she did was watch varicolored lights blink on and off. But no doubt -the ship landing, too, was as automatic as the piloting. - -Helena turned and leaned back to Ross. “We’re coming in for a landing,” -she relayed. - -Ross said sourly, “I heard.” - -Helena gave him a look of reprimand and forgiveness. “I’m hungry,” she -mused. - -The pilot turned from her controls. “You can get something at the -airport,” she offered eagerly. “I’ll show you.” - -Helena looked at Ross. “Would you like something?” - -But the pilot frowned. “I don’t believe there’s any place for men,” she -said disapprovingly. “Perhaps we can get something sent out for him if -you like. Although, really, it’s probably against the rules, you know.” - -Ross started to say with great dignity, “Thank you, but that won’t be -necessary.” But he didn’t quite get it out. The ship came in for its -landing. There was an enormous jolt and a squawk of alarm bells and -flashing lights. The ship careened crazily, and stopped. - -“Oh, darn,” complained the pilot mildly. “It’s always doing that. Come -on, dear, let’s get something to eat. We’ll come back for _him_ later.” - -And Ross was left alone to stare apprehensively at the unceasingly -flashing lights and to listen to the strident alarms for three-quarters -of an hour. - -His luck was in, though. The ship didn’t explode. And eventually a -pallid young man in a greasy apron appeared with a tray of sandwiches -and a vacuum jug. - -“Up here, boy,” Ross called. - -He gaped through the port. “You mean come in?” - -“Sure. It’s all right.” - -The young man put down the tray. Something in the way he looked at it -prompted Ross to invite him: “Have some with me? More here than I can -handle.” - -“Thanks; I believe I will. I, uh, was supposed to take my break after I -brought you this stuff.” He poured steaming brew into the cup that -covered the jug, politely pushed it to Ross and swigged from the jug -himself. “You’re with the starship?” he asked, around a mouthful of -sandwich. - -“Yes. I—the captain, that is—wants to contact an outfit called Cavallo -Machine-Tool. You know where they are?” - -“Sure. Biggest firm on the south side. Fifteen Street; you can’t miss -them. The captain—is she the lady who was with Pilot Breuer?” - -“Yes.” - -The youngster’s eyes widened. “You mean you were in space—alone—with a -lady?” - -Ross nodded and chewed. - -“And she didn’t—uh—there wasn’t—well—any problem?” - -“No,” said Ross. “You have much trouble with that kind of thing?” - -The boy winced. “If I’ve asked once I’ve asked a hundred times for a -transfer. Oh, those jet pilots! I used to work in a roadside truck stop. -I know truckers are supposed to be rough and tough; maybe they are. But -you can’t tell me that deep down a trucker isn’t a lady. When you tell -them no, that’s that. But a pilot—it just eggs them on. Azor City today, -Novj Grad tomorrow—what do they care?” - -Ross was fascinated and baffled. It seemed to him that they should care -and care plenty. Back where he came from, it was the woman who paid and -he couldn’t imagine any cultural setup which could alter that biological -fact. He asked cautiously: “Have you ever been—in trouble?” - -The boy stiffened and looked disapproving. Then he said with a sigh: “I -might as well tell you. It’s all over the station anyway; they call me -‘Bernie the Pullover.’ Yes. Twice. Pilots both times. I can’t seem to -say no——” He took another long pull from the jug and a savage bite from -a second sandwich. - -“I’m sure,” Ross said numbly, “it wasn’t your fault.” - -“Try telling that to the judge,” Bernie the Pullover said bitterly. “The -pilot speaks her piece, the medic puts the blood group tests in -evidence, the doctor and crèche director depose that the child was born -and is still living. Then the judge says, without even looking up, -‘Paternity judgment to the plaintiff, defendant ordered to pay one -thousand credits annual support, let this be a warning to you, young -man, next case.’ I shouldn’t have joined you and eaten your sandwiches, -but the fact is I was hungry. I had to sell my meal voucher yesterday to -meet my payment. Miss three payments and——” He jerked his thumb -heavenward. - -Ross thought and realized that the thumb must indicate the orbiting -prison hulk “Minerva.” It _was_ the man who paid here. - -He demanded: “How did all this happen?” - -Bernie, having admitted his hunger, had stopped stalling and seized a -third sandwich. “All what?” he asked indistinctly. - -Ross thought hard and long. He realized first that he could probably -never explain what he meant to Bernie, and second that if he did they’d -probably both wind up aboard “Minerva” for conspiracy to advocate -equality. He shifted his ground. “Of course everybody agrees on the -natural superiority of women,” he said, “but people seem to differ from -planet to planet as to the reasons. What do they say here on Azor?” - -“Oh—nothing special or fancy. Just the common-sense, logical thing. -They’re smaller, for one thing, and haven’t got the muscles of men, so -they’re natural supervisors. They accumulate money as a matter of course -because men die younger and women are the beneficiaries. Then, women -have a natural aptitude for all the interesting jobs. I saw a broadcast -about that just the other night. The biggest specialist on the planet in -vocational aptitude. I forget her name, but she proved it conclusively.” - -He looked at the empty platter before them. “I’ve got to go now. Thanks -for everything.” - -“The pleasure was mine.” Ross watched his undernourished figure head for -the station. He swore a little, and then buckled down to some hard -thinking. Helena was his key to this world. He’d have to have a long -skull-session or two with her; he couldn’t be constantly prompting her -or there would be serious trouble. She would be the front and he would -be the very inconspicuous brains of the outfit, trailing humbly behind. -But was she capable of absorbing a brand-new, rather complicated -concept? She seemed to be, he told himself uncomfortably, in love with -him. That would help considerably.... - -Helena and Pilot Breuer showed up, walking with a languor that suggested -a large and pleasant meal disposed of. Helena’s first words disposed -with shocking speed of Ross’s doubts that she was able to acquire a -brand-new sociological concept. They were: “Ah, there you are, my dear. -Did the boy bring you something or other to eat?” - -“Yes. Thanks. Very thoughtful of you,” he said pointedly, with one eye -on Breuer’s reaction. There was none; he seemed to have struck the right -note. - -“Pilot Breuer,” said Helena blandly, “thinks I’d enjoy an evening doing -the town with her and a few friends.” - -“But the Cavallo people——” - -“Ross,” she said gently, “don’t _nag_.” - -He shut up. And thought: wait until I get her out into space. _If_ I get -her out into space. She’d be a damned fool to leave this wacked-up -culture.... - -Breuer was saying, with an altogether too-innocent air, “I’d better get -you two settled in a hotel for the night; then I’ll pick up Helena and a -few friends and we’ll show her what old Novj Grad has to offer in the -way of night life. Can’t have her batting around the universe saying -Azor’s sidewalks are rolled up at 2100, can we? And then she can do her -trading or whatever it is with Cavallo bright and early tomorrow, eh?” - -Ross realized that he was being jollied out of an attack of the sulks. -He didn’t like it. - - * * * * * - -The hotel was small and comfortable, with a bar crowded by roistering -pilots and their dates. The glimpses Ross got of social life on Azor -added up to a damnably unfair picture. It was the man who paid. Breuer -roguishly tested the mattress in their room, nudging Helena, and then -announced, “Get settled, kids, while I visit the bar.” - -When the door rolled shut behind her Ross said furiously: “Look, you! -Protective mimicry’s fine up to a point, but let’s not forget what this -mission is all about. We seem to be suckered into spending the night, -but by hell tomorrow morning bright and early we find those Cavallo -people—” - -“There,” Helena said soothingly. “Don’t be angry, Ross. I promise I -won’t be out late, and she really did insist.” - -“I suppose so,” he grumbled. “Just remember it’s no pleasure trip.” - -“Not for you, perhaps,” she smiled sweetly. - -He let it drop there, afraid to push the matter. - -Breuer returned in about ten minutes with a slight glow on. “It’s all -fixed,” she told Helena. “Got a swell crowd lined up. Table at Virgin -Willie’s—oops!” She glanced at Ross. “No harm in it, of course,” she -said. “Anything you want, Ross, just dial service. It’s on my account. I -fixed it with the desk.” - -“Thanks.” - -They left, and Ross went grumpily to bed. - - * * * * * - -A secretive rustle in the room awoke him. “Helena?” he asked drowsily. - -Pilot Breuer’s voice giggled drunkenly, “Nope. Helena’s passed out at -Virgin Willie’s, kind of the way I figured she would be on triple -antigravs. Had my eye on you since Azor City, baby. You gonna be nice to -me?” - -“Get out of here!” Ross hissed furiously. “Out of here or I’ll yell like -hell.” - -“So yell,” she giggled. “I got the house dick fixed. They know me here, -baby——” - -He fumbled for the bedside light and snapped it on. “I’ll pitch you -right through the door,” he announced. “And if you give me any more lip -I won’t bother to open it before I do.” - -She hiccupped and said, “A spirited lad. That’s the way I like ’em.” -With one hand she drew a nasty-looking little pistol. With the other she -pulled a long zipper and stepped out of her pilot’s coveralls. - -Ross gulped. There were three ways to play this, the smart way, the -stupid way, and the way that all of a sudden began to look attractive. -He tried the stupid way. - -He got the pistol barrel alongside his ear for his pains. “Don’t jump -me,” Pilot Breuer giggled. “The boys that’ve tried to take this gun away -from me are stretched end to end from here to Azor City. By me, baby.” - -Ross blinked through a red-spotted haze. He took a deep breath and got -smart. “You’re pretty tough,” he said admiringly. - -“Oh, sure.” She kicked the coveralls across the room and moved in on -him. “Baby,” she said caressingly, “if I seem to sort of forget myself -in the next couple of minutes, don’t get any ideas. I _never_ let go of -my gun. Move over.” - -“Sure,” Ross said hollowly. This, he told himself disgustedly, was the -damnedest, silliest, ridiculousest.... - -There was a furious hiccup from the door. “So!” Helena said venomously, -pushing the door wide and almost falling to the floor. “So!” - -Ross flailed out of the bed, kicking the pistol out of Pilot Breuer’s -hand in the process. He cried enthusiastically, “Helena, dear!” - -“Don’t you ‘Helena-dear’ me!” she said, moving in and kicking the door -shut behind her. “I leave you alone for one little minute, and what -happens? And _you_!” - -“Sorry,” Pilot Breuer muttered, climbing into her coveralls. “Wrong -room. Must’ve had one anti-grav too many.” She licked her lips -apprehensively, zipping her coveralls and sidling toward the door. With -one hand on the knob, she said diffidently, “If I could have my gun -back——? No, you’re right! I’ll get it tomorrow.” She got through the -door just ahead of a lamp. - -“Hussy!” spat Helena. “And you, Ross——” - -It was the last straw. As Ross lurched toward her he regretted only one -thing: that he didn’t have a hairbrush. - -Pilot Breuer had been right. Nobody paid any attention to the noise. - - * * * * * - -“Yes, Ross.” Helena had hardly touched her breakfast; she sat with her -eyes downcast. - -“‘Yes, Ross’,” he mimicked bitterly. “It better be ‘Yes, Ross.’ This -place may look all right to you, but it’s trouble. You don’t want to -find yourself stuck here all your life, do you? Then do what I tell -you.” - -“Yes, Ross.” - -He pushed the remains of his food away. “Oh, the hell with it,” he said -dispiritedly. “I wish I’d never started out on this fool’s errand. And I -double damn well wish I’d left you in the dye vats.” - -“Yes, Ro——I mean, I’m glad you didn’t, Ross,” she said in a small voice. - -He stood up and patted her shoulder absently. “Come on,” he said, “we’ve -got to get over to the Cavallo place. I wish you had let me talk to them -on the phone.” - -She said reasonably, “But you said——” - -“I know what I said. When we get there, remember that I do the talking.” - -They walked through green-lit streets, filled with proud-looking women -and sad-eyed men. The Cavallo Machine-Tool Corporation was only a few -intersections away, by the map the desk clerk had drawn for Helena; they -found it without trouble. It was a smallish sort of building for a -factory, Ross thought, but perhaps that was how factories went on Azor. -Besides, it was well constructed and beautifully landscaped with the -purplish lawns these people seemed to prefer. - -Helena led him through the door, as was right and proper. She said to -the busy little bald-headed man who seemed to be the receptionist, -“We’re expected. Miss Cavallo, please.” - -“Certainly, Ma’am,” he said with a gap-toothed smile, and worked a -combination of rods and buttons on the desk beside him. In a moment, he -said, “Go right in. Three up and four over; can’t miss it.” - -They passed through a noisy territory of machines where metal was -sliced, spun, hacked, and planed; no one seemed to be paying any -attention to them. Ross wondered who had built the machines, and had a -sudden flash of realization as to where those builders were now: On -“Minerva,” staring at the unattainable free sky. - -Miss Cavallo was a motherly type with a large black cigar. “Sit right -down,” she said heartily. “You, too, young man. Tell me what we in -Cavallo Company can do for you.” - -Helena opened her mouth, but Ross stopped her with a gesture. “That’s -enough,” he said quietly. “I’ll take over. Miss Cavallo,” he declaimed -from memory, “what follows is under the seal.” - -“Is it indeed! What do you know,” she said. - -Ross said, “Wesley.” - -Miss Cavallo slapped her thigh admiringly. “Son of a gun,” she said -admiringly. “How this takes me back—those long-ago childhood days, -learning these things at my mother’s knee. Let’s see. Uh—the limiting -velocity is C.” - -“But C^2 is not a velocity,” Ross finished triumphantly. And, from the -heart, “Miss Cavallo, you don’t begin to know how happy this makes me.” - -Miss Cavallo reached over and pumped his hand, then Helena’s. To the -girl she said, “You’ve got a right to be a proud woman, believe me. The -way he got through it, without a single stumble! Never saw anything like -it in my life. Well, just tell me what I can do for you, now that that’s -over.” - -Ross took a deep, deep breath. He said earnestly, “A great deal. I don’t -know where to begin. You see, it all goes back to Halsey’s Planet, where -I come from. This, uh, this ship came in, a longliner, and it got some -of us a little worried because, well, it seemed that some of the planets -were no longer in communication. We—uh, Miss Cavallo?” She was smiling -pleasantly enough, but Ross had the crazy feeling that he just wasn’t -getting through to her. - -“Go right ahead,” she boomed. “God knows, I’ve got nothing against men -in business; that’s old-fashioned prejudice. Take your time. I won’t -bite you. Get on with your proposition, young man.” - -“It isn’t exactly a proposition,” Ross said weakly. All of a sudden the -words seemed hard to find. What did you say to a potential partner in -the salvation of the human race when she just nodded and blew cigar -smoke at you? - -He made an effort. “Halsey’s Planet was the seventh alternate -destination for this ship, and so we figured——That is, Miss Cavallo, it -kind of looked like there was some sort of trouble. So Mr. Haarland—he’s -the one who has the F-T-L secret on Halsey, like you do here on Azor—he -passed it on to me, of course—well, he asked me to, well, sort of take a -look around.” He stopped. The words by then were just barely audible -anyhow; and Miss Cavallo had been looking furtively at her watch. - -Miss Cavallo shrugged sympathetically to Helena. “They’re all like that -under the skin, aren’t they?” she observed ambiguously. “Well, if men -could take our jobs away from us, what would we do? Stay home and mind -the kids?” She roared and poked a box of cigars at Helena. - -“Now,” she said briskly, “let’s get down to cases. I really enjoyed -hearing those lines from you, young man, and I want you to know that I’m -prepared to help you in any possible way because of them. Open a line of -credit, speed up deliveries, send along some of our technical people to -help you get set up—anything. Now, what can I do for you? Turret lathes? -Grinders? Screw machines?” - -“Miss Cavallo,” Ross said desperately, “don’t you know anything about -the faster-than-light secret?” - -She said impatiently, “Of course I do, young man. Said the responses, -didn’t I? There’s no call for that item, though.” - -“I don’t want to _buy_ one,” Ross cried. “I have one. Don’t you realize -that the human race is in danger? Populations are dying out or going out -of communication all over the galaxy. Don’t you want to do something -about it before we all go under?” - -Miss Cavallo dropped all traces of a smile. Her face was like flint as -she stood up and pointed to the window. “Young man,” she said icily, -“take a look out there. That’s the Cavallo Machine-Tool Company. Does -that look as if we’re going under?” - -“I know, but Clyde, Cyrnus One, Ragansworld—at least a dozen planets I -can name—are _gone_. Didn’t you ever think that you might be next?” - -Miss Cavallo kept her voice level, but only with a visible effort. - -She said flatly, “No. Never. Young man, I have plenty to do right here -on Azor without bothering my head about those places you’re talking -about. Seventy-five years ago there was another fellow just like you; -Flarney, some name like that; my grandmother told me about him. He came -bustling in here causing trouble, with that old silly jingle about -Wesley and C-square and so on, with some cock-and-bull story about a -planet that was starving to death, stirring up a lot of commotion. Well, -he wound up on ‘Minerva,’ because he wouldn’t take no for an answer. -Watch out that you don’t do the same.” - -She marched majestically to the door. “And now,” she said, “if you’ve -wasted quite enough of my time, kindly leave.” - - - - -..... 8 - - -“STUPID old bat,” Ross muttered. They were walking aimlessly down -Fifteen Street, the nicely-landscaped machine tool works behind them. - -Helena said timidly: “You really shouldn’t talk that way, Ross. She _is_ -older than you, after all. Old heads are——” - -“——wisest,” he wearily agreed. “Also the most conservative. Also the -most rigidly inflexible; also the most firmly closed to the reception of -new ideas. With one exception.” - -She reeled under the triple blasphemy and then faintly asked: “What’s -the exception?” - -Ross became aware that they were not alone. Their very manner of -walking, he a little ahead, obviously leading the way, was drawing -unfavorable attention from passers-by. Nothing organized or even -definite—just looks ranging from puzzled distaste to anger. He said, -“Somebody named Haarland. Never mind,” and in a lower voice: “Straighten -up. Step out a little ahead of me. Scowl.” - -She managed it all except the scowl. The expression on her face got some -stupefied looks from other pedestrians, but nothing worse. - -Helena said loudly and plaintively: “I don’t like it here after all, -Ross. Can’t we get away from all these women?” - -Should the impulse seize you, placard ancient Brooklyn with twenty-four -sheets proclaiming the Dodgers to be cellar-dwelling bums. Mount a -detergent box and inform a crowd of Altairians that they are degenerate -slith-fondlers if you must. Announce in a crowded Cephean bar room that -Sadkia Revall is no better than she should be. From these situations you -have some chance of emerging intact. But never, never pronounce the word -“women” as Helena pronounced it on Fifteen Street, Novj Grad, Azor. - -The mob took only seconds to form. - -Ross and Helena found themselves with their backs to the glass doors of -a food store. The handful of women who had actually heard the remark -were all talking to them simultaneously, with fist-shaking. Behind them -stood as many as a dozen women who knew only that something had happened -and that there were comfortably outnumbered victims available. The noise -was deafening, and Helena began to cry. Ross first wondered if he could -bring himself to knock down a woman; then realized after studying the -hulking virago in their foreground that he might bring himself to try -but probably would not succeed. - -She seemed to be accusing Helena of masquerading, of advocating -equality, of uttering obscenely antisocial statements in the public -road, to the affront of all decent-minded girls. - -There was violence in the air. Ross was on the point of blocking a -roundhouse right when the glass doors opened behind them. The small -diversion distracted the imbecile collective brain of the mob. - -“What’s going on here?” a suety voice demanded. “Ladies, may I please -get through?” - -It was a man trying to emerge from the food shop with a double armful of -cartons. He was a great fat slob, quite hairless, and smelling -powerfully of kitchen. He wore the gravy-spotted whites of any cook -anywhere. - -The virago said to him, “Keep out of this, Willie. This fellow here’s a -masquerader. The thing I heard him say——!” - -“I’m not,” Helena wept. “I’m not!” - -The cook stooped to look into her face and turned on the mob. “She -isn’t,” he said definitely. “She’s a lady from another system. She was -slopping up triple antigravs at my place last night with a gang of jet -pilots.” - -“That doesn’t prove a thing!” the virago yelled. - -“Madam,” the cook said wearily, “after her third antigrav I had to trip -her up and crown her. She was about to climb the bar and corner my -barman.” - -Ross looked at her fixedly. She stopped crying and nervously cleared her -throat. - -“So if you’ll just let us through,” the cook bustled, seizing the -psychological moment of doubt. His enormous belly bulldozed a lane for -them. “Beg pardon. Excuse us. Madam, will you—thank you. Beg pardon——” - -The lynchers were beginning to drift away, embarrassed. The party had -collapsed. “Faster,” the cook hissed at them. “Beg pardon——” And they -were in the clear and well down the street. - -“Thank you, Sir,” Helena said humbly. - -“Just ‘Willie’, _if_ you please,” the fat man said. - -One hand descended on Ross’s shoulder and another on Helena’s. They both -belonged to the virago. She spun them around, glaring. “_I’m_ not -satisfied with the brush-off,” she snapped. “Exactly what did you mean -by that remark you made?” - -Helena wailed, “It’s just that you and all these other women here seem -so _young_.” - -The virago’s granite face softened. She let go and tucked in a strand of -steel-wool hair. “Did you really think so, dear?” she asked, beaming. -“There, I’m sorry I got excited. A wee bit jealous, were you? Well, -we’re broad-minded here in Novj Grad.” She patted Helena’s arm and -walked off, smiling and jaunty. - -Virgin Willie led off and they followed him. Ross’s knees were shaky. -The virago had not known that to Helena “young” meant “stupid.” - -The cook absently acknowledged smiles and nods as they walked. He was, -obviously, a character. Between salutes he delivered a low-voiced, -rapid-fire reaming to Ross and Helena. “Silly stunt. Didn’t you hear -about the riots? Supposed to be arms caches somewhere here on the south -side. Everybody’s nerves absolutely ragged. Somebody gets smashed up in -traffic, they blame it on us. Don’t care _where_ you’re from. Watch it -next time.” - -“We will, Willie,” Helena said contritely. “And I think you run an -awfully nice restaurant.” - -“Yeah,” said Ross, looking at her. - -Willie muttered, “I guess you’re clear. You still staying at that hot -pilot’s hangout? This is where we say good-by, then. You turn left.” - -He waddled on down the street. Helena said instantly, “I don’t remember -a thing, Ross.” - -“Okay,” he said. “You don’t remember a thing.” - -She looked relieved and said brightly, “So let’s get back to the hotel.” - -“Okay,” he said. Climbed the bar and tried to corner the.... Halfway to -the hotel he slowed, then stopped, and said, “I just thought of -something. Maybe we’re not staying there any more. After last night why -should Breuer carry us on her tab? I thought we’d have some money to -carry us from the Cavallos by now——” - -“The ship?” she asked in a small voice. - -“Across the continent. Hell! Maybe Breuer forgave and forgot. Let’s try, -anyway.” - -They never got as far as the hotel. When they reached the square it -stood on, there was a breathless rush and Bernie stood before them, -panting and holding a hand over his chest. “In here,” he gasped, and -nodded at a shopfront that announced hot brew. Ross thoughtlessly -started first through the door and caught Bernie’s look of alarm. He -opened the door for Helena, who went through smiling nervously. - -They settled at a small table in an empty corner in stiff silence. “I’ve -been walking around that square all morning,” Bernie said, with a cowed -look at Helena. - -Ross told her: “This young man and I had a talk yesterday at the plane -while you were eating. What is it, Bernie?” - -He still couldn’t believe that he was doing it, but Bernie said in a -scared whisper: “Wanted to head you off and warn you. Breuer was down at -the field cafe this morning, talking loud to the other hot-shots. She -said you—both of you—talked equality. Said she got up with a hangover -and you were gone. But she said there’d be six policewomen waiting in -your room when you got back.” He leaned forward on the table. Ross -remembered that he had been forced to sell his ration card. - -“Here comes the waiter,” he said softly. “Order something for all of us. -We have a little money. And thanks, Bernie.” - -Helena asked, “What do we _do_?” - -“We eat,” Ross said practically. “Then we think. Shut up; let Bernie -order.” - - * * * * * - -They ate; and then they thought. Nothing much seemed to come from all -the thinking, though. - -They were a long, long way from the spaceship. Ross commandeered all of -Helena’s leftover cash. It was almost, not quite, enough for one person -to get halfway back to Azor City. He and Bernie turned out their pockets -and added everything they had, including pawnable valuables. That -helped. It made the total almost enough for one person to get -three-quarters of the way back. - -It didn’t help enough. - -Ross said, “Bernie, what would happen if we, well, stole something?” - -Bernie shrugged. “It’s against the law, of course. They probably -wouldn’t prosecute, though.” - -“They wouldn’t?” - -“Not if they can prove egalitarianism on you. Stealing’s against the -law; preaching equality is against the _state_. You get the maximum -penalty for that.” - -Helena choked on her drink, but Ross merely nodded. “So we might as well -take a chance,” he said. “Thanks, Bernie. We won’t bother you any more. -You’ll forget you heard this, won’t you?” - -“The hell I will!” Bernie squawked. “If you’re getting out of here, I -want to go with you! You aren’t leaving _me_ behind!” - -“But Bernie——” Ross started. He was interrupted by the manager, a -battleship-class female with a mighty prow, who came scowling toward -them. - -“Pipe down,” she ordered coarsely. “This place is for decent people; we -don’t want no disturbances here. If you can’t act decent, get out.” - -“Awk,” said Helena as Ross kicked her under the table. “I mean, yes -ma’am. Sorry if we were talking too loud.” They watched the manager walk -away in silence. - -As soon as she was fairly away, Ross hissed, “It’s out of the question, -Bernie. You might be jumping from the frying-pan into the fire.” - -Bernie asked, startled, “The what?” - -“The—never mind, it’s just an expression where I come from. It means you -might get out of this place and find yourself somewhere worse. We don’t -know where we’re going next; you might wish to God you were back here -within the next three days.” - -“I’ll take that chance,” Bernie said earnestly. “Look, Ross, I played -square with you. I didn’t have to stick my neck out and warn you. How -about giving me a break too?” - -Helena interrupted, “He’s right, Ross. After all, we owe him that much, -don’t we? I mean, if a person does that much for a person, a person -ought to——” - -“Oh, shut up.” Ross glared at both of them. “You two seem to think this -is a game,” he said bitterly. “Let me set you straight, both of you. It -isn’t. More hangs on what happens to me than either of you realize. The -fate of the human race, for instance.” - -Helena flashed a look at Bernie. “Of _course_, Ross,” she said -soothingly. “Both of us know that, don’t we, Bernie?” - -Bernie stammered, “Sure—sure we do, Ross.” He rubbed his ankle. He went -on, “Honest, Ross, I want to get the hell away from Azor once and for -all. I don’t care _where_ you’re going. Anything would be better than -this place and the damned female bloodsuckers that——” - -He stopped, petrified. His eyes, looking over Ross’s shoulder, were -enormous. - -“Go on, sonny,” said a rich female voice from behind Ross. “Don’t let me -and the lieutenant stop you just when you’re going good.” - - * * * * * - -“It must have been that damn manager,” Bernie said for the fifteenth -time. - -Ross uncrossed his legs painfully and tried lying on the floor on his -side. “What’s the difference?” he asked. “They got us; we’re in the jug. -And face it: somebody would have caught us sooner or later, and we might -have wound up in a worse jail than this one.” He shifted uncomfortably. -“If that’s possible, I mean. Why don’t they at least have beds in these -places?” - -“Oh,” said Bernie immediately, “some do. The jails in Azor City and -Nuevo Reykjavik have beds; Novj Grad, Eleanor, and Milo don’t. I mean, -that’s what they tell me,” he added virtuously. - -“Sure,” Ross growled. “Well, what do they tell you usually happens -next?” - -Bernie spread his hands. “Different things. First there’s a hearing. -That’s all over by now. Then an indictment and trial. Maybe that’s -started already; sometimes they get it in on the same day as the -hearing, sometimes not. Then—tomorrow sometime, most likely—comes the -sentencing. We’ll know about that, though, because we’ll be there. The -law’s very strict on that—they always have you in the court for -sentencing.” - -Ross cried, “You mean the trial might be going on right now without us?” - -“Of course. What else? Think they’d take a chance on having the -prisoners creating a disturbance during the trial?” - -Ross groaned and turned his face to the wall. For this, he thought, he -had come the better part of a hundred light years; for this he had left -a comfortable job with a brilliant future. He spent a measurable period -of time cursing the memory of old Haarland and his double-jointed, -persuasive tongue. - -Back in the days of Ross’s early teens he had seen a good many -situations like this in the tri-dis, and the hero had never failed to -extricate himself by a simple exercise of superhuman strength, -intellect, and ingenuity. That, Ross told himself, was just what he -needed now. The trouble was, he didn’t have them. - -All he had was the secret of faster-than-light travel. And, here on Azor -as on the planet of the graybeards, it had laid a king-sized egg. Women, -Ross thought bitterly, women were basically inward-directed and -self-seeking; trust them with the secret of F-T-L; make them, like the -Cavallos, custodians of a universe-racking truth; and see the secret -lost or embalmed in sterile custom. What, he silently demanded of -himself, did the greatest of scientific discoveries mean to a biological -baby-foundry? How could any female—no single member of which class had -ever painted a great picture, written a great book, composed a great -sonata, or discovered a great scientific truth—appreciate the ultimate -importance of the F-T-L drive? It was like entrusting a first-folio -Shakespeare to a broody hen; the shredded scraps would be made into a -nest. For the egg came first. Motherhood was all. - -That explained it, of course. That, Ross told himself moodily, explained -everything except why the F-T-L secret had fallen into apparently equal -or worse desuetude on such planets as Gemsel, Clyde, Cyrnus One, -Ragansworld, Tau Ceti II, Capella’s family of eight, and perhaps a -hundred others. - -Ragansworld was gone entirely, drowned in a planetary nebula. - -The planet of the graybeard had gone to seed; nothing new, nothing not -hallowed by tradition had a chance in its decrepit social order. - -His home, Halsey’s Planet, was rapidly, calmly, inevitably depopulating -itself. - -And Azor had fallen into a rigid, self-centered matriarchal order that -only an act of God could break. - -Was there a pattern? Were there any similarities? - -Ross searched desperately in his mind; but without result. The image of -Helena kept intruding itself between him and his thoughts. Was he -getting sentimental about that sweet little chucklehead? Who, he hastily -added, had come near to criminally assaulting him, who had climbed -the.... - -He turned to the little waiter and demanded: “Will she—Helena—be on the -orbital station with us if we’re all convicted?” - -“Hmm—no, I should think not. As a responsible person, she gets the -supreme penalty.” - -Ross numbly asked after a long pause, “How? Nothing—painful?” It was -hard to think of Helena dangling grotesquely at a rope’s end or jolting -as she sat strapped in a large, ugly chair. But there were things he had -heard of which were horribly worse. - -Bernie had been watching him. “I’m sorry,” the little man said soberly. -“It’s up to the judge. She’s a foreigner, so they may consider that an -extenuating circumstance and place some quick-acting poison aboard for -her to take. Otherwise it’s slow starvation.” - -A faint, irrational hope had begun to dawn in Ross’s mind. “Aboard what? -Exactly how does it work?” - -“They’ll put her aboard some hulk with the rockets disabled, fire it off -into space—and that’s that. I suppose they’ll use the ship she came -in——” - -Ross was frantically searching his pockets. He had a stylus. “Got any -paper?” he briskly demanded of Bernie. - -“Yes, but——?” The waiter blankly passed over an order book. Ross -sprawled on the floor and began to scribble: “Never mind how or why this -works. Do it. You saw me work the big fan-shaped computer in the center -room and you can do it too. Find the master star maps in the chart room. -Look up the co-ordinates of Halsey’s System. Set these co-ordinates on -the twenty-seven dials marked Proximate Mass. Take the readings on the -windows above the dials and set them on the cursors of the computer——” -He scribbled furiously, from time to time forcing himself deliberately -to slow down as the writing became an unreadable scrawl. He filled the -ruled fronts of the order pages and then the backs—perhaps ten thousand -closely-written words, and not one of them wasted. Haarland’s precise -instructions, mercilessly drilled into him, flowed out again. - -He flung the stylus down at last and read through the book again, -ignoring the gaping Bernie. It was all there, as far as he could tell. -Grant her a lot of luck and more brains than he privately credited her -with, and she had a fighting chance of winding up within radar range of -Halsey’s Planet. GCA could take her down from there; an annoying -ship-like object hanging on the radarscopes would provoke a -reconnaissance. - -She knew absolutely nothing about F-T-L or the Wesley drive, but -then—neither did he. That fact itself was no handicap. - -He might rot on “Minerva,” but some word might get back to Haarland. And -so would the ship. And Helena would not perish miserably in a drifting -hulk. - -Bernie saw the mysterious job was ended and dared to ask, “A letter?” - -“No,” Ross said jubilantly. “By God, if things break right they won’t -get her. It’s like this——” - -He happily began to explain that his F-T-L ship’s rockets were only -auxiliaries for fine maneuvering, but he counted on the court not -knowing that. If he and Helena could persuade.... - -As he went on the look on Bernie’s face changed very slowly from hope to -pity to politely-simulated interest. Correspondingly Ross’s accounting -became labored and faulty. The pauses became longer and at last he broke -off, filled with self-contempt at his folly. He said bitterly, “You -don’t think it’ll work.” - -“Oh, no!” Bernie protested with too much heartiness. “I could see she’s -awfully mechanically-minded for a woman, even if it wouldn’t be polite -to say so. Sure it’ll work, Ross. Sure!” - -The hell it would. - -At least he had disposed of a few hours. And—perhaps some bungling -setting would explode the ship, or end a Wesley Jump in the heart of a -white dwarf star—sudden annihilation, whiffing Helena out of existence -before her body could realize that it had died, before the beginning of -apprehension could darken happy absorption with a task she thought would -bring her to safety. - -For that reason alone he had to carry the scheme through. - - * * * * * - -The courtroom was a chintzy place bright with spring flowers. Ross and -Helena looked numbly at one another from opposite corners while the -previous order of business was cleared from the docket. A wedding. - -The judge, unexpectedly sweet-faced and slender though gray, obviously -took such parts of her work seriously. “Marylyn and Kent,” she was -saying earnestly to the happy couple, “I suppose you know my reputation. -I lecture people a bit before I tie the knot. Evidently it’s not such a -bad idea because my marriages turn out well. Last week in Eleanor one of -my girls was arrested and reprimanded for gross infidelity and a couple -of years ago right here in Novj Grad one of my boys got five hundred -lashes for nonsupport. Let’s hope it did them some good, but the cases -were unusual. My people, I like to think, know their rights and -responsibilities when they walk out of my court, and I think the record -bears me out. - -“Marylyn, you have chosen to share part of your life with this man. You -intend to bear his children. This should not be because your animal -appetites have overcome you and you can’t win his consent in any other -way but because you know, down deep in your womanly heart, that you can -make him happy. Never forget this. If you should thoughtlessly conceive -by some other man, don’t tell him. He would only brood. Be thrifty, -Marylyn. I have seen more marriages broken up by finances than any other -reason. If your husband earns a hundred Eleanors a week, spend only that -and no more. If he makes _fifty_ Eleanors a week spend only that and no -more. Honorable poverty is preferable to debt. And, from a practical -standpoint, if you spend more than your husband earns he will be jailed -for debt sooner or later, with resulting loss to your own pocket. - -“Kent, you have accepted the proposal of this woman. I see by your -dossier that you got in just under the wire. In your income group the -antibachelor laws would have caught up with you in one more week. I must -say I don’t like the look of it, but I’ll give you the benefit of the -doubt. I want to talk to you about the meaning of marriage. Not just the -wage assignment, not just the insurance policy, not just the waiver of -paternity and copulation ‘rights’, so-called. Those, as a good citizen, -you will abide by automatically—Heaven help you if you don’t. But there -is more to marriage than that. The honor you have been done by this -woman who sees you as desirable and who wishes to make you happy over -the years is not a sterile legalism. Marriage is like a rocket, I -sometimes think. The brute, unreasoning strength of the main jets -representing the husband’s share and the delicate precise steering and -stabilizing jets the wife’s. We have all of us seen too many marriages -crash to the ground like a rocket when these roles were reversed. It is -not reasonable to expect the wife to provide the drive—that is, the -income. It is not reasonable to expect the husband to provide the -steering—that is, the direction of the personal and household -expenditures. So much for the material side of things. On the spiritual -side, I have little to say. The laws are most explicit; see that you -obey them—and if you don’t, you had better pray that you wind up in some -court other than mine. I have no patience with the obsolete doctrine -that there is such a legal entity as seduction by female, despite the -mouthings of certain so-called jurists who disgrace the bench of a -certain nearby city. - -“Having heard these things, Marylyn and Kent, step forward and join -hands.” - -They did. The ceremony was short and simple; the couple then walked from -the courtroom under the beaming smile of the judge. - -A burly guard next to Ross pointed at the groom. “Look,” she said -sentimentally. “He’s crying. Cute!” - -“I don’t blame the poor sucker,” Ross flared, and then, being a man of -conscience, wondered suddenly if that was why, on Halsey’s Planet, women -cried at weddings. - -A clerk called: “Dear, let’s have those egalitarians front and center, -please. Her honor’s terribly rushed.” - -Helena was escorted forward from one side, while Ross and Bernie were -jostled to the fore from the other. The judge turned from the happy -couple. As she looked down at the three of them the smile that curved -her lips turned into something quite different. Ross, quailing, suddenly -realized that he had seen just that expression once before. It was when -he was very, very young, when a friend of his mother’s had come bustling -into the kitchen where he was playing, just after she had smelled, and -just before she had seen, the long-dead rat he had fetched up from the -abandoned cellar across the street. - -While the clerk was reading the orders and indictment, the judge’s stare -never wavered. And when the clerk had finished, the judge’s silent stare -remained, for a long, terrible time. - -In the quietest of voices, the judge said, “So.” - -Ross caught a flicker of motion out of the corner of his eye. He turned -just in time to see Bernie, knees buckling, slip white-faced and -unconscious to the floor. The guards rushed forward, but the judge -raised a peremptory hand. “Leave him alone,” she ordered soberly. “It is -kinder. Defendants, you are charged with the gravest of crimes. Have you -anything to say before sentence is passed on you?” - -Ross tried to force words—any words, to protest, to plead, to -vilify—through his clogged throat. All he managed was a croaking sound; -and Helena, by his side, nudged him sharply to silence. He turned to her -sharply, and realized that this was the best chance he’d be likely to -get. He clutched at her, rolled up his eyes, slumped to the floor in as -close an imitation of Bernie’s swoon as he could manage. - -The judge was visibly annoyed, and this time she didn’t stop the -attendants when they rushed in to kick him erect. But he had the -consolation of seeing a flash of understanding cross Helena’s face, and -her hand dart to a pocket with the paper he had handed her. In the -confusion no one saw. - -The rest of the courtroom scene was kaleidoscopic in Ross’s -recollection. The only part he remembered clearly was the judge’s voice -as she said to him and Bernie, “——for the rest of your lives, as long as -Almighty God shall, in Her infinite wisdom, permit you the breath of -life, be banished from Azor and all of its allied worlds to the prison -hulk in ‘Orbit Minerva.’” - -And they were hustled out as the judge, even more wrathful than before, -turned to pronounce sentence on Helena. - - - - -..... 9 - - -THE guard spat disgustedly. “Fine lot of wrecks we’re getting,” she -complained. “Not like the old days. They used to send real men here.” -She glowered at Ross and Bernie, holding their commitment papers loosely -in her hand. “And for treason, too!” she added. “Used to be it took guts -to commit a crime against the state.” She shook her head, then made a -noise of distaste and scribbled initials on the commitment papers. She -handed them back to the pilot who had brought them up from Azor, who -grinned, waved, and got out of there. “All right,” said the guard, “we -have to take what we get. I’ll have to put you two on construction; -you’ll never stand up under hard work. Keep your noses clean, that’s -all. Up at 0500; breakfast till 0510; work detail till 1950; dinner and -recreation till 2005; then lights out. Miss a formation and you miss a -meal. Miss two, and you get punishment detail. Nobody misses three.” - -Ross and Bernie found themselves sharing a communal cell. They had all -of five minutes to look around and get oriented; then they were out on -their first work detail. - -It wasn’t so bad as it sounded. Their shiftmates were a couple of dozen -ragged-looking wrecks, half-heartedly assembling a sort of meccano-toy -wall out of sheets of perforated steel and clip-spring bolts. All the -parts seemed well worn; some of the bolts hardly closed. It took Ross -the better part of his first detail, whispering when the guards were -looking the other way, to find out why. Their half of the prisoners were -Construction; the other half was Demolition. What Construction in the -morning put up, Demolition in the evening tore down. Neither side was -anxious to set any speed records, and the guards without exception were -too bored to care. - -With any kind of luck, Ross found, he could hope eventually to get a -real job—manning the “Minerva’s” radar, signal, or generating -facilities, working in the kitchens or service shops, perhaps even as an -orderly in the guard quarters. (Although Ross quite by accident chanced -to see a guard’s orderly as he passed through a corridor near the work -area, a handkerchief held daintily to his nose. And though the orderly’s -clothing was neat and his plump cheeks indicated good eating, the -haunted expression in his eyes made Ross think twice.) - -The one thing he could not do, according to the testimony of every man -he spoke to, was escape. - -The fifth time Ross got that answer, the guard had stepped out of the -room. Ross took the opportunity to thrash the thing through. “Why?” he -demanded. “Back where I come from we’ve got lots of prisons. I never -heard of one nobody escaped from.” - -The other prisoner laughed shortly. “Now you have,” he said. “Go ahead, -try. Every one of us has tried, one time or another. There’s only one -thing stopping you—there’s no place to go. You can get past the guards -easy enough—they’re lazy, when they’re not either drunk or boy-chasing. -You can roam around ‘Minerva’ all you like. You can even get to the -spacelock, and if you want to you can walk right through it. But not in -a spacesuit, because there aren’t any on board. And not into the tender -that brings us up from Azor, because you aren’t built right.” - -Ross looked puzzled. “Not built right?” - -“That’s right. There’s telescreens and remote-control locks built into -that tender. The pilot brings you up, but once she couples with -‘Minerva’ the controls lock. And the only way they get unlocked is when -three women, in three different substations down on Azor, push the RC -releases. And they don’t do that until they look in their screens, and -see that everybody who has turned up in the tender has stripped down to -nothing at all, and every one of them is by-God female. Any further -questions?” He grinned wryly. “Don’t even think about plastic surgery, -if that happens to cross your mind,” he said. “We have two men here who -tried it. You don’t have much equipment here; you can’t do a neat enough -job.” - -Ross gulped. “Hadn’t given it a thought,” he assured the other man. “You -can’t even hide away in a trunk or something?” - -The prisoner shook his head. “Aren’t any trunks. Everything’s one -way—Azor to ‘Minerva’—except pilots and guards. No men ever go back. -When you die, you go out the lock—without a ship. Same with everything -else that they want to get rid of.” - -Ross thought hard. “What if they—well, what if you’re sent up here and -all, and then some new evidence turns up and you’re found innocent? -Don’t they send you back then?” - -“Found innocent?” The man looked at Ross pityingly. “Man, you _are_ new. -Hey,” he called. “Hey, Chuck! This guy wants to know what happens if -they find out back on Azor that he’s innocent!” - -Chuck exploded into laughter. Wiping his eyes, he walked over to Ross. -“Thanks,” he grinned. “Haven’t had a good laugh in fifteen years.” - -“I don’t see that that’s so funny,” Ross said defensively. “After all, -the judge can make a mistake, none of us is per—awk!” - -“Shut up!” Chuck hissed, holding a hand over Ross’s mouth. “Do you want -to get us all in _real_ trouble? Some of these guys would rat to the -guards for an extra hunk of bread! The judges never make a mistake.” And -his lips formed the silent word: “Officially.” - -He let go of Ross and stood back, but didn’t walk away. He scratched his -head. “Say,” he said, “you ask some stupid questions. Where are you -from, anyhow?” - -Ross said bitterly, “What’s the use? You won’t believe me. I happen to -be from a place called Halsey’s Planet, which is a good long distance -from here. About as far as light will travel in two hundred years, if -that gives you an idea. I came here in an F-T-L—that is, a -faster-than-light ship. You don’t know what that is, of course, but I -did. It was a mistake, I admit it. But here I am.” - -Somewhat to Ross’s surprise, Chuck didn’t laugh again. He looked -dubious, and he scratched his head some more, but he didn’t laugh. To -the other prisoner he said, “What do you think, Sam?” - -Sam shrugged. “So maybe we were wrong,” he observed. - -Ross demanded, “Wrong about what?” - -“Well,” Chuck said hesitantly, “there’s a guy here named Flarney. He’s a -pretty old son-of-a-gun by now, must be at least ninety, and he’s been -here a good long time. Dunno how long. But he talks crazy, just like -you. No offense,” he added, “it’s just that we all thought he’d gone -space-happy. But maybe we’re wrong. Unless——” his eyes narrowed “unless -the two of you are both space-happy, or trying to kid us, or something.” - -Ross said urgently, “I swear, Chuck, there’s no such thing. It’s true. -Who’s this Flarney? Where does he say he came from?” - -“Who can make sense out of what he says? All I know is, he talked a lot -about something faster than light. That’s crazy; that’s like saying -slower than dark, or bigger than green, or something. But I don’t know, -maybe it means something.” - -“Believe me, Chuck, it does! Where is this man—can I see him?” - -Chuck looked uncertain. “Well, sure. That is, you can see him all right. -But it isn’t going to do you a whole hell of a lot of good, because he’s -dead. Died yesterday; they’re going to pitch him out into space sometime -today.” - -Sam said, “This is when Whitker flips. One week without his old pal -Flarney and he’ll begin to look funny. Two weeks and he starts acting -funny. Three and he’s talking funny and the guards begin to crack down. -I give him a month to get shot down and heaved through the locker.” - -Old pal? Ross demanded, “Who’s this Whitker? Where can I get in touch -with him?” - -“Him and Flarney were both latrine orderlies. That’s where they put the -feeble old men, mopping and polishing. Number Two head, any hour of the -day or night. Old buzzard has his racket—we’re supposed to get a hank of -cellosponge per man per day, but he’s always ‘fresh out’—unless you slip -him your saccharine ration every once in a while.” - -Ross asked the way to Number Two head and the routine. But it was an -hour before he could bring himself to ask the hulking guard for -permission. - -“Sure, sonny,” she boomed. “I’ll show you the way. Need any help?” - -“No, thanks, ma’am,” he said hastily, and she roared with laughter. So -did the members of the construction gang; it must have been an ancient -gag. He hurried on his way thinking dark and bloody thoughts. - -“Whitker?” he asked a tottering ancient who nodded and drowsed amid the -facilities of the head. - -The old man looked up blearily and squeaked: “Fresh out. Fresh out. You -should’ve saved some from yesterday.” - -“That’s all right. I’m a new man here. I want to ask you about your -friend Flarney——” - -Whitker bowed his head and began to cry noiselessly. - -“I’m sorry, Mr. Whitker. I heard. But there’s something we can do about -it—maybe. Flarney was a faster-than-light man. He must have told you -that. So am I. Ross, from Halsey’s Planet.” - -He hadn’t the faintest idea as to whether any of this was getting -through to the ancient. - -“It seems Flarney and I were both on the same mission, finding out how -and why planets were dropping out of communication. You and he used to -talk a lot, they tell me. Did he ever tell you anything about that?” - -Whitker looked up and squeaked dimly. “Oh, yes. All the time. I humored -him. He was an old man, you know. And now he’s dead.” The tears leaked -from his rheumy eyes and traced the sad furrows beside his nose. - -Was he getting through? “What did he _say_, Mr. Whitker? About -faster-than-light?” - -The old man said, “L-sub-T equals L-sub-zero e to the minus -T-over-two-N.” - -That damned formula again! “But what does it mean, Mr. Whitker? What did -he say it meant?” Ross softly urged. - -The old man looked surprised. “Genes?” he asked himself hazily. -“Generations? I don’t remember. But you go to Earth, young man. Flarney -said _they’d_ know, and know what to do about it, too, which is more -than he did. His very words, young man!” - -Ross didn’t dare stay longer. Furthermore he suspected that the old -man’s attention span had been exhausted. He started from the room with a -muttered thanks, and was stopped at the door by Whitker’s hand on his -shoulder. - -“You’re a good boy,” Whitker squeaked. “Here.” - -Ross found himself walking down the corridor with an enormous wad of -cellosponge in his hand. - -The bunks were hard, but that didn’t matter. Dormitories were the -outermost layer of the hulk, pseudogravity varies inversely as the -fourth power of the distance, and the field generator was conventionally -located near “Minerva’s” center. When your relative weight is -one-quarter normal you can sleep deliciously on a gravel driveway. This -was the dormitory’s only attractive feature. Otherwise it was too many -steel slabs, tiered and spotted too close, too many unwashed males, too -much weary snoring. The only things in short supply were headroom and -air. - -Not everybody slept. Insomniacs turned and grunted; those who had given -up the struggle talked from bunk to bunk in considerately low tones. - -Bernie muttered from a third-tier bunk facing Ross’s: “I wonder if she -made it.” - -Ross knew what he meant. “Unlikeliest thing in the world,” he said. “But -I think she went fast and never knew what hit her.” He thought of the -formula and “They’d know on Earth—and know what to do about it too.” -Earth the enigma, from which all planetary peoples were supposed to be -derived. Earth—the dot on the traditional master charts, Earth—from -which and to which no longliners ever seemed to travel. Haarland had -told him no F-T-L ship had in recent centuries ever reported again after -setting out for Earth. Another world sunk in barbarism? But Flarney had -said—no; that was not data. That was the confused recollections of a -very old man, possibly based on the confused recollections of another -very old man. Perhaps it had got mixed up with the semilegendary origin -story. - -Poor sweet Helena! He hoped it had happened fast, that she had been -thinking of some pleasant prospect on Halsey’s Planet. In her naïve way -she’d think it just around the corner, a mere matter of following -instructions.... - - * * * * * - -So thought Ross, the pessimist. - -In his gloom he had forgotten that this was exactly what it was. In his -snobbishness he never realized that he was guilty of the most frightful -arrogance in assuming that what he could do, she could not. In his -ignorance he was not aware that since navigation began, every new -instrument, every technique, has drawn the shuddery warnings of savants -that uneducated skippers, working by rote, could not be expected to -master these latest fruits of science—or that uneducated skippers since -navigation began have cheerfully adopted new instruments and techniques -at the drop of a hat and that never once have the shuddery warnings been -justified by the facts. - -Up the aisle somebody was saying in a low, argumentative tone, “I saw -the drum myself. Naturally it was marked Dulsheen Creme, but the guards -here never did give a damn whether their noses were dull or bright -enough to flag down a freighter and I don’t think they’ve suddenly -changed. It was booze, I tell you. Fifty liters of it.” - -“Gawd! The hangovers tomorrow.” - -“We’ll all have to watch our steps. I hope they don’t do anything worse -than getting quietly drunk in their quarters. Those foot-kissing -orderlies’ll get a workout, but who cares what happens to an orderly?” - -“They haven’t been on a real tear since I’ve been here.” - -“Lucky you. Let’s hope they don’t bust loose tonight. It’s a break in -the monotony, sure—but those girls play rough. Five prisoners died last -time.” - -“They beat them up?” - -“One of them.” - -“What about the others? Oh! Oh, Gawd—fifty liters, you said?” - -Bernie began to whimper: “Not again! Not those plug-uglies! I swear I’ll -throw myself through the spacelock if they make a pass at me. Ross, -isn’t there anything we can do?” - -“Seems not, Bernie. Maybe they won’t come in. Or if they do, maybe -they’ll pass you by. There certainly isn’t any place to hide.” - -A raucous female voice roared through the annunciator: “Bed check five -minutes, boys. Anybody got any li’l thing to do down the hall, better do -it now. See you lay-terrr!” Hiccup and drunken giggle. - -For the first time in his life Ross suddenly and spontaneously acted -like a tri-di hero, with the exception that he felt like a silly ass -through it all. - -“Got an idea,” he muttered. “Get out of your bunk.” He pulled the wad of -cellosponge, old Whitker’s present, from his pocket and yanked it in -half, one for him and one for Bernie. - -The Pullover said faintly: “Thanks, but I don’t have to——” - -Ross didn’t bother to answer. He was carefully fluffing the stuff out to -its maximum dimensions. He unzipped his coveralls and began wadding them -with cellosponge. - -“I get it,” Bernard said softly. He stepped out of his one-piece garment -and followed suit. In less than a minute they had creditable dummies -lying on their bunks. - -The others watched their activity with emotions ranging between awe and -envy. One giant of a man proclaimed grimly to whoever cared to listen: -“These are a couple of smart guys. I wish them luck. And I want you guys -to know that I will personally break the back of any sneaking rat who -tips off a guard about this.” - -“Sure, Ox. Sure,” came a muted chorus. - -Arranged in a fetal sleeping position, face down, the dummies astonished -even their creators. It would take a lucky look in a fair light to note -that the heads were earless, fibrous globes. - -“They’ll do,” Ross snapped. “Come on, Bernie.” - -They walked quietly from the dormitory in their singlet underwear toward -the dormitory latrine—and past it. Into the corridor. Through a doorless -opening into a storeroom piled with crates of rations. “This’ll do,” -Ross said quietly. They ducked into a small cavern formed by sloppy -issuing of stock and hunched down. - -“The dummies will fool the bed check. It’s only a sweep with a -hundred-line TV system. If the guards do raid the dormitory tonight -we’ll have to count on them ignoring the dummies or thinking they’re a -joke or being too busy with other things to care. They’ll be drunk, -after all. Then in the morning things’ll be plenty disorganized. We’ll -be able to sneak back into formation—and that’ll be that for a matter of -years. They can’t often bribe the pilots with enough to guarantee a real -ripsnorting drunk. Now try and get some sleep. There’s nothing more we -can do.” - -They actually did doze off for a couple of hours, and then were awakened -by drunken war whoops. - -“It’s them!” Bernie wailed. - -“Shut up. They’re heading for the dormitory. We’re safe.” - -“Safe!” Bernie echoed derisively. “Safe until when?” - -Ross threatened him with the side of his hand and Bernie was quiet, -though his lips were mumbling soundlessly. The guards lurched giggling -past and Ross said: - -“We’ll sneak into the lockroom. There won’t be anybody there tonight; at -least we’ll get a night’s sleep.” - -“Big deal,” grumbled Bernie, but he followed, complaining inarticulately -to himself. Ross thought tiredly: All this work for a night’s sleep! And -saw, half-formed, the dreadful procession of days and nights and years -ahead.... - -They reached the lockroom and stumbled in breathlessly. - -“Dearie!” Two guards, playing a card game on the floor with a ring of -empty bottles around them, looked up in drunken delight. “Dearie!” -repeated the bigger of the two. “Angela, _look_ what _we’ve_ got!” - -Ross said stupidly. “But you shouldn’t be here——” - -The guard made a clumsy pass at fluffing up her back hair and giggled. -“Duty comes first, dearie. Angela, just lock that door, will you?” The -other guard scrambled unevenly to her feet and weaved over to the door. -It was locked before Ross or Bernie could move. - -The big guard stood up too, leering at Bernie. “Wow!” she said. “New -merchandise. Just be patient, dearie. We’ve got a little something to -attend to in a couple of minutes, but we’ll have _lots_ of time after -that.” - -Then things began to happen rapidly. There was Angela the guard, -inarticulate, falling-down drunk; she waved bonelessly at a brightly -flickering light on the far side of the lockroom. There was the other -guard, reaching out for Bernie with one hand, pawing at a bottle with -the other. There was Ross, a paralyzed spectator. - -And there was Bernie. - -Bernie’s eyes bulged wide as the guard came toward him. He babbled -hysterically, “No! Nonononono! I said I’d kill myself and I——” - -He stiff-armed the big guard and leaped for the lock door. Ross suddenly -came to life. “Bernie!” he bellowed. “Hold it! Don’t jump!” - -But it was too late. The one guard sprawling, the other staggering -helplessly across the floor, Bernie was clear. He scrabbled at the -lockwheels, spun them open. Ross tensed himself for the sudden, awful -rush of expanding air; he leaped after Bernie just as Bernie flung the -lock door open and jumped. - -Ross jumped after. - -There was no rush of air. They were not in space. Around them was no -ripping, sucking void, no flaming backdrop of stars; around them were -six walls and a Wesley board, and Helena peering at them wide-eyed and -delighted. - -“Well!” she said. “_That_ was fast!” - - * * * * * - -Ross said, “But——” - -Helena, hanging from the acceleration loops, smiled maternally. “Oh, it -was nothing,” she said. “Ross don’t you think we’re far enough away -yet?” - -Ross said hopelessly, “All right,” and cut the drive. The starship hung -in space in the limbo between stars. Azor, “Minerva,” and the rest were -light-years behind, far out of range of challenge. - -Helena wriggled free from the loops and rubbed her arms where the -retaining straps had gripped them. “After all,” she said demurely, “you -_told_ me how to run the ship, and _really_, Ross, I’m not quite -_stupid_.” - -Ross said, “But——” - -“But what, Ross? It isn’t as if I were some sort of brainless little -thing that had never run a machine in her life. My goodness, Ross——” She -wrinkled her nose. “_You_ should remember. All those days in the dye -vats? Don’t you think I had to learn a little something about machines -_there_?” - -Ross swore incredulously. To compare those clumsy constructs of wheels -and rollers with the subtle subelectronic flows of the Wesley force—and -to make it work! He said, unbelievingly, “And the ‘Minerva’ helped you -vector in? They gave you the co-ordinates and radared your course?” - -“Certainly.” Helena turned to Bernie, who was staring dazedly around -him. “Are you all right, dear?” she asked. - -Ross turned his back on them and faced the Wesley Christmas tree of -controls. Don’t question it, he told himself; take a miracle for what it -is. God wanted you out of “Minerva”—and God moves in most mysterious -ways His wonders to perform. - -Anyway, they had to get going. When the court had exiled Helena in the -starship they had gone through the customary rituals; not only was -everything that looked like a weapon gone, along with all but a teacup -of fuel for the auxiliary jets, but the food locker was stripped -entirely. He put everything else out of his mind and began to calculate -a setting. - -Bernie said over his shoulder, “Home, huh? That place you call Halsey’s -Planet?” - -Ross shook his head. “Not this time. I got this far and I’m still alive; -maybe I can finish the job. Anyway, I’ll try. The first solid suggestion -I’ve had ever since I took off was what that half-witted old moron——” He -ignored a little gasp from Helena. “——said back on ‘Minerva.’ If Flarney -had lived, he would have gone there; we’ll go there now.” He finished -manipulating the calculator and began to set it up on the board. He -said, “The name of the place is—Earth.” - - - - -..... 10 - - -IT took Ross a while to learn a lesson, but when he learned it, it -stuck. This time, he promised himself, _no spaceport_. - -They sneaked into the solar system that held fabulous old Earth from far -outside the ecliptic, where the chance of radar detection was least; -they came to a relative dead halt millions of miles from the planet and -cautiously scanned the surrounding volume of space with their own radar. - -No ships seemed to be in space. Earth’s solar system turned out to be a -trivial affair, only five planets, scarcely a half-dozen moons among -them. None of the planets except Earth itself was anything like -inhabitable. - -“Hold tight,” said Ross grimly, “I’m not so good at this fine -navigation.” He cautiously applied power along a single vector; the -starship leaped and bucked. He corrected with another; and the distant -sun swelled in their view plates with frightening rapidity. The alarm -beeps bleated furiously, and the automatic cutoff restored all controls -to neutral. - -Ross, sweating, picked himself up from the floor and staggered back to -the panel. Helena said carefully, “You’re doing _fine_, Ross, but if -you’d like _me_ to take over for a minute——” - -Ross swallowed his pride and stood back. After one wide-eyed stare of -shock—she wasn’t even calculating!—he gripped the loops and closed his -eyes and waited for death. - -There was a punishing bump and his eyes flew open. Helena was looking at -him apologetically. “You would have done it better,” she lied, “but -anyway we’re down.” - -Ross lied, “Of course, but I’m glad you had the practice. Where—uh, -where are we?” - -Helena silently showed him the radar plot. Earth, it seemed, had a -confusing multiplicity of continents; they were on one in the northern -hemisphere, a large one as Earth’s continents went, and smack in the -middle of it. It was night on their side of Earth just then; and, by the -plot, a largish city was only a dozen or so miles away. - -“Okay,” said Ross wearily, “landing party away. Helena, you stay here -while Bernie and I——” - -Helena said simply, “No.” - -Ross stared at her a minute, then shrugged. “All right. Then Bernie will -stay while——” - -“I will not!” said Bernie. - -Clearly it was time for a showdown. Ross roared: “Who’s the captain -here, anyway?” - -“You are,” Helena said promptly. “As long as I don’t have to stay here -alone.” - -“Yeah,” said Bernie. - -Ross said, “Oh.” He thought for a while and then said, “Well, let’s all -go.” They thought it was a wonderful idea. - -Earth wasn’t a very unusual planet—lots of green sand and purple -vegetation. Either the master star chart was wrong or the gravity meter -was off; the former, strangely enough, gave Earth’s gravity as 1.000000 -and the latter as 0.8952, a whopping ten per cent discrepancy. Further, -the principal inert gas in Earth’s atmosphere was, according to the -master chart’s planetary supplement, nitrogen; and according to the -ship’s instruments was indubitably neon. A terrific aurora polaris -display constantly flickering in the northern sky bore that out. - -But the gap between the chart and the facts didn’t particularly worry -Ross as they swung along overland. So the chart was off, or perhaps -things had changed. This was—according to Flarney via Whitker—the place -where people knew about the formula, where his questions would be -answered. After this, he thought happily, it’s off to Halsey’s Planet -and an unspecified glorious future, revered as the savior of humanity -instead of a lousy Yards clerk pushing invoices around. And Helena, he -thought sentimentally.... - -He turned to smile at her and found she and Bernie were giggling. - -“Listen, you two!” Captain Ross roared. “Haven’t you learned anything -yet? What’s the good of us exploring if we stroll along with our silly -heads in the clouds, not paying attention? Do you realize that this -place may be as dangerous as Azor or worse?” - -“Ross——” Helena said. - -“Don’t interrupt! What this outfit needs is some discipline—tightening -up. You two have got to accept your responsibilities. Keep alert! Be on -the lookout! Any single thing out of the ordinary may be a deathtrap. -Watch for——” - -Helena was looking not at Ross but over his shoulder. Bernie was making -strangled noises and pointing. - -Ross turned. Behind him stood a mechanical monstrosity vaguely -recognizable as a heavily-armed truck, its motor faintly humming. A man -leaned darkly from the cab and transfixed them to the ground with a -powerful spotlight. From the dazzling circle of light his voice came, -hasty and furtive. “Thought it was two women and a man, but I guess -you’re the ones. Ugh, those faces on you! Yes, you’re the ones. Get in. -Fast.” - -The light blinked out. When their eyes adjusted to the dimmer -illumination of the stars and the aurora display they saw a side door in -the body of the truck standing open. Too, one of the long, slim gun -barrels with which the truck seemed copiously supplied swiveled to cover -them. - -Ross stupidly read aloud a sign on the truck: “Jones Floor-Cover -Company. Finest Tile on Jones. Wall-to-Wall a Specialty. ‘Rugs Fit For a -Jones’.” - -“Yeah,” the man said. “Yeah, yeah. Just don’t try to buy any. Get in, -for Jones’ sake! If I’d of known you were half-wits I wouldn’t of taken -this job for a million Joneses, cash. Get in!” His voice was hysterical -and the gun covering them moved ominously. “If this is a frame——” he -began to shrill. - -“Get in,” Ross said shakily to the others. They climbed in and the door -slammed violently and automatically. Helena began to cry in a -preoccupied sort of way and Bernie began a long, mumbling inventory of -his own mental weaknesses for ever getting involved in this -crackbrained, imbecilic, feeble-minded.... - -There were windows in the truck body and Ross turned from one to -another. He saw the guns on the cab telescope into stubs, the stubs fold -into the mounts, the mounts smoothly descend flush with the sheet metal. -He saw the cursing driver manipulate a dozen levers as the car began to -glide across the green sand, purple-dotted with vegetation. Finally, -through the rear window, he saw three figures racing across the sand -waving their arms, rapidly being left behind. All he could make out was -that they seemed to be two women and a man. - -Helena was wailing softly, “——and I am _not_ ugly and just because we’re -young and we’re strangers isn’t any reason to go around insulting -people——” - -From Bernie: “——fatheaded, goggly-eyed, no-browed, slobber-lipped, -dim-witted——” - -“Shut up,” Ross said softly. “Before I bang both your heads together.” - -They stared. - -“Thank you. We’ve got to think. What’s this spot we’re in? What can we -do about it? I don’t have any F-T-L contact name for Earth and obviously -this fellow picked us up by mistake. I saw two women and a man—remember -what he said?—just now trying to catch up with us. He seems to be some -kind of criminal. Otherwise why a disguised gun-carrier? Why floor -coverings ‘but don’t try to buy any’? And Jones seems to be the name of -the local political subdivision, the name of the local deity and the -currency. That’s important. It points to a rigid one-man -dictatorship—Jones, of course, or possibly his dynasty. What course of -action should we take? Kick it around. Helena, what do you think?” - -“He shouldn’t have said we were ugly,” she pouted. “Isn’t _that_ -important?” - -“Women!” Ross said grimly. “If you’ll kindly forget the trivial affront -to your vanity perhaps we can figure something out.” - -Helena said stubbornly: “But he _shouldn’t_. We’re not. What if they -just _think_ we are because they all look alike and we don’t look like -them?” - -Ross collapsed. After a long pause during which he tried and almost -failed to control his temper he said slowly: “Thank you, Helena. You’re -wrong, of course, but it was a contribution. You see, you can’t build up -such a wild, far-fetched theory from the few facts available.” His voice -was beginning to choke with anger. “It isn’t reasonable and it isn’t -really any help. In fact it’s the God-damndest stupidest imitation of -reasoning I have ever——” - -“City,” Bernard croaked, pointing. The jolting ride had become smoother, -and gliding past the windows were green tiled buildings and street -lights. - -“Fine,” Ross said bitterly. “We had a few clear minutes to think and now -we find they were wasted by the crackpot dissertation of a female and my -reasonable attempt to show her the elements of logical thinking.” He put -his head in his hands and tried to ignore them, tried to reason it out. -But the truck made a couple of sharp turns and jolted to a stop. - -The door opened and the voice of their driver said, again from behind a -flashlight’s dazzling circle: “Out. Walk ahead of me.” - -They did, into a fair-sized, well-lighted room with eight people in it -whom they studied in amazement. Every one of the eight was exactly the -same height—six feet. Every one had straight red hair of exactly the -same shade, sprouting from an identical hairline. Every one had -precisely the same build—gangling but broad-shouldered. Their sixteen -eyes were the identical blue under sixteen identical eyebrows. Head to -toe, they were duplicates. One of them spoke—in exactly the same voice -as the truckdriver’s. - -“So you want to be Joneses, do you?” he said. - -“Absolutely impossible.” - -“But we took their money.” - -“Give it back. Reasonable changes, yes, but look at them!” - -“We can’t give it back. Look what we spent already. Anyway, Sam,——” It -sounded like “Sam” to Ross. “——anyway, Sam, look at some of the work -you’ve done already. You can do it. I doubt if anybody else could, but -you can.” - -Ross felt his eyes crossing, and gave up the effort of trying to tell -which Jones was speaking to which. Even the clothing was nearly -identical—purple pantaloons, scarlet jacket, black cummerbund sash, -black shoes. Then he noticed that Third-from-the-left Jones—the one who -seemed to be named Sam—wore a frilly shirt of white under the scarlet -jacket. Only a lacy edge showed at the open collar; but where his was -white, the others were all muted pastels of pink and green. - -Sam said coldly, “I know nobody else can do it. Anybody else! Who else -_is_ there?” - -A Jones with a frill of chartreuse pursed his lips. “Well,” he said -thoughtfully, “there’s Northside Tim Jones——” - -“Northside Tim Jones,” Sam mimicked. “Eight of his jobs are in the -stockade right now! Paraffin, for Jones’s sake—he still uses paraffin to -mold a face!” - -“I know, Sam, but after all, these people need help. If you won’t do it -for them, what’s left?” - -Sam shrugged morosely. “Well——” he said. Then he shook his head, sighed, -and came forward to look at the three travelers. With an expression of -revulsion he said, “Strip.” - -Ross hesitated. “Hold it!” he said sharply to Helena, already half out -of her coveralls. “Sir, there may have been some mistake. Would you mind -explaining just what you propose to do?” - -“The usual thing,” Sam said irritably. “Fix your hair, build up your -frames, level you off at standard Jones height. The works. Though I must -say,” he added bitterly, “I never saw such unpromising specimens in my -life. How the Jones have you managed to stay out of trouble this long? -Whose garrets have you been hiding in?” - -Ross licked his lips. “You mean,” he said, “you want to make us look -more like you gentlemen, is that it?” - -“_I_ want!” Sam repeated in bafflement. Over his shoulder he roared, -“Ben, what kind of creeps are you saddling me with?” - -Ben, looking worried, said, “Holy Jones, Sam, I don’t get it either. It -was a perfectly normal deal. This guy came up to me in Jones’s Joint and -made a pitch. He knew the setup all right, and he had the money with -him. Six hundred Joneses, cold cash; and it wasn’t funny money, either.” -His face clouded. “I did think, though,” he mentioned, “that he said two -women and one man. But Paul Jones picked them up right at the -rendezvous, so it must’ve been the right ones.” - -He glowered suspiciously at Ross and the others. “Come to think of it,” -he said, “maybe not. Tell you what, Sam, you just sit tight here for -twenty minutes or so.” And he hurried out of the room. - -One of the other Joneses said curtly, “Sit down.” Ross, Bernie, and -Helena found chairs lined up against a wall; they sat. A different Jones -rummaged in a stack of papers on a table; he handed something to each of -them. “Relax,” he advised. Obediently the three spacefarers opened the -magazines he gave them. When they were settled, most of the Joneses, -after a whispered conference, went out. The one that was left said, “No -talking. If we made a mistake, we’re sorry. Meanwhile, you do what -you’re told.” - -Ross found that his magazine was called _By Jones_; it seemed to be a -periodical devoted to entertaining news and gossip of sports, fashion, -and culture. He stared at an article headed “Be Glad the People’s Police -Are Watching YOU!”, but the words made little sense. He tried to think; -but somehow he couldn’t find a point at which to grasp the flickering -mass of impressions that were circling through his brain. Nothing seemed -to make a great deal of sense any more; and Ross suddenly realized that -he was very, very tired. - -His mind an utter blank, he sat and waited. - -It was twenty minutes and a bit more. Then the door flew open and half a -dozen Joneses burst in. Even at first sight, Ross could tell that three -of them were newcomers. For one thing, two were women; and the third, -though red-haired, tall and gangling, had a nose a full centimeter -shorter than any of the others, and his hair was crisply curled. - -“All right, you Peepeece!” snarled the first Jones. “You found what you -were looking for—now try to get out!” - -Helena did the talking. It wasn’t Ross’s idea, but when her heel -crunched down on his instep he was too startled to object, and from then -on he didn’t get a chance to get a word in edgewise. - -He had to admit that her act was getting across with the audience. Long -before she had finished reporting their meeting, their flight to Azor, -the escape from “Minerva,” and the flight here, most of the Joneses had -put their guns away, and all were showing signs of stupefaction. “——And -then,” she finished, “we saw this truck, and that very good-looking man -picked us up. And so we’re here on Earth; and, honest to goodness, -that’s the exact truth.” - -There was silence while the Joneses looked at each other. Then the -plastic-surgeon-type Jones, Sam with the white shirt front, stepped -forward. “Hold still, my dear,” he ordered. Helena bravely stood rigid -while the surgeon raked searchingly through the roots of her hair, -peered into her eyes, expertly traced the configuration of her ribs. - -He stepped back, shaken. “One thing is for sure,” he told the others, -“they’re not Peepeece. Not with those bones. They’d never get in.” - -Ben Jones beat his forehead and moaned. “How do I get into these -things?” he demanded. - -One of the female Joneses said shrilly, “We didn’t expect anything like -this. We’re honest Jones-fearing Joneses and——” - -“Shut up!” Ben Jones roared. “What about the other two, Sam? They all -right too?” - -“Oh, for Jones’s sake, Ben,” Sam said disgustedly, “just look at them, -will you? Do you think the police would take in a five-inch height -deviation like that one——” he pointed to Bernie——“or a half-bald -scarecrow like that?” Ross, stung, opened his mouth to object; but -swiftly closed it again. Nobody was paying much attention to him, -anyhow, except as Exhibit A. - -“So what do we do?” Ben demanded. - -Sam shrugged. “The first thing we do,” he said wearily, “is to take care -of our, uh, clients here. We get them out of the way, and then we decide -what to do next.” He looked around at the other Joneses. “If you three -will come this way,” he said, “we’ll finish up your job and get you back -home. I needn’t remind you, of course, that if you should happen to -mention anything you’ve seen here tonight to the Peepeece it would——” -His voice was cut off by the closing door before Ross could catch the -nature of the threat. - -Ben Jones stayed behind, scowling to himself. “You people got any -Joneses?” he demanded abruptly. - -“You mean money? Not any at all,” Helena said honestly. Ross could have -kicked her. - -Ben Jones growled deep in his throat. “Always it happens to me!” he -complained. “I suppose we’re going to have to feed you, too.” - -“Well,” Helena said diffidently, “we haven’t eaten in a long time——” - -Ben Jones swore to his god, whose name was Jones, but he stepped to the -door and ordered food. When it came it was surprisingly good; each of -the three, with their diverse backgrounds, found it delicious. While -they were eating, Ben Jones sat watching them, refreshing himself from -time to time with a greenish bubbling liquid out of a jug. He offered -some to Ross; who clutched his throat as though he’d swallowed molten -steel. - -Ben Jones guffawed till his eyes ran. “First taste of Jones’s Juice, -hey? Kind of gets right down inside, doesn’t it?” He wiped his eyes, -then sobered. “I guess you people are all right,” he admitted. “What I’m -going to do with you I don’t know. I can’t take you to Earth, and I -can’t keep you here, and I can’t throw you out on the street—the -Peepeece would have you in the stockade in ten minutes.” - -Ross, startled, said, “Aren’t we on Earth?” - -“Naw,” Ben Jones said disgustedly. “Didn’t you hear me? You’re on Jones, -halfway between Jones’s Forks and Jonesgrad. But you came pretty close, -at that. Earth’s about fifty miles out the Jones Pike past Jonesgrad, -turn right at Jonesboro Minor.” - -Ross said bewilderedly, “The planet Earth is fifty miles along the -Pike?” - -“Not a planet,” Ben Jones said. “It’s an old city, kind of. Nobody lives -there any more; the Peepeece don’t permit it. I’ve never been there, but -they say it’s kind of, you know, different. Some of the buildings——” he -seemed actually to be blushing——“are as much as fifteen, twenty stories -high; and the walls aren’t even all green. Excuse me,” he added, looking -at Helena. - -Sam Jones returned and said to Ben, “It’s all right. All finished. -Trivial alterations. Maybe they could have gone along for the rest of -their lives on wigs and pads—but we don’t tell them that, do we? And -anyway now they won’t worry. Healy Jones, the older man, for instance. -Very bright fellow, but it seems he was working as a snathe-handler’s -apprentice. Afraid to take the master’s test, afraid to change his line -of work—might be noticed and questioned.” He heaved a tremendous sigh -and poured himself a tremendous slug of the green fluid. Ben Jones gave -Ross a cynical wink and shrug. - -“Look at my hand!” the surgeon exploded. It was shaking. He gulped the -Jones Juice and poured himself another. “Nothing physical,” he said. -“Neurosis. The subconscious coldly counting up my crimes and coldly -imposing and executing sentence. I’m a surgeon, so my hand trembles.” He -drank. “Jones is not mocked,” he said broodingly. “Jones is not mocked. -Think those three are going to be happy? Think they’re going to be -folded in Jones’s bosom just because they’re Joneses externally now? No. -Watch them five years, ten years. Maybe they’ll sentence themselves to -be hateful, vitriol-tempered lice and wonder why nobody loves them. -Maybe they’ll sentence themselves to penal servitude and wonder why -everybody pushes them around, why they haven’t the guts to hit -back—Jones is not mocked,” he told the jug of green liquid, ignoring the -others, and drank again. - -Ben Jones said softly to them, “Come on,” and led them into an adjoining -room furnished with sleeping pads. He said apologetically, “The doctor’s -nerves are shot tonight. Trouble is, he’s too Jones-fearing. Me, I can -take it or leave it alone.” His laugh had a little too much bravado in -it. “There’s a little bit of nonJones in the best of us, I always -say—but not to the doctor. And not when he’s hitting the Jones juice.” -He shrugged cynically and said, “What the hell? L-sub-T equals -L-sub-zero e to the minus T-over-two-N.” - -Ross had him by his shirt frill. “Say that again!” - -Ben Jones shoved him away. “What’s the matter with you, boy?” - -“I’m sorry. Would you please repeat that formula? What you said?” he -hastily amended when the word “formula” obviously failed to register. - -Ben Jones repeated the formula wonderingly. - -“What does it mean?” Ross demanded. “I’ve been chasing the damned thing -across the Galaxy.” He hastily filled Ben Jones in on its previous -appearances. - -“Well,” Ben Jones said, “it means what it says, of course. I mean, it’s -obvious, isn’t it?” He studied their faces and added uncertainly, “Isn’t -it?” - -“What does it mean to _you_, Ben?” Ross asked softly. - -“Why, what it means to anybody, pal. Right’s right, wrong’s wrong, Jones -is in his Heaven, conform or else—it means morality, man. What else -could it mean?” - -Ross then proceeded to make an unmannerly nuisance of himself. He -grilled their involuntary host mercilessly, shrugging aside all -attempted diversions of the talk into what they were going to do with -the three visitors. He ignored protestations that Ben was no -Jonesologist, Jones knew, and drilled in. By the time Ben Jones -exploded, stamped out, and locked them in for the night, he had elicited -the following: - -Everybody knew the formula; they were taught it at their mother’s knee. -It was recited antiphonally before and after Jones Meetings. Ben knew it -was right, of course, and some day he was going to get right with Jones -and live up to it, but not just yet, because if he didn’t make money in -the prosthesis racket somebody else would. The formula was everywhere: -on the lintels of public buildings, hanging in classrooms, and on the -bedroom walls of the most Jones-fearing old ladies where they could see -its comforting message last thing at night and first thing in the -morning. - -From a book? Well yes, he guessed so; sure it was in the Book of -Joneses, but who could say whether that was where it started. Most -people thought it was just Handed Down. Way back during the war—what -war? The War of the Joneses, of course! Anyway, in the war the last of -the holdouts against the formula had been destroyed. No, he didn’t know -anything about the war. No, not his grandfather’s time or his -grandfather’s grandfather’s time. Long ago, that war was. Maybe there -were records in the old museum in Earth. The city, of course, not some -damn planet he never heard of! - -After Ben Jones slammed out and the room darkened Helena and Bernie -exchanged comforting words from adjoining sleeping pads, to Ross’s -intense displeasure. They fell asleep and at last he fell asleep still -churning over the problem. - -When he woke he found that evidently the doctor, Sam Jones, had stumbled -in during the night and passed out on the pad next to him. The white -frill was stiff and green with dried Jones Juice. Helena and Bernie -still slept. He tried the door. - -It was locked, but there was a tantalizing hum of voices beyond it. He -put his ear to the cold steel. The fruits of his eavesdropping were -scanty but alarming. - -“——cut ’em down mumble found someplace mumble.” - -“——mumble never killed yet mumble prosthesis racket.” - -“——Jones’s sake, it’s their lives or mumble mumble time to get scared -mumble Peepeece are you?” - -And then apparently the speakers moved out of range. Ross was cold with -sweat, and there was an abnormal hollow in the pit of his stomach that -breakfast would never fill. - -He spun around as a Jones voice croaked painfully: “Hear anything good, -stranger?” - -The surgeon, looking very dilapidated, was sitting up and regarding him -through bloodshot eyes. “They’re talking about killing us,” he said -shortly. - -“They are not really intelligent,” Sam Jones said wearily. “They were -just bright enough to entangle me to the point where I had to work for -them—and to keep me copiously supplied with that green stuff I haven’t -the intelligence to use in moderation.” - -Ross said, “How’d you like to break away from this?” - -Sam Jones mutely extended his hand. It trembled like a leaf. He said, -“For his own inscrutable reason, Jones grants me steadiness of hand -during an operation designed to frustrate his grand design. He then -overwhelms me with a titanic thirst for oblivion to my shame.” - -“There’s no design,” Ross said. “Or if there is, luckily this planet is -a trifling part of it. I have never heard of such arrogant pip-squeakery -in my life. You flyspecks in your shabby corner of the Galaxy think your -own fouled-up mess is the pattern of universal life. You’re wrong! I’ve -seen life elsewhere and I know it isn’t.” - -The doctor passed his trembling hand over his eyes. “Jones is not -mocked,” he croaked. “L-sub-T equals L-sub-zero e to the minus -T-over-two-N. You can’t fight _that_, stranger. You can’t fight that.” - -Ross realized he was silently crying behind his covering hand. - -He said, much more gently, “It’s nothing you have to fight. It’s -something you have to understand.” He told Sam Jones of his two previous -encounters with the formula. The doctor looked up, his eyes full of -wonder. Ross said, “How would you like to be free, doctor? Free of your -shaking hands, free of your guilt, free of these killers? How would you -like to know the truth?” - -The doctor said faintly, “If I dared——” - -Ross pressed, “The museum in Earth city. Get me records, facts, anything -about the War of the Joneses. If there’s any meaning to the formula -it’ll have to lie in that. It seems there was a battle about its -interpretation and we know who won. Let’s find out what the other side -said. Get me in there.” He was thinking of the disgraceful war of -fanaticism that had marred his own planet’s history. The doctor’s weak -Jones jaw was firming up, though his eyes were still haunted. “Stall -your killer friends, doctor,” Ross urged. “Tell them you can use us for -experiments that’ll cut the cost of the operations. That ought to bring -them around. And get me the facts!” - -“To be free,” the doctor said wistfully. He said after a pause, “I’ll -try. But——” And rapped a code series on the steel door. - - - - -..... 11 - - -THE doctor said with weak belligerence, “Who do you think I am? Jones? I -_had_ to leave your friends behind. I had enough trouble getting those -hoods to let me take _you_ along. After all, I’m not a miracle-worker.” - -Ross said sullenly, “Okay, okay.” He glowered out of the car window and -spat out a tendril of red hair that had come loose from the fringe -surrounding his mouth. The trouble with a false beard was that it -itched, worse than the real article, worse than any torment Ross had -ever known. But at least Ross, externally and at extreme range, was -enough of a Jones to pass a casual glance. - -And what would Helena and Bernie be thinking now? He hadn’t had a chance -to whisper to them; they’d been just waking when the doctor dragged him -out. Ross put that problem out of his mind; there were problems enough -right on hand. - -He cautiously felt his red wig to see if it was on straight. The doctor -didn’t seem to look away from his driving, but he said: “Leave it alone. -That’s the first thing the Peepeece look for, somebody who obviously -isn’t sure if his hair is still on or not. It won’t come off.” - -“Umph,” said Ross. The road was getting worse, it seemed; they had -passed no houses for several miles now. They rounded a rutted turn, and -ahead was a sign. - - STOP! - RESTRICTED AREA AHEAD - WARNING: THIS ROAD IS MINED - NO TRAFFIC ALLOWED! DETOUR - “Trespassers beyond this point will be shot - without further notice.” Decree #404-5 - People’s Commissariat of - Culture and Solidarity. - -The doctor spat contemptuously out the window and roared past. Ross -said, “Hey!” - -“Oh, relax,” said the doctor. “That’s just the Cultureniks. Nobody pays -any attention to _them_.” - -Ross swallowed and sat as lightly as possible on the green leather -cushion of the car. By the time they had gone a quarter of a mile, he -began to feel a little reassured that the doctor knew what he was -talking about. Then the doctor swerved sharply to miss a rusted hulk and -almost skidded off the road. He swore and manhandled the wheel until -they were back on the straightaway. - -White lipped, Ross asked, “What was that?” - -“Car,” grunted the doctor. “Hit a mine. Silly fools!” - -Ross squawked, “But you said——” - -“Shut up,” the doctor ordered tensely. “That was weeks ago; they haven’t -had a chance to lay new mines since then.” Pause. “I hope.” - -The car roared on. Ross closed his eyes, limply abandoning himself to -what was in store. But if it was bad to see what was going on, the -roaring, swerving, jolting race was ten times worse with his eyes -closed. He opened them again in time to see another sign flash past, -gone before he could read it. - -“What was that?” he demanded. - -“What’s the difference?” the doctor grunted. “Want to go back?” - -“Well, no——” Ross thought for a moment. “Do we have to go this fast, -though?” - -“If we want to get there. Crossed a Peepeece radar screen ten miles -back; they’ll be chasing us by now.” - -“Oh, I see,” Ross said weakly. “Look, Doc, tell me one thing—why do they -make this place so hard to get to?” - -“Tabu area,” the doctor said shortly. “Not allowed.” - -“Why not allowed?” - -“Because it’s not allowed. Don’t want people poking through the old -records.” - -“Why not just put the old records in a safe place—or burn the damn -things up?” - -“Because they didn’t, that’s why. Shut up! Expect me to tell you why the -Peepeece do anything? They don’t know themselves. It isn’t Jonesly to -destroy, I guess.” - -Ross shut up. He leaned against the window, letting the air rush over -his head. They were moving through forest, purplish squatty trees with -long, rustling leaves. The sky overhead was crisp and cool looking; it -was still early morning. Ross exhaled a long breath. Back on Halsey’s -Planet he would be getting up about now, rising out of a soft, warm bed, -taking his leisurely time about breakfast, climbing into a comfortable -car to make his way to the spaceport where he was safe, respected, and -at home.... Damn Haarland! - -At least, Ross thought, some sort of a pattern was beginning to shape -up. The planets were going out of communication each for its own reason; -but wasn’t there a basic reason-for-the-reasons that was the same in -each case? Wasn’t there some overall design—some explanation that -covered all the facts, pointed to a way out? - -He sat up straight as they approached a string of little signs. He -scanned them worriedly as they rolled past. - - “Workers, Peasants, Joneses all——” - “By these presents know ye——” - “If you don’t stop in spite of all——” - “THIS to hell will blow ye!” - -“Duck!” the doctor yelled, crouching down in the seat and guiding the -careening car with one hand. Ross, startled, followed his example, but -not before he saw that “THIS” was an automatic, radar-actuated -rapid-fire gun mounted a few yards past the last sign. There was a -stuttering roar from the gun and a splatter of metal against the armored -sides of the car. The doctor sat up again as soon as the burst had hit; -evidently only one was to be feared. “Yah, yah,” he jeered at the absent -builders of the gun. “Lousy fifty-millimeters can’t punch their way -through a tin can!” - -Ross, gasping, got up just in time to see the last sign in the series: - - “By order of People’s Democratic Council - Of Arts & Sciences, Small Arms Division.” - -He said wildly, “They can’t even write a poem properly. Did you notice -the first and third line rhyme-words?” - -Surprisingly, the doctor glanced at him and laughed with a note of -respect. He took a hand off the wheel to pat Ross on the shoulder. -“You’ll make a Jones yet, my boy,” he promised. “Don’t worry about these -things; I told you this place was restricted. This stuff isn’t worth -bothering about.” - -Ross found that he was able to smile. There was a point, he realized -with astonishment, where courage came easily; it was the only thing -left. He sat up straighter and breathed the air more deeply. Then it -happened. - -They rounded another curve; the doctor slammed on the brakes. Suspended -overhead across the road was a single big sign: - - THAT’S ALL, JONES! - ——PEOPLE’S POLICE - -The car bucked, slewed around, and skidded. The wheels locked, but not -in time to keep it from sliding into the pit, road wide and four feet -deep, that was dug in front of them. - -Ross heard the axles crack and the tires blow; but the springing of the -car was equal to the challenge. He was jarred clear in the air and -tumbled to the floor in a heap; but no bones were broken. - -Painfully he pushed the door open and crawled out. The doctor limped -after and the two of them stood on the edge of the pit, looking at the -ruin of their car. - -“That one,” said the doctor, “was worth bothering about.” He motioned -Ross to silence and cocked an ear. Was there a distant roaring sound, -like another car following on the road they had traveled? Ross wasn’t -sure; but the doctor’s expression convinced him. “Peepeece,” he said -briefly. “From here on it’s on foot. They won’t follow beyond here; but -let’s get out of sight. They’ll by-Jones _shoot_ beyond here if they see -us!” - -Ross stared unbelievingly. “This is Earth?” he asked. - -The doctor fanned himself and blew. “That’s it,” he said, looking around -curiously. “Heard a lot about it, but I’ve never been here before,” he -explained. “Funny-looking, isn’t it?” He nudged Ross, indicating a -shattered concrete structure beside them on the road. “Notice that toll -booth?” he whispered slyly. “Eight sides!” - -Ross said wearily, “Yes, mighty funny! Look, Doc, why don’t you sort of -wander around by yourself for a while? That big thing up ahead is the -museum you were talking about, isn’t it?” - -The doctor squinted. His eyes were unnaturally bright, and his breathing -was fast, but he was making an attempt to seem casual in the presence of -these manifold obscenities of design. He licked his lips. “_Round -pillars_,” he marveled. “Why, yes, I think that’s the museum. You go on -up there, like you say. I’ll, uh, sort of see what there is to see. -Jones, yes!” He staggered off, staring from ribald curbing to -scatological wall in an orgy of prurience. - -Ross sighed and walked through the deserted, weed-grown streets to the -stone building that bore on its cracked lintel the one surviving word, -“Earth.” This was all wrong, he was almost certain; Earth _had_ to be a -planet, not a city. But still.... - -The museum had to have the answers. - -On its moldering double doors was a large lead seal. He read: “Surplus -Information Repository. Access denied to unauthorized personnel.” But -the seal had been forced by somebody; one of the doors swung free, -creaking. - -Ross invoked the forcer of the door. If _he_ could do it.... - -He went in and stumbled over a skeleton, presumably that of the last -entrant. The skull had been crushed by a falling beam. There was some -sort of mechanism involved—a trigger, a spring, a release hook. All had -rusted badly, and the spring had lost its tension over the years. A -century? Two? Five? Ross prayed that any similar mantraps had likewise -rusted solid, and cautiously inched through the dismal hall of the -place, ready for a backward leap at the first whisper of a concealed -mechanism in action. - -It was unnecessary. The place was—dead. - -Exploring room after room, he realized slowly that he was stripping off -history in successive layers. The first had been the booby-trapped road, -lackadaisically planned to ensure that mere inquisitiveness would be -discouraged. There had been no real denial of access, for there was -almost no possibility that anybody would care to visit the place. - -Next, the seal and the mantraps. An earlier period. Somebody had once -said: “This episode is closed. This history is determined. We have all -reached agreement. Only a dangerous or frivolous meddler would seek to -rake over these dead ashes.” - -And then, prying into the museum, Ross found the era during which -agreement had been reached, during which it still was necessary to -insist and demonstrate and cajole. - -The outer rooms and open shelves were testimonials to Jones. There were -books of Jonesology—ingenious, persuasive books divided usually into -three sections. Human Jonesology would be a painstaking effort to -determine the exact physical and mental tolerances of a Jones. -Anatomical atlases minutely gave femur lengths, cranial angles, eye -color to an angstrom, hair thickness to a micron. Moral Jonesology -treated of the dangers of deviating from these physical and more elastic -mental specifications. (Here the formula appeared again, repeatedly -invoked but never explained. Already it was a truism.) And Sacred -Jonesology was a series of assertions concerning the nature of The Jones -in whose image all other Joneses were created. - -Subdivisions of the open shelves held works on Geographical Jonesology -(the distribution across the planet of Joneses) and similar works. - -Ross went looking for a lower layer of history and found it in a bale of -crumbling pamphlets. “Comrades, We Must Now Proceed to Consolidate Our -Victory”; “Ultra-Jonesism, An Infantile Political Disorder”; “On The -Fallacy of ‘Jonesism In One Country’.” These Ross devoured. They added -up to the tale of a savage political battle among the victors of a -greater war. Clemency was advocated and condemned; extermination of the -opposition was casually mentioned; the Cultural Faction and the -Biological Faction had obviously been long locked in a death struggle. -Across the face of each pamphlet stood a similar logotype: the formula. -It was enigmatically mentioned in one pamphlet, which almost -incomprehensibly advanced the claims of the Biological faction to -supremacy among the Joneses United: “Let us never forget, comrades, that -the initiation of the great struggle was not caused by our will or by -the will of our sincere and valiant opponents, the Culturists. The -inexorable law of nature, L_{T}=L_{O}e-^{T/2N}, was the begetter of that -holocaust from which our planet has emerged purified——” - -Was it now? - -The entrance to a musty, airless wing had once been bricked up. The -mortar was crumbling and a few bricks had fallen. Above the arched -doorway a sign said Military Archives. On the floor was a fallen metal -plaque whose inscription said simply Dead Storage. He kicked the loose -bricks down and stepped through. - -That was it. The place was lightless, except for the daylight filtering -through the violated archway. Ross hauled maps and orders and period -newspapers and military histories and handbooks into the corridor in -armfuls and spread them on the floor. It took only minutes for him to -realize that he had his answer. He ran into the street and shouted for -the doctor. - -Together they pored over the papers, occasionally reading aloud choice -bits, wonderingly. - -The simplest statement of the problem they found was in the paper-backed -“Why We Fight” pamphlet issued for the enlisted men of the Provisional -North Continent Government Army. - -“What is a Jones?” the pamphlet asked rhetorically. “A Jones is just a -human being, the same as you and I. Dismiss rumors that a Jones is -supernatural or unkillable with a laugh when you hear them. They arose -because of the extraordinary resemblance of one Jones to another. -Putting a bullet through one Jones in a skirmish and seeing another one -rise up and come at you with a bayonet is a chilling experience; in the -confusion of battle it may seem that the dead Jones rose and attacked. -But this is not the case. Never let the rumor pass unchallenged, and -never fail to report habitual rumor-mongers. - -“How did the Joneses get that way? Many of you were too young when this -long war began to be aware of the facts. Since then, wartime disruption -of education and normal communications facilities has left you in the -dark. This is the authoritative statement in simple language that -explains why we fight. - -“This planet was colonized, presumably from the quasi-legendary planet -Earth. (The famous Earth Archives Building, incidentally, is supposed to -derive its puzzling name from this fact.) It is presumed that the number -of colonists was originally small, probably in the hundreds. Though the -number of human beings on the planet increased enormously as the -generations passed, genetically the population remained small. The same -ones (heredity units) were combined and reshuffled in varying -combinations, but no new ones were added. Now, it is a law of genetics -that in small populations, variations tend to smooth out and every -member of the population tends to become like every other member. -So-called unfixed genes are lost as the generations pass; the end -product of this process would theoretically be a population in which -every member had exactly the same genes as every other member. This is a -practical impossibility, but the Joneses whom we fight are a tragic -demonstration of the fact that the process need not be pushed to its -ultimate extreme to dislocate the life of a planet and cause endless -misery to its dwellers. - -“From our very earliest records there have been Joneses. It is theorized -that this gangling redheaded type was well represented aboard the -original colonizing ship, but some experts believe one Jones type and -the workings of chance would be sufficient to produce the unhappy -situation of type-dominance. - -“Some twenty-five years ago Joneses were everywhere among us and not, as -now, withdrawn to South Continent and organized into a ruthless -aggressor nation. They made up about thirty per cent of the population -and had become a closely knit organization devoted to mutual help. They -held the balance of political power in every election from the municipal -to the planetary level and virtually monopolized production and finance. -There were fanatics and rabble-rousers among them who readily exploited -a rising tide of discontent over a series of curbing laws, finally -pushed through by a planetary majority, united at last in self-defense -against the rapacity and ruthless self-interest of the Joneses. - -“The Joneses withdrew en masse to South Continent. Some sincerely wished -them well; others scoffed at the secession as a sulky and childish -gesture. Only a handful of citizens guessed the terrible truth, and were -laughed at for their pains. Five years after their withdrawal the -Joneses returned across the Vandemeer Peninsula and the war had begun. - -“A final word. There has been much loose talk among the troops about the -slogan of the Joneses, which goes L_{T}=L_{O}e-^{T/2N}. Some uninformed -people actually believe it is an invocation which gives the Joneses -supernatural power and invulnerability. It is not. It is merely an -ancient and well-known formula in genetics which quantitatively -describes the loss of unfixed genes from a population. By mouthing this -formula, the Joneses are simply expressing in a compact way their -ruthless determination that all genes except theirs shall disappear from -the planet and the Joneses alone survive. In the formula L_{T} means the -number of genes after the lapse of T years, L_{O} means the original -number of genes, e means the base of the natural system of logarithms -and N means number of generations.” - -The surgeon said slowly and with wonder: “So _that_ was my God!” He -stretched out his hands before him. The fingers were rock-steady. - -Ross left him and paced the corridor uneasily. Fine. Now he knew. Lost -genes in genetically small populations. On Halsey’s Planet, some -fertility gene, no doubt. On Azor, a male-sex-linked gene that provides -men with the backbone required to come out ahead in the incessant war of -the genders? Bernie was a gutless character. Here, all too many genes -determining somatotype. On the planets that had dropped out of -communication, who knew? Scientific-thought genes? Sex-drive-determining -genes? - -One thing was clear: any gene-loss was bad for the survival of a -planetary colony. Evolution had——on Earth——worked out in a billion -trial-and-error years a working mechanism, man. Man exhibited a vast -range of variation, which was why he survived almost any conceivable -catastrophe. - -Reduce man to a single type and he is certain to succumb, sooner or -later, to the inevitable disaster that his one type cannot cope with. - -The problem, now stated clearly, was bigger than he had dreamed. And now -he knew only the problem—not the solution. - -Go to Earth. - -Well, he had tried. There had been no flaw in his calculations, no -failure in setting up the Wesley panel. Yet—this was Jones, not Earth; -the city was only a city, not the planet that the star charts logged. -And the planet, beyond all other considerations, was less like Earth -than any conceivable chart error could account for. Gravitation, wrong; -atmosphere, wrong; flora and fauna, wrong. - -So. Eliminate the impossible, and what remains, however unlikely, is -true. So there had been a flaw in his calculations. And the way to check -that, once and for all, was to get back to the starship. - -Ross wheeled and went back into the book room. “Doc,” he called, “how do -we get out of here?” - -The answer was: on their bellies. They trudged through the forest for -hours, skirting the road, hiding whenever a suspicious noise gave -warning that someone might be in the vicinity. The Peepeece knew they -were in the woods; there was no doubt of that. And as soon as they got -past the tabu area, they had to crawl. - -It was well past dark before Ross and the doctor, scratched and aching, -got to the tiny hamlet of Jonesie-on-the-Pike. By the light from the one -window in the village that gave any signs of life, the doctor took a -single horrified look at Ross and shuddered. “You wait here,” he -ordered. “Hide under a bush or something—your beard rubbed off.” - -Ross watched the doctor rap on the door and be admitted. He couldn’t -hear the conversation that followed, but he saw the doctor’s hand go to -his pocket, then clasp the hand of the figure in the doorway. That was -the language all the galaxy understood, Ross realized; he only hoped -that the householder was an honest man—i. e., one who would stay bribed, -instead of informing the Peepeece on them. It was beyond doubt that -their descriptions had long since been broadcast; the road must have -been lined with TV scanners on the way in. - -The door opened again, and the doctor walked briskly out. He strode out -into the street, walked half a dozen paces down the road, and waited for -Ross to catch up with him. “Okay,” the doctor whispered. “They’ll pick -us up in half an hour, down the road about a quarter of a mile. Let’s -go.” - -“What about the man you were talking to?” Ross asked. “Won’t he turn us -in?” - -The doctor chuckled. “I gave him a drink of Jones’s Juice out of my -private stock,” he said. “No, he won’t turn anybody in, at least not -until he wakes up.” - -Ross nodded invisibly in the dark. He had a thought, and suppressed it. -But it wouldn’t stay down. Cautiously he let it seep through his -subconscious again, and looked it over from every angle. - -No, there wasn’t any doubt of it. Things were definitely looking up! - - * * * * * - -Ben Jones roared, “Just what the hell do you think you’re doing, Doc?” - -The doctor pushed Ross through the doorway and turned to face the other -Jones. He asked mildly, “What?” - -“You heard me!” Ben Jones blustered. “I let you out with this one, and -maybe I made a mistake at that. But I by-Jones don’t intend to let you -get out of here with all three of them. What are you trying to get away -with anyhow?” - -The doctor didn’t change his mild expression. He took a short, unhurried -step forward. _Smack._ - -Ben Jones reeled back from the slap, his mouth open, hand to his face. -“Hey!” he squawked. - -The doctor said levelly, “I’m telling you this just one time, Ben. -_Don’t cross me._ You’ve got the guns, but I’ve got these.” He held up -his spread hands. “You can shoot me, I won’t deny that. But you can’t -make me do your dirty work for you. From now on things go my way—with -these three people, with my own life, with the bootleg plastic surgery -we do to keep you in armored cars. Or else there won’t _be_ any plastic -surgery.” - -Ben Jones swallowed, and Ross could see the man fighting himself. He -said after a moment, “No reason to act sore, Doc. Haven’t we always got -along? The only thing is, maybe you don’t realize how dangerous these -three——” - -“Shut up,” said the doctor. “Right, boys?” - -The other two Joneses in the room shuffled and looked uncomfortable. One -of them said, “Don’t get mad, Ben, but it kind of looks as if he’s -right. We and the doc had a little talk before you got here. It figures, -you have to admit it. He does the work; we ought to let him have -something to say about it.” - -The look that Ben Jones gave him was pure poison, but the man stood up -to it, and in a minute Ben Jones looked away. “Sure,” he said distantly. -“You go right ahead, Doc. We’ll talk this over again later on, when -we’ve all had a chance to cool off.” - -The doctor nodded coldly and followed Ross out. Helena and Bernie, -suitably Jonesified for the occasion, were already in the car; Ross and -the doctor jumped in with them, and they drove away. Now that the strain -was relaxed a bit the doctor was panting, but there was a grin on his -lips. “Son-of-a-Jones,” he said happily, “I’ve been waiting five years -for this day!” - -Ross asked, “Is it all right? They won’t chase after us?” - -“No, not Ben Jones. He has his own way of handling things. Now if we -were stupid enough to go back there, after he had a chance to talk to -the others without me around, that would be something different. But we -aren’t going back.” - -Ross’s eyes widened. “Not even you, Doc?” - -“Especially not me.” The doctor concentrated on his driving. Presently: -“If I take you to the rendezvous, can you find your ship from there?” he -asked. - -“Sure,” said Ross confidently. “And Doc—welcome to our party.” - - * * * * * - -Space had never looked better. - -They hung half a million miles off Jones, and Ross fumbled irritatedly -with the Wesley panel while the other three stood around and made -helpful suggestions. He set up the integrals for Earth just as he had -set them up once before; the plot came out the same. He transferred the -computations to the controls and checked it against the record in the -log. The same. The ship should have gone straight as a five-dimensional -geodesic arrow to the planet Earth. - -Instead, he found by cross-checking the star atlas, it had gone in -almost the other direction entirely, to the planet of Jones. - -He threw his pencil across the room and swore. “I don’t get it,” he -complained. - -“It’s probably broken, Ross,” Helena told him seriously. “You know how -machines are. They’re _always_ doing something funny just when you least -expect it.” - -Ross bit down hard on his answer to that. Bernie contributed his morsel, -and even Dr. Sam Jones, whose race had lost even the memory of -spaceflight, had a suggestion. Ross swore at them all, then took time to -swear at the board, at the starship, at Haarland, at Wesley, and most of -all at himself. - -Helena turned her back pointedly. She said to Bernie, “The way Ross acts -sometimes you’d honestly think he was the _only_ one who’d _ever_ run -this thing. Why, my goodness, I _know_ you can’t _rely_ on that silly -board! Didn’t I have just exactly the same experience with it myself?” - -Ross gritted his teeth and doggedly started all over again with the -computations for Earth. Then he did a slow double-take. - -“Helena,” he whispered. “What experience did you have?” - -“Why, just the same as now! Don’t you _remember_, Ross? When you and -Bernie were in jail and I had to come rescue you?” - -“What happened?” Ross shouted. - -“My goodness, Ross don’t _yell_ at me! There was that silly light -flashing all the time. It was driving me out of my _mind_. Well, I knew -_perfectly_ well that I wasn’t going to get anywhere if it was going to -act like _that_, so I just——” - -Ross, eyes glazed, robotlike, lifted the cover off the main Wesley unit. -Down at the socket of the alarm signal, shorting out two delicately -machined helices that were a basic part of the Wesley drive, wedged -between an eccentric vernier screw and a curious crystalline lattice, -was—the hairpin. - -He picked it out and stared at it unbelievingly. He marveled, “It says -in the manual, ‘On no account should any alterations be made in any part -of the Wesley driving assembly by any technician under a C-Twelve -rating.’ She didn’t like the alarm going off. So she fixed it. With a -hairpin.” - -Helena giggled and appealed to Bernie. “Doesn’t he _kill_ you?” she -asked. - -Ross’s eyes were glazed and his hands worked convulsively. “Kill,” he -muttered, advancing on Helena. “Kill, kill, kill——” - -“Help!” she screamed. - -The two men managed to subdue Ross with the aid of a needle from Dr. -Jones’s kit-pocket. - -Helena was in tears and tried to explain to the others: “Just for no -reason at _all_——” - -She got only icy stares. After a while she sulkily began setting up the -Wesley board for the Earth jump. - - - - -..... 12 - - -ROSS awoke, clearheaded and alert. Helena and Bernie were looking at him -apprehensively. - -He understood and said grudgingly, “Sorry I flipped. I didn’t mean to -scare you. Everything seemed to go black——” - -They smothered him with relieved protestations that they understood -perfectly and Helena wouldn’t stick hairpins into the Wesley Drive ever -again. Even if the ship hadn’t blown up. Even if she had rescued the men -from “Minerva.” - -“Anyway,” she said happily, “we’re off Earth. At least, it’s _supposed_ -to be Earth, according to the charts.” - -He unkinked himself and studied the planet through a vision screen at -its highest magnification. The apparent distance was one mile; nothing -was hidden from him. - -“Golly,” he said, impressed. “Science! Makes you realize what backward -gropers we were.” - -Obviously they had it, down there on the pleasant, cloud-flecked, green -and blue planet. Science! White, towering cities whose spires were laced -by flying bridges—and inexplicably decorated with something that looked -like cooling fins. Huge superstreamlined vehicles lazily coursing the -roads and skies. Long, linked-pontoon cities slowly heaving on the -breasts of the oceans. Science! - -Ross said reverently, “We’re here. Flarney was right. Helena, Bernie, -Doc—maybe this is the parent planet of us all and maybe it isn’t. But -the people who built those cities _must_ know all the answers. Helena, -will you please land us?” - -“Sure, Ross. Shall I look for a spaceport?” - -Ross frowned. “Of course. Do you think _these_ people are savages? We’ll -go in openly and take our problem to them. Besides, imagine the radar -setup they must have! We’d never sneak through even if we wanted to.” - -Helena casually fingered the controls; there was the sickening swoop -characteristic of her ship-handling, several times repeated. As she -jerked them wildly across the planet’s orbit she explained over her -shoulder, “I had the darnedest time finding a really big spaceport on -that little radar thing—oops!—but there’s a nice-looking one near that -coastal city. Whee! That was close! There was one—sorry, Ross—on a big -lake inland, but I didn’t like——Now everybody be very quiet. This is the -hard part and I have to concentrate.” - -Ross hung on. - -Helena landed the ship with her usual timber-shivering crash. “Now,” she -said briskly, “we’d better allow a little time for it to cool down. This -_is_ nice, isn’t it?” - -Ross dragged himself, bruised, from the floor. He had to agree. It was -nice. The landing field, rimmed by gracious, light buildings (with the -cooling fins), was dotted with great, silvery ships. They didn’t, Ross -thought with a twinge of irritation, seem to be space vessels, though; -leave it to Helena to get them down at some local airport! Still—the -ships also, he noticed, were liberally studded with the fins. He peered -at them with puzzlement and a rising sense of excitement. Certainly they -had a function, and that function could only be some sort of energy -receptor. Could it be—dared he imagine that it was the long-dreamed-of -cosmic energy tap? What a bonus that would be to bring back with him! -And what other marvels might this polished technology have to give -them.... - -Bernie distracted him. He said, “Hey, Ross. Here comes somebody.” - -But even Bernie’s tone was awed. A magnificent vehicle was crawling -toward them across the field. It was long, low, bullet-shaped—and with -cooling fins. Multiple plates of silvery metal contrasted with a glossy -black finish. All about its periphery was a lacy pattern of intricate -crumples and crinkles of metal, as though its skirts had been crushed -and rumpled. Ross sighed and marveled: What a production problem these -people had solved, stamping those forms out between dies. - -Then he saw the faces of the passengers. - -He drew in his breath sharply. Godlike. Two men whose brows were cliffs -of alabaster, whose chins were strong with the firmness of steady, -flamelike wisdom. Two women whose calm, lovely features made the heart -within him melt and course. - -The vehicle stopped ten yards from the open spacelock of the ship. From -its tip gushed upward a ten-foot fountain of sparks that flashed the -gamut of the rainbow. Simultaneously one of the godlike passengers -touched the wheel, and there was a sweet, piercing, imperative summons -like a hundred strings and brasses in unison. - -Helena whispered, “They want us to come out. Ross—Ross—I can’t face -_them_!” She buried her face in her hands. - -“Steady,” he said gravely. “They’re only human.” - -Ross gripped that belief tightly; he hardly dared permit himself to -think, even for a second, that perhaps these people were no longer -merely human. Hoarsely he said, “We need their help. Maybe we should -send Doc Jones out first. He’s the oldest of us, and he’s the only one -you could call a scientist; he can talk to them. Where is he?” - -A raucous Jones voice bellowed through the domed control room: “Who -wansh ol’ doc, hargh? Who wansh goo’ ol’ doc?” - -Good old doc staggered into the room, obviously loaded to the gills by a -very enjoyable backslide. He began to sing: - - “In A. J. seven thirty-two a Jones from Jones’s Valley, He - wandered into Jones’s Town to hold a Jonesist Rally. He shocked - the gents and ladies both; his talk was most disturbing; He spoke - of seven-sided doors and purple-colored curbing——” - -Jones’s eyes focused on Helena. He flushed. “’m deeply sorry,” he -mumbled. “Unf’rgivable vulgararrity. Mom’ntarily f’rgot ladies were -present.” - -Again that sweet summons sounded. - -“Pull yourself together, doctor,” Ross begged. “This is Earth. The -people seem—very advanced. Don’t disgrace us. Please!” - -Jones’s face went pale and perspiration broke out. “’Scuse me,” he -mumbled, and staggered out again. - -Ross closed the door on him and said, “We’ll leave him. He’ll be all -right; nothing’s going to happen here.” He took a deep breath. “We’ll -all go out,” he said. - -Unconsciously Ross and Helena drew closer together and joined hands. -They walked together down the unfolding ramp and approached the vehicle. - -One of the coolly lovely women scrutinized them and turned to the man -beside her. She remarked melodiously, “Yuhsehtheybebems!”, and laughed a -silvery tinkle. - -Panic gripped Ross for a long moment. A thing he had never considered, -but a thing which he should have realized would be inevitable. Of -course! These folk—older and incomparably more advanced than the rest of -the peoples in the universe—would have evolved out of the common -language into a speech of their own, deliberately or naturally rebuilt -to handle the speed, subtlety, and power of their thoughts. - -But perhaps the older speech was merely disused and not lost. - -He said formally, quaking: “People of Earth, we are strangers from -another star. We throw ourselves on your mercy and ask for your -generosity. Our problem is summed up in the genetic law L-sub-T equals -L-sub-zero e to the minus T-over-two-N. Of course——” - -One of the men was laughing. Ross broke off. - -The man smiled: “Wha’s that again?” - -They understood! He repeated the formula, slowly, and would have -explained further, but the man cut him off. - -“Math,” the man smiled. “We don’ use that stuff no more. I got a lab -assistant, maybe he uses it sometimes.” - -They were beyond mathematics! They had broken through into some mode of -symbolic reasoning that must be as far beyond mathematics as math was -beyond primitive languages! - -“Sir,” he said eagerly, “you must be a scientist. May I ask you to——” - -“Get in,” he smiled. Gigantic doors unfolded from the vehicle. -Thought-reading? Had the problem been snatched from his brain even -before he stated it? Mutely he gestured at Helena and Bernie. Jones -would be all right where he was for several hours if Ross was any judge -of blackouts. And you don’t quibble with demigods. - -The man, the scientist, did something to a glittering control panel that -was, literally, more complex than the Wesley board back on the starship. -Noise filled the vehicle—noise that Ross identified as music for a -moment. It was a starkly simple music whose skeleton was three thumps -and a crash, three thumps and a crash. Then followed an antiphonal -chant—a clear tenor demanding in a monotone: “Is this your car?” and a -tremendous chorally-shouted: “NO!” - -Too deep for him, Ross thought forlornly as the car swerved around and -sped off. His eyes wandered over the control board and fixed on the -largest of its dials, where a needle crawled around from a large forty -to a large fifty and a red sixty, proportional to the velocity of the -vehicle. Unable to concentrate because of the puzzling music, unable to -converse, he wondered what the units of time and space were that gave -readings of fifty and sixty for their very low rate of speed—hardly more -than a brisk walk, when you noticed the slow passage of objects outside. -But there seemed to be a whistle of wind that suggested high -speed—perhaps an effect peculiar to the cooling-fin power system, -however it worked. He tried to shout a question at the driver, but it -didn’t get through. The driver smiled, patted his arm and returned to -his driving. - -They nosed past a building—cooling fins—and Ross almost screamed when he -saw what was on the other side: a curve of highway jammed solid with -vehicles that were traveling at blinding speed. And the driver wasn’t -stopping. - -Ross closed his eyes and jammed his feet against the floorboards waiting -for the crash which, somehow, didn’t come. When he opened his eyes they -were in the traffic and the needle on the speedometer quivered at 275. -He blew a great breath and thought admiringly: reflexes to match their -superb intellects, of course. There _couldn’t_ have been a crash. - -Just then, across the safety island in the opposing lane, there was a -crash. - -The very brief flash of vision Ross was allowed told him, incredibly, -that a vehicle had attempted to enter the lane going the wrong way, with -the consequences you’d expect. He watched, goggle-eyed, as the effects -of the crash rippled down the line of oncoming traffic. The squeal of -brakes and rending of metal was audible even above the thumping music: -“Is this your car?” “NO!” - -Thereafter, as they drove, the opposing lane was motionless, but not -silent. The piercing blasts of strings and trumpets rose to the heavens -from each vehicle, as did the brilliant pyrotechnic jets. A call for -help, Ross theorized. The music was beginning to make his head ache. It -had been going on for at least ten minutes. Suddenly, blessedly, it -changed. There was a great fanfare of trombones in major thirds that -seemed to go on forever, but didn’t quite. At the end of forever, the -same tenor chanted: “You got a Roadmeister?” and the chorus roared: -“_YES!_” - -Ross realized forlornly that the music must contain values and -subtleties which his coarser senses and undeveloped esthetic background -could not grasp. But he wished it would stop. It was making him miss all -the scenery. After perhaps the fifteenth repetition of the Roadmeister -motif, it ended; the driver, with a look of deep satisfaction, did -something to the control board that turned off a subsequent voice before -it could get out more than a syllable. - -He turned to Ross and yelled above the suddenly-noticeable rush of air, -“Talk-talk-talk,” and gave a whimsical shrug. - -During the moment his attention wandered from the road, his vehicle -rammed the one ahead, decelerated sharply and was rammed by the one -behind, accelerated and rammed the one ahead again and then fell back -into place. - -Ross suddenly realized that he knew what had caused those crumples and -crinkles around the periphery of the car. - -“Subtle,” the driver yelled. “Indirection. Sneak it in.” - -“What?” Ross screamed. - -“The commersh,” the driver yelled. - -It meant nothing to Ross, and he felt miserable because it meant -nothing. He studied the roadside unhappily and almost beamed when he saw -a sign coming up. Not advertising, of course, he thought. Perhaps some -austere reminder of a whole man’s duty to the race and himself, some -noble phrase that summed up the wisdom of a great thinker.... - -But the sign—and it had cooling fins—declared: - - BE SMUG! SMOKE SMOGS! - -And the next one urged: - - BEAT YOUR SISTER - CHEAT YOUR BROTHER - BUT SEND SOME SMOGS - TO DEAR OLD MOTHER. - -It said it on four signs which, apparently alerted by radar, zinged in -succession along a roadside track even with the vehicle. - -There were more. And worse. They were coming to a city. - -Turmoil and magnificence! White pylons, natty belts of green, lacy -bridges, the roaring traffic, nimble-skipping pedestrians waving at the -cars and calling—greetings? It sounded like “Suvvabih! Suvvabih! -Bassa-bassa!” The shops were packed and radiant, dazzling. Ross wondered -fleetingly how one parked here, and then found out. A car pulled from -the curb and a hundred cars converged on the spot, shrilling their sweet -message and spouting their gay sparkles. Theirs too! There were a pair -of jolting crashes as it shouldered two other vehicles aside and parked, -two wheels over the curb and on the sidewalk. - -“Suvvabih-bassa!” shouted drivers, and the man beside Ross gaily -repeated the cry. The vehicle’s doors opened and they climbed out into -the quick tempo of the street. - -It was loud with a melodious babble from speaker horns visible -everywhere. The driver yelled cheerfully at Ross: “C’mon. Party.” He -followed, dazed and baffled, assailed by sudden doubts and -contradictions. - - * * * * * - -It was a party, all right—twenty floors up a shimmering building in a -large, handsome room whose principal decorative motif seemed to be -cooling fins. - -Perhaps twenty couples were assembled; they turned and applauded as they -made their appearance. - -The vehicle driver, standing grandly at the head of a short flight of -stairs leading to the room, proclaimed: “I got these rocket flyers like -on the piece of paper you guys read me. Right off the field. Twenny -points. How about that?” - -A tall, graying man with a noble profile hurried up and beamed: “Good -show, Joe. I knew we could count on you to try for the high-point combo. -You was always a real sport. You got the fish?” - -“Sure we got the fish.” Joe turned and said to one of the lovely ladies, -“Elna, show him the fish.” - -She unwrapped a ten-pound swordfish and proudly held it up while Ross, -Bernie, and Helena stared wildly. - -The profile took the fish and poked it. “Real enough, Joe. You done -great. Now if the rocket flyers here are okay you’re okay. Then you got -twenny points and the prize. - -“You’re a rocket flyer, ain’t you, Buster?” - -Ross realized he was being addressed. He croaked: “Men of Earth, we come -from a far-distant star in search of——” - -The profile said, “Just a minute, Buster. _Just_ a minute. You ain’t -from Earth?” - -“We come from a far-distant star in search of——” - -“Stick to the point, Buster. You ain’t a rocket flyer from Earth? None -of you?” - -“No,” Ross said. He furtively pinched himself. It hurt. Therefore he -must be awake. Or crazy. - -The profile was sorrowfully addressing a downcast Joe. “You should of -asked them, Joe. You really should of. Now you don’t even get the three -points for the swordfish, because you went an’ tried for the combo. It -reely is a pity. Din’t you ask them at all?” - -Joe blustered, “He did say sump’m, but I figured a rocket flyer was a -rocket flyer, and they come out of a rocket.” His lower lip was -trembling. Both of the ladies of his party were crying openly. “We -tried,” Joe said, and began to blubber. Ross moved away from him in -horrified disgust. - -The profile shook its head, turned and announced: “Owing to a -unfortunate mistake, the search group of Dr. Joseph Mulcahy, Sc.D., -Ph.D., got disqualified for the combination. They on’y got three points. -So that’s all the groups in an’ who got the highest?” - -“I got fifteen! I got fifteen!” screamed a gorgeous brunette in a -transport of joy. “A manhole cover from the museum an’ a las’ month -_Lipreaders Digest_ an’ a steering wheel from a police car! I got -fifteen!” - -The others clustered about her, chattering. Ross said to the profile -mechanically: “Man of Earth, we come from a far-distant star in search -of——” - -“Sure, Buster,” said the profile. “Sure. Too bad. But you should of told -Joe. You don’t have to go. You an’ your friends have a drink. Mix. Have -fun. I gotta go give the prize now.” He hurried off. - -A passing blonde, stacked, said to Ross: “Hel-looo, baldy. Wanna see my -operation?” He began to shake his head and felt Helena’s fingers close -like steel on his arm. The blonde sniffed and passed on. - -“I’ll operate her,” Helena said, and then: “Ross, what’s _wrong_ with -everybody? They act so young, even the old people!” - -“Follow me,” he said, and began to circulate through the party, trailing -Bernie and a frankly terrified Helena, button-holing and confronting and -demanding and cajoling. Nothing worked. He was greeted with amused -tolerance and invited to have a drink and asked what he thought of the -latest commersh with its tepid trumpets. Nobody gave a damn that he was -from a far-distant star except Joe, who sullenly watched them wander and -finally swaggered up to Ross. - -“I figured something out,” he said grimly. “You made me lose.” He -brought up a roundhouse right, and Ross saw the stars and heard the -birdies. - - * * * * * - -Bernie and Helena brought him to on the street. He found he had been -walking for some five minutes with a blanked-out mind. They told him he -had been saying over and over again, “Men of Earth, I come from a -far-distant star.” It had got them ejected from the party. - -Helena was crying with anger and frustration; she had also got a nasty -scare when one of the vehicles had swerved up onto the sidewalk and -almost crushed the three of them against the building wall. - -“And,” she wailed, “I’m hungry and we don’t know where the ship is and -I’ve got to sit down and—and go someplace.” - -“So do I,” Bernie said weakly. - -So did Ross. He said, “Let’s just go into this restaurant. I know we -have no money—don’t nag me please, Helena. We’ll order, eat, not pay, -and get arrested.” He held up his hand at the protests. “I said, get -arrested. The smartest thing we could do. Obviously somebody’s running -this place—and it’s not the stoops we’ve seen. The quickest way I know -of to get to whoever’s in charge is to get in trouble. And once they see -us we can explain everything.” - -It made sense to them. Unfortunately the first restaurant they tried was -coin-operated—from the front door on. So were the second to seventh. -Ross tried to talk Bernie into slugging a pedestrian so they could all -be jugged for disturbing the peace, but failed. - -Helena noted at last that the women’s wear shops had live attendants -who, presumably, would object to trouble. They marched into one of the -gaudy places, each took a dress from a rack and methodically tore them -to pieces. - -A saleslady approached them dithering and asked tremulously: “What for -did you do that? Din’t you like the dresses?” - -“Well yes, very much,” Helena began apologetically. “But you see, the -fact is——” - -“Shuddup!” Ross told her. He said to the saleslady: “No. We hated them. -We hate every dress here. We’re going to tear up every dress in the -place. Why don’t you call the police?” - -“Oh,” she said vaguely. “All right,” and vanished into the rear of the -store. She returned after a minute and said, “He wants to know your -names.” - -“Just say ‘three desperate strangers,’” Ross told her. - -“Oh. Thank you.” She vanished again. - -The police arrived in five minutes or so. An excited elder man with many -stripes on his arms strode up to them excitedly as they stood among the -shredded ruins of the dresses. “Where’d they go?” he demanded. “Didja -see what they looked like?” - -“We’re them. We three. We tore these dresses up. You’d better take them -along for evidence.” - -“Oh,” the cop said. “Okay. Go on into the wagon. And no funny business, -hear me?” - -They offered no funny business. In the wagon Ross expounded on his theme -that there must be directing intelligences and that they must be at the -top. Helena was horribly depressed because she had never been arrested -before and Bernie was almost jaunty. Something about him suggested that -he felt at home in a patrol wagon. - -It stopped and the elderly stripe-wearer opened the door for them. Ross -looked on the busy street for anything resembling a station house and -found none. - -The cop said, “Okay, you people. Get going. An’ let’s don’t have no -trouble or I’ll run you in.” - -Ross yelled in outrage, “This is a frame-up! You have no right to turn -us loose. We demand to be arrested and tried!” - -“Wise guy,” sneered the cop, climbed into the wagon and drove off. - -They stood forlornly as the crowd eddied and swirled around them. “There -was a plate of sandwiches at that party,” Helena recalled wistfully. -“And a ladies’ room.” She began to cry. “If only you hadn’t acted so -darn superior, Ross! I’ll bet they would have let us have all the -sandwiches we wanted.” - -Bernie said unexpectedly, “She’s right. Watch me.” - -He buttonholed a pedestrian and said, “Duh.” - -“Yeah?” asked the pedestrian with kindly interest. - -Bernie concentrated and said, “Duh. I yam losted. I yam broke. I losted -all my money. Gimme some money, mister, please?” - -The pedestrian beamed and said, “That is real tough luck, buddy. If I -give you some money will you send it to me when you get some more? Here -is my name wrote on a card.” - -Bernie said, “Sure, mister. I will send the money to you.” - -“Then,” said the pedestrian, “I will give you some money because you -will send it back to me. Good luck, buddy.” - -Bernie, with quiet pride, showed them a piece of paper that bore the -interesting legend Twenty Dollars. - -“Let’s eat,” Ross said, awed. - -A machine on a restaurant door changed the bill for a surprising heap of -coins and they swaggered in, making beelines for the modest twin doors -at the rear of the place. Close up the doors were not very modest, but -after the initial shock Ross realized that there must be many on this -planet who could not read at all. The washroom attendant, for instance, -who collected the “dimes” and unlocked the booths. “Dime” seemed to be -his total vocabulary. - -By comparison the machines in the restaurant proper were intelligent. -The three of them ate and ate and ate. Only after coffee did they spare -a thought for Dr. Sam Jones, who should about then be awakening with a -murderous hangover aboard the starship. - -Thinking about him did not mean they could think of anything to do. - -“He’s in trouble,” Bernie said. “_We’re_ in trouble. First things -first.” - -“What trouble?” asked Helena brightly. “You got twenty dollars by asking -for it and I suppose you can get plenty more. And I think we wouldn’t -have got thrown out of that party if—ah—_we_ hadn’t gone swaggering -around talking as if we knew everything. Maybe these people here aren’t -very bright——” - -Ross snorted. - -Helena went on doggedly, “——not _very_ bright, but they certainly can -tell when somebody’s brighter than they are. And naturally they don’t -like it. Would you like it? It’s like a really old person talking to a -really young person about nothing but age. But here when you’re bright -you make everybody feel bad every time you open your mouth.” - -“So,” Ross said impatiently, “we can go on begging and drifting. But -that’s not what we’re here for. The answer is supposed to be on Earth. -Obviously none of the people we’ve seen could possibly know anything -about genetics. Obviously they can’t keep this machine civilization -going without guidance. There must be people of normal intelligence -around. In the government, is my guess.” - -“No,” said Helena, but she wouldn’t say why. She just thought not. - -The inconclusive debate ended with them on the street again. Bernie, who -seemed to enjoy it, begged a hundred dollars. Ross, who didn’t, got -eleven dollars in singles and a few threats of violence for acting like -a wise guy. Helena got no money and three indecent proposals before Ross -indignantly took her out of circulation. - -They found a completely automatic hotel at nightfall. Ross tried to -inspect Helena’s room for comfort and safety, but was turned back at the -threshold by a staggering jolt of electricity. “Mechanical house dick,” -he muttered, picking himself up from the floor. “Well,” he said to her -sourly, “it’s safe. Good night.” - -And later in the gents’ room, to Bernie: “You’d think the damn-fool -machine could be adjusted so that a person with perfectly innocent -intentions could visit a lady——” - -“Sure,” said Bernie soothingly, “sure. Say, Ross, frankly, is this Earth -exactly what you expected it to be?” - -The attendant moved creakily across the floor and said hopefully, -“Dime?” - - - - -..... 13 - - -THEIR second day on the bum they accumulated a great deal of change and -crowded into a telephone booth. The plan was to try to locate their -starship and find out what, if anything, could be done for Sam Jones. - -An automatic Central conferred with an automatic Information and decided -that they wanted the Captain of the Port, Baltimore Rocket Field. - -They got the Port Captain on the wire and Ross asked after the starship. -The captain asked, “Who wan’sta know, huh?” - -Ross realized he had overdone it and shoved Bernie at the phone. Bernie -snorted and guggled and finally got out that he jus’ wannit ta know. The -captain warmed up immediately and said oh, sure, the funny-lookin’ ship, -it was still there all right. - -“How about the fella that’s in it?” - -“You mean the funny-lookin’ fella? He went someplace.” - -“He went someplace? What place?” - -“Someplace. He went away, like. I din’t see him go, mister. I got plenty -to do without I should watch out for every dummy that comes along.” - -“T’anks,” said Bernie hopelessly at Ross’s signal. - -They walked the street, deep in thought. Helena sobbed, “Let’s _leave_ -him here, Ross. I don’t like this place.” - -“No.” - -Bernie growled, “What’s the difference, Ross? He can get a snootful just -as easy here as anywhere else——” - -“No! It isn’t the Doc, don’t you see? But this is the place we’re -looking for. All the answers we need are here; we’ve got to get them.” - -Bernie stepped around two tussling men on the ground, ineffectually -thumping each other over a chocolate-covered confection. “Yeah,” he said -shortly. - - * * * * * - -Helena said: “Isn’t that a silly way to put up a big sign like that?” - -Ross looked up. “My God,” he said. A gigantic metal sign with the -legend, _Buy Smogs_——_You Can SMOKE Them_, was being hoisted across the -street ahead. The street was nominally closed to traffic by cheerfully -inattentive men with red flags; a mobile boom hoist was doing the work, -and quite obviously doing it wrong. The angle of the boom arm with the -vertical was far too great for stability; the block-long sign was -tipping the too-light body of the hoisting engine on its treads.... - -Ross made a flash calculation: when the sign fell, as fall it inevitably -would, perhaps two hundred people who had wandered uncaringly past the -warning flags would be under it. - -There was a sudden aura of blue light around the engine body. - -It tipped back to stability. The boom angle decreased, and the engine -crawled forward to take up the horizontal difference. - -The blue light went out. - -Helena choked and coughed and babbled, “But Ross, it _couldn’t_ have -because——” - -Ross said: “It’s them!” - -“Who?” - -Excitedly: “The people behind all this! The people who built the cities -and put up the buildings and designed the machines. The people who have -the answers! Come on, Bernie. I just seem to antagonize these people—I -want you to ask the boom operator what happened.” - -The boom operator cheerfully explained that nah, it was just somep’n -that happened. Nah, nobody did nothin’ to make it happen. It was in case -if anything went wrong, like. You know? - -They retired and regrouped their forces. - -“Foolproof machines,” Ross said slowly. “And I mean really _fool_ proof. -Friends, I was wrong, I admit it; I thought that those buildings and -cars were something super-special, and they turned out to be just silly -gimcracks. But not this blue light thing. That boom _had_ to fall.” - -Bernie shrugged rebelliously. “So what? So they’ve got some kinds of -machines you don’t have on Halsey’s Planet?” - -“A different order of machines, Bernie! Believe me, that blue light was -something as far from any safety device I ever heard of as the starships -are from oxcarts. When we find the people who designed them——” - -“Suppose they’re all dead?” - -Ross winced. He said determinedly, “We’ll find them.” They returned to -their begging and were recognized one day by the gray-haired profile of -the party. He didn’t remember just who they were or where they were from -or where he had met them, but he enthusiastically invited them to yet -another party. He told them he was Hennery Matson, owner of an airline. - -Ross asked about accidents and blue lights. Matson jovially said some o’ -his pilots talked about them things but he din’t bother his head none. -Ya get these planes from the field, see, an’ they got all kinds of -gadgets on them. Come on to the party! - -They went, because Hennery promised them another guest—Sanford Eisner, -who was a wealthy aircraft manufacturer. But he din’t bother his head -none either; them rockets was hard to make, you had to feed the -patterns, like, into the master jigs just so, and, boy!, if you got ’em -in backwards it was a _mess_. Wheredja get the patterns? Look, mister, -we _always_ had the patterns, an’ don’t spoil the party, will ya? - -The party was a smasher. They all woke with headaches on Matson’s deep -living room rug. - -“You did fine, Ross,” Helena softly assured him. “Nobody would have -guessed you were any smarter than anybody else here. There wasn’t a bit -of trouble.” - -Ross seemed to have a hiatus in his memory. - -The importance of the hiatus faded as time passed. There was a general -move toward the automatic dispensing bar. It seemed to be regulated by a -time clock; no matter what you dialed first thing in the morning, it -ruthlessly poured a double rye with Worcestershire and tabasco and -plopped a fair imitation of a raw egg into the concoction. It helped! - -Along about noon something clicked in the bar’s innards. Guests long -since surfeited with the prairie oysters joyously dialed martinis and -manhattans and the day’s serious drinking began. - -Ross fuzzily tried to trace the bar’s supply. There were nickel pipes -that led Heaven knew where. Some vast depot of fermentation tanks and -stills? Fed grain and cane by crawling harvest-monsters? Grain and cane -planted from seed the harvest-monsters carefully culled from the crop -for the plow-and-drag-and-drill-and-fertilize-and-cultivate monsters? - -His head was beginning to ache again. A jovial martini-drinker who had -something to do with a bank—a _bank!_—roared, “Hey, fellas! I got a idea -what we can do! Less go on over to _my_ place!” - -So they all went, and that disposed of another day. - - * * * * * - -It blended into a dream of irresponsible childhood. When your clothes -grew shabby you helped yourself to something that fit from your host of -the moment’s wardrobe. When you grew tired of one host you switched to -another. They seldom remembered you from day to day, and they never -asked questions. - -Their sex was uninhibited and most of the women were more or less -pregnant most of the time. They fought and sulked and made up and -giggled and drank and ate and slept. All of the men had jobs, and all of -them, once in a while, would remember and stagger over to a phone and -make a call to an automatic receptionist to find out if everything was -going all right with their jobs. It always was. They loved their -children and tolerated anything from them, except shrewd inquisitiveness -which drew a fast bust in the teeth from the most indulgent daddy or -adoring mommy. They loved their friends and their guests, as long as -they weren’t wise guys, and tolerated anything from them—as long as they -weren’t wise guys. - -Did it last a day, a week, a month? - -Ross didn’t know. The only things that were really bothering Ross were, -first, nobody wouldn’t tell him nothin’ about the blue lights and, -second, that Bernie, he was actin’ like a wise guy. - -There came a morning when it ended as it had begun: on somebody’s living -room rug with a headache pounding between his eyes. Helena was sobbing -softly, and that wise guy, Bernie, was tugging at him. - -“Lea’ me alone,” ordered Captain Ross without opening his eyes. Wouldn’t -let a man get his rest. What did he have to bring them along for, -anyway? Should have left them where he found them, not brought them to -this place Earth where they could act like a couple of wise guys and -keep getting in his way every time he came close to the blue-light -people, the intelligent people, the people with the answers to——to—— - -He lay there, trying to remember what the question was. - -“——_have_ to get him out of here,” said Helena’s voice with a touch of -hysteria. - -“——go back and get that fellow Haarland,” said Bernie’s voice, equally -tense. Ross contemplated the fragments of conversation he had caught, -ignoring what the two were saying to him. Haarland, he thought fuzzily, -_that_ wise guy.... - -Bernie had him on his feet. “Leggo,” ordered Ross, but Bernie was -tenacious. He stumbled along and found himself in the men’s room of the -apartment. The tired-looking attendant appeared from nowhere and Bernie -said something to him. The attendant rummaged in his chest and found -something that Bernie put into a fizzy drink. - -Ross sniffed at it suspiciously. “Wassit?” he asked. - -“Please, Ross, drink it. It’ll sober you up. We’ve got to get out of -here—we’re going nuts, Helena and me. This has been going on for weeks!” - -“Nope. Gotta find a blue light,” Ross said obstinately, swaying. - -“But you aren’t finding it, Ross. You aren’t doing anything except get -drunk and pass out and wake up and get drunk. Come on, drink the drink.” -Ross impatiently dashed it to the floor. Bernie sighed. “All right, -Ross,” he said wearily. “Helena can run the ship; we’re taking off.” - -“Go ’head.” - -“Good-by, Ross. We’re going back to Halsey’s Planet, where you came -from. Maybe Haarland can tell us what to do.” - -“Go ’head. _That_ wise guy!” Ross sneered. - -The attendant was watching dubiously as Bernie slammed out and Ross -peered at himself in a mirror. “Dime?” the attendant asked in his tired -voice. Ross gave him one and went back to the party. - -Somehow it was not much fun. - -He shuffled back to the bar. The boilermaker didn’t taste too good. He -set it down and glowered around the room. The party was back in swing -already; Helena and Bernie were nowhere in sight. Let them go, then.... - -He drank, but only when he reminded himself to. This party had become a -costume ball; one of the men lurched out of the room and staggered back -guffawing. “Looka him!” one of the women shrieked. “He got a woman’s hat -on! Horace, you get the craziest kinda ideas!” - -Ross glowered. He suddenly realized that, while he wasn’t exactly sober, -he wasn’t drunk either. Those soreheads, they had to go and spoil the -party.... - -He began abruptly to get less drunk yet. Back to Halsey’s Planet, they -said? Ask Haarland what to do, they said? Leave him here——? - -He was cold sober. - -He found a telephone. The automatic Central checked the automatic -Information and got him the Captain of the Port, Baltimore Rocket Field. -The Captain was helpful and sympathetic; caught by the tense note in -Ross’s voice when he told him who wannit to know, the Captain said, -“Gee, buddy, if I’d of known I woulda stopped them. Stoled your ship, is -that what they done? They could get arrested for that. You could call -the cops an’ maybe they could do something——” - -Ross didn’t bother to explain. He hung up. - -The party was no fun at all. He left it. - -Ross walked along the street, hating himself. He couldn’t hate Helena -and Bernie; they had done the right thing. It had been his fault, all -the way down the line. He’d been acting like a silly child; he’d had a -job of work to do, and he let himself be sidetracked by a crazy round of -drinking and parties. - -Of course, he told himself, something had been accomplished. Somebody -had built the machines—not the happy morons he had been playing with. -Somebody had invented whatever it was that flared with blue light and -repaired the idiot errors the morons made. Somebody, somewhere. - -Where? - -Well, he had some information. All negative. At the parties had been -soldiers and politicians and industrialists and clergy and entertainers -and, heaven save the mark, scientists. And none of them had had the wit -to do more than push the Number Three Button when the Green Light A -blinked, by rote. None of them could have given him the answer to the -question that threatened to end human domination over the cosmos; none -of them would have known what the words meant. - -Maybe—Ross made himself face it—maybe there was no answer. Maybe even if -he found the intellects that lurked beneath the surface on this ancient -planet, they could not or would not tell him what he wanted to know. -Maybe the intellects didn’t exist. - -Maybe he was all wrong in all of his assumptions; maybe he was wasting -his time. But, he told himself wryly, he had fixed it for himself that -time was all he had left. He might as well waste it. He might as well go -right on looking.... - -A migrant party was staggering down the street toward him, a score of -persons going from one host’s home to another. He crossed to avoid them. -They were singing drunkenly. - -Ross looked at them with the distaste of the recently reformed. One of -the voices raised in song caught his ear: - - “——bobbed his nose and dyed it rose, and kissed his lady fair, And - sat her down on a cushion brown in a seven-legged chair. ‘By - Jones,’ he said, ‘my shoes are red, and so’s my overcoat, And with - buttons nine in a zigzag line, I’ll——’” - -“Doc!” Ross bellowed. “Doc Jones! For God’s sake, come over here!” - -They got rid of the rest of Doctor Sam Jones’s party, and Ross sobered -the doctor up in an all-night restaurant. It wasn’t hard; the doctor had -had plenty of practice. - -Ross filled him in, carefully explaining why Bernie and Helena had left -him. Doc Jones filled Ross in. He didn’t have much to tell. He had come -to in the ship, waited around until he got hungry, fallen into a -conversation with a rocket pilot on the field—and that was how _his_ -round of parties had begun. - -Like Ross, Doc, in his soberer moments, had come to the conclusion that -Earth was run by person or persons unseen. He had learned little that -Ross hadn’t found out or deduced. The blue lights had bothered him, too; -he’d asked the pilot about it, and found out about what Ross had—there -appeared to be some sort of built-in safety device which kept the -inevitable accidents from becoming unduly fatal. How they worked, he -didn’t know— - -But he had an idea. - -“It sounds a little ridiculous, I admit,” he said, embarrassed. “But I -think it might work. It’s a radio program.” - -“A radio program?” - -“I said it sounded ridiculous. They call it, ‘What’s Biting You,’ and -one of the fellows was telling me about it. It seems that you can appear -before the panel on the program with any sort of problem, any sort at -all, and they guarantee to solve it for you. There’s some sort of bond -posted—I don’t know much about the details, but this man assured me that -the bond was only a formality; they never failed. Of course,” Doc -finished, hearing his own proposal with a touch of doubt, “I don’t know -whether they ever had any problem like this before, but——” - -“Yeah,” said Ross. “What have we got to lose?” - -They got into the program. It took the techniques of a doubler on an -army chow line and a fair amount of brute strength, but they got to the -head of the queue at the studio and wedged themselves inside. Doc came -close to throttling the man who prowled through the studio audience, -selecting the lucky few who would get on stage—but they got on. - -The theme music swelled majestically around them, and a chorus crooned, -“What’s Biting You—Hunh?” It was repeated three times, with crashing -cymbals under the “Hunh?” - -Ross listened to the beginning of the program and cursed himself for -being persuaded into such a harebrained tactic. But, he had to admit, -the program offered the only possibility in sight. The central figure -was a huge, jovially grinning figure of papier-mâché, smoking a Smog and -billowing smoke rings at the audience. An announcer, for some obscure -reason in blackface, interviewed the disturbed derelicts who came before -Smiley Smog, the papier-mâché figure, and propounded their problems to -Smiley in a sort of doggerel. And in doggerel the answers came back. - -The first person to go up before Smiley was a woman, clearly in her last -month of pregnancy. The announcer introduced her to the audience and -begged for a real loud holler of hello for this poor mizzuble li’l girl. -“Awright, honey,” he said. “You just step right up here an’ let ol’ -Uncle Smiley take care of your troubles for you. Less go, now. What’s -Bitin’ You?” - -“Uh,” she sobbed, “it’s like I’m gonna have a baby.” - -“Hoddya like that!” the announcer screamed. “She’s gonna have a _baby!_ -Whaddya say to that, folks?” The audience shrieked hysterically. -“Awright, honey,” the announcer said. “So you’re gonna have a baby, so -what’s bitin’ you about that?” - -“It’s my husband,” the woman sniffled. “He don’t like kids. We got eight -already,” she explained. “Jack, he says if we have one more kid he’s -gonna take off an’ marry somebody else.” - -“He’s gonna marry somebody else!” the announcer howled. “Hoddya like -that, folks?” There was a tempest of boos. “Awright, now,” the announcer -said, “you just sit there, honey, while I tell ol’ Uncle Smiley about -this. Ya ready? Listen: - - “What’s bitin’ this lady is plain to see: - Her husband don’t want no more family!” - -The huge figure’s head rotated on a concealed hinge to look down on the -woman. From a squawk-box deep in Smiley’s papier-mâché belly, a weary -voice declaimed: - - “If one more baby is your husband’s dread, - Cross him up, lady. Have twins instead!” - -The audience roared its approval. The announcer asked anxiously, “Ya get -it? When ya get inta the hospital, like, ya jus’ tell the nurse ya want -to take _two_ kids home with you. See?” - -The grateful woman staggered away. Ross gave Doc a poisonous look. - -“What else is there to do?” the doctor hissed. “All right, perhaps this -won’t work out—but let’s try!” He half rose, and staggered against the -man next to him, who was already starting toward the announcer. “Go on, -Ross,” Doc hissed venomously, blocking off the other man. - -Ross went. What else was there to do? - -“What’s biting me,” he said belligerently before the announcer could put -him through the preliminaries, “is simply this: L-sub-T equals -L-sub-zero e to the minus-T-over-two-N.” - -Dead silence in the studio. The announcer quavered, “Wh-what was that -again, buddy?” - -“I said,” Ross repeated firmly, “L-sub-T equals L-sub-zero e to the——” - -“Now, wait a minute, buddy,” the announcer ordered. “We never had no -stuff like that on _this_ program before. Whaddya, some kind of a wise -guy?” - -There might have been violence; the conditions were right for it. But -Uncle Smiley Smog saved the day. - -The papier-mâché figure puffed a blinding series of smoke rings at Ross. -From its molded torso, the weary voice said: - - “If you’re looking for counsel sagacious and wise, - The price is ten cents. It’s right under your eyes.” - -They left the studio in a storm of animosity. - -“Maybe we could have collected the forfeit,” Doc said hopefully. - -“Maybe we could have collected some lumps,” Ross growled. “Got any more -ideas?” - -The doctor sipped his coffee. “No,” he admitted. “I wonder—No, I don’t -suppose that means anything.” - -“That jingle? Sure it means something, Doc. It means I should have had -my head examined for letting you talk me into that performance.” - -The doctor said rebelliously, “Maybe I’m wrong, Ross, but I don’t see -that you’ve had any ideas than panned out much better.” - -Ross got up. “All right,” he admitted. “I’m sorry if I gave you a hard -time. It’s all this coffee and all the liquor underneath it; I swear, if -I ever get back to a civilized planet I’m going on a solid diet for a -month.” - -They headed for the room marked “Gents,” Ross sullenly quiet, Doc -thoughtfully quiet. - -Doc said reflectively, “‘The price is ten cents.’ Ross, could that mean -a paper that we could buy on a newsstand, maybe?” - -“Yeah,” Ross said in irritation. “Look, Doc, don’t give it another -thought. There must be some way to straighten this thing out; I’ll think -of it. Let’s just make believe that whole asinine radio program never -happened.” The attendant materialized and offered Ross a towel. - -“Dime?” he said wearily. - -Ross fished absently in his pocket. “The thing that bothers me, Doc,” he -said, “is that I know there are intelligent people somewhere around. I -even know what they’re doing, I bet. They’re doing exactly what I tried -to do: acted as stupid as anybody else, or stupider. I’d make a guess,” -he said, warming up, “that if we could just make a statistical analysis -of the whole planet and find the absolute stupidest-seeming people of -the lot, we’d——” - -He ran out of breath all at once. His eyes bulged. - -He looked at the men’s-room attendant, and at the ten-cent piece in his -own hand. - -“You!” he breathed. - -The attendant’s face suddenly seemed to come to life. In a voice that -was abruptly richer and deeper than before, the man said: “Yes. You had -to find us yourself, you know.” - - - - -..... 14 - - -THERE was a home base, a gigantic island called Australia, to which they -took Ross and Doc Jones in a little car that sprouted no wings and -flashed no rockets, but flew. - -They lived underground there, invisible to goggling passengers and -crewmen aboard the “rockets.” (They weren’t rockets. They were -turbo-jets. But it made the children happy to think that they had -rockets, so iron filings were added to the hot jet stream, and they -sparkled in magnificent display.) - -There they were born, and there they spent strange childhoods, learning -such things as psychodynamics and teleportation. By the time they were -eight months or so old they thought it amusing to converse of Self and -the Meaning of Meaning. By eighteen months a dozen infants would chat in -_terza rima_. But by the age of two they had put such toys behind them -with a sigh of pleasant regret. They would revert to them only for such -purposes as love-making or choral funeral addresses. - -They were then of an age to begin their work. - -They were born there, and trained there for terrible tasks. And they -died there, at whatever risk. For that they would not surrender: their -right to die among their own. - -But their lives between cradle and grave, those they gave away. - -Nursemaids? What else can one call them? - -They explained it patiently to Ross and the doctor. - -“The pattern emerged clearly in the twentieth century. Swarming slums -abrawl with children, children, children everywhere. Walk down a Chicago -Southside street, and walk away with the dazed impression that all the -world was pregnant. Walk through pretty, pleasant Evanston, and find the -impression wrong. Those who lived in Evanston were reasonable people. -They waited and thought. Being reasonable, they saved and planned. Being -reasonable, they resorted to gadgets or chemicals or continence. - -“A woman of the period had some three hundred and ninety opportunities -to conceive a child. In the slums and the hills they took advantage of -as many of them as they might. But around the universities, in the -neighborhoods of the well-educated and the well-to-do, what was the -score? - -“First, education, until the age of twenty. This left two hundred and -ninety-nine opportunities. Then, for perhaps five years, shared work; -the car, the mortgage, the furniture, that two salaries would pay off -earlier than one. Two hundred and thirty-four opportunities were left. -Some of them were seized: a spate of childbearing perhaps would come -next. But subtract a good ten years more at the end of the cycle, for -the years when a child would be simply too late—too late for fashion, -too late for companionship with the first-born. We started with three -hundred and ninety opportunities. We have, perhaps, one hundred and -forty-four left. - -“Is that the roster complete? No. There is the battle of the budget: No, -not right now, not until the summer place is paid for. And more. The -visits from the mothers-in-law, the quarterly tax payments, the -country-club liaisons and the furtive knives behind the brownstone -fronts and what becomes of fertility—they have all been charted. But -these are superfluous. The ratio 390:144 points out the inevitable. As -three hundred and ninety outweighs one hundred and forty-four, so the -genes of the slovenly and heedless outweigh the thoughtful and slow to -act. - -“We tampered with the inevitable. - -“The planet teemed and burst. The starships went forth. The strong, -bright, quick ones went out in the ships. Two sorts were left: The -strong ones who were not bright, the bright ones who were not strong. - -“We are the prisoners of the planet. We cannot leave. - -“The children—the witless ones outside—can leave. But who would have -them?” - -Ross peered into the shifting shadows. “But,” he said, “you are the -masters of the planet——” - -“_Masters?_ We are slaves! Fully alive only here where we are born and -die. Abstracted and as witless as they when we are among _them_—well we -might be. For each of us, square miles to stand guard over. Our minds -roving across the traps we dare not ignore, ready to leap out and -straighten these children’s toppling walls of blocks, ready to warn the -child that sharp things cut and hot things burn. The blue lights—did you -think they were machines?” They were _us_! - -“You’re torturing yourselves!” Ross exploded. “Let them die.” - -“Let—ten—billion—children—die? We are not such monsters.” - -Ross was humbled before their tragedy. Diffidently he spoke of Halsey’s -Planet, Ragansworld, Azor, Jones. He warmed to the task and was growing, -he thought, eloquent when their smiles left him standing ashamed. - -“I don’t understand,” he said, almost weeping. - -The voice corrected him: “You do. But you do not—yet—know that you do. -Consider the facts: - -“Your planet. Sterile and slowly dying. - -“The planets you have seen. One sterile because it is imprisoned by -ancients, one sterile under an in-driven matriarchal custom, one sterile -because all traces of divergence have been wiped out. - -“Earth. Split into an incurable dichotomy—the sterility of brainless -health, the sterility of sick intellect. - -“Humanity, then, imprisoned in a thousand sterile tubes, cut off each -from the other, dying. We feared war, and so we isolated the members -with a wall of time. We have found something worse to fear. What if the -walls are cracked?” - -“Crack the walls? How? Is it too late?” - -Somehow the image of Helena was before him. - -“Is it too late?” they gently mocked. “Surely you know. How? Perhaps you -will ask her.” - -The image of Helena was blushing. - -Ross’s heart leaped. “As simple as that?” - -“For you, yes. For others there will be lives spent over the lathes and -milling machines, eyes gone blind in calculating and refining -trajectories, daring ones lost screaming in the hearts of stars, or -gibbering with hunger and pain as the final madness closes down on them, -stranded between galaxies. There will be martyrs to undergo the worst -martyrdom of all—which is to say, they will never know of it. They will -be unhappy traders and stock-chasers, grinding their lives to smooth -dull blanks against the wearying routine so that the daring ones may go -forth to the stars. But for you—you have seen the answer. - -“Old blood runs thin. Thin blood runs cold. Cold blood dies. Let the -walls crack.” - -There was a murmuring in the shadows that Ross could not hear. Then the -voice again, saying a sort of good-by. - -“We have had a great deal of experience with children, so we know that -they must not be told too much. There is nothing more you need be told. -You will go back now——” - -Ross dared interrupt. “But our ship—the others have taken it away——” - -Again the soundless laughter. “The ship has not been taken far. Did you -think we would leave you stranded here?” - -Ross peered hard into the shadows. But only the shadows were there, and -then he and Jones were in the shadows no longer. - -“Ross!” Helena was hysterical with joy. Even Bernie was stammering and -shaking his head incredulously. “Ross, dearest! We thought—And the ship -acted all _funny_, and then it landed here and there just wasn’t anybody -around, and I couldn’t make it go again——” - -“It will go now,” Ross promised. It did. They sealed ship; he took the -controls; and they hung in space, looking back on a blue-green planet -with a single moon. - -There were questions; but Ross put an end to questions. He said, “We’re -going back to Halsey’s Planet. Haarland wanted an answer. We’ve found -it; we’ll bring it to him. The F-T-L families have kept their secret too -well. No wars between the planets—but stagnation worse than wars. And -Haarland’s answer is this: He will be the first of the F-T-L traders. -He’ll build F-T-L ships, and he’ll carelessly let their secrets be -stolen. We’ll bridge the galaxy with F-T-L transports; and we’ll pack -the ships with a galaxy of crews! New genes for old; hybrid vigor for -dreary decay! - -“Do you see it?” His voice was ringing loud; Helena’s eyes on him were -adoring. “Mate Jones to Azor, Halsey’s Planet to Earth. Smash the -smooth, declining curve! Cross the strains, and then breed them back. -Let mankind become genetically wild again instead of rabbits isolated in -their sterile hutches!” - -Exultantly he set up the combinations for Halsey’s Planet on the Wesley -board. - -Helena was beside him, proud and close, as he threw in the drive. - - - - - ABOUT THE AUTHORS - - -THE SPACE MERCHANTS was not only one of the best-reviewed -science-fiction novels in 1953, it was one of the most widely reviewed. -Favorable notices appeared in journals ranging from _Printer’s Ink_ to -science-fiction magazines, from _Tide_ magazine to the great national -dailies. That novel firmly established Messrs. Pohl and Kornbluth as a -team, although they had collaborated before under pen names and had -established reputations singly. Their new novel, SEARCH THE SKY, has the -same wit, the same passages of genuinely beautiful writing and—what is -most important and most characteristic—the same underlying concern for -human beings, whether they are on future Madison Avenues or in the outer -galaxies. - -This is Mr. Kornbluth’s seventh published novel. Two were written in -collaboration with Judith Merril under the pen name “Cyril Judd”; one -was the notable TAKEOFF (Doubleday, 1952); one was not science fiction; -one was his last collaborative effort with Mr. Pohl; and his most recent -was THE SYNDIC (Doubleday, 1953). Mr. Kornbluth, still under thirty, now -lives in an upstate New York farmhouse with his wife and child where he -devotes himself to writing. - -This is Mr. Pohl’s sixth published book. Two of them were reprint -collections which he edited and two others were the now-celebrated first -and second volumes of STAR SCIENCE FICTION STORIES, collections of new -stories published by Ballantine Books. At 34, Mr. Pohl lives in a large -old house on the Jersey shore—“five rooms for me, four for my wife and -two apiece for the children.” He has three more books forthcoming in -1953: two anthologies and his first solo novel. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - - - - - TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE - - -Repeated instances of the title in the front of the book have been -reduced. - -Punctuation has been normalized. Variations in hyphenation have been -retained as they were in the original publication. The following assumed -printer’s errors were corrected: - - look at the stars and breath —> breathe {Page 24} - - Halsey City to the ’port —> port {Page 29} - - were ready to quit Oldhan —> Oldham {Page 31} - - short of meccano-toy —> sort {Page 96} - - O.8952, —> 0.8952, {Page 109} - - Trouble is, he’s too Jonesfearing. —> Jones-fearing {Page 118} - -Italicized phrases are presented by surrounding the text with -_underscores_. - -In the mathematical formulas, superscripts and subscripts are -represented by surrounding with curly brackets; in the case of -subscripts, the leading bracket is preceded by an underscore, and in the -case of superscripts, it is preceded by a caret. In the simple case of a -single superscripted character, a caret may precede the character -without any brackets. 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