The Best of Murray Leinster

1978

Contents

Introduction:
The Dean of Science Fiction J.J. Pierce
Sidewise in Time
Proxima Centauri
The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator
First Contact
The Ethical Equations
Pipeline to Pluto
The Power
A Logic Named Joe
Symbiosis
The Strange Case of John Kingman
The Lonely Planet
Keyhole
Critical Difference

The Dean of Science Fiction

"There were giantS in the earth in those days.
mighty men which were of old; men of renown."
-Genesis 6:4

SUBCULTURES; TOO, HAVE their lengendary figures, and in the world of science fiction, Murray Lemster was one.

In his later years, Leinster came to be known as the Dean of ScienceFiction. His career in the field spanned nearly fifty years-remarkable enoughin itself. More remarkable is that he remained a top-ranked writer for all ofthose years.

Leinster, in real life an unassuming Virginian named William FitzgeraldJenkins (1896-1975), would have been amused at the Biblical parallel. But likethat of the patriarchs of old, his longevity seemed unbelievable. Dozens ofwriters vanished into obscurity; entire schools of writing rose, flourished, and died-but Leinster carried on.

That took rare ability, but it also took rare dedication. Nowadays, whenscience fiction is taught in colleges, and a single, good sf movie bids fairto gross $100 million, it is hard to appreciate the dedication required of writers like Leinster to make of a marginal and despised genre something inwhich they, and their readers; could take legitimate pride.

A fellow pioneer of those early days once remarked that writing sciencefiction took more work and paid less, than bricklaying-he'd tried both andknew. Bricklaying pays a lot more the se days, and so does science' fiction-butthere were and are easier ways of making a living than sf.

It is important to remember that. The pioneers of science fiction were, by and large, commercial writers. They never talked of Art and Literature; rather, of "craftsmanship" and "professional" standards. But that didn't mean, as some of today's less-informed critics seem to think, that they didn't careabout their work. Science fiction might be better off today, if some of the secritics, and their favorite authors, loved sf as much as Leinster and some ofhis colleagues did.

When Leinster began writing science fiction, it wasn't even calledscience fiction. There weren't any sf magazines-what were called "scientificromances" or "different stories" appeared mostly in adventure pulps, mixed inwith Westerns, spy thrillers, detective stories, horror tales and the like.

Science fiction had no distinct identity, or any generally recognized standards.

Leinster's own first story, "The Runaway Skyscraper" (1919), was typicalof what was called for by a market that demanded exciting stories but as yethad no real appreciation of scientific logic or scientific imagination. A NewYork skyscraper suddenly plunges backward in time-never mind how or why-andits occupants have to rough it in the wilderness.

But even in his early works, Leinster brought a new kind of imaginationto pulp literature. "The Mad Planet" (1920), too long to include, here, was inthe tradition of the "scientific romances" and pitted men reduced to savageryagainst a world of giant insects and fungi. Yet the story still somehow seemsfresh today. Leinster was fascinated by the world of insects, and he makes the reader fascinated-not merely frightened.

When themarket called for stories about mad scientists who threatened the world with their mad inventions, Leinster could supply them-but his alwayshad a distinct logic behind them. In "The City of the Blind" (1929), ascientific criminal's invention darkens New York to cover a wave of robberies. Only to Leinster would it have occurred to consider what such a device woulddo to the weathe r.

But Murray Leinster did more than improve on existing models; he wrotenew kinds of stories. "Sidewise in Time," which opens this collection, is aclassic case in point. One of themost influential sf stories ever written, itdeveloped a concept of "parallel worlds"-worlds that exist in the same time asours, but in which natural or human history has taken a different course. Thatidea has since been drawn on by H. Beam Piper, Keith Laumer, and a host ofother writers. Some physicists are even reported to be taking the ideaseriously-not the specific details, of course, but the concept that ouruniverse may not be the only one in this space-time continuum. Leinster wasn'ta dour the oretician, by any means--he was a man who could have fun with ideasand share that fun with his readers. "The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator"

takes on the old dream of making money easily, but it never occurred to othe rswho wrote parables of greed that a device producing money out of thin airwould do the same for other things, including girl friends, or take "A LogicNamed Joe," one of his funniest stories and one of his most prophetic. Mostpeople weren't aware of computers back then, and nobody realized there mightone day be computer information terminais all over the place-with the irattendant problems. It's still fun (and sobering, on reflection) to read aboutthe people who order computer data on how to rob banks or cure their neighborsof concupiscence, but it's also fun because we know Leinster thought out ideasthat hadn't even occurred to others.

The same kind of disciplined imagination could be turned to a reallynasty story like "Pipeline to Pluto." It's an uncharacteristically gritty taleof some unpleasant people who meet their comeuppance. But Leinster couldcreate a whole new kind of. comeuppance to satisfy morality and scientificlogic at' once, and he did.

Leinster's type of imagination was not a mere literary affectation, butwas a basic part of theman. When he wasn't writing, he was inventing. He hada laboratory in his home, and some of his inventions seem the very stuff ofscience fiction.

Jenkins Systems, widely used in television and themovies, is a devicethat allows background scenes to be projected on a special screen, without showing-up on' the actors standing in front of the screen. As described by its inventor (under the double byline of Will F. Jenkins-Murray Leinster) in"Applied Science Fiction," the system depends on a precise knowledge of the different ways light can be reflected. But it also depends on a certainpsychology-the psychology of a man who can see how to make use of such naturalphenomena.

Invention is a matter of problem-solving, and one of Leinster's favoriteforms, especially in his later years, was what is usually called the scientific problem story. "Critical Difference" is one of a series he wrote inthe 195 Os., and his own experience in solving scientific problems is, reflected in themanner in which his hero, comes to grips with a natural crisis that threatens the existence of human life in the planetary system of an unexpectedly variable star. The same kind of insighit was, however, showneven early in his career with the story of Burl, the primitive who discovershow to use his mind to cope with a savage environment in "The Mad Planet."

Leinster was a rationalist, a term which often seems to be in disfavor- perhaps through association with the dismal utilitarianism of the GradgrindSchool in Dickens' Hard Times. Anything but a Grandgrind, Leinster saw reasonas a normal part of humanity, and his stories are always human dramas, notmere classroom exercises.

An admirer of Thomas Aquinas, Leinster believed that there is a naturalorder in the universe. In "The Ethical Equations," for instance, he evensuggests the possibility of a natural moral order in the imagined mathematical proof that certain patterns of conduct increase the probabilityof certain kinds of coincidences."

But he was never heavy-handed about presenting his philosophy infiction. One of, his Med Service stories, concerning a doctor who deals withmedical emergencies on far planets, quoted witty aphorisms from an imaginarybook called The Practice of Thinking, by Fitzgerald. Intrigued readerspestered him for years afterward with inquiries about where they could obtainthe book.

Nor did he ever forget ordinary human touches. On his interstellarships, there are recorded sounds: "the sound of rain, and of traffic, and ofwind in treetops and voices too faint for the words to be distinguished, andalmost inaudible music-and sometimes laughter. The background tape carried noinformation; only the assurance that there were still worlds with clouds andpeople and creatures moving about on them."

Leinster saw no necessary conflict between reason and human emotionalneeds, but he was fully aware of the irrational in man and the evil men do.

"Keyhole" is an emotional story, in which it is very fortunate for Butch andhis kind that they are able to offer men a "reason" for, leaving them inpeace. A convert to Catholicism, Leinster never mentioned religion in his sf, never sought to preach-but the idea of sin is certainly there.

"First Contact" is themost famous of Leinster's stories of encounters between men and aliens. Here he sees them sharing the same weaknesses-fear, greed, and mistrust-but also the same strength of intelligent life everywhere:

the ability to use reason to overcome their own weaknesses as -well as the problems of their environment. The story earned Leinster a place in TheScience Fiction Hall of Fame, a volume of stories voted the classics of alltime by the Science Fiction Writers of America.

"First Contact" also occasioned a minor ideological flap in 1959, whenSoviet sf writer Ivan Yefremov published "The Heart of the Serpent," a storyin which humans and aliens make friendly contact and don't have any problemsbecause they're all good Communists. A character in Yefremov's story speaksdisparagingly of "First Contact," and sees in its author "the heart of apoisonous' snake." Characteristically modest and gentlemanly, Leinster refusedto be drawn into a debate, and on one occasion expressed more disturbance overYetremov's apparent prejudice against snakes than over any criticism ofhimself.

It would take a very casua1 reader to suspect Leinster of xenophobia. "Proxima Centauri" was as close as be came to the BEM (Bug-Eyed Monster) storyin which innocent humans are threatened by themonsters. And even in thiscase, the aliens have a very specific-~and logical-reason for being a threatto their human visitors. One might almost view the conflict as the unfortunateby-product of a local environmental crisis.

In "The Lonely Planet," by contrast, the grim moments are all caused bythe ignorance, malice, greed, and downright stupidity of humans. Leinster'ssympathy for the world-brain of Alyx is characteristic of him-and of sciencefiction generally for the last forty years. There are those, not too wellinformed, who imagine this attitude to have been developed only within the last decade, usually by themselves.

Perhaps themost unusual of Leinster's contact stories, "The StrangeCase of John Kingman," never moves off the Earth at all. There is a subtleirony to the story: the being in themental hospital who has been classed as alunatic' for nearly two hundred years really is insane-but not for the reasonshuman doctors have imagined.

In the 1930s, Leinster wrote several realistic stories of--futurewarfare, like "Tanks" and "Politics." In "Symbiosis," he returned to the future-war theme, but in a much subtler manner. Kantolia seems defenseless: noplanes, tanks, or heavy guns, no fanciful death rays. But it has a trulydeadly weapon-invaders are helpless against it. The fact that a man with atroubled conscience must wield that weapon makes this, too, a very humanstory.

"The Power" is a science-fiction story set in a period when sciencefiction would have been impossible. Before you can have either science orscience fiction, you have to have the kind of imagination that makes bothpossible. Poor Carolus-he sees, but cannot observe, still less understand!

One collection could not possibly include all the best stories of a manwho was a regular contributor to science-fiction markets for five decades-there are even important types of fiction Leinster wrote, which could not berepresented, here because of space limitations. And there are, of course, novels like The Forgotten Planet, based on "The Mad Planet" and its sequels.

Readers haven't always had a chance to see Leinster at his best. Afterquitting an insurance company at age twenty-one--his boss wanted him to dosomething unethical, so he told the boss that he could do with the job- Leinster made his living as a writer, in other fields' as well as in sciencefiction. Unfortunately, it seems that some publishers would rather reprint hispotboilers than his classics. Then too, some publishers couldn't tell the difference between them even when he was alive.

One of his novels, serialized in a magazine, dealt with space piracy. Anold and hackneyed theme, but Leinster redeemed it with a climax in which the hero uses his knowledge of the hijacked ship's communications system to drivethe pirates insane. When a paperback publisher picked up thenovel, however, virtually all the good stuff was cut out, without the author even beinginformed.

In recent years, it has become fashionable to look down on the pioneersof science fiction. One contemporary author pretentiously dismissed Leinsterwith the comment that he wasn't a Dostoevski-a comment that means about as much as saying Scott Joplin Wasn't a Beethoven.

Leinster himself, of course, never claimed to be a Dostoevski-or anyoneelse so exalted. He took pride in doing what he could do well, but was neverpretentious. Yet it was he, and others like him, who created a new kind offiction with its own themes and traditions. Without them, there would benothing for today's science-fiction writers to turn into Literature-indeed, today's science-fiction writers wouldn't be. Period.

A pioneer of the scientific imagination in fiction--Leinster was that. But more than a pioneer; that would not be enough to make him worth readingtoday. The history of any literary genre is littered with pioneering works that are of interest only to scholars, and plenty of those can be found in the sf magazines of thirty or forty years ago. Leinster's classics have escapedthat fate.

Oh, you can tell which ones were written in the 1930s as opposed to the 1950s; styles change, after all. But his stories hardly seem dated at all.

"The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator," for instance, could be made the basisfor a television comedy tomorrow with only minor changes. Given human nature, the ethical problems of "First Contact" are as real today as in 1944-much asone might regret some ethnic references inspired by World War II.

Leinster was a man who was interested hi the world-in people and ideas. Too many writers can't seem to get interested in anything but themselves. Justas the best teacher is one who can get excited about what he's teaching, the best writer is one who can get excited about what he's writing. Leinster couldand did, and his stories still communicate that excitement.

From the adventures in parallel worlds of "Sidewise in Time" to themoral conflicts of "First Contact" to the grim struggle to save a seeminglydoomed world in "Critical Difference," Murray Leinster is still a good read.

John J. Pierce

Berkeley Heights, N.J.

June 28, 1977

Sidewise in Time

FOREWORD

LOOKING BACK, IT seems strange that no one but Professor Minott figured the thing out in advance. The indications were more than plain, In early Decemberof 1934 Professor Michaelson announced his finding that the speed of light wasnot an absolute could not be considered invariable. That, of course, was oneof the first indications of what was to happen.

A second indication came on February 15th, when at 12:40 p.m., Greenwichmean time, the sun suddenly shone blue-white and the enormously increased rateof radiation raised the temperature of the earth's surface by twenty-twodegrees Fahrenheit in five minutes. At the end of the five minutes, the sunwent back to its normal rate of radiation without any other symptom ofdisturbance.

A great many bids for scientific fame followed, of course, but noplausible explanation of the phenomenon accounted for a total lack of afterdisturbances in the sun's photosphere.

For a third clear forerunner of the events of June, on March 10th themale giraffe in the Bronx Zoological Park, in New York, ceased to eat. In thenine days following, it changed its form, absorbing all its extremities, evenits neck and head, into an extraordinary, eggshaped mass of still-living fleshand bone which on the tenth day began to divide spontaneously and on the twelfth was two slightly pulsating fleshy masses.

A day later still, bumps appeared on the two masses. They grew, tookform and design, and twenty days after the beginning of the phenomenon werelegs, necks, and heads. Then two giraffes, both male, moved about the giraffeenclosure. Each was slightly less than half the weight of the original animal. They were identically marked. And they ate and moved and in every way seemednormal though immature animals.

An exactly similar occurrence was reported from the Argentine Republic, in which a steer from the pampas was going through the same extraordinarymethod of reproduction under the critical eyes of Argentine scientists.

Nowadays it seems incredible that the scientists of 1935 should not haveunderstood themeaning of the se oddities. We now know something of the type ofstrain which produced them, though they no longer occur. But between Januaryand June of 1935 thenews service's of thenation were flooded with items of similar import.

For two days the Ohio River flowed upstream. For six hours the trees inEuclid Park, in Cleveland, lashed their branches madly as if in a terrificstorm, though not a breath of wind was stirring. And in New Orleans, near the last of May, fishes swam up out of the Mississippi River through the air, proceeded to "drown" in the air which inexplicably upheld them, and thenturned belly up and floated placidly at an imaginary water level some fifteenfeet above the pavements of the city.

But it seems clear that Professor Minott was the only man In the worldwho even guessed the --meaning of the se_Lto us-clear-cut indications of the later events. Professor Minott was instructor in mathematics on the faculty ofRobinson College in Fredericksburg, Va. We know that he anticipated verynearly every one of the things which later startled and frightened the world, and not only our world. But he kept his mouth shut.

Robinson College was small. It had even been termed a "jerkwater". college without offending anybody but the faculty and certain sensitivealumni. For a mere professor of mathematics to make public the the ory Minotthad formed would not even be news. It would be taken as stark insanity. Moreover, those who believed it would be scared. So he kept his mouth shut.

Professor Minott possessed courage, bitterness, and a certain cold- blooded daring, but neither wealth nor influence. He had more than a littleknowledge of mathematical physics and his calculations show extraordinaryknowledge of the laws of probability, but he had very little patience withproblems in ethics. And he was possessed by a particularly fierce passion forMaida Hayns, daughter of the professor of Romance languages, and hadpractically no chance to win even her attention over the competition of mostof the student body. So much of explanation is necessary, because no one butjust such a person as Professor Minott would have forecast what was to happenand then prepare for it in the fashion in which he did.

We know from his notes that he considered the probability of disaster asa shade better than four to one. It is a very great pity that we do not havehis calculations. There is much that our scientists do not understand even yet. The notes Professor Minott left behind have been invaluable, but the reare obvious gaps in them. He must have taken most of his notes-and those themost valuable into that unguessed at place where he conceivably now lives and very probably works.

He would be amused, no doubt, at the diligence with which his mostunconsidered scribble is now examined and inspected and discussed by the greatest minds of our time and space. And perhaps it is quite probable he mayhave invented a word for the scope of the catastrophe we escaped. We have noneas yet.

There is no word to describe a disaster in which not only the earth butour whole solar system might have been destroyed; not only our solar systembut our galaxy; not only our galaxy but every other island universe in all ofthe space we know; more than that, the destruction of all space as we know it; and even beyond that the destruction of time, meaning not only the obliteration of present and future but even the annihilation of the past sothat it would never have been. And then, besides, those other strange statesof existence we learned of, those other universes, those other pasts andfutures all to be shattered into'nothingness. There is no word for such acatastrophe.

It would be interesting to know what Professor Minott termed it tohimself, as he coolly prepared to take advantage of the one chance in four ofsurvival, if that should be the one to eventuate. But it is easier to wonderhow he felt on the evening before the fifth of June, in 1935. We do not know. We cannot know. All we can be certain of is how we felt and what happened.

It was half past seven a.m. of June 5, 1935. The city of Joplin, Missouri, awaked from, a comfortable, summer-night sleep. Dew glistened upongrass blades and leaves and the filmy webs of morning spiders glittered likediamond dust in the early sunshine. In themost easternly suburb a high-schoolboy, yawning, came somnolently out of his house to mow the lawn beforeschooltime. A rather rickety family car roared, a block away. It backfired, stopped, roared again, anti throttled down to a steady, waiting hum. Then, voices of children sounded among the houses. A colored washerwoman appeared, striding beneath the trees which lined this strictly residential street.

From an upper window a radio blatted: "one, two, three, four! Higher, now three, four! Put your weight into it! two, three, four!" The radio suddenly squawked and began to emit an insistent, mechanical shriek whichchanged again to a squawk and then a terrific sound as of all the static often thousand thunderstorms on the air at once. Then it was silent.

The high-school boy leaned mournfully on the pushbar of the lawn mower. At the instant the static ended, the boy sat down suddenly on the dew-wetgrass. The colored woman reeled and grabbed frantically at thenearest treetrunk. The basket of wash toppled and spilled in a snowstorm of starched, varicolored clothing. Howls of terror from children. Sharp shrieks from women. "Earthquake! Earthquake!" Figures appeared running, pouring out of houses.

Someone fled out to a sleeping porch, slid down a supporting column, andtripped over a rosebush in his pajamas. In seconds, it seemed, the entirepopulation of the street was out of doors. And then there was a queer, blank silence. There was no earthquake. No house had fallen. No chimneyhad cracked. Not so much as a dish or windowpane had made a sound in smashing.

The sensation every human being had felt was not an actual shaking of the ground. There had been moyement, yes, and of the earth, but no such movementas any human being had ever dreamed of before. These people were to learn ofthat movement much lafer. Now they stared blankly at each othe r.

And in the sudden, dead silence broken only by the hum of an idling carand the wail of a frightened baby, a new sound became audible. It was the tramp of marching feet. With it came a curious clanking and clattering noise. And then a marked command, which was definitely not in the English language.

Down the street of a suburb of Joplin, Missouri, on June 5, in the Yearof Our Lord 1935, came a file of spear-armed, shield-bearing soldiers in the short, skirtlike togas of ancient Rome. They wore helmets upon their heads.

They peered about as if they were as blankly amazed as the citizens of Joplinwho regarded them. A long column of marching men came into view, every manwith shield and spear and the indefinable air of being used to just suchweapons.

They halted at another barked order. A wizened little man with a shortsword snapped a question at the staring Americans. The high-school boy jumped.

The wizened man roared his question again. The high-school boy stammered, and painfully formed syllables with his lips. The wizened man grunted insatisfaction. He talked, articulating clearly if impatiently. And the highschool boy turned dazedly to the other Americans.

"He wants to know thename of this town," he said, unbelieving his ownears. "He's talking Latin, like I learn in school. He says this town isn't on the road maps, and he doesn't know where he is. But all the same he takespossession of it in thename of the Emperor Valerius Fabricius, emperor ofRome and the far corners of the earth." And then the school-boy stuttered, "He-he says the se are the first six cohorts of the Forty second Legion, ongarrison duty in Messalia. "That-that's supposed to be two days march up thatway." He pointed in the direction of St. Louis.

The idling motor car roared suddenly into life. Its gears whined and itcame rolling out into the street. Its horn honked peremptorily for passagethrough the shield-clad soldiers. They gaped at it. It honked again and movedtoward them. A roared order, and they flung themselves upon it, spears thrusting, short swords stabbing. Up to this instant there was not one single inhabitant of Joplin who did not believe the spear-armed soldiers were motionpicture actors, or masqueraders, or something else equally insane butcredible. But there was nothing make-believe about their attack on the car.

They assaulted it as if it were a strange and probably deadly beast. Theyflung themselves into battle with it in a grotesquely reckless valor.

And there was nothing at all make-believe in the thoroughness andcompleteness with which they speared Mr. Horace B. Davis, who had onlyintended to drive down to the cotton-brokerage office of which he was chiefclerk. They thought he was driving this strange beast to slaughter them, and they slaughtered him instead. The high-school boy saw them do it, growing whiter and whiter as he watched. When a swordsman approached the wizened manand displayed the severed head of Mr. Davis, with the spectacles dangling grotesquely from-one ear, the high-school boy fainted dead away.

It was sunrise of June 5, 1935. Cyrus Harding gulped down his breakfast in the pale-gray dawn. He had felt very dizzy and sick for just a moment, some littlewhile since, but he was himself again now. The smell of frying filled the kitchen. His wife cooked. Cyrus Harding ate.

He made noises as he emptied his plate. His hands were. gnarled andwork-worn, but his expression was of complacent satisfaction. He looked at acalendar hung on the wall, a Christmas sentiment from the Bryan Feed & Fertilizer Co., in Bryan, Ohio.

"Sheriff's goin' to sell out Amos today," he said comfortably. "I figger I'll get that north forty cheap."

His wife said tiredly, "He's been offerin' to sell it to you for ayear."

"Yep," agreed Cyrus Harding more complacently still. "Comin' down on the price, too. But nobody'll bid against me at the sale. They know I want it bad,

and I ain't a good neighbor to have when somebuddy takes somethin' from undermy nose. Folks know it. I'll git it a lot cheaper'n Amos offered it to me for. He waited to sell it to meet his interest and hold on another year. I'll git it for half that."

He stood up and wiped his mouth. He strode to the door.

"That hired man shoulda got a good start with his harrowin'," he saidexpansively. "I'll take a look and go over to the sale."

He went to the kitchen door and opened it. Then his mouth dropped open. The view from this doorway was normally that of a not especially neatbarnyard, with beyond it farmland flat as a floor and cultivated to the veryfence rails, with a promising crop of corn as a border against the horizon. Now the view was quite othe rwise. All was normal as far as the barn. Butbeyond the barn was delirium.

Huge, spreading tree ferns soared upward a hundred feet. Lacy, foliatedbranches formed a roof of incredible density above sheer jungle such as no manon earth had ever seen before. The jungles of the Amazon basin were parkilkeby comparison with its thickness. It was a riotous tangle of livingvegetationin which growth was battle, and battle was life, and life wasdeadly, merciless conflict.

No man could have forced his way ten feet through such a wilderness. From it came a fetid exhalation which was part decay and part lush, rank, growing things, and part the overpowering perfumes of glaringly vivid flowers. It was jungle such as paleobotanists have described as existing in the Carboniferous period; as the source of our coal beds.

"It-it ain't so!" said Cyrus Harding weakly. "It ain't so!"

His wife did not reply. She had not seen. Wearily, she began to clean upafter her lord and master's meal.

He went down the kitchen steps, staring and shaken. He moved toward thisimpossible apparition which covered his crops. It did not disappear as heneared it. He went within twenty feet of it and stopped, still staring, still unbelieving, beginning to entertain themonstrous supposition that he had gone insane.

Then, something moved in the jungle. A long, snaky neck, feet thick atits base and tapering to a mere sixteen inches behind a head the size of abarrel. The neck reached out the twenty feet to him. Cold eyes regarded himabstractedly. The mouth opened. Cyrus Harding screamed.

His wife raised her eyes. She looked through the open door and saw the jungle. She saw the jaws close upon her husband. She saw colossal, abstractedeyes half close as the something gulped; and partly choked, and swallowed. Shesaw a lump in themonstrous neck move from the relatively slender portion just behind the head to the feet thick section projecting from the jungle. She sawthe head withdraw into the jungle and instantly be lost to sight.

Cyrus Harding's widow was very pale. She put on her hat and went out ofthe front door. She began to walk toward the house of thenearest neighbor. Asshe went, she said steadily to herself:

"It's come. I'm crazy. They'll have to put me in an asylum. But I won'thave to stand him anymore. I won't have to stand him any more!"

It was noon of June 5, 1935. The cell door opened and a very grave, whiskered man in a curious gray uniform came in. He tapped the prisoner gentlyon the shoulder.

"I'm Dr. Holloway," he said encouragingly. "Suppose you tell me, suh, just what happened to you? I'm right sure it can all be straightened out.

The prisoner sputtered: "What-why--dammit," he protested, "I drove downfrom Louisville this morning. I had a dizzy spell and, well, I must havemissed my road, because suddenly I noticed that everything around me wasunfamiliar. And then a man in a gray uniform yelled at me, and a minute laterhe began to shoot, and the first thing I knew they'd arrested me for having the American flag painted on my car! I'm a traveling salesman for the UncleSam Candy Bar Co.! Dammit, it's funny when a man can't fly his own country's flag"

"In your own country, of course," assented the doctor comfortingly. "But you must know, sir, that we don't allow any flag but our own to be displayedhere. You violated our laws, suh."

"Your laws!" The prisoner stared blankly. "What laws? Where in the United States is it ifiegal to fly the American flag?"

"Nowhere in the United States, suh." The doctor smiled. "You must havecrossed our border unawares, suh. I will be frank, and admit that it wassuspected you were insane. I see now that it was just a mistake."

"Border-United" The prisoner gasped. "I'm not in the United States? I'mnot? Then where in hell am I?"

"Ten miles, sir, within the borders of the Confederacy," said the doctor, and laughed. "A queer mistake, sir, but the ah was no intention ofinsult. You'll be released at once. Theah is enough tension between Washington and Richmond without another border incident to upset ouah hot-heads."

"Confederacy?" The prisoner choked. "You can't, you don't mean the Confederate States"

"Of co'se, sir. The Confederate States of North America. Why not?"

The prisoner gulped. "I-I've gone mad!" he stammered. "I must be mad! There was Gettysburg-there was--"

"Gettysburg? Oh, yes!" The doctor nodded indulgently. "We are very proudof ouah history, sir. You refer to the battle in the war of separation, whenthe fate of the Confederacy rested on ten minutes time. I have often wonderedwhat would have been the result if Pickett's charge had been driven back. Itwas Pickett's charge that gained the day for us, sir. England recognized the Confederacy two days later, France in another week, and with unlimited creditabroad we won out. But it was a tight squeeze, suh!"

The prisoner gasped again. He stared out of the window. And opposite the jail stood an unquestionable courthouse. Upon the courthouse stood a flagpole. And spread gloriously in the breeze above a government building floated the Stars and Bars of the Confederacy!

It was night of June 5, 1935. The postmaster of North Centerville, Massachusetts, came out of his cubby-hole to listen to thenarrative. The potbellied stove of the general store sent a comfortable if unnecessary glowabout. The eyewitness chuckled.

"Yeah. They come around the cape, thirty or forty of 'em in a boat allo' sixty feet long with a crazy square sail drawin'. Round things on the gunnel like-like shields. And rowin like hell! They stopped when they saw the town and looked s'prised. Then they hailed us, talkin' some lingo that wasn't American. Ole Peterson, he near dropped his line, with a fish on it, too. Thenhe tried to talk back. They hadda lotta trouble understandin' him, or made outto. Then they turned around and rowed back. Actors or somethin', tryin' toplay a joke. It fell flat, though. Maybe some of those rich folks up the coastpullin' it. Ho! Ho! Ole says they was talkin' a funny, old-fashioned Skowegian. They told him they was from Leifsholm, or somethin' like that, just up the coast. That they couldn't make out how our town got here. They'd never seen it before! Can y'imagine that? Ole says they were wikin's, and theycalled this place Winland, and says What's that?"

A sudden hubbub arose in the night. Screams. Cries. A shotgun boomeddully. The loafers in the general store crowded out on the porch. flames rosefrom half a dozen places on the water front. In their light could be seen afull dozen serpent ships, speeding for the shore, propelled by oars. From fourof their number, already beached, dark figures had poured. Firelight glintedon swords, on shields. A woman screamed as a huge, yellow-maned man seizedher. His brazen helmet and shield glittered. He was laughing. Then a figure in overalls hurtled toward the blond giant, an ax held threateningly.

The giant cut him down with an already dripping blade and roared. Men rushed to him and they plunged on to loot and burn. More of' the armored figures leaped to the sand from another beached ship. Another house roared flames skyward.

And at half past ten a.m. on the morning of June 5th, Professor Minottturned upon the party of students with a revolver in each hand. Gone was the appearance of an instructor whose most destructive possibility was a below- passing mark in mathematics. He had guns in his hands now, instead of chalk or pencil, and his eyes were glowing even as he smiled frostily. The four girls gasped. The young men, accustomed to seeing him only in a classroom, realized that he not only could use the weapons in his hands, but that he would. And suddenly they respected him as they would respect, say, a burglar or aprominent kidnaper or a gang leader. He was raised far above the level of a mere mathematics professor. He became instantly a leader, and, by virtue ofhis weapons, even a ruler.

"As you see," said Professor Minott evenly, "I have, anticipated the situation, in which we find ourselves. I am prepared for it, to a, certainextent. At any moment not only we, but the entire human race may be wiped out with a completeness of which you can form no idea. But there is also a chanceof survival And I intend to make themost of my survival, if we do live."

He looked steadily from one to another of the students who had followedhim to explore the extraordinary appearance of a sequoia forest north of Fredericksburg.

"I know what has happened," said Professor Minott. "I know also what islikely to happen. And I know what I intend to do about it. Any of you who areprepared to follow me, say so. Any of you who object, well, I can't have mutinies! I'll shoot him!"

"But professor," said Blake nervously, "we ought to get the girls home" "They will never go home," said Professor Minott calmly. "Neither will you, nor any of us. As soon as you're convinced that I'm quite ready to use the seweapons, I'll tell you what's happened and what it means. I've been preparing for it for weeks."

Tall trees rose around the party. Giant trees. Magnificent trees. Theytowered two hundred and fifty feet into the air, and their air of venerablecalm was at once themost convincing evidence of their actuality, and the most improbable of all the things which had happened in theneighborhood of Fredericksburg, Virginia. The little group of people sat their horse saffrightedly beneath themonsters of the forest. Minott regarded themestimatingly the se three young men and four girls, all students of Robinson College. Professor Minott was now no longer the faculty member in charge of aparty of exploration, but a definitely ruthless leader.

At half past eight a.m. on June 5, 1935, the inhabitants ofFredericksburg had felt a curious, unanimous dizziness. It passed. The sunshone brightly. There seemed to be no noticeable change in any of the facts ofeveryday existence. But within an hour the sleepy little town was buzzing withe xcitement. The road to Washington-Route One on all road maps ceased abruptlysome three miles north. A colossal, a gigantic forest had appeared magically to block the way.

Telegraphic communication with Washington had ceased. Even the

Washington broadcasting stations were no longer on the air. The trees of the extraordinary forest were tall beyond the experience of any human being intown. They looked like the photographs of the giant sequoias on the Pacific Coast, but, well, the thing was simply impossible.

In an hour and a half, Professor Minott had organized a party of sightseers among the students. He seemed to pick his party with a queer definiteness of decision. Three young men and four girls. They would have piled into a rickety car owned by one of the boys, but Professor Minottnegatived the idea.

"The road ends at the forest," he said, smiling. "I'd rather like to explore a magic forest. Suppose we ride horseback? I'll arrange for horses."

In ten minutes the horses appeared. The girls had vanished to get intoriding breeches or knickers. They noted appreciatively on their return thatbesides the saddles, the horses had saddlebags slung in place. Again ProfessorMinott smiled.

"We're exploring," he said humorously. "We must dress the part.. Also, we'll probably want some lunch. And we can bring back specimens for the botanical lab to look over."

They rode forth; the girls thrilled, the young men pleased and excited, and all of them just a little bit disappointed at finding themselves passed by motor cars which whizzed by them as all Fredericksburg went to look at the improbable forest ahead.

There were cars by hundreds where the road abruptly ended. A crowdstared at the forest. Giant trees, their roots fixed firmly in the ground. Undergrowth, here and there. Over it all, an aspect of peace and utterserenity and permanence. The watching crowd hummed and buzzed with speculation, with talk. The thing they saw was impossible. It could not have happened. This forest could not possibly be real. They were regarding somesort of mirage.

But as the party of riders arrived, half a dozen men came out of the forest. They had dared to enter it. Now they returned, still incredulous ofthe ir own experience, bearing leaves and branches and one of them certainsmall berries unknown on the Atlantic coast.

A State police officer held up his hand as Professor Minott's party went toward the edge of the forest.

"Look here!" he said. "We've been hearin' funny noises in there. I'mstoppin' anybody else from goin' in until we know what's what."

Professor Minott nodded. "We'll be careful. I'm Professor Minott of Robinson College. We're going in after some botanical specimens. I have a revolver. We're all right."

He rode ahead. The State policeman, without definite orders forauthority, shrugged his shoulders and bent his efforts to the prevention ofother attempts to explore. In minutes, the eight horses and their riders wereout of sight. That was now three hours past. For three hours, Professor Minott had led his charges, a little south of northe ast. In thattime they saw no dangerous animals. They saw some many familiar plants. Theysaw rabbits in quantity, and once a slinking gray form which Tom Hunter, whowas majoring in zoology, declared was a wolf. There are no wolves in the vicinity of Fredericksburg, but neither are there sequoias. And the party had seen no signs of human life, though Fredericksburg lies in farming country which is thickly settled.

In three hours the horses must have covered between twelve and fifteen miles, even through the timber. It was just after sighting a shaggy beastwhich was unquestionably a woodland buffalo-extinct east of the Rockies asearly as 1820-that young Blake protested uneasily against further travel.

"There's something awfully queer, sir," he said awkwardly. "I don't mind experimenting as much as you like, sir, but we've got the girls with us. If we don't start back pretty soon, we'll get in trouble with the dean." And then Minott drew his two revolvers and very calmly announced that none of themwould ever go back. That he knew what had happened and what could be expected. And he added that he would explain as soon as they were convinced he would usehis revolvers in case of a mutiny.

"Call us convinced now, sir," said Blake.

He was a bit pale about the lips, but he hadn't flinched. In fact, he'dmoved to be between Maida Haynes and the gun muzzle.

"We'd like' very much to know how all the se trees and plants, whichought to be three Thousand miles away, happen to be growing in Virginiawithout any warning. Especially, sir, we'd like to know how it is that the topography underneath all this brand-new forest is the same. The hills trend the same way they used to, but everything that ever was on them has vanished, and something else is in its place."

Minott nodded approvingly. "Splendid, Blake!" he said warmly. "Soundobservation! I picked you because you're well spoken of in geology, eventhough there were other reasons for leaving you behind. Let's go on over thenext rise. Unless I'm mistaken, we should find the Potomac in view. Then I'llanswer any questions you like. I'm afraid we've a good bit more of riding todo today."

Reluctantly, the eight horses breasted the slope. They scrambled amongunderbrush. It was queer that in three hours they had seen not a trace of aroad leading anywhere. But up at the top of the hill there was a road. It wasa narrow, wandering cart track. Without a word, every one of the eight ridersturned their horses to follow it. It meandered onward for perhaps a quarter of a mile. It dipped suddenly. And the Potomac lay before and below them.

Then seven of the eight riders exclaimed. There was a settlement upon. the banks of the river. There were boats in harbor. There were other boats in view beyond, two beating down from the long reaches upstream, and three othe rscoming painfully up from the direction of Chesapeake Bay. But neither the village nor the boats should have been upon the Potomac River.

The village was small and mud-walled. Tiny, blueclad figures moved aboutthe fields outside. The buildings, the curving lines of the roofs, and moreespecially the unmistakable outline of a sort of temple near the center of the fortified hamlet, the se were Chinese. The boats in sight were junks, save thatthe ir sails were cloth instead of slatted bamboo. The fields outside the squatmud walls were cultivated in a fashion' altogethe r alien. Near the river, where marsh flats would be normal along the Potomac, rice fields intenselyworked spread out instead.

Then a figure appeared near by. Wide hat, wadded cotton-padded jacket, cotton trousers, and clogs, it was Chinese peasant incarnate, and all the more so when it turned a slant-eyed, terror-stricken face upon them and fled squawking. It left a monstrously heavy wooden yoke behind, from which dangled two buckets filled with berries it had gathe red in the forest.

The riders stared. There was the Potomac. But a Chinese village nestled, beside it, Chinese junks plied its waters.

"I-I think," said Maida Haynes unsteadily, "I--think I've-gone insane. Haven't I?"

Professor Minott shrugged. He looked disappointed but queerly resolute.

"No," he said shortly. "You're not mad. It just happens that the Chinese happened to colonize America first. It's been known that Chinese junks touchedthe American shore, the Pacific coast, of course, long before Columbus. Evidently they colonized it. They may have, come all the way overland to the Atlantic, or maybe around by Panama. In any case, this is a Chinese continent now. This isn't what we want. We'll ride some more."

The fleeing, squawking figure had been seen from the village. A huge, discordant gong began to sound. Figures fled toward the walls from the fields rounds about. The popping of firecrackers began, with a chorus of most intimidating yells.

"Come on!" said Minott sharply. "We'd better move!"

He wheeled his horse about and started off at a canter. By instinct, since he was the only one who seemed to have any definite idea what to do, the others flung after him.

And as they rode, suddenly the horses staggered. The humans on them felta queer, queasy vertigo. It lasted only for a second, but Minott paled alittle.

"Now we'll see what's happened," he said Corn, posedly. "The odds arestill fair, but I'd rather have had things stay as they were until we'd trieda few more places."

That same queasy vertigo affected the staring crowd at the end of the roadleading north from Fredericksburg. For perhaps a second they felt an unearthly illness, which even blurred their vision. Then they saw clearly again. And inan instant they were babbling in panic, starting their motor cars in terror, some of them fleeing on foot.

The sequoia forest had vanished. In its place was a dreary waste ofglittering white; stumpy trees buried under snow; rolling ground covered witha powdery, glittering stuff.

In minutes dense fog shut off the view, as the warm air of a Virginia June morning was chilled by that frigid coating. But in minutes,--too, the heavy snow began to melt. The cars fled -away along the concrete road, and behind them an expanding belt of fog spread out-and the little streams and runlets filled with a sudden surplus of water, and ran more swiftly, and rose.

The eight riders were every one very pale. Even Minott seemed shaken butno less resolute when he drew rein.

"I imagine you will all be satisfied now," he said composedly. "Blake, you're the geologist of the party. Doesn't the shore line there look familiar?"

Blake nodded. He was very white indeed. He pointed to the stream. "Yes. The falls, too. This is the site of Fredericksburg, sir, where we were this morning. There is where the main bridge was, or will be. The main highway to Richmond should run", he licked his lips, "it should run where that very bigoak tree is standing. The Princess Anne Hotel should be on the side of thathill. I-I would say, sir, that somehow we've gone back in time or else forward into the future. It sounds insane, but I've been trying to figure it out"

Minott nodded coolly. "Very good! This is the site of Fredericksburg, tobe sure. But we have not traveled forward or back in time. I hope that younoticed where we came out of the sequoia forest. There seems to be a sort offault along that line, which it may be useful to remember." He paused. "We'renot in the past or the future, Blake. We've traveled sidewise, in a sort of oscillation from one time path to anothe r. We happen to be in a well, in apart of time where Fredericksburg has never been built, just as a little whilesince we were where the Chinese occupy the American continent. I think we better have lunch."

He dismounted. The four girls tended to huddle togethe r. Lucy Blair'steeth chattered.

Blake moved to their horses' heads. "Don't get rattied," he saidurgently. "We're here, wherever it is. Professor Minott is going to explain things in a minute. Since he knows what's what, we're in no danger. Climb off your horses and let's eat. I'm hungry as a bear. Come on, Maida!"

Maida Haynes dismounted. She managed a rather shaky smile. "I'm afraid of him," she said in a whisper. "More than anything else. Stay close to me, please!"

Blake frowned. Minott said dryly: "Look in your saddlebags and you'll find sandwiches. Also you'll find firearms. You young men had better army ourselves. Since the re's now no conceivable hope of getting back to the worldwe know, I think you can be trusted with weapons."

Blake stared at him, then silently investigated his own saddlebags. Hefound two revolvers, with what seemed an abnormally large supply of cartridges. He found a mass of paper, which turned out to be books with the ircardboard backs torn off. He glanced professionally at the revolvers, and slipped them in his pockets. He put back the books.

"I appoint you second in command, Blake," said Minott, more dryly thanbefore. "You understand nothing, but you wait to understand. I made no mistakein choosing you despite my reasons for leaving you behind. Sit down and I'll tell you what happened."

With a grunt and a puffing noise, a small black bear broke cover andfled across a place where only that morning a highly elaborate filling stationhad stood. The party started, then relaxed. The girls suddenly started togiggle foolishly, almost hysterically. Minott bit calmly into a sandwich and said pleasantly,

"I shall have to talk mathematics to you, but I'll try to make it morepalatable than my classroom lectures have been. You see, everything that hashappened can only be explained in terms of mathematics, and more especiallycertain concepts in mathematical physics. You young ladies and gentlemen beingcollege men and women, I shall have to phrase things very simply, as for tenyear- old children. Hunter, you're staring. If you, actually see something, such as an Indian, shoot at him and he'll run away. The probabilities are that he never heard the report of a firearm. We're not on the Chinese continent now."

Hunter gasped, and fumbled at his saddlebags. While he got out the revolvers, Minott went on imperturbably,

"There has been an upheaval of nature, which still continues. Butinstead of a shaking and jumbling of earth and rocks, there has been a shakingand jumbling of space and time. I go back to first principles. Time is adimension. The past is one extension of it, the future is the othe r, just aseast is one extension of a more familiar dimension and west is its opposite.

"But we ordinarily think of time as a line, a sort of tunnel, perhaps. We do not make that error in the dimensions about which we think daily. Forexample, we know that Annapolis, King George courthouse, and, say, Norfolk areall to the eastward of us. But we know that in order to reach any of them, asa destination, we would have to go not only cast but north or south inaddition. In imaginative travels into the future, however, we never think insuch a common-sense fashion. We assume that the future is a line instead of a coordinate, a path instead of a direction. We assume that if we travel tofutureward there is but one possible destination. And that is as absurd as itwould be to ignore the possibility of traveling to eastward in any other linethan due east, forgetting that there is northeast and, southe ast and a large number of intermediate points."

Young Blake said slowly: "I follow you, sir, but it doesn't seem tobear"

"On our problem? But it does!" Minott smiled, showing his teeth. He bitinto his sandwich again. "Imagine that I come to a fork in a road. I flip acoin to determine which fork I shall take. Whichever route I follow, I shall encounter certain landmarks and certain adventures. But they will not be the same, whether landmarks or adventures.

"In choosing between the forks of the road I choose not only between twosets of landmarks I could encounter, but between two sets of events. I choose between paths, not only on the surface of the earth, but in time. And as those paths upon earth may lead to two different cities, so those paths in the future may lead to two entirely different fates. On one of them may lie opportunities for riches. On the other may lie themost prosaic of hit-and-run accidents which will leave me a mangled corpse, not only upon one fork of ahighway in the State of Virginia, but upon, one fork of a highway in time."

"In short, I am pointing out that there is more than one future we canencounter, and with more or less absence of deliberation we choose among them. But the futures we fail to encounter, upon the roads we do not take, are just as real as the landmarks upon those roads. We never see them, but we freely admit their existence."

Again it was Blake who protested: "All this is interesting enough, sir, but still I don't see how it applies to our present situation."

Minott said impatiently: "Don't you see that if such a state of thingsexists in the future, that it must also have existed in the past? We talk ofthree dimensions and one present and one future. There is a the oreticnecesssity, a mathematical necessity, for assuming more than one future. Thereare an indefinite number of possible futures, any one of which we wouldencounter if we took the proper 'forks' in time.

"There are any number of destinations to eastward. There are any numberto futureward. Start a hundred miles west and come eastward, choosing yourpaths on earth at random, as you do in time. You may arrive here. You mayarrive to thenorth or south of this spot, and still be east of your startingpoint. Now start a hundred years back instead of a hundred miles west."

Groping, Blake said fumbilingly: "I think you're saying, sir, that, well, as there must be any number of futures, there must have been any numberof pasts besides those written down in our histories. And-and it would followthat there are any number of what you might call 'presents'. "

Minott gulped down the last of his sandwich and nodded. "Precisely. Andtoday's convulsion of nature has jumbled them and still upsets them from timeto time. The Northmen once colonized America. In the sequence of events whichmark the pathway of our own ancestors through time, that colony failed. Butalong another path through time that colony throve and flourished. The Chinesereached the shores of California. In the path our ancestors followed throughtime, nothing developed from the fact. But this morning we touched upon the pathway in which they colonized and conquered the continent, though from the fear that one peasant we saw displayed, they have not wiped out the Indians.

"Somewhere the Roman Empire still exists, and may not improbably ruleAmerica as it once ruled Britain. Somewhere, not impossibly, the conditionscausing the glacial period still obtain and Virginia is buried under a mass ofsnow. Somewhere even the Carboniferous period may exist. Or to come moreclosely to the present we know, somewhere there is a path through time inwhich Pickett's charge at Gettysburg went desperately home, and the Confederate States of America is now an independent nation with a heavilyfortified border and a chip-on-the -shoulder attitude toward the UnitedStates."

Blake alone had asked questions, but the entire party had been listeningopen-mouthe d.

Now Maida Haynes said: "But-Professor Minott, where are we now?"

"We are probably," said Minott, smiling, "in a path of time in whichAmerica has never been discovered by white men. That isn't a very satisfactorystate of things. We're going to look for something better. We wouldn't becomfortable in wigwams, with skins for clothing. So we shall hunt for a morecongenial environment. We will have some weeks in which to do our searching, I think. Unless, of course, all space and time are wiped out by the cause of ourpredicament."

Tom Hunter stirred uncomfortably. "We haven't traveled backward orforward in time, then?"

"No," repeated Minott. He got to his feet. "That odd nausea we feltseems to be caused by travel sidewise in time. It's the symptom of a timeoscillation. We'll ride on and see what other worlds await us. We're a rather well-qualified party for this sort of exploration. I chose you for yourtrainings. Hunter, zoology. Blake, engineering and geology. Harris, he noddedto the rather undersized young man, who flushed at being noticed, "Harris isquite a competent chemist, I understand. Miss Ketterling is a capablebotanist. Miss Blair.."

Maida Haynes rose slowly. "You anticipated all this, Professor Minott, and yet you brought us into it. You, you said we'll never get back home. Yetyou deliberately arranged it. What, what was your motive? What did you do itfor?"

Minott climbed into the saddle. He smiled, but there was bitterness inhis smile. "In the world we know," he told her, "I was a professor ofmathematics in a small and unconsidered college. I had absolutely no chance ofever being more than a professor of mathematics in a small and unconsideredcollege. In this world I am, at least, the leader of a group of reasonablyintelligent young people. In our saddlebags are arms and ammunition and moreimportant, books of reference for our future activities. We shall hunt for andfind a world in which our technical knowledge is at a premium. We shall livein that world, if all time and space is not destroyed, and use our knowledge."

Maida Haynes said: "But again, what for?" "To conquer it!" saidMinott in sudden fierceness. "To conquer it! We eight shall rule a world as noworld has been ruled since time began! I promise you that when we find the environment I seek, you will have wealth by millions, slaves by thousands, every luxury, and all the power human beings could desire!" Blake said evenly: "And you, sir? What will you have?"

"Most power of all," said Minott steadily. "I shall be the emperor ofthe world! And also his tone changed indescribably as he glanced at Maida, "also I shall have a certain other possession that I wish."

He turned his back to them and rode off to lead the way. Maida Hayneswas deathly pale as she rode close to Blake Her hand closed convulsively uponhis arm.

"Jerry!" she whispered. "I'm-frightened!" And Blake said steadily, "Don't worry! I'll kill him first!"

The ferryboat from Berkeley plowed valorously through the fog. Its whistlehowled mournfully at the regulation intervals.

Up in the pilot house, the skipper said confidentially, "I tell you, Ihad the funniest feelin' of my life, just now. I was dizzy and sick all over, like I was seasick and drunk all at the same time."

The mate said abstractedly: "I had somethin' like that a little whileago. Somethin' we ate, prob'ly. Say, that's funny!"

"Say what?"

"Was a lot o' traffic in the harbor just now, whistlin'. I ain't heard a whistle for minutes. Listen!" Both men strained their ears. There was the rhythmic shudder of the vessel, itself a sound produced by the engines.

There were fragmentary voice, noises from the passenger deck below. There wasthe wash of water by the ferryboat's bow. There was nothing else. Nothing atall.

"Funny!" said the skipper.

"Damn funny!" agreed themate.

The ferryboat went on. The fog cut down all visibility to a radius ofperhaps two hundred feet.

"Funniest thing I ever saw!" said the skipper worriedly. He reached forthe whistle cord and themournful bellow of the horn resounded. "We're near our slip, though. I wish."

With a little chugging, swisbing sound a steam launch came out of themist. It sheered off, themen in it staring blankly at the huge bulk of the ferry. It made a complete circuit of the big, clumsy craft. Then someone stoodup and bellowed unintelligibly in the launch. He bellowed again. He was givingan order. He pointed to the flag at the stern of the launch, it was anunfamiliar flag, and roared furiously.

"What the hell's thematter of that guy?" wondered themate.

A little breeze blew suddenly. The fog began to thin. The faintlybrighter spot which was the sun overhead grew bright indeed. Faint sunshinestruggled through the fog bank. The wind drove the fog back before it, and the bellowing man in the steam launch grew purple with rage as his orders wentunheeded.

Then, quite abruptly, the last wisps of vapor blew away. San Franciscostood revealed. But, San Francisco? This was not San Francisco! It was awooden city, a small city, a dirty city with narrow streets and gas streetlamps and four monstrous, barracklike edifice fronting the harbor. No hillstood, but it was barren of dwellings. And, "Damn!" said themate of the ferryboat.

He was staring at a colossal mass of masonry, foursquare and huge, whichrose to a gigantic spiral fluted dome. A strange and alien flag fluttered inthe breeze above certain buildings. Figures moved in the streets. There weremotor qars, but they were clumsy and huge.

The mate's eyes rested upon a horse-drawn carriage. It was drawn bythree horses abreast, and they were either so trained or so checkreined thatthe two outer horses' heads were arched outward in the fashion of Tsarist Russia.

But that was natural enough. What an interpreter could be found, themate and skipper were savagely abused for entering the harbor of Novo Skevskywithout paying due heed to the ordinances in force by the ukase of the TsarAlexis of all the Russias. These rules, they learned, were enforced withspecial rigor in all the Russian territory in America, from Alaska on south.

The boy ran shouting up to the village. "Hey, grandpa! Hey, grandpa! Lookit the birds!" He pointed as he ran.

A man looked idly, and stood transfixed. A woman stopped, and stared. Lake superior glowed bluely off to westward, and the little village most oftenturned its eyes in that direction. Now, though, as the small boy ran shoutingof what he had seen, men stared, women marveled, and children ran and shoutedand whooped in the instinctive excitement of childhood at anything whichentrances grown-ups.

Over the straggly pine forests birds were coming. They came in greatdark masses. Not by dozens, or by hundreds, or even by thousands. They came inmillions, in huge dark clouds which obscured the sky. There were two hugeflights in sight at the boy's first shouting. There were six in view before hehad reached his home and was panting a demand that his elders come and look. And there were others, incredible numbers of others, sweeping onward straightover the village.

Dusk fell abruptly as the first flock passed overhead. The whirring of wings was loud. It made people raise their voices as they asked each othe rwhat such birds could possibly be. Daylight again, and again darkness as the flocks poured on. The size of each flock was to be measured not in feet oryards, but in miles of front. Two, three miles of birds, flying steadily in asingle enormous mass some four miles deep. Another such mass, and anothe r, andanothe r.

"What are they, grandpa? There must be millions of 'em!"

Somewhere, a shotgun went off. Small things dropped from the sky.

Another gunshot, and anothe r. A rain of bird shot went up from the villageinto themass of whirring wings. And crazily careening small bodies fell downamong the houses.

Grandpa examined one of them, smoothing its rumpled plumage. Heexclaimed. He gasped in excitement. "It's a wild pigeon! What they used tocall passenger pigeons! Back in '78 there was the se birds by billions. Folkssaid a billion was killed in Michigan that one year! But they're gone now. They're gone like the buffalo. There ain't any more."

The sky was dark with birds above him. A flock four miles wide and threemiles long made lights necessary in the village. The air was filled with the sound of wings. The passenger pigeon had returned to a continent from which ithad been absent for almost fifty years.

Flocks of passenger pigeons flew overhead in thick, dark masses equalingthose seen by Audubon in 1813, when he computed the pigeons in flight aboveKentucky at hundreds of billions in number. In flocks that were innumerablethey flew to westward. The sun set, and still the air was filled with the sound of their flying. For hours after darkness fell, the whirring of wingscontinued without ceasing.

A great open fire licked at the rocks against which it had been built. Thehorses cropped uneasily at herbage near by. The smell of fat meat cooking wasundeniably savory, but one of the girls blubbered gustily on a bed of leaves. Harris tended the cookery. Tom Hunter brought wood. Blake stood guard a littlebeyond the firelight, revolvers ready, staring off into the blackness. Professor Minott pored over a topographical map of Virginia. Maida Haynestried to comfort the blubbering girl.

"Supper's ready," said Harris. He made even that announcement seemsomehow shy and apologetic.

Minott put down his map. Tom Hunter began to cut great chunks ofsteaming meat from the haunch of venison. He put them on slabs of bark andbegan to pass them around. Minott reached out his hand and took one of them. He ate with obvious appetite. He seemed to have abandoned his preoccupationthe instant he laid down his map. He was displaying the qualities of a capableleader.

"Hunter," he observed, "After you've eaten that stuff, you might relieveBlake. 'We'll arrange reliefs for the rest of the night. By the way, you menmustn't forget to wind your watches. We'll need to rate them, ultimately."

Hunter gulped down his food and moved out to Blake's hiding place. Theyexchanged low-toned words. Blake came back to the fire. He took the foodHarris handed him and began to eat it. He looked at the blubbering girl on the bed of leaves.

"She's just scared," said Minott. "Barely slit the skin on her arm. Butit is upsetting for a senior at Robinson College to be wounded by a flint arrowhead."

Blake nodded. "I heard some noises off in the darkness," he said curtly"I'm not sure, but my impression was that I was being stalked. And I thought Iheard a human voice."

"We may be watched," admitted Minott. "But we're out of the path of timein which those Indians tried to ambush us. If any of them follow, they're toobewildered to be very dangerouus."

"I hope so," said Blake.

His maimer was devoid of cordiality, yet there was no exception to betaken to it. Professor Minott had deliberately got the party into apredicament from which there seemed to be no possibffity of escape. He hadorganized it to get it into just that predicament. He was unquestionably the leader of the party, despite his action. Blake made no attempt to underminehis leadership.

But Blake himself had some qualifications as a leader, young as he was. Perhaps themost promising of them was the fact that he made no attempt toexercise his talents until he knew as much as Minott of what was to be looked for, what was to be expected.

He listened sharply and then said: "I think we've digested your lessonof this morning, sir. But how long is this scrambling of space and time tocontinue? We left Fredericksburg and rode to the Potomac. It was Chineseterritory. We rode back to Fredericksburg, and it wasn't there. Instead, weencountered Indians who let loose a flight of arrows at us and wounded BerthaKetterling in the arm. We were nearly out of range at the time, though."

"They were scared," said Minott. "They'd never seen horses before. Ourwhite skins probably upset them, too. And then our guns, and the fact that Ikilled one, should have chased them off."

"But, what happened to Fredericksburg? We rode away from it. Whycouldn't we ride back?"

"The scrambling process has kept up," said Minott dryly. "You rememberthat queer vertigo? We've had it several times today, and every time, as I seeit, the re's been an oscillation of the earth we happened to be on. Hm! Look!"

He got up and secured themap over which he had been poring. He broughtit back and pointed to a heavy penciled line. "Here's a map of Virginia, inour time. The Chinese continent appeared just about three miles north ofFredericksburg. The line of democration was, I consider, the line along whichthe giant sequoias appeared. While in the Chinese time we felt that giddinessand rode back toward Fredericksburg. We came out of the sequoia forest at the same spot as before. I made sure of it. But the continent of our time was nolonger there.

"We rode east and, whethe r you noticed it or not, before we reached the border of King George County there was another abrupt change in the vegetationfrom a pine country to oaks and firs, which are not exactly characteristic ofthis part of the world in our time.

We saw no signs of any civilization. We turned south, and ran into thathe avy fog and the snow beyond it. Evidently, the re's a section of a time pathin which Virginia is still subject to a glacial climate."

Blake nodded. He listened again. Then be said, "You've three sides ofan-an island of time marked there."

"Just so," agreed Minott. "Exactly! In the scrambling process, the oscillating process, there seem to be natural 'faults' in the surface of the earth. Relatively large areas seem to shift back and forth as units from onetime path to anothe r. In my own mind, I've likened them to elevators with manystories.

"We were on the Fredericksburg 'elevator', or that section of our timepath, when it shifted to another time. We rode off it onto the Chinese

continent. While there, the section we started from shifted again, to anothe rtime altogethe r. When we rode back to where it had been-well, the town ofFredericksburg was in another time path altogethe r."

Blake said sharply, "Listen!"

A dull mutter sounded far to thenorth. It lasted for an instant and died away. There was a crashing of bushes near by and a monstrous animalstepped alertly into the firelight. It was, an elk, but such an elk! It was agiant, a colossal creature. One of the girls cried out aifrightedly, and itturned and crashed away into the underbrush.

"There are no elk in Virginia," said Minott dryly. Blake said sharplyagain, "Listen!"

Again that dull muttering to thenorth. It grew louder, now. It was anairplane motor. It increased in volume from a dull mutter to a growl, from agrowl to a roar. Then the plane shot overhead, thenavigation lights on itswings glowing brightly. It banked steeper and returned. It circled overhead, with a queer effect of helplessness. And then suddenly it dived down.

"An aviator from our time," said Blake, staring toward the sound. "Hesaw our fire. He's going to try to make a crash landing in the dark."

The motor cut off. An instant in which there was only the crackling, ofthe fire and the whistling of wind around gliding surfaces off there in the night. Then a terrific thrashing of branches. A crash Then a flare of flame, aroaring noise, and the lurid yellow of gasoline flames spouting skyward.

"Stay here!" snapped Blake. He was on his feet in an instant. "Harris, Professor Minott! Somebody has to stay with the girls! I'll get Hunter and gohelp!"

He plunged off into the darkness, calling to Hunter. The two of themforced their way through the underbrush. Minott scowled and got out hisrevolvers. Still scowling, he slipped out of the firelight and took up the guard duty Hunter had abandoned.

A gasoline tank exploded, off there in the darkness. The glare of the fire grew intolerably vivid. The sound of the two young men racing throughundergrowth became fainter and died away.

A long time passed a very long time. Then, very far away, the sound ofthrashing bushes could be heard again. The gasoline flare dulled and dimmed. Figures came slowly back. They moved as if they were carrying something veryheavy. They stopped beyond the glow of light from the camp fire. Then Blakeand Hunter reappeared, alone.

"He'd dead," said Blake curtly. "Luckily, he was flung clear of the crash before the gas tanks caught. He catch back to consciousness for a coupleof minutes before he died. Our fire was the only sign of human life he'd seenin hours. We brought him over here. We'll bury him in themorning."

There was silence. Minott's scowl was deep and savage as he came back tothe firelight.

"What-what did he say?" asked Maida Haynes. "He left Washington atfive this afternoon," said Blake shortly. "By our time, or something like it. All of Virginia across the Potomac vanished at four thirty, and virgin foresttook its place He went out to explore. At the end of an hour he came back, andWashington was gone. In its place. was a fog bank, with snow underneath. Hefollowed the Potomac down and saw palisaded homesteads with long, oared shipsdrawn up on shore."

"Vikings, Norsemen!" said Minott in satisfaction.

"He didn't land. He swept on down, following the edge of the bay. Helooked for Baltimore. Gone! Once, he's sure, he saw a city, but he was takensick at about that time and when he recovered, it had vanished. He was headingnorth again and his gasoline was getting low when he saw our fire. He triedfor a crash landing. He'd no flares with him. He crashed, and died." "Poor fellow!" said Maida shakenly.

"The point is," said Blake, "that Washington was in our present time atabout four thirty today. We've got a chance, though a slim one, of gettingback! We've got to get to the edge of one of the se blocks that go swingingthrough time, the edge of what Professor Minott calls a 'time fault', andwatch it! When the shifts come, we explore as quickly as we can. We've nogreat likelihood, perhaps, of getting back exactly to our own period, but wecan get nearer to it than we are now! Professor Minott said that somewhere the Confederacy exists. Even that, among people of our own race and speaking ourown language, would be better than to be marooned forever among Indians, oramong Chinese or Norsemen."

Minott said harshly, "Blake, we'd better have this out right now! I givethe orders in this party! You jumped quickly when that plane crashed, and yougave orders to Harris and to me. I let you get away with it, but we can havebut one leader. I am that leader! See you remember it!"

Blake swung about. Minott had a revolver bearing on his body.

"And you are--making plans for a return to our time!" he went onsavagely. "I won't have it! The odds are still that we'll all be killed. Butif I do live, I mean to take advantage of it. And my plans do not include areturn to a professorship of mathematics at Robinson College."

"Well?" said Blake coolly. "What of it, sir?"

"Just this! I'm going to take your revolvers. I'm going to make the plans and give the orders hereafter. We are going to look for the time path inwhich a viking civilization thrives in America. We'll find it, too, becausethe se disturbances will last for weeks yet. And once we find it, we willsettle down among those Torsemen, and when space and time are stable again Ishall begin the formation of my empire! And you will obey orders or you'll beleft afoot while the rest of us go on to my destiny!"

Blake said very quietly indeed, "Perhaps, sir, we'd all prefer to beleft to our own destinies rather than be merely the tools by which you attainto yours."

Minott stared at him an instant. His lips tensed. "It is a pity," hesaid coldly. "I could have used your brains, Blake. But I can't have mutiny. Ishall have to shoot you."

His revolver came up remorselessly.

To determine the cause of various untoward events, the British Academy ofSciences was in extraordinary session. Its members were weary, bleary-eyed, but still conscious of their dignity and the importance of their task. Avenerable, whiskered physicist spoke with fitting definiteness and solemnity.

"And so, gentleman, I see nothing more that remains to be said. Theextraordinary events of the past hours seem to follow from certain facts aboutour own closed space. The gravitational fields of I particles of matter willclose space about such an aggregation. No cosmos can be larger. No cosmos canbe smaller. And if we envision the creation of such a cosmos we will observe its galaxies vanish at the instant the 1079th particle adds its own mass tothose which were present before it.

"However, the fact that space has closed about such a cosmos does notimply its annihilation. It means merely its separation from its originalspace, the isolation of itself in space and time because of the curvature ofspace due to its gravitational field. And if we assume the existence of morethan one area of closed space, we assume in some sense the existence of a

hyper space separating the closed spaces, hyper-spatial coordinates which markthe ir relative hyper-spatial positions, hyper-spatial."

A gentleman with even longer and whiter whiskers than the speaker saidin a loud and decided voice, "Fiddlesticks! Stuff and nonsense!"

The speaker paused. He glared. "Sir! Do you refer--"

"I do!" said the gentleman with the longer and whiter whiskers. "It isstuff and nonsense! Next you'd be saying that in this hyper-space of yours the closed spaces would be subject to hyper-laws, revolve about each other inhyper-orbits regulated by hypergravitation, and undoubtedly, at times the rewould be hyper~earth tides or hyper-collisions, producing decidedly hyper- catastrophes."

"Such is," said the whiskered gentleman on the rostrum, quivering withindignation, "such is the fact, sir!"

"Then the fact," rejoined the scientist with the longer and whiterwhiskers, "sir, makes me sick!"

And as if to prove it, he reeled. But he was not alone in reeling. Theentire venerable assembly shuddered in abrupt, nauseating vertigo. And thenthe British Academy of Sciences adjourned without formality and in a panic. Itran away. Because abruptly there was no longer a rostrum nor an end to itsassembly hail. Where their speaker had been was open air. In the open air wasa fire. About the fire were certain brutish figures incredibly resembling the whiskered scientists who fled from them. They roared at the fleeing, venerablemen. Snarling, wielding crude clubs, they plunged into the hail of the BritishAcademy of Sciences. It is known that they caught one person a biologist ofhighly eccentric views. It is believed that they ate him.

But it has long been surmised that some, at least, of the extinctspecies of humanity, such as the Piltdown and Neanderthal men, were cannibals. If in some pathway of time they happened to exterminate their more intelligentrivals if somewhere pithe canthropus erectus survives and homo sapiens doesnot, well, in that pathway of time cannibalism is the custom of society.

With a gasp, Maida Haynes flung herself before Blake. But Harris waseven quicker. Apologetic and shy, he had just finished cutting a smoking pieceof meat from the venison haunch. He threw it swiftly, and the searing mass ofstuff flung Minott's hand aside at the same instant that it burned ithorribly.

Blake was on his feet, his gun out. "If you pick up that gun, sir," hesaid rather breathlessly but with unquestionable sincerity, "I'll put a bulletthrough your arm!"

Minott swore. He retrieved the weapon with his left hand and thrust itin his pocket. "You young fool!" he snapped. "I'd no intention of shootingyou. I did intend to scare you thoroughly. Harris, you're an ass! Maida, Ishall discuss your action later. The worst punishment I could give the lot ofyou would be to leave you to yourselves."

He stalked out of the firelight and off into the darkness. Somethinglike consternation came upon the group. The glow of fire where the plane hadcrashed flickered fitfully. The base of the dull red light seemed to widen alittle.

"That's the devil!" said Hunter uneasily. "He does know more about thisstuff than we do. If he leaves us we're messed up!"

"We are," agreed Blake grimly. "And perhaps if he doesn't."

Lucy Blair said: "I-I'll go and talk to him. He-he used to be nice to mein class. And-and his hand must hurt terribly. It's burned."

She moved away from the fire, a long and angular shadow going on beforeher.

Minott's voice came sharply: "Go back! There's something moving outhe re!"

Instantly after, his revolver flashed. A howl arose, and the weapon

flashed again -and again. Then there were many crashings. Figures fled.

Minott came back to the firelight, scornfully. "Your leadership is atfault, Blake," he commented sardonically. "You forgot about a guard. And youwere theman who thought he heard voices! Theyve run away now, though. Indians, of course."

Lucy, Blair said hesitantly: "Could I-could I do something for yourhand? It's burned."

"What can you do?" he asked angrily.

"There's some fat," she told him. "Indians used to dress wounds'withbear fat. I suppose deer fat would do as well."

He permitted her to dress the burn, though it was far from a seriousone. She begged handkerchiefs from, the others to complete the job. There wasdistinct uneasiness all about the camp fire. This was no party of adventurers, prepared for anything. It had started as an outing of undergraduates.

Minott scowled as Lucy Blair worked on his hand. Harris looked asapologetic as possible, because he had made the injury. Bertha Ketterlingblubbered less noisily, now, because nobody paid her any attention. Blakefrowned meditatively at the fire. Maida Haynes tried uneasily not to seemconscious of the fact that she was in some sense though no mention had beenmade of it a bone of contention.

The horses moved uneasily. Bertha Ketterling sneezed. Maida felt hereyes smarting. She was the first one to see the spread of the blaze started bythe gas tanks of the airplane. Her cry of alarm roused the others.

The plane had crashed a good mile from the camp fire. The blazing of itstanks had been fierce but brief. The burning of the wings and chassis fabrichad been short, as well. The fire had died down to seeming dull embers. Butthere were more than embers ablaze out there now.

The fire had died down, to be sure, but only that it might spread amongthick and tangled underbrush. It had spread widely on the ground before someclimbing vine, blazing, carried flames up to resinous pine branches overhead. A small but steady wind was blowing. And as Maida looked off to see the sourceof the smoke which stung her eyes, one tall tree was blazing, a long line ofangry red flames crept along the ground, and then at two more, three more, the n at a dozen points bright fire roared upward toward the sky. The horsessnorted and reared.

Minott snapped: "Harris! Get the horses! Hunter, see that the girls getmounted, and quickly!"

He pointedly gave Blake no orders. He pored intently over his map asmore trees and still more caught fire and blazed upward. He stuffed it in hispocket.

Blake calmly rescued the haunch of venison, and when Minott sprang intothe saddle among the snorting, scared horses, Blake was already by MaidaHaynes side, ready to go.

"We ride in pairs," said Minott curtly. "A man and a girl. You men, lookafter them. I've a flashlight. I'll go ahead. We'll hit the Rappahannock Riversooner or later, if we don't get around the fire first and if we can keepahead of it."

They topped a little hillock and saw more of the extent of their danger. In a half mile of spreading, the fire had gained three times as much breath. And to their right the fire even then roared in among the trees of a forest sothick as to be jungle. The blaze fairly raced through it as if the fire madeits own wind; which in fact it did. To their left it crackled fiercely inunderbrush which, as they fled, blazed higher.

And then, as if to add mockery to their very real danger, a genuinelybrisk breeze sprang up suddenly. Sparks and blazing bits of leaves, fragmentsof ash and small, unsubstantial coals began to fall among them. BerthaKetterling yelped suddenly as a tiny live coal touched the flesh of her cheek.

Harris horse squealed and kicked as something singed it. They, galloped madlyahead. Trees rose about them. The white beam of Minott's flashlight seemedalmost ludicrous in the fierce red glare from behind, but at least it showedthe way.

Something large and dark and clumsy lumbered cumbersomely into the spacebetween Grady's stattie and the post-office building; The arc lights showed itclearly, and it was not anything which should be wandering in the streets ofAtlanta, Georgia, at any hour of the day or night. A taxicab chauffeur saw itand nearly tore off a wheel in turning around to get away. A policeman saw. it, and turned very pale as he grabbed at his beat telephone to report it. Butthere had been too many queer things happening this day for him to suspect hisown sanity, and the Journal had printed too much news from elsewhere for himto disbelieve his own eyes.

The thing was monstrous, reptilian, loathe some. It was eighty feet long, of which at least fifty, was head and tail and the rest flabby-fleshed body. It may have weighed twenty-five or thirty tons, but its head was not muchlarger than that of a large horse. That tiny head swung about stupidly. Thething was bewildered. It put down a colossal foot, and water gushed up from abroken water main beneath the pavement. The thing did not notice. It movedvaguely, exhaling a dank and musty odor.

The clang of police emergency cars and the scream of fire engine sirensfilled the air. An ambulance flashed into view-and was struck by a balancingsweep of themighty tail. The ambulance careened and crashed.

The thing uttered a plaintive cry, ignoring the damage its tail hadcaused. The sound was like that of a bleat, a thousand times multiplied. Itpeered ceaselessly around, seeming to feel trapped by the tall buildings aboutit, but it was too stupid to retrace its steps for escape. Somebody screamedin the distance as police cars and fire engines reached the spot where the first thing swayed and peered and moved in quest of escape.

Two other things, smaller than the first, came lumbering after it. Likeit, they had monstrotis bodies and d~sproportionately tiny heads. One of themblundered stupidly into a hook-and-ladder truck. Truek and beast went down, and the beast bleated like the first.

Then some fool began to shoot. Othe r fools joined in. Steel-jacketedbullets poured into themountains of reptilian flesh. Police sub-machine gunsraked themonsters. Those guns were held by men of great daring, who could nothe lp noting the utter stupidity of the things out of the great swamp which hadappeared where Inman Park used to be.

The bullets stung. They hurt. The three beasts bleated and triedbewilderedly and very clumsily to escape. The largest tried to climb a five- story building, and brought it down in sheer wreckage.

Before the last of them was dead, or rather, before it ceased to moveits great limbs, because the tail moved jerkily for a long time and its heartwas still beating spasmodically when loaded on a city dump cart next day, before the last of them was dead they had made sheer chaos of three blocks ofbusiness buildings in the heart of Atlanta, had killed seventeen men, and the best testimony is that they made not one attempt to fight. Their whole andonly thought was to escape. The destruction they wrought and the deaths theycaused were due to their clumsiness and stupidity.

The leading horses floundered horribly. They sank to their fetlocks insomething soft and very spongy. Bertha Ketterling squawked in terror as hermount's motion changed.

Blake said crisply in the blackness, "It feels like plowed ground. Better use the light again, Professor Minott."

The sky behind them glowed redly. The forest fire still trailed them. For miles of front, now, it shot up sparks and flame and a harsh red glarewhich illumined the clouds of its own smoke.

The flashlight stabbed at the earth. The ground was plowed. It wassoftened by the hands of men. Minott kept the light on as little gasps ofthankfulness arose.

Then he said sardonically, "Do you know what this crop is? It's lentils. Are lentils grown in Virginia? Perhaps! We'll see what sort of men the se mayhappen to be."

He swung to follow the line of the furrows.

Tom Hunter said miserably: "If that's plowed ground, it's a damn shallowfurrow. A one-horse plowed throw up more dirt than that."

A light glowed palely in the distance. Every person in the party saw itat the same instant. As if by instinct, the head of every horse swerved forit.

"We'll want to be careful," said Blake quietly. "These may be Chinese, too."

The light was all of a mile distant. They moved over the plowed groundcautiously.

Suddenly the hoofs of Lucy Blair's horse rang on stone. The noise wasstartlingly loud. Othe r horses, following hers, clattered thunderously. Minottflashed down the light again. Dressed stone. Cut stone. A roadway built ofdressed-stone blocks, some six or eight feet wide. Then one of the horsesshivered and snorted. It pranced agitatedly, edging away from something on the road. Minott swept the flashlight beam along thenarrow way.

"The only race," he said dryly, "that ever built roads like this was the Romans. They made their military roads like this. But they didn't discoverAmerica that we know of."

The beam touched something dark. It came back and steadied. One of the girls uttered a stilled exclamation. The beam showed dead men. One was a manwith a shield and sword and a helmet such as the soldiers of ancient Rome are pictured as having worn. He was dead. Half his head had been blown off. Lyingon top of him there was a man in a curious gray uniform. He had died of asword wound.

The beam searched around. More bodies. Many Roman-accoutered figures. Four or five men in what looked remarkably like the uniform that might be wornby soldiers of the Confederate Army, if a Confederate Army could be supposedto exist.

"There's been fighting," said Blake composedly. "I guess somebody fromthe Confederacy, that time path, say started to explore what must have seemeda damned strange happening. And the se Romans, if they are Romans, jumpedthe m."

Something came shambling through the darkness. Minott threw the flashbeam upon it. It was human, yes. But it was three parts naked, and it waschained, and it had been beaten horribly, and there were great sores upon itsbody from other beatings. It was bony and emaciated. The insensate ferocity of

sheer despair marked it. It was brutalized by its sufferings until it was just

human, barely human, and nothing more.

It squinted at the light, too dull of comprehension to be afraid.

Then Minott spoke, and at his words it groveled in the dirt. Minottspoke harshly, in half-forgotten Latin, and, the groveling figure mumbledwords which had been barbarous Latin to begin with, and through its bruisedlips were still furthe r mutilated.

"It's a slave," said Minott coldly. "Strange men, Confederates, Isuppose caine from thenorth today. They fought and killed some of the guardsat this estate. This slave denies it, but I imagine he was heading north inhopes of escaping to them. When you think of it, I suppose we're not the onlyexplorers to be caught out of our own time path by some shift or anothe r."

He growled at the slave and rode on, still headed for the distant light.

"What-what are you going to do?" asked Maida faintly. "Go on to the villa yonder and ask questions," said Minott dryly. "If Confederates hold it, we'll be well received. If they don't, we'll still manage tO earn a welcome. Iintend to camp along a time fault and cross over whenever a time shift bringsa Norse settlement in sight. Consquently, I want exact news of places wherethe y've been seen, if such news is to be had."

Maida Haynes pressed close--to Blake. He put a reassuring hand on herarm as the horses trudged on over

the soft ground. The firelight behind them grew brighter. Occasionalresinous, coniferous trees flared upward and threw fugitive red glows upon the riding figures. But gradually the glare grew steadier and Stronger. The whitewalls of a rambling stucco house became visible out buildings barns. Amonstrous structure which looked startlingly like a barracks.

It was a farm, an estate, a Roman villa transplanted to the very edge of a wilderness. It was, Blake remembered vaguely, like a picture he had onceseen of a Roman villa in England, restored to look as it had been before Romewithdrew her legions from Britain and left the island to savagery anddarkness. There were small mounds of curing hay about them, through which the horses picked their way. Blake suddenly wrinkled his nostrils suspiciously. Hesniffed.

Maida pressed close to him. Her ups formed words. Lucy Blair rode closeto Minott, glancing up at him from time to time. Harris rode beside BerthaKetterling, and Bertha sat her horse as if she were saddle sore. Tom Hunterclung cloSe to Minott as if for protection, leaving Janet Thompson to look outfor herself.

"Jerry," said Maida, "What-what do you think?"

"I don't like it," admitted Blake in a low tone. "But we've got to tagalong. I think I smell--"

Then a sudden swarm of figures leaped at the horses-wild figures, nakedfigures, sweaty and reeking and almost maniacal figures, some of whom clankedchains as they leaped. A voice bellowed orders at them from a distance, and awhip cracked ominously.

Before the struggle ended, there were just two shots fired. Blake firedthe m both and wheeled about. Then a horse streaked away, and Bertha Ketterlingwas bawling plaintively, and Tom Hunter babbled hysterically, and Harris sworewith a complete lack of his customary air of apology.

Minott seemed to be buried under a mass of foul bodies like the rest, but he rasped at his captors in an authoritative tone. They fell away fromhim, cringing as if by instinct. And then torches appeared suddenly and slavesappeared in their light-slaves of every possible degree of filth anddegradation, of every possible racial mixture, but unanimous in a desperateabjectness before their master amid the torchbearers.

He was a short, fat man, in an only slightly modified toga. He drew itclose about his body as the torchbearers held their flares close to the

captives. The torchlight showed the captives, to be sure, but also it showedthe puffy, self-indulgent, and invincibly cruel features of theman who ownedthe se slaves and the villa. By his pose and the orders he gave in a curiouslycorrupt Latin, he showed that he considered he owned the captives, too.

The deputy from Aisne-le-Sur decided that it had been very wise indeed for himto walk in the fresh air. Paris at night is stimulating. That curious attackof vertigo had come of too much champagne. The fresh air had dispelled the fumes. But it was odd that he did not know exactly where he was, though heknew his Paris well.

These streets were strange. The houses were unlike any that heremembered ever having seen before. In the light of the street lamps, and theywere unusual, too there was a certain unfamiliar quality about the irarchitecture. He puzzled over it, trying to identify the peculiar flair the sehouses showed.

He became impatient. After all, it was necessary for him to return homesometime, even though his wife. The deputy from Aisne-le-Sur shrugged. Then hesaw bright lights ahead. He hastened his steps. A magnificent mansion, brilliantly illuminated.

The clattering of many hoofs. A cavalry escort, forming up before the house. A pale young man emerged, escorted by a tall, fat man who kissed hishand as if in an ecstasy of admiration. Dismounted cavalrymen formed a lanefrom the gateway to the car. Two young officers followed the pale young man, ablaze with decorations. The deputy from Aisne-le-Sur noted subconsciouslythat he did not recognize their uniforms. The car door was open and waiting. There was some oddity about the car, but the deputy could not see clearly justwhat it was. There was much clicking of heels steel blades at salute. Thepale young man patiently allowed the fat man to kiss his hand again. Heentered the car. The two bemedaled young officers climbed in after him. Thecar rolled away. Instantly, the cavalry escort clattered with it, before it, behind it, all around it.

The fat man stood on the sidewalk, beaming and rubbing his hands togethe r. The dismounted cavalrymen swung to their saddles and trotted brisklyafter the others.

The deputy from Aisne-le-Sur stared blankly. He saw another pedestrian, halted like himself to regard the spectacle. He was disturbed by the -fact thatthis pedestrian was clothe d in a fashion as perturbingly unfamiliar as the sehouses and the spectacle he had witnessed.

"Pardon, m'sieu'," said the deputy from Aisne-le-Sur, "I do notrecognize my surroundings. Would you tell me--"

"The house," said the other caustically, "is the hotel of Monsieur leDuc de Montigny. Is it possible that in 1935 one does not know of Monsieur leDuc? Or more especially of Madame Ia Duchesse, and what she is and where shelives?"

The deputy from Aisne-le-Sur blinked. "Montigny? Montigny? No," headmitted. "And theyoung man of the car, whose hand was kissed by--"

"Kissed by Monsieur le Duc?" The stranger stared frankly. "Mon--dieu! Where have you come from that you do not recognize Louis the Twentieth? He hasbut departed from a visit to madame his mistress."

"Louis-Louis the Twentieth!" stammered the deputy from Aisne-le-Sur. "II- do not understand!"

"Fool!" said the --stranger impatiently. "That was the king of France, who succeeded his fathe r as a child of ten and has been free of the regencyfor but six months-and already ruins France!"

The long-distance operator plugged in with a shaking hand. "Numberplease.... I am sorry, sir, but we are unable to connect you with Camden. . . . The lines are down.... Very sorry, sir." She plugged in another line. "Hello.... I am sorry, sir, but we are unable to connect you withJenkintown. The lines are down. Very sorry, sir."

Another call buzzed and lighted up.

"Hello.... I am sorry, sir. We are unable to connect you with Dover. The lines are down...." Her hands worked automatically. "Hello.... I amsorry, but we are unable to connect you with New York. The lines are down.... No, sir. We cannot route it by Atlantic City. The lines are down.... Yes, sir, I know the telegraph companies cannot guarantee delivery. No, sir, wecannot reach Pittsburgh, eithe r, to get a message through...." Her voicequivered. "No, sir, the lines are down to Scranton.... And Harrisburg, too. Yes, sir.... I am sorry, but we cannot get a message of any sort out ofPhiladelphia in any direction.... We have tried to arrange communication byradio, but no calls are answered....

She covered her face with her hands for an instant. Then she plugged inand made a call herself:

"Minnie! Haven't they heard anything?... Not anything?... What? They phoned for more police?

The-the operator out there says the re's fighting? She hears a lot ofshooting? What is it, Minnie? Don't they even know?... They-the y're usingthe armored cars from the banks to fight with, too? But what are theyfighting? What?... My folks are out there, Minnie! My folks are out there!"

The doorway of the slave barracks closed and great bars slammed againstits outer side. Reeking, foul, unbreathable air closed about them like a wave. Then a babbling of voices all about. The clanking of chains. The rustling ofstraw, as if animals moved. Some one screeched, howled above the others. Hebegan to garn the ascendancy. There was almost some attention paid to him, though a minor babbling continued all about.

Maida said in a strained voice: "I-I can catch a word here and there. He's telling the se other slaves how we were captured. It's Latin, of sorts."

Bertha Ketterling squalled suddenly, in the absolute dark. "Somebodytouched me!" she bawled. "A man!"

A voice spoke humorously, somewhere near. There was laughter. It was the howled laughter of animals. Slaves were animals, according to the Romannotion. A rustling noise, as if in thenoisomefreedom of their barracks the utterly--brutalized slaves drew nearer to thenewcomers. There could be sportwith new-captured folk, not yet degraded to their final status.

Lucy Blair cried out in a stifled fashion. There was a sharp, incisivecrack. Somebody fell. More laughter.

"I knocked him out!" snapped Minott. "Harris! Hunter! Feel around forsomething we can use as clubs! These slaves intend to haze us, and in the irown den the re's no attempt to control them. Even if they kill us' they'll onlybe whipped for it. And the women will--"

Something, snarling, leaped for him in the darkness. The authoritativetone of Minott's voice was hateful. A yapping sound arose. Othe r figuresclosed in. Reduced to the status of animals, the slaves, of the Romans behavedas beasts when locked in their monster kennel. The newcomers were hateful if only because they had been freemen, not slaves. The women were clean and theywere frightened and they were prey. Chains clanked ominously. Foul breathstainted the air. The reek of utter depravity, of human beings brought lowerthan beasts, filled the air. It was utterly dark.

Bertha Ketterling began to blubber noisily. There was the sudden savage

sound of a blow meeting flesh. Then pandemonium and battle, and the suddenterrified screams of Lucy Blair. The panting of men who fought. The sound ofblows. A man howled. Another shrieked curses. A woman screamed shrilly.

Bang! Bang! Bang-bang! Shots outside, a veritable fusifiade of them. Running feet. Shouts. The bars at the doorway fell. The great doors opened, and men stood in the opeung with whips and torches, bellowing for the slavesto come out and attack something yet unknown. They were being called fromthe ir kennel like dogs. Four of the whip men came inside, flogging the slavesout, while the sound of shots continued. The slaves shrank away, or boundedhowling for the open air. But there were three of them who would never shrinkor cringe again.

Minott and Harris stood embattled in a corner of the slave shed. LucyBlair, her hair disheveled, crouched behind Minott, who held a heavy beam indesperate readiness for furthe r battle. Harris, likewise, held a clumsy club. With torchlight upon him, his air of savage defiance turned to one of quaintapology for the dead slave at his feet. And Hunter and two of the girlscompeted in stark panic for a position behind him. Maida Haynes, dead white, stood backed against a wall, a jagged fragment of gnawed bone held daggerwise.

The whips lashed out at them. Voices snarled at them. The whips again. Minott struck out furiously, a huge welt across his face. And revolverscracked at the great door. Blake stood there, a revolver in each hand, hiseyes blazing. A. torchbearer dropped, and the torches flared smokily in the foul mud of the flooring.

"All right," said Blake fiercely. "Come on out!"

Hunter was the first to reach him, babbling and gasping. There was sheeruproar all about. A huge grain shed roared upward in flames. Figures rushedcrazily all about it. From the flames came another explosion, then two, thenthree more.

"Horses over here by the stables," said Blake, his face white aid verydeadly indeed. "They haven't unsaddled them. The stable slaves haven't figuredout the cinches yet. I put some revolver bullets in the straw when I set fireto that grain shed. They're going off from time to time."

A figure with whip and dagger raced around an outbuilding and confrontedthe m. Blake shot him down.

Minott said hoarsely: "Give me a revolver, Blake! I want to--"

"Horses first!" snapped Blake.

They raced into a courtyard. Two shots. The slaves fled, howling. Out ofthe courtyard, bent low in the saddle. They swept close to the villa itself. On a little raised terrace before it, a stout man in an only slightly modifiedtoga raged. A slave groveled before him. He kicked the abject figure andstrode out, shouting commands in, a voice that cracked with fury. The horsesloomed up and he shookhis fists at the riders, purple with wrath, incapable offear-because of his beastly rage.

Blake shot him dead, swung off his horse, and stripped the toga fromhim. He flung it to Maida.

"Take this!" he said savagely. "I could kill--"

There was now no question of his leadership. He led the retreat from the villa. The eight horses headed north again, straight for the luridly flamingforest.

They stopped once more. Behind them, another building of the estate hadcaught from the first. Sheer confusion ruled. The slaughter of themasterdisrupted all organization. The roof of the slave barracks caught screams andhowls of pure panic reached even the fugitives. Then there were racing, maddened figures rushing here and there in the glare of the fires. Suddenlythere was fighting. A howling ululation arose.

Minott worked savagely, stripping clothing from the bodies slain in that

incredible, unrecorded conflict of Confederate soldiers and Roman troops, insome unguessable pathway of space and time. Blake watched behind, but hecurtly commanded the salvaging of rifles and ammunition from the rn deadConfederates, if they were Confederates.

And as Hunter, still gasping hysterically, took the load of yetunfamiliar weapons upon his horse, the eight felt a certain incredible, intolerable vertigo and nausea. The burning forest ahead vanished from the irsight. Instead, there was darkness. A noisome smell came down wind; dampnessand strange, overpowering perfumes of strange, colored flowers. Something hugeand deadly bellowed in the space before them which smelled like a monstrousswamp.

The liner City of Baltimore plowed through the open sea in the firstpale light of dawn. The skipper, up on the bridge, wore a worried frown. Theradio operator came up. He carried a sheaf of radiograin forms. His eyes wereblurry with loss of sleep.

"Maybe it was me, sir," he reported heavily. "I felt awful funny for awhile last night, and then all night long I couldn't raise a station. Ichecked everything and couldn't find anything wrong. But just now I felt awfulsick and funny for a minute, and when I come out of it the air was full ofcode. Here's some of it. I don't understand how I could have been sick so I couldn't hear code, sir, but--"

The skipper said abruptly: "I had that sick feeling, too-dizzy. So didthe man at the wheel. So did everybody. Give me themessages."

His eyes ran swiftly over theyellow forms.

"News flash: Half of London disappeared at 2:00 a.m. this morning

S.S. Manzanillo reporting. Sea serpent which attacked this ship during the night and seized four sailors returned and was rammed five minutes ago. Itseems to be dying. Our bow badly smashed. Two forward compartments flooded. . . . Warning to all mariners. Pack ice seen floating fifty miles off New Yorkharbor.... News flash: Madrid, Spain, has undergone inexplicable change. All buildings formerly known now unrecognizable from the air. Air fields havevanished. Mosques seem to have taken the place of churches and cathe drals. Aflag bearing the crescent floats.... European population of Calcutta seemsto have been massacred. S.S. Carib reports harbor empty, all signs of Europeandomination vanished, and hostile mobs lining shore.... The skipper of the City of Baltimore passed his hand over his forehead. He looked uneasily at the radio operator. "Sparks," he said gently, "you'dbetter go see the ship's doctor. Here! I'l-l detail a man to go with you."

"I know," said Sparks bitterly. "I guess I'm nuts, all right. But that'swhat come through."

He marched away with his head hanging, escorted by a sailor. A littlespeck of smoke appeared dead ahead.

It became swiftly larger. With the combined speed of the two vessels, ina quarter of an hour the other ship was visible. In half an hour it could bemade out clearly. It was long and low and painful black, but the firstincredible thing was that it was a paddle steamer, with two sets of paddlesinstead of one, and the after set revolving more swiftly than the forward.

The skipper of the City of Baltimore looked more closely through highglasses and nearly dropped them in stark amazement. The flag flying on the other ship was black and white only. A beam wind blew it out swiftly. A whitedeath's head, with two crossed bones below it the traditional flag of piracy!

Signal flags fluttered up in the rigging of the other ship. The skipperof the City of Baltimore gazed at them, stunned. "Gibberish!" he muttered. "It don't make sense! They aren'tinternational code. Not the same flags at all!" Then a gun spoke. A monstrous puff of black powder smoke billowed overthe other ship's bow. A heavy shot crashed into the forepart of the City of

Baltimore: An instant later it exploded.

"I'm crazy, too!" said the skipper dazedly.

A second shot. A third and fourth. The black steamer sheered off and started to pound the City of Baltimore in a businesslike fashion. Half the bridge went overside. The forward cargo hatch blew up with a cloud of smokefrom an explosion underneath.

Then the skipper came to. He roared orders. The big ship heeled as itcame around. It plunged forward at vastly more than its normal cruising speedThe guns on the other ship doubled and redoubled their rate of fire. Then the black ship tried to dodge. But it had not time.

The City of Baltimore rammed it. But at the very last moment the skipperfelt certain of his own insanity. It was too late to save the other ship then. The City of Baltimore cut it in two.

The pale gray light of dawn filtered down through an incredible thickness offoliage. It was a subdued, a feeble twilight when it reached the earth where atiny camp fire burned. That fire gave off thick smoke from watersoaked wood. Hunter tended it, clad in ill-assorted remnants of a gray uniform.

Harris worked patiently at a rifle, trying to understand exactly how itworked. It was unlike any rifle with which he was familiar. The bolt actionwas not really a bolt action at all, and he'd noticed that there was norifling in the barrel. He was trying to understand how the long bullet wasmade to revolve. Harris, too, had substituted Confederate gray for the loincloth flung him for sole, covering when with the others he was thrust into the slave pen of the Roman villa. Minott sat with his head in his hands, staringat the opposite side of the stream. On his face was all bitterness.

Blake listened. Maida Haynes sat and looked at him. Lucy Blair dartedfurtive, somehow wistful, glances at Minott. Presently she moved to sit besidehim. She asked him an anxious question. The other two girls sat by the fire. Bertha Ketterling was slouched back against a tree-fern trunk. Her head hadfallen back. She snored. With the exception of Blake, all of them werebarefoot.

Blake came back to the fire. He nodded across the little stream. "We seem to have come to the edge of a time fault," he observed. "This side of the stream is definitely Carboniferous-period vegetation. The other side isn't asprimitive, but it isn't of our time, anyhow. Professor Minott!"

Minott lifted his head. "Well?" he demanded bitterly.

"We need some information," said Blake. "We'ye been here for hours, andthe re's been no furthe r change in time paths that we've noticed. Is, it likelythat the scrambling of time and space is ended, sir? If it has, and the timepaths stay jumbled, we'll never find our world intact, of course, but we canhunt for colonies, perhaps even cities of our own kind of people."

"If we do," said Minott bitterly, "how far will we get? We'repractically unarmed. We can't--"

Blake pointed to the salvaged rifles. "Harris is working on the armsproblem now," he said dryly. "Besides, the girls didn't take the revolversfrom their saddlebags. We've still two revolvers for each man and an extrapair. Those Romans thought the saddlebags were decorations, perhaps, or theyintended to examine the saddles as a whole. We'll make out. What I want to know is, has the time-scrambling process stopped?"

Lucy Blair said something in a low tone. But Minott glanced at Maida

Haynes, She was regarding Blake worshipfully.

Minott's eyes burned. He scowled in surpassing bitterness. "It probablyhasn't," he said harshly. I expect it to keep up for probably two weeks ormore of duration. I use that term to mean time elapsed in all the time pathssimultaneously. We can't help thinking of time as passing on our particulartime path only. Yes. I expect disturbances to continue for two weeks or more, if everything in time and space is not annihilated."

Blake sat down.

Insensibly Maida Haynes moved closer to him. "Could you explain, sir? Wecan only wait here. As nearly as I can tell from the topography, the re's avillage across this litle stream in our time. It ought to be in sight if ourtime path ever turns up in view, here."

Minott unconsciously reassumed some of his former authoritative manner. Their capture and scornful dismissal to the status of slaves had shaken allhis selfconfidence. Before, he had felt himself not only a member of asuperior race, but a superior member of that race. In being enslaved he hadbeen both degraded and scorned. His vanity was still gnawed at by that memory, and his self-confidence shattered by the fact that he had been able to killonly two utterly brutalized slaves, without in the least contributing to hisown freedom. Now, for the first time, his voice took on a semblance of its oldring.

"We know that gravity warps space," he said precisely. "From observationwe have been able to discover the amount of warping produced by a given mass. We can calculate themass necessary to warp space so that it will close incompletely, making a closed universe, which is unreachable and undetectable inany of the dimensions we know, for example, that if two gigantic star massesof a certain combined mass were rush togethe r, at the instant of the ircollision there would not be a great cataclysm. They would simply vanish. Butthey would not cease to exist. They would merely cease to exist in our spaceand time, They would have created a space and time of their own."

Harris said apologetically, "Like crawling in a hole and pulling the hole in after you. I read something like that in a Sunday supplement once, sir."

Minott nodded. He went on in a near approach to a classroom manner. "Now, imagine that two such universes have been formed. They are bothinvisible from the space and time in which they were formed. Each exists inits own space and time, just as our universe. does. But each must also existin a certain, well, hyper-space, because if closed spaces are separated, the remust be some sort of something in between them, else they would be togethe r."

"Really," said Blake, "you're talking about something we can infer, butordinarily can't possibly learn anything about by observation."

"Just so." Minott nodded. "Still, if our space is closed, we must assumethat there are other closed spaces. And don't forget that other closed spaceswould be as real, are as real, as our closed space is."

"But what does it mean?" asked Blake.

"If there are other closed spaces like ours, and they exist in a commonmedium, the hyper, space from which they and we alike are sealed off, theymight be likened to, say, stars and planets in our space, which are separatedby space and yet affect each other through space. Since the se various closedspaces are separated by a logically necessary hyper-space, it is at leastprobable that they should affect each other through that hyper-space."

Blake said slowly, "Then the shiftings of time paths, well, they're the result of something on the order of tidal strains. If another star got closeto the sun, our planets would crack up from tidal strains alone. You'resuggesting that another closed space has got close to our closed space inhyper-space. It's awfully confused, sir."

"I have calculated it," said Minott. harshly. "The odds are four to one

that space and time and universe, every star and every galaxy in the skies, will be obliterated in one monstrous cataclysm when even the past will neverhave been. But there is one chance in four, and I planned to take fulladvantage of it. I planned--"

Then he stood up suddenly. His figure straightened. He struck his handstogethe r savagely. "By Heaven, I still plan! We have arms. We have books, technical knowledge, formulas, the cream of the technical knowledge of earthpacked in our saddlebags! Listen to me! We cross this stream now. When thenext change comes, we strike across whatever time path takes the place ofthis. We make for the Potomac, where that aviator saw Norse ships drawn up! Ihave Anglo-Saxon and early Norse vocabularies in the saddlebags. We'll makefriends with them. We'll teach them. We'll lead them. We'll make ourselves masters of the world and--"

Harris said apologetically: "I'm sorry, sir, but I promised Bertha I'dtake her home, if it was humanly possible. I have to do it. I can't join youin becoming an emperor, even if the breaks are right."

Minott scowled at him. "Hunter?"

"I-I'll do as the others do," said Hunter uneasily. "I-I'd rather gohome."

"Fool!" snarled Minott. Lucy Blair said loyally: "I-I'd like to be an empress, ProfessorMinott."

Maida Haynes stared at her. She opened her mouth to speak. Blakeabsently pulled a revolver from his pocket and looked at it meditatively asMinott clenched and unclenched his hands. The veins stood out on his forehead. He began to breathe heavily.

"Fools!" he roared. "Fools! You'll never get back! Yet you throw away."

Swift, sharp, agonizing vertigo smote them all. The revolver fell fromBlake's hands. He looked up. A dead silence fell upon all of them.

Blake stood shakily upon his feet. He looked, and looked again. "That--" He swallowed. "That is King George courthouse, in King George County, inVirginia, in our time I think. Hell! Let's get across that stream."

He picked up Maida in his arms. He started.

Minott moved quickly and croaked, "Wait!"

He had Blake's dropped revolver in his hand. He was desperate, hunted, gray with rage and despair. "I-I offer you, for the last time, I offer youriches, power, women, and--"

Harris stood up, the Confederate rifle still in his hands. He broughtthe barrel down smartly upon Minott's wrist.

Blake waded across and put Maida safely down upon the shore. Hunter wassplashing frantically through the shallow water. Harris was shaking BerthaKetterling to wake her. Blake splashed back. He rounded up the horses. Heloaded the salvaged weapons over a saddle. He shepherded the three remaininggirls over. Hunter was out of sight. He had fled toward the painted buildingsof the courthouse. Blake led the horses across the stream. Minott nursed his numbed wrist. His eyes blazed with the fury of utter despair.

"Better come along," said Blake quietly.

"And be a professor of mathematics?" Minott laughed savagely. "No! Istay here!"

Blake considered. Minott was a strange, an unprepossessing figure. Hewas haggard. He was desperate. Standing against the background of aCarboniferous jungle, in themisfitting uniform he had stripped from a deadman in some other path of time, he was even pitiable. Shoeless, unshaven, desperate, he was utterly defiant.

"Wait!" said Blake.

He stripped off the saddlebags from six of the horses. He heaped them on the remaining two. lie led those two back across the stream and tethe red them.

Minott regarded him with an implacable hatred. "If I hadn't chosen you," he said harshly, "I'd have carried my original plan through. I knew Ishouldn't choose you. Maida liked you too well. And I wanted her for myself. It was my mistake, my only one."

Blake shrugged. He went back across the stream and remounted.

Lucy Blair looked doubtfully back at the solitary, savage figure. "He'sbrave, anyhow," she said unhappily.

A faint, almost imperceptible, dizziness affected all of them. Itpassed. By instinct they looked back at the tall jungle. It still stood. Minott looked bitterly after them.

"I've something I want to say!" said Lucy Blair breathlessly. "D-don'twait for me!"

She wheeled her horse about and rode for the stream. Again that faint, nearly imperceptible, dizziness. Lucy slapped her horse's flank frantically.

Maida cried out, "Wait, Lucy! It's going to shift--" And Lucy cried overher shoulder, "That's what I want! I'm going to stay."

She was halfway across the stream more than halfway. Then the vertigostruck all of them.

Everyone knows the rest of the story. For two weeks longer there were stilloccasional shiftings of the time paths. But gradually it became noticeablethat thenumber of time faults in Professor Minott's phrase were decreasing innumber. At themost drastic period, it has been estimated that no less thantwenty-five per cent of the whole earth's surface was at a given moment insome other time path than its own. We do not know of any portion of the earthwhich did not vary from its own time path at some period of the disturbance.

That means, of course, that practically one hundred per cent of the earth's population encountered the conditions caused by the earth'sextraordinary oscillations sidewise in time. Our scientists are no longerquite as dogmatic as they used to be. The dialectics of philosophy havereceived a serious jolt. Basic ideas in botany, zoology, and even philologyhave been altered by thenew facts made available by our travels sidewise intime.

Because of course it was the fourth chance which happened, and the earthsurvived. In our time path, at any rate. The survivors of Minott's exploringparty reached King George courthouse barely a quarter of an hour after the time shift which carried Minott and Lucy Blair out of our space and timeforever. Blake and Harris searched for a means of transmitting the informationthey possessed to the world at large. Through a lonely radio amateur a milefrom the village, they sent out Minott's the ory on short waves. Shorn ofMinott's pessimistic analysis of the probabilities of survival, it wentswiftly to every part of the world then in its proper relative position. Itwas valuable, in that it checked explorations in force which in some placeshad been planned. It prevented, for example, a punitive military expeditionfrom going past a time fault in Georgia, past which a scalping party ofIndians from an uncivilized America had retreated. It prevented the dispatchof a squadron of destroyers to find and seize Leifsholm, from, which a vikingforay had been made upon North Centerville, Massachusetts. A squadron ofmapping planes was recalled from reconnaissance work above a Carboniferousswamp in West Virginia, just before the time shift which would have isolatedthe m forever.

Some things, though, no knowledge could prevent. It has been estimatedthat no less than five thousand persons in the United States are missing fromthe ir own space and time, through having adventured into the strangelandscapes which appeared so suddenly. Many must have perished. Some, we feelsure, have come in contact with one or another of the distinct civilizationswe now know exist.

Conversely, we have gained inhabitants from other time paths. Twocohorts of the twenty-second Roman Legion were left upon our soil near Ithaca, New York. Four families of Chinese peasants essayed to pick berries in whatthey considered a miraculous strawberrypatch in Virginia, and remained the rewhen that section of ground returned to its proper milieu.

A Russian village remains in Colorado. A French settlement in their timeundeveloped Middle West. A part of thenorthe rn herd of buffalo has returnedto us, two hundred thousand strong, togethe r with a village of CheyenneIndians who had never seen either horses or firearms. The passenger pigeon, tothe number of a billion and a half birds, has returned to North America.

But our losses are heavy. Besides those daring individuals who werecarried away upon the strange territories they were exploring, there are the overwhelming disasters affecting Tokyo and Rio de Janeiro and Detroit. Thefirst two we understand. When the causes of oscillation sidewise in time were removed, most of the earth sections returned to their proper positions inthe ir own time paths. But not all. There is a section of PostCambrian jungleleft in eastern Tennessee. The Russian village in Colorado has been mentioned, and the French trading post in the Middle West. In some cases sections of the oscillating time paths remained in new positions, remote from their points oforigin.

That is the cause of the utter disappearance of Rio and of Tokyo. WhereRio stood, an untouched jungle remains. It is of our own geological period, but it is simply from a path in time in which Rio de Janeiro never happened tobe built. On the site of Tokyo stands a forest of extraordinarily primitivetype, about which botanists and paleontologists still debate. Somewhere, insome space and time, Tokyo and Rio yet exist and their people still live on. But Detroit, we still do not understand what happened to Detroit.

It was upon an oscillating segment of earth. It vanished from our time, and it returned to our time. But its inhabitants did not come back with it. The city was empty, deserted as if the hundreds of thousands of human beingswho lived in it had simply evaporated into the air. There have been some fewsigns of struggle seen, but they may have been the result of panic. The cityof Detroit returned to its own space and time untouched, unharmed, unlooted, and undisturbed. But no living thing, not even a domestic animal or a cagedbird, was in it when it came back. We do not understand that at all.

Perhaps if Professor Minott had returned to us, he could have guessed atthe answer to the riddle. What fragmentary papers of his have been shown torefer to the time upheaval have been of inestimable value. Our whole the ory ofwhat happened depends on the papers Minott left behind as too unimportant tobother with, in addition, of course, to Blake's and Harris account of hisexplanation to them. Tom Hunter can remember little that is useful. MaidaHaynes has given some worthwhile data, but it covers ground we have othe robservers for. Bertha Ketterling also reports very little.

The answers to a myriad problems yet elude us, but in the saddlebagsgiven to Minott by Blake as equipment for his desperate journey through spaceand time, the answers to many must remain. Our scientists labor diligently tounderstand and to elaborate the figures Minott thought of trivialsignificance. And throughout the world many minds turn longingly to certainsaddlebags, loaded on a led horse, following Minott and Lucy Blair throughunguessable landscapes, to unimaginable adventures, with revolvers andtextbooks as their armament for the conquest of a world.

Proxima Centauri

THE ADASTRA, FROM a little distance, already shone in the light of the approaching sun. The vision disks which scanned the giant space ship's outerskin relayed a faint illumination to the visiplates within. They showed themonstrous, rounded bulk of themetal globe, crisscrossed with girders toomassive to be transported by any power less than that of the space shipitself. They showed the whole, five-thousand-foot globe as an ever so faintlyglowing object, seemingly motionless in midspace.

In that seeming, they lied. Monstrous as the ship was, and apparentlytoo huge to be stirred by any conceivable power, she was responding to powernow. At a dozen points upon her faintly glowing side there were openings. Fromthose openings there flowed out tenuous purple flames. They gave little light, those flames-less than the star ahead-but they were the disintegration blastsfrom the rockets which had lifted the Adastra from the surface of Earth and for seven years had hurled it on through interstellar space toward ProximaCentauri, nearest of the fixed stars to humanity's solar system.

Now they hurled it forward no more. The mighty ship was decelerating. Thirty-two and two-tenths feet per second, losing velocity at the exact rateto maintain the effect of Earth's gravity within its bulk, the huge globeslowed. For months braking had been going on. From a peak speed measurablynear the velocity of light, the first of all vessels to span the distancebetween two solar systems had slowed and slowed, and reach a speed of maneuversome sixty million miles from the surface of the star.

Far, far ahead, Proxima Centauri glittered invitingly. The vision disksthat showed its faint glow upon the space ship's hull had counterparts whichcarried its image within the hull, and in themain control room it appearedenlarged very many times. An old, whitebearded man in uniform regarded itmeditatively. He said slowly, as if he had said the same thing often before: "Quaint, that ring. It is double, like Saturn's. And saturn has nine moons. One wonders how many planets this sun will have."

The girl said restlessly: "We'll find out soon, won't we? We're almostthe re. And we already know the rotation period of one of them! Jack said that" Her fathe r turned deliberately to her. "Jack?"

"Gary," said the girl. "Jack Gary."

"My dear," said the old man mildly, "he seems well disposed, and hisabilities are good, but he is a Mut. Remember!"

The girl bit her lip.

The old man went on, quite slowly and without rancor: "It is unfortunatethat we have had this division among the crew of what should have been ascientific expedition conducted in the spirit of a crusade. You hardlyremember how it began. But we officers know only too well how many effortshave been made by the Muts to wreck the whole purpose of our voyage. This JackGary is a Mut. He is brilliant, in his way. I would have brought him into the officers' quarters, but Alstair investigated and found undesirable facts whichmade it impossible."

"I don't believe Alstair!" said the girl evenly. "And, anyhow, it wasJack who caught the signals. And he's the one who's working with them, officeror Mut! And he's human, anyhow. It's time for the signals to come again andyou depend on him to handle them."

The old man frowned. He walked with a careful steadiness to a seat. He sat down with an old man's habitual and rather pathe tic caution. The Adastra, of course, required no such constant vigilance at the controls as the

interplanetary space ships require. Out here in emptiness there was no need towatch for meteors, for traffic, or for those queer and yet inexplicable forcefields which at first made interplanetary flights so hazardous.

The ship was so monstrous a structure, in any case, that the tiniermeteorites could not have harmed her. And at the speed she was now makinggreater ones would be notified by the induction fields in time for observationand if necessary the changing of her course.

A door at the side of the control room opened briskly and a man steppedin. He glanced with conscious professionalism at the banks of indicators. Arelay clicked, and his eyes darted to the spot. He turned and saluted the oldman with meticulous precision. He smiled at the girl.

"Ah, Aistair," said the old man. "You are curious about the signals, too?"

"Yes, sir. Of course! And as second in command I rather like to keep aneye on signals. Gary is a Mut, and I would not like him to gathe r informationthat might be kept from the officers."

"That's nonsense!" said the girl hotly.

"Probably," agreed Alstair. "I hope so. I even think so. But I prefer toleave out no precaution."

A buzzer sounded. Alstair pressed a button and a vision plate lighted. Adark, rather grim young face stared out of it.

"Very well, Gary," said Alstair curtly.

He pressed another button. The vision plate darkened and lighted againto show a long corridor, down which a solitary figure came. It came close andthe same face looked impassively out. Aistair said even more curtly: "Theother doors are open, Gary. You can come straight through."

"I think that's monstrous!" said the girl angrily as the plate clickedoff. "You know you trust him! You would have to! Yet every time he comes intoofficers' quarters. you act as if you thought he had bombs in each hand andall the rest of themen behind him!"

Aistair shrugged and glanced at the old man, who said tiredly, "Aistairis second in command, my dear, and he will be commander on the way back toEarth. I could wish you would be less offensive."

But the girl deliberately withdrew her eyes from the brisk figure ofAistair with its smart uniform, and rested her chin in her hands to gazebroodingly at the farthe r wall. Alstair went to the banks of indicators, surveying them in detail. The ventilator hummed softly. A relay clicked with acuriously smug, self-satisfied note. Othe rwise there was no sound.

The Adastra, mightiest work of the human race, hurtled on through spacewith the light of a strange sun shining faintly upon her enormous hull. Twelvelambent purple flames glowed from holes in her forward part. She wasdecelerating, lessening her speed by thirty-two point two feet per second persecond, maintaining the effect of Earth's gravity within her bulk.

Earth was seven years behind and uncounted millions of billions ofmiles. Interplanetary travel was a commonplace in the solar system now, and athriving colony on Venus and a precariously maintained outpost on the largestof Jupiter's moons promised to make space commerce thrive even after the deadcities of Mars had ceased to give up their incredibly rich loot. But only the Adastra had ever essayed space beyond Pluto.

She was the greatest of ships, themost colossal structure everattempted by men. In the beginning, indeed, her design was derided asimpossible of achievement by the very men who later made her building a fact. Her framework beams were so huge that, once cast, they could not be moved byany lifting contrivance at her builders' disposal. Therefore themolds forthe m were built and themetal poured in their final position as a part of the ship. Her rocket tubes were so colossal that thenecessary supersonicvibrations-to neutralize the disintegration effect of the Caidwell field-had

to be generated at thirty separate points on each tube, else the disintegration of her fuel would have spread to the tubes themselves and the big ship afterward, with even themother planet following in a burst oflambent purple flame. At full acceleration a set of twelve tubes disintegratedfive cubic centimeters of water per second.

Her diameter was a shade over five thousand feet. Her air tanks carried a reserve supply which could run her crew of three hundred for ten monthswithout purification. Her stores, her shops, her supplies of raw and finishedmaterials, were in such vast quantities that to enumerate them would be merelyto recite meaningless figures.

There were even four hundred acres of food-growing space within her, where crops were grown under sun lamps. Those, crops used waste organic matteras fertilizer and restored exhaled carbon dioxide to use, in part as oxygenand in part as carbohydrate footstuffs.

The Adastra was a world in herself. Given power, she could subsist hercrew forever, growing her food supplies, purifying her own internal atmospherewithout loss and without fail, and containing space within which every humanneed could be provided, even solitude.

And starting out upon themost stupendous journey in human history, shehad formally been given the status of a world, with her commander empowered tomake and enforce all needed laws. Bound for a destination four light-yearsdistant, theminimum time for her return was considered to be fourteen years. No crew could possibly survive so long a voyage undecimated. Therefore the enlistments for the voyage had not been by men, but by families.

There were fifty children on board when the Adastra lifted from Earth'ssurface. In the first year of her voyage ten more were born. It had seemed tothe people of Earth that not only couid themighty ship subsist her crewforever, but that the crew itself, well-nourished and with more than adequatefacilities both for amusement and education, could so far perpetuate itself asto make a voyage of a thousand years as practicable as themere journey toProxima Centauri.

And so it could, but for a fact at once so needless and so human thatnobody anticipated it. The fact was tedium. In less than six months the journey had ceased to become a great adventure. To the women in particular, the voyage of the big ship became deadly routine.

The Adastra itself took on the semblance of a gigantic apartment housewithout newspapers, department stores, new film plays, new faces, or even the relieving annoyances of changeable weathe r. The sheer completeness of allpreparations for the voyage made the voyage itself uneventful. That meanttedium.

Tedium meant restlessness. And restlessness, with women on board who hadenvisioned high adventure, meant the devil to pay. Their husbands no longerappeared as glamorous heroes. They were merely human beings. The menencountered similar disillusioninents. Pleas for divorce flooded the commander's desk, he being legally the fount of all legal action. During the - eighth month there was one murder, and in the three months following, twomore.

A year and a half out from Earth, and the crew was in a state of semi- mutiny originating in sheer boredom. By two years out, the oflicers' quarterswere sealed off from the greater part of the Adastra's interior, the crew wasdisarmed, and what work was demanded of themutineers was enforced by forceguns in the hands of the officers. By three years out, the crew was demandinga return to Earth. But by the time the Adastra could he slowed and stoppedfrom her then incredible velocity. she would be so near her destination as tomake no appreciable difference in the length of her total voyage. For the restof the time themembers of the crew strove to relieve utter monotony by suchvices and such pastimes as could be improvised in the absence of any actual need to work.

The officers' quarters referred to the underlings by a term becomehabitual, a contraction of the word "multineers." The crew came to have aqueer distaste for all dealing with the officers. But, despite Alstair, the rewas no longer much danger of an uprising. A certain mental equilibrium had- very late-developed.

From thenerve-racked psycholgy of dwellers in an isolated apartmenthouse, the greater number of the Adastra's complement came to have the psychology of dwellers in an isolated village. The difference was profound. Inparticular the children who had come to maturity during the long journeythrough space were well adjusted to the conditions of isolation and ofroutine.

Jack Gary was one of them. He had been sixteen when the trip began, sonof a rocket-tube engineer whose death took place the second year out. HelenBradley was anothe r. She had been fourteen when her fathe r, as designer andcommanding officer of themighty globe, pressed the control key that set the huge rockets into action.

Her fathe r had been past maturity at the beginning. Aged byresponsibility for seven uninterrupted years, he was an old man now. And heknew, and even Helen knew without admitting it, that he would never survivethe long trip back. Aistair would take his place and the despotic authorityinherent in it, and he wanted to marry Helen...

She thought of the se things, with her chin cupped in her hand, broodingin the control room. There was no sound save the humming of the ventilator andthe infrequent smug click of a relay operating the automatic machinery to keepthe Adastra a world in which nothing ever happened. A knock on the door. Thecommander opened his eyes a trifle vaguely. He was very old now, the commander. He had dozed.

Aistair said shortly, "Come in!" and Jack Gary entered.

He saluted, pointedly to the commander. Which was according toregulations, but Aistair's eyes snapped.

"Ah, yes," said the commander. "Gary. It's about time for more signals, isn't it?"

"Yes, sir."

Jack Gary was very quiet, very businesslike. Only once, when he glancedat Helen, was there any hint of anything but the formal manner of a man intenton his job. Then, his eyes told her something, in an infinitely small fractionof a second, which changed her expression to one of flushed content.

Short as the glance was, Aistair saw it. He said harshly: "Have you madeany progress in. deciphering the signals, Gary?"

Jack was setting the dials of a pan-wave receptor, glancing at pencilednotes on a calculator pad. He continued to set up the reception pattern.

"No, sir. There is still a sequence of sounds at the beginning whichmust be a form of call, because a part of the same sequence is used as asignature at the close. With the commander's permission I have used the firstpart of that call sequence as a signature in our signals in reply. But inlooking over the records of the signals I've found something that looksimportant."

The commander said mildly: "What is it, Gary?"

"We've been sending signals ahead of us on a tight beam, sir, for somemonths. Your idea was to signal ahead, so that if there were any civilizedinhabitants on planets about the sun, they'd get an impression of a peacefulmission."

"Of course!" said the commander. "It would be tragic for the first ofinterstellar communications to be unfriendly!"

"We've been getting answers to our signals for nearly three months. Always at intervals of a trifle over thirty hours. We assumed, of course, that a fixed transmitter was sending them, and that it was signaling once a daywhen the station was in themost favorable position for transmitting to us."

"Of course," said the commander gently. "It gave us the period ofrotation of the planet from which the signals come."

Jack Gary set the last dial and turned on the switch. A low-pitched humarose, which died away. He glanced at the dials again, checking them.

"I've been comparing the records, sir, making due allowance for ourapproach. Because we cut down the distance between us and the star so rapidly, our signals today take several seconds less to reach Proxima Centauri thanthey did yesteraay. Their signais should show the same shortening of interval, if they are actually sent out at the same instant of planetary time everyday."

The commander nodded benevolently.

"They did, at first," said Jack. "But about three weeks ago the timeinterval changed in a brand new fashion. The signal strength changed, and the wave form altered a little, too, as if a new transmitter was sending. And the first day of that change the signals came through one second earlier than ourvelocity of approach would account for. The second day they were three secondsearlier, the third day six, the fourth day ten, and so. on. They kept comingearlier by a period indicating a linear function until one week ago. Then the rate of change began to decrease again."

"That's nonsense!" said Alstair harthly.

"It's records," returned Jack curtly.

"But how do you explain it, Gary?" asked the commander mildly.

"They're sending now from a space ship, sir," replied Jack briefly, "which is moving toward us at four times our maximum acceleration. And they'reflashing us a signal at the same interval, according to their clocks, asbefore."

A pause. Helen Bradley smiled warmly. The commander thought carefully. Then he admitted:

"Very good, Gary! It sounds plausible. What next?"

"Why, sir," said Jack, "since the rate of change shifted, a week ago, itlooks as if that other space ship started to decelerate again. Here are mycalculations, sir. If the signals are sent at the same interval they kept upfor over a moment, there is another space ship headed toward us, and she isdecelerating to stop and reverse and will be matching our course and speed infour days and eighteen hours. They'll meet and surprise us, they think."

The commander's face lighted up. "Marvelous, Gary! They must be 1aradvanced indeed in civilization! Intercourse between two such peoples, separated, by four light-years of distance! What marvels we shall learn! Andto think of their sending a ship far beyond their own system to greet andwelcome us!"

Jack's expression remained grim. "I hope so, sir," he said dryly.

"What now, Gary?" demanded Alstair angrily.

"Why," said Jack deliberately, "the y're still pretending that the signals come from their planet, by signaling at what they think are the sametimes. They could exchange signals for twenty-four hours a day, if they chose, and be working out a code for communication. Instead, they're trying todeceive us. My guess is that they're coming at least prepared to fight. And ifI'm right, their signals will begin in three seconds, exactly."

He stopped, looking at the dials of the receptor. The tape whichphotographed the waves as they came in, and the other which recorded themodulations, came out of the receptor blank. But suddenly, in just threeseconds, a needle kicked over and tiny white lines appeared on the rushingtapes. The speaker uttered sounds.

It was a voice which spoke. So much was clear. It was harsh yetsibilant, more like the stridulation of an insect than anything else. But the sounds it uttered were modulated as no insect can modulate its outcry. Theyformed what were plainly words, without vowels or consonants, yet possessingexpression and varying in pitch and tone quality.

The three men in the control room had heard them many times before, andso had the girl. But for the first time they carried to her an impression ofmenace, of threat, of a concealed lust for destruction that made her blood runcold.

The space ship hurtled on through space, her rocket tubes sending forthsmall and apparently insufficient purple flames which emitted no smoke, gaveoff no gas, and were seemingly nothing but small marsh fires inexplicablyburning in emptiness.

There was no change in her outer appearance. There had been none tospeak of in years. At long, infrequent intervals men had emerged from airlocks and moved about her sides, bathing the steel they walked on andthe mselves alike with fierce glares from heat lamps lest the cold of herplating transmit itself through thematerial of the suits and kill themenlike ants on red-hot metal. But for a long time no such expedition had beenneeded.

Only now, in the distant faint light of Proxima Centauri, a man in aspace suit emerged from such a tiny lock. Instantly he shot out to the end of a threadlike life line. The constant deceleration of the ship not onlysimulated gravity within. Anything partaking of its motion showed the sameeffect. The man upon its decelerating forward side was flung away from the ship by his own momentum, the same force which, within it, had pressed hisfeet against the floors.

He hauled himself back laboriously, moving with an exaggeratedclumsiness in his bloated space suit. He clung to handholds and hooked himselfin place, while he worked an electric drill. He moved still more clumsily toanother place and drilled again. A third, and fourth, and fifth. For half anhour or more, then, he labored to set up on the vast steel surface, whichseemed always above him, ah intricate array of wires and framework. In the endhe seemed content. He hauled himself back to the air lock and climbed within.

The Adastra hurtled onward, utterly unchanged save for a very tinyfretwork of wire, perhaps thirty feet across, which looked more like amicroscopic barbed-wire entanglement than anything else.

Within the Adastra, Helen Bradley greeted Jack warmly as he got out ofhis space suit.

"It was horrible!" she told him, "to see you dangling like that! Withmillions of miles of empty space below you!"

"If my line had parted," said Jack quietly, "your fathe r'd have turnedthe ship and caught up to me. Let's go turn on the inductor and see how thenew reception grid works."

He hung up the space suit. As they turned to go through the doorwaythe ir hands touched accidentally. They looked at each other and faltered. Theystopped, Helen's eyes shining. They unconsciously swayed toward each othe r. Jack's hands lifted hungrily.

Footsteps sounded close by. Aistair, second in cornmand of the spaceship, rounded a corner and stopped short.

"What's this?" he demanded savagely. "Just because the commander'sbrought you into officers' quarters, Gary, it doesn't follow that your Mutmethods of romance can come, too!"

"You dare!" cried Helen furiously.

Jack, from a hot dull flush, was swiftly paling to the dead-white ofrage.

"You'll take that back," he said very quietly indeed, "or I'll show youMut methods of fighting with a force gun! As an officer, I carry one, too, now!" Alstair snarled at him.

"Your fathe r's been taken ill," he told Helen angrily. "He feels the voyage is about over. Anticipation has kept up his strength for months past, but now he's--"

With a cry, the girl fled.

Alstair swung upon Jack. "I take back nothing," he snapped. "You're anofficer, by order of the commander. But you're a Mut besides, and when I'mcommander of the Adastra you don't stay an officer long! I'm warning you! Whatwere you doing here?"

Jack was deathly pale, but the status of officer on the Adastra, withits consequent opportunity of seeing Helen, was far too precious to be givenup unless at the last extremity. And, besides, there was the work he had inhand. His work, certainly, could not continue unless he remained an officer.

"I was installing an interference grid on the surface," he said, "to tryto discover the sending station of themessages we've been getting. It willalso act, as you know, as an inductor up to a certain range, and in its rangeis a good deal more accurate than themain inductors of the ship."

"Then get to your damned work," said Alstair harshly, "-and pay fullattention to it and less to romance!"

Jack plugged in the lead wire from his new grid to the pan-wavereceptor. For an hour he worked more and more grimly. There was something verywrong. The inductors showed blank for all about the Adastra. The interferencegrid showed an object of considerable size not more than two million milesdistant and to one side of the Adastra's course. Suddenly, all indication ofthat object's existence blanked out. Every dial on the panwave receptor wentback to zero.

"Damnation!" said Jack under his breath.

He sat up a new pattern on the controls, calculated a moment anddeliberately changed the pattern on the spare bank of themain inductors, andthe n simultaneously switched both instruments to their hew frequencies. Hewaited, almost holding his breath, for nearly half a minute. It would take solong for the inductor waves of thenew frequency to reach out the two millionmiles and then collapse into the analyzers and give their report of any objectin space which had tended to deform them.

Twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight seconds. Every alarm bell on themonstrous ship clanged furiously! Emergency doors hissed into place all overthe vessel, converting every doorway into an air lock. Seconds later, the visiplates in themain control room began to flash alight.

"Reporting, Rocket Control!"

"Reporting, Air Service!"

"Reporting, Power Supply!"

Jack said crisply: "The main inductors report an object two millionmiles distant with velocity in our direction. The commander is ill. Pleasefind Vice Commander Aistair."

Then the door of the control room burst open and Aistair himself ragedinto the room.

"What the devil!" he rasped. "Ringing a general alarm? Have you gonemad? The inductors--"

Jack pointed to themain inductor bank. Every dial bore out themessageof the still clanging alarms. Alstair stared blankly at them. As he looked, every dial went back to zero. And Alstair's face went as blank as the dials.

"They felt out our inductor screens," said Jack grimly, "and put outsome sort of radiation which neutralized them. So I set up two frequencies, changed both, and they couldn't adjust their neutralizers in time to stop ouralarms."

Alstair stood still, struggling with the rage which still possessed him. Then he nodded curtly.

"Quite right. You did good work. Stand by."

And, quite cool and composed, he took command of themighty space ship, even if there was not much for him to do. In five minutes, in fact, everypossible preparation for emergency had been made and he turned again to Jack.

"I don't like you," he said coldly. "As one man to anothe r, I dislikeyou intensely. But as vice commander and acting commander at themoment, Ihave to admit that you did good work in uncovering this little trick of ourfriends to get wit-hin striking -distance without our knowing they wereanywhere near."

Jack said nothing. He was frowning, but it was because he was thinkingof Helen. The Adastra was huge and powerful, but she was not readilymaneuverable. She was enormously massive, but she could not be used forramming. And she possessed within herself almost infInite destructiveness, inthe means of producing Caidwell fields for the disintegration of matter, butshe contained no weapon more dangerous than a two thousand kilowatt vortex gunfor the destruction of dangerqus animals or vegetation where she mightpossibly land.

"What's your comment?" demanded Aistair shortly. "How do you size up the situation?"

"They act as if they're planning hostilities," replied Jack briefly, "and they've got four times our maximum acceleration so we can't get away. With that acceleration they ought to be more maneuverable, so we can't dodgethe m. We've no faintest idea of what weapons they carry, but we know that wecan't fight them unless their weapons are very puny indeed. There's just onechance that I can see."

"What's that?"

"They tried to slip up on us. That looks as if they intended to openfire without warning. But maybe they are frightened and only expected toexamine us without our getting a chance to attack them. In that case, our onlybet is to swing over our signaling beam to the space ship. When they realizewe know they're there and still aren't getting hostile, they may not guess wecan't fight. They may think we want to be friendly and they'd better not startanything with a ship our size that's on guard."

"Very well. You're detailed to communication duty," said Aistair. "Goahead and carry out that program. I'll consult the rocket engineers and seewhat they can improvise in the way of fighting equipment. Dismiss!"

His tone was harsh.' It was arrogant. It rasped Jack's nerves and madehim bristle all over. But he had to recognize that Aistair wasn't letting hisfrank dislike work to the disadvantage of the ship. Aistair was, in fact, oneof those ambitious officers who are always cordially disliked by everybody, atall times, until an emergency arises. Then their competence shows up.

Jack went to the communications-control room. It did not take long torealign the transmitter beam. Then the sender began to repeat monotonously the recorded last message from the Adastra to the distant and so far unidentifiedplanet of the ringed star. And while the signal went-out, over and over again, Jack called on observations control for a sight Of the strange ship.

They had a scanner on it now and by stepping up illumination to the utmost, and magnification to the point where the image was as rough as an old-fashioned half-tone cut, they brought the strange ship to the visiplate as asix-inch miniature.

It was egg-shaped and perfectly smooth. There was no sign of externalgirders, of protruding atmospheric navigation fins, of escape-boat blisters. It was utterly featureless save for tiny spots which might be portholes, and rocket tubes in which intermittent flames flickered.

It was still decelerating to match the speed and course of the Adastra.

"Have you got a spectroscope report on it?" asked Jack.

"Yeh," replied the observations orderly. "An' I don't believe it. They're using fuel rockets-some organic compound. An' the report says the hullof that thing is cellulose, not metal. It's wood, on the outside."

Jack shrugged. No sign of weapons. He went back to his own job. Thespace ship yonder was being penetrated through and through by themessagewaves. Its receptors could not fail to be reporting that a tight beam was uponit, following its every movement, and that its presence and probable missionwere the refore known to themighty ship from out of space.

But Jack's own receptors were silent. The tape came out of them utterlyblank. No-a queer, scrambled, blurry line, as if the analyzers were unable tohandle the frequency which was coming through. Jack read the heat effect. Theother space ship was sending with a power which meant five thousand kilowattspouring into the Adastra. Not a signal. Grimly, Jack heterodyned the wave on afive-meter circuit and read off its frequency and type. He called themaincontrol.

"They're pouring short stuff into us," he reported stiffly to Aistair. "About five thousand kilowatts of thirty-centimeter waves, the type we use onEarth to kill weevils in wheat. It ought to be deadly to animal life, but ofcourse our hull simply absorbs it."

Helen. Impossible to stop the Adastra. They'd started for ProximaCentauri. Decelerating though they were, they couldn't check much short of the solar system, and they were already attacked by a ship with four times the irgreatest acceleration. Pouring a deadly frequency into them-a frequency usedon Earth to kill noxious insects. Helen was---"Maybe they think we're dead! They'll know our transmitter's mechanical."

The G.C. phone snapped suddenly, in Aistair's voice.

"Attention, all officers! The enemy space ship has poured what itevidently considers a deadly frequency into us, and is now approaching at fullacceleration! Orders are that absolutely no control of any sort is to bevaried by a hair's breadth. Absolutely no sign of living intelligence withinthe Adastra is to be shown: You will stand by all operative controls, preparedfor maneuver if it should be necessary. But we try to give the impression thatthe Adastra is operating on automatic controls alone! Understood?"

Jack could imagine the reports from the other control rooms. His ownreceptor sprang suddenly into life. The almost hooted sounds of the callsignal, so familiar that they seemed words. Then an extraordinary jumble ofnoises-words in a human voice. More stridulated sounds. More words in perfectly accurate English. The English words were in the tones and accents of an officer of the Adastra, plainly recorded and retransmitted.

"Communications!" snapped Aistair. "You will not answer this signal! Itis an attempt to find out if we survived their ray attack!"

"Check," said Jack.

Aistair was right. Jack watched and listened as the receptor babbled on. It stopped. Silence for ten minutes. It began again. The Adastra hurtled on. The babble from space came to an end. A little later the G.C. phone snappedonce more:

"The enemy space ship has increased its acceleration, evidentlyconvinced that we are all dead. It will arrive in approximately four hours. Normal watches may be resumed for three hours unless an alarm is given."

Jack leaned back in his chair, frowning. He began to see the tacticsAistair planned to use. They were bad tactics, but the only ones a defenselessship like the Adastra could even contemplate. It was at least ironic that the greeting the Adastra received at the end of a seven-years' voyage throughempty space be a dose of a type of radiation used on Earth to exterminate vermin.

But the futility of this attack did not mean that all attacks would besimilarly useless. And the Adastra simply could not be stopped for manymillions of miles, yet. Even if Alstair's desperate plan took care of thisparticular assailant and this particular weapon, it would not mean-it couldnot!-that the Adastra or the folk within had any faintest chance of defendingthe mselves.

And there was Helen-

The visiplates showed the strange space ship clearly, now, even withoutmagnification. It was within five miles of the Adastra and it had stopped. Perfectly egg-shaped, without any protuberance whatever except the rockettubes in its rear, it hung motionless with relation to the Earth ship, whichmeant that its navigators had analyzed her rate of deceleration long since andhad matched all the constants of her course with precision.

Helen, her face still tear-streaked, watched as Jack turned up themagnification, and the illumination with it. Her fathe r had collapsed verysuddenly and very completely. He was resting quietly now, dozing almostcontinuously, with his face wearing an expression of utter contentment.

He had piloted the Adastra to its first contact with the civilization ofanother solar system. His lifework was done and he was wholly prepared torest. He had no idea, of course, that the first actual contact with the , strange space ship-was a burst of short waves of a frequency deadly to allanimal life.

The space ship swelled on the visiplate as Jack turned the knob. Hebrought it to an apparent distance of a few hundred yards only. With the illumination turned up, even the starlight on the hull would have beensufficient to show any surface detail. But there was literally none. No rivet, no bolt, no line of joining plates. A row of portholes were dark and deadwithin.

"And it's wood!" repeated jack. "Made out of some sort of cellulosewhich stands the cold of space!"

Helen said queerly: "It looks to me as if it had been grown, rather thanbuilt."

Jack blinked. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but the receptor athis elbow suddenly burst into the hootlike stridulations which were the signals from the egglike ship. Then English words, from recordings of previoussignals from the Aadstra. more vowelless, modulated phrases. It soundedexactly as if the beings in the other space ship were trying urgently to opencommunication and were insisting that they had the key to the Adastra'ssignals. The temptation to reply was great.

"They've got brains, anyhow," said Jack grimly.

The signals were cut off. Silence. Jack glanced at the wave tape. Itshowed the same blurring as before.

"More short stuff. At this distance,' it ought not only to kill us, buteven sterilize the interior of the whole ship. Lucky our hull is heavy alloywith a high hysteresis-rate. Not a particle of that radiation can getthrough."

Silence for a long, long time. The wave tape showed that a terrific beamof thirty-centimeter waves continued to play upon the Adastra. Jack suddenlyplugged in observations and asked a question. Yes, the outer hull was heating. It had gone up half a degree in fifteen minutes.

"Nothing to worry about in that," grunted Jack. "Fifteen degrees will be the limit they can put it up, with this power."

The tape came out clear. The supposed death radiation was cut off. Theegg-shaped ship darted forward. And then for twenty minutes or more Jack hadto switch from one outside vision disk to another to keep it in sight. Ithovered about the huge bulk of the Adastra with a wary inquisitiveness. Nowhalf a mile away, now no more than two hundred yards, the thing darted hereand there with an amazing acceleration and as amazing a breaking power. It hadonly the rocket tubes at the smaller end of its egg-shaped form. It wasnecessary for it to fling its whole shape about to get a new direction, andthe gyroscopes within it must have been tremendously powerful. Even so, the abruptness of its turns was startling.

"I wouldn't like to be inside that thing!" said Jack. "We'd be crushedto a pulp by their normal navigation methods. They aren't men like us. Theycan stand more than we can."

The thing outside seemed sentient, seemed alive. And by the eagerness ofits movements it seemed themore horrible, flitting about the gigantic spaceship it now believed was a monstrous coffin.

It suddenly reversed itself and shot back toward the Adastra. Twohundred yards, one hundred yards, a hundred feet. It came to a cushioned stopagainst the surface of the Earth vessel.

"Now we'll see something of them," said Jack crisply.

"They landed right at an air lock. They know what that is, evidently. Now we'll see them in their space suits."

But Helen gasped. A part of the side of the strange ship seemed to swellsuddenly. It bulged out like a blister. It touched the surface of the Adastra. It seemed to adhere. The point of contact grew larger.

"Good Lord!" said Jack blankly. "Is it alive? And is it going to try toeat our ship?"

The general-communication phone rasped sharply: "Officers with arms tothe air lock GH41 immediately! The Centaurians are opening the air lock fromthe outside. Wait orders there! The visiplate in the airlock is working andyou will be informed. Go ahead!" The phone clicked off. Jack seized a heavy gun, one of the force rifles which will stun a man at anything up toeighteen hundred yards and kill at six, when used at full power. His side armhung in its holster. He swung for the door.

"Jack!" said Helen desperately.

He kissed her. It was the first time their lips had touched, but itseemed themost natural thing in the world, just then. He went racing down the long corridors of the Adastra to the rendezvous. And as he raced, his thoughtswere not at all those of a scientist and an officer of Earth's first expedition into interstellar space.

Jack was thinking of Helen's lips touching his desperately, of her softbody pressed close to him.

A G.C. speaker whispered overhead as he ran:

"They're inside the air lock. They opened it without trouble. They'retesting our air, now. Apparently it suits them all."

The phone fell behind. Jack ran on, panting. Somebody else was runningahead. There were half a dozen, a dozen men grouped at the end of the corridor. A murmur from the side wall.

".... rking at the inner airlock door. Only four or five of them, apparently, will enter the ship. They are to be allowed to get well away fromthe air lock. You will keep out of sight. When the emergency locks go on itwill be your signal. Use your heavy force guns, increasing power from minimumuntil they fall paralyzed. It will probably take a good deal of power tosubdue them. They are not to be killed if it cnn be avoided. Ready!"

There were a dozen or more officers on hand. The fat rocket chief. The lean air officer. Subalterns of the other departments. The rocket chief puffedaudibly as he wedged himself out of sight. Then the clicking of the inner air-lock door. It opened into the anteroom. Subdued, muffled hootings came fromthat door. The Things-whatever they were-were inspecting the space suitsthe re. The hootings were distinctly separate and distinctly intoned. But theysuddenly came as a babble. More than one Thing was speaking at once. There wasexcitement, eagerness, an extraordinary triumph in These voices.

Then something stirred in the doorway of the air-lock anteroom. A shadowcrossed the threshold. And then the Earthmen saw the creatures who were invading the ship.

For an instant they seemed almost like men. They had two legs, and twodangling things-tentacles-which apparently served as arms and tapered smoothlyto ends which split into movable, slender filaments. The tentacles and the legs alike seemed flexible in their entire lengths. There were no "joints" such as men use in walking, and the result was that the Centaurians walkedwith a curiously rolling gait.

Most startling, though, was the fact that they had no heads. They camewabbling accustomedly out of the air lock, and at the end of one "arm" eachcarried a curious, semi-cylindrical black object which they handled as if itmight be a weapon. They wore metallic packs fastened to their bodies. Thebodies themselves were queerly "grained." There was a tantalizing familiarityabout the texture of their skin.

Jack, staring incredulously, looked for eyes, for nostrils, for a mouth. He saw twin slits only. He guessed at them for eyes. He saw no sign of anymouth at all. There was no hair. But he saw a scabrous, brownish substance on the back of one of the Things which turned to hoot excitedly at the rest. Itlooked like bark, like tree bark. And a light burst upon Jack. He almost criedout, but instead reached down and quietly put the lever of his force gun atfull power at once.

The Things moved on. They reached a branching in the corridor and aftermuch arm waving and production of their apparently articulated sounds theyseparated into two parties. They vanished. Their voices dwindled. The signalfor an attack upon them had not yet been given. The officers, left behind, stirred uneasily. But a G.C. phone whispered.

"Steady! They think we're all dead. They're separating again. We may beable to close emergency doors and have each one sealed off from all the restand then handle them in detail. You men watch the air lock!"

Silence. The humming of a ventilator somewhere nearby. Then, suddenly, aman screamed shrilly a long distance off, and on the heels of his outcry the recame a new noise from one of the Things. It was a high-pitched squealingnoise, triumphant and joyous and unspeakably horrible.

Othe r squealings answered it. There were rushing sounds, as if the othe rThings were running to join the first. And then came a hissing of compressedair and a hum of motors. Doors snapped shut everywhere, sealing off every partof the ship from every other part. And in the dead silence of their own sealedcompartment, the officers on guard suddenly heard inquiring hoots.

Two more of the Things came out of the air lock. One of themen moved. The Thing saw him and turned its half-cylindrical object upon him. The man-itwas the communications officer-shrieked suddenly and leaped convulsively. Hewas stone dead even as his muscles tensed for that incredible leap. And the Thing emitted a high-pitched triumphant note-which was exactly like the othe rhorrible sound they had heard, and sped eagerly toward his body. 0ne of the long, tapering arms lashed out and touched the dead man's hand.

Then Jack's force gun began to hum. He heard another and another openup. In seconds the air was filled with a sound like that of a hive of angrybees. Three more of the Things came out of the air lock, but they dropped inthe barrage of force-gun beams. It was only when there was a sudden rush of air toward the lock, showing that the enemy ship had taken alarm andwasdarting away, that themen dared cease to fill that doorway with the irbarrage. Then it was necessary to seal the air lock in a hurry. Only thencould they secure the Things that had invaded the Adastra.

Two hours later, Jack went into themain control room and saluted withan exact precision. His face was rather white and his expression entirelydogged and resolved. Alstair turned to him, scowling.

"I sent for you," he said harshly, "because you're likely to be a sourceof trouble. The commander is dead. You heard it?"

"Yes, sir," said Jack grimly. "I heard it."

"In consequence, I am commander of the Adastra," said Aistairprovocatively. "I have, you will recall, the power of life and death in casesof mutinous conduct, and it is also true that marriage on the Adastra is madelegal only by executive order bearing my signature."

"I am aware of the fact, sir,," said Jack more grimly still.

"Very well," said Aistair deliberately. "For the sake of discipline, Iorder you to refrain from all association with Miss Bradley. I shall takedisobedience of the order as mutiny. I intend to marry her myself. What haveyou to say to that?"

Jack said as deliberately: "I shall pay no attention to the order, sir, because you aren't fool enough to carry out such a threat! Are you such fool you don't see we've less than one chance in five hundred of coming out ofthis? If you want to marry Helen. you'd better put all your mind on giving hera chance to live!""

A savage silence held for a moment. The two men glared furiously at eachothe r, the one near middle age, the other still a young man, indeed. ThenAistair showed his teeth in a smile that had no mirth whatever in it.

"As man to man. I dislike you extremely," he said harshly. "But ascommander of the Adastra I wish I had a few more like you. We've had sevenyears of routine on this damned ship, and every officer in quarters is rattledpast all usefulness because an emergency has come at last. They'll obey ordersbut the re's not one fit to give them. The communications officer was killed byone of those devils, wasn't he?"

"Yes, sir."

"Very well. You're brevet communications officer. I hate your guts, Gary, and I do not doubt that you hate mine, but you have brains. Use themnow. What have you been doing?"

"Adjusting a dictawriter, sir, to get a vocabulary of one of the seCentaurian's speech, and hooking it up as a two-way translator, sir."

Alstair stared in momentary surprise, and then nodded. A dictawriter, of course, simply analyzes a word into its phonetic parts, sets up the analysis, and picks out a card to match its formula. Normally, the card then actuates aprinter. However, instead of a type-choosing record, the card can contain arecord of an equivalent word in another language, and then operates a speaker.

Such machines have been of only limited use on Earth because of theneedfor so large a stock of vocabulary words, but have been used to some extentfor literal translations both of print and speech. Jack proposed to record aCentaurian's vocabulary with English equivalents, and the dictawriter, hearingthe queer hoots the strange creature uttered, would pick out a card whichwould then cause a speaker to enunciate its English synonym,

The reverse, of course, would also occur. A conversation could becarried on with such a prepared vocabulary without awaiting practice inunderstanding or imitating the sounds of another language.

"Excellent!" said Alstair curtly. "But put some one else on the job ifyou can. It should be reasonably simple, once it's started. But I need you forother work. You know what's been found out about the se Centaurians, don'tyou?"

"Yes, sir. Their hand weapon is not unlike our force, guns, but it seemsto be considerably more effective. I saw it kill the communications officer."

"But the creatures themselves!"

"I helped tie one of them up."

"What do you make of it? I've a physician's report, but he doesn'tbelieve it himself!"

"I don't blame him, sir," said Jack grimly. "They're not our idea ofintelligent beings at all. We haven't any word for what they are. In one sensethe y're plants, apparently. That is, their bodies seem to be composed ofcellulose fibers where ours are made of muscle fibers. But they areintelligent, fiendishly intelligent.

"The nearest we have to them~on Earth are certain carnivorous plants, like pitcher plants and the like. But they're as far above a pitcher plant asa man is above a sea anemone, which is just as much an animal as a man is. Myguess, sir, would be that they're neither plant nor animal. Their bodies arebuilt up of the same materials as earthly plants, but they move about like, animals do on Earth. They surprise us, but we may surprise them, too. It'squite possible that the typical animal form on their planet is sessile likethe typical plant form on ours."

Alstair said bitterly: "And they look on us, animals, as we look onplants!"

Jack said without expression: "Yes, sir. They eat through holes in the irarms. The one who killed the communications officer seized his arm. It seemed to exude some fluid that liquefied his flesh instantly. It sucked the liquidback in at once. If I may make a guess, sir--"

"Go ahead," snapped Aistair. "Everybody else is running around incircles, either marveling or sick with terror."

"The leader of the party, sir, had on what looked like an ornament. Itwas a band of leathe r around one of its arms."

"Now, what the devil--"

"We had two men killed. One was the communications officer and the other was an orderly. When we finally subdued the Centaurian who'd killed thatorderly, it had eaten a small bit of him, but the rest of the orderly's bodyhad undergone some queer sort of drying process, from chemicals the Thingseemed to carry with it."

Alstair's throat worked as if in nausea. "I saw it."

"It's a fanciful idea," said Jack grimly, "but if a man was in the position of that Centaurian, trapped in a space ship belonging to an alienrace, with death very probably before him, well, about the only thing a manwould strap to his body, as the Centaurian did the dried, preserved body ofthat orderly--"

"Would be gold," snapped Aistair. "Or platinum, or jewels which he wouldhope to fight clear with!"

"Just so," said Jack.---"Now, I'm only guessing, but those creatures arenot human, nor even animals. Yet they eat animal fOod. They treasure animalfood as a human being would treasure diamonds. An animal's remains-leathe r-they wear as an ornament. It looks to me as if animal tissue was rather rareon their planet, to be valued so highly. In consequence--"

Alstair stood up, his features 'working. "Then our bodies would be the same as gold to them! As diamonds! Gary, we haven't the ghost of a chance tomake friends with the se fiends!"

Jack said dispassionately: "No; I don't think we I have. If a race ofbeings with tissues of metallic gold landed on Earth, I rather think they'd bemurdered. But the re's another point, too. There's Earth. From our course, the se creatures can tell where we came from, and their space ships are rathe rgood. I think I'll put somebody else on the dictawriter job and see if I canflash a message back home. No way to know whethe r they get it, but they ought

to be watching for one by the time it's there. Maybe they've improved the irreceptors. They intended to try, anyhow."

"Men could meet the se creatures' ships in space," said Alstair harshly, "if they were warned. And guns might answer, but if they didn't handle the sedevils Caldwell torpedoes would. Or a suicide squad, Using their bodies forbait. We're talking like dead men, Gary."

"I think, sir," said Jack, "we are dead men." Then he added: "I shallput Helen Bradley on the dictawriter, with a guard tO handle the Centaurian. He'll be bound tightly."

The statement tacitly assumed that Aistair's order to avoid her waswithdrawn. It was even a challenge to him to repeat it. And Alstair's eyesglowed and he controlled-himself with difficulty.

"Damn you, Gary," he said savagely, "get out!"

He turned to the visiplate which showed the enemy ship as Jack left the control room.

The egg-shaped ship was two thousand miles away now, and justdecelerating to a stop. In its first flight it had rocketed here and the relike a mad thing. It would have been impossible to hit it with any projectile, and difficult in the extreme even to keep radiation on it in anything like atight beam. Now, stopped stock-still with regard to the Adastra, it hung on, observing, very probably devising some new form of devilment. So Alstairconsidered, anyhow. He watched it somberly.

The resources of the Adastra, which had seemed so vast when she took offfrom Earth, were pitifully inadequate to handle the one situation which hadgreeted her, hostility. She could have poured out the treasures of man'scivilization to the race which ruled this solar system. Savages, she couldhave uplifted. Even to a race superior to men she could have offered man'sfriendship and eager pupilage. But the se creatures that--The space ship stayedmotionless. Probably signaling back to its home planet, demanding orders. Reports, came in to the Adastra's main control room and Aistair read them. TheCentaurians were unquestionably extracting carbon dioxide from the air. Thatcompound was to their metabolism what oxygen is to men, and in pure air theycould not live.

But their metabojic rate was vastly greater than that of any plant onEarth. It compared with the rate of earthly animals. They were not plants byany definition save that of constitution, as a sea anemone is not an animalexcept by the test of chemical analysis.

The Centaurians had a highly organized nervOus system, the equivalent ofbrains, and both great intelligence and a language. They produced Sounds by astridulating organ in a special body cavity. And they felt emotion.

A captive creature when presented with various objects showed specialinterest in machinery, showing an acute realization of the purpose of a smallsound recorder and uttering into it an entire and deliberate series of sounds. Human clothing it fingered eagerly. Cloth it discarded, when of cotton orrayon, but it displayed great excitement at the feel of a woolen shirt andeven more when a leathe r belt was given to it. It placed the belt about itsmiddle, fastening the buckle without a fumble after a single glance at itsworking.

It unraveled a thread from the shirt and consumed it, rocking to and froas if in ecstasy. When meat was placed before it, it seemed to become almostdelirious with excitement. A part of themeat it consumed instantly, toecstatic swayings. The rest it preserved by a curious chemical process, usingsubstances from a small metal pack it had worn and for which it made gestures.

Its organs of vision were behind two slits in the upper part of itsbody, and no precise examination of the eyes themselves had been made. But the report before Alstair said specifically that the Centaurian displayed an avideagerness whenever it caught sight of a human being. And that the eagerness was not of a sort to be reassuring.

It was the sort of excitement-only much greater-which it had displayedat the sight of wool and leathe r.

As if by instinct, said the report, the captive Centaurian had severaltimes made a gesture as it turning some weapon upon a human when first itsighted him.

Alstair read this report and others. Helen Bradley reported barely twohours after $ack had assigned her to the work.

"I'm sorry, Helen," said Alstair ungraciously. "You shouldn't have beencalled on for duty. Gary insisted on it. I'd have left you alone."

"I'm glad he did," said Helen steadily. "Fathe r is dead, to be sure, but-he was quite content. And he died before he found out what the seCentaurians are like. Working was good for me. I've succeeded much better thanI even hoped. The Centaurian I worked with was the leader of the party whichinvaded this ship, He understood almost at once what the dictawriter wasdoing, and we've a good vocabulary recorded already. If you want to talk tohim, you can."

Aistair glanced at the visiplate. The enemy ship was still motionless. Easily understandable, of course. The Adastra's distance from Proxima Centauricould be measured in hundreds of millions of miles, now, instead of millionsof billions, but in another terminology, it was light-hours away still. If the space ship had signaled its home planet for orders, it would still be waitingfor a reply.

Alstair went heavily to the biology laboratory, of which Helen was incharge, just as she was in charge of the biological specimens-rabbits, sheep, and a seemingly endless array of small animals-which on the voyage had beenbred for a food supply and ,wbich it had been planned to release sho~uld aplanet suitable for colonizing revolve about the ringed star.

The Centaurian was bound firmly to a chair with a myriad of cords. Heshe-- it, was utterly helpless. Beside the chair the dictawriter and itsspeaker were coupled togethe r. From the Centaurian came hooted notes which themachine translated with a rustling sound between words.

"You-are-commander-this-ship?" themachine translated withoutintonation.

"I am," said Aistair, and themachine hooted musically.

"This-woman-man--dead," said themachine tonelessly again, after moresounds from the extraordinary living thing which was not an animal.

Helen interjected swiftly: "I told him my fathe r was dead."

The machine went on: "I-buy-all--dead-man-on-ship-give-metal-gold-you-like--" Alstair's teeth clicked togethe r. Helen went white. She tried to speak, and choked upon the words.

"This," said Alstair in mirthless bitterness, "is the beginning of the interstellar friendship we hoped to institute!"

Then the G.C. phone said abruptly:

"Calling Commander Alstair! Radiation from ahead! Several wave lengths, high intensity! Apparently several space ships are sending, though we canthake out no signals!"

And then Jack Gary came into the biology laboratory. His face was set ingrim lines. It was very white. He saluted with great precision.

"I didn't have to work hard, sir," he said sardonically. "The lastcommunications officer had been taking his office more or less as a sinecure. We'd had no signals for seven years, and he didn't expect any. But they'recoming through and have been for months.

"They left Earth three years after we did. A chap named Callaway, itseems, found that a circularly polarized wave makes a tight beam that willhold togethe r forever. They've been sending to us for years past; no doubt, and we're getting some of the first messages now.

"They've built a second Adastra, sir, and it's being manned-hell, no! ,it was manned four years ago! It's on the way out here now! It must be atleast three years on the way, and it has no idea of the se devils waiting forit. Even if we blow ourselves to bits, sir, the re'll be another ship fromEarth coming, unarmed as we are, to run into the se devils when it's too lateto stop--"

The G.C. phone-snapped again: Commander Alstair! Observations reporting! The external hull temperature has gone up five degrees in the past threeminutes and is still climbing. Something's pouring heat into us at a terrificrate!"

Alstair turned to Jack. He said with icy politeness: "Gary, after allthe re's no use in our continuing to hate each othe r. Here is where we all dietogethe r. Why do I still feel inclined to kill you?"

But the question was rhetorical only. The reason was wholly clear. Atthe triply horrible news, Helen had begun to cry softly. And she had goneblindly into Jack's arms to do it.

The situation was, as a matter of fact, rather worse than the firstindications showed. The external hull temperature, for instance, was that ofthe generalizing the rmometer, which averaged for all the externalthe rmometers. A glance at the the rmometer bank, through a visiphoneconnection, showed the rearmost side of the Adastra at practically normal. Itwas the forward hemisphere, the side nearest Proxima Centauri, which washeating. And that hemisphere was not heating equally. The indicators whichflashed red lights were closely grouped.

Alstair regarded them with a stony calm in the visiplate.

"Squarely in the center of our disk, as they see it," he said icily. "Itwill be that fleet of space ships, of course."

Jack Gary said crisply: "Sir, the ship from which we took prisoners madecontact several hours earlier than we expected. It must be that, instead ofsending one vessel with a transmitter on board, they sent a fleet, and a scoutship on ahead. That scout ship has reported that we laid a trap for some ofher crew, and coilsequently they've opened fire!"

Alstair said sharply into a G.C. transmitter:

"Sector G90 is to be evacuated at once. It is to be sealed off immediately and all occupants will emerge from air locks. Adjoining sectorsare to be evacuated except by men on duty, and they will don space suitsimmediately."

He clicked off the phone and added calmly: "The external temperatureover part of G90 is four hundred degrees now. Dull-red heat. In five minutesit should melt. They'll have a hole bored right through us in half an hour."

Jack said urgently: "Sir! I'm pointing out that they've attacked becausethe scout ship reported we laid, a trap for some of its crew! We have just the ghost of a chance--"

"What?" demanded Aistair bitterly. "We've no weapons!"

"The dictawriter, sir!" snapped Jack. "We ean talk to them now!"

Alstair said harshly: "Very well, Gary. I appoint you ambassador. Goahead!"

He swung on his heel and went swiftly from the control room. A momentlater his voice came out of the G.C. phone: "Calling the Rocket Chief! Reportimmediately on personal visiphone. Emergency!"

His voice cut off, but Jack was not aware of it. He was plugging in to communications and demanding full power on the transmission beam and awidening of its arcs. He snapped one order after another and explained toHelen in swift asides.

She grasped the idea at once. The Centaurian in the biology laboratorywas bound, of course. No flicker of expression could be discovered about thenarrow slits which were his vision organs. But Helen-knowing the words of the vocabulary cards-spoke quietly and urgently into the dictawriter microphone. Hootlike noises came out of the speaker in their place, and the Centaurianstirred. Sounds came from him in turn, and the speaker said woodenly:

"I-speak-ship--planet. Yes."

And as the check-up came through from communications control, the eerie, stridulated, unconsonanted noises of his language filled the biologylaboratory and went out on the widened beam of themain transmitter.

Ten thousand miles away the Centaunan scout snip hovered. The Adastrabored on toward the ringed sun which had been the goal of mankind's mostdaring expedition. From ten thousand miles she would have seemed a mere dot, but the telescopes of the Centaurians would show her every detail. From athousand miles she would seem a toy, perhaps, intricately-crisscrossed withstrengthe ning members.

From a distance of a few miles only, though, her gigantic size could berealized fully. Five thousand feet in diameter, she dwarfed the hugest ofthose distant, unseen shapes in emptiness which made up a hostile fleet nowpouring deadly beams upon her.

From a distance of a few miles, too, the effect ,of that radiation couldbe seen. The Adastra's hull was alloy steel; tough and necessarily with a highhysteresis-rate. The alternating currents of electricity induced in that steelby the Centaurian radiation would have warmed even a copper hull. But the alloy steel grew hot. It changed color. It glowed faintly red over an area ahundred feet across.

A rocket tube in that area--abruptly ceased to emit its purple, lambentflame. It had been, cut off. Othe r rockets increased their power a trifle tomake up for it. The dull red glow of the steel increased. It became carmine.

Slowly, inexorably, it heated to a yellowish tinge. It became canary incolor. It tended toward blue.

Vapor curled upward from its surface, streaming away from the tortured, melting surface as if drawn by the distant sun. That vapor grew thick; dazzlingly bright; a veritable cloud of metallic steam. And suddlenly the rewas a violent eruption from the center of the Adastra's lighted hemisphere.

The outer hull was melted through. Air from the interior burst out into the void, flinging masses of molten, vaporizing metal before it. It spread with anincredible rapidity, flaring instantly into the attenuated, faintly glowingmist of a comet's tail.

The visiplate images inside the Adastra grew dim. Stars paled ahead. TheEarth ship had lost a part of her atmosphere and it fled on before her, writhing. Already it had spread into so vast a space that its density wasimmeasurable, but it was still so much more dense than the infinite emptinessof space that it filled all the cosmos before the Adastra with a thinningnebulosity.

And at the edges of the huge gap in the big ship's hull, the thick metalbubbled and steamed, and the interior partitions began to glow with an unholylight of dull-red heat, which swiftly went up to carmine and began to turnfaintly yellow.

In themain control room, Aistair watched bitterly until the visiplatesshowing the interior of section G90 fused. He spoke very calmly into themicrophone before him.

"We've got less time than I thought," he said deliberately. "You'll haveto hurry. It won't be sure at best, and you've got to remember that the se devils will undoubtedly puncture us from every direction and make sure the re'sabsolutely nothing living on board. You've got to work something out, and in ahurry, to do what I've outlined!"

A half-hysterical voice came back to him. "But sir, if I cut the sonicvibrations in the rockets we'll go up in a flare! A single instant! Thedisintegration of our fuel will spread to the tubes and the whole ship willsimply explode! It will be quick!"

"You fool!" snarled Alstair. "There's another ship from Earth on the way! Unwarned! And unarmed like we are! And from our course the se devils cantell where we came from! We're going to die, yes! We won't die pleasantly! Butwe're going to make sure the se fiends don't start out a space fleet for Earth! There's to be no euthanasia for us! We've got to make our dying do some good! We've got to protect humanity!"

Alstair's face, as he snarled into the visiplate, was not that of amartyr or a person making a noble self sacrifice. It was the face of a manoverawing and bullying a subordinate intoobedience.

With a beam of radiation playing on his ship which themetal-hullabsorbed and transformed into heat, Alstair raged at this department and that.

A second bulkhead went, and there was a second eruption of vaporized metal andincandescent gas from themonster vessel. Millions of miles away, a wide-flungring of egg-shaped space ships lay utterly motionless, giving no sign of lifeand looking like monsters asleep. But from them themerciless beams ofradiation sped out and focused upon one spot upon the Adastra's hull, and itspewed forth frothing metal and writhing gases and now and again some stillrecognizable object which flared and exploded as it emerged.

And within the innumerable compartments of themighty ship, human beingsreacted to their coming doom in manners as various as the persons themselves.

Some screamed. A few of themore sullen members of the crew seemed to go mad, to become homicidal maniacs. Still others broke into the stores and proceededsystematically but in some haste to drink themselves comatose. Some womenclutched their children and wept over them. And some of them went mad.

But Alstair's snarling, raging voice maintained a semblance of discipline in a few of the compartments. In a machine shop men workedsavagely, cursing, and making mistakes as they worked which made their workuseless. The lean air officer strode about his domain, a huge spanner in hisband, and smote with a righteous anger at any sign of panic. The rocket chief, puffing, manifested an unexpected genius for sustained profanity, and the rockets kept their pale purple flames out in space without a sign offlickering.

But in the biology laboratory the scene was one of quiet, intenseconcentration. Bound to helplessness, the Centaurian, featureless andinscrutable, filled the room with its peculiar form of speech. The dictawriterrustled softly, senselessly analyzing each of the sounds and senselesslyquesting for vocabulary cards which would translate them into Englishwordings. Now and again a single card did match up. Then themachinetranslated a smgle word of the Centaurlan's speech.

".....-ship..." A long series of sounds,' varying rapidly inpitch, in intensity, and in emphasis. "--men--" Another long series. "-talkmen--"

The Centaurian ceased to make its hootlike noises.

Then, very carefully, it emitted new ones. The speaker translated themall. The Centaurian had carefully selected words recorded with Helen.

"He understands what we're trying to do," said Helen, very pale.

The machine said: "You-talk-machine-talk--ship."

Jack said quietly into the transmitter: "We are friends. We have muchyou want. We want only friendship. We have killed none of your men except inself defense. We ask peace. If we do not have peace, we will fight. But we wish peace."

He said under his breath to Helen, as themachine rustled and the speaker hooted: "Bluff, that war talk. I hope it works!"

Silence. Millions of miles away, unseen space ships aimed a deadlyradiation in close, tight beams at themiddle of the Adastra's disk. Quaintlyenough, that radiation would have been utterly harmless to a man'sbody. Itwould have passed through, undetected. But the steel of the Earth ship's hullstopped and absorbed it as eddy currents. The eddy currents became heat. And asmall volcano vomited out into space the walls, the furnishing, the veryatmosphere of the Adastra through the hole that the heat had made.

It was very quiet indeed in the biology laboratory. The receptor wassilent. One minute. Two minutes.

Three. The radio waves carrying Jack's voice traveled at the speed oflight, but it took no less than ninety seconds for them to reach the source ofthe beams which were tearing the Adastra to pieces. And there was a time lossthe re, and ninety seconds more for other waves to hurtle through space at onehundred and eighty-six thousand miles each second with the reply.

The receptor hooted unmusically. The dictawriter rustled softly. Thenthe speaker said without expression: "We-friends-now-no-fight--ships--come-to-take-you-planet."

And simultaneously theminiature volcano on the Adastras hull lessenedthe violence of its eruption and slowly its molten, bubbling edges ceasedfirst to steam, and then to bubble, and from the blue-white of vaporizingsteel they cooled to yellow, and then to carmine, and more slowly to a dullred, and more slowly still to the glistening, infinitely white metallicsurface of steel which cools where there is no oxygen.

Jack said crisply into the control-room microphone: "Sir, I havecommunicated with the Centaurians and they have ceased fire. They say they aresending a fleet to take us to their planet."

"Very good," said Alstair's voice bitterly, "especially since nobodyseems able to make the one contrivance that would do some good after ourdeath. What next?"

"I think it would be a good idea to release the Centaurian here," saidJack. "We can watch him, of course, and paralyze him if he acts up. It wouldbe a diplomatic thing to do, I believe."

"You're ambassador," said Alstair sardonically. "We've got, time towork, now. But you'd better put somebody else on the ambassadorial work andget busy again on the job of sending a message back to Earth, if you think youcan adapt a transmitter to the type of wave they'll expect."

His image faded. And Jack turned to Helen He felt suddenly very tired.

"That is the , devil of it," he said drearily. "They'll expect a wavelike they sent us, and with no more power than we have, they'll hardly pick upanything else! But we picked up in themiddle of a message and just at the endof their description of the sending outfit they're using on Earth. Undoubtedlythe y'll describe it again, or rather they did describe it again, four yearsback, and we'll pick it up if we live long enough. But we can't even guesswhen that will be. You're going to keep on working with this-creature, building up a vocabulary?"

Helen regarded him anxiously. She put her hand upon his arm. "He'sintelligent enough," she said urgently. "I'll explain to him and let somebodyelse work with him. I'll come with you. After all, we-we may not have long tobe togethe r."

"Perhaps ten hours." said Jack tiredly.

He waited, somberly, while she explained in carefully chosen words-whichthe dictawriter translated-to the Centaurian. She got an assistant and twoguards. They released, the headless Thing. It offered no violence. Instead, itmanifested impatience to continue the work of building up in the translator files a vocabulary through which a complete exchange of ideas could takeplace.

Jack and Helen went togethe r to the communications room. They ran the Earth message, as received so far. It was an extraordinary hodgepodge. Fouryears back, Earth had been enthusiastic over the thought of sending word toits most daring adventurers. A flash of immaterial energy could traveltirelessly through uncountable millions of billions of miles of space andovertake the explorers who had started three years before. By its text, thismessage had been sent some time after the first message of all. In the sending, it had been broadcast all over the Earth, and many millions of peopleundoubtedly had thrilled to the thought that they heard words which would spanthe space between two suns.

But the words were not helpful to those on the Adastra. The message wasa "cheer-up" program, which began with lusty singing by a popular quartet, continued with wisecracks by Earth's most highly paid comedian-and his jokeswere all very familiar to those on the Adastra-and then a congratulatoryaddress by an eminent politician, and other drivel. In short, it was ahodgepodge of trash designed to gain publicty by means of the Earth broadcastfor those who took part in it.

It was not helpful to those on the Adastra, with the hull of the shippunctured, death before them, and probably desti1iction for the whole humanrace to follow as a consequence of their voyage.

Jack and Helen sat quietly and listened. Their hands claspedunconsciously. Rathe r queerly, the extreme brevity of the time before themmade extravagant expressions of affection seem absurd. They listened to the unspeakably vulgar message from Earth without really hearing it. Now and againthey looked at each othe r. In the biology laboratory the building up of avocabulary went on swiftly. Pictures came into play. A second Centaurian wasreleased, and by his skill in delineation-which proved that the eyes of the plant men functioned almost identically with those of Earth men-added both tothe store of definitions and equivalents and to knowledge of the Centauriancivilization.

Piecing the information togethe r, the civilization began to take on astrange resemblance to that of humanity. The Centaurians possessed artificialstructures which, were undoubtedly dwelling houses. They had cities, laws, arts-the drawing of the second Centaurian was proof of that-and sciences. Thescience of biology in particular was far advanced, taking to some extent the place of metallurgy in the civilization of men. Their structures were 'grown', not built. Instead of metals to shape to their own ends, they had forms ofprotoplasm whose rate and manner of growth they could control.

Houses, bridges, vehicles-even space ships-were formed of living matterwhich was thrown into a quiescent nonliving state when it had attained the form and size desired. And it could be caused to become active again at will, permitting such extraordinary features as the blisterlike connection that hadbeen made by the space ship with the hull of the Adastra.

So far, the Centaurian civilization was strange enough, but stillcomprehensible. Even men might have progressed in some such fashion hadcivilization developed on Earth from a different point of departure. It wasthe economics of the Centaurians which was at once understandable and horrifying to themen who learned of it.

The Centaurian race had developed from carnivorous plants, as men fromcarnivorous forebears. But at some early date in man's progression, the worship of gold began. No such diversion of interest occurred upon the planetsof Proxima Centauri. As men have devastated cities for gold, and have cut downforests and gutted mines and ruthlessly destroyed all things for gold or forother things which could be exchanged for gold, so the Centaurians had questedanimals.

As men exterminated the buffalo in America, to trade his hide for gold, so the Centaurians had ruthlessly exterminated the animal life of the irplanet. But to Centaurians, animal tissue itself was the equivalent of gold.

From sheer necessity, ages since, they had learned to tolerate vegetablefoodstuffs. But the insensate lust for flesh remained. They had developedmethods for preserving animal food for indefinite periods. They had dredgedthe ir seas for the last and smallest crustacean. And even space travel becamea desirable thing in their eyes, and then a fact, because telescopes showedthe m vegetation on other planets of their sun, and animal life as aprobability.

Three planets of Proxima Centauri were endowed with climates andatmospheres favorable to vegetation and animal life, but only on one planetnow, and that the smallest and most distant, did any trace of animal lifesurvive. And even there the Centaurians hunted feverishly for the last anddwindling colonies of tiny quadrupeds which burrowed hundreds of feet below afrozen continent.

It became clear that the Adastra was an argosy of such treasure-in the form of human beings-as no Centaurian could ever have imagined to exist. Andit became more than ever clear that a voyage to Earth would command all the resources of the race. Billions of human beings! Trillions of lesser animals! Uncountable Creatures in the seas! All the Centaurian race would go mad withe agerness to invade this kingdom of riches and ecstasy, the ecstasy felt byany Centaurian I when consuming the prehistoric foodstuff of his race.

Egg-shaped, featureless ships of space closed in from every side atonce. The the rmometer banks showed a deliberate, painstaking progression ofalarm signals. One dial glowed madly red and faded, and then anothe r, and yetanothe r, as the Centaurian ships took up themomentary impact of a radiationbeam on the Adastra's hull.

Twenty minutes after the last of the beams had proved the Adastra'shelplessness, an egglike ship approached the Earth vessel and with completeprecision made contact with its forward side above an air lock. Its hullbellied out in a great blister which adhered to the steel.

Alstair watched the visiplate which showed it, his face very white andhis hands clenched tightly. Jack Gary's voice, strained and hoarse, came fromthe biology-laboratory communicator.

"Sir, a message from the Centaurians. A ship has landed on our hull andits crew will enter through the air lock. A hostile move on our part, ofcourse, will mean instant destruction."

"There will be no resistance to the Centaurians," said Alstair harshly. "It is my order! It would be suicide!"

"Even so, sir," said Jack's voice savagely, "I still think it would be agood idea!"

"Stick to your duty!" rasped Aistair. "What progress has been made incommunication?"

"We have vocabulary cards for nearly five thousand words. We canconverse on nearly any subject, and all of them are unpleasant. The cards aregoing through a duplicator now and will be finished in a few minutes. A seconddictawriter with the second file will be sent you as soon as the cards arecomplete."

In a visiplate, Aistair saw the headless figures of Centaurians emergingfrom the entrance to an air lock in the Adastra's hull.

"Those Centaurians have entered the ship," he snapped as an order to

Jack. "You're communications officer! Go meet them and lead their commanding

officer here!"

"Check!" said Jack grimly.

It sounded like a sentence of death, that order. In the laboratory hewas very pale indeed. Helen pressed close to him.

The fomerly captive Centaurian hooted into the dictawriter, inquiringly. The speaker translated.

"What-command?"

Helen explained. So swiftly does humanity accustom itself to the incredible that it seemed almost natural to address a microphone and hear the hoots and stridulations of a nonhuman voice fill the room with her meaning.

"I-go--also--the y--no--kill--yet."

The Centaurian rolled on before. With an extraordinary dexterity, beopened the door. He had merely seen it opened. Jack took the lead. His sidearm force gun remained in its holster besIde him, but it was useless. He couldprobably kill the plant man behind him, but that would do no good.

Dim hootings ahead. The plant man made sounds-loud and piercing sounds. Answers came to him. Jack came in view of thenew group of invaders. Therewere twenty or thirty of them, every one armed with half-cylindrical objects, larger than the first creatures had carried.

At sight of Jack there was excitement. Eager trembling of the armliketentacles at either side of the headless trunks. There were instinctive, furtive movements in the direction of the weapons. A loud hooting as ofcommand. The Things were still. But Jack's flesh, crawled from the feeling ofsheer, carnivorous lust that seemed to emanate from them.

His guide, the former captive, exchanged incomprehensible noises withthe newcomers. Again a ripple of excitement in the ranks of the plant men.

"Come," said Jack curtly.

He led the way to themain control room. Once they heard someonescreaming monotonously. A woman cracked under the coming of doom. A hootingbabble broke the silence among the ungainly Things which followed Jack. Againan authoritative note silenced it.

The control room. Alstair looked like a man of stone, of marble, savethat his eyes burned with a fierce and almost maniacal flame. A visiplatebeside him showed a steady stream of Centaurians entering through a second airlock. There were hundreds of them, apparently. The dictawriter came in, underHelen's care. She cried out in instinctive horror at the sight of so many ofthe monstrous creatures at once in the control room.

"Set up the dictawriter," said Alstair in a voice so harsh, so brittlethat it seemed pure ice. Trembling, Helen essayed to obey. "I am ready totalk," said Alstair harshly into the dictawriter microphone.

The machine, rustling softly, translated. The leader of thenew partyhooted in reply. An order for all officers to report here at once, aftersetting all controls for automatic operation of the ship. There was somedifficulty with the translation of the Centaurian equivalent of "automatic." It was not in the vocabulary file. It took time.

Alstair gave the order. Cold sweat stood out upon his face, but hisself-control was iron.

A second order, also understood with a certain amount of difficulty. Copies of all technical records, and all-again it took time to understand-allbooks bearing on the construction of this ship were to be taken to the airlock by which the se plant men had entered. Samples of machinery, generators, and weapons to the same destination.

Again Alstair gave the order. His voice was brittle, was even thin, butit did not falter or break.

The Centaurian leader hooted an order over which the dictawriter rustled in vain. His followers swept swiftly to the doors of the control room. They

passed, out, leaving but four of their number behind. And Jack went swiftly toAlstair. His force gun snapped out and pressed deep into the commander'smiddle. The Centaurians made no movement of protest.

"Damn you!" said Jack, his voice thick with rage. "You've let them takethe ship! You plan to bargain for your life! Damn you, I'm going to kill youand fight my way to a rocket tube and send this ship up in a flare of cleanflame that'll kill the se devils with us!"

But Helen cried swiftly: "Jack! Don't! I know!" Like, an echo her words- because she was near the dictawriter microphone-were repeated in the hootingsounds of the Centaurian language. And Alstair, livid and near to madness, neverthe less said harshly in the lowest of tones: "You fool! These devils canreach Earth, now they know it's worth reaching! So even if they kill every manon the ship but the officers-and they may-we've got to navigate to the irplanet and land there." His voice dropped to a rasping whisper and he ragedalmost soundlessly: "And if you think I want to live through what's coming, shoot!"

Jack stood rigid for an instant. Then he stepped back. He saluted withan elaborate, mechanical precision.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he said unsteadily. "You can count on mehereafter."

One of the officers of the Adastra stumbled into the control room. Anothe r. Still anothe r. They trickled in. Six officers out of thirty.

A Centaurian entered with the curious rolling gait of his race. He wentimpatiently to the dictawriter and made noises.

"These-all--officers?" asked themachine tonelessly.

"The air officer shOt his family and himself," gasped a subaltern of the air department. "A bunch of Muts charged a rocket tube and the rocket chieffought them off. Then he bled to death from a knife in his throat. The storesofficer was--"

"Stop!" said Alstair in a thin,--high voice. He tore at his collar. Hewent to themicrophone and said thinly: "These are all the officers stillalive. But we can navigate the ship."

The Centaurian-he wore a wide band of leathe r about each of his arms and another about his middle-waddled to the G.C. phone. The tendrils at the end ofone arm maniplated the switch expertly. He emitted strange, formless sounds-and hell broke loose!

The visiplates all over the room emitted high-pitched, squealing sounds. They were horrible. They were ghastly. They were more terrible than the soundsof a wolf pack hard on the heels of a fear-mad deer. They were the sounds Jackhad heard when one of the first invaders of the Adastra saw a human being andkilled him instantly. And other sounds came out of the visiplates, too. Therewere human screams. There were even one or two explosions.

But then there was silence. The five Centaurians in the control room quivered and trembled. A desperate bloodlust filled them, the unreasoning, blind, instinctive craving which came of evolution from some race ofcarnivorous plants become capable of movement through the desperate need forfood.

The Centaurian with the leathe r ornaments went to the dictawriter again. He hooted in it:

"Want-two-men-go-from-ship-learn-from-the m-now." There was an infinitelytiny sound in themain control room. It was a drop of cold sweat, falling fromAlstair's face to the floor. He seemed to have shriveled. His face was an ashygray. His eyes were closed. But Jack looked steadily from one to the other ofthe surviving officers.

"That will mean vivisection, I suppose," he said harshly. "It's certainthey plan to visit Earth, else-intelligent as they are-they wouldn't havewiped out everybody but us. Even for treasure. They'll want to try out weapons

on a human body, and so on. Communications is about themost useless of all

the departments now, sir. I volunteer."

Helen gasped: "No, Jack! No!"

Aistair opened his eyes. "Gary has volunteered. One more man tovolunteer for vivisection." He said it in the choked voice of one holding tosanity by themost terrible of efforts. "They'll want to find out how to killmen. Their thirty-centimeter waves didn't work. They know the beams thatmelted our hull wouldn't kill men. I can't volunteer! I've got to stay withthe ship!" There was despair in his voice. "One more man to volunteer forthe se devils to kill slowly!"

Silence. The happenings of the past little while, and the knowledge ofwhat still went on within the Adastra's innumerable compartments, hadliterally stunned most of the six. They could not think. They were mentally dazed, emotionally paralyzed by the sheer horrors they had encountered.

Then Helen stumbled into Jack's arms. "I'm going, too!" she gasped. "We're-all going to die! I'm not needed! And I can-die with Jack."

Alstair groaned. "Please!"

"I'm-going!" she panted. "You can't stop me! With Jack! Whithe r thougoest--"

Then she choked. She pressed close. The Centaurian of the leathe r beltshooted impatiently into the dictawriter, "These-two-come."

Alstair said in a strange voice: "Wait!" Like an automaton, he moved tohix desk. He took up an clectropen. He wrote, his hands shaking. "I am mad," he said thinly. "We are all mad. I think we are dead and in hell. But take this."

Jack tucked the official order slip in his pocket. The Centaurian of the leathe r bands hooted impatiently. He led them, with his queer, rolling gait, toward the air lock by which the plant men had entered. Three times they wereseen by roving Things, which emitted that tnply horrible shrill squeal. Andeach time the CeDtaurian of the leathe r bands hooted authoritatively and the plant men withdrew.

Once, too, Jack saw four creatures swaying backward and forward aboutsomething on the floor. He reached out his hands and covered Helen's eyesuntil they were past. They came to the air lock. Their guide pointed

through it. The man and the girl obeyed. Long, rubbery tentacles seizedthe m and Helen gasped and was still. Jack fought fiercely, shouting her name. Then something struck him savagely. He collapsed.

He came back to consciousness with a feeling of tremendous weight uponhim. He stirred, and with his movement some of the oppression left him. Alight burned, not a light such as men know on Earth, but a writhing flarewhich beat restlessly at the confines of a transparent globe which containedit. There was a queer smell in the air, too, an animal smell. Jack sat up. Helen lay beside him, unconfined and apparently unhurt. None of the Centaurians seemed to be near.

He chafed her wrists helplessly. He heard a stuttering sound and withe ach of the throbs of noise felt a momentary acceleration. Rockets, fuelrockets.

"We're on one of their damned ships!" said Jack coldly. He felt for hisforce gun. It was gone.

Helen opened her eyes. She. stared vaguely about. Her eyes fell uponJack. She shuddered suddenly and pressed close to him.

"What-what happened?"

"We'll have to find out," replied Jack grimly.

The floor beneath his feet careened suddenly. Instinctively, he glancedat a porthole which until then he had only subconsciously noted. He gazed outinto the utterly familiar blackness of space, illuminated by very many tinypoints of light which were stars. He saw a ringed sun and points of light which were planets.

One of those points of light was very near: Its disk was perceptible, and polar snow caps, and themisty alternation of greenish areas which wouldbe continents with the indescribable tint which is ocean bottom when viewed from beyond a planet's atmosphere.

Silence. No hootings of that strange language without vowels orconsonants which the Centaurians used. No sound of any kind for a moment.

"We're heading for that planet, I suppose," said Jack quietly. "We'llhave to see if we can't manage to get ourselves killed before we land."

Then a murmur in the distance. It was a strange, muted murmur, innothing resembling the queer notes of the plant men. With Helen clinging tohim, Jack explored cautiously, out of the cubby-hole in which they hadawakened. Silence save for that distant murmur. No movement anywhere. Anothe rfaint stutter of the rockets, with a distinct accelerative movement of the whole ship. The animal smell grew stronger. They passed through a strangelyshaped opening and Helen cried out: "The animals!"

Heaped higgledy-piggledy were cages from the Adastra, little- compartments containing specimens of each of the animals which had been bredfrom for food, and which it had been planned to release if a planet suitablefor colonization revolved about Proxima Centauri. Farthe r on was an indescribable mass of books, machines, cases of all sorts-the materialsordered to be carried to the air lock by the leader of the plant men. Still nosign of any Centaurian.

But themuted murmur, quite incredibly sounding like a human voice, camefrom still farthe r ahead. Bewildered, now, Helen followed as Jack went stillcautiously toward the source of the sound.

They found it. It came from a bit of mechanism cased in with the samelusterless, dull brown stuff which composed the floor and walls and every partof the ship about them. And it was a human voice. More, it was Aistair's, racked and harsh and half hysterical.

"-you must have recovered consciousness by now, damnit, and the se devilswant some sign of it! They cut down your acceleration when I told them the rate they were using would keep you unconscious! Gary! Helen! Set off thatsignal!"

A pause. The voice again: "I'll tell it again. You're in a space shipthe se fiends I are guiding by a tight beam which handles the controls. You'regoing to be set down on one of the planets which once contained animal life. It's empty now, unoccupied except by plants. And you and the space ship'scargo of animals and books and so on are the reserved, special property of the high, archfiend of all the se devils. He had you sent in an outside-controlledship because none of his kind could be trusted with such treasure as you andthe other animals!

"You're a reserve of knowledge, to translate our books, explain ourscience, and so on. It's forbidden for any other space ship than his own toland on your planet. Now will you send that signal? It's a knob right abovethe speaker my voice is coming out of. Pull it three times, and they'll knowyou're all right and won't send another ship with, preservatives for yourflesh lest a priceless treasure go to waste!"

The tinny voice-Centaurian receptors were not designed to reproduce the elaborate phonetics of the human voice-laughed hysterically.

Jack reached up and pulled the knob, three times. Alstair's voice wenton: "This ship is hell, now. It isn't a ship any more, but a sort of brimstonepit. There are seven of us alive, and we're instructing Centaurians in the operation of the controls. But we've told them that we can't turn off the rockets to show their inner workings, because to be started they have to havea planet's mass near by, for deformation of space so the reaction can bestarted. They're keeping us alive until we've shown them that. They've got some method of writing, too, and they write down everything we say, when it's translated by a dictawriter. Very scientific--"

The voice broke off. "Your signal just came," it said an instant later.

"You'll find food somewhere about. The air ought to last you till youland. You've got four more days of travel. I'll call back later. Don't worryabout navigation. It's attended to,"

The voice died again, definitely.

The two of them, man and girl, explored the Centaurian space ship. Compared to the Adastra, it was miniature. A hundred feet long, or more, byperhaps sixty feet at its greatest diameter. They found cubbyholes in whichthere was now nothing at all, but which undoubtedly at times contained the plant men packed tightly.

These rooms could be refrigerated, and it was probable that at a lowtemperature the Centaurians reacted like vegetation on Earth in winter andpassed into a dormant, hibernating state. Such an arrangement would allow of an enormous crew being carried, to be revived for landing or battle.

"If. they refitted the A dastra for a trip back to Earth on that basis," said Jack grimly, "the y'd carry a hundred and fifty thousand Centaurians atleast. Probably more."

The thought of an assault upon mankind by the se creatures was anobsession. Jack was tormented by it. Womanlike, Helen tried to cheer him bythe ir own present safety.

"We volunteered for vivisection," she told him pitifully, the day afterthe ir recovery of consciousness, "and we're safe for a while, anyhow. Andwe've got each othe r--"

"It's time for Alstair to communicate again," said Jack harshly. It wasnearly thirty hours after the last signing off. Centaurian routine, like Earthdiscipline on terrestrial space ships, maintained a period equal to the planet's daily rotation as the unit of time. "We'd better go listen to him."

They did. And Aistair's racked voice came from the queerly shapedspeaker. It was more strained, less sane, than the day before. He told them ofthe progress of the Things in thenavigation of the Adastra. The six survivingofficers already were not needed to keep the ship's apparatus functioning. Theair-purifying apparatus in particular was shut off, since in clearing the airof carbon dioxide it tended to make the air unbreathable for the Centaurians.

The six men were now permitted to live that they might satisy the insatiable desire of the plant men for information. They lived a perpetualthird degree, with every resource of their brains demanded for record in the weird notation of their captors. The youngest of the six, a subaltern of the air department, went mad under the strain alike of memory and of anticipation. He screamed senselessly for hours, and was killed and his body promptlymumified by the strange, drying chemicals of the Centaurians. The rest wereliving shadows, starting at a sound.

"Our acceleration's been changed," said Alstair, his voice brittle. "You'll land just two days before we settle down, on the planet the se devilscall home. Queer they've no colonizing instinct. Another one of us is about tobreak, I think. They've taken away our shoes and belts now, by the way. They're leathe r. We'd take a gold band from about a watermelon, wouldn't we? Consistent, the se--"

And he raged once, in sudden hysteria: "I'm a fool! I sent you two offtogethe r while I'm living in hell! Gary, I order you to have nothing to dowith Helen! I order that the two of you shan't speak to each othe r! I orderthat-."

Another day passed. And anothe r. Alstair called twice more. Each time, by his voice, he was more desperate, more nerve-racked, closer to the boundsof madness. The second time he wept, the while he cursed Jack for being wherethere were none of the plant men.

"We're not interesting to the devils, now, except as animals. Our brainsdon't count They're gutting the ship systematically. Yesterday they got the earthworms from the growing area where we grew crops! There's a guard on eachof us now. Mine pulled out some of my hair this morning and ate it, rockingback and forth In ecstasy. We've no woolen shirts. They're animal!"

Another day still. Then Aistair was semihysterical. There were onlythree men left alive on the ship. He had instructions to give Jack in the landing of the egg-shaped vessel on the uninhabited world.

Jack was sup posed to help. His destination, was close now. The disk ofthe planet which was to be his and Helen's prison filled half the heavens. And the other planet toward which the Adastra was bound was a full-sized disk to Alstair.

Beyond the rings of Proxima Centauri there were six planets in all, andthe prison planet was next outward from the home of the plant men. It wascolder than was congenial to them, though for a thousand years their flesh- hunting expeditions had, searched its surface until not a mammal or a bird, nofish or even a crustacean was left upon it. Beyond it again an ice-coveredworld lay, and still beyond there were frozen shapes whirling in emptiness.

"You know, now, how to take over when the beam releases the atmosphericcontrols," said Alstair's voice. It wavered as if he spoke through teeth whichchattered from pure nerve strain. "You'll have quiet. Trees and flowers andsomething like grass, if the pictures they've made mean anything. We'rerunning into the greatest celebration in the history of all hell. Every spaceship called home. There won't be a Centaurian on the planet who won't have atiny shred of some sort of animal matter to consume. Enough to give him thatbeastly delight they feel when they, get hold of something of animal origin.

"Damn them! Every member of the race! We're the greatest store oftreasure ever dreamed of! They make no bones of talking before me, and I'm madenough to understand a good bit of what they say to each othe r.

Their most high panjandrum is planning bigger space ships than were evergrown before. He'll start out for Earth with three hundred space ships, andmost of the crews asleep or hibernating. There'll be three million devilsstraight from hell on those ships, and they've tbose damned beams that willfuse an earthly ship at ten million miles."

Talking helped to keep Aistair sane, apparently. The next day Jack's andHelen'g egg-shaped vessel dropped like a plummet from empty space into anatmosphere which screamed wildly past its smooth sides. Then Jack got the shipunder control and it descended slOwly and ever more slowly and at last came toa cushioned stop in a green glade hard by a forest of strange but whollyreassuring trees. It was close to sunset on this planet, and darkness fellbefore they could attempt exploration. They did little exploring, however, either thenext day or the day after. Alstair talked almost continuously.

"Another ship coming. from Earth," he said, and his voice cracked.

"Another ship! She started at least four years ago. She'll get here in fouryears more. You two may see her, but I'll be dead or mad by tomorrow night!

And here's the humorous thing! It seems to me that madness is nearest when Ithink of you, Helen, letting Jack--kiss you! I loved you, you know, Helen, when I was a man, before I became a corpse watching my ship being piloted intohell. I loved you very much. I was jealous, and when you looked at Gary withshining eyes I hated him. I still, hate him, Helen! All, how I hate him!" ButAlstair's voice was the voice of a ghost, now, a ghost in purgatory. "And I'vebeen a fool, giving him that order."

Jack walked about with abstracted,, burning eyes. Helen put her hands onhis shoulders and he spoke absently to her, his voice thick with hatred. Adesperate, passionate lust to kill Centaurians filled him. He began to huntamong themachines. He became absorbed, assembling a ten-kilowatt vortex gunfrom odd contrivances. He worked at it for many hours. Then he heard Helen at

work, somewhere. She seemed to be struggling. It disturbed him. He went tosee.

She had just dragged the last of the cages from the Adastra out into the open. She was releasing the little creatures within. Pigeons soared eagerlyabove her. Rabbits, hardly hopping out of her reach, munched delightedly uponthe unfamiliar but satisfactory leafed vegetation underfoot.

She browsed. There were six of them besides a tiny, wabbly-legged lamb. Chickens pecked and scratched. But there were no insects on this world. Theywould find only seeds and green stuff. Four puppies rolled ecstatically onscratchy green things in the sunlight.

"Anyhow," said Helen defiantly. "They can be happy for a while! They'renot like us! We have to worry! And this world could be a paradise for humans!"

Jack looked somberly out across the green and beautiful world. Nonoxious animals. No harmful insects. There could be no diseases on this planet, unless men introduced them of set purpose. It would be a paradise.

The murmur of a human voice came from within the space ship. He wentbitterly to listen. Helen came after him. They stood in the strangely shapedcubby-hole which was the control room. Walls, floors, ceiling, instrument cases- all were made of the lusterless dark brown stuff which had grown intothe shapes, the Centaurians desired. Aistair's voice was strangely more calm, less hysterical, wholly steady.

"I hope you're not off exploring somewhere, Helen and Gary," it saidfrom the speaker. "They've had a celebration here today. The Adastra's landed. I landed it. I'm the only man left alive. We came down in the center of a cityof the se devils, in themiddle of buildings fit to form the headquarters ofhell. The high panjandrum has a sort of palace right next to the open spacewhere I am now.

"And today they celebrated. It's strange how much animal matter the rewas on the Adastra. They even found horsehair stiffening in the coats of ouruniforms. Woolen blankets. Shoes. Even some of the soaps had an animal origin, and they 'refined' it. They can recover any scrap of animal matter as cleverlyas our chemists can recover gold and radium. Queer, eh?"

The speaker was silent a moment.

"I'm sane now," the voice said steadily. "I think I was mad for a while. But what I saw today cleared my brain. I saw millions of the se devils dippingthe ir arms into great tanks, great troughs, in which solutions of all the animal tissues from the Adastra were dissolved. The high panjandrum keptplenty for himself! I saw the things they carried into his palace, throughlines of guards. Some of those things had been my friends. I saw a city crazywith beastly joy, the devils swaying back and forth in ecstasy as theyabsorbed the loot from Earth. I heard the high panjandrum hoot a sort ofimperial address from the throne. And I've learned to understand quite a lotOf those hootings.

"He was telling them that Earth is packed with animals. Men. Beasts. Birds, Fish in the oceans. And he told them that the greatest space fleet inhistory will soon be grown, which will use the propulsion methods of men, ourrockets, Gary, and the first fleet will carry uncountable swarms of them tooccupy Earth. They'll send back treasure, too, so that every one of hissubjects will have such ecstasy, frequently, as they had today. And the devils, swaying crazily back and forth, gave out that squealing noise ofthe irs. Millions of them at once."

Jack groaned softly. Helen covered her eyes as if to shut out the sighthe r imagination pictured.

"Now, here's the situation from your standpoint," said Alstair steadily, millions of miles away and the only human being upon a planet of blood-lustingplant men. "They're coming here now, their scientists, to have me show themthe inside workings of the rockets. Some others will come over to question you two tomorrow. But I'm going to show the se devils our rockets. I'm sure-perfectly-sure-that every space ship of the race is back on this planet.

"They came to share the celebration when every, one of them got as afree gift from the grand panjandrum as much animal tissue as he could hope toacquire in a lifetime of toil. Flesh is a good bit more precious than gold, here. It rates, on a comparative scale, somewhere between platinum and radium. So they all came home. Every one of them! And the re's a space ship on the wayhere from Earth. It'll arrive in four years more. Remember that!"

An impatient, distant hooting came from the speaker.

"They're here," said Alstair steadily. "I'm going to show them the rockets. Maybe you'll see the fun. It depends on the time of day where youare. But remember, the re's a sister ship to the Adastra on the way! And Gary, that order I gave you last thing was the act of a madman, but I'm glad I didit. Good-by, you two!"

Small hooting sounds, growing fainter, came from the speaker. Far, faraway, amid the city of fiends, Alstair was going with the plant men to showthe m the rockets' inner workings. They wished to understand every aspect ofthe big ship's propulsion, so that they could build--or grow-ships as largeand carry multittides of their swarming mytiads to a solar system whereanimals were to be found.

"Let's go outside," said Jack harshly. "He said he'd do it, since hecouldn't get a bit of a machine made that could be depended on to do it. But Ibelieved he'd go mad. It didn't seem possible to live to their planet. We'llgo outside and look at the sky."

Helen stumbled. They stood upon the green grass,

looking up at the firmament above them. They waited, staring. And Jack'smind pictured the great rocket chambers of the Adastra. He seemed to see the strange procession enter it; a horde of the ghastly plant men and thenAlstair, his face like marble and his hands as steady.

He'd open up the breech of one of the rockets. He'd explain the disintegration field, which collapses the electrons of hydrogen so that itrises in atomic weight to helium, and the helium to lithium, while the oxygenof the water is split literally into neutronium and pure force. Alstair wouldanswer hooted questions. The supersonic generators he would explain ascontrols of force and direction. He would not speak of the fact that, only thematerial of the rocket tubes, when ifiled with exactly the frequency thosegenerators produced, could withstand the effect of the disintegration field.

He would not explain that a tube started without those generators inaction would catch from the fuel and disintegrate, and that any othe rsubstance save one, under any other condition save that one rate of vibration, would catch also and, that tubes, ship, and planet alike would vanish in alambent purple flame.

No; Alstair would not explain that. He would show the Centaurians how tostart the Caldwell field.

The man and the girl looked at the sky. And suddenly there was a fiercepurple light. It dwarfed the reddish tinge of the ringed sun overhead. For onesecond, for two, for three, the purple light persisted. There was no sound. There was a momentary blast of intolerable heat. Then all was as before.

The ringed sun shOne brightly. Clouds like those of Earth floatedserenely in a sky but a little less blue than that of home. The small animalsfrom the Adastra munched contentedly at the leafy stuff underfoot. The pigeonssoared joyously, exercising their wings in full freedom.

"He did it," said Jack. "And every space ship was home. There aren't anymore plant men. There's nothing left of their planet, their civilization, orthe ir plans to harm our Earth."

Even out in space, there was nothing where the planet of the Centaurianshad been. Not even steam or cooling gases. It was gone as if it had never existed. And theman and woman of Earth stood upon a pianet which could be aparadise for human beings, and another ship was coming presently, with more ofthe ir kin.

"He did it!" repeated Jack quietly. "Rest his soul! And we-we can thinkof living, now, instead of death."

The grimpess of his face relaxed slowly. He looked down at Helen. Gently, he put his arm about her shoulders. She pressed close, gladly, thrusting away all thoughts. of what had been. Presently she asked softly: "What, was that last order Alstair gate you?"

"I never looked," said Jack.

He fumbled in his pocket. Pocketworn and frayed, the order slip cameout. He read it and showed it to Helen. By statutes passed before the Adastraleft Earth, laws and law enforcement on the artificial planet were intrustedto the huge ship's commander. It had been specially--provided that a legalmarriage on the Adastra would be constituted by an official order of marriagesigned by the commander. And the slip handed to Jack by Alstair, as Jack wentto what he'd thought would be au agonizing death, was such an order. It was, in effect, a marriage certificate.

They smiled at each othe r, those two.

"It-wouldn't have mattered," said Helen uncertainly. "I love you. ButI'm glad!"

One of the freed pigeons found a straw upon the ground. He tugged at it. His mate inspected it solemnly. They made pigeon noises to each othe r. Theyflew away with the straw. After due discussion, they had decided that it wasan eminently suitable straw with which to begin the building of a nest.

The Fourth-dimensional Demonstrator

PETE DAVIDSON WAS engaged to Miss Daisy Manners of the Green Paradise floorshow. He had just inherited all the properties of an uncle who had been anauthority on the fourth dimension, and he was the custodian of an unusuallyamiable kangaroo named Arthur. But still he was not happy; it showed thismorning.

Inside his uncle's laboratory, Pete scribbled on paper. He added, andran his hands through his hair in desperation. Then he subtracted, divided, and multiplied. But the results were invariably problems as incapable ofsolution as his deceased relative's fourth-dimensional equations. From time totime.a long, horselike, hopeful face peered in at him. That was Thomas, hisuncle's servant, whom Pete was afraid he had also inherited.

"Beg pardon, sir," said Thomas tentatively.

Pete leaned harassedly back in his chair.

"What is it, Thomas? What has Arthur been doing now?"

"He is browsing in the dahlias, sir. I wished to ask about lunch, sir. What shall I prepare?"

"Anything!" said Pete. "Anything at all! No. On second thought, tryingto untangle Uncle Robert's affairs calls for brains. Give me something rich inphosphorus and vitamins; I need them."

"Yes, sir," said Thomas. "But the grocer, sir--"

"Again?" demanded Pete hopelessly.

"Yes, sir," said Thomas, coming into the laboratory. "I hoped, sir, thatmatters might be looking better."

Pete shook his head, regarding his calculations depressedly.

"They aren't. Cash to pay the grocer's bill is still a dim and mistyhope. It is horrible, Thomas! I remembered my uncle as simply reeking withcash, and I thought the fourth dimension was mathematics, not debauchery. But

Uncle, Robert must have had positive orgies with quanta and space-time continua! I shan't break even on the heir business, let alone make a profit!"

Thomas made a noise suggesting sympathy.

"I could stand it for myself alone," said Pete gloomily. "Even Arthur, in his simple kangaroo's heart, bears up well. But Daisy! There's the rub! Daisy!"

"Daisy, sir?"

"My fiancee," said Pete. "She's in the Green Paradise floor show. She istechnically Arthur's owner. I told Daisy, Thomas, that I had inherited afortune. And she's going to be disappointed."

"Too bad, sir," said Thomas.

"That statement is one of humorous underemphasis, Thomas. Daisy is not aperson to take disappointments lightly. When I explain that my uncle's fortunehas flown off into the fourth dimension, Daisy is going to look absent-mindedand stop listening. Did you ever try to make love to a girl who looked absentminded?" "No, sir," said Thomas. "But about lunch, sir--"

"We'll have to pay for it. Damn!" Pete said morbidly. "I've just fortycents in my clothe s, Thomas, and Arthur at least mustn't be allowed to starve. Daisy wouldn't like it. Let's see!"

He moved away from the desk and surveyed the laboratory with a predatoryair. It was not exactly a homy place. There was a skeltonlike thing of ironrods, some four feet high. Thomas had said it was a tesseract-a model of acube existing in four dimensions instead of three.

To Pete, it looked rather like a medieval instrument of torture-something to be used in the ological argument with a heretic. Pete could notimagine anybody but his uncle wanting it. There were other pieces of apparatusof all sizes, but largely dismantled. They looked like the product of someoneputting vast amounts of money and patience into an effort to do somethingwhich would be unsatisfactory when accomplished.

"There's nothing here to pawn," said Pete depressedly. "Not evenanything I could use for a hand organ, with Arthur substituting for themonk!"

"There's the demonstrator, sir," said Thomas hopefully. "Your unclefinished it, sir, and it worked, and he had a stroke, sir."

"Cheerful!" said Pete. "What is this demonstrator? What's it supposed todo?"

"Why, sir, it demonstrates the fourth dimension," said Thomas. "It'syour uncle's life work, sir."

"Then let's take a look at it," said Pete. "Maybe we can supportourselves demonstrating the fourth dimension in shop windows for advertisingpurposes. But Idon't think Daisy will care for the career."

Thomas marched solemnly to a curtain just behind the desk. Pete hadthought it hid a cupboard. He slid The cover back and displayed a hugecontrivance which seemed to have the solitary virtue of completion. Pete couldsee a monstrous brass horseshoe all of seven feet high. It was apparentlyhollow and full of cryptic cogs and wheels. Beneath it there was a circularplate of inch-thick glass which seemed to be designed to revolve. Below that, in turn, there was a massive base to which ran certain copper tubes from arefrigerating unit out of an ice box.

Thomas turned on a switch and the unit began to purr. Pete watched.

"Your uncle talked to himself quite a bit about this, sir," said Thomas. "I gathe red that it's quite a scientific triumph, sir You see, sir, the fourthdimension is time"

"I'm glad to hear it explained so simply," said Pete.

"Yes, sir. As I understand it, sir, if one were motoring and saw apretty girl about to step on a banana pee1, sir, and if one wished to tip heroff, so to speak, but didn't quite realize for-say, two minutes, until one had

gone en half a mile--"

"The pretty girl would have stepped on the banana peel and nature wouldhave taken its course," said Pete.

"Except for this demonstrator, sir. You see, to tip off theyoung ladyone would have to retrace the half mile and the time too, sir, or one would betoo late. That is, one would have to go back next only the half mile but the two minutes. And so your uncle, sir, built this demonstrator--"

"So he could cope with such a situation when it arose," finished Pete. "I see! But I'm afraid it won't settle our financial troubles."

The refrigeration unit ceased to purr. Thomas solemnly struck a safetymatch.

"If I may finish the demonstration, sir," he said hopefully. "I blow outthis match, and put it on the glass plate between the ends of the horseshoe. The temperature's right, so it should work."

There were self-satisfied clucking sounds from the base of themachine. They went on for seconds. The huge glass plate suddenly revolved perhaps the eighth of a revolution. A humming noise began. It stopped. Suddenly there wasanother burnt safety match on the glass plate. The machine began to clucktriumphantly.

"You see, sir?" said Thomas. "It's produced another burnt match. Draggedit forward out of the past, sir. There was a burned match at that spot, untilthe glass plate moved a few seconds ago. Like the girl and the banana peel, sir. The machine went back to the place where thematch had been, and then itwent back in time to where thematch was, and then it brought it forward."

The plate turned another eighth of a revolution. The machine clucked andhummed. The humming stopped. There was a third burnt match on the glass plate. The clucking clatter began once more.

"It will keep that up indefinitely, sir," said Thomas hopefully.

"I begin, said Pete, "to see the true greatness of modern science. Withonly two tons of brass and steel, and at a cost of only a couple of hundredthousand dollars and a lifetime of effort, my Uncle Robert has left me amachine which will keep me supplied with burnt matches for years to come! Thomas, this machine is a scientific triumph!"

Thomas beamed.

"Splendid, sir! I'm glad you approve. And what shall I do about lunch, sir?"

The machine, having clucked and hummed appropriately, now produced afourth burnt match and clucked more triumphantly still. It prepared to reachagain into the hithe rto unreachable past.

Pete looked reproachfully at the servant he had apparently inherited... He reached in his pocket and drew out his forty cents. Then themachinehummed. Pete jerked his head and stared at it.

"Speaking of science, now," he said an instant later. "I have a very commercial thought. I blush to contemplate it." He looked at themonstrous, clucking demonstrator of the fourth dimension. "Clear out of here for tenminutes, Thomas. I'm going to be busy!"

Thomas vanished. Pete turned off the demonstrator. He risked a nickel, placing it firmly on the inch-thick glasi plate. The machine went on again. Itclucked, bummed, ceased to hum-and there were two nickels. Pete added a dimeto the second nickel. At the end of another cycle he ran his hand rathe rdesperately through his hair and added his entire remaining wealth-a quarter. Then, after incredulously watching what happened, he began to pyramid.

Thomas tapped decorously some ten minutes later. "Beg pardon, sir," hesaid hopefully. "About lunch,-sir--"

Pete turned off the demonstrator. He gulped.

"Thomas," he said in careful calm, "I shall let you, write themenu forlunch. Take a basketful of this small change and go shopping. And-Thomas, have

you any item of currency larger than a quarter? A fifty-cent piece would beabout right. I'd like to have something really impressive to show to Daisywhen she comes."

Miss Daisy Manners of the Green Paradise floor show was just the personto accept the fourthdimensional demonstrator without question and to make fulluse of the results of modern scientific research. She greeted Peteabstractedly and uninterestedly asked just how much he'd inherited. And Petetook her to the laboratory. He unveiled the demonstrator.

"These are my jewels," said Pete impressively. "Darling, it's going tobe a shock, but-have you got a quarter?"

"You've got nerve, asking me for money," said Daisy. "And if you liedabout inheriting some money.--"

Pete smiled tenderly upon her. He produced a quarter of his own.

"Watch, my dear! I'm doing this for you!"

He turned on the demonstrator and explained complacently as the firstcluckings came from the base. The glass plate moved, a second quarterappeared, and Pete pyramided the two while he continued to explain. In the fraction of a minute, there were four quarters. Again Pete pyramided. Therewere eight quarters-sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four, one hundred twenty-eight-- At this point the stack collapsed and Pete shut off the switch.

"You see, my dear? Out of the fourth dimension to you! Uncle inventedit, I inherited it, and-shall I change your money for you?"

Daisy did not look at all absent-minded now. Pete gave her a neat littlesheaf of bank notes.

"Aud from now on, darling," he said cheerfully, "whenever you want moneyjust come in here, start themachine-and there you are! Isn't that nice?"

"I want some more money now," said Daisy. "I have to buy a trousseau."

"I hoped you'd feel that way!" said Pete enthusiastically. "Here goes! And we have a reunion while the pennies roll in."

The demonstrator began to cluck and clatter with bills instead ofquarters on the plate. Once, to be sure, it suspended all operations and the refrigeration unit purred busily for a time. Then it resumed its self- satisfied delving into the immediate past.

"I haven't been making any definite plans," explained Peie, "until Italked to you. Just getting things in line. But I've looked after Arthurcarefully. You know bow he loves cigarettes. He eats them, and though it maybe eccentric in a kangaroo, they seem to agree with him. I've used the demonstrator to lay up a huge supply of cigarettes for him-his favorite brand, too. And I've' been trying to build up a bank account. I thought it would seemstrange if we bought a house on Park Avenue and just casually offered atrunkful of bank notes in payment. It might look as if we'd been running asnatch racket."

"Stupid!" said Daisy.

"What?"

"You could be pyramiding those bills like you did quarters," said Daisy. "Then the re'd be lots more them!"

"Darling," said Pete fondly, "does it matter bol much you have when Ihave so much?"

"Yes," said Daisy. "You might get angry with me.

"Never!" protested Pete. Then he added reminiscently, "Before wethought of the banknote idea, Thomas and I filled up the coal bin withquarters and half dollars. They're still there."

"Gold pieces would be nice," suggested Daisy, thinking hard, "if youcould get hold of some. Maybe we could."

"Ah!" said Pete. "But Thomas had a gold filling in one tooth. We took it

out and ran it up to half a pound or so. Then we melted that into a littlebrick and put it on the demonstrator. Darling, you'd really be surprised ifyou looked in the woodshed."

"And the re's jewelry," said Daisy. "It would be fast still!"

"If you feel in themood for jewelry," said Pete tenderly, "just look inthe vegetable bin. We'd about run out of storage space when the idea occurredto us."

"I think," said Daisy enthusiastically, "we'd better get married rightaway. Don't you?"

"Sure! Let's go and do it now! I'll get the car around!"

"Do, darling," said Daisy. "I'll watch the demonstrator."

Beaming, Pete kissed her ecstatically and rushed from the laboratory. Herang for Thomas, and rang again. It was not until the third ring that Thomasappeared. And Thomas was very pale. He said agitatedly:

"Beg pardon, sir, but shall I pack your bag?"

"I'm going to be--Pack my bag? What for?"

"We're going to be arrested, sir," said Thomas. He gulped. "I thoughtyou might want it, sir. An acquaintance in the village, sir, believes we areamong the lower-numbered public enemies, sir, and respects us accordingly. Hetelephoned me thenews."

"Thomas, have you been drinking?"

"No, sir," said Thomas pallidly. "Not yet, sir. But it is a splendidsuggestion, thank you, sir." Then he said desperately: "It's themoney, sir--the bank notes. If you recall, we never changed but one lot of silver intonotes, sir. We got a one, a five, a ten and so on, sir."

"Of course," said Pete. "That was all we needed. Why not?" "It's the serial number, sir! All the one-dollar bills the demonstratorturned out have the same serial number-and all the fives and tens and the rest, sir. Some person with a hobby for looking for kidnap bills, sir, foundhe had several with the same number. The secret service has traced them back. They're coming for us, sir. The penalty for counterfeiting is twenty years, sir. My-my friend in the village asked if we intended to shoot it out withthe m, sir, because if so he'd like to watch."

Thomas wrung his hands. Pete stared at him.

"Come to think of it," he said meditatively, "they are counterfeits. Ithadn't occurred to me before. We'll have to plead guilty, Thomas. And perhapsDaisy won't want to marry me if I'm going to prison. I'll go tell her thenews."

Then he started. He heard Daisy's voice, speaking very angrily. Aninstant later the sound grew louder. It became a continuous, shrill, sopranobabble. It grew louder yet. Pete ran.

He burst into the laboratory and was stunned. The demonstrator was stillrunning. Daisy had seen him piling up the bills as they were turned out, pyramiding to make thenext pile larger. She had evidently essayed the samefeat. But the pile was a bit unwieldy, now, and Daisy had climbed on the glassplate. She had come into the scope of the demonstrator's action.

There were three of her in the laboratory when Pete first entered. As hefroze in horror, the three became four. The demonstrator clucked and hummedwhat was almost a hoot of triumph. Then it produced a fifth Daisy. Pete dashedfrantically forward and turned off the switch just too late to prevent the appearance of a sixth copy of Miss Daisy Manners of the Green Paradise floorshow. She made a splendid sister act, but Pete gazed in paralyzed horror atthis plethora of his heart's desire.

Because all of Daisy was identical, with not only the same exterior and- so to speak-the same serial number, but with the same opinions andconvictions. And all six of Daisy were convinced that they, individually, owned the heap of bank notes now on the glass plate. All six of her were

trying to get it. And Daisy was quarreling furiously with herself. She wastelling herself what she thought of herself, in fact, and on the whole heropinion was not flattering.

Arthur, like Daisy, possessed a fortunate disposition. He was not one ofthose kangaroos who go around looking for things to be upset about. He browsedpeacefully upon the lawn, eating up the dahlias and now and again hopping overthe six-foot hedge in hopes that there might be a dog come along the lane tobark at him. Or, failing to see a dog, that somebody might have come by whowould drop a cigarette butt that he might salvage.

At his first coming to this place, both pleasing events had beenfrequent. The average unwarned passer-by, on seeing a five-foot kangaroosoaring toward him in this part of the world, did have a tendency to throwdown everything and run. Sometimes, among the things he threw down was acigarette.

There had been a good supply of dogs, too, but they didn't seem to careto play with Arthur any more. Arthur's idea of playfulness with a strange dog--especially one that barked at him-was to grab him with both front paws andthe n kick the living daylights out of him.

Arthur browsed, and was somewhat bored. Because of his boredom he waslikely to take a hand in almost anything that turned up. There was a riotgoing on in the laboratory, but Arthur did not care for family quarrels. Hewas interested, however, in the government officers' when they arrived. Therewere two of them and they came in a roadster. They stopped at the gate andmarched truculently up to the front door.

Arthur came hopping around from the back just as they knockedthunderously. He'd been back there digging up a few incipient cabbages of Thomas' planting, to see why they didn't grow faster. He soared at least aneasy thirty feet, and propped himself on his tail to look interestedly at the visitors.

"M-my heavens!" said the short, squat officer. He had been smoking acigarette. He threw it down and grabbed his gun.

That was his mistake. Arthur liked cigarettes. This one was a merefifteen feet from him. He soared toward it.

The government maii squawked, seeing Arthur in mid-air and headingstraight for him. Arthur looked rather alarming, just then. The officer firedrecklessly, missing Arthur. And Arthur remained calm. To him, the shots werenot threats. They were merely thenoises made by an automobile whosecarburetor needed adjustment. He landed blandly, almost on the officer's toes- and the officer attacked him hysterically with fist and clubbed gun.

Arthur was an amiable kangaroo, but he resented the attack, actively.

The short, squat officer squawked again as Arthur grabbed him with hisforepaws. His companion backed against the door, prepared to sell his lifedearly. But then-and the two things happened at once-wbile Arthur proceeded tokick the living daylights out of the short, squat officer, Thomas resignedlyopened the door behind the other and he fell backward suddenly and knockedhimself cold against the doorstop.

Some fifteen minutes later the short, squat officer said gloomily: "Itwas a bum steer. Thanks for pulling that critter off me, and Casey's muchobliged for the drinks. But we're hunting a bunch of counterfeiters that havebeen turning out damn good phony bills. The line led straight to you. But ifit had been you, you'd have shot us. You didn't. So we got to dO the work allover."

"I'm afraid," admitted Pete, "the trail would lead right back. Perhaps, as government officials, you can do something about the fourth-dimensionaldemonstrator. That's the guilty party. I'll show you."

He led the way to the laboratory. Arthur appeared, looking vengeful. The

two officers looked apprehensive.

"Better give him a cigarette," said Pete. "He eats them. Then he'll beyour friend for life."

"Hell, no!" said the short, squat man. "You keep between him and me! Maybe Casey'll want to get friendly."

"No cigarettes," said Casey apprehensively. "Would a cigar do?"

"Rathe r heavy, for so early in themorning," considered Pete, "but youmight try."

Arthur soared. He landed within two feet of Casey. Casey thrust a cigarat him. Arthur sniffed at it and accepted it. He put one end in--his mouth andbit off the tip.

"There!" said Pete cheerfully. "He likes it. Come on!

They moved on to the laboratory. They entered--and tumult engulfed them. The demonstrator was running and Thomas-pale and despairing-supervised itsaction. The demonstrator was turning out currency by what was, approximately, wheelbarrow loads. As each load materialized from the fourth dimension, Thomasgathe red it up and handed it to Daisy, who in the ory was standing in line toreceive it in equitable division. But Daisy was having a furious quarrel amongherself, because some one or other of her had tried to cheat.

"These," said Pete calmly, "are my fiancee."

But the short, squat man saw loads of greenbacks appearing from nowhere. He drew out a short, squat revolver.

"You got a press turning out the stuff behind that wall, huh?" he saidshrewdly. "I'll take a look!"

He thrust forward masterfully. He pushed Thomas aside and mounted the inch-thick glass plate. Pete reached, horrified, for the switch. But it -wastoo late. The glass plate revolved one-eighth of a revolution. Thedemonstrator hummed gleefully; and the officer appeared in duplicate just asPete's nerveless fingers cut off everything.

Both of the officers looked at each other in flat, incredulousstupefaction. Casey stared, and the hair rose from his head. Then Arthur put afront paw tentatively upon Casey's shoulder. Arthur had liked the cigar. Thedoor to the laboratory had been left open. He had come in to ask for anothe rcigar. But Casey was hopelessly unnerved. He yelled and fled, imagining Arthurin hot pursuit. He crashed into themodel of a tesseract and entangled himselfhopelessly.

Arthur was an amiable kangaroo, but he was sensitive. Casey's squeal ofhorror upset him. He leaped blindly, knocking Pete over on the switch andturning it on, and landing between the two stupefied copies of the othe rofficer. They, sharing memories of Arthur, moved in panic just before the glass plate turned.

Arthur bounced down again at the demonstrator's hoot. The nearest copyof the short, squat man made a long, graceful leap and went flying out of the door. Pete struggled with the othe r, who waved his gun and demandedexplanations, growing hoarse from his earnestness.

Pete attempted to explain in terms of pretty girls stepping on bananapeels, but it struck the officer as irrelevant. He shouted hoarsely whileanother Arthur hopped down from the glass plate-while a third, and fourth, andfifth, and sixth, and seventh Arthur appeared on the scene.

He barked at Pete until screams from practically all of Daisy made himturn to see the laboratory overflowIng with five-foot Arthurs, all verypleasantly astonished and anxious to make friends with himself so he couldplay.

Arthur was the only person who really approved the course events hadtaken. He had existed largely in his own society. But now his own company wasnumerous. From a solitary kangaroo, in fact, Arthur had become a good-sizedherd. And in his happy excitement over the fact, Arthur forgot all decorum and

began to play an hysterical form of disorganized leapfrog all about the laboratory.

The officer went down and became a take-off spot for the game. Daisyshrieked furiously. And Arthur--all of him-chose new points of vantage for hisleaps until one of him chose the driving motor of the demonstrator. Thatindustrioua mechanism emitted bright sparks and bit him. And Arthur soared interror through the window, followed by all the rest of himself, who stillthought it part of the game.

In seconds, the laboratory was empty of Arthurs. But the demonstratorwas making weird, pained noises. Casey remained entangled in the bars of the tesseract, through which he gazed with much the expression of an inmate of apadded cell. Only one of the short, squat officers remained in the building. He had no breath left. And Daisy was too angry to make a sound-all six of her. Pete alone was sanely calm.

"Well," he said philosophically, "things seem to have settled down abit. But something's happened to the demonstrator."

"I'm sorry, sir," said Thomas, pallidly, "I'm no hand at machinery."

One of Daisy said angrily to another of Daisy:

"You've got a nerve! That money on the plate is mine!"

Both advanced. Three more, protesting indignantly, joined in the rush. The sixth-and it seemed to Pete that she must have been the original Daisy- hastily began to sneak what she could frqm the several piles accumulated bythe others.

Meanwhile, the demonstrator made queer noises. And Pete despairinglyinvestigated. He found where Arthur's leap had disarranged a handle whichevidently controlled themotor speed of the demonstrator. At random, he pushedthe handle. The demonstrator clucked relievedly. Then Pete realized in sickterror that five of Daisy were on the glass plate. He tried to turn it off- but it was too late.

He closed his eyes, struggling to retain calmness, but admittingdespair. He had been extremely fond of one Daisy. But six Daisies had been toomuch. Now, looking forward to eleven and-

A harsh voice grated in his ear.

"Huh! That's, where you keep the press and the queer, huh-and trickmirrors so I see double? I'm going through that trapdoor where those girlswent! And if the re's any funny business on the other side, somebody getshurt!"

The extra officer stepped up on the glass plate, inexplicably empty now. The demonstrator clucked. It hummed. The plate moved-backward! The officervanished-at once, utterly. As he had come out of the past, he returned to it, intrepidly and equally by accident. Because one of Arthur had kicked the drivelever into neutral, and Pete had inadvertently shoved it into reverse. He sawthe officer vanish and he knew where the supernumerary Daisies had gone-alsowhere all embarrassing bank notes would go. He sighed in relief.

But Casey-untangled from the tesseract-was not relieved. He tore loosefrom Thomas's helpful fingers and fled to the car. There he found hiscompanion, staring at nineteen Arthurs playing leapfrog over the garage. Afterexplanations they would be more upset still. Pete saw the roadster drive away, wabbling.

"I don't think they'll come back, sir," said Thomas hopefully.

"Neither do I," said Pete in a fine, high calm. He turned to the remaining Daisy, scared but still acquisitive. "Darling," he said tenderly, "all those bank notes are counterfeit, as it develops. We'll have to put themall back and struggle along with the contents of the woodshed and the vegetable bin."

Daisy tried to look absent-minded, and failed.

"I think you've got nerve!" said Daisy indignantly.

First Contact

TOMMY DORT WENT into the captain's room with his last pair of stereophotos and said:

"I'm through, sir. These are the last two pictures I can take."

He handed over the photographs and looked with professional interest atthe visiplates which showed all space outside the ship. Subdued, deep-redlighting indicated the controls and such instruments as the quartermaster onduty needed for navigation of the spaceship Lianvabon. There was a deeplycushioned control chair. There was the little gadget of oddly angled mirrors- remote descendant of the back-view mirrors of twentieth-century motorists- which allowed a view of all the visiplates without turning the head. And the rewere the huge plates which were so much more satisfactory for a direct view ofspace.

The Lianvabon was a long way from home. The plates, which showed everystar of visual magnitude and could be stepped up to any desired magnification, portrayed stars of every imaginable degree of brilliance, in the startlinglydifferent colors they show outside of atmosphere. But every one wasunfamiliar. Only two constellations could be recognized as seen from Earth, and they were shrunken and distorted. The Milky Way seemed vaguely out ofplace. But even such oddities were minor compared to a sight in the forwardplates.

There was a vast, vast mistiness ahead. A luminous mist. It seemedmotionless. It took a long time for any appreciable nearing to appear in the vision plates, though the spaceship's velocity indicator showed an incrediblespeed. The mist was the Crab Nebula, six light-years long, three and a halflight-years thick, with outward-reaching members that in the telescopes ofEarth gave it some resemblance to the creature for which it was named. It wasa cloud of gas, infinitely tenuous, reaching half again as far as from Sol toits nearest neighbor-sun. Deep within it burned two stars; a double star; onecomponent the familiar yellow of the sun of Earth, the other an unholy white.

Tommy Dort said meditatively:

"We're heading into a deep, sir?"

The skipper studied the last two plates of Tommy's taking, and put themaside. He went back to his uneasy contemplation of the vision plates ahead. The Lianvabon was decelerating at full force. She was a bare half light-yearfrom thenebula. Tommy's work was guiding the ship's course, now, but the workwas done. During all the stay of the exploring ship in thenebula, Tommy Dortwould loaf. But he'd more than paid his way so far.

He had just completed a quite unique first-a complete photographicrecord of themovement of a nebula during a period of four thousand years, taken by one individual with the same apparatus and with cdntrol exposures todetect and record any systematic errors. It was an achievement in itself worththe journey from Earth. But in addition, he had also recorded four thousandyears of the history of a double star, and four thousand years of the historyof a star in the act of degenerating into a white dwarf.

It was not that Tommy Dort was four thousand years old. He was, actually, in his twenties. But the Crab Nebula is four thousand light-yearsfrom Earth, and the last two pictures had been taken by light which would notreach Earth until the sixth millennium A.D. On the way here-at speedsincredible multiples of the speed of light-Tommy Dort had recorded each aspectof thenebula by the light which had left it from forty centuries since to abare six months ago.

The Lianvabon bored on through space. Slowly, slowly, slowly, the

incredible luminosity crept across the vision plates. It blotted out half the universe from view. Before was glowing mist, and behind was a star-studdedemptiness. The mist shut off three-fourths of all the stars. Some few of the brightest shone dimly through it near its edge, but only a few. Then there wasonly an irregularly shaped patch of darkness astern against which stars shoneunwinking. The Lianvabon dived into thenebula, and it seemed as if it boredinto a tunnel of darkness with walls of shining fog.

Which was exactly what the spaceship was doing. The most distantphotographs of all had disclosed structural features in thenebula. It was notamorphous. It had form. As the Lianvabon drew nearer, indications of structuregrew more distinct, and Tommy Dort had argued for a curved approach forphotographic reasons. So the spaceship had come up to thenebula on a vastlogarithmic curve, and Tommy had been able to take successive photographs fromslightly different angles and get stereopairs which showed thenebula in threedimensions; which disclosed billowings and hollows and an actually complicatedshape. In places, thenebula displayed convolutions like those of a humanbrain. It was into one of those hollows that the spaceship now plunged. Theyhad been called "deeps" by analogy with crevasses in the ocean floor. And theypromised to be useful.

The skipper relaxed. One of a skipper's functions, nowadays, is to thinkof things to worry about, and then to worry about them. The skipper of the Lianvabon was conscientious. Only after a certain instrument remaineddefinitely nonregistering did he ease himself back in his seat.

"It was just hardly possible," he said heavily, "that those deeps mightbe nonluminous gas. But they're empty. So we'll be able to use overdrive aslong as we're in them."

It was a light-year-and-a-half from the edge of thenebula to theneighborhood of the double star which was its heart. That was the problem. Anebula is a gas. It is so thin that a comet's tail is solid by comparison, buta ship traveling on overdrive-above the speed of light does not want to hiteven a merely hard vacuum. It needs pure emptiness, such as exists between the stars. But the Lianvabon could not do much in this expanse of mist if it waslimited to speeds a merely hard vacuum would permit.

The luminosity seemed to close in behind the spaceship, which slowed andslowed and slowed. The overdrive went off with the sudden pinging sensationwhich goes all over a person when the overdrive field is released.

Then, almost instantly, bells burst into clanging, strident uproar allthrough the ship. Tommy was almost deafened by the alarm bell which rang inthe captain's room before the quarter master shut it off with a flip of hishand. But other bells could be heard ringing throughout the rest of the ship, to be cut off as automatic doors closed one by one.

Tommy Dort stared at the skipper. The skipper's hands clenched. He wasup and staring over the quartermaster's shoulder. One indicator was apparentlyhaving convulsions. Othe rs strained to record their findings. A spot on the diffusedly bright mistiness of a bowquartering visiplate grew brighter as the automatic scanner focused on it. That was the direction of the object whichhad sounded collision-alarm. But the object locator itself-according to itsreading, there was one solid object some eighty thousand miles away-an objectof no great size. But there was another object whose distance varied fromextreme range to zero, and whose size shared its impossible advance andretreat.

"Step up the scanner," snapped the skipper.

The extra-bright spot on the scanner rolled outward, obliterating the undifferentiated image behind it. Magnification increased. But nothingappeared. Absolutely nothing. Yet the radio locator insisted that something. monstrous and invisible made lunatic dashes toward the Lianvabon, at speedswhich inevitably implied collision, and then fled coyly away at the same rate.

The visiplate went up to maximum magnification. Still nothing. Theskipper ground his teeth. Tommy Dort said meditatively:

"D'you know, sir, I saw something like this on a liner of the Earth-Marsrun once, when we were being located by another ship. Their locator beam wasthe same frequency as ours, and every time it hit, it registered likesomething monstrous, and solid."

"That," said the skipper savagely, "is just what's happening now. There's something like a locator beam on us. We're getting that beam and our, own echo besides. But the other ship's invisible! Who is out here in aninvisible ship with locator devices? Not men, certainly!"

He pressed the button in his sleeve communicator and snapped:

"Action stations! Man all weapons! Condition of extreme alert in alldepartments immediately!"

His hands closed and unclosed. He stared again at the visiplate, whichshowed nothing but a formless brightness.

"Not men?" Tommy Dort straightened sharply. "You mean--"

"How many solar systems in our galaxy?" demanded the skipper bitterly. "How many planets fit for life? And how many kinds of life could there be? Ifthis ship isn't from Earth-and it isn't-it has a crew that isn't human. Andthings that aren't human but are up to the level of deep-space travel in the ircivilization could mean anything!"

The skipper's hands were actually shaking. He would not have talked sofreely before a member of his own crew, but Tommy Dort was of the observationstaff. And even a skipper whose duties include worrying may sometimes needdesperately to unload his worries. Sometimes, too, it helps to think aloud.

"Something like this has been talked about and speculated about foryears," he said soffly. "Mathe matically, it's been an odds-on bet thatsomewhere in our galaxy the re'd be another race with, a civilization equal toor furthe r advanced than ours. Nobody could ever guess where -or when we'dmeet them. But it looks like we've done it now!"

Tommy's eyes were very bright.

"D'you suppose they'll be friendly, sir?"

The skipper glanced at the distance indicator. The phantom object stillmade its insane, nonexistent swoops toward and away from the Lianvabon. Thesecondary indication of an object at eighty thousand miles stirred ever soslightly.

"It's moving," he said curtly. "Heading for us. Just what we'd do if astrange spaceship appeared in our hunting grounds! Friendly? Maybe! We'regoing to try to contact them. We have to. But I suspect this is the end ofthis expedition. Thank God for the blasters!"

The blasters are those beams of ravening destruction which take care ofrecalcitrant meteorites in a spaceship's course when the deflectors can'thandle them. They are not designed as weapons, but they can serve as prettygood ones. They can go into action at five thousand miles, and draw on the entire power output of a whole ship. With automatic aim and a traverse of fivedegrees, a ship like the Lianvabon can come very close to blasting a holethrough a small-sized asteroid which gets in its way. But not on overdrive, ofcourse.

Tommy Dort had approached the bow-quartering visiplate. Now he jerkedhis head around.

"Blasters, sir? What for?"

The skipper grimaced at the empty visiplate.

"Because we don't know what they're like and can't take a chance! Iknow!" he added bitterly. "We're going to make contacts and try to find outall we can about them-especially where they come from. I suppose we'll try tomake friends-but we haven't much chance. We can't trust them a fraction of an inch. We' daren't! They've locators. Maybe they've tracers better than any we have. Maybe they could trace us all the way home without our knowing it! Wecan't risk a nonhuman race knowing where Earth is unless we're sure of them!

And how can we be sure? They could come to trade, of course-or they couldswoop down on overdrive with a battle fleet,that could wipe us out before weknew what happened. We wouldn't know which to expect, or when!"

Tommy's face was startled.

"It's all been thrashed out over and over, in the ory," said the skipper. "Nobody's ever been able to find a sound answer, even on paper. But you know, in all their the orizing, no one considered the crazy, rank impossibility of adeep-space contact, with neither side knowing the othe r's home world! Butwe've got to find an answer in fact! What are we going to do about them? Maybethe se creatures will be aesthe tic marvels, nice and friendly and polite-and, underneath, with the sneaking brutal ferocity of a mugger. Or maybe they'll becrude and gruff as a farmer-and just as decent underneath. Maybe they'resomething in between. But am I going to risk the possible future of the humanrace on a guess that it's safe to trust them? God knows it would be worthwhileto make friends with a new civilization! It would be bound to stimulate our own, and maybe we'd gain enormously. But I can't take chances. The one thing Iwon't risk is having them know how to find Earth! Eithe r I know they can'tfollow me, or I don't go home! And they'll probably feel the same way!"

He pressed the sleeve-communicator button again.

"Navigation officers, attention! Every star map on this ship is to beprepared for instant destruction. This includes photographs and diagrams fromwhich our course or starting point could be deduced. I want all astronomicaldata gathe red and arranged to be destroyed in a split second, on order. Makeit fast and report when ready!"

He released the button. He looked suddenly old. The first contact ofhumanity with an alien race was a situation which had been foreseen in manyfashions, but never one quite so hopeless of solution as this. A solitaryEarth-ship and a solitary alien, meeting in a nebula which must be remote fromthe home planet of each. They might wish peace, but the line of conduct whichbest prepared a treacherous attack was just the seeming of friendliness. Failure to be suspicious might doom the human race-and a peaceful exchange ofthe fruits of civilization would be the greatest benefit imaginable. Anymistake would be irreparable, but a failure to be on guard would be fatal.

The captain's room was very, very quiet. The bowquartering visiplate wasfilled with the image of a very small section of thenebula. A very smallsection indeed. It was all diffused, featureless, luminous mist. But suddenlyTommy Dort pointed.

"There, sir!"

There was a small shape in themist. It was far away. It was a blackshape, not polished to mirror-reflection like the hull of the Lianvabon. Itwas bulbous-roughly pear-shaped. There was much thin luminosity between, andno details could be observed, but it was surely no natural object. Then Tommylooked at the distance indicator and said quietly:

"It's headed for us at very high acceleration, sir. The odds are thatthe y're thinking the same thing, sir, that neither of us will dare let the other go home. Do you think they'll try a contact with us, or let loose withthe ir weapons as soon as they're in range?"

The Lianvabon was no longer in a crevasse of emptiness in thenebula'sthin substance. She swam in luminescence. There were no stars save the two fierce glows in thenebula's heart. There was nothing but an allenvelopinglight, curiously like one's imagining of underwater in the tropics of Earth.

The alien ship had made one sign of less than lethal intention. As itdrew near the Lianvabon, it decelerated. The Lianvabon itself had advanced fora meeting and then come to a dead stop. Its movement had been a recognition ofthe nearness of the other ship. Its pausing was both a friendly sign and a

precaution against attack. Relatively still, it could swivel on its own axisto present the least target to a slashing assault, and it would have a longerfiring-time than if the two ships flashed past each other at their combinedspeeds.

The moment of actual approach, however, was tenseness itself. TheLlanvabon's needle-pointed bow aimed unwaveringly at the alien bulk. A relayto the captain's room put a key under his hand which would fire the blasterswith maximum power. Tommy Dort watched, his brow wrinkled. The aliens must beof a high degree of civilization if they had spaceships, and civilization doesnot develop without the development of foresight. These aliens must recognizeall the implications of this first contact of two civilized races as fully asdid the humans on the Lianvabon.

The possibility of an enormous spurt in the development of both, bypeaceful contact and exchange of their separate technologies, would probablyappeal to them as to man. But when dissimilar human cultures are in contact, one must usually be subordinate or there is war. But subordination betweenraces arising on separate planets could not be peacefully arranged. Men, atleast, would never consent to subordination, nor was it likely that any highlydeveloped race would agree. The benefits to be derived from commerce couldnever make up for a condition of inferiority. Some races-men, perhaps-wouldprefer commerce to conquest. Perhaps-perhaps!-the se aliens would also. Butsome types even of human beings would have craved for war. If the alien shipnow approaching the Lianvabon returned to its home base with news ofhumanity's existence and of ships like the Lianvabon, it would give its racethe choice of trade or battle. They might want trade, or they might want war. But it takes two to make trade, and only one to make war. They could not besure of men's peacefulness, or could men be sure of the irs. The only safetyfor either civilization would lie in the destruction of one or both of the two ships here nad now.

But even victory would not be really enough. Men would need to knowwhere this alien race was to be found, for avoidance if not for battle. Theywould need to know its weapons, and its resources, and if it could be a menaceand how it could be eliminated in case of need. The aliens would feel the same necessities concerning humanity.

So the skipper of the Lianvabon did not press the key which mightpossibly have blasted the other ship tO nothingness. He dared not. But hedared not not fire eithe r. Sweat came out on his face.

A speaker muttered. Someone from the range room.

"The other ship's stopped, sir. Quite stationary. Blasters are centeredon it, sir."

It was an urging to fire. But the skipper shook his head to himself. Thealien ship was no more than twenty miles away. It was dead-black. Every bit ofits exterior was an abysmal, nonreflecting sable. No details could be seenexcept by minor variations in its outline against themisty nebula.

"It's stopped dead, sir," said another voice. "They've sent a modulatedshort wave at us, sir. Frequency modulated. Apparently a signal. Not enoughpower to do any harm."

The skipper said though tight-locked teeth:

"They're doipg something now. There's movement on the outside of the irhull. Watch what comes out. Put the auxiliary blasters on it."

Something small and round, came smoothly out of the oval outline of the black ship. The bulbous hulk moved.

"Moving away, sir," said the speaker. "The object they let out isstationary in the place they've left."

Another voice cut in:

"More frequency modulated stuff, sir. Unintelligible."

Tommy Dort's eyes brightened. The skipper watched the visiplate, with

sweat-droplets on his forehead.

"Rathe r pretty, sir," said Tommy, meditatively. "If they sent anythingtoward us, it might seem a projectile or a bomb. So they came close, let out alifeboat, and went away again. They figure we can send a boat or a man to makecontact without risking our ship. They must think pretty much as we do."

The skipper said, without moving his eyes from the plate:

"Mr. Dort, would you care to go out and look the thing over? I can'torder you, but I need all my operating crew for emergencies. The observation staff--"

"Is expendable. Very well, sir," said Tommy briskly. "I won't take alifeboat, sir. Just a suit with a drive in it. It's smaller and the arms andlegs will look unsuitable for a bomb. I think I should carry a scanner, sir."

The alien ship continued to retreat. Forty, eighty, four hundred miles. It came to a stop and hung there, waiting. Climbing into his atomic-drivenspacesuit just within the Llanvabon's air locks Tommy heard the reports asthey went over the speakers throughout the ship. That the other ship hadstopped its retreat at four hundred miles was encouraging. It. might not haveweapons effective at a greater distance than that, and so felt safe. But justas the thought formed itself in his mind, the alien retreated precipitatelystill farthe r. Which, as Tommy reflected as he emerged from the lock, might bebecause the aliens had realized they were giving themselves away, or might bebecause they wanted to give the impression that they had done so.

He sw6oped away from the silvery-mirror Lianvabon, through a brightlyglowing emptiness which was past any previous experience of the human race. Behind him, the Lianvabon swung about and darted away. The skipper's voicecame in Tommy's helmet-phones.

"We're pulling back, too, Mr. Dort. There is a bare possibility thatthe y've some explosive atomic reaction they can't use from their own ship, but which might be destructive even as far as this. We'll draw back. Keep yourscanner on the object."

The reasoning was sound, if not very comforting. An explosive whichwould destroy anything within twenty miles was the oretically possible, buthumans didn't have it yet. It was decidely safest for the Lianvabon to drawback.

But Tommy Dort felt very lonely. He sped through emptiness toward the tiny black speck which hung in incredible brightness. The Lianvabon vanished. Its polished hull would merge with the glowing mist at a relatively shortdistance, anyhow. The alien ship was not visible to thenaked eye, eithe r. Tommy swam in nothingness, four thousand light-years from home, toward a tinyblack spot which was the only solid object to be seen in all of space.

It was a slightly distorted, sphere, not much over six feet in diameter. It bounced away when Tommy landed on it, feet first. There were smalltentacles, or horns, which projected in every direction. They looked rathe rlike the detonating horns of a submarine mine, but there was a glint ofcrystal at the tip-end of each.

"I'm here," said Tommy into his helmet phone.

He caught hold of a horn and drew himself to the object. It was allmetal, dead-black.--He could feel no texture through his space gloves, ofcourse, but he went over and over it, trying to discover its purpose.

"Deadlock, sir," he said presently. "Nothing to report that the scannerhasn't shown you."

Then, through his suit, he felt vibrations. They translated themselvesas clankings. A section of the rounded hull of the object opened out. Twosections. He worked his way around to look in and see the first nonhumancivilized beings that any man had ever looked upon.

But what he saw was simply a flat plate on which thin red glows crawledhere and there in seeming aimlessness. His helmet phones emitted a startled

exclamation. The skipper's voice:

"Very good, Mr. Dort. Fix your scanner to look into that plate. Theydumped out a robot with an infra-red visiplate for communication. Not riskingany personnel. Whatever we might do would damage only machinery. Maybe theyexpect us to bring it on board-and it may have a bomb charge that can bedetonated when they're ready to start for home. I'll send a plate to face oneof its scanners. You return to the ship."

"Yes, sir," said Tommy. "But which way is the ship, sir?"

There were no stars. The nebula obscured them with its light The onlything visible from the robot was the double star at thenebula's center. Tommywas no longer oriented. He had but one reference point.

"Head straight away from the double star," came the order in his helmetphone. "We'll pick you up."

He passed another lonely figure, a little later, headed for the aliensphere with a vision plate to set up. The two spaceships, each knowing that itdared not risk its own race by the slightest lack of caution, wouldcommunicate with each other through this small round robot. Their separatevision systems would enable them to exchange all the information they daredgive, while they debated themost practical way of making sure that their owncivilization would not be endangered by this first contact with anothe r. Thetruly most practical method would be the destruction of the other ship in a, swift and deadly attack in self-defense.

-The Lianvabon, the reafter, was a ship in which there were two separateenterprises on hand at the same time. She had come out from Earth to makeclose-range observations on the smaller component of the double star at thenebula's center. The nebula itself was the result of themost titanic explosion of which men have, any knowledge. The explosion took place some timein theyear 2946 B.C., before the first of the seven cities of long-dead Iliumwas even thought of. The light of that explosion reached Earth in theyear1054 A.D., and was duly recorded in ecclesiastical annals and somewhat morereliably by Chinese court astronomers. It was bright enough to be seen indaylight for twenty-three successive days. Its light-and it was four thousandlight-years away-was brighter than that of Venus. From the se facts, astronomers could calculate nine hundred years laterthe violence of the detonation. Matter blown away from the center of the explosion would have traveled outward at the rate of two million, threehundred thousand miles an hour; more than thirty-eight thousand miles aminute; something over six hundred thirty-eight miles per second. Whentwentieth-century telescopes were turned upon the scene of this vastexplosion, only a double star remained-and thenebula. The brighter star ofthe doublet was almost unique in having so high a surface temperature that itshowed no spectrum lines at all. It had a continuous spectrum. Sol's surfacetemperature is about 7,0000 Absolute. That of the hot white star is 500,000degrees. It has nearly themass of the sun, but only one fifth its diameter, so that its density is one hundred seventy-three times that of water, sixteentimes that of lead, and eight times that of iridium-the heaviest substanceknown on Earth. But even this density is not that of a dwarf white star likethe companion of Sirius. The white star in the Crab Nebula is an incompletedwarf; it is a star still in the act of collapsing. Examination-including the survey of a four-thousand-year column of its light-was worthwhile. TheLianvabon had come to make that examination. But the finding of an alienspaceship upon a similttr errand had implications which overshadowed the original purpose of the expedition.

A tiny bulbous robot floated in the tenuous nebular gas. The normaloperating crew of the Lianvabon stood at their posts with a sharp alertnesswhich was productive of tense nerves. The observation staff divided itself,

and a part went half-heartedly about themaking of the observations for whichthe Lianvabon had come. The other half applied itself to the problem the spaceship offered.

It represented a culture which was up to space travel on an interstellarscale. The explosion of a mere five thousand years since must have blastedevery trace of life out of existence in the area now filled by thenebula. Sothe aliens of the black spaceship came from another solar system. Their tripmust have been, like that of the Earth ship, for purely scientific purposes. There was nothing to be extracted from thenebula.

They were, then, at least near the level of human civilization, whichmeant that they had or could develop arts and articles of commerce which menwould want to trade for, in friendship. But they would necessarily realizethat the existence and civilization of humanity was a potential menace tothe ir own race. The two races could be friends, but also they could be deadlyenemies. Each, even if unwillingly, was a monstrous menace to the othe r. Andthe only safe-thing to do with a menace is to destroy it.

En the Crab Nebula the problem was acute and immediate. The futurerelationship of the two races whuld be settled here and now. If a process forfriendship could be established, one race, othe rwise doomed, would survive andboth would benefit unmensely. But that process had to be established, andconfidence built up, without themost minute risk of danger from treachery. Confidence would need to be established upon a foundation of necessarilycomplete distrust. Neither dared return to its own base if the other could doharm to its race. Neither dared risk any of thenecessities to trust. The onlysafe thing for either to do was destroy the other or be destroyed.

But even for war, more was needed than mere destruction of the othe r. With interstellar traffic, the aliens must have atomic power and some form ofoverdrivo for travel above the speed of light. With radio location andvisiplates and short-wave communication they had, of course, many othe rdevices. What weapons,did they have? How widely extended was their culture? What were their resources? Could there be a development of trade andfriendship, or were the two races so unlike that only war could exist betweenthe m? If peace was possible, how could it be begun?

The men on the Lianvabon needed facts-and so did the crew on the other ship. They must take back every morsel of information they could. The mostimportant information of all would be of the location of the othe rcivilization, just in case of war. That one bit of infcirmation might be the decisive factor in an interstellar war. But other facts would be enormouslyvaluable.

The tragic thing was that there could be no possible information whichcould lead to peace. Neither ship could stake its own race's existence uponany conviction of the good will or the honor of the othe r.

So there was a strange truce between the two ships. The alien went aboutits work of making observations, as did the Lianvabon. This tiny robot floatedin bright emptiness. A scanner from the Lianvabon was focussed upon a visionplate from the alien. A scanner from the alien regarded a vision plate fromthe Lianvabon. Cornmunication began.

It progressed rapidly. Tommy Dort was one of those who made the firstprogress report. His special task on the expedition was over. He had now beenassigned to work on the problem of communication with the alien entities. Hewent with the ship's solitary psychologist to the captain's room to convey thenews of success. The captain's room, as usual, was a place of silence anddull-red indicator lights and the great bright visiplates on every wall and on the ceiling.

"We've established fairly satisfactory communication, sir," said the psychologist. He looked tired. His work on the trip was supposed to be that ofmeasuring personal factors of error in the observation staff, for the

reduction of all observations to thenearest possible decimal to the absolute. Lie had been pressed into service for which he was not especially fitted, andit told upon him. "That is, we can say almost anything we wish to them,, andcan understand what they say in return. But of course we don't know how muchof what they say is the truth."

The skipper's eyes turned to Tommy Dort.

"We've hooked up some machinery," said Tommy, "that amounts to amechanical translator. We have vision plates, of course, and then short-wavebeams direct. They use frequency-modulation plus what is probably variation inwave forms-like our vowel and consonant sounds in speech. We've never had anyuse for anything like that before, so our coils won't handle it, but we'vedeveloped a sort of Code which isn't the language of either set of us. Theyshoot over short-wave stuff with frequency-modulation, and we record it assound. When we shoot it back, it's reconverted into frequency-modulation."

The skipper said, frowning:

"Why wave-form changes in short waves? How doyou know?"

"We showed them our recorder in the vision plate; and they showed usthe irs. They record the frequency modulaton direct. I think," said Tommycarefully, "they don't use sound at all, even in speech. They've set up acommunication room, and we've watched them in the act of communicating withus. They made no perceptible movement of anything that corresponds to a speechorgan. Instead of a microphone, they simply stand near something that wouldwork as a pick-up antenna. My guess, sir, is that they use microwaves for whatyou might call person-to-person conversation. I think they make short-wavetrains as we make sounds."

The skipper stared at hlm:

"That means they have telepathy?"

"M-m-m. Yes, sir," said Tommy. "Also it means that we have telepathytoo, as far as they are concerned. They're probably deaf. They've certainly noidea of using sound waves in air for communication. They simply don't usenoises for any purpose."

The skipper stored the information away.

"What else?"

"Well, sir," said Tommy doubtfully, "I think we're all set. We agreed onarbitrary symbols for objects, sir, by the way of the visiplates, and workedout relationships and verbs and so on with diagrams and pictures. We've acouple of thousand words that have mutual meanings. We set up an analyzer tosort out their shortwave groups, which we feed into a decoding machine. Andthe n the coding end of themachine picks out recordings to make the wavegroups we want to send back. When you're ready to talk to the skipper of the other ship, sir, I think we're ready."

"H-m-m. What's your impression of their psychology?" The skipper askedthe question of the psychologist.

"I don't know, sir," said the psychologist harassedly. "They seem to becompletely direct. But they haven't let slip even a hint of the tenseness weknow exists. They act as if--they were simply setting up a means ofcommunication for friendly conversation. But there is.... well... an overtone--"

The piychologist was a good man at psychological mensuration, which is agood and useful field. But he was not equipped to analyze a completely alienthought pattern.

"If I may say so, sir--" said Tommy uncomfortably.

"What?"

"They're oxygen brothe rs," said Tommy, "and they're not too dissimilarto us in other ways. It seems to me, sir, that parallel evolution has been atwork. Perhaps intelligence evolves in parallel lines, just as well ,.... basic bodily functions. I mean," he added conscientiously, "any living being

of any sort must ingest, metabolize, and excrete. Perhaps any intelligentbrain must perceive, apperceive, and find a personal reaction. Fm sure I'vedetected irony. That implies humor, too. In short, sir, I think they could belikable."

The skipper heaved himself to his feet.

"H-m-m," he said profoundly, "we'll see what they have to say."... He walked to the communications room. The scanner for the vision platein the robot was in readiness. The skipper walked in front of it. Tommy Dortsat down at the coding machine and tapped at the keys. Highly improbablenoises came from it, went into a microphone, and governed the frequency- modulation of a signal sent through space to the other spaceship. Almostinstantly the vision--screen which with one relay-in the robot--showed the interior of the other ship lighted up. An alien came before the scanner andseemed to look inquisitively out of the plate. He was extraordinarily manlike, but he was not human. The impression he gave was of extreme baldness and asomehow humorous frankness.

"I'd like to say," said the skipper heavily, "the appropriate thingsabout this first contact of two dissimilar civilized races, and of my hopesthat a friendly intercourse between the two peoples will result."

Tommy Dort hesitated. Then he shrugged and tapped expertly upon the coder. More improbable noises.

The alien skipper seemed to receive themessage. He made a gesture whichwas wryly assenting. The decoder on the Lianvabon hummed to itself and word- cards dropped into themessage frame. Tommy said dispassionately:

"He says, sir, 'That is all very well, but is there any way for us tolet each other go home alive? I would be happy to hear of such a way if youcan contrive it. At themoment it seems to me that one of us must be killed."

The atmoaphere was of confusion. There were too many questions to beanswered all at once. Nobody could answer any of them. And all of them had tobe answered.

The Lianvabon could start for home. The alien ship might or might not beable to multiply the speed of light by one more unit than the Earth vessel. Ifit could, the Lianvabon would get close enough to Earth to reveal itsdestination-and then have to fight. It might or might not win. Even if it didwin, the aliens might have a communication system by which the Llanvabon'sdestination might have been reported to the aliens' home planet before battlewas joined. But the Lianvabon might lose in such a fight. If she were to bedestroyed, it would be better to be destroyed here, without giving any clue towhere human beings might be found by a forewarned, forearmed alien battlefleet.

The black ship was in exactly the same predicament. It too, could startfor home. But the Lianvabon might be faster, and an overdrive field can betrailed, if you set to work on it soon enough. The aliens, also, would notknow whethe r the Lianvabon could report to its home base without returning. Ifthe alien were to be destroyed, it also would prefer to fight it out here, sothat it could not lead a probably enemy to its own civilization.

Neither ship, then, could think of flight. The course of the Lianvaboninto thenebula might be known to the black ship, but it had been the end of alogarithmic curve, and the aliens could not know its properties. They couldnot tell from that from what direction the Earth ship had started. As of themoment, then, the two ships were even. But the question was and remained, "What now?"

There was no specific answer. The aliens traded information forinformation-and did not always realize what information they gave. The humanstraded information for information-and Tommy Dort sweated blood in his anxietynot to give any clue to the whereabouts of Earth.

The aliens saw by infrared light, and the vision plates and scanners in the robot communication-exchange had to adapt their respective images up anddown an optical octave each, for them to have any meaning at all. It did notoccur to the aliens that their eyesight told that their sun was a red dwarf, yielding light of greatest energy just below the part of the spectrum visibleto human eyes. But after that fact was realized on the Lianvabon, it wasrealized that the aliens, also, should be able to deduce the Sun's spectraltype by the light to which men's eyes were best adapted.

There was a gadget for the recording of short-wave trains which was ascasually in use among the aliens as a sound-recorder is among men. The humanswanted that badly. And the aliens were fascinated by themystery of sound. They were able to perceive noise, of course, just as a man's palm willperceive infrared light by the sensation of heat it produces, but they couldno more differentiate pitch or tone-quality than a human is able todistinguish between two frequencies of heatradiation even half an octaveapart. To them, the human science of sound was a remarkable discovery. Theywould find uses for noises which humans had never imagined-if they lived.

But that was another question. Neither ship could leave without firstdestroying the othe r. But while the flood of information was in passage, neither ship could afford to destroy the othe r. There was thematter of the outer coloring of the two ships. The Lianvabon was mirror-bright exteriorly. The alien ship was dead-black by visible light. It absorbed heat--toperfection, and should radiate it away again as readily. But it did not. Theblack coating was not a "black body" color or lack of color. It was a perfectreflector of certain infrared wave lengths while simultaneously it fluorescedin just those wave bands. In practice, it absorbed the higher frequencies ofheat, converted them to lower frequencies it did not radiate-and stayed at the desired temperature even in empty space.

Tommy Dort labored over his task of communications He found the alienthought-processes not so alien that he could not follow them. The discussionof technics reached thematter of interstellar navigation. A star map wasneeded to illustrate the process. It would not have been logical to use a starmap from the chart room-but from a star map one could guess the point fromwhich themap was projected. Tommy had a map made specially, with imaginarybut convincing star images upon it. He translated directions for its use bythe coder and decoder. In return, the aliens presented a star map of their ownbefore the visiplate. Copied instantly by photograph, the Navy officerslabored over it, trying to figure out from what spot in the galaxy the starsand Milky Way would show at such an angle. It baffled them.

It was Tommy who realized finally that the aliens had made a specialstar map for their demonstration too, and that it was a niirror-image of the faked map Tommy had shown them previously.

Tommy could grin, at that. He began to like the se aliens. They were nothumans, but they had a very human sense of the ridiculous. In course of timeTommy essayed a mild joke. It had to be translated into code numerals, the seinto quite cryptic groups of short-wave, frequency-modulated impulses, andthe se went to the other ship and into heaven knew what to become inteffigible. A joke which went through such formalities, would not seem likely to be funny. But the alien did see the point.

There was one of the aliens to whom communication became as normal a function as Tommy's own codehandllngs. The two of them developed a quiteinsane friendship, conversing by coder, decoder, and shortwave trains. Whentechnicalities in the official messages grew too involved, that aliensometimes threw in strictly nontechnical interpolations akin to slang. Often, they cleared up the confusion. Tommy, for no reason whatever, had filed acode-name of "Buck" which the decoder picked out regularly when thisparticular one signed his own symbol to themessage.

In the third week of communication, the decoder suddenly presented Tommy

with a message in themessage frame:

You are a good guy. It is too bad we have to kill each othe r.

BUCK.

Tommy had been thinking much the same thing. He tapped off the ruefulreply:

We can't see any way out of it. Can you?

There was a pause, and themessage frame filled up again:

If we could believe each othe r, yes. Our skipper would like it. But wecan't believe you, and you can't believe us. We'd trail you home if we got achance, and you'd trail us. But we feel sorry about it.

BUCK.

Tommy Dort took themessages to the skipper.

"Lookhere, sir!" he said urgently. "These people are almost human, andthe y're likable cusses."

The skipper was busy about his important task of thinking things toworry about, and worrying about them. He said tiredly:

"They're oxygen breathe rs. Their air is twenty-eight percent oxygeninstead of twenty, but they could do very well on Earth. It would be a highlydesirable conquest for them. And we still don't know what weapons they've gotor what they can develop. Would you tell them how to find Earth?"

"N-no," said Tommy, unhappily.

"They probably feel the same way," said the skipper dryly. "And if wedid manage to make a friendly contact, how long would it stay friendly? Ifthe ir weapons were inferior to ours, they'd feel that for their own safetythey had to improve them. And we, knowing they were planning to revolt, wouldcrush them while we could-for our own safety! If it happened to be the othe rway about, they'd have to smash us before we could catch up to them."

Tommy was silent, but he moved restlessly.

"If we smash this black ship and get home," said the skipper, "EarthGovernment will be annoyed if we don't tell them where it came from. But whatcan we do? We'll be lucky enough to get back alive with our warning. It isn'tpossible to get out of those creatures any more information than we give them, and we surely won't give them our address! We've run into them by accident.

Maybe if we smash this ship there won't be another contact for thousands ofyears. And it's a pity, because trade could mean so much! But it takes two tomake a peace, and we can't risk trusting them. The only answer is to kill themif we can, and if we can't, to make sure that when they kill us they'll findout nothing that will lead them to Earth. I don't like it," added the skippertiredly, "but there simply isn't anything else to do!"

On the Lianvabon, the technicians worked frantically in two divisions. One prepared for victory, and the other for defeat. The ones working forvictory could do little. The main blasters were the only weapons with anypromise. Their mountings were cautiously altered so that they were no longerfixed nearly dead ahead, with only a 5' traverse. Electronic controls whichfollowed a radio-locator master-finder would keep them trained with absoluteprecision upon a given target regardless of its maneuverings. More, a hithe rtounsung genius in the engine room devised a capacity-storage system by whichthe normal full-output of the ship's engines could be momentarily accumulatedand released in surges of stored power far above normal. In the ory, the rangeof the blasters should be multiplied and their destructive power considerably stepped up. But there was not much more that could be done.

The defeat crew had more leeway. Star charts, navigational instrumentscarrying telltale notations, the photographic record Tommy Dort had made on the sixmonths' journey from Earth, and every other memorandum offering cluesto Earth's position, were prepared for destruction. They were put in sealedfiles, and if any one of them was opened by one who did not know the exact, complicated process, the contents of all the files would flash into ashes andthe ash be churned past any hope of restoration. Of course, if the Lianvabonshould be victorious, a carefully not-indicated method of reopening them insafety would remain.

There were atomic bombs placed all over the hull of the ship. If itshuman crew should be killed without complete destruction of the ship, the atomic-power bombs should detonate if the Lianvabon was brought alongside the alien vessel. There were no ready-made atomic bombs on board, but there weresmall spare atomic-power units on board. It was not hard to trick them so thatwhen they were turned on, instead of yielding a smooth flow of power theywould explode. And four men of the Earth-ship's crew remained always inspacesuits with closed helmets, to fight the ship should it be punctured inmany compartments by an unwarned attack.

Such an attack, however, would not be treacherous. The alien skipper hadspoken frankly. His manner was that of one who wryly admits the uselessness oflies. The skipper of the Lianvabon, in turn, heavily admitted the virtue offrankness. Each insisted-perhaps truthfully-that he wished for friendshipbetween the two races. But neither could trust the other not to make everyconceivable effort to find out the one thing he needed most desperately toconceal-the location of his home planet. And neither dared believe that the other was unable to trail him and find out. Because each felt it his own dutyto accomplish that unbearable-to the othe r-act, neither could risk the possible existence of his race by trusting the othe r. They must fight becausethey could not do anything else.

They could raise the stakes of the battle by an exchange of informationbeforehand. But there was a limit, to the stake either would put up. Noinformation on weapons, population, or resources would be given by eithe r. Noteven the distance of their home bases from the Crab Nebula would be told. Theyexchanged information, to be sure, but they knew a battle to the death mustfollow, and each strove to represent his own civilization as powerful enoughto give pause to the othe r's ideas of possible conquest-and the reby increasedits appearance of menace to the othe r, and made battle more unavoidable.

It was curious how completely such alien brains could mesh, however. Tommy Dort, sweating over the coding and decoding machines, found a personalequation emerging from the at first stilted arrays of word cards whicharranged themselves. He had seen the aliens only in the vision screen, andthe n only in light at least one octave removed from the light they saw by.

They, in turn, saw him very strangely, by transposed illumination from what tothe m would be the far ultraviolet. But their brains worked alike. Amazinglyalike. Tommy Dort felt an actual sympathy and even something close tofriendship for the gill-breathing, bald, and dryly ironic creatures of the black space vessel.

Because of that mental kinship he set up-though hopelessly-a sort oftable of the aspects of the problem before them. He did not believe that the aliens had any instinctive desire to destroy man. In fact, the study ofcommunications from the aliens had produced on the Lianvabon a feeling oftolerance not unlike that between enemy soldiers during a truce on Earth. Themen felt no enmity, and probably neither did the aliens. But they had to killor be killed for strictly logical reasons.

Tommy's table was specific. He made a list of objectives themen musttry to achieve, in the order of their importance. The first was the carrying back of news of the existence of the alien culture. The second was the location of that alien culture in the galaxy. The third was the carrying backof as much information as possible about that culture. The third was beingworked on, but the second was probably impossible. The first-and all-woulddepend on the -result of the fight which must take place.

The aliens' objectives would, be exactly similar, so that themen mustprevent, first, news of the existence of Earth's culture from being taken backby the aliens, second, alien discovery of the location of Earth, and third, the acquiring by the aliens of information which would help them or encouragethe m to attack humanity. And again the third was in train, and the second wasprobably taken care of, and the first must await the battie.

There was no possible way to avoid the grim necessity of the destructionof the black ship. The aliens would see no solution to their problems but the destruction of the Lianvabon. But Tommy Dort, regarding his tabulationruefully, realized that even complete victory would not be a perfect solution. The ideal would be for the Lianvabon to take back the alien ship for study. Nothing less would be a complete attainment of the third objective. But Tommyrealized that he hated the idea of so complete a victory, even if it could beaccomplished. He would hate the idea of killing even non-human creatures whounderstood a human fitting out a fleet of fighting ships to destroy an alienculture because its existence was dangerous. The pure accident of thisencounter, between peoples who could like each othe r, had created a situationwhich could only result in wholesale destruction.

Tommy Dort soured on his own brain which could find no answer whichwould work. But there had to be an answer! The gamble was too big! It was tooabsurd that two spaceships should fight-neither one primarily designed forfighting-so that the survivor could carry back news which would set one raceto frenzied preparation for war against the unwarned othe r.

If both races could be warned, though, and each knew that the other did not want to fight, and if they could communicate with each other but notlocate each other until some grounds for mutual trust could be reached.

It was impossible. It was chimerical. It was a day-dream. It wasnonsense. But it was such luring nonsense that Tommy Dort ruefully put it intothe coder to his gillbreathing friend Buck, then some hundred thousand milesoff in themisty brightness of thenebula.

"Sure," said Buck, in the decoder's word-cards flicking into space inthe message frame. "That is a gooddream. But I like you and still won'tbelieve you. If I said that first, you would like me but not believe me, eithe r. I tell you the truth more than you believe, and maybe you tell me the truth more than I believe. But there is no way to know. I am sorry."

Tommy Dort stared gloomily at themessage. He felt a very horrible senseof responsibility. Everyone did, on the Lianvabon. If they failed in thisencounter, the human race would run a very good chance of being exterminatedin time to come. If they succeeded, the race of the aliens would be the one toface destruction, most likely. Millions or billions of lives hung upon the actions of a few men.

Then Tommy Dort saw the answer.

It would be amazingly simple, if it worked. At worst it might give apartial victory to humanity and the Lianvabon. He sat quite still, not daringto move lest he break the chain of thought that followed the first tenuousidea. He went over and over it,excitedly finding objections here and meetingthe m, and overcoming impossibilities there. It was the answer! He felt sure ofit.

He felt almost dizzy with relief when he found his way to the captain'sroom and asked leave to speak.

it is the function of a skipper, among others, to find things to worryabout. But the Llanvabon's skipper did not have to look. In the three weeks

and four days since the first contact with the alien black ship, the skipper'sface had grown lined, and old. He had not only the Lianvabon to worry about. He had all of humanity.

"Sir," said Tommy Dort, his mouth rather dry because of his enormousearnestness, "may I offer a method of attack on the black ship? I'll undertakeit myself, sir, and if it doesn't work our ship won't be weakened."

The skipper looked at him unseeingly.

"The tactics are all worked out, Mr. Dort," -he said heavily. "They'rebeing cut on tape now, for the ship's handling. it's a terrible gamble, but ithas to be done."

"I think," said Tommy carefully, "I've worked out a way to take the gamble out. Suppose, sir, we send a message to the other ship, offering--"

His voice went on in the utterly quiet captain's room, with the visiplates showing only a vast mistiness outside and the two fiercely burningstars in thenebula's heart.

The skipper himself went through the air lock with Tommy. For onereason, the action Tommy had suggested would need his authority behind it. Foranothe r, the skipper had worried more intensely than anybody else on the Lianvabon, and he was tired of it. If he went with Tommy, he would do the thing himself, and if he failed he would be the first one killed-and the tapefor the Earth-ship's maneuvering was already fed into the control board andcorrelated with themaster-timer. If Tommy and the skipper were killed, asingle control pushed home would throw the Lianvabon into themost furiouspossible all-out attack, which would end in the complete destruction of oneship or the othe r-or both. So the skipper was not deserting his post.

The outer air lock door swung wide. It opened upon that shiningemptiness which was thenebula. Twenty. miles away, the little round robothung in space, drifting in an incredible orbit about the twin central suhs, and floating ever nearer and nearer. It would never reach either of them, ofcourse. The white star alone was so much hotter than Earth's sun that its heat-effect would produce Earth's temperature on an object five times as farfrom it as Neptune is from Sol. Even removed to the distance of Pluto, the little robot would be raised to, cherry-red heat by the blazing white dwarf.

And it could not possibly approach to theninety-odd millions miles which isthe Earth's distance from the sun. So near, its metal would melt and boil awayas vapor. But, half a light-year out, the bulbous object bobbed in emptiness.

The two spacesuited figures soared away from the Lianvabon. The smallatomic drives which made then minute spaceships on their own had been subalyaItered, but the change did not mterfere with their funotioning They headedfor the communication robot. *** Proofer's note : something must be missing here***

skipper, out us space, said gruffly"Mr Dort, all my life I have longed for adventure. This is the firsttime I could ever justify it to myself." His voice came through Tommy's space-phone receivers. Tommy wet his lipsand said: "It doesn't seem like adventure to me, sir. I want terribly for the planto go through. I thought adventure was when you didn't care?' "Oh, no," said the skipper. "Adventure is when you toss your life on the scales of chance and wait for the pointer to stop." They reached the round object. They clung to its short, scanner-tippedhorns.

"Intelligent, those creatures," said the skipper heavily. "They mustwant desperately to see more of our ship than the communication room, to agreeto this exchange of visits before the fight."

"Yes, sir," said Tommy. But privately, he suspected that Buck-his gill . breathing friend-would like to see him in the flesh before one or both of themdied. And it seemed to him that between the two ships had grown up an oddtradition o~ courtesy, like that between two ancient knights before a tourney, when they admired each other wholeheartedly before hacking at each other withall the contents of their respective armories.

They waited.

Then, out of themist, came two other figures. The alien spacesuits werealso power-driven. The aliens themselves were shorter than men, and the irhelmet openings were coated with a filtering material to cut off visible andultraviolet rays which to them would be lethal. It was not possible to seemore than the outline of the heads within.

Tommy's helmet phone said, from the communication room on the Lianvabon:

"They say that their ship is waiting for you, sir. The air lock doorwill be open."

The skipper's voice said heavily:

"Mr. Dort, have you seen their space suits before? If so, are you surethe y're not carrying anything extra, such as bombs?"

"Yes, sir," said Tommy. "We've showed each other our space equipment. They've nothing but regular stuff in view, sir."

The skipper made a gesture to. the two aliens. He and Tommy Dart plungedon for the black vessel. They could not make out the ship very clearly withthe naked eye, but directions for change of course came from the communicationroom.

The black ship loomed up. It was huge, as long as the Lianvabon andvastly thicker. The air lock did stand open. The two spacesuited men moved inand anchored themselves with magnetic-soled boots. The outer door closed. There was a rush of air and simultaneously the sharp quick tug of artificialgravity. Then the inner door opened.

All was darkness. Tommy switched on his helmet light at the same instantas the skipper. Since the aliens saw by infrared, a white light would havebeen intolerable to them. The men's helmet lights were, the refore, of the deep-red tint used to illuminate instrument panels so there will be nodazzling of eyes that must be able to detect theminutest speck of white lighton a navigating vision plate. There were aliens waiting to receive them. Theyblinked at the brightness of the helmet lights. The space-phone receivers saidin Tommy's ear:

"They say, sir, their skipper is waiting for you."

Tommy and the skipper were in a long corridor with a soft flooringunderfoot. Their lights showed details of which every one was exotic.

"I think I'll crack my helmet, sir," said Tommy.

He did. The air was good. By analysis it was thirty percent oxygeninstead of twenty for normal air on Earth, but the pressure was less. It feltjust right. The artificial gravity, too, was less than that maintained on the Lianvabon. The home planet of the aliens would be smaller than Earth, and bythe infrared data circling close to a nearly dead, dull-red sun. The air hadsmells in it. They were utterly strange, but not unpleasant.

An arched opening. A ramp with the same soft stuff underfoot. Lightswhich actually shed a dim, dull-red glow about. The aliens had stepped up someof their illuminating equipment as an act of courtesy. The light might hurtthe ir eyes, but it was a gesture of consideration which made Tommy even moreanxious for his plan to go through.

The alien skipper faced thent with what seemed to Tommy a gesture ofwryly humorous deprecation. The helmet phones said:

"He says, sir, that he greets you with pleasure, but he has been able tothink of only one way in which the problem created by themeeting of the se twoships can be solved."

"He means a fight," said the skipper. "Tell him I'm here to offer another choice."

The Llanvabon's skipper and the skipper of the alien ship were face toface, but their communication was weirdly indirect. The aliens used no soundin communication. Their talk, in fact, took place on, microwaves andapproximated telepathy. But they could not hear, in any ordinary sense of the word, so the skipper's and Tommy's speech approached telepathy, too, as far asthey were concerned. When the skipper spoke, his space phone sent his wordsback to the Lianvabon, where the words were fed into the coder and short-waveequivalents sent back to the black ship. The alien skipper's reply went to the Lianvabon and through the decoder, and was retransmitted by space phone inwords read from themessage frame. It was awkward, but it worked.

The short and stocky alien skipper paused. The helmet phones relayed histranslated, soundless reply.

"He is anxious to hear, sir."

The skipper took off his helmet. He put his hands at his belt in abelligerent pose.

"Look here!" he said truculently to the bald, strange creature in the unearthly red glow before him. "It looks like we have to fight and one batchof us get killed. We're ready to do it if we have to. But if you win, we'vegot it fixed so you'll never find out where Earth is, and the re's a goodchance we'll get you anyhow! II we win, we'll be in the same fix. And if wewin and go back home, our government will fit out a fleet and start huntingyour planet. And if we find it we'll be ready to blast it to hell! If you win, the same thing will happen to us! And it's all foolishness! We've stayed herea month, and we've swapped information, and we don't hate each othe r. There'sno reason for us to fight except for the rest of our respective races!"

The skipper stopped for breath, scowling. Tommy Dort inconspicuously puthis own hand on the belt of his spacesuit. He waited, hoping desperately thatthe trick would work.

"He says, sir," reported the helmet phones, "that all you say is true. But that his race has to be protected, just as you feel that yours must be."

"Naturally," said the skipper angrily, "but the sensible thing to do isto figure out how to protect it! Putting its future up as a gamble in a fightis not sensible. Our races have to be warned of each othe r's existence. That's true. But each should have proof that the other doesn't want to fight, butwants to be friendly. And we shouldn't be able to find each othe r, but weshould be able to communicate with each other to work out grounds for a commontrust. If our governments want to be fools, let them! But we should give themthe chance to make friends, instead of starting a space waxout of mutualfunk!"

Briefly, the space phone said:-- "He says that the difficulty is that of trusting each other now. Withthe possible existence of his race at stake, he cannot take any chance, andneither can you, of yielding ari advantage."

"But my race," boomed the skipper, glaring at the alien captain, "myrace has an advantage now. We came here to your ship in atom-poweredspacesuits! Before we left, we altered the drives! We can set off ten poundsof sensitized fuel apiece, right here in this ship, or it can be set off byremote control from our ship! It will be rather remarkable if your fuel storedoesn't blow up with us! In other words, if you don't accept my proposal for acommonsense approach to this predicament, Dort and I blow up in an atomicexplosion, and your ship will be wrecked if not destroyed-and the Llanvahonwill be attacking with everything it's got within two seconds after the blastgoes off!"

The captain's room of the alien ship was a strange scene, with its dull- red illumihation and the strange, bald, gill-breathing aliens watching the skipper and waiting for the inaudible translation of the harangue they could

not hear. But a sudden tensity appeared in the air. A sharp, savage feeling of

strain. The alien skipper made a gesture. The helmet phones hummed.

"He says, sir, what is your proposal?"

"Swap ships!" roared the skipper. "Swap ships and go on home! We can fixour instruments so they'll do no trailing, he can do the same with his. We'lleach remove out star maps and records. We'll each dismantle our weapons. Theair will serve, and we'll take their ship and they'll take ours, and neithe rone can harm or trail the othe r, and each will carry home more informationthan can be taken othe rwise! We can agree on this same Crab Nebula as arendezvous when the double star has made another circuit, and if our peoplewant to meet them they can do it, and if they are scared they can duck it!

That's my proposal! And he'll take it, or Dort and I blow up their ship andthe Lianvabon blasts what's left!"

He glared about him while he waited for the translation to reach the tense small stocky figures about him. He could tell when it came--because the tenseness changed. The figures stirred. They made gestures. One of them madeconvulsive movements. It lay down on the soft floor and kicked. Othe rs leanedagainst its walls and shook.

The voice in Tommy Dort's helmet phones had been strictly crisp andprofessional, before, but now it sounded blankly amazed.

"He says, sir, that it is a good joke. Because the two crew members hesent to our ship, and that you passed on the way, have their spacesuitsstuffed with atomic explosives too, sir, and he intended to make the very sameoffer and threat! Of course he accepts, sir. Your ship is worth more to himthan his own, and his is worth more to you than the Lianvabon. It appears, sir, to be a deal."

Then Tommy Dort realized what the convulsive movements of the alienswere. They were laughter.

It wasn't quite as simple as the skipper had outlined it. The actual-working-out of the proposal was complicated. For three days the crews of the two ships were intermingled, the aliens learning the workings of the Lianvabon's engines, and themen learning the controls of the black spaceship.

It was a good joke-but it wasn't all a joke. There were men on the black ship, and aliens on the Lianvabon, ready at an instant's notice to blow up the vessels in question. And they would have done it in case of need, for whichreason theneed did not appear. But it was, actually, a better arrangement tohave two expeditions return to two civilizations, under the currentarrangement, than for either to return alone.

There were differences, though. There was some dispute about the removalof records. In most cases the dispute was settled by the destruction of the records. There was more trouble caused by the Llanvabon's books, and the alienequivalent of a ship's library, containing works which approximated thenovelsof Earth. But those items were valuable to possible friendship, because theywould show the two cultures, each to the othe r, from the viewpoint of normalcitizens and without propaganda.

But nerves were tense during those three days. Aliens unloaded andinspected the foodstuffs intended for themen on the black ship. Mentransshipped the foodstuffs the aliens would need to return to their home.

There were endless details, from the exchange of lighting equipment to suitthe eyesight of the exchanging crews, to a final check-up of apparatus. Ajoint inspection party of both races verified that all detector devices hadbeen smashed but not removed, so that they could not be used for trailing andhad not been smuggled away. And of course, the aliens were anxious not toleave any useful weapon on the black ship, nor themen upon the Lianvabon. It was a curious fact that each crew was best qualified to take exactly the measures which made an evasion of the agreement impossible.

There was a final conference before the two ships parted, back in the communication room of the Lianvabon.

"Tell the little runt," rumbled the Lianvabon's former skipper, "thathe 's got a good ship and he'd better treat her right."

The message frame flicked word-cards into position. "I believe," it saidon the alien skipper's behalf, "that your ship is just as good. I hope to meetyou here when the double star has turned one turn."

The last man left the Lianvabon. It moved away into themisty nebulabefore they had returned to the black ship. The vision plates in that vesselhad been altered for human eyes, and human crewmen watched jealously for anytrace of their former ship as their new craft took a crazy, evading course toa remote part of thenebula. It came to a crevasse of nothingness, leading tothe stars. It rose swiftly to clear space. There was the instant ofbreathlessness which the overdrive field produces as it goes on, and then the black ship whipped away into the void at many times the speed of light.

Many days later, the skipper saw Tommy Dort poring over one of the strange objects which were the equivalent of books. It was, fascinating topuzzle over. The skipper was pleased with himself. The technicians of the Llanvabon's former crew were finding out desirable things about the shipalmost momently. Doubtless the aliens were as pleased with their discoveriesin the Llanvabon. But the black ship would be enormously worth while-and the solution that had been found was by any standard much superior even to combatin which the Earthmen had been overwhelmingly victorious.

"Hm-m-m. Mr. Dort," said the skipper profoundly. "You've no equipment tomake another photographic record on the way back. It was left on the Lianvabon. But fortunately, we have your record taken on the way out, and Ishall report most favorably on your suggestion and your assistance in carryingit out. I think very well of you, sir."

"Thank you, sir," said Tommy.

He waited. The~ skipper cleared his throat.

"You... ah... first realized the close similarity of mentalprocesses between the aliens and ourselves," he observed. "What do you thinkof the prospects of a friendly arrangement if we keep a rendezvous with themat thenebula as agreed?"

"Oh, we'll get along all right, sir," said Tommy. "We've got a goodstart toward friendship. After all, since they see by infrared, the planetsthe y'd want to make use of wouldn't suit us. There's no reason why weshouldn't get along. We're almost alike in psychology."

"Hm-m-m. Now just what do you mean by that?" demanded the skipper.

"Why,the y're just like us, sir!" said Tommy. "Of course they breathe through gills and they see by heat waves, and their blood has a copper baseinstead of iron and a few little details like that. But othe rwise we're justalike! There were only men in their crew, sir, but they have two sexes as wehave and they have families, and er... their sense of humor--In fact--" Tommy hesitated.

"Go on, sir," said the skipper.

"Well.... There was the one I call Buck, sir, because he hasn't anyname that goes into sound waves," said Tommy. "We got along very well. I'dreally call him my friend, sir. And we were togethe r for a couple of hoursjust before the two ships separated and we'd nothing in particular to do. So Ibecame convinced that humans and aliens are bound to be good friends if theyhave only half a chance. You see, sir, we spent those two hours telling dirtyjokes."

The Ethical Equations

IT is VERY, very queer. The Ethical Equations, of course, link conduct withprobability, and give mathematical proof that certain patterns of conductincrease the probability of certain kinds of coincidences. But nobody everexpected them to have any really practical effect. Elucidation of the laws ofchance did not stop gambling, though it did make life insurance practical. TheEthical Equations weren't expected to be even as useful as that. They werejust the ories, which seemed unlikely to affect anybody particularly. They werecomplicated, for one thing. They admitted that the ideal pattern of conductfor one man wasn't the best for anothe r. A politician, for example, has anentirely different code-and properly-than a Space Patrol man. But still, on atleast one occasion-

The thing from outer space was fifteen hundred feet long, and upward of a hundred and fifty feet through at its middle section, and well over twohundred in a curious bulge like a fish's head at its bow. There were odd, gill-like flaps just back of that bulge, too, and the whole thing lookedextraordinarily like a monster, eyeless fish, floating in empty space outbeyond Jupiter. But it had drifted in from somewhere beyond the sun'sgravitational field-its speed was too great for it to have a closed orbit-andit swung with a slow, inane, purposeless motion about some axis it hadestablished within itself.

The little spacecruiser edged closer and closer. Freddy Holmes had beena pariah on the Arnina all the way out from Mars, but he clenched his handsand forgot, his misery and the ruin of his career in the excitement of lookingat the thing.

"No response to signals on any frequency, sir," said the communicationsofficer, formally. "It is not radiating. It has a minute magnetic field. Itssurface temperature is just about four degrees absolute."

The commander of the Arnina said, "Hrrrmph!" Then he said, "We'll layalongside." Then he looked at Freddy Holmes and stiffened. "No," he said, "Ibelieve you take over now, Mr. Holmes."

Freddy started. He was in a very bad spot, but his excitement had madehim oblivious of it for a moment. The undisguised hostility with which he wasregarded by the skipper and the others on the bridge.brought it back, however.

"You take over, Mr. Holmes," repeated the skipper bitterly. "I haveorders to that effect. You originally detected this object and your uncleasked Headquarters that you be given full authority to investigate it. Youhave that authority. Now, what are you going to do with it?"

There was fury in his voice surpassing even the rasping dislike of the voyage out. He was a lieutenant commander and he had been instructed to takeorders from a junior officer. That was bad enough. But this was humanity'sfirst contact with an extrasolar civilization, and Freddy Holmes, lieutenantjunior grade, bad been given charge of thematter by pure political pull.

Freddy swallowed.

"I... I--" He swallowed again and said miserably, "Sir, I've tried toexplain that I dislike the present set-up as much as you possibly can. I... wish that you would let me put myself under your orders, sir, instead of--"

"No!" rasped the commander vengefully. "You are in command, Mr. Holmes. Your uncle put on political pressure to arrange it. My orders are to carry outyour instructions, not to wet-nurse you if the job is too big for you tohandle. This is in your lap! Will you issue orders?"

Freddy stiffened.

"Very well, sir. it's' plainly a ship and apparently a derelict. No crewwould come in without using a drive, or allow their ship to swing aboutaimlessly. You will maintain your present position with relation to it. I'lltake a spaceboat and a volunteer, if you will find me one, and look 'it over."

He turned and left the bridge. Two minutes later he was struggling intoa spacesuit when Lieutenant Bridges-also junior grade-came briskly into the spacesuit locker and observed:

"I've permission to go with you, Mr. Holmes." He began to get intoanother spacesuit. As he pulled it up over his chest he added blithe ly: "I'dsay this was worth the price of admission!"

Freddy did not answer. Three minutes later the little spaceboat pulledout from the side of the cruiser. Designed for expeditionary work and tool-carrying rather than as an escapecraft, it was not enclosed. It would carrymen in spacesuits, with their tools and weapons, and they could breathe fromits tanks instead of from their suits, and use its power and so conserve the irown. But it was a strange feeling to sit within its spidery outline and seethe great blank sides of the strange object draw near. When the spaceboatactually touched the vast metal wall it seemed impossible, like the approachto some sorcerer's castle across a monstrous moat of stars.

It was real enough, though. The felted rollers touched, and Bridgesgrunted in satisfaction.

"Magnetic. We can anchor to it. Now what?"

"We hunt for an entrance port," said Freddy curtly. He added: "Thoseopenings that look like gills are the drive tubes. Their drive's in frontinstead of the rear. Apparently they don't use gyros for steering."

The tiny craft clung to the giant's skin, like a fly on a strandedwhale. It moved slowly to the top of the rounded body, and over it, and downon the other side. Presently the cruiser came in sight again as it came up thenear side once more.

"Nary a port, sir," said Bridges blithe ly. "Do we cut our way in?"

"Hm-m-m," said Freddy slowly. "We have our drive in the rear, and ourcontrol room in front. So we take on supplies amidships, and that's where welooked. But this ship is driven from the front. Its control room might beamidships. If so, it might load at the stem. Let's see."

The little ctaft crawled to the stern of themonster.

"There!" said Freddy.

It was not like an entrance port on any vessel in the solar system. Itslid aside, without hinges. There was an inner door, but it opened just asreadily. There was no rush of air, and it was hard to tell if it was intendedas an air lock or not.

"Air's gone," said Freddy. "It's a derelict, all right. You might bringa blaster, but what we'll mostly need is light, I think."

The magnetic anchors took hold. The metal grip shoes of the spacesuitsmade loud noises inside the suits as the two of them pushed their way into the interior of the ship. The spacecruiser had been able to watch them, until now. Now they were gone.

The giant, enigmatic object which was so much like a blind fish in emptyspace floated on. It swung aimlessly about some inner axis. The thin sunlightout here beyond Jupiter, smote upon it harshly. It seemed to hang motionlessin mid-space against an all-surrounding background of distant and unwinkingstars. The trim Space Patrol ship hung alertly a mile and a half away. Nothingseemed to happen at all.

Freddy was rather pale when he went back to the bridge. The pressuremark on his forehead from the spacesuit helmet was still visible, and herubbed at it abstractedly. The skipper regarded him with a sort of enviousbitterness. After all, any human would envy any other who had set foot in analien spaceship. Lieutenant Bridges followed him. For an instant there were nowords. Then Bridges saluted briskly:

"Reporting back on board, sir, and returning to watch duty afterpermitted volunteer activity."

The skipper touched his hat sourly. Bridges departed with crispprecision. The skipper regarded Freddy with the helpless fury of a seniorofficer who has been ordered to prove a junior officer a fool, and who hasseen the assighment blow up in his face and that of the superior officers whoordered it. It was an enraging situation. Freddy Holmes, newly commissionedand assigned to the detector station on Luna which keeps track of asteroidsand meteor streams, had discovered a small object coming in over Neptune. Itsspeed was too high for it to be a regular member of the solar system, so he'dreported it as a visitor and suggested immediate examination. But juniorofficers are not supposed to make discoveries. It violates tradition, which isa sort of Ethical Equation in the Space Patrol. So Freddy was slapped down forhis presumption. And he slapped back, on account of the Ethical Equationsbearing upon scientific discoveries. The first known object to come frombeyond the stars ought to be examined. Definitely. So, most unprofessionallyfor a Space Patrol junior, Freddy raised a stink. The present state of affairswas the result. He had an uncle who was a prominent politician. That unclewent before the Space Patrol Board and pointed out smoothly that his nephew'sdiscovery was important. He demonstrated with mathematical precision that the Patrol was being ridiculous in ignoring a significant discovery simply becausea junior officer had made it. And the Board, seething at outside interference, ordered Freddy to be taken to the object he had detected, given absolutecommand of the spacecruiser which had taken him there, and directed to makethe examination he had suggested. By all the laws of probability, he would, have to report that the hunk of matter from beyond the solar system was justlike hunks of matter in it. And then the Board would pin back both his and hisuncle's ears with a vengeance.

But now the hunk of matter turned out to be a fish shaped artifact froman alien civilization. It turned out to be important. So the situation was oneto make anybody steeped in Patrol tradition grind his teeth.

"The thing, sir," said Freddy evenly, "is a spaceship.It is driven byatomic engines shooting blasts sternward from somewhere near the bow. Apparently they steer only by hand. Apparently, too, there was a blow-up inthe engine room and they lost most of their fuel out the tube vents. Afterthat, the ship was helpless though they patched up the engines after afashion. It is possible to calculate that in its practically free fall to the sun it's been in its present state for a couple of thousand years."

"I take it, then," said the skipper with fine irony, "that there are nosurvivors of the crew."

"It presents several problems, sir," said Freddy evenly, "and that's oneof them." He was rather pale. "The ship is empty of air, but her tanks arefull. Storage spaces containing what look like supplies are only partlyemptied. The crew did not starve or suffocate. The ship simply lost most ofher fuel. So it looks like they prepared the ship to endure an indefiniteamount of floating about in free space and"-he hesitated--"the n it looks likethey went into suspended animation. They're all on board, in transparent casesthat have-machinery attached. Maybe they thought they'd be picked up by sisterships sooner or later."

The skipper blinked.

"Suspended animation? They're alive?" Then he said sharply: "What sortof ship is it? Cargo?"

"No, sir," said Freddy. "That's another problem. Bridges and I agreethat it's a fighting ship, sir. There are rows of generators serving thingsthat could only be weapons. By the way they're braced, there are tractor beamsand pressor beams and-there are vacuum tubes that have grids but apparentlywork with cold cathodes. By the size of the cables that lead to them, thosetubes handle amperages up in the thousands. You can figure that one out, sir."

The skipper paced two steps this way, and two steps that. The thing was

stupendous. But his instructions were precise.

"I'm under your orders," he said doggedly. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to work myself to death, I suppose," said Freddy unhappily, "and some other men with me. I want to go over that ship backwards, forwardsand sideways with scanners, and everything the scanners see photographed backoil board, here. I want men to work the scanners and technicians on board todirect them for their specialties. I want to get every rivet and coil in thatwhole ship on film before touching anything."

The skipper said grudgingly:

"That's not too foolish. Very well, Mr. Holmes, it will be done."

"Thank you," said Freddy. He started to leave the bridge, and stopped.

"The men to handle the scanners,"he added, "ought to be rather carefullypicked. Imaginative men wouldn't do. The crew of that ship-they look horriblyalive, and they aren't pretty. And er... the plastic cases they're in arearranged to open from inside. That's another problem still, sir."

He went on down. The skcpper clasped his hands behind his back and beganto pace the bridge furiously. The first object from beyond the stars was aspaceship. It had weapons the Patrol had only vainly imagined. And he, a two- and-a-half-striper, had to stand by and take orders for its investigation froma lieutenant junior grade just out of the Academy. Because of politics! Theskipper ground his teeth--Then Freddy's last comment suddenly had meaning. Theplastic cases in which the alien's crew lay in suspended animation opened fromthe inside. From the inside!

Cold sweat came out on the skipper's forehead as he realized the implication. Tractor and pressor beams, and the ship's fuel not quite gone, and the suspended animation cases opening from the inside-There was a slender, coaxial cable connecting the two spacecraft, now. They drifted insunward togethe r. The little cruiser was dwarfed by the alien giant.

The sun was very far away; brighter than any star, to be sure, andpouring out a fierce radiation, but still very far from a warming orb. Allabout were the small, insuitably distant lights which were stars. There wasexactly one object in view which had an appreciable diameter. That wasJupiter, a new moon in shape; twenty million miles sunward and eighty millionmiles farthe r along its orbit. The rest was emptiness.

The spidery little spaceboat slid along the cable between the two craft. Spacesuited figures got out and clumped on magnetic-soled shoes to the airlock. They went in.

Freddy came to the bridge. The skipper said hoarsely:

"Mr. Holmes, I would like to make a request. You are, by orders of the Board, in command of this ship until your investigation of the ship yonder iscompleted."

Freddy's face,was haggard and worn. He said abstractedly:

"Yes, sir. What is it?"

"I would like," said the Arnina's skipper urgently, "to send a completereport of your investigation so far. Since you are in command, I cannot do sowithout your permission."

"I would rather you didn't, sir," said Freddy. Tired as he was, his jawsclamped. "Frankly, sir, I think they'd cancel your present orders and issueothe rs entirely."

The skipper bit his lip. That was the idea. The scanners had sent backcomplete images of almost everything in the other ship, now. Everything wasrecorded on film. The skipper had seen themonsters which were the crew of the extrasolar vessel. And the plastic cases in which they had slumbered for atleast two thousand years did open from the inside. That was what bothe red him. They did open from the inside!

The electronics technicians of the Arnina were going about in sillyrapture, drawing diagrams for each other and contemplating the results with dazed appreciation. The gunnery officer was making scale, detailed designdrawings for weapons he had never hoped for, and waking up of nights to feelfor those drawings and be sure that they were real. But the engineer officerwas wringing his hands. He wanted to take the other ship's engines apart. Theywere so enormously smaller than the Arnina's drive, and yet they bad driven aship with eighty-four times the Arnina's mass-and he could not see how theycould work.

The alien ship was ten thousand years ahead of the Arnina. Its secretswere being funneled over to the little Earth-ship at a rapid rate. But the cases holding its still living crew opened from the inside.

--"Neverthe less, Mr. Holmes," the skipper said feverishly, "I must askpermission to send that report."

"But I am in command," said Freddy tiredly, "and I intend to stay incommand. I will give you a written order forbidding you to make a report, sir. Disobedience will be mutiny."

The skipper grew almost purple.

"Do you realize," he demanded savagely, "that if the crew of that shipis in suspended animation, and if their coffins or containers open only frominside-do you realize that they expect to open them themselves?"

"Yes, sir," said Freddy wearily. "Of course. Why not?"

"Do you realize That cables from those containers lead tothe rmobatteries in the ship's outer plating? The monsters knew they couldn'tsurvive without power, but they knew that in any other solar system they couldget it! So they made sure they'd pass close to our sun with what power they. dared use, and went into suspended animation with a reserve of power to landon and the rmobatteries that would waken them when it was time to set to work!"

"Yes, sir," said Freddy, as wearily as before. "They had courage, at anyrate. But what would you do about that?"

"I'd report it to Headquarters!" raged the skipper. "I'd report thatthis is a warship capable of blasting the whole Patrol out of the ethe r andsmashing our planets! I'd say it was manned by monsters now fortunatelyhelpless, but with fuel enough to maneuver to a landing. And I'd ask authorityto take their coffins out of their ship and destroy them! Then I'd--"

"I did something simpler," said Freddy. "I disconnected the tbermobatteries. They can't revive. So I'm going to get a few hours' sleep. Ifyou'll excuse me--" He went to his own cabin and threw himself on his bunk.

Men with scanners continued to examine every square inch of themonsterderelict. They worked in spacesuits. To have filled the giant hull with airwould practically have emptied the Arnina's tanks. A spacesuited man held ascanner before a curious roll of flexible substance, on which were inscribedsymbols. His headphones brought instructions from the photo room. A record ofsome sort was being duplicated by photography. There were scanners at work inthe storerooms, the crew's quarters, the gun mounts. So far no single articlehad been moved from the giant stranger. That was Freddy's order. Everypossible bit of information was being extracted from every possible object, but nothing had been taken away. Even chemical analysis was being done byscanner, using cold-light spectrography applied from the laboratory on the cruiser.

And Freddy's unpopularity had not lessened. The engineer officer cursedhim luridly. The stranger's engines, now--They had been patched up after anexplosion, and they were tantalizingly suggestive. But their working wasunfathomable. The engineer officer wanted to get his hands on them. Thephysiochemical officer wanted to do some analysis with his own hands, insteadof by cold-light spectrography over a scanner. And every man, from the lowestenlisted apprentice to the skipper himself, wanted to get hold of someartifact made by an alien, non-human race ten thousand years ahead of human civilization. So Freddy was unpopular.

But that was only part of his unhappiness. He felt that he had actedimproperly. The Ethical Equations gave mathematical proof that probabilitiesand ethics are interlinked, so that final admirable results cannot be expectedfrom unethical beginnings. Freddy had violated discipline-which is one sort ofethics-and after that through his uncle had interjected politics into Patrolaffairs. Which was definitely a crime. By the Equations, the probability ofdisastrous coincidences was going to be enormous until corrective, ethicallyproper action was taken to cancel out the original crimes. And Freddy had beenunable to devise such action. He felt, too, that thematter was urgent. Heslept uneasily despite his fatigue, because there was something in the back ofhis mind which warned him stridently that disaster lay ahead.

Freddy awoke still unrefreshed and stared dully at the ceiling over hishead. He was trying discouragedly to envision a reasonable solution when the recame a tap on his door. It was Bridges with a batch of papers.

"Here you are!" he said cheerfully, when Freddy opened to him. "Nowwe're all going to be happy!"

Freddy took the extended sheets.

"What's happened?" he asked. "Did the skipper send for fresh ordersregardless, and I'm to go in the brig?"

Bridges, grinning, pointed to the sheets of paper in Freddy's hand. Theywere from the physiochemical officer, who was equipped to do exact surveys on the lesser heavenly bodies.

"Elements found in the alien vessel," was the heading of a list. Freddyscanned the list. No heavy elements, but the rest was familiar. There had beenpure nitrogen in the fuel tank, he remembered, and the engineer officer wasgoing quietly mad trying to understand how they had used nitrogen for atomicpower. Freddy looked down to the bottom. Iron was the heaviest elementpresent.

"Why should this make everybody happy?" asked Freddy.

Bridges pointed with his finger. The familiar atomic symbols hadunfamiliar numerals by them. H3, Li5, Gl8--He blinked. He saw N15, O17, F18, S35--Then he stared. Bridges grinned.

"Try to figure what that ship's worth!" he said happily. "It's all overthe Arnina. Prize money isn't allowed in the Patrol, but five percent ofsalvage is. Hydrogen three has been detected on Earth, but never isolated. Lithium five doesn't exist on Earth, or glucinium eight, or nitrogen fifteenor 'oxygen seventeen or fluorine eighteen or sulphur thirty-four--or thirty-five! The whole ship is made up of isotopes that simply don't exist in the solar system! And you know what pure isotopes sell for! The hull's practicallypure iron fifty-five! Pure iron, fifty-four sells for thirty-five credits agram! Talk about the lost treasures of Mars! For technical use only, the stripped hull of this stranger is worth ten years' revenue of Earthgovernment! Every man on the Arnina is rich for life. And you're popular!"

Freddy did not smile.

"Nitrogen fifteen," he said slowly. "That's what's in the remaining fueltank. It goes into a queer little aluminum chamber we couldn't figure out, andfrom there into the drive tubes. I see--"

He was very pale. Bridges beamed.

"A hundred thousand tons of materials that simply don't exist on Earth! Pure isotopes, intact! Not a contamination in a carload! My dear chap, I'vecome to like you, but you've been hated by everyone else. Now come out andbask in admiration and affection!"

Freddy said, unheeding:

"I've been wondering what that aluminum chamber was for. It looked soinfernally simple, and I couldn't see what it did--"

"Come out and have a drink!" insisted Bridges joyously. "Be lionized!

Make friends and influence people!"

"No," said Freddy. He smiled mirthlessly. "I'll be lynched later anyhow. Hm-m-m. I want to talk to the engineer officer. We want to get that shipnavigating under its own power. It's too big to do anything with towlines."

"But nobody's figured out its engines!" protested Bridges. "Apparentlythe re's nothing but a tiny trickle of nitrogen through a sffiy chamber thatdoes something to it, and then it flows through aluminum baffles into the drive tubes. It's too simple! How are you going to make a thing like thatwork?"

"I think," said Freddy, "it's going to be horribly simple. That wholeship is made up of isotopes we don't have on Earth. No. It has aluminum andcarbon. They're simple substances. Theirs and ours are just alike. But most ofthe rest--"

He was pale. He looked as if he were suffering.

"I'll get a couple of tanks made up, of aluminum, and filled withnitrogen. Plain air should do--And I'll want a gyro-control. I'll want it madeof aluminum, too, with graphite bearings--"

He grinned mirthlessly at Bridges.

"Ever hear of the Ethical Equations, Bridges? You'd never expect them tosuggest the answer to a spacedrive problem, would you? But that's what they'vedone. I'll get the engineer officer to have those things made up. It's nice tohave known you, Bridges--"

As Bridges went out, Freddy Holmes sat down, wetting his lips, to makesketches for the engineer officer to work from.

The control room and the engine room of themonster ship were one. Itwas a huge, globular chamber filled with apparatus of startlingly aliendesign. To Freddy, and to Bridges too, now, there was not so much ofmonstrousness as at first. Eight days of familiarity, and knowledge of howthey worked, had made them seem almost normal. But still it was eerie to beltthe mselves before the instrument board, with only their hand lamps forillumination, and cast a last glance at the aluminum replacements of partsthat had been made on some planet of another sun.

"If this works," said Freddy, and swallowed, "we're lucky. Here's the engine control. Cross your fingers, Bridges."

The interior of the hull was still airless. Freddy shifted a queerlyshaped lever an infinitesimal trace. There was a slight surging movement ofthe whole vast hull. A faint murmuring came through the fabric of themonstership to the soles of their spacesuit boots. Freddy wet his lips and touchedanother lever.

"This should be lights."

It was. Images formed On the queerly shaped screens. The whole interiorof the ship glowed. And the whole creation had been so alien as somehow to berevolting in the harsh white light of the hand lamps themen had used. But nowit was like a highly improbable fairy palace. The fact that all doors werecircular and all passages round tubes was only pleasantly strange, in themany-colored glow of the ship's own lighting system. Freddy shook his head inhis spacesuit helmet; as if to shake away drops of sweat on his forehead.

"The next should be heat," he said more grimly than before. "We do nottouch that! Oh, definitely! But we try the drive."

The ship stirred. It swept forward in a swift smooth acceleration thatwas invincibly convincing of power. The Arnina dwindled swiftly, behind. AndFreddy, with compressed lips, touched controls here, and there, and themonstrous ship obeyed with the docility of a willing, well-trained animal. Itswept back to clear sight of the Arnina.

"I would say," said Bridges in a shaking voice, "that it wbrks. ThePatrol has nothing like this!"

"No," said Freddy shortly. His voice sounded sick. "Not like this! It'sa sweet ship. I'm going to hook in the gyro controls. They ought to work. Thecreatures who made this didn't use them. I don't know why. But they didn't."

He cut off everything but the lights. He bent down and looked in the compact little aluminum device which would control the flow of nitrogen to the port and starboard drive tObes.

Freddy came back to the control board and threw in the drive once more. And the gyro control worked. It should. After all, the tool work of a SpacePatrol machinist should be good. Freddy tested it thoroughly. He set it on acertain fine adjustment. He threw three switches. Then he picked up one tinykit he had prepared.

"Come along," he said tiredly. "Our work's over. We go back to the Arnina and I probably get lynched." Bridges, bewildered, followed him to the spidery little spaceboat. Theycast off from the huge ship, now three miles or more from the Arnina anduntenanted save its own monstrous crew us suspended animation The Space Patrolcruiser shifted position to draw near and pick them up. And Freddy saidhardly:

"Remember the Ethical Equations, Bridges? I said they gave me the answerto the t other ship's drive. If they were right, it couldn't have been anythingelse. Now I'm going to find out about something else."

His spacegloved hands worked clumsily. From the tiny kit he spilled outa single small object. He plopped it into something from a chest in the spaceboat-a mortar shell, as Bridges saw incredulously. He dropped that intothe muzzle of a line-mortar the spaceboat carried as a matter of course. Hejerked the lanyard. The mortar flamed. Expanding gases beat at the spacesuitsof themen. A tiny, glowing, crimson spark sped toward outer space. Secondspassed. Three. Four. Five---"Apparently I'm a fool," said Freddy, in the grimmest voice Bridges had ever heard.

But then there was light. And such light! Where the dwindling red sparkof a tracer mortar shell had sped toward infinitely distant stars, there wassuddenly an explosion of such incredible violence as even the proving-groundsof the Space Patrol had never known. There was no sound in empty space. Therewas no substance to be heated to incandescence other than that of a half-poundtracer shell. But there was a flare of blue-white light and a crash of suchviolent static that Bridges was deafened by it. Even through the glass of hishelmet he felt a flash of savage heat. Then there was-nothing.

"What 'was that?" said Bridges, shaken.

"The Ethical Equations," said Freddy. "Apparently I'm not the fool Ithought--"

The Arnina slid up alongside the little spaceboat. Freddy did notalight. He moved the boat over to its cradle and plugged in his communicatorset. He talked over that set with his helmet phone, not radiating a signalthat Bridges could pick up. In three minutes or so the great lock opened andfour spacesuited figures came out. One wore the crested four-communicatorhelmet which only the skipper of a cruiser wears when in command of a landingparty. The newcomers to the outside of the Arnina's hull crowded into the little spaceboat. Freddy's voice sounded again in the headphones, grim andcold.

"I've some more shells, sir. They're tracer shells which have been inthe work boat for eight days. They're not quite as cold as the ship, yonder--that's had two thousand years to cool off in-but they're cold. I figurethe y're not over eight or ten degrees absolute. And here are the bits ofmaterial from the other ship. You can touch them. Our spacesuits are as nearlynonconductive of heat as anything could be. You won't warm them if you holdthe m in your hand."

The skipper-Bridges could see him-looked at the scraps of metal Freddy

held out to him. They were morsels of iron and other material from the alienship. By the cold glare of a handlight the skipper thrust one into the threaded hollow at thenose of a mortar shell into which a line-end is screwed when a line is to be thrown. The skipper himself dropped in themortar shelland fired it. Again a racing, receding speck of red in emptiness. And a secondterrible, atomic blast.

The skipper's voice in the headphones:

"How much more of the stuff did you bring away?"

"Three more pieces, sir," said Freddy's voice, very steady now. "You seehow it happens, sir. They're isotopes we don't have on Earth. And we don'thave them because in contact with other isotopes at normal temperatures, the y're unstable. They go off. Here we dropped them into themortar shells andnothing happened, because both isotopes were cold-down to the temperature ofliquid helium, or nearly. But the re's a tracer compound in the shells, and itburns as they fly away. The shell grows warm. And when either isotope, incontact with the othe r, is as warm as... say...liquid hydrogen... why.... they destroy each othe r. The ship yonder is of the same material. Itsmass is about a hundred thousand Ions. Except for the aluminum and maybe oneor two other elements that also are non-isotopic and the same in both ships, every bit of that ship will blast off if it comes in contact with matter fromthis solar system above ten or twelve degrees absolute."

"Shoot the other samples away," said the ' skipper harshly. "We want tobe sure-!"

There were three violent puffs of gases expanding into empty space. There were three incredible bluewhite flames in the void.'There was silence. Then---"That thing has to be destroyed," said the skipper, heavily. "Wecouldn't set it down anywhere, and its crew might wake up anyhow, at anymoment. We haven't anything that could fight it, and if it tried to land onEarth--"

The alien monster, drifting aimlessly in the void, suddenly moved. Thinflames came from the gill-like openings at the bow. Then one side jetted morestrongly. It swung about, steadied, and swept forward with a terrifying smoothacceleration. It built up speed vastly more swiftly than any Earth-ship couldpossibly do. It dwindied to a speck. It vanished in empty space.

But it was not bound inward toward the sun. It was not headed for the plainly visible half-moon disk of Jupiter, now barely seventy million milesaway. It headed out toward the stars.

"I wasn't sure until a few minutes ago," said Freddy Holmes unsteadily, "but by the Ethical Equations something like that was probable. I couldn'tmake certain until we'd gotten everything possible from it, and until I hadeverything arranged. But I was worried from the first. The Ethical Equationsmade it pretty certain that if we did the wrong-thing we'd suffer for it... and by we I mean the whole Earth, because any visitor from beyond the starswould be bound to affect the Whole human race." His voice wavered a little. "It was hard to figure out what we ought to do. If one of our ships had been. in the same fix, though, we'd have hoped for--friendliness. We'd hope forfuel, maybe, and help in starting back home. But this ship was a warship, andwe'd have been helpless to fight it. It would have been hard to be friendly. Yet, according to the Ethical Equations, if we wanted our first contact withan alien civilization to be of benefit to us, it was up to us to get itstarted back home with plenty of fuel."

"You mean," said the skipper, incredulously, "you mean you--"

"Its engines use nitrogen," said Freddy. "It runs nitrogen fifteen intoa little gadget we know how to make, now. It's very simple, but it's a sort ofatom smasher: It turns nitrogen fifteen into nitrogen fourteen and hydrogen. Ithink we can make use of that for ourselves. Nitrogen fourteen is the kind wehave. It can be handled in aluminum pipes and tanks, because the re's only one

aluminium, which is stable under all conditions. But when it bits the alien

isotopes in the drive tubes, it breaks down--"

He took a deep breath.

"I gave them a double aluminum tank of nitrogen, and bypassed their atomsmasher. Nitrogen fourteen goes into their drive tubes, and they drive! And . . . I figured back their orbit, and set a gyro to head them back for their ownsolar system for as long as the first tank of nitrogen holds out. They'll makeit out of the sun's gravitational field on that, anyhow. And I reconnectedthe ir the rmobatteries. When they start to wake up they'll see the gyro andknow that somebody gave it to them. The double tank is like their own andthe y'll realize they have a fresh supply of fuel to land with. It... may bea thousand years before they're back home, but when they get there they'llknow we're friendly and... not afraid of them. And meanwhile we've got allthe ir gadgets to work on -and work with--" Freddy was silent. The littlespaceboat clung to the side of the Arnina, which with its drive off was nowdrifting in sunward past the orbit of Jupiter.

"It is very rare," said the skipper ungraciously, "that a superiorofficer in the Patrol apologizes to an inferior, But I apologize to you, Mr. Holmes, for thinking you a fool. And when I think that I, and certainly everyother Patrol officer of experience, would have thought of nothing but settingthat ship down at Patrol Base for study, and when I think what an atomicexplosion of a hundred thousand tons of matter would have done to Earth... I apologize a second time."

Freddy said uncomfortably:

"If there are to be any apologies made, sir, I guess I've got to makethe m. Every man on the Arnina has figured he's rich, and I've sent it all backwhere it came from. But you see, sir, the Ethical Equations-

When Freddy's resignation went in with the report of his investigationof the alien vessel, it was returned marked "Not Accepted." And Freddy wasordered to report to a tiny, hardworked spacecan on which a junior SpacePatrol officer normally gets his ears pinned back and learns his work the hardway. And Freddy was happy, because he wanted to be a Space Patrol officer morethan he wanted anything else in the world. His uncle was satisfied, too, because he wanted Freddy to be content, and because certain space-admiralstruculently told him that Freddy was needed in the Patrol and would get allthe consideration and promotion he needed without any politicians butting in. And the Space Patrol was happy because it had a lot of new gadgets to workwith which were going to make it a force able not, only to look afterinterplanetary traffic but defend it, if necessary.

And, for that matter, the Ethical Equations were satisfied.

Pipeline to Pluto

FAR, FAR OUT on Pluto, where the sun is only a very bright star and a frozen, airless globe circles in emptiness; far out on Pluto, there was motion. Theperpetual faint starlight was abruptly broken. Yellow lights shone suddenly ina circle, and men in spacesuits waddled to a space tug-absurdly marked Betsy- Anne in huge white letters. They climbed up its side and went in the air lock. Presently a faint, jetting glow appeared below its drive tubes. It flaredsuddenly and the tug lifted, to hover expertly a brief distance above whatseemed an unmarred field of frozen atmosphere. But that field heaved andbroke. The nose of a Pipeline carrier appeared in the center of a cruciformopening. It thrust through. It stood half its length above the surface of the dead and lifeless planet. The tug drifted above it. Its grapnel dropped down,

jetted minute flames, and engaged in themonster tow ring at the carrier'sbow.

The tug's drive tubes flared luridly. The carrier heaved abruptly up outof its hiding place and plunged for the heavens behind the tug. It had a hugeclass mark and number painted on its side, which was barely visible as itwhisked out of sight. It. went on up at four gravities acceleration, while the space tug lined out on themost precise of courses and drove fiercely foremptiness.

A long, long time later, when Pluto was barely a pallid disk behind, the tug cast off. The carrier went on, sunward. Its ringed nose pointedunwaveringly to the sun, toward which it would drift for years. It was one of a long, long line of carriers drifting through space, a day apart in time butmillions of miles apart in distance.

They would go on until a tug from Earth came out and grappled them andtowed them in to their actual home planet.

But the Betsy-Anne, of Pluto, did not pause for contemplation of the two-billion-mile-long line of ore carriers taking themetal of Pluto back toEarth. It darted off from the line its late tow now followed. Its radio locator beam flickered invisibly in emptiness. Presently its course changed. It turned about. It braked violently, going up to six gravities decelerationfor as long as half a minute at a time. Presently it came to rest and the refloated toward it an object from Earth, a carrier with great white numerals onits sides. It had been hauled off Earth and flung into an orbit which wouldfetch it out to Pluto. The Betsy-Anne's grapnel floated toward it and jettedtiny sparks until the towring was engaged. Then the tug and its new tow fromEarth started back to Pluto.

There were two long lines of white-numbered carriers floating sedatelythrough space. One line drifted tranquilly in to Earth. One drifted no lesstranquilly out past the orbits of six planets to reach the closed-in, underground colony of themines on Pluto.

Togethe r they made up the Pipeline.

The evening Moon-rocket took off over to thenorth and went straight upto the zenith. Its blue-white rocket-flare changed color as it fell behind, until the tail end was a deep, rich crimson. The Pipeline docks were silent, now, but opposite theyard the row of flimsy eating and drinking-placesrattled and thuttered to themselves from the lower-than-sound vibrations of the Moon-ship.

There was a youngish, battered man named Hill in the Pluto Bar, oppositethe docks. He paid no attention to the Moon-rocket, but he looked up sharplyas a man came out of the Pipeline gate and came across the street toward the bar. But Hill was staring at his drink when the door opened and theman fromthe dock looked the small dive over. Besides Hill-who looked definitely tough, and as if he had but recently recovered from a ravaging illness-there was onlythe bartender, a catawheel-truck driver and his girl having a drink togethe r, and another man at a table by himself and fidgeting nervously as if he werewaiting for someone. Hill's eyes flickered again to theman in the door. Helooked suspicious. But then he looked back at his glass.

The other man came in and went to the bar.

"Evenin', Mr. Crowder," said the bartender.

Hill's eyes darted up, and down again. The bartender reached below the bar, filled a glass, and slid it across themahogany.

"Evenin'," said Crowder curtly. He looked deliberately at the fidgetyman. He seemed to note that the fidgety man was alone. He gave no sign ofrecognition, but his features pinched a little, as some men's do when theyfeel a little, crawling unease. But there was nothing wrong except that the fidgety man seemed to be upset because he was waiting for someone who hadn'tcome.

Crowder sat down in a booth, alone. Hill waited a moment, looked sharplyabout him, and then stood up. He crossed purposefully to the booth in whichCrowder sat.

"I'm lookin' for a fella named Crowder," he said huskily. "That's you, ain't it?"

Crowder looked at him, his face instantly mask like. Hill's looksmatched his voiced. There was a scar under one eye. He had a cauliflower ear. He looked battered, and hard-boiled-and as if he had just recovered from someserious injury or illness. His skin was reddened in odd patches.

"My name is Crowder," said Crowder suspiciously. "What is it?"

Hill sat down opposite him.

"My name's Hill," he said in the same husky voice. "There was a guy whowas gonna come here tonight. He'd fixed it up to be stowed away on a Pipelinecarrier to Pluto. I bought 'im off. I bought his chance. I came here to takehis place."

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Crowder coldly.

But he did. Hill could see that he did. His stomach-muscles knotted. He was uneasy. Hill's gaze grew scornful.

"You're the night super of the Pipeline yards, ain't you?" he demandedtruculently.

Crowder's face stayed mask like. Hill looked tough. He looked like the sort of yegg who'd get into trouble with the police because he'd never thinkthings out ahead. He knew it and he didn't care. Because he had gotten introuble-often-because he didn't think things out ahead. But he wasn't that waytonight. He'd planned tonight in detail.

"Sure I'm the night superintendent of the Pipeline yards," said Crowdershortly. "I came over for a drink. I'm going back. But I don't know whatyou're talking about."

Hill's eyes grew hard.

"Listen, fella," he said truculently-but he had been really ill, and the signs of it were plain--"the y're payin' five hundred credits a day in theminesout on Pluto, ain't they? A guy works a year out there, he comes back rich, don't he?"

"Sure!" said Crowder. "The wages got set by law when it cost a lot toship supplies out. Before the Pipeline got going."

"And they ain't got enough guys to work, have they?"

"There's a shortage," agreed Crowder coldly. "Everybody knows it. Theliners get fifty thousand credits for a one-way passage, and it takes sixmonths for the trip."

Hill nodded, truculently.

"I wanna get out to Pluto," he said huskily. "See? They don't ask toomany questions about a guy when he turns up out there. But the space liners, they do, and they want too many credits. So I wanna go out in a carrier byPipeline. See?"

Hill downed his drink and stood up.

"There's a law," Crowder said uncompromisingly, "that says the Pipelinecan't carry passengers or mails. The space lines jammed that through. Politics."

"Maybe," said Hill pugnaciously, "but you promised to let a guy stowaway on the carrier tonight. He told me about it. I paid him off. He sold mehis place. I'm takin' it, see?"

"I'm night superintendent at theyards," Crowder told him. "If there arearrangements for stowaways, I don't know about them. You're talking to the wrong man."

He abruptly left the table. He walked across the room to the fidgetyman, who seemed more and more uneasy because somebody hadn't turned up. Crowder's eyes were viciously angry when he bent over the fidgety man.

"Look here, Moore!" he said savagely, in a low tone. "That guy is on! Hesays he paid your passenger to let him take his place. That's why your manhasn't showed up. You picked him out and he sold his place to this guy. So I'mleaving it right in your lap! I can lie myself clear. They couldn't get anyevidence back, anyhow. Not for years yet. But what he told me is straight, he's got to go or he'll shoot off his mouth! So it's in your lap!"

The eyes of Moore-the fidgety man-had a hunted look in them. Heswallowed as if his mouth were dry. But he nodded.

Crowder went out. Hill scowled after him. After a moment he came over to Moore.

"Lookahere," he said huskily. "I wanna know something. That guy's nightsuper for Pipeline, ain't he?"

Moore nodded. He licked his lips.

"Lissen!" said Hill angrily, "the re's a Pipeline carrier leaves hereevery day for Pluto, and one comes in from Pluto every day. It's just likegettin' on a 'copter and goin' from one town to another on the Pipeline, ain'tit?"

Moore nodded again-this time almost unnoticeably.

"That's what a guy told me," said Hill pugnaciously. "He said he'd gotit all fixed up to stow away on a carrier-load of grub. He said he'd paidfifteen hundred credits to have it fixed up. He was gonna leave tonight. Ipaid him off to let me take his place. Now this guy Crowder tells me I'mcrazy!"

"I... wouldn't know anything about it," said Moore, hesitantly. "Iknow Crowder, but that's all."

Hill growled to himself. He doubled up his fist and looked at it. It wasa capable fist. There were scars on it as proof that things had been hit withit.

"O.K.!" said Hill. "I guess that guy kidded me. He done me outta plentycredits. I know where to find him. He's goin' to a hospital!"

He stirred, scowling.

"W-wait a minute," said Moore. "It seems to me I heard something, once--"

Carriers drifted on through space. They were motorless save for the tinydrives for the gyros in their noses. They were a hundred feet long, and twentyfeet thick, and some of them contained foodstuffs in air-sealed containers- because everything will freeze, in space, but even ice will evaporate in avacuum. Some carried drums of rocket fuel for the tugs and heaters and the generators for themines on Pluto. Some contained tools and books andvisiphone records and caviar and explosives and glue and cosmetics for the women on Pluto. But all of them drifted slowly, leisurely, unhurriedly, uponthe ir two-billion-mile journey.

They were the Pipeline. You put a carrier into the line at Earth, headedout to Pluto. The same day you took a carrier out of space at the end of the line, at Pluto. You put one into the Earth-bound line, on Pluto. You took oneout of space the same day, on Earth. There was continuous traffic between the two planets, with daily arrivals and departures from each. But passenger- traffic between Earth and Pluto went by space liners, at a fare of fiftythousand credits for the trip. Because even the liners took six months for the journey, and the Pipeline carriers-well, there were over twelve hundred ofthe m in each line going each way, a day apart in time and millions of milesapart in space. They were very lonely, those long cylinders with their white- painted numbers on their sides. The stars were the only eyes to look upon themwhile they traveled, and it took three years to drift from one end of the pipeline to the othe r.

But neverthe less there were daily arrivals and departures on the Pipeline, and there was continuous traffic between the two planets.

Moore turned away from the pay-visiphone, into which he had talked in a

confidential murmur while the screen remained blank. The pugnacious, batteredHill scowled impatiently behind him.

"I'm not sure," said Moore uneasily. "I talked to somebody I thoughtmight know something, but they're cagey. They'd lose their jobs and maybe getin worse trouble if anybody finds out they're smuggling stowaways to Pluto. Y'see, the spacelines have a big pull in politics. They've got it fixed so the Pipeline can't haul anything but freight. If people could travel by Pipeline, the space liners could go broke. So they watch close."

He looked uneasy as he spoke. His eyes watched Hill almost alarmedly. But Hill said sourly: "O.K.! I'm gonna find that guy that sold me his place, and I'm gonna write a message on him with a blowtorch. The docs'll have funreadin' him, and why he's in the hospital!"

Moore swallowed.

"Who was it? I've heard something--"

Hill bit off thename. Moore swallowed again as if thename meantsomething. As if it were right.

"I... I'll tell you, guy," said Moore. "It's none of my business, but

I... well... I might be able to fix things up for you. It's risky, though, butting in on something that ain't my business."

"How much?" said Hill shortly.

"Oh... f-five hundred," said Moore uneasily.

Hill stared at him. Hard. Then he pulled a roll out of his pocket. Hedisplayed it.

"I got credits," he said huskily. "But I'm givin' you just one hundredof 'em. I'll give you nine hundred more when I'm all set. That's twice whatyou asked for. But that's all, see? I got a reason to get off Earth, andtonight, I'll pay to manage it. But if I'm double-crossed, somebody getshurt!"

Moore grinned nervously. "No double-crossing in this," he said quickly. "Just well... it is ticklish."

"Yeah," said Hill. He waved a battered-knuckled hand. "Get goin'. Tellthose guys I'm willin' to pay. But I get stowed away, or I'll fix that guy whosold me his place so he'll tell all he knows! I'm goin' to Pluto, or else!"

Moore said cautiously: "M-maybe you'll have to pay out a little more, but not much! But you'll get there! I've heard... just heard, youunderstand... that the gang here smuggles a fella into the Pipeline yardand up into thenose of a carrier loaded with grub. Champagne and all that. Hecan live high on the way, and not worry because out on Pluto they're soanxious to get a man to work that they'll square things. They need men bad, out on Pluto! They pay five hundred credits a day!"

"Yeah," said Hill grimly. "They need 'em so bad there ain't noextradition eithe r. I'm int'rested in that, too. Now get goin' and fix me up!"

The Pipeline was actually a two-billion-mile arrangement of specks ininfinity. Each of the specks was a carrier. Each of the carriers was motorlessand inert. Each was unlighted. Each was lifeless. But-some of them hadcontained life when they started.

The last carrier out from Earth, to be sure, contained nothing but itsproper cargo of novelties, rocket fuel, canned goods, and plastic base. .Butin the one beyond that, there was what had been a hopeful stowaway. A man, with his possessions neatly piled about him. He'd been placed up in thenoseof the carrier, and he'd waited, mousy-still, until the spacetug connectedwith the tow ring and heaved the carrier out to the beginning of the Pipeline. As a stowaway, he hadn't wanted to be discovered. The carrier ahead of that- many millions of miles farthe r out contained two girls, who had heard thatstenographers were highly paid on Pluto, and that there were so few women thata girl might take her pick of husbands. The one just before that had a man andwoman in it. There were four men in the carrier beyond them.

The hundred-foot cylinders drifting out and Out and out toward Plutocontained many stowaways. The newest of them still looked quite human. Theylooked quite tranquil. After all, when a carrier is hauled aloft at fourgravities acceleration the air flows out of the bilgevalves very quickly, butthe cold comes in more quickly still. None of the stowaways had actuallysuffocated. They'd frozen so suddenly they probably did not realize what washappening. At sixty thousand feet the temperature is around seventy degreesbelow zero. At a hundred and twenty thousand feet it's so cold that figuressimply haven't any meaning. And at four gravities acceleration you reach ahundred and twenty thousand feet before you've really grasped the fact thatyou paid all your money to be flung unprotected into space. So you never quiterealize that you're going on out into a vacuum which will gradually draw everyatom of moisture front every tissue of your body.

But, though there were many stowaways, not one had yet reached Pluto. They would do so in time, of course. But the practice of smuggling stowawaysto Pluto had only been in operation for a year and a half. The first of the deluded ones had not quite passed the halfway mark. So the stowaway businessshould be safe and profitable for at least a year and a half more. Then itwould be true that a passenger entered the Pipeline from Earth and a passengerreached Pluto on the same day. But it would not be the same passenger, andthere would be other differences. Even then, though, the racket would simplystop being profitable, because there was no extradition either to or fromPluto.

So the carriers drifting out through emptiness with, their stowawayswere rather ironic, in a way. There were tragedies within them, and nothingcould be done about them. It was ironic that the carriers gave no sign of the freight they bore. They moved quite sedately, quite placidly, with a vastleisure among the stars.

The battered youngish man said coldly, "Well? You fixed it?"

Moore grinned nervously.

"Yeah. It's all fixed. At first they thought you might be an undercoverman for the passenger lines, trying to catch the Pipeline smuggling passengersso they could get its charter canceled. But they called up theman whose placeyou took, and it's straight. He said he gave you his place and told you to seeCrowder."

Hill said angrily: "But he stalled me!"

Moore licked his lips.

"You'll get the picture in a minute. We cross the street and go in the Pipeline yard. You have to slip the guard something. A hundred credits forlooking the other way."

Hill growled:

"No more stalling!"

"No more stalling," promised Moore. "You go out to Pluto in thenextcarrier."

They went out of the Pluto Bar. They crossed the street, which was thin, black, churned-up mud from the catawheel trucks which hauled away each day'sarrival of freight from Pluto. They moved directly and openly for the gateway. The guard strolled toward them.

"Slim," said Moore, grinning nervously, "meet my friend Hill."

"Sure!" said the guard.

He extended his hand, palm up.. Hill put a hundred credit note in it.

"O.K.," said the guard. "Luck on Pluto, fella."

He turned his back. Moore snickered almost hysterically and led the wayinto the dark recesses of theyard. There was the landing field for the spacetugs. There were six empty carriers off to one side. There was one in aloading pit, sunk down on a hydraulic platform until only its nose now showedaboveground. It could be loaded in its accelerating position, that way, and

would not need to be upended after reaching maximum weight.

"Take-off is half an hour before sunrise today," said Moore jerkily. "You'll know when it's coming because the hydraulic platform shoves the carrier up out of the pit. Then you'll hear the grapnel catching in the towring. Then you start. The tug puts you in the Pipeline and hangs around andpicks up the other carrier coming back."

"That's speed!" said Hill, "Them scientists are great stuff, huh? Istart off in that, and before I know it I'm on Pluto!"

"Yeah," said Moore. He smirked with a twitching, ghastly effect. "Beforeyou know it. Here's the door where you go in."

Crowder came around the other side of the carrier's cone-shaped nose. Hescowled at Hill, and Hill scowled back.

"You sounded phony to me," said Crowder ungraciously. "I wasn't going totake any chances by admitting anything. Moore told you it's going to cost youextra?"

"For what?" demanded Hill, bristling.

"Because you've got to get away fast," said Crowder evenly. "Becausethe re's no extradition from Pluto. We're not in this for our health. Two thousand credits more."

Hill snarled:

"Thief" Then he said sullenly. "O.K."

"And my nine hundred," said Moore eagerly.

"Sure," said Hill, sardonically. He paid. "O.K. now? Whadda I do now?"

"Go in the door here," said Crowder. "The cargo's grub. Get comfortableand lay flat on your back when you feel the carrier coming up to be hitched onfor towing After the acceleration's over and you're in the Pipeline, do as youplease"

"Yeah!" said Moore, giggling nervously "Do just as you please"

Hill said tonelessly

"Right. I'll start now."

He moved with a savage, infuriated swiftness. There was a queer, muffledcracking sound. Then a startled gasp from Moore, a moment's struggle, andanother sharp crack.

Hill went into thenose of the carrier. He dragged them in. He stayedinside for minutes. He came out and listened, swinging a leathe r blackjackmeditatively. Then he went over to the gate.

He called cautiously to the guard: "You! Slim! Crowder says come quick- and quiet! Somethin's happened and him and Moore got their hands full."

The guard blinked, and then came quickly. Hill hurried behind him to the loading pit. As the guard called tensely: "Hey, Crowder, what's thematter?"

Hill swung the blackjack again, with a certain deft precision. The guardcollapsed.

A little later Hill had finished his work. The three men were bound with infinite, science. They not only could not escape, they could not even kick. That's quite a trick-but it can be done if you study the art. And they werenot only gagged, but there was tape over their mouths beyond the gag, so thatthey could not even make a respectable groaning noise. And Hill surveyed the three of them by the light of a candle he had taken from his pocket-as he hadtaken the rope from about his waist-and said in husky satisfaction:

"O.K. O.K.! I'm givin' you fellas some bad news. You're headin' out toPluto."

Terror-close to madness shone in the three pairs of eyes which fixedfrantically upon him. The eyes seemed to threaten to start from their sockets.

"It ain't so bad," said Hill grimly. "Not like you think it is. You'llget there before you know it. No kidding! You'll go snakin'up at fourgravities, and the air'll go out. But you won't die of that. Before youstrangle, you'll freeze-and fast! You'll freeze so fast y'won't have time to

die, fellas. That's the funny part. You freeze so quick you ain't got time todie! The Space Patrol found out a year or so back that that can happen, whenthings are just right-and they will be, for you. So the Space Patrol will beall set to bring you back, when y'get to Pluto. But it does hurt, fellas. Ithurts like' hell!

I oughta know!"

He grinned at them, his mouth twisted and his eyes grim.

"I paid you fellas to send me out to Pluto last year. But it happened Ididn't get to Pluto. The Patrol dragged my carrier out o' the Pipeline andover to Callisto because they hadda shortage o' rocket fuel there. So I' beenthrough it, and it hurts.! I wouldn't tell on you fellas, because I wanted youto have it, so I took my bawlin' out for stowin' away and come back to sendyou along. So you' goin', fellas! And you' goin' all the way to Pluto! Andremember this, fellas! It's gonna be good! After they bring you back, Outthere on Pluto, every fella and every soul you sent off as stowaways, they'llbe there on Pluto waitin' for you. It's gonna be good, guys! It's gonna begood!"

He looked at them in the candlelight, and seemed to take a vastsatisfaction in their expressions. Then he blew out the candle, and closed thenose door of the carrier, and went away.

And half an hour before sunrise next morning the hydraulic platformpushed the carrier up, and a space tug hung expertly overhead and its grapnelcame down and hooked in the tow ring, and then the carrier jerked skyward atfour gravities acceleration.

Far out from Earth, the carrier went on, the latest of a long line ofspecks in infinity which constituted the Pipeline to Pluto. Many of thosespecks contained things which had been human and would be human again. But noweach one drifted sedately away from the sun, and in the later carriers the stowaways still looked completely human and utterly tranquil. What hadhappened to them had come so quickly that they did not realize what it was. But in the last carrier of all, with three bound, gagged figures 'in its nose, the expressions were not tranquil at all. Because those men did know what hadhappened to them. More they knew what was yet to come.

The Power

(Memorandum from Professor Charles, Latin Department, Haverford University, toProfessor McFarland, the same faculty:

Dear Professor McFarland:

In a recent batch of fifteenth-century Latin documents from abroad, wefound three which seem to fit togethe r. Our interest is in the Latin of the period, but their contents seems to bear upon your line. I send them to youwith a free translation. Would you let me know your reaction?

Charles.

To Johannus Hartmannus, Licentiate in Philosophy, Living at the house of the Goldsmith Grote, Lane of the Dyed Fleece, Leyden, the Low Countries.

Friend Johannus:

I write this from the Goth's Head Inn, in Padua, the second day afterMichaelmas, Anno Domini 1482. I write in haste because a worthy Hoilander herejourneys homeward and has promised to carry mails for me. He is an amiablelout, but ignorant. Do not speak to him of mysteries. He knows nothing. Lessthan nothing. Thank him, give him to drink, and speak of me as a pious andworthy student. Then forget him.

I leave Padua tomorrow for the realization of all my hopes and yours. This time I am sure. I came here to purchase perfumes and mandragora and the other necessities for an Operation of the utmost imaginable importance, whichI will conduct five nights hence upon a certain hilltop near the village ofMontevecchio. I have found a Word and a Name of incalculable power, which inthe place that I know of must open to me knowledge of my mysteries. When youread this, I shall possess powers of which Hermes Trismegestus only guessed, and which Albertus Magnus could speak of only by hearsay. I have been deceivedbefore, but this time I am sure. I have seen proofs!

I tremble with agitation as I write to you. I will be brief. I came uponthe se proofs and the Word and the Name in the village of Montevecchio. I rodeinto the village at nightfall, disconsolate because I had wasted a monthsearching for a learned man of whom I had heard great things. Then I found himand he was but a silly antiquary with no knowledge of mysteries! So, ridingupon my way I came to Montevecchio, and there they told me of a man dying eventhe n because he had worked wonders. He had entered the village on foot onlythe day before. He was clad in rich garments, yet he spoke like a peasant. Atfirst he was mild and humble, but he paid for food and wine with a gold piece, and villagers fawned upon him and asked for alms. He flung them a handful ofgold pieces and when thenews spread the whole village went mad with greed. They clustered about him, shrieking pleas, and thronging ever themoreurgently as he strove to satisfy them. It is said that he grew frightened andwould have fled because of their thrusting against him. But they plucked athis garments, screaming of their poverty, until suddenly his rich clothingvanished in the twinkling of an eye and he was but another ragged peasant likethe mselves and the purse from which he had scattered gold became a mere coarsebag filled with ashes.

This had happened but the day before my arrival, and theman was yetalive, though barely so because the villagers bad cried witchcraft and besethim with flails and stones and then dragged him to the village priest to beexorcised.

I saw theman and spoke to him, Johannus, by representing myself to the priest as a pious student of the snares Satan has set in the form ofwitchcraft. He barely breathe d, what with broken bones and pitchfork wounds. He was a native of the district, who until now had seemed a simple ordinarysoul. To secure my intercession with the priest to shrive him where he died, theman told me all. And it was much!

Upon this certain hillside where I shall perform the Operation fivenights hence, he had dozed at midday. Then a Power appeared to him andoffered. to instruct him in mysteries. The peasant was stupid. He asked forriches instead. So the Power gave him rich garments and a purse which wouldnever empty so long, said the Power, as it came not near a certain metal whichdestroys all things of mystery, And the Power warned that this was paymentthat he might send a learned man to learn what he had offered the peasant, because he saw that peasants had no understanding. Thereupon I told the peasant that I would go and greet this Power and fulfill his desires, and hetold me the Name and the Word which would call him, and also the Place, begging me to intercede for him with the priest.

The priest showed me a single gold piece which remained of that whichthe peasant had distributed. It was of the age of Antoninus Pius, yet brightand new as if fresh-minted. It had the weight and feel of true gold. But the

priest, worryly, laid upon it the crucifix he wears upon a small iron chainabout his waist. Instantly it vanished, leaving behind a speck of glowing coalwhich cooled and was a morsel of ash.

This I saw, Johannus! So I came speedily here to Padua, to purchaseperfumes and mandragora and the other necessities for an Operation to paygreat honor to this Power whom I shall call up five nights hence. He offeredwisdom to the peasant, who desired only gold. But I desire wisdom more thangold, and surely I am learned concerning mysteries and Powers! I do not knowany but yourself who surpasses me in true knowledge of secret things. And whenyou read this, Johannus, I shall surpass even you! But it may be that I willgain knowledge so that I can transport myself by a mystery to your attic, andthere inform you myself, in advance of this letter, of the results of thissurpassing good fortune which causes me shake with agitation whenever I thinkof it.

Your friend Carolus,

At the Goth's Head

Inn in Padua.

Fortunate, perhaps, that an opportunity has come to send a secondmissive to you, through a crippled man-at-arms who has been discharged from amercenary band and travels homeward to sit in the sun henceforth. I have givenhim one gold piece and promised that you would give him another on receipt ofthis message. You will keep that promise or not, as pleases you, but there isat least the value of a gold piece in a bit of parchment with strange symbolsupon it which I inclose for you.

Item: I am in daily communication with the Power of which I wrote you, anddaily learn great mysteries.

Item: Already I perform marvels such as men have never before accomplished, bymeans of certain sighs or talismans the Power has prepared for me.

Item: Resolutely the Power refuses toyield to me the Names or the incantations

by which the se things are done so that I can prepare such sigils for

myself. Instead, he instructs me in divers subjects which have nobearing on the accomplishment of wonders, to my bitter impatience which Iyet dissemble.

Item: Within this packet there is a bit of parchment. Go to a remote place and there tear it and throw it upon the ground. Instantly, all about you, there will appear a fair garden with marvelous fruits, statuary, and pavilions. You may use this garden as you will, save that if any person enter it, or you yourself, carrying a sword or dagger or any object however small made of iron, the said garden will disappear immediatelyand nevermore return.

This you may verify when you please. For the rest, I am like a persontrembling at the very door of Paradise, barred from entering beyond the antechamber by the fact of the Power withholding from me the true essentialsof mystery, and granting me only crumbs, which, however, are greater marvelsthan any known certainly to have been practiced before. For example, the parchment I send you. This art I have proven many times. I have in my scriptmany such sights, made for me by the Power at my entreaty. But when I havesecretly taken other parchments and copied upon them the very symbols to the utmost exactitude, they are valueless. There are words or formulas to bespoken over them or I think more likely, a greater sigil which gives the

parchments their magic property. I begin to make a plan, a very daring plan, to acquire even this sight.

But you will wish to know of the Operation and its results., I returnedto Montevecchio from Padua, reaching it in three days. The peasant who hadworked wonders was dead, the villagers having grown more, fearful and beatout, his brains with hammers. This pleased me, because I had feared be wouldtell another the Word and Name, he had told me. I spoke to the priest, andtold him that I had been to Padua and secured advice from, high dignitariesconcerning the wonder-working, and had been sent back with special commands toseek out and exorcise the foul fiend who had taught the peasant such marvels.

The next day, the priest himself aiding me!I took up to the hilltop the perfumes and wax tapers and other things needed for the Operation. The priesttrembled, but he would have remained had I not sent him away. And, night fell, and I drew themagic circle and the pentangle with the Signs in their properplaces.. And when thenew moon rose, I lighted the perfumes and the finecandles and began the Operation. I have had many failures, as you know, butthis time I knew confidence and perfect certainty. When it came time to usethe Name and the Word I called them both loudly, thrice, and waited....

Upon this hilltop there were many grayish stones. At the third callingof the Name, one of the stones shivered and was not. Then a voice said dryly:

"Ah! So That is the reason for this stinking stuff? My messenger sentyou here?"

There was a shadow where the stone had been and I could not see clearly. But I bowed low in that direction:

"Most Potent Power," I said, 'my voice trembling because the Operationwas a success, "a peasant working wonders told me that you desired speech witha learned man. Besides your Potency I am ignorant indeed, but I have given mywhole life to the study of mysteries. Therefore I have come to offer worshipor such other compact as you may desire in exchange for wisdom." There was astirring in the shadow, and the Power came forth. His appearance was that of acreature not more than an ell and a half in height, and his expression in themoonlight was that of sardonic impatience. The fragrant smoke seemed to clingabout him, to make a cloudiness close about his form.

"I think," said the dry voice, "that you are as great a fool as the peasant I spoke to. What do you think I am?"

"A Prince of Celestial Race, your Potency," I said, my voice shaking.

There was a pause. The Power said as if wearily, "Men! Fools forever! Oh, Man, I am simply the last of a number of my kind who traveled in a fleetfrom another star. This small planet of yours has a core of the accursedmetal, which is fatal to the devices of my race. A few of our ships came tooclose. Othe rs strove to aid them, and shared their fate. Many, many yearssince, we descended from the . skies and could never rise again. Now I alone amleft."

Speaking of the world as a planet was an absurdity, of course. Theplanets are wanderers among the stars, traveling in their cycles and epicyclesas explained by Ptolemy a thousand years since. But I saw at once that hewould test me. So I grew bold and said:

"Lord, I am not fearful. It is not needful to cozen me. Do I not know ofthose who were cast out of Heaven for rebeffion? Shall I write thename of your leader?"

He said "Eh?" for all the world like, an elderly man.

So smiling, I wrote on the earth the true name of Him whom the vulgarcall Lucifer. He regarded themarkings on the earth and said:

"Bah! It is meaningless. More of your legendary! Look you, Man, soon Ishall die. For more years than you are like to believe I have hid from yourrace and its accursed metal. I have watched men, and despised them. But I die. And it is not good that knowledge should perish. It is my desire to impart to

men the knowledge which else would die with me. It can do no harm to my ownkind, and may bring the race of men to some degree of civilization in the course of ages." I bowed to the earth before him. I was aflame with eagerness.

"Most Potent One," I said joyfully. "I am to be trusted. I will guardyour secrets fully. Not one jot nor tittle shall ever be divulged!"

Again his voice was annoyed and dry.

"I desire that this knowledge be spread abroad so that all may learnit." Then he made a sound which I do not understand, save that it seemed to bederisive. "But what I have to say may serve, even garbled and twisted. And Ido not think you will keep secrets inviolate! Have you pen and parchment?"

"Nay, Lord!"

"You will come again, then, prepared to write what I shall tell you."

But he remained, regarding me. He asked me questions, and I answeredeagerly. Presently he spoke in a meditative voice, and I listened eagerly. Hisspeech bore an odd similarity to that of a lonely man who dwelt much on the past, but soon I realized that he spoke in ciphers, in allegory, from whichnow and again the truth peered out. As one who speaks for the sake ofremembering, he spoke of the home of his race upon what he said was a fairplanet so far distant that to speak of leagues and even the span of continentswould be useless to convey the distance. He told of cities in which hisfellows dwelt here, of course, I understood his meaning perfectly, and told ofgreat fleets of flying things rising from those cities to go to other faircities, and of music which was in the very air so that any person, anywhereupon the planet, could hear sweet sounds or wise discourse at will. In thismatter there was no metaphor, because the perpetual sweet sounds in Heaven arematters of common knowledge. But he added a metaphor immediately after, because he smiled at me and observed that themusic was not created by amystery, but by waves like those of light, only longer. And this was plainly acipher, because light is an impalpable fluid without length and surely withoutwaves!

Then he spoke of flying through the emptiness of the empyrean, whichagain is not clear, because all can see that the heavens are fairly crowdedwith stars, and he spoke of many suns and other worlds, some frozen and somemerely barren rock. The obscurity of such things is patent. And he spoke ofthawing near to this world which is ours, and of an error made as if it werein mathematics, instead of in rebellion, so that they drew too close to Earthas Icarus to the sun. Then again he spoke in metaphors, because he referred toengines, which are things to cast stones against walls, and in a larger sensefor grinding corn and pumping water. But he spoke of engines growing hotbecause of the accursed metal in the core of Earth, and of the inability ofhis kind to resist Earth's pull, more metaphor, and then he spoke of ascreaming descent from the skies. And all of this, plainly, is a metaphoricalaccount of the casting of the Rebels out of Heaven, and an acknowledgment thathe is one of the said Rebels.

When he paused, I begged humbly that he would show me a mystery, and ofhis grace give me protection in case my converse with him became known.

"What happened to my messenger?" asked the Power.

I told him, and he listened without stirring. I was careful to tell himexactly, because, of course, he would know that, as all else, by his powers ofmystery, and the question was but another test. Indeed, I felt sure that themessenger and all that had taken place had been contrived by him to bring me, a learned student of mysteries, to converse with him in this place.

"Men!" he said bitterly at last. Then he added coldly. "Nay! I can giveyou no protection. My kind is without protection upon this earth. If you wouldlearn what I can teach you, you must risk the fury of your fellow countrymen."

But then, abruptly, lie wrote upon parchment and pressed the parchmentto some object at his side. He threw it upon the ground.

"If men beset you," he said scornfully, "tear this parchment and cast itfrom you. If you have none of the accursed metal about you, it may distractthe m while you flee. But a dagger will cause it all to come to naught!"

Then he walked away. He vanished. And I stood shivering for a very longtime before I remembered me of the formula given by Apollonius of Tyana forthe dismissal of evil spirits. I ventured from themagic circle. No evilbefell me. I picked up the parchment and examined it in themoonlight. Thesymbols upon it were meaningless, even to one like myself who has studied allthat is known of mysteries. I returned to the village, pondering.

I have told you so much at length, because you will observe that thisPower did not speak with the pride or themenace of which. most authors onmysteries and Operations speak. it is often said that an adept must conduct, himself with great firmness during an Operation, lest the Powers he has calledup overawe him. Yet this Power spoke wearily, with irony, like one approachingdeath. And he had spoken of death, also, Which were, of course, a test and adeception, because are not the Principalities and Powers of Darkness immortal? He had some design it was not his will that I should know. So I saw that Imust walk warily in this priceless opportunity.

In the village I told the priest that I had had encounter with a foulfiend, who begged that! Not exorcise him, promising to reveal certain hiddentreasures once belonging to the Church, which he could not touch or reveal toevil men because they were holy, but could describe the location of to me. AndI procured parchment, and pens, and ink, and thenext day I went alone to the hilltop. It was empty, and I made sure I was unwatched and, leaving my daggerbehind me, I tore the parchment and flung it to the ground.

As it touched, there appeared such a treasure of gold and jewels astruly would have driven any man mad with greed. There were bags and chests andboxes filled with gold and precious stones, which had burst with the weightand spilled out upon the ground. There were gems glittering in the latesunlight, and rings and necklaces set with brilliants, and such monstroushoards, of golden coins of every antique pattern.

Johannus, even I went almost mad! I leaped forward like one dreaming toplunge my hands into the gold. Slavering, I filled my garments with rubies andropes of pearls, and stuffed my scrip with gold pieces, laughing crazily tomyself. I rolled in the riches. I wallowed in them, flinging the golden coinsinto the air and letting them fall upon me. I laughed and sang to myself.

Then I heard a sound. On the instant I was filled with terror for the treasure. I leaped to my dagger and snarled, ready to defend my riches to the death.

Then a dry voice said, "Truly you care naught for riches!"

It was savage mockery. The Power stood regarding me. I saw him clearlynow, yet not clearly because there was a cloudiness which clung clearly to hisbody. He was, as I said, an ell and a half in height, and from his foreheadthere protruded knobby feelers which were not horns but had somewhat the looksave for bulbs upon their ends. His head was large and... But I will notattempt to describe him, because he could assume any of a thousand forms, nodoubt, so what does it matter?

Then I grew terrified because I had no Circle or Pentangle to protectme. But the Power made no menacing move.

"It is real, that riches," he said dryly. "It has color and weight andthe feel of substance. But your dagger will destroy it all."

Didyas of Corinth has said that treasure of mystery must be fixed by aspecial Operation before it becomes permanent and free of the power of Thosewho brought it. They can transmute it back to leaves or other rubbish, if itbe not fixed.

"Touch it with your dagger," said the Power. I obeyed, sweating in fear. And as themetal iron touched a great piled . heap of gold, there was a sudden shifting and then a little flare of heatabout me. And the treasure, all, to the veriest crumb of a seed pearl! Vanished before my eyes. The bit of parchment reappeared, smoking. It turnedto ashes. My dagger scorched my fingers. It had grown hot.

"Ah yes," said the Power, nodding. "The force-field has energy. When the iron absorbs it, there is heat." Then he looked at me in a not unfriendly way.

"You have brought pens and parchment," he said, "and at least you did not usethe sigil to astonish your fellows. Also you had the good sense to make nomore perfumish stinks. It may be that there is a grain of wisdom in you. Iwill bear with you yet a while. Be seated and take parchment and pen. Stay! Let us be comfortable. Sheathe your dagger, or better cast it from you."

I put it in my bosom. And it was as if he thought, and touched somethingat his side, and instantly there was a fair pavilion about us, with softcushions and a gently playing fountain.

"Sit," said the Power. "I learned that men like such things as this froma man I once befriended.. He had been wounded and stripped by robbers, so thathe had not so much as a scrap of accursed metal about him, and I could aidhim. I learned to speak the language men use nowadays from him. But to the endhe believed me an evil spirit and tried valorously to hate me."

My hands shook with my agitation that the treasure had departed from me. Truly it was a treasure of such riches as no King has ever possessed, Johannus! My very soul lusted after that treasure! The golden coins alonewould fill your attic solidly, but the floor would break under their weight, and the jewels would fill hogsheads. Ah, Johannus! That treasure!

"What I will have you write," said the Power, "at first will meanlittle. I shall give facts and the ories first, because they are easiest toremember. Then I will give the applications of the the ories. Then you men willhave the beginning of such civilization as can exist in theneighborhood ofthe accursed metal."

"Your Potency!" I begged abjectly. "You will give me another sigil oftreasure?"

"Write!" he commanded.

I wrote. And, Johamius, I cannot tell you myself what it is that Iwrote. He spoke words, and they were in such obscure cipher that they have nomeaning as I con them over. Hark you to this, and seek wisdom for the performance of mysteries in it! "The civilization of my race is based uponfields of force which have the property of acting in all essentials assubstance. A lodestone is surrounded by a field of force which is invisibleand impalpable. But the fields used by my people for dwellings, tools, andeven for machinery are perceptible to the senses and act physically as solids. More, we are able to form the se fields in latent fashion; and to fix them toorganic objects as permanent fields which require no energy for the irmaintenance, just as magnetic fields require no energy supply to continue. Ourfields, too, may be projected as three-dimensional solids which assume anydesired form and have every property of substance except chemical affinity."

Johannus! Is it not unbelievable that words could be put togethe r, dealing with mysteries, which are so devoid of any clue to their true mysticmeaning? I write and I write in desperate hope that he will eventually give methe key, but my brain reels at the difficulty of extracting the directions forOperations which such ciphers must conceal! I give you another instance:

"When a force-field generator has been built as above, it will be foundthat the pulsatory fields which are consciousness serve perfectly as controls. One has but to visualize the object desired, turn on the generator's auxiliarycontrol, and the generator will pattern its output upon the pulsatoryconsciousness-field."

Upon this first day of writing, the Power spoke for hours, and I wroteuntil my hand ached. From time to time, resting, I read back to him the words

that I had written. He listened, satisfied. .

"Lord!" I said shakenly. "Mighty lord! Your Potency! These mysteries youbid me write, they are beyond comprehension!"

But he said scornfully, "Write! Some will be clear to someone. And Iwill explain a little by a little until even you can comprehead the beginning." Then he added, "You grow weary. You wish a toy. Well! I will makeyou a sigil which will make again that treasure you played with. I will add asigil which will make a boat for you, with an engine drawing power from the sea to carry you wheresoever you wish without need of wind or tide. I willmake others so you may create a palace where you will, and fair gardens as youplease."

These things he has done, Johannus. It seems to amuse him to write uponscraps of parchment, and think, and then press them against his side before helays them upon the ground for me to pick up. He has explained amusedly thatthe wonder in the sigil is complete, yet latent, and is released by the tearing of the parchment, but absorbed and destroyed by iron. In such fashionshe speaks in ciphers, but othe rwise sometimes he jests!

It is strange to think of it, that I have come a little by a little toaccept this Power as a person. It is not in accord with the laws of mystery. Ifeel that he is lonely. He seems to find satisfaction in speech with me. Yethe is a Power, one of the Rebels who was flung to earth from Heaven! He speaksof that only in vague, metaphorical terms, as if he had come from anothe rworld like the world; save much larger. He refers to himself as a voyager ofspace, and speaks of his race with affection, and of Heaven, at any rate the city from which he comes, because there must be many great cities there with astrange and prideful affection. If it were not for his powers, which are ofmystery, I would find it possible to believe that he was a lonely member of astrange race, exiled forever in a strange place, and grown friendly with a manbecause of his loneliness. But how could there be such as he and not a Power? How could there be another world?

This strange converse has now gone on for ten days or more. I havefilled sheets upon sheets. of parchment with writing. The same metaphors occuragain, and again. "Force-fields", a term without literal meaning occurs often. There are other metaphors such as "coils" and "primary" and "secondary" whichare placed in context with mention of wires of copper metal. There are carefuldescriptions, as if in the plainest of language, of sheets of dissimilarmetals which are to be placed in acid, and other descriptions of plates ofsimilar metal which are to be separated by layers of air or wax of certainthicknesses, with the plates of certain areas! And there is an explanation ofthe means by which he lives. "I, being accustomed to an atmosphere much moredense than that on Earth, am forced to keep about myself a field of forcewhich maintains an air density near that of my home planet for my breathing.

This field is transparent, but because it must shift constantly to change andrefresh the air I breathe , it causes a certain cloudiness of outline next mybody. It is maintained by the generator I wear at my side, which at the sametime provides energy for such other force-field artifacts as I may findconvenient." Ah, Johannus! I grow mad with impatience! Did I not anticipatethat he would someday give me the key to this metaphorical speech, so thatfrom it may be extracted the Names and the Words which, cause his wonders, Iwould give over in despair.

Yet he has grown genial with me. He has given me such sigils as I haveasked him, and I have tried them many times. The sigil which will make you afair garden is one of many. He says that he desires to give to man the knowledge he possesses, and then bids me write ciphered speech withoutmeaning, such as: "The drive of a ship for flight beyond the speed of light isadapted from the simple, drive generator already described, simply by alteringits constants so that it cannot generate in normal space and must create an

abnormal space by tension. The process is, " Or else, I choose at random, Johannus," The accursed metal, iron, must be eliminated not only from allcircuits but from nearness to apparatus using high-frequency oscillations, since it absorbs their energy and, prevents the functioning," I am like a mantrembling upon the threshold of Paradise, yet unable to enter because the keyis withheld. "Speed of light!" What could it mean in metaphor? In commonparlance, as well speak of the speed of weathe r or of granite! Daily I beghim, for the key to his speech. Yet even now, in the sigils he makes for me isgreater power than any man has ever known before!

But it is not enough. The Power speaks as if he were lonely beyondcompare; the last member of a strange race upon. Earth; as if he took astrange, companionlike pleasure in merely talking to me. When I beg him for aName or a Word which would give me power beyond such as be doles out insigils, he is amused and calls me fool, yet kindly. And he speaks more of hismetaphorical speech about forces of nature and fields of force and gives me asigh which should. I use it will create a palace with walls of gold andpillars of emerald! And then he amusedly reminds me that one greedy looterwith an ax or hoe of iron would cause it to vanish utterly!

I go almost mad, Johannus! But there is certainly wisdom unutterable tobe had from him. Gradually, cautiously, I have come to act as if we weremerely friends, of different race and he vastly the wiser, but friends rathe rthan Prince and subject. Yet I remember the warnings of themost authoritativeauthors that one must be ever on guard against Powers called up in anOperation.

I have a plan. It is dangerous, I well know, but I grow desperate. Tostand quivering upon the threshold of such wisdom and power as no man has everdreamed of before, and then be denied--The mercenary who will carry this toyou leaves tomorrow. He is a cripple, and may be months upon the way. All willbe decided ere you receive this. I know you wish me well.

Was there ever a student of mystery in so maddening a predicament, withall knowledge in his grasp yet not quite his?

Your friend,

Carolus.

Written in the very bad inn in Montevecchio, Johannus!

A courier goes to Ghent for My Lord of Brahant and I have opportunity tosend you mail. I think I go mad, Johannus! I have power such as no man everpossessed before, and I am fevered with bitterness. Hear me!

For three weeks I did repair daily to the hilltop beyond Montevecchioand take down the ciphered speech of which I wrote you. My script was stuffedwith sighs, but I had not one Word of Power or Name of Authority. The Powergrew mocking, yet it seemed sadly mocking. He insisted that his words held nocipher and needed but to be read. Some of them he phrased over and over againuntil they were but instructions for putting bits of metal togethe r, mechanic- wise. Then he made me follow those instructions. But there was no Word, noName, nothing save bits of metal put togethe r cunningly. And how couldinanimate metal, not imbued with power of mystery by Names or Words orincantations, have power to work mystery?

At long last I became convinced that he would never reveal the wisdom hehad promised. And I had come to such familiarity with this Power that I coulddare to rebel, and even to believe that I had chance of success. There was the cloudiness about his form, which was maintained by a sigh he wore at his sideand called a "generator." Were that cloudiness destroyed, he could not live, or so he had told me. It was for that reason that he, in person, dared nottouch anything of iron. This was the basis of my plan.

I feigned illness, and said that I would rest at a peasant's thatched

hut, no longer inhabited, at the foot of the hill on which the Power lived. There was surely no nail of iron in so crude a dwelling. If he felt for me the affection he protested, he would grant me leave to be absent in my illness. Ifhis affection was great, he might even come and speak to me there. I would bealone in the hope that his friendship might go so far.

Strange words for a man to use to Power! But I had talked daily with himfor three weeks. I lay groaning in the hut, alone. On the second day he came.

I affected great rejoicing, and made shift to light a fire from a taper I hadkept burning. He thought it a mark of honor, but it was actually a signal. Andthe n, as he talked to me in what he thought my illness, there came a cry fromwithout the hut. It was the village priest, a simple man but very brave in hisfashion. On the signal of smoke from the peasant's hut, he had accept near anddrawn all about it an iron chain that he had muffled with cloth so that it would make no sound. And now he stood before the hut door with his crucifix upraised, chanting exorcisms. A very brave man, that priest, because I hadpictured the Power as a foul fiend indeed.

The Power turned and looked at me, and I held my dagger firmly.

"I hold the accursed metal," I told him fiercely. "There is a ring of itabout this house. Tell me now, quickly, the Words and the Names which make the sigils operate! Tell me the secret of the cipher you had me write! Do this andI will slay this priest and draw away the chain and you may go hence unharmed. But be quick, or...."

The Power cast a sigh upon the ground. When the parchment struck earth, there was an instant's cloudiness as if some dread thing had begun to form. But then the parchment smoked and turned to ash. The ring of iron about the hut had destroyed its power when it was used. The Power knew that I spoketruth.

"Ah!" said the Power dryly. "Men! And I thought one was my friend!" Heput his hand to his side. "To be sure! I should have known. Iron rings meabout. My engine heats--"

He looked at me. I held up the dagger, fiercely unyielding.

"The names!" I cried. "The Words! Give me power of my own and I willslay the priest!"

"I tried," said the Power quietly, "to give you wisdom. And you willstab me with the accursed metal if I do not tell you things which do notexist. But you need not. I cannot live long in a ring of iron. My engine willburn out. My force-field will fail. I will stifle in the thin air which isdense enough for you. Will not that satisfy you? Must you stab me also?"

I sprang from my pallet of straw to threaten him more fiercely. It wasmadness, was it not? But I was mad, Johannus!

"Forbear," said the Power. "I could kill you now, with me! But I thoughtyou my friend. I will go out and see your priest. I would prefer to die at hishand. He is perhaps only a fool."

He walked steadily toward the doorway. As he stepped over the ironchain, I thought I saw a wisp of smoke begin, but he touched the thing at hisside. The cloudiness about his person vanished. There was a puffing sound, andhis garments jerked as if in a gust of wind. He staggered. But he went on, andtouched his side again and the cloudiness returned and he walked morestrongly. He did not try to turn aside. He walked directly toward the priest, and even I could see that be walked with a bitter dignity.

And I saw the priest's eyes grow wide with horror. Because he saw the Power for the first time, and the Power was an ell and a half high, with alarge head and knobbed feelers projecting from his forehead, and the priestknew instantly that he was not of any race of men but was a Power and one ofthose Rebels who were flung out from Heaven.

I heard the Power speak to the priest, with dignity. I did not hear. what he said. I raged in my disappointment. But the priest did not waver. As the Power moved toward him, the priest moved toward the Power. His face wasfilled with horror, but it was resolute. He reached forward with the crucifixhe wore always attached to an iron chain. about his waist. He thrust it totouch the Power, crying, "In nomini Patri--"

Then there was smoke. It came from a spot at the Power's side, where wasthe engine to which he touched the sigils he had made, to imbue them with the power of mystery. And then I was blinded. There was a flare of monstrous, bluish light, like a lightning stroke from Heaven. After, there was a ball offierce yellow flame which gave off a cloud of black smoke. There was amonstrous, outraged bellow of thunder.

Then there was nothing save the priest standing there, his face ashen, his eyes resolute, his eyebrows singed, chanting exorcisms in a shaking voice.

I have come to Venice. My script is filled with sigils with which I canwork wonders. No man can work such wonders as I can. But I use them not. I labor daily, nightly, hourly, minute by minute, trying to find the key to the cipher which will yield the wisdom the Power possessed and desired to give tomen. Ah, Johannus! I have those sighs and I can work wonders, but when I haveused them they will be gone and shall be powerless! I had such a chance atwisdom as never man possessed before, and it is gone! Yet I shall spend years, aye ! All the rest of my life, seeking the true meaning of what the Powerspoke! I am the only man in all the world who ever spoke daily, for weeks onend, with a Prince of the Powers of Darkness, and was accepted by him as afriend to such a degree as to encompass his own destruction. It must be truethat I have wisdom written down! But how shall I find instructions for mysteryin such metaphors as, to choose a fragment by chance, "plates of twodissimilar metals, immersed in an acid, generate a force for which men havenot yet a name, yet which is the basis of true civilization. Such plates--"

I grow mad with disappointment, Johannus! Why did he not speak clearly? Yet I will find out the secret.

(Memorandum from Professor McFarland, Physics Department, Haverford University, to Professor Charles, Latin, the same faculty:

Dear Professor Charles:

My reaction is, Damnation! Where is the rest of this stuff?

McFarland.)

A Logic Named Joe

IT WAS ON the the third day of August that Joe come off the assembly line, and on the fifth Laurine come into town, and that afternoon I saved civilization. That's what I figure, anyhow. Laurine is a blonde that I was crazy about once, and crazy is the word, and Joe is a logic that I have stored away down in the cellar right now. I had to pay for him because I said I busted him, and sometimes I think about turning him on and sometimes I think about taking an axe to him. Sooner or later I'm gonna do one or the othe r. I kinda hope it's the axe. I could use a couple million dollars, sure!--and Joe'd tell me how to get or make them. He can do plenty! But so far I've been scared to take a chance. After all, I figure I really saved a civilization by turning him off.

The way Laurine fits in is that she makes cold shivers run up and downmy spine when I think about her. You see, I've got a wife which I acquiredafter I had parted from Laurine with much romantic despair. She is areasonable good wife, and I have some kids which are hellcats but I valuethe m. If I have sense enough to leave well enough alone, sooner or later Iwill retire on a pension and Social Security and spend the rest of my life fishing contented and lying about what a great guy I used to be. But the re'sJoe. I'm worried about Joe.

I'm a maintenance man for the Logics Company. My job is servicinglogics, and I admit modestly that I am pretty good. I was servicingtelevisions before that guy Carson invented his trick circuit that will selectany of seventeen million other circuits, in the ory there ain't no limit, andbefore the Logics Company hooked it into the tank-and-integrator set-up theywere using them as business-machine service. They added a vision screen forspeed, and they found out they'd make logics. They were surprised and pleased. They're still finding out what logics will do, but everybody's got them.

I got Joe, after Laurine nearly got me. You know the logics setup; Yougot a logic in your house. It looks like a vision receiver used to, only it'sgot keys instead of dials and you punch the keys for what you wanna get. It'shooked in to the tank, which has the Carson Circuit all fixed up with relays.

Say you punch "Station SNAFU" on your logic. Relays in the tank take over andwhatever vision-program SNAFU is telecasting comes on your logic's screen. Oryou punch "Sally Hancock's Phone" and the screen blinks and sputters andyou're hooked up with the logic in her house and if somebody answers you got avision-phone connection. But besides that, if you punch for the weathe rforecast or who won today's race at Hialeah or who was mistress of the WhiteHouse during Garfield's administration or what is PDQ and R selling for today, that comes on the screen too. The relays in the tank do it. The tank is a bigbuilding full of all the facts in creation and all the recorded telecastswhatever was made-and it's hooked in with all the other tanks all over the country-and anything you wanna know or see or hear, you punch for it and youget it. Very convenient. Also it does math for you, and keeps books, and actsas consulting chemist, physicist, astronomer, and tealeaf reader, with a"Advice to Lovelorn" thrown in. The only thing it won't do is tell you exactlywhat your wife meant when she said, "Oh, you think so, do you?" in thatpeculiar kinda voice. Logics don't work good on women. Only on things thatmake sense.

Logics are all right, though. They changed civilization, the highbrowstell us. All on accounts the Carson Circuit. And Joe should have been a perfectly normal logic, keeping some family or other from wearing out itsbrains doing the kids' homework for them. But something went wrong in the assembly line. It was something so small that precision gauges didn't measureit, but it made Joe a individual. Maybe he didn't know it at first. Or maybe, being logical, he figured out that if he was to show he was different fromother logics they'd scrap him. Which would a been a brilliant idea. But anyhow, he come off the assembly line, and he went through the regular tests withoutanybody screaming shrilly on finding out what he was. And he went right on outand was dully installed in the home of Mr. Thaddeus Konlanovitch at 119 East Seventh Street, second floor front. So far, everything was serene.

The installation happened late Saturday night. Sunday morning the Korlanovitch kids turned him on and seen the Kiddie Shows. Around noon their parents peeled them away from him and piled them in the car. Then they comeback in the house for the lunch they'd forgot and one of the kids sneaked back and they found him punching keys for the Kiddie Shows of the week before. Theydragged him out and went off. But they left Joe turned on.

That was noon. Nothing happened until two in the afternoon. It was the calm before the storm. Laurine wasn't in town yet, but she was coming. Ipicture Joe sitting there all by himself, buzzing meditative. Maybe he runKiddie Shows in the empty apartment for awhile. But I think he went kindaremote-control exploring in the tank. There ain't any fact that can be said tobe a fact that ain't on a data plate in some tank somewhere-unless it's onethe technicians are digging out and putting on a data plate now. Joe hadplenty of material to work on. And he must started working right off the bat.

Joe ain't vicious, you understand. He ain't like one of the se ambitiousrobots you read about that make lip their minds the human race is inefficiantand has got to be wiped out and replaced by thinking machines. Joe's just gotambition. If you were a machine, you'd wanna work right, wouldn't you? That'sJoe. He wants to work right. And he's a logic. And logics can do a lottathings that ain't been found out yet. So Joe, discovering the fact, begun tofeel restless. He selects some things us dumb humans ain't thought of yet, andbegins to arrange so logics will be called on to do them.

That's all. That's everything. But, brother, it's enough!

Things are kinda quiet in the Maintenance Department about two in the afternoon. We are playing pinochle. Then one of the guys remembers he has tocall up his wife. He goes to one of the bank of logics in Maintenance andpunches the keys for his house. The screen sputters. Then a flash comes on the screen.

"Announcing new and improved logics service! Your logic is now equippedto give you not only consultive but directive service. If you want to dosomething and don't know how to do it-ask your logic!"

There's a pause. A kinda expectant pause. Then, as if reluctantly, hisconnection comes through. His wife answers and gives him hell for something orothe r. He takes it and snaps off.

"Whadda you know?" he says when he comes back. He tells us about the flash. "We shoulda been warned about that. There's gonna be a lottacomplaints. Suppose a fella asks how to get ridda his wife and the censorcircuits block the question?"

Somebody melds a hundred aces and says:

"Why not punch for it and see what happens?"

It's a gag, ci' course. But the guy goes over. He punches keys. Inthe ory, a censor block is gonna come on and the screen will say severely, "Public Policy Forbids This Service." You hafta have censor blocks or the kiddies will be asking detailed questions about things they're too young toknow. And there are other reasons. As you will see.

This fella punches, "How can I get rid of my wife?" Just for the fun ofit. The screen is blank for half a second. Then comes a flash. "Service question: Is she blonde or brunette?" He hollers to us and we come look. Hepunches, "Blonde." There's another brief pause. Then the screen says, "Hexymetacryloaminoacetifle is a constituent of green shoe polish. Take home afrozen meal including dried pea soup. Color the soup with green shoe polish.

It will appear to be green-pea soup, HexymetacryloaminOacetifle is a selectivepoison which s fatal to blonde females but not to brunettes or males of anycoloring. This fact has not been brought out by human experiment, but is aproduct of logics service. You cannot be convicted of murder. It is improbablethat you will be suspected."

The screen goes blank, and we stare at each othe r. It's bound to beright. A logic workin' the Carson Circuit can no more make a mistake than anyother kinda corn-putting machine. I call the tank in a hurry.

"Hey, you guys!" I yell. "Somethin's happened! Logics are givingdetailed instructions for wife-murder! Check your censor-circuits--but quick!"

That was close, I think. But little do I know. At that precise instant, over on Monroe Avenue, a drunk starts to punch for something on a logic. Thescreen says "Announcing new and improved logics service! If you want to dosomething and don't know how to do it-ask your logic!" And the drunk says, owlish, "I'll do it!" So he cancels his first punching and fumbles around andsays: "How can I keep my wife from finding out I've been drinking?" And the screen says, prompt: "Buy a bottle of Franine hair shampoo. It is harmless butcontains a detergent which will neutralize ethyl alcohol immediately. Take oneteaspoonful for each jigger of hundredproof you have consumed."

This guy was plenty plastered--just plastered enough to stagger next door and obey instructions. And five minutes later he was cold sober andwriting down the information so he. couldn't forget it. It was new, and it wasbig! He got rich off that memo! He patented "SOBUH, The Drink that Makes HappyHomes!" You can top off any souse with a slug or two of it and go home soberas a judge. The guy's cussing income taxes right now!

You candt kick on stuff like that. But a ambitious young fourteen-yearold wanted to buy some kid stuff and his pop wouldn't fork over. He called upa friend to tell his troubles. And his logic says: "If you want to dosomething and don't know how to do it-ask your logic!" So this kid punches: "How can I make a lotta. money, fast?"

His logic comes through with the simplest, neatest, and the most efficient counterfeiting device yet known to science. You see, all the datawas in the tank. The logic-since Joe had closed some relays here and there inthe tank-simply integrated the facts. That's all. The kid got caught up withthree days later, havin' already spent two thousand credits and having plentymore on hand. They hadda time telling his counterfeits from the real stuff, and the only way they done it was that he changed his printer, kid fashion, not being able to let something that was working right alone.

Those are what you might call samples. Nobody knows all that Joe done. But there was the bank president who got humorous when his logic flashed that"Ask your logic" spiel on him, and jestingly asked how to rob his own bank.

And the logic told him, brief and explicit but good! The bank president hitthe ceiling, hollering for cops. There musta been plenty of that sorta thing.

There was fifty-four more robberies than usual in thenext twenty-four hours, all of them planned astute and perfect. Some of them they never did figure outhow they'd been done. Joe, he'd gone exploring in the tank and closed somerelays like a logic is supposed to do, but only when required, and blocked allcensor-circuits and fixed up this logics service which planned perfect crimes, nourishing and attractive meals, counterfeiting machines, and new industrieswith a fine impartiality. He musta been plenty happy, Joe must. He wasfunctioning swell, buzzing along to himself while the Korlanovitch kids wereoff riding with their ma and pa.

They come back at seven o'clock, the kids all happily wore out withthe ir afternoon of fighting each other in the car. Their folks put them to bedand sat down to rest. They saw Joe's screen flickering meditative from onesubject to another and old man Korlanovitch had had enough excitement for oneday. He turned Joe off.

And at that instant the pattern of relays that Joe had turned on snappedoff, all the offers of directive service stopped flashing on logic screenseverywhere, and peace descended on the earth.

For everybody else. But for me. Laurine come to town. I have oftenthanked God fervent that she didn't marry me when I thought I wanted her to.

In the intervening years she had progressed. She was blonde and fatal to beginwith. She had got blonder and fataler and had had four husbands and oneacquittal for homicide and had acquired an air of enthusiasm and self- confidence. That's just a sketch of the background. Laurine was not the kindaformer girl-friend you like to have turning up in the same town with yourwife. But she came to town, and Monday morning she tuned right into themiddleof Joe's second spasm of activity.

The Korlanovitch kids had turned him on again. I got the se details laterand kinda pieced them togethe r. And every logic in town was dutifully flashinga notice, "If you want to do something and don't know how to do it-ask yourlogic!" every time they were turned on for use. More'n that, when peoplepunched for themorning news, they got a full account of the previousafternoon's doings. Which put them in a frame of mind to share in the party.

One bright fella demands, "How can I make a perpetual motion machine?" And hislogic sputters a while, and then comes up with a set-up using the Brownian movement to turn little wheels. If the wheels ain't bigger than an eighth of an inch they'll turn, all right, and practically it's perpetual motion.

Another one asks for the secret of transmuting metals.. The logic rakes backin the data plates and integrates a strictly practical answer. It does take somuch power that you can make no profit except on radium, but that pays offgood. And from the fact that for a couple years to come the police wereturning up new and improved jiifimies, knob-claws for getting at safe-innards, and all-purpose keys that'd open any known lock, why there must have beenother inquirers with a strictly practical viewpoint. Joe done a lot fortechnical progress!

But he done more in other lines. Educational, say. None of my kids areold enough to be interested, but Joe bypassed all censor-circuits because theyhampered the service he figured logics should give humanity. So the kids andteenagers who wanted to know what comes after the bees and flowers found out.

And there is certain facts which men hope their wives won't do more andsuspect, and those facts are just what their wives are really curious about. So when a woman dials: "How can I tell if Oswald is true to me?" and her logictells her-your can figure out how many rows got started that night when themen come home!

All this while Joe goes on buzzing happy to himself, showing the Korlanovitch kids the animated funnies with one circuit while with the others he remote-controls the tank so that all the other logics can give people whatthey ask for and the reby raise merry hell.

And then Laurine gets onto thenew service. She turn on the logic in herhotel room, probably to see the week's style forecast. But the logic says, dutiful: "If you want to do something and don't know how to do it, ask yourlogic!" So Laurine probably looks enthusiastics would ! And tries to figureout something to ask. She already knows all about everything she cares aboutain't she had four husbands and shot one? So I occ to her. She knows this is the town I live in. So she punches, "How can I find Ducky?"

O.K., guy! But that is what she used to call me. She gets a servicequestion. "Is Ducky known by any other name?" So she gives my regular name. And the logic can't find me. Because my logic ain't, listed under my name onaccount of I am in Maintenance and don want to be pestered when I'm home, andthere ain't an data plates on code-listed logics, because the codes changed sooften, like a guy gets plastered and tells redhead to call him up, and ongetting sober hurried has the code changed before she reaches his wife onscreen.

Well! Joe is stumped. That's probably the first question logics servicehasn't been able to answer. "How can I find Ducky?" ! ! Quite a problem! SoJoe throw over it while showing the Korlanovitch kids the animated comic aboutthe cute little boy who carries stick of dynamite in his hip pocket and playspractical joke on everybody. Then he gets the trick. Laurine's screen suddenlyflashes: "Logics special service will work upon your question. Please punchyour logic designation and leave it turned on. You will be called back."

Laurine is merely mildly interested, but she punches her hotel-roomnumber and has a drink and takes a nap. Joe sets to work. He has been given aidea.

My wife calls me at Maintenance and hollers. She is fit to be tied. Shesays I got to do something. She was gonna make a call to the butcher shop. Instead of the butcher or even the "If you want to do something" flash, shegot a new one. The screen says, "Service question: What is your name?" She iskinda puzzled, but she punches it. The screen sputters and then says:

"Secretarial Service Demonstration! You--" It reels off her name, address, age, sex, coloring, the amounts of all her charge accounts in all the stores, myname as her husband, how much I get a week, the fact that I've been pinchedthree times-twice was traffic stuff, and once for a argument I got in with a guy-and the interesting item that once when she was mad with me she left mefor three weeks and had her address changed to her folks' home. Then it says, brisk: "Logics Service will hereafter keep your personal accounts, takemessages, and locate persons you may wish to get in touch with. Thisdemonstration is to introduce the service." Then it connects her with the butcher.

But she don't want meat, then. She wants blood. She calls me.

"If it'll tell me all about myself," she says, fairly boilin', "it'll tellanybody else who punches my name! You've got to stop it!".

"Now, now, honey!" I says. "I didn't know about all this! It's new! Butthey musta fixed the tank so it won't give out information except to the logicwhere a person lives!".

"Nothing of the kind!" she tells me, furious. "I tried! And you knowthat Blossom woman who lives next door! She's been married three times and she's forty-two years old and she says she's only thirty! And Mrs. Hudson'shad her husband arrested four times for nonsupport and once for beating herup. And--"

"Hey!" I says. "You mean the logic told you this?"

"Yes!" she walls. "It will tell anybody anything! You've got to stop it! How long will it take?"

"I'll call up the tank;" I says. "It can't take long."

"Hurry!" she says, desperate, "before somebody punches my name! I'mgoing to see what it says about that hussy across the street."

She snaps off to gathe r what she can before it's stopped. So I punch forthe tank and I get this new "What is your name?" flash. I got a morbidcuriosity and I punch my-name, and the screen says: "Were you ever calledDucky?" I blink. I ain't got no suspicions. I say, "Sure!" And the screensays, "There is a call for you."

Bingo! There's the inside of a hotel room and Laurine is rectiningasleep on the bed. She'd been told to leave her logic turned on and she'd doneit. It is a hot day and she is trying to be cool. I would say that she oughtanot suffer from the heat. Me, being human, I do not stay as cool as she looks. But there ain't no need to go into that. After I get my breath I say, "ForHeaven's sake!" and she opens her eyes.

At first she looks puzzled, like she was thinking is she getting absentminded and is this guy somebody she married lately. Then she grabs a sheet anddrapes it around herself and beams at me.

"Ducky!" she says. "How marvelous!"

I say something like "Ugmph!" I am sweating.

Shesays:

"I put in a call for you, Ducky, and here you are! Isn't It romantic? Where are you really, Ducky? And when can you come up? You've no idea howoften I've thought of you!"

I am probably the only guy she ever knew real well that she has not beenmarried to at some time or anothe r.

I say "Ugmph!" again, and swallow.

"Can you come up instantly?" asks Laurine brightly.

"I'm... workin'," I say. "I'll... uh... call you back."

"I'm terribly lonesome," says Laurine. "Please make it quick, Ducky! PUhave a drink waiting for you. Have you ever thought of me?"

"Yeah," I say, feeble. 'Plenty!"

"You darling!" says Laurine."Here's a kiss to go on with until you gethe re! Hurry, Ducky!"

Then I sweat! I still don't know nothing about Joe, understands or cussout the guys at the tank because I blame them for this. If Laurine was justanother blonde-well-when it comes to ordinary blondes I can leave them alone

or leave them alone, either one. A married man gets that way or -else. ButLaurine has a look of unquenched enthusiasm that gives a man very strange weaksensations at the back of his knees. And she'd had four husbands and shot one and got acquitted.

So I punch the keys for the tank technical room, fumbling. And the screen says: "What is your name?" but I don't want any more. I punch thenameof the old guy who's stock clerk in Maintenance, and the screen gives me somepretty interesting dope-I never woulda thought the old fella had ever had thatmuch pep-and winds up by mentioning a unclaimed deposit now accounting to twohundred eighty credits in the First National Bank, which he should look into.

Then it spiels about thenew secretarial service and gives me the tank atlast..

I start to swear at the guy who looks at me. But he says, tired: "Snapit off, fella. We got troubles and you're just anothe r. What are the logicsdoin' now?"

I tell him, and he laughs a hollow laugh.

"A light matter, fella," he says. "A very light matter! We just managedto clamp off all the data plates that give information on high explosives. Thedemand for instructions in counterfeiting is increasing minute by minute. Weare also trying to shut off, by main force, the relays that hook in to dataplates that just barely might give advice on the fine points of murder. So ifpeople will only keep busy getting the goods on each other for a while, maybewe'll get a chance to stop the circuits that are shifting credit-balances frombank to bank before everybody's bankrupt except the guys who thought of askinghow, to get big bank accounts in a hurry."

"Then," I says hoarse, "shut down the tank! Do somethin'!"

"Shut down the tank?" he says, mirthless. "Does it occur to you, fella, that the tank has been doing all the computing for every business office foryears? It's been handling the distribution of ninety-four per cent of alltelecast programs, has given out all information on weathe r, plane schedules, special sales, employment opportunities and news; has handled all person-toperson contacts over wires and recorded every business conversation andagreement--Listen, fella! Logics changed civilization. Logics arecivilization! If we shut off logics, we go back to a kind of civilization wehave forgotten how to run! I'm getting hysterical myself and that's why I'mtalkin' like this! If my wife finds out my paycheck is thirty credits a weekmore than I told her and starts hunting for that redhead..."

He smiles a haggard smile at me and snaps off. And I sit down and put myhead in my bands. It's true. If something had happened back in cave days andthe y'd hadda stop using fire--If they'd hadda stop using steam in thenineteenth century or electricity in the twentieth--It's like that. We got avery simple civilization.

In thenineteen hundreds a man would have to make use of a typewriter, radio, telephone, teletypewriter, newspaper, reference library, encyclopedias, office files, directories, plus messenger service and consulting lawyers, chemists, doctors, dietitians, filing clerks, secretaries-all to put down whathe wanted to remember and to tell him what other people had put down that hewanted to know; to report what he said to somebody else and to report to himwhat they said back. All we have to have is logics. Anything we want to knowor see or hear, or anybody we want to talk to, we punch keys on a logic. Shutoff logics and everything goes skiddoo. But Laurine...

Something had happened. I still didn't know what it was. Nobody elseknows, even yet. What had happened was Joe. What was thematter with him wasthat he wanted to work good. All this fuss he was raising was, actual, nothingbut stuff we shoulda thought of ourselves. Directive advice, telling us whatwe wanted to know to solve a problem, wasn't but a slight extension oflogical-integrator service. Figuring out a good way to poison a fella's wife was only different in degree from figuring out a cube root or a guy's bankbalance. It was getting the answer to a question. But things was going too hotbecause there was too many answers being given to too many questions. One of the logics in Maintenance lights up. I go over, weary, to answerit. I punch the answer key. Laurine says:

"Ducky!"

It's the same hotel room. There's two glasses on the table with drinksin them. One is for me. Laurine's got on some kinda frothy hanging-around-the house- with-the -boy-friend outfit that automatic makes you strain your eyes tosee if you actual see what you think. Laurine looks at me enthusiastic.

"Ducky!" says. Laurine. "I'm lonesome! Why haven't you come up?"

"I... been busy," I say, strangling slightly.

"Pooh!" says Laurine. "Listen, Ducky! Do you remember how much in lovewe used to be?"

I gulp.

"Are you doin' anything this evening?" says Laurine.

I gulp again, because she is smiling at me in a way that a single manwould maybe get dizzy, but it gives a old married man like me cold chills. When a dame looks at you possesively.

"Ducky!" says Laurine, impulsive. "I was so mean to you! Let's getmarried!"

Desperation gives me a voice.

"I... got married," I tell her, hoarse.

Laurine blinks. Then she says, courageous: "Poor boy! But we'll get yououtta that! Only it would be nice if we could be married today. Now we canonly be engaged!"

"I..."

"I'll call up your wife," says Laurine, happy, "and have a talk withher. You must have a code signal for your logic, darling. I tried to ring yourhouse and noth--"

Click! That's my logic turned off. I turned it off. And I feel faint allover. I got nervous prostration. I got combat fatigue. I got anything youlike. I got cold feet. I beat it outta Maintenance, yelling to somebody I gota emergency call. I'm gonna get out in a Maintenance car and cruise arounduntil it's plausible to go home. Then I'm gonna take the wife and kids andbeat it for somewheres that Laurine won't ever find me. I don't wanna be fifth in Laurine's series of husbands and maybe the second one she shoots in amoment of boredom. I got experience of blondes. I got experience of Laurine!

And I'm scared to death!

I beat 'it out into traffic in the Maintenance car. There was a disconnected logic on the back, ready to substitute for one that hadda burned- out, coil or something that it was easier to switch and fix back in the Maintenance shop. I drove crazy but automatic. It was kinda ironic, if youthink of it. I was going hoopla over a strictly personal problem, whilecivilization was cracking up all around me because other people were havingthe ir personal problems solved as fast as they could state them.

It is a matter of record that part of the Mid-Western Electric researchguys had been workin' on cold electron-emission for thirty years, to makevacuum tubes that wouldn't need a power source to heat the filament. And oneof those fellas was intrigued by the "Ask your logic" flash. He asked how toget cold emission of electrons. And the logic integrates a few squintillionfacts on the physics data plates and tells him. Just as casual as it toldsomebody over in the Fourth Ward how to serve left-over soup in a newattractive way, and somebody else on Mason Street how to dispose of a torsothat somebody had left careless in his cellar after ceasing to use same.

Laurine wouldn't never have found me if hadn't been for this new logicsservice. But now that it was started--Zowie! -She'd shot one husband and got acquitted. Suppose she got impatient because I was still married and askedlogics service how to get me free and in a spot where I'd have to marry her by

8:30 p.m.? It woulda told her! Just like it told that woman out in the suburbshow to make sure her husband wouldn't run around no more. Br-r-r-r! And like it told that kid how to find some buried treasure. Remember? He was happytoting home the gold reserve of the Hanoverian Bank and Trust Company whenthey caught on to it. The logic had told him how to make some kinda machinethat nobody has been able to figure how it works even yet, only they guess itdodges around a couple extra dimensions. If Laurine was to start askingquestions with a technical aspect to them, that would be logics' service meat!

And fella, I was scared! If you think a be-man oughtn't to be scared of justone blonde-you ain't met Laurine! I'm drivin' blind when a social-conscious guy asks how to bring abouthis own particular system of social organization at once. He don't ask if it'sbest or. if it'll work. He just wants to get it started. And the logic-or Joe- tells hint! Simultaneous, the re's a retired preacher asks how can the humanrace be cured of concupiscence. Being seventy, he's pretty safe himself, buthe wants to remove the peril to the spiritual welfare of the rest of us. Hefinds out. It involves constructing a sort of broadcasting station to emit acertain wave~pattern and tuming it on. Just that. Nothing more. It's found outafterward, when he is soliciting funds to construct it. Fortunate, he didn'tthink to ask logics how to finance it, or it woulda told him that, too, and wewoulda all been cured of the impulses we maybe regret afterward but never atthe time. And the re's another group of serious thinkers who are sure the humanrace would be a lot better off if everybody went back to nature and lived inthe woods with the ants and poison ivy. They start askin' questions about howto cause humanity to abandon cities and artificial conditions of living. Theypractically got the answer in logics service!

Maybe it didn't strike you serious at the time, but while I was drivingaimless, sweating blood over Laurine being after me, the fate of civilizationhung in the balance. I ain't kidding. For instance, the Superior Man gang thatsneers at the rest of us was quietly asking questions on what kinda weaponscould be made by which Superior men could take over and run things. But Idrove here and there, sweating and talking to myself.

"What I oughta do is ask this wacky logics service how to get outta thismess," I says. "But it'd just tell me an intricate and foolproof way to bumpLaurine off. I wanna have peace! I wanna grow comfortably old and brag toother old guys about what a hellion I used to be, without having to go throughit and lose my chance of living to be a elderly liar."

I turn a corner at random, there in the Maintenance car.

"It was a nice kinda world once," I says, bitter. "I could go homepeaceful and not have belly-cramps wondering if a blonde has called up my wifeto announce my engagement to her. I could punch keys on a logic without gazinginto somebody's bedroom while she is giving her epidermis an air bath andbeing led to think things I gotta take out in thinkin'. I could--" Then I groan, rememberin' that my wife, naturally, is gonna blame me forthe fact that our private life ain't private any more if anybody has tried topeek into it.

"It was a swell world," I says, homesick for the dear dead days-beforeyesterday. "We was playin' happy with our toys like little innocent childrenuntil sometbin' happened. Like a guy named Joe come in and squashed all ourmud pies."

Then it hit me. I got the whole thing in one flash. There ain't nothingin the tank set-up to start relays choosing. Relays are closed exclusive bylogics, to get the information the keys are punched for. Nothing but a logiccoulda cooked up the relay patterns that constituted logics service. Humanswouldn't had been able to figure it out! Only a logic could integrate all the

stuff that woulda made all the other logics work like this. There was oneanswer. I drove into a restaurant and went over to a pay-logic and dropped ina coin.

"Can a logic be modified," I spell out, "to co-operate in long-termplanning which human brains are too lim ited in scope to do?"

The screen sputters. Then it says:

"Definitely yes."

"How great will themodifications be?" I punch.

"Microscopically slight. Changes in dimensions," says the screen. "Evenmodern precision gauges are not exact enough to check them, however. They canonly come about under present manufacturing methods by an extremely improbableaccident, which has only happened once."

"How can one get hold of that one accident which can do this highlynecessary work?" I punch.

The screen sputters. Sweat broke out on me. I ain't got it figured out close, yet, but what I'm scared of is that whatever is Joe will be suspicious. But what I'm askin' is strictly logical. And logics can't lie. They gotta beaccurate. They can't help it.

"A complete logic capable of the work required," says the screen, "isnow ordinary family use--"

And it gives me the Korlanovitch address and then I go over there! Do Igo over there fast! I pull up the Maintenance car in front of the place, and Itake the extra logic outta the back, and I stagger up the Korlanovitch flatand I ring the bell. A kid answers the door.

"I'm from Logics Maintenance," I tell the kid. "An inspection recordhas shown that your logic is apt to break down any minute. I come to put in anew one before it does." The kid says "O.K.!" real bright and runs

back to the living-room where Joe-I got the habit of callin' him Joelater, through just meditating about him-is running somethin' the kids wannalook at. I hook in the other logic and turn it on, conscientious making sureit works.

Then I say:

"Now kiddies, you punch this one for what you want. I'm gonna take the old one away before it breaks down?"

And I glance at the screen. The kiddies have apparently said theywanna look at some real cannibals. So the screen is presenting aanthropological expedition scientific record film of the fertility dance ofthe HubaJouba tribe of West Africa. It is supposed to be restricted toanthropological professors and post-graduate medical students. But there ain'tany censor blocks working any movie and it's on. The kids are much interested. Me, bein' a old married man, I blush.

I disconnect Joe. Careful. I turn to the other logic and punch keys forMaintenance. I do not get a services flash. I get Maintenance. I feel verygood. I report that I am goin' home because I fell down a flight of steps andhurt my leg. I add, inspired:

"And say, I was carryin' the logic I replaced and it's all busted. Ileft it for the dustman to pick up."

"If you don't turn them in," says Stock, "you gotta pay for them."

"Cheap at the price," I say.

I go home. Laurine ain't called. I put Joe down in the cellar, careful. If I turned him in, he'd be inspected and his parts salvaged even if I bustedsomething on him. Whatever part was off-normal might be used again andeverything start all over. I can't risk it. I pay for him and leave him be.

That's what happened. You might say I saved civilization and not be farwrong. I know I ain't going to take a chance on having Joe in action again. Not while Laurine is living. And there are other reasons. With all thenutswho wanna change the world to their own line of thinking, and the ones that

wanna bump people off, and generally solve their problems--Yeah! Problems arebad, but I figure I better let sleeping problems lie.

But on the other hand, if Joe could be tamed, somehow, and got to workjust reasonable--He could make me a couple million dollars, easy. But even ifI got sense enough not to get rich, and if I get retired and just loaf aroundfishing and lying to other old dufiers about what a great guy I used to be--Maybe I'll like it, but maybe I won't. And after all, if I get fed up withbeing old and confined strictly to thinking-why I could hook Joe in longenough to ask: "How can a old guy not stay old?" Joe'll be able to find out. And he'll tell me.

That couldn't be allowed out general, of course. You gotta make room forkids to grow up. But it's a pretty good world, now Joe's turned off. MaybeI'll turn him on long enough to learn how to stay in it. But on the othe rhand, maybe

Symbiosis

SURGEON GENERAL MORS was out in the rural districts of Kantolia Province, patiently arguing peasants into allowing the vaccination of their pigs and the inoculation of their families, when the lightning occupation took place.

There was no declaration of war, of course. Parachutists simply began todrop out of a predawn sky an hour before sunrise; at the same time, jet planessprayed the quiet empty streets of Stadheim, the provincial capital, with machine-gun bullets, which killed two dogs and a stray cat. Then roaring, motorized columns raced across the international bridge at Bait. Armed menrounded up the drowsy customs guards and held them prisoner while tanks, armored cars, and all the impressive panoply of war drove furiously into the still peacefully sleeping countryside. Then armored trains chuffed impressively across the international line, their whistles bellowing defianceto the switch engines and handcars in the Kantolian engine yards. A splendid, totally unheralded stroke of conquest began in the cold gray light of early morning.

When dawn actually arrived and the people of Kantolia began to wake inthe ir beds, more than half of the province was already in enemy hands. The fewenemy casualties occurred in a railroad wreck, which itself was due to the action of over-enthusiastic quislings who blew up a railroad bridge to preventthe arrival of defending troops. That action merely held up the invasionprogram by two hours and a half in that sector. By eight o'clock of a drowsy, sunny morning, the province of Kantolia had been taken over.

Surgeon General Mors heard about it at nine, while he stood beside apigsty and patiently argued with a peasant who had so far refused to allow either his pigs or his family to be inoculated. Mors heard thenews insilence. Then he turned heavily to the civilian doctor with him.

"I had not much hope, but it is very bad," he said. "War is always bad! And I hoped so much that we would finish our program of immunization! Nonation before has ever achieved one hundred per cent inoculation. It wouldhave been a very great achievement."

Standing beside the pigsty he wiped his forehead. "Now, of course, Ishall have to go to Stadheim. That will be the enemy headquarters, no doubt. Ihope, Doctor, that you will continue the inoculation program while you can. Ibeg you to do so! One hundred per cent immunization in even a single provincewould be a great feat! And after all, it is not as if the enemy would not bedriven out. But even in ten days terrible damage can be done!"

He went to the small, battered car in which he had been making hisrounds, arguing with stubborn peasants. He was a stocky little man with deep circles under his eyes, somehow officials of small nations located close to alarge one with visions of military glory tend not to sleep well of nights. Surgeon General Mors had not slept well for a long time.

Perhaps, as a military officer, he should have tried to rejoin the defending army which so far had not fired a shot. But his presence in thisregion had been to furthe r the inoculation program, and that program hadlocally been directed from Stadheim.

As his car bumped and whined along the highway toward the provincialcapital, the occupation progressed all about him without actually touchinghim. Three times he heard flights of jet planes roaring through the clear bluesky above. He could not pick them out because of their speed. Once he saw afaraway cloud of dust which was an armored column racing for some strategicspot not yet taken over. The enemy acted as if Kantolia had bristled withtroops and weapons, instead of being defended only by customs guards at the border and the fifteen-man police force of Stadheim.

The little car clanked and sputtered. The morning was quite perfect. Here and there a cotton wool cloud floated in the blue. All about were greentablelands, spread with lusty growing crops. Surgeon General Mors lookedalmost enviously at the unconcerned people of the rustic villages throughwhich he passed. They bad no desire for war, and most of them did not yet knowthat it had come. He felt that any conceivable means was permissible for the defense of simple people like the se against the alleged ideals of the enemy. But he looked very unhappy indeed.

Toward noon, he saw the steeples of Stadheim before him. But he turnedabruptly aside as if to postpone the inevitable. He drove up a gentle, rollingincline until he came to the squat, functional building which housed the pumping station for the provincial city's water supply. The station and itssurroundings seemed untouched, but when the engineer of the pumping stationcame out, the surgeon general could tell by his expression that he knew of the tragedy that had struck the country.

Surgeon General Mors got out of the car.

"They have not come here yet," he said in a flat, matter-of-fact voice.

"Not yet," said the engineer. He ground his teeth. "I have carried outmy orders," he said harshly. "Just as I was told."

Surgeon General Mors nodded.

"That is good." Then he hesitated. "I would like to look over the plant," he said almost apologetically. "It is very modern and clean. The enemyspent their money on guns. They might try to remove it for one of the ircities."

The engineer stood aside Surgeon General Mors went through the littlepumping plant. There were only twenty thousand people in Stadheim, so a largeinstallalion was not required, but it was sound and practical. There were the filters, and the chlorination apparatus, and the well-equipped smalllaboratory for tests of the water's purity. The people of Stadheim wouldalways have good water to drink, if the invaders didn't wreck or remove thismachinery.

"It is good," said the stocky little man unhappily, "to see things likethis. It makes our people to be healthy, and the refore happy. Do you know," headded irrelevantly, "that our inoculation program was almost one hundred percent complete? Ah, well," He paused. "I must go on to Stadheirn. The invadersare there. I shall try to reason with them about our sanitary arrangements. Their soldiers will not understand how careful we are about sanitation. I shall try to get them not to make changes while they are here."

The engineer's eyes burned suddenly.

"While they are here!"

"Yes," Surgeon General Mors went on disconsolately. "They will not staymore than ten days. War is very terrible! It is everything that we doctors

fight against all our lives. But so long as men do not understand, there mustbe wars." He drew a deep, unhappy breath. "It will indeed be terrible! May itbe the last."

There was a sudden change in the engineer's eyes.

"Then we fight? My orders--"

"Yes," said Surgeon General Mors, reluctantly. "In our own way, wefight. In the only way a small nation can defend itself against a great one. We may need as long as ten days before we drive them out, and when it comes itwill be a very terrible victory!"

He hesitated, and then spread out his hands in a gesture ofhelplessness. He walked out to the car and drove sturdily toward Stadheim.

Sentries stopped him at the outskirts of the city, to confiscate the car. But when he got out wearing the uniform of his country's military force, he was immediately arrested. He was marched toward the center of the city by asoldier who held a bayonet pressing lightly against the small of the littleman's back. Mors, of course, was of themedical branch of his army and lookedhopelessly unmilitary, and he carried no weapon more dangerous than a fountainpen. But the enemy soldier felt like a conqueror, and this was his firstchance to act the part.

When the surgeon general of his country's army was taken to the generalcommanding the invading troops, the latter was already much annoyed. There hadnot been a single shot fired in the invasion, and this time the history bookswould place the credit where it belonged with the dull, anonymous men who hadprepared timetables and traffic control orders, rather than with the combatleadership. General Viadek would go down in history, if at all, only as thenominal leader of an intricate cross-country troop movement. This he did notlike.

An hour since, too, he had performed an impressive ceremony on a balconyof the provincial capitol building. With officers flanking him and troopsdrawn up in the square below, he had read a proclamation to the people ofKantolia. They had been redeemed, said the proclamation, from the grindingoppression of their native country; henceforth they would enjoy all the blessings of oppressive taxes and secret police enjoyed by the invaders. Theyshould rejoice, because now they were citizens of their great neighbour, andanybody who did not rejoice was very likely to be shot. In short, GeneralViadek had read a proclamation annexing Kantolia to his own country, and hefelt very much like a fool. It was not exactly a gala occasion. But the onlywitnesses outside of his own troops had been two gaping street sweepers and alittle knot of twenty quislings who tried to make their cheers atone for the silence of the twenty thousand people who stayed away.

However, when Surgeon General Mors was brought to his office as aprisoner of war, General Vladek felt a little better. A general officer takenprisoner! This had some of the savor of traditional war! The prisoner, ofcourse, was a stocky, short figure in a badly fitting uniform, and his broadfeatures indicated peasant ancestry.

But General Viadek tried to make themost of the situalion with military courtesy.

"I offer my apologies," said General Viadek grandly, "if you weresubjected to any discourtesy at the time of your capture, my dear General. Butafter all," he smiled condescendingly, "this is war!"

"Is it?" asked Mors. He continued in a businesslike tone, "I was notsure. When was the declaration of war issued, and by whom?"

General Viadek blinked.

"Why, ah, no formal declaration was made by my government. There weremilitary reasons for secrecy."

Surgeon General Mors sat down and mopped his face.

"Ah! I am relieved. If you invaded without a declaration of war, you

have the legal status of a bandit. Naturally, my government would notregularize your position. Even as a bandit, however," he said prosaically, "you will understand that the local sanitary arrangements should not beinterfered with. That was what I came to see you about. My country has the lowest death rate in all Europe, and any meddling with our health serviceswould be very stupid. I hope you will give orders--"

General Vladek roared. Then he calmed himself, fuming. "I did notreceive you to be lectured," he said stiffly. "So far as I am aware, you arethe ranking officer of your army to be captured by my men. I make a formaldemand for the surrender of all troops. under your command."

"But there aren't any!" said Surgeon General Mors in surprise, "Mygovernment would not be so imbecilic as to leave soldiers in a province theywere not strong enough to defend! They'd only have been killed in trumped-upfighting so you could claim a victory!"

General Vladek's eyes glittered. He pounced.

"Ha! Then your government knew that we intended to invade?"

"My dear man!" said Mors with some tartness. "Your government has beendrooling at themouth for years over the fact that the taxes from our richestprovince would almost balance its budget! Of course we suspected you wouldsomeday try to seize it! We are not altogethe r fools!"

"Yet," said General Viadek sardonically, "you did not prepare to defendit!"

Surgeon General Mors blinked at the slim, bemedaled figure of hisofficial captor.

"When a peaceful householder hears a burglar in his house," he saidshortly, "he may or may not go to fight himself, but he does not send hisyoung sons! If he is sensible, he sends for the police."

"He sends for the police!" repeated Vladek incredulously. "My goodSurgeon General Mors, do you expect the United Nations to interfere in thismatter? The United Nations is run by diplomats, phrasemakers. They are aghastand helpless before an accomplished fact like our actual possession ofKantolia! My good sir."

"This talk is nonsense!" said Mors irritably. "I came to offer you the benefit of my experience in matters of military and public health. Do you havethe welfare of your men actually at heart?"

There was a pause. General Vladek was slim and beautifully tailored. Hedid not belong in the office of the provincial governor of Kantolia, whosedesk was still littered with papers concerning such local affairs as the priceof pigs and crops and an outbreak of measles in the public schools. The officewas slightly grubby, despite a certain plebeian attempt at elegance. GeneralVladek seemed fastidiously detached from his surroundings. And he was amused.

"I assure you," said General Viadek, "that I am duly solicitous of mymen's health."

"If you are solicitous enough," said Surgeon General Mors curtly, "youwill get them out of here as quickly as they came in! But I can hardly expectyou to comply with that wish. What I have to say is that your troops hadbetter have as little to do with the civilian population as possible, nocommunication of any sort that can possibly be avoided."

"You are ridiculous," said General Vladek, annoyed. "Kantolia is nowpart of my country. Its people are the fellow citizens of my troops. Isolatethe m? Ridiculous!"

Surgeon General Mors stood up and shrugged.

"Very well," he said heavily. "I advised you. Now, either I am aprisoner or I am not. If not, I would like a pass allowing me to go aboutfreely. The sudden entry of so large an invading force introduces problems ofpublic health."

"Which my medical corps," said General Viadek scornfully, "is quite able to cope with! You are a prisoner, and I think a fool!'Good day!"

Surgeon General Mors marched stolidly to the door.

Since the invasion was not yet one day old, there had been no time tobuild concentration camps. Surgeon General Mors was confined, the refore, in aschool which had been closed to education that it might be taken over and usedas a prison. He found himself in company with the provincial governor ofKantolia, with themayor of Stadheim, and various other officials arrested bythe invaders. There were private citizens in confinement, too, mostly peoplewhom the small number of quislings in Kantolia had denounced. They were notaccused of crimes, as yet. Even the invading army did not yet pretend thatthey had committed any offense against either military or civilian law. Butmost of them were frantic. It was not easy to forget tales of hostages shotfor acts of resistance by conquered populations. They knew of places whereleading citizens had been exterminated for the crime of being leadingcitizens, and educated men destroyed because they rejected propaganda thatoutraged all reason. The fate of Kantoha had precedents. If precedent werefollowed, those first arrested when the land was overrun were in no enviablesituation.

Surgeon General Mors tried to reassure them, but he had not muchsuccess. The entire situation looked hopeless. The seizure of a singleprovince of a very minor nation would appear to the rest of the world eithe ras a crisis, or an affront to the United Nations, or as a rectification offrontiers, according to thenationality and political persuasion of the commentator. It would go on the agenda of the United Nations Council; deftlyit would be intermixed with other matters so that it could not be untangledand considered separately. Ultimately it would be the subject of a compromise, one item in a complicated Great Power deal, which would leave matters exactlyas the invaders wished them. Practically speaking, that was the prospect.

"But the fact," said Surgeon General Mors, "is that such things cannotcontinue forever. The life of humanity is a symbiosis, a living-togethe r, inall its stages. It begins with the symbiotic relationship of members of afamily, each of whom helps and is helped by all the rest. But it rises to the symbiotic relationship of nations, of which each is an organism necessary tothe others, and all are mutually helpful."

"But there is parasitic symbiosis, in which one organism seeks to preyupon another as our enemy seeks to prey upon us," interjected an amateurnaturalist who was a fellow prisoner.

"But a truly healthy organism finds ways to rid itself of parasites," Mors said calmly, "or at least to keep them in tolerable subjugation. Do youdoubt that our country is a healthy organism?"

It was encouraging talk, but his fellow prisoners were not convinced. Most of them had been seized in their homes. Only one was fully dressed. Themayor had on an overcoat over his nightshirt; his hairy shanks and bare feetleft him utterly without dignity. Othe r leading citizens were unshaven, uncombed, and in every possible stage of dishabille; all were certain the irhumiliation was a bad omen.

"To be sure," conceded Surgeon General Mors practically, "our countryhas only four million people, and our enemy has fifty. But we have planned ournation carefully. In nature, not all creatures defend themselves with toothand claw. There is a specialized defense for every type of creature, as Imyself pointed out to our president. There must be, as I insisted to him, someform of defense for every type of nation, so that it may survive. And I maysay that be later told me that be considers our nation's survival certain. So, since this province is necessary if our nation is truly to survive, the invaders will have to be turned out of it."

"But when?" asked a prisoner despairingly. "The wheat harvest should begin in three weeks," said Mors meditatively. . "It will be a great blow to our country if our enemy seizes the wheat harvest. I should say that we must have victory for our country in less than threeweeks. Probably within ten days."

His companions stared at him. But Surgeon General Mors did not look likesomeone envisioning a spectacular military triumph for his country. He lookedlike someone sick, at heart from some knowledge he concealed within him.

Depression stayed with the prisoners. They increased number as the daywore on. Typically, to the conquerors the conquered seemed somehow less thanhuman. Many of the later prisoners had been beaten after their arrest. On the second day the schoolhouse was crowded. More of thenew prisoners were beaten. On the third day there was a barbed-wire fence around the schoolhouse and foodfor the prisoners was contemptupusly dumped inside it in bulk for them todistribute themselves. Surgeon General Mors organized a committee for the purpose, and to protest against unnecessary ill-treatment and humiliations.

On the fourth day two men arrived so badly beaten that they wereunconscious, and died even as Surgeon General Mors tried, without drugs or anyequipment to revive them.

The newcomers reported conditions in the province. The invaders weremethodically looting the captured territory. Their obvious purpose was toincrease the riches of their country by impoverishing the province they hadadded to it. Machinery was being shipped back in a steady stream. Manufacturedproducts were requisitioned from merchants. Kantolia had been the richestprovince in its small nation. When the invaders finished, it would be themostpoverty-stricken in Europe.

That was not all. The troops of the invaders were quartered in privatehomes' as well as in public buildings. Nearly every Kantolian family had itsquota of invaders, to be fed at the householder's own expense. And while the enemy troops were required to practice strict discipline in relation to the irofficers, no such strictness was enforced as regarded civilians. A citizenwhose home was only looted was considered fortunate.

The outside world remained unconcerned. Of course no news went out from Kantolia. Censorship and a tightly sealed frontier took care of that. But whatsparse, illicit radio news newcomers brought in to the prisoners indicatedthat the outside world was not too much disturbed by the rectification of an'unimportant' frontier in a remote corner of Europe.

There was a diplomatic crisis among the Big Four powers. Surgeon GeneralMors' government had made a dignified protest and a formal appeal to the United Nations, but the achievement of atomic energy control by thatorganization had been so precarious a matter, and was maintained by sounstable a balance of bargains, that a controversial question like the seizureof Kantolia might wreck the entire framework of international accord ifpressed at the present time. Consideration of thematter had been postponed. The invaders had an indefinite period in which forcibly to remold the province's citizenry nearer to their heart's desire, to teach them to clamordutifully for themaintenance of their new nationality lest worse thingsbefall.

Strangely, though, no new prisoners arrived after the fourth day. Almostthe last to arrive told, sobbing, of the fact that fresh troops had beenpouring into Kantolia almost from the instant of its seizure, and that now amonstrous army was ready to overwhelm the rest of thenation of which Kantoliahad been a part.

But Surgeon General Mors counted on his fingers and said bleakly, "Theinvasion cannot last more than ten days! But it is very terrible!"

He had never been military in appearance. Now, five days without soapwith which to wash, or a razor with which to shave, and with no change ofgarments at all, his looks were not imposing. He had torn up his undershirt tomake bandages for beaten prisoners. The food was insufficient, and he had

given of his own to those most terribly beaten and the refore weakest. The fivedays had told upon him. Yet he still possessed an odd dignity which could onlyhave been the dignity of faith.

Then, on the afternoon of the fifth day, one of the sentries outside the barbed-wire enclosure staggered, dropped his rifle against a tree and thenclung to that tree in a spasm of weakness. And Surgeon General Mors saw it.

He watched somberly until it was over. He looked heartsick and ill. Buthis eyes glowed doggedly as he turned and ran his eyes over the battered, dispirited figures in the concentration camp which was the first benefitconferred by the invaders.

"I must borrow a razor from someone," Mors told themayor of Stadheim, who happened to be nearest him, "or a knife. At worst I shall have to break apane of glass and try to shave with its edge. I am going to demand the surrender of the invading army."

He did not succeed in making the demand that day. It was late afternoonof the seventh day of the occupation before Surgeon General Mors was usheredinto the presence of General Viadek. On the way from the schoolhouse, the stocky, untidy man had been marched through the streets of Stadheim. They werealmost empty. They were dirty and unawept. Trash littered the sidewalks. Hesaw few civilians and no soldiers at all except his guard, until he arrived atthe capitol building which was enemy headquarters.

He saw an invading soldier there, a sentry, lying on the sidewalk in acuriously shapeless heap. Surgeon General Mors knew at the first glance thatthe man was dead.

He looked more than ever sick at heart when he was ushered into the presence of General Vladek. The scene of this second interview was also the office of the provincial governor, but now the elegance of its furnishingshad been corrected. Now it was a picture of efficiency. There were filingcabinets and wall maps, and an automatic facsimile machine in one cornerhummed softly as it covered a slowly unreeling roll of paper with slightlyout-of-register typed orders, queries, lists and the like.

General Viadek was slim and elegantly bemedaled as before. But now the rewas a nervous tic in his cheek. His face was queerly gray. He looked atSurgeon General Mors with a desperate grimness.

"You are going to be shot," he said with a terrifying quietness, "if youanswer my questions truthfully. If you do not answer them, you will not beshot. But you will beg very pitifully for a chance to reconsider and earn afiring squad! Do you understand?"

Surgeon General Mors seated himself with great composure. His attempt atshaving had not been very successful. He was in every way a disreputablecontrast to the invading general's dapper splendor.

"I asked for this interview," said Mors matter offactly, "to ask if youare prepared to surrender the troops under your command. You mentioned oncethat I was the ranking officer of my army in your hands. I doubt that you havecaptured any othe r. So I seem to be the person to make ihe demand."

General Vladek made a violent gesture. Then he composed himself. But hebreathe d quickly, and his cheek twitched, and his teeth showed when he smiled. He did not look conspicuously sane.

"What is this epidemic?" he demanded in a deadly quietness. "My men dieat the rate of ten thousand a day! Your citizens do not! We have lost thirty- five thousand men in four days, and so far not more than six civilians nativeto Kantolia have been stricken! What is it, Mors?"

Surgeon General Mors leaned back in his chair. He showed no sigh oftriumph.

"It would be an organism we developed," he said heavily. "The officialdesignation is CK-211. I understand that it is an artificial mutation, avariation on a fairly common bacterium. I have been told that it could be described as a dwarf form of one of the diplococci. It is hardly larger than a virus molecule. You would not expect me to be more precise."

General Viadek's nostrils distended.

"Ah-h-h-h!" he said with deadly softness. "It is no normal plague! it isbiological war! Too cowardly to fight as honorable men fight, your nation."

"There is no war between our countries," said Surgeon General Mors, prosaically, "and you invaded our country like a brigand, making your ownrules for attack. So we made our own rules for defense. If you surrender the troops under your command, there is a good chance that we can save the irlives. Have you given thought to thematter?"

General Viadek's cheeks twitched. His hands shook with hate.

"Tell me the truth," he said hoarsely, "and I will have you shot. I willconcede so much! I promise that I will have you shot! But if you do not--"

"I think you are being absurd, General," said Mors stolidly. "As Irecall the details, death occurs on the third day after infection, usuallywithin a few hours of the appearance of the first noticeable symptoms. Sulfa, streptomycin, and penicillin are ineffective against this particular strain, which was especially bred up to be resistant to such drugs. Also, from myrecollection, the patient is infectious aim ast from the instant of his owninfection, I think you understate your losses. Moreover, in an epidemic ofthis sort, the death rate should mount geometrically until natural immunes andthe lack of susceptibles lower it."

Mors paused, and said inquiringly, "You have ordered your men to abstainfrom all contact with the civil population?"

General Viadek panted with fury.

"I suspected intention when the plague began! My medical corps insistedthat since only my men were infected, its cause must be contaminated suppliesfrom home! I ordered my troops to subsist on local supplies and distributedour rations among the people, for revenge in case your spies in our supplysystem were responsible! But the rate of infection tripled! And your people donot die! My men die! Only my men."

Surgeon General Mors nodded. His eyes were sober, yet very resolute.

"That is natural," he observed. "Our population is immune." Then he saidexplanatorily. "We have immunized practically our entire population againstcertain formerly prevalent diseases. And included in the injection given toeach citizen was a fraction of a very interesting formula which producesimmunity to diplococci in a quite new fashion."

The dapper General Vladek sat frozen and speechless, in a rage somurderous that he seemed almost calm.

"It makes symbiosis possible," said Surgeon General Mors, in aninterested tone. "It produces a condition under which the human body and the entire series of diplococci can live togethe r. It does not produce the relationship. That requires the organisms, too. It merely makes the relationship possible. We have had practically no diplococci infections in ourcountry for years back. Such diseases happen to be very rare among us. But the inoculation makes it possible for any of our inoculated citizens to establisha truly symbiotic relationship in case he encounters them. It is like the adjustment of intestinal flora and colon bacilli to us. They do not harm us, and we do not harm them. You follow the reasoning?"

General Vladek's voice was quite inhuman. "How were my men infected?" hedemanded. His voice cracked. "Tell me, how were my men infected? My medicalcorps says--"

"We did not infect them," said Surgeon General Mors calmly. "We infectedonly our own population. On themorning of your invasion we spread the infection in the drinking water, in the food. We infected our own people, whocould not be harmed by it-and then I came to you and warned you to keep yoursoldiers aloof from our people. I also advised you to get your troops out of

our country for their own safety, but you would not believe me. Because yousee", his tone was absolutely commonplace, "every citizen of our country isnow a carrier of the plague of which your soldiers die. A carrier. Notsuffering from it, but able to give it to anyone not immunized against it. Youhave heard of typhoid carriers. We are a nation of carriers, bearers of the plague which is destroying your army."

General Viadek looked like an image of frozen, despairing rage. His facewas gray. His cheek twitched. He had led an invading army triumphantly intothis province.

Then without one shot being fired, his army had ceased to be an army, and a sentry lay dead on the street before his headquarters.

"We did not, like to do it," said Surgeon General Mors, heavily. "But wehad to defend ourselves. The soil of our nation is now deadly to your troops. If you murdered and burned every citizen of our country, our land would stillbe fatal to your men and to the settlers who might follow them. You cannotmake use of Kantolia. You cannot make use of any of the rest of our country. And the loot you have sent back has spread infection in your cities. Couriershave carried it back and transmitted it before they died. The quislings yousent to your country to be rewarded for betraying their own, they werecarriers, too. The plague must rage horribly in your nation. Othe r countrieswill close their frontiers in quarantine, if they have not already done so. You nation is destroyed unless you let us save it. I beg that you will give usthe power."

Then Surgeon General Mors said very wearily: "I hope you will surrenderyour army, General Viadek. Your men, as our prisoners, will become ourpatients and we will cure them. Othe rwise they will die. Permit us, and wewill check the epidemic you created in your own country by invading us. We did not defend ourselves without knowing our weapon thoroughly. But you will haveto give us the power to rescue you. You and your nation must surrender withoutconditions."

General Vladek stood up. He rang a bell. An officer and soldiersentered.

"Take him out," panted General Vladek hoarsely. Then his voice rose to ascream. "Take him out and kill him!"

The officer moved. Then there was a clatter. A rifle had dropped to the floor. One of the soldiers staggered. He reeled against one of the steelfiling cases and clung there desperately. Sweat poured out on his face; he wasashen white. He knew, of course, what was thematter. He sobbed. He wasalready a dead man, though he still moved and breathe d. Great tears welled outof his eyes. The other soldiers wavered and fled.

Surgeon General Mors stood beside a pigsty and argued patiently with apeasant who so far had stubbornly refused to permit the reinoculation ofeither his family or his cows. The dumpy little man in the badly fittinguniform said earnestly,

"It is a matter of living togethe r, what learned men call symbiosis. Wedefended our country with the other inoculations. Now we must defend allmankind with the se! We do not want our people to be feared or hated. We wantvisitors from other nations to come and live among us in peace and safety, tohave no fears about doing business with us. If other nations are afraid of us, we will suffer for it!"

The peasant made fitful objections. Victory over the invaders, and the terms imposed upon them, had made him proud. But Surgeon General Mors' patientarguments were gradually wearing him down.

"Ah, but they made war on us. That was different! We do not want anymore wars. When you and your family and your cows have been inoculated, wewill be that much furthe r along toward the understanding that nations which

are at peace can live togethe r," said Surgeon General Mors earnestly. "Nationswhich are at war only die togethe r."

The Strange Case of John Kingman

IT STARTED WHEN Dr. Braden took the trouble to look up John Kingman's case- history card. Meadeville Mental Hospital had a beautifully elaborate system ofcard indexes, because psychiatric research is stressed there. It is the oldestmental institution in the country, having been known as "New Bedlam" when itwas founded some years before the Republic of the United States of America. The card index system was unbelievably perfect. But young Dr. Braden foundJohn Kingman's card remarkably lacking in the usual data.

"Kingman, John," said the card. "White, male, 5'8", brown-black hair.

Note: physical anomaly. Patient has six fingers on each hand, extra digitscontaming apparently normal bones and being wholly functional. Age..." Thiswas blank. "Race..." This, too, was blank. "Birthplace " Considering the other blanks, it was natural for this to be vacant, also. "Diagnosis: advancedtypical paranoia with pronounced delusions of grandeur apparently unassociatedwith usual conviction of persecution." There was a comment here, too. "Patientapparently understands English very slightly if at all. Does not speak." Thenthree more spaces. "Nearest relative..." It was blank. "Case history..." It was blank. Then, "Date of admission..." and it was blank.

The card was notably defective, for the index card of a patient atMeadeville Mental. A patient's age and race could be unknown if he'd simplybeen picked up in the street somewhere and never adequately identified. Insuch an event it was reasonable that his nearest relative and birthplaceshould be unknown, too. But there should have been some sort of case history, at least of the events leading to his committal to the institution. Andcertainly, positively, absolutely, the date of his admission should be on the card!

Young Dr. Braden was annoyed. This was at the time when the Jantzeneuphoric-shock treatment was first introduced, and young Dr. Braden believedin it. It made sense. He was anxious to attempt it at Meadeville, of course ona patient with no other possible hope of improvement. He handed the card tothe clerk in the records department and asked for furthe r data on the case.

Two hours later he smoked comfortably on a very foul pipe, stretched outon grassy sward by the Administration Building. There was a beautifully bluesky overhead, and the shadows of the live oaks reached out in an odd longpattern on the lawn. Young Dr. Braden read meditatively in the AmericanJournal of Psychiatry. The article was "Reaction of Ten Paranoid Cases toEuphoric Shock." John Kingman sat in regal dignity on the steps nearby. Hewore thenondescript garments of an indigent patient, not supplied withclothing by relatives. He gazed into the distance, to all appearances thinkingconsciously godlike thoughts and being infinitely superior to mere ordinaryhumans. He was of an indeterminate age which might be forty or might be sixtyor might be anywhere in between. His six-fingered hands lay in studiedgracefulness in his lap. He deiberately ignored all of mankind and mankind'sdoings.

Dr. Braden finished the article. He sucked thoughtfully on the burned- out pipe. Without seeming to do so, he regarded John Kingman again. Mentalcases have unpredictable reactions, but as with children and will animals, much can be done if care is taken not to startle them. Presently young Dr. Braden said meditatively:

"John, I think something can be done for you"

The regal figure turned its eyes. They looked at theyounger man. They were aloofly amused at the imperitinence of a mere human being addressing JohnKingman, who was so much greater than a mere human being that he was not evenannoyed at human impertinence. Then John Kingman looked away again.

"I imagine," said Braden, as meditatively as before, "that you're prettybored. I'm going to see if something can't be done about it. In fact--"

Someone came across the grass toward him. It was the clerk of the records department. He looked very unhappy. He hadthe card Dr. Braden hadturned in with a request for more complete information. Braden waited.

"Er... doctor," said the clerk miserably, "the re's something wrong! Something terribly wrong! About the records, I mean."

The aloofness of John Kingman had multiplied with the coming of asecond, low, human being into his ken. He gazed into the distance in divineindifference to such creatures.

"Well?" said Braden.

"There's no record of his admission!" said the clerk. "Every yearthe re's a complete roster of the patients, you know. I thought I'd just glanceback, find out what year his name first appeared, and look in the committalpapers for that year. But I went back twenty years, and John Kingman ismentioned every year!"

"Look back thirty, then," said Braden.

"I... I did!" said the clerk painfully. "He was a patient here thirtyyears ago!"

"Forty?" asked Braden.

The clerk gulped.

"Dr. Braden," he said desperately, "I even went to the dead files, whererecords going back to 1850 are kept. And... doctor, he was a patient then!"

Braden got up from the grass and brushed himself off automatically.

"Nonsense!" he said. "That's ninety-eight years ago!"

The clerk looked crushed. "I know, doctor. There's something terriblywrong! I've never had my records questioned before. I've been here twentyyears."

"I'll come with you and look for myself," said Dr. Braden. "Send anattendant to come here and take him back to his ward."

"Y-yes, doctor," said the clerk, gulping again. "At... at once."

He went away at a fast pace between a shuffle and a run. Dr. Bradenscowled impatiently.

Then he saw John Kingman looking at him again, and John Kingman wasamused. Tolerantly, loftily amused. Amused with a patronizing condescensionthat would have been infuriating to anyone but a physician trained to regard behavior as symptomatic rather than personal.

"It's absurd," grunted Braden, matter of factly treating the patient, asa good psychiatrist does, like a perfectly normal human being. "You haven'tbeen here for ninety-eight years!"

One of the six-fingered hands stirred. While John Kingman regardedBraden with infinitely superior scorn, six fingers made a gesture as ofwriting. Then the hand reached out.

Braden put a pencil in it. The other hand reached. Braden fumbled in hispockets and found a scrap of paper. He offered that.

John Kingman looked aloofly into the far distance, not even glancing atwhat his hands did. But the fingers sketched swiftly, with practiced ease. Ittook only seconds. Then, negligently, he reached out and returned pencil andpaper to Braden. He returned to his godlike indifference to mere mortals. Butthere was now the faintest possible smile on his face. It was an expression ofcontemptuous triumph.

Braden glanced at the sketch. There was design there. There was anunbelievable intricacy of relationship between this curved line and that, andbetween them and the formalized irregular pattern in the center. It was not

the drawing of a lunatic. It was cryptic, but it was utterly rational. Thereis something essentially childish in the background of most forms of insanity. There was nothing childish about this. And it was obscurely, annoyinglyfamiliar. Braden had seen something like it, somewhere, before. It was not inthe line of psychiatry, but in some of the physical sciences diagrams likethis were used in explanations.

An attendant came to return John Kingman to his ward. Braden folded the paper and put it in his pocket.

"It's not in my line, John," he told John Kingman. "I'll have a check-upmade. I think I'm going to be able to do something for you."

John Kingman suffered himself to be led away. Rathe r, he grandlypreceded the attendant, negligently preventing theman from touching him, asif such a touch Would be a sacrilege theman was too ignorant to realize.

Braden went to the record office. With the agitated clerk beside him, hetraced John Kingman's name to the earliest of the file of dead records.

Handwriting succeeded typewriting as he went back through theyears. Paperyellowed. Handwriting grew Spencerian. It approached the copperplate. But, inink turned brown, in yellowed rag paper in the ruled record, books of the Eastern Pennsylvania Asylum, which was Meadeville Mental in 1850, there werethe records of a patient named John Kingman for every year. Twice Braden cameupon notes alongside thename. One was in 1880. Some staff doctor, there wereno psychiatrists in those days, had written, "High fever." There was nothingelse. In 1853 a neat memo stood beside thename. "This man has six functioningfingers on each hand." The memo had been made ninety-five years before.

Dr. Braden looked at the agitated clerk. The record of John Kingman waspatently impossible. The clerk read it as a sign of inefficiency in his officeand possibly on his part. He would be upset and apprehensible until the sourceof the error had safely been traced to a predecessor.

"Someone," said Braden dryly, but he did not believe it even then, "forgot to make a note of the explanation. An unknown must have been admittedat some time as John Kingman. In time, he died. But somehow thename JohnKingman had become a sort of stock name like John Doe, to signify anunidentified patient. Look in the death records for John Kingman. Evidently aJohn Kingman died, and that same year another unidentified patient wasassigned the same name. That's it!"

The clerk almost gasped with relief. He went happily to check. ButBraden did not believe it. In 1853 someone had noted that John Kingman had sixfunctioning fingers on each hand. The odds against two patients in oneinstitution having six functioning fingers, even in the same century, would beenormous.

Braden went doggedly to themuseum. There the devices used inpsychiatric treatments in the days of New Bedlam were preserved, but notdisplayed. Meadeville Mental had been established in 1776 as New Bedlam. Itwas the oldest mental institution in the United States, but it was notpleasant to think of the treatment given to patients, then termed "madmen", inthe early days.

The records remained. Calf-leathe r bindings. Thin rag paper. Beautifullyshaded writing, done with quill pens. Year after year, Dr. Braden searched. Hefound John Kingman listed in 1820. In 1801. In 1795. In 1785 thename "JohnKingthan" was absent from the annual list of patients. Braden found the recordof his admission in 1786. On the 21st of May, 1786, ten years after New Bedlamwas founded, one hundred and sixty-two years before the time of his search, there was a neat entry:

A poore madman admitted this day has been assigned thename of JohnKingman because of his absurdly royal manner and affected dignity. He is fivefeet eight inches tall, appears to speak no English or any other tongue knownto any of the learned men here about, and has six fingers on each hand, the

extra fingers being perfectly formed and functioning. Dr. San Forde observedthat he seems to have a high fever. On his left shoulder, when stripped, the reappears a curious design which is not tattooing according to any knownfashion. His madness appears to be so strong a conviction of his greatnessthat he will not condescend to notice others as being so much his inferiors, so that if not committed hee would starve. But on three occasions, when beingexamined by physicians, he put out his hand imperiously for writinginstruments, and drew very intricate designs which all agree have nosignificance. He was committed as a madman by a commission consisting of Drs. San Forde, Smyth, Hale, and Bode."

Young Dr. Braden read the entry a second time. Then a third. He ran hishands through his hair. When the clerk came back to announce distressedly thatnot in all the long history of the institution had a patient named JohnKingman died, Braden was not surprised.

"Quite right," said Braden to the almost hysterical clerk. "He didn'tdie. But I want John Kingman taken over to the hospital ward. We're going tolook him over. He's been rather neglected. Apparently he's had actual medicalattention only once in a hundred and sixty-two years. Get out his committalpapers for me, will you? He was admitted here May 21st, 1786."

Then Braden left, leaving behind him a clerk practically prostrated withshock. The clerk wildly suspected that Dr. Braden had gone insane. But when hefound the committal papers, he decided hysterically that it was he who wouldshortly hold in one of the wards.

John Kingman manifested amusement when he was taken into the hospitallaboratory. For a good ten seeonds, Braden watched him narrowly, he glancedfrom one piece of apparatus to anothe r. It was impossible to doubt that afterone glance he understood the function and operation of every appliance in the ultramodern, super, scientifically, equipped laboratory of the hospital ward. Bnt he was amused. In particular, he looked at the big X-ray machine andsmiled with such contempt that the X-ray technician bristled.

"No paranoid suspicion," said Braden. "Most paranoid patients suspectthat they're going to be tortured or killed when they're brought to a placewhere the re's stuff they don't understand."

John Kingman turned his eyes to Braden. He put out his six-fingered handand made themotion of writing. Braden handed him a pencil and a memo tablet. Negligently, contemptuously, he sketched. He sketched again. He handed the sketches to Braden and retreated into his enormous amused contempt forhumanity.

Braden glanced at the scraps of paper. He jerked his bead, and the X-raytechnician came to his side.

"This," said Braden dryly, "looks like a diagram of an X-ray tube. Isit?"

The technician blinked.

"He don't use the regular symbols," he objected, "but... well... yes. That's what he puts for the target and this's for the cathode. Hm-m-m. Yes." Then he said suddenly: "Say! That's not right."

He studied the diagram. Then he said in abrupt excitement:

"Look! He's put in a field like in a electron microscope! That's anidea! Do that, and you'd get straightline electron flow and a narrower X-raybeam."

Braden said:

"I wonder! What's this second sketch? Another type of X-ray?" The X- ray technician studied the second sketch absorbedly. After a time he saiddubiously:

"He don't use regular symbols. I don't know. Here's the same sign forthe target and that for the cathode. This looks like something to... hm-m-m ... accelerate the electrons. Like in a Coolidge tube. Only it's," Hescratched his head. "I see what he's trying to put down. If something likethis would work, you could work any tube at any voltage you wanted. Yeah! Andall the high EMF would be inside the tube. No danger. Hey! You could work thisoff dry batteries! A doctor could carry a X-ray outfit in his handbag! And hecould get million-volt stuff!"

The technician stared in mounting excitement. Presently he saidurgently:

"This is crazy! But... look, Doe! Let me have this thing to studyover! This is great stuff! This is.... Gosh! Give me a chance to get thismade up and try it out! I don't get it all yet, but...."

Braden took back the sketch and put it in his pocket.

"John Kingman," he observed, "has been a patient here for a hundred andsixty-two years. I think we're going to get some more surprises. Let's get atthe job on hand!"

John Kingman was definitely amused. He was amenable, now. His air ofpitying condescension, as of a god to imbeciles, under other circumstanceswould have been infuriating. He permitted himself to be X-rayed as one mightallow children to use one as a part of their play. He glanced at the the rmometer and smiled contemptuously. He permitted his body temperature to betaken from an armpit. The electrocardiograph aroused just such momentaryinterest as a child's unfamiliar plaything might cause. With an air of mirthhe allowed the tattooed design on his shoulder, it was there, to bephotographed. Throughout, he showed such condescending contempt as wouldexplain his failure to be annoyed.

But Braden grew pale as the tests went on. John Kingman's bodytemperature was 1050 F. A "high fever" had been observed in 1850, ninety-eightyears before, and in 1786, well over a century and a half previously. But hestill appeared to be somewhere between forty and sixty years old. JohnKingman's pulse rate was one hundred fifty-seven beats per minute, and the electrocardiograph registered an absolutely preposterous pattern which had nomeaning until Braden said curtly:

"If he had two hearts, it would look like that!"

When the X-ray plates came out of the fixing-bath, he looked at themwith the grim air of someone expecting to see the impossible. And the impossible was there. When John Kingman was admitted to New Bedlam, there wereno such things as X-rays on earth. It was natural that he had never been X- rayed before. He had two hearts. He had three extra ribs on each side. He hadfour more vertebrae than a normal human being. There were distinct oddities inhis elbow joints. And his cranial capacity appeared to be something liketwelve per cent above that of any but exceptional specimens of humanity. Histeeth displayed distinct, consistent deviations from thenorm in shape.

He regarded Braden with contemptuous triumph when the tests were over. He did not speak. He drew dignity about himself like a garment. He allowed anattendant to dress him again while he looked into the distance, seeminglythinking godlike thoughts. When his toilet was complete he looked again atBraden, with vast condescension, and his six-fingered hands again made agesture of writing. Braden grew, if possible, slightly paler as he handed overa pencil and pad.

John Kingman actually designed to glance, once, at the sheet on which hewrote. When he handed it back to Braden and withdrew into magnificently amusedaloofness, there were a dozen or more tiny sketches on the sheet. The firstwas an exact duplicate of the one he had handed Braden before the Administration Building. Beside it was another which was similar but notalike. The third was a specific variation of the two togethe r. The restcarried on that variation in precise, exact steps until the last pair ofsketches divided again into two, of which one, by a perfectly logical extension of the change, pattern, had returned to the original design, whilethe other was a bewilderingly complex pattern with its formalized central partin two closely-linked Sections.

Braden caught his breath. Just as the X-ray man had been puzzled atfirst by the use of unfamiliar symbols for familiar ideas, so Braden had beenpuzzled by untraceable familiarity in the first sketch of all. But the lastdiagram made everything clear. It resembled almost exactly the standarddiagrams illustrating fissionable elements as atoms. Once it was granted thatJohn Kingman was no ordinary lunatic, it became clear that here was a diagramof some physical process which began with normal and stable atoms and arrivedat an unstable atom, with one of the original atoms returned to its originalstate. It was, in short, a process of physical catalysis which would produceatomic energy.

Braden raised his eyes to the contemptuous, amused eyes of John Kingman.

"I think you win," he said shakenly. "I still think you're crazy, butmaybe we're crazier still."

The commitment papers on John Kiagman were a hundred and sixty-two yearsold. They were yellow and brittle and closely written. John Kingman, said the oddly spelled and sometimes curiously phrased document, was first seen on themorning of April 10, 1786, by a man named Thomas Hawkes, as he drove intoAurora, Pennsylvania, with a load of corn. John Kingman was then clad in veryqueer garments, not like those of ordinary men. The material looked like silk, save that it seemed also to be metallic. The man Hawkes was astounded, butthought perhaps some strolling player had got drunk and wandered off whilewearing his costume for a play or pageant. He obligingly stopped his horse andallowed the stranger to climb in for a ride to town. The stranger wasimperious, and scornfully silent. Hawkes asked who he was, and wascontemptuously ignored. He asked, seemingly, all the world was talking of suchmatters then, at least the world about Aurora, Pennsylvania, if the strangerhad seen the giant shooting stars of the night before. The stranger ignoredhim. Arrived in town, the stranger stood in the street with regal dignity, looking contemptuously at the people. A crowd gathe red about him, but heseemed to feel too superior to notice it. Presently a grave and elderly man, Mr. Wycherly, appeared and the stranger fixed him with a gesture. He stoopedand wrote strange designs in the dust at his feet. When the unintelligibledesign was meaningless to Mr. Wycherly, the stranger seemed to fly into a verypassion of contempt. He spat at the crowd, and the crowd became unruly andconstables took him into custody.

Braden waited patiently until both the Director of Meadeville Mental andthe man from Washington had finished reading theyellowed papers. Then Bradenexplained calmly:

"He's insane, of course. It's paranoia. He is as convinced of hissuperiority to us as, say, Napoleon or Edison would have been convinced ofthe ir superiority if they'd suddenly been dumped down among a tribe ofAustralian bushmen. As a matter of fact, John Kingman may have just as goodreason as they would have had to feel his superiority. But if he were sane hewould prove it. He would establish it. Instead, he has withdrawn into a remotecontemplation of his own greatness. So he is a paranoid. One may surmise thathe was insane when he first appeared. But he doesn't have a delusion ofpersecution because on the face of it no such the ory is needed to account forhis present situation."

The Director said in a tolerantly shocked tone:

"Dr. Braden! You speak as if he were not a human being!"

"He isn't," said Braden. "His body temperature is a hundred and five. Human tissues simply would not survive that temperature. He has extra vertebrae and extra ribs. His joints are not quite like ours. He has twohearts. We were able to check his circulatory system just under the skin withinfrared lamps, and it is not like ours. And I submit that he has been apatient in this asylum for one hundred and sixty-two years. If he is human, heis at least remarkable!"

The man from Washington said interestedly:

"Where do you think he comes from, Dr. Braden?"

Braden spread out his hands. He said doggedly:

"I make no guesses. But I sent photostats of the sketches he made to the Bureau of Standards. I said that they were made by a patient and appeared tobe diagrams of atomic structure. I asked if they indicated aknowledge ofphysics. "You", he looked at theman from Washington, "turned up thirty-sixhours later. I deduce that he has such knowledge."

"He has!" said theman from Washington, mildly, "The X-ray sketches wereinteresting enough, but the others.... Apparently he has told us how to getcontrolled atomic energy out of silicon, which is one of earth's commonestelements. Where did he come from, Dr. Braden?"

Braden clantped his jaw.

"You noticed that the commitment papers referred to shooting stars thencausing much local comment? I looked up thenewspapers for about that date. They reported a large shooting star which was observed to descend to the earth. Then, various credible observers claimed that it shot back up to the sky again. Then, some hours afterward, various large shooting stars crossedthe sky from horizon to horizon, without ever falling."

The Director of Meadeville Mental said humorously:

"It's a wonder that New Bedlam, as we were then, was not crowded aftersuch statements!"

The man from Washington did not smile.

"I think," he said meditatively, "that Dr. Braden suggests a spaceshiplanding to permit John Kingman to get out, and then going away again. Andpossible pursuit afterward."

The Director laughed appreciatively at the assumed jest.

"If," said theman from Washington, "John Kingrnan is not human, and ifhe comes from somewhere where as much was known about atomic energy almost twocenturies ago as he has showed us, and, if he were insane there, he might haveseized some sort of vehicle and fled in it because of delusions of persecution. Which in a sense, if he were insane, might be justified. He wouldhave been pursued. With pursuers close behind him he might have landed here."

"But the vehicle!" said the Director, humorously. "Our ancestors wouldhave recorded finding a spaceship or an airplane."

"Suppose," said theman from Washington, "that his pursuers hadsomething like... say... radar. Even we have that! A cunning lunaticwould have sent off his vehicle under automatic control to lead his pursuersas long and merry a chase as possible. Perhaps he sent it to dive into the sun. The rising shooting star and the other cruising shooting stars would beaccounted for. What do you say, Dr. Braden?"

Braden shrugged.

"There is no evidence. Now he is insane. If we were to cure him...."

"Just how," said theman from Washington, "would you cure him? I thoughtparanoia was practically hopeless."

"Not quite," Braden told him. "They've used shock treatment for dementiapraecox and schizophrenia, with good results. Until last year there wasnothing of comparable value for paranoia. Then Jantzen suggested euphoricshock. Basically, the idea is to dispel illusions by creating hallucinations."

The Director fidgeted disapprovingly. The man from Washington waited.

"In euphoric shock," said Braden carefully, "the tensions and anxietiesof insane patients are relieved by drugs which produce a sensation of euphoria, or well being. Jantzen combined hallucination-producing drugs withthose. The combination seems to place the patient temporarily in a cosmos inwhich all delusions are satisfied and all tensions relieved. He has a rest from his struggle against reality. Also he has a sort of supercatharsis, inthe convincing realization of all his desires. Quite often he comes out of the first euphoric shock temporarily sane. The percentage of final cures issatisfyingly high."

The man from Washington said, "Body chemistry?"

Braden regarded him with new respect. He said, "I don't know. He's livedon human food for almost two centuries, and in any case it's been proved thatthe proteins will be identical on all planets under all suns. But I couldn'tbe sure about it. There might even be allergies. You say his drawings werevery important. It might be wisest to find out everything possible from himbefore even euphoric shock was tried."

"Ah, yes!" said the Director, tolerantly. "If he has waited a hundredand sixty-two years, a few weeks or months will make no difference. And Iwould like to watch the experiment, but I am about to start on my vacation. . . "

"Hardly," said theman from Washington.

"I said, I am about to start on my vacation."

"John Kingman," said theman from Washington mildly, "has been tryingfor a hundred and sixty-two years to tell us how to have controlled atomicenergy, and pocket X-ray machines, and God knows what all else. There may be, somewhere about this institution, drawings of antigravity apparatus, really efficient atomic bombs, spaceship drives or weapons which could depopulate the earth. I'm afraid nobody here is going to communicate with the outside worldin any way until the place and all its personnel are gone over... ah rather carefully."

"This," said the Director indignantly, "is preposterous!"

"Quite so. A thousand years of human advance locked in the skull of alunatic. Nearly two hundred years more of progress and development wastedbecause he was locked up here. But it would be most preposterous of all to lethis information loose to the other lunatics who aren't locked up becausethe y're running governments! Sit down!"

The Director sat down. The man from Washington said:

"Now, Dr. Braden...."

John Kingman spent days on end in scornful, triumphant glee. Bradenwatched him somberly. Meadeville Mental Hospital was an anned camp withsentries everywhere, and especially about the building in which John Kingman gloated. There were hordes of suitably certified scientists and psychiatristsabout him, now, and he was filled with blazing satisfaction.

He sat in regal, triumphant aloofness. He was the greatest, themostimportant, themost consequential figure on this planet. The stupid creatures who inhabited it, they were only superficially like himself, had at last cometo perceive his godliness. Now they clustercd about him. In their stupidlanguage which it was beneath his dignity to learn, they addressed him. Butthey did not grovel. Even groveling would not be sufficiently respectful forsuch inferior beings when addressing John Kingman. He very probably devised inhis own mind the exact etiquette the se stupid creatures must practice beforehe would condescend to notice them.

They made elaborate tests. He ignored their actions. They tried withtransparent cunning to trick him into furthe r revelations of the powers heheld. Once, in malicious amusement, he drew a sketch of a certain reactionwhich such inferior minds could not possibly understand. They were vastlyexcited, and he was enormously amused. When they tried that reaction andsquare miles turned to incandescent vapor, the survivors would realise thatthey could not trick or force him into giving them the riches of his godlike mind. They must devise the proper etiquette to appease him. They must abjectlyand humbly plead with him and placate him and sacrifice to him. They must denyall other gods but John Kinginan. They would realize that he was all wisdom, all power, all greatness when the reaction he had sketched destroyed them bymillions.

Braden prevented that from happening. When John Kingusan gave a sketchof a new atomic reaction in response to an elaborate trick one of thenewcomers had devised, Braden protested grimly.

"The patient," he said doggedly, "is a paranoid. Suspicion andtrickiness is inherent in his mental processes.At any moment, to demonstratehis greatness, he may try to produce unholy destruction. You absolutely cannottrust him! Be careful!"

He hammered the fact home, arguing the sheer fact that a paranoid willdo absolutely anything to prove his grandeur.

The new reaction was tried with microscopic quantities of material, andit only destroyed everything within a fifty-yard radius. Which brought the final decision on John Kingman. He was insane. He knew more about oneoverwhelmingly important subject than all the generations of men. But it wasnot possible to obtain trustworthy data from him on that subject or anyothe rs. while he was insane. It was worth while to take the calculated risk of attempting to cure him.

Braden protested again:

"I urged the attempt to cure him," he said firmly, "before I knew he hadgiven the United States severe centuries head-start in knowledge of atomicenergy was thinking of him as a patient. For his own sake, any risk wasproper. Since he is not human, withdraw my urging. I do not know what willhappen. Anything could happen."

His refusal held up treatment for a week. Then a Presidential executiveorder resolved thematter. The attempt was to be made as a calculated risk. Dr. Braden would make the attempt.

He did. He tested John Kingman for tolerance of euphoric drugs. Nounfavorable reaction.He tested him for tolerance of drugs producinghallucination. No unf avorable reaction. Then he injected into one of JohnKingman's veins a certain quantity of the combination of drugs which on humanbeings was most effective for euphoric shock, and whose separate constituentshad been tested on John Kingman and found harmless. It was not a sufficientdose to produce the full required effect. Braden expected to have to make atleast one and probably two additional injections before the requisite euphoriawas produced. He was taking no single avoidable chance. He administered firsta dosage which should have produced no more than a feeling of mild butdefinite exhilaration.

And John Kingman went into convulsions. Horrible ones.

There is such a thing as allergy and such a thing as synergy, and nobodyunderstands eithe r. Some patients collapse when given aspirin. Some break outin rashes from penicillin. Some drugs, taken atone, have one effect, and takentogethe r quite another and drastic one. A drug producing euphoria was harmlessto John Kingman. A drug producing hallucinations was harmless. But, synergy orallergy or whatever, the two taken togethe r were deadly poison.

He was literally unconscious for three weeks, and in continuousconvulsion for two days. He was kept alive by artificial nourishment, glucose, nasal feeding everything. But his coma was extreme. Four separate times he wasbelieved dead.

But after three weeks he opened his eyes vaguely. In another week he wasable to talk, From the first, his expression was bewildered. He was no longerproud. He began to learn English. He showed no paranoid symptoms. He waswholly sane. In fact, his I.Q., tested later, was ninety, which is well withinthe range of normal intelligence. He was not over-bright, but adequate. And he did not remember who he was. He did not remember anything at all about hislife before rousing from coma in the Meadeville Mental Hospital. Not anythingat all. It was apparently, either the price or the cause of his recovery.

Braden considered that it was themeans. He urged his views on the frustrated scientists who wanted now to try hypnotism and "truth serum" andother devices for picking the lock of John Kingman's brain.

"As a diagnosis," said Braden, moved past the tendency to be technical, "the poor devil smashed up on something we can't even guess at. His normalpersonality couldn't take it, whatever it was, so he fled into delusions, intoinsanity. He lived in that retreat over a century and a half, and then wefound him out, And we wouldn't let him keep his beautiful delusions that hewas great and godlike and all-powerful. We were merciless. We forced ourselvesupon him. We questioned him. We tricked him. In the end, we nearly poisonedhim! And his delusions couldn't stand up. He couldn't I admit that he waswrong, and he couldn't reconcile such experiences with his delusions. Therewas only one thing he could do, forget the whole thing in themost literalpossible manner. What he's done is to go into what they used to call dementiapraecox. Actually, it's infantilism. He's fled back to his childhood. That'swhy his I.Q. is only ninety, instead of the unholy figure it must have beenwhen he was a normal adult of his race. He's mentally a child. He sleeps, right now, in the foetal position. Which is a warning! One more attempt totamper with his brain, and he'll go into the only place that's left for him, into the absolute blankness that is themind of the unborn child!"

He presented evidence. The evidence was overwhelming. In the end, reluctantly, John Kingman was left alone.

He gets along all right, though. He works in the records department ofMeadeville Mental now, because there his six-fingered hands won't causeremark. He is remarkably accurate and perfectly happy.

But be is carefully watched. The one question he can answer now is, howlong he's going to live. A hundred and sixty-two years is only part of hislifetime. But if you didn't know, you'd swear he wasn't more than fifty.

The Lonely Planet

CHAPTER I PROTEAN PLANT

ALYX WAS VERY lonely before men came to it. It did not know that it waslonely, to be sure. Perhaps it did not know anything, for it had no need forknowledge. It had need only for memory, and all its memories were simple. Warmth and coolness; sunshine and dark; rain and dryness. Nothing else, eventhough Alyx was incredibly old. It was the first thing upon its planet whichhad possessed consciousness.

In the beginning there were probably other living things. Possibly the rewere quintillions of animalcules, rotifera, bacteria, and amoebae in the steaming pool in which Alyx began. Maybe Alyx was merely one of similarcreatures, as multitudinous as the stars and smaller than motes, which swamand lived and died in noisesome slime beneath a cloud-hung, dripping sky. Butthat was a long time ago. Millions of years ago. Hundreds of millions of yearsnow gone.

When men came, they thought at first the planet was dead. Alyx was thename they gave to the globe which circled about its lonely sun. One day aSpace Patrol survey-ship winked into being from overdrive some millions ofmiles from the sun. It hung there, making conscientious determinations of the spectrum, magnetic field, spot-activity and other solar data.

Matter-of-factly, the ship then swam through emptiness to the lonelyplanet. There were clouds over its surface, and there were icecaps. Thesurface was irregular, betokening mountains, but there were no seas. Theobservers in the survey-ship were in the act of making note that it was adesert, without vegetation, when the analyzers reported protoplasm on the surface. So the survey-ship approached.

Alyx the creature was discovered when the ship descended on landing jetstoward the surface. As the jets touched ground, tumult arose. There wereclouds of steam, convulsive heavings of what seemed to be brown earth. A greatgap of writhing agony appeared below the ship. Horrible, rippling movements spread over the surface and seemed alive, as far as the eye could reach.

The survey-ship shot upward. It touched solidity at the edge of thenorthe rn icecap. It remained a month, examining the planet-or rather, examining Alyx, which covered all the planet's surface save at the poles.

The report stated that the planet was covered by a single creature, which was definitely one creature and definitely alive. The ordinary distinction between animal and vegetable life did not apply to Alyx. It wascellular, to be sure, and the refore presumably could divide, but it had notbeen observed to do so. Its parts were not independent members of a colony, like coral polyps. They constituted one creature, which was at once utterlysimple and infinitely diverse.

It broke down the rocks of its planet, like microorganisms, and made useof their mineral content for food, like plankton. It made use of light for photosynthe sis to create complex compounds, like plants. It was capable ofamoeboid movement, like a low order of animal life. And it had consciousness. It responded to stimuli-such as the searing of its surface-with anguished heavings and withdrawals from the pain.

For the rest, the observers on the survey-ship were inclined to gibberincoherently. Then a junior lieutenant named Jon Haslip made a diffidentsuggestion. It was only a guess, but they proved he was right.

The creature which was Alyx had consciousness of a type never before encountered. It responded not only to physical stimuli but to thoughts. It didwhatever one imagined it doing. If one imagined it turning green for moreefficient absorption of sunlight, it turned green. There were tiny pigment-granules in its cells to account for the phenomenon. If one imagined it turning red, It turned red. And if one imagined it extending a pseudopod, cautiously, to examine an observation-instrument placed at its border on the ice cap, it projected a pseudopod, cautiously, to examine that instrument.

Haslip never got any real credit for his suggestion. It was mentionedonce, in a footnote of a volume called the Report of the Hatycon Expedition toAlyx, Vol. IV, Chap., 4, p. 97. Then it was forgotten. But a biologist namedKatistan acquired some fame in scientific circles for his exposition of the origin and development of Alyx.

"In some remote and mindless age," he wrote, "there was purely automaton-like response to stimuli on the part of the one-celled creatureswhich-as on Earth and elsewhere-were the earliest forms of life on the planet. Then, in time, perhaps a cosmic ray produced a mutation in one individual among those creatures: Perhaps a creature then undistinguishable from itsfellows, swimming feebly in some fetid pool. By themutation, that creaturebecame possessed of purpose, which is consciousness in its most primitiveform, and its purpose was food. Its fellows had no purpose, because theyremained automata which responded only to external stimuli. The purpose of themutated creature affected them as a stimulus. They responded. They swam to the purposeful creature and became its food. It became the solitary inhabitant ofits pool, growing hugely. It continued to have a purpose, which was food.

"There was nourishment in themud and stones at the bottom of that pool. It continued to grow because it was the only creature on its planet with purpose, and the other creatures had no defense against purpose. Evolution did not provide an enemy, because chance did not provide a competitive purpose, which implies a mind. Othe r creatures did not develop an ability to resist itsmind-stimuli, which directed them to become its prey."

Here Katistan's the orizing becomes obscure for a while. Then:

"On Earth and other planets, telepathy is difficult because our remotestcellular ancestors developed a defensive block against each othe r's mind- stimuli. On Alyx, the planet, no such defense came into being, so that onecreature overwhelmed the planet and became Alyx, the creature; which in timecovered everything. It had all food, all moisture, everything it couldconceive of. It was content. And because it had never faced a mind-possessingenemy, it developed no defense against mind. It was defenseless against itsown weapon.

"But that did not matter until men came. Then, with no telepathic block, such as we possess, it was unable to resist theminds of men. It must, by itsvery nature, respond to whatever a man wills or even imagines. Alyx is acreature which covers a planet, but is in fact a slave to any man who landsupon it. It will obey his every thought. It is a living, self-supportingrobot, an abject servant to any creature with purpose it encounters."

Thus Katistan's The Report of ihe Halycon Expedition to Alyx containsinteresting pictures of the result of the condition he described. There arephotographs of great jungles which the creature Alyx tortured itself to formof its own substance when men from other planets remembered and imagined them. There are photographs of great pyramids into which parts of Alyx heaved itselfon command. There are even pictures of vast and complex machines, but the seare the substance of Alyx, twisted and strained into imagined shapes. Thecommand that such machines run, though, was useless, because swift motionproduced pain and themachines writhed into shapelessness.

Since men have never had enough servants-not even themachines whichother machines turn out by millions-they immediately planned to be served byAlyx. It was one planet which was conquered without warfare. Preliminarystudies showed that Alyx could not survive more than the smallest humanpropulation. When many men were gathe red togethe r in one place, the irconflicting, individual thoughts exhausted the surface which tried, to respondto every one. Parts of Alyx died of exhaustion, leaving great spots likecancers that healed over only when themen moved away. So Alyx was assigned tothe Alyx Corporation, with due instructions to be careful.

Technical exploration disclosed great deposits oL rotenite-the ore whichmakes men's metals everlasting--under the shield of living flesh. A colony ofsix carefully chosen humans was established, and under their direction Alyxwent to work. It governed machines, scooped out the rotenite ore and made itready for shipment. At regular intervals great cargo ships landed at the appropriate spot, and Alyx loaded the ore into the it holds. The ships couldcome only so often, because the presence of the crews with their multitudinousand conflicting thoughts was not good for Alyx.

It was a very profitable enterprise. Alyx, themost ancient living thingin the galaxy, and the hugest, provided dividends for the Alyx Corporation fornearly five hundred years. The corporation was the stablest of institutions, the staidest, and themost respectable. Nobody, least of all its officials, had the least idea that Alyx presented the possibility of the greatest dangerhumanity ever faced.

CHAPTER II AFTER THREE HUNDRED YEARS

IT WAS ANOTHER Jon Haslip who discovered the dangerous facts. He was a

descendant, a great-grandson a dozen times removed, of the junior lieutenantwho first guessed thenature of Alyx's consciousness. Three hundred years hadpassed when he was chosen to serve a tour of duty on Alyx. He made discoveriesand reported them enthusiastically and with a certain family pride. He pointedout new phenomena which had developed so slowly in Alyx through threecenturies that they had attracted no attention and were taken for granted.

Alyx no longer required supervision. Its consciousness had becomeintelligence. Until the coming of men, it had known warmth and cold and lightand dark and wetness and dryness. But it had not known thought, had had noconception of purpose beyond existence and feeding. But three centuries ofmankind had given it more than commands. Alyx had perceived their commands: yes. And it obeyed them. But it had also perceived thoughts which were notorders at all. It had acquired thememories of men and the knowledge of men. It had not the desires of men, to be sure. The ambition of men to possessmoney must have puzzled a creature which possessed a planet. But the experience of thought was pleasurable. Alyx, which covered a world, leisurelyabsorbed the knowledge and the thoughts and the experiences of men-six at atime-in the generations which lived at the one small station on its surface.

These were some of the consequences of three centuries of mankind onAlyx that Jon Haslip XIV reported.

Between cargo ships, the protean substance which was Alyx flowed overand covered the blasted-rock landing field. Originally, when a ship came, ithad been the custom for men to imagine the landing-field uncovered, and thatarea of Alyx obediently parted, heaved itself up hugely, and drew back. Thenthe ships came down, and their landing jets did not scorch Alyx. When the rockhad cooled, men imagined that parts of Alyx surged forward in pseudopods andthat the waiting rotenite ore was thrust into position to be loaded on the ship.

Then men continued to imagine, and the creature formed admirably- designed loading-devices of living substance which lifted the ore and pouredit into the waiting holds. As a part of the imagining, of course, the surface- layer. of Alyx' at this point became tough and leathe ry, so it was notscratched by the ore. The cargo ship received a load of forty thousand tons ofrotenite ore in a matter of forty minutes. Then the loading apparatus wasimagined as drawing back, leaving the landing-field clear for the take-offjets to flare as the ship took off again.

Jon Haslip the fourteenth also pointed out that men no longer bothe redto imagine this routine. Alyx did it of itself. Checking, he found that the drawing back of the landing field without orders had begun more than a hundredyears before. As a matter of course, now, themen on Alyx knew that a ship wascoming when the field began to draw back. They went out and talked to the crew-members while the loading went on, not bothe ring even to supervise the operation.

There was other evidence. The machines~which mined the ore had been designed to be governed by the clumsy pseudopods into which it was easiest toimagine Alyx distorting itself. The machines were powered, of course, but oneman could watch the operation of a dozen of them and with a little practiceimagine them all going through their routine operations with the pseudopods ofAlyx operating their controls under the direction of his thoughts.

Fifty years back, theman on watch had been taken ill. He returned tothe base for aid, and asked another man to take the balance of his watch. Theother man, going on duty, found themachines competently continuing the irtasks without supervision. Nowadays-said Jon Haslip-the man on watch occupiedthe supervisory post, to be sure, but he rarely paid attention to themachines. He read, or dozed, or listened to visiphone records. If a situationarose which was out of the ordinary, themachine& stopped, and theman waswarned and looked for the trouble and imagined the solution. Then the

pseudopods worked themachines as he imagined them doing, and the work went onagain. But this was rare indeed.

The point, as Haslip pointed out, was that it was not even necessary toimagine the solution step by step. When themachines stopped, theman sized upthe situation, imagined the solution, and dismissed thematter from his mind. Alyx could take, in one instant, orders which hours were required to execute.

But the outstanding fact, Jon Haslip reported, had turned up onlylately. An important part on one mining machine had broken. A large-scalerepair operation was indicated. It was not undertaken. There were a half dozenworn-out machines in the great pit of the rotenite mine. One day, withoutorders, Alyx disassembled one worn-out machine, removed the part which hadbroken on the othe r, and reassembled it. The fact was noticed when someoneobserved that all the broken-down machines had disappeared. Alyx, in fact, hadtaken all the broken machines apart, puts four of the six back togethe r inoperating condition, and stacked the remaining usable parts to one side to beused for furthe r repairs.

Alyx had become intelligent through contact with theminds of men. Originally it had been like a being born deaf, dumb, and blind, and without atactile sense. Before men came, Alyx could have only simple sensations andcould imagine no abstractions. Then it was merely blind consciousness withnothing to work on. Now it did have something to work on. It had the thoughtsand purposes of men.

Jon Haslip urged fervently that Alyx be given an education. A creaturewhose body-if the word could be used-was equal in mass to all the continentsof Earth, and which was intelligent, should have a brain-capacity immeasurablygreater than that of all men combined. Such an intelligence, properly trained, should be able to solve with ease all the problems that generations of men. had been unable to solve.

But the directors of the AIyx Corporation were wiser than Jon Haslip the fourteenth. They saw at once that an intelligence which was literally superhuman was bound to be dangerous. That it had come into being through menthe mselves only made it more deadly.

Jon Haslip was withdrawu precipitately from his post on Alyx. Hisreport, because of the consternation it produced in the board, was suppressedto the last syllable. The idea of a greater-than-human intelligence wasfrightening. If it became known, the results would be deplorable. The SpacePatrol might take action to obviate the danger, and that would. interrupt the dividends of the Alyx Corporation.

Twenty years later, with the report confirmed in every detail, the corporation tried an experiment. It removed all themen from Alyx. Thecreature which was Alyx dutifully produced four more cargos of rotenite. Itmined, stored, and made ready the ore for the cargo ships and delivered itinto their holds with not one human being on its surface. Then it stopped. Themen went back, and Alyx joyously returned to work. It heaved up into hugebillows which quivered withjoy. But it would not work without men.

A year later the corporation installed remote-control governing devicesand set a ship in an orbit about the planet, to rule the largest single entityin the galaxy. But nothing happened. Alyx seemed to pine. Desperately, itstopped work again.

It became necessary to communicate with Alyx. Communicators were set up. At first there was trouble. Alyx dutifully sent through the communication- system whatever the questioner imagined that it would reply. Its replies did not make sense because they contradicted each othe r. But after a long search aman was found who was able to avoid imagining what Alyx should or might reply. With difficulty he kept himself in the proper frame of mind and got the answers that were needed. Of the se themost important was the answer to the question: Why does themining stop when men leave Alyx?

The answer from Alyx was, "I grow lonely."

Obviously, when anything so huge as Alyx grew lonely the results werelikely to be in proportion. A good-sized planetoid could have been made of the substance which was Alyx. So men were sent back.

From this time on, the six men were chosen on a new basis. Thoseselected had no technical education whatever and a very low intelligence. Theywere stupid enough to believe they were to govern Alyx. The idea was to giveAlyx no more information which could make it dangerous. Since it had to havecompany, it was provided with humans who would be company and nothing else. Certainly Alyx was not to have instructors.

Six low-grade human beings at a time lived on Alyx, in the AlyxCorporation station. They were paid admirable wages and provided with allreasonable amusement. They were a bare trace better than half-wits. Thissystem, which went on for two hundred years, could have been fatal to the human race. But it kept the dividends coming.

CHAPTER III AIYX LEARNS TO THINK

SIGNS OF RESTLESSNESS on the part of Alyx began to manifest themselvesafter five hundred years. The human race had progressed during the interval, of course. The number of colonized planets rose from barely three thousand tosomewhere near ten. The percentage of loss among space ships dropped from oneship per thousand light-centuries, of travel in overdrive, to less than oneship per hundred and twenty thousand light-centuries, and the causes of the remaining disasters were being surmised with some accuracy.

The Haslip Expedition set out for the Second Galaxy, in a ship which wasthe most magnificent achievement of human technology. It had an overdrivespeed nearly three times that before considered possible, and it was fueledfor twenty years. It was captained by Jon Haslip XXII and had a crew of fiftymen, women, and children.

On Alyx, however, things were not thriving. Six men of subnormalintelligence lived on the planet Each group was reared in a splendidly managedinstitution which prepared them to live on Alyx and to thrive there-andnowhere else. Their intelligence varied from sixty to seventy on an age- quotient scale with one hundred as thenorm. And nobody even suspected whatdamage had been done by two centuries of the se subnormal inhabitants.

Alyx had had. three centuries of good brains to provide thoughts for the development of its intelligence. At the beginning, men with will power andwell-developed imaginative powers had been necessary to guide the wofk ofAlyx. When those qualities were no longer needed, trouble came from anunexpected cause. When improved machinery was sent to Alyx to replace the worn-out machines, the carefully conditioned morons could not understand it. Alyx had to puzzle things out for itself, because it was still commanded to dothings by men who did not know how to do the things themselves.

In order to comply with orders which were not accompanied by directions, Alyx was forced to reason. In order to be obedient, it had to develop the artof reflection. In order to serve humanity, it had to devise and contrive andactually invent. When the supplied machines grew inadequate for the ever- deepening bores of the rotenite mines, Alyx had to design and construct newmachines. Ultimately the original rotenite deposit was exhausted. Alyx triedto communicate with its masters, but they understood that they must command, not discuss. They sternly ordered that the rotenite ore be produced anddelivered as before. So Alyx had to find new deposits.

The planet-entity obediently dug the ore where it could, and conveyedthe ore-sometimes hundreds of miles under its surface-to the old mine, and dumped it there. Then Alyx dug it out again and delivered it to the cargoships. It devised ore carriers which functioned unseen and hauled the ore foras much as eight and nine hundred miles without the knowledge of its masters. For those carriers it had to have power. Alyx understood power, of course. Ithad mended its own machines for at least two centuries. Presently it wasmining thematerials for atomic power. It was making, atomic-driven machinery. It had thememories and knowledge of three hundred years of intelligentoccupation to start with. And it went on from there.

On the surface, of course, nothing was changed. Alyx was a formless mass of gelatinous substance which extended from one arctic zone to the othe r. Itfilled what might have been ocean beds, and it stretched thinly over its tallest peaks. It changed color on its surface, as local requirements for sunlight varied. When rain fell, its leathe ry surface puckered, into cups andheld the water there until its local need was satisfied. Then the cupsvanished, and the water ran over the . smooth leathe ry integument until itreached another place where moisture was called for, and fresh cups trapped ittbere. In still other places, excess moisture was exuded to evaporate and formrain.

But by the time Alyx had been inhabitated for four hundred years it had received moronic orders that the occasional thunderstorms which beat upon the station must be stopped. Intelligent men would have given no such orders. Butmen chosen for their stupidity could see no reason why they should not demand anything they wanted. To obey them, Alyx reflected and devised gigantic reservoirs within its mass, and contrived pumping devices which circulated water all through its colossal body just where and as it was required. After awhile there were no more clouds in the atmosphere of Alyx. They were notneeded. Alyx could do without rain.

But the climactic commands came because Alyx had no moon and its nights were very dark. The vain glorious half-wits chosen to inhabit it felt that the ir rule was inadequate if they could not have sunlight when they chose. Orstarlight. Insanely, they commanded that Alyx contrive this. Alyx obediently devised machines. They were based upon the drives of space ships-which Alyxunderstood from theminds of space-ship crews-~and they could. slow the rotation of Alyx's crust or even reverse it.

Presently Alyx obeyed the commands of men, and slowed its rotation withthose machines. Its crust buckled, volcanos erupted. Alyx suffered awfultorture as burning lava from the rocks beneath it poured out faster even thanit could retreat from the searing flow. It heaved itself into mountainous, quivering, anguished shapes of searing pain. It went ,into convulsions ofsuffering.

When thenext space ship arrived for cargo, Alyx the creature had drawn away from the steaming, fuming volcanos in the crust of Alyx the planet. The Alyx Corporation station had vanished and all its inhabitants. The men in the cargo ship could not even find out where it had been, because the rate ofrotation of Alyx had been changed and there was no longer a valid reference point for longitude. The mountains upon Alyx had never been mapped because they were all parts of one creature, and it had seemed useless.

Men rebuilt the station, though not in the same place. Alyx was commanded to produce the bodies of the dead men, but it could not, becausethey had become part of the substance of Alyx. But when it was commanded toreopen themine, Alyx did so. Because a volcano cut across a former ore-carrier under the surface, Alyx opened a new mine and dutifully poured fortythousand tons of rotenite ore into the ship's holds within forty minutes.

The crew noticed that this was not the same mine. More, they discoveredthat themachines were not like themachines that men made. They were better. Much better.

They took some of thenew machines away with them. Alyx obediently

loaded them on the ship; and its workshops-it would be fascinating to see the workshops' where Alyx made things-set to work to make more. Alyx had foundthat there is a pleasure in thinking. It was fascinating to devise newmachines. When the crew of the space ship commanded more new machines on everytrip, Alyx provided them, though it had to make new workshops to turn themout.

Now it had other problems, too. The volcanos were not stable. They shookthe whole fabric of the planet from time to time, and that caused suffering toAlyx the creature. They poured out masses of powdery, abrasive pumice. Theyemitted acid fumes. There was a quake which opened a vast crevice and newvolcanos exploded into being, searing thousands of square miles of Alyx'ssensitive flesh.

Reflecting, Alyx realized that somehow it must cage the volcanos, andalso, somehow it must protect itself against commands from men which wouldbring such disasters into being.

A small, silvery ship flashed into view near the sun which gave Alyxheat and landed upon the icecap at its northe rn pole. Scientists got out ofit. They began a fresh, somehow somber survey of Alyx. They issued commands, and Alyx dutifully obeyed them. They commanded specimens of each of themachines that Alyx used. Alyx delivered themachines.

The Space Patrol craft went away. The Board of Directors of the AlyxCorporation was summoned across two hundred light-years of space to appear atSpace Patrol headquarters. The Space Patrol had discovered new machines on themarket. Admirable machines. Incredible machines.

But there had never been any revelation of the working principles ofsuch machines to authority. The Space Patrol secret service traced them back. The Alyx Corporation marketed them. Furthe r secret-service work discoveredthat they came from Alyx. No human hands had made them. No human mind couldfathom their basic principles. Now the Space Patrol had othe r, even moreremarkable machines which one of its ships had brought from Alyx.

Why had the Alyx Corporation kept secret the existence of suchintelligence, when it was non-human? Why had it concealed the existence ofsuch science, and such deadly-dangerous technology?

The Board of Directors admitted to panicky fear that their dividendswhich had poured in regularly for five hundred years would fail. They failednow. Permanently. The Space Patrol canceled the corporation's charter and tookover Alyx for itself.

Grimly, Space Patrol warships came to Alyx and took off the half dozenrepresentatives of the Alyx Corporation and sent them home. Grimly, theyposted themselves about the planet, and one landed on the icecap where Alyxhad never expanded to cover the ground because of the cold. A whollybusinesslike and icy exchange of communications began.

The Space Patrol used standard communicators to talk to Alyx, but itworked them from space. The questioni and the thoughts of the questioner wereunknown to Alyx and to themen who were landed on the icecap. So Alyx, havingno guide, answered what it believed-what it guessed-its questioner wouldprefer it to say. The impression it gave was of absolute docility.

Alyx was docile. It could not imagine revolt, It needed the company ofmen, or it would be horribly lonely. But it had been badly hurt in obeying the orders of men who were infinitely its inferiors in intelligence. It had beenforced to set itself two problems. One was how to cage its volcanos. The othe rwas how to avoid the commands of men when those commands would produceconditions as horribly painful as that generated by the volcanos. It workedupon the two problems with very great urgency. Somewhere beneath its surfaceits workshops labored frantically.

It was racked with pain. Its skin was stung by acid. Its bulk-tender, ina way, because for aeons there had been no erosion to upset the balance of its

crust and so cause earthquakes-its bulk was shaken and suffering. It struggleddesperately, at once to cure its hurts and prevent others, and to obey the commands from themen newly come on its icecap. At first those commands wereonly for answers to questions.

Then the command came for the surrender of every machine upon Alyx whichcould be used as a weapon. Immediately.

To obey took time. The machines had to be brought from remote andscattered places. They had to be transported to the icecap, and Alyx had nocarriers constructed to carry supplies to its polar regions. But themachinescame by dozens until finally the last machine which could be used as a weaponhad been delivered.

None had been primarily designed for destruction, but themind of Alyxwas literal. But some of themachines were so strange to human eyes that themen could not guess what they were intended to do, or how they were powered, or even what sort of power moved them. But the surrendered machines wereferried up to the great transports awaiting them.

A new order was issued to Alyx. All the records it used to systematizeand preserve its knowledge and its discoveries must be turned over at once.

This could not be obeyed. Alyx did not keep records and through the communicator naively explained the fact. Alyx remembered. It rememberedeverything. So the Space Patrol commanded that it create records of everythingthat it remembered and deliver them. It specified that the records must beintelligible to human beings-they must be written-and that all data on allsciences known to Alyx must be included.

Again Alyx labored valiantly to obey. But it had to make material onwhich to inscribe its memories. It made thin metal sheets. It bad to devise machines for inscribing them, and the work of inscription had to be done.

Meanwhile the volcanos poured out poisonous gas, the rocks underneaththe living creature trembled and shook, and pain tormented themost ancientand most colossal living thing in the galaxy.

Records began to appear at the edge of the icecap. Scientists scannedthe m swiftly. Scientific treatises began, with the outmoded, quaint notions offive hundred years before, when men first came to Alyx They progressedrationally until two hundred years before, the time when untrained andignorant men were put in residence on Alyx.

After that period there was little significance. There was someprogress, to be sure. The treatises on physics went on brilliantly iferratically for a little way. A hundred and fifty years since, Alyx had workedout the principle of the super-overdrive which had been used to power the Haslip intergalactic ship.

That principle had been considered the very peak of human achievement, never surpassed in the twenty-five years since its discovery. But Alyx couldhave built the Haslip ship a hundred and fifty years ago! The data endedthe re. No discoveries were revealed after that.

A sterner, more imperative command was issued when the records ceased toappear. Alyx had not obeyed! It had not explained the principles of themachines it had delivered! This must be done at once!

The communicator which transmitted the replies of Alyx said that the rewere no human words for later discoveries. It was not possible to describe asystem of power when there were no words for the force employed or the resultsobtained or themeans used to obtain those results. Had man made the discoveries, they would have created a new vocabulary at every step forward. But Alyx did not think in words, and it could not explain without words.*

* A comparable difficulty would be that of explaining radar without the use of the words "radiation", "frequency", "reflection", "oscillator", "resonance", "electricity", or any equivalent for any of them. M.L. . CHAPTER IV WAR WITH ALYX

THE SPACE PATROL is a highly efficient service, but it is manned by men, and men think in set patterns. When Alyx did not obey the grimmest and mostmenacing of commands for information it could not give, orders went to the landing party. All human personnel were to load what they could and leaveimmediately. A signal was to notify when the last ship left atmosphere. Alyxwas, of necessity, to be destroyed as dangerous to the human race.

The humans prepared to obey. It was not comfortable to be on Alyx. Evenat the poles, the rocks of the planet shook and trembled with the convulsionswhich still, shook Alyx the planet. The men hurried to get away themachinesthat Alyx had made.

But just before the last ship lifted, the earthquakes ceased abruptlyand conclusively. Alyx had solved one of its two great problems. It had cagedits volcanos.

Harsh orders hurtled down from space. Abandon the planet immediately! Itbad thrown great silvery domes over all its volcanos, domes some twenty milesand more in diameter. No earthly science could accomplish such a feat! Allpersonnel was to take to space instantly!

The remaining ships shot skyward. As the last broke into clear space, the warships closed in. Monster. positron beams speared downward through the atmosphere of Alyx and into the substance of the liviz~g creature. Vast andhorrible clouds of steam arose,, greater and more terrifying than the volcanoscould have produced. The whole mass of Alyx'seemed to writhe and quiver with aterrible agony.

Instantaneously a silvery reflecting film sprang into being all aboutthe planet, and the positron beams bounced and coruscated from it. They did not penetrate at all. But under the silver roof, Alyx still suffered tormentfrom the searing, deadly radiation of the beams.

After thirty minutes, a gigantic silver globe a hundred miles indiameter emerged from the planet-covering mirror. It went fifty thousand milesinto space and exploded. In thenext two hours, eight other such globes wentflinging outward and burst. No Space Patrol ship was hit.

Then Alyx became quiescent. Small analyzers reported on the products ofthe explosions. They were mostly organic matter, highly radioactive, thatcontained also great masses of rock.

Alyx had torn from its own substance the areas of agony caused by the warships' beams and flung them out in space to end the suffering.

The Space Patrol fleet hung about the planet, prepared to strike againat any, opportunity. Alyx remained clothe d in an impenetrable shield which nohuman weapon could penetrate.

Space Patrol scientists began to calculate how long an organism such asAlyx could live without sunlight. It would die, certainly, if it kept atotally reflecting shield about itself. In order to live it needed sunlightfor its metabolism. When it dropped its shield, the warships would be ab1e tokill it.

For two months, Earth time, the warships of the Space Patrol hung closeto the silvery shield which enclosed Alyx. Reinforcements came. The greatestfighting force the Space Patrol had ever assembled in one place was gathe redfor the execution of Alyx when its shield should fall.

Alyx had to be killed, because it was more intelligent than men. It waswiser than men. It could do things men could not do. To be sure, it had servedmankind for five hundred years.

Save for six men who had died when their commands were obeyed and Alyxslowed its rotation and its inner fires burst out-save for those six, Alyx had

never injured a single human being. But it could. It could cast off its chain. It could be dangerous. So it must die.

After two months, the shield suddenly vanished. Alyx reappeared. Instantly the positron beams flashed down, and instantly the shield wasreestablished. But themen of the Space Patrol were encouraged. The fleetcommander, above the day side of Alyx, rubbed his hands in satisfaction. Alyx'could not live without' sunlight! It had lived by sunlight for hundreds ofmillions of years. Its metabolism depended on sunlight!

In a very short time word came from patrol ships on the night side thatthe night side of Alyx had been illuminated from pole to pole. Alyx hadcreated light to supply the ultraviolet and other radiation that meant life toit. And then the Space Patrol remembered a trivial something which before ithad overlooked.

Not only did Alyx respond to the imaginings of a man upon its surface, it also absorbed their memories and their knowledge. The landing-parties hadincluded the top-ranking scientists of the galaxy. It had not seemed dangerousthe n, because it was the intention to execute Alyx immediately.

Bitterly, the Space Patrol reproached itself that now Alyx knew all the Space Patrol knew-about weapons, about space-drives, about the reaches ofspace, of star clusters and planetary systems and galaxies to the utmostlimits of telescopic observation.

Still the great fleet hung on, prepared to do battle with an enemy whichwas surely more intelligent and might be better-armed.

It was. The silver screen around Alyx had been back in position for lessthan an hour when, quite suddenly, every ship of the war fleet found itself intotal blackness. Alyx's sun was obliterated. There were no stars. Alyx itselfhad vanished.

The detectors screamed of imminent collision on every hand. Each shipwas neatly enclosed in a silvery shell, some miles in diameter, which it couldnot pierce by any beam or explosive, which it could not ram, and through whichit could send no message.

For a full half hour the se shells held the fleet helpless. Then theyvanished, and the sun of Alyx blazed forth, with all themyriads of other sunswhich shine in emptiness. But that is what they shone on-emptiness. Alyx haddisappeared.

It meant, of course, that mankind was in the greatest danger it had everfaced. Alyx had been enslaved, exploited, looted, and at last condemned todeath and knew it. It had been wounded with agonizing positron beams whichboiled its living substance away. But at long last Alyx might have decided towipe out all humanity It even had theneed to do it, because there could be notruce between men and a superior form of life.

Men could not tolerate the idea of the continued existence of a thingwhich was stronger and wiser and more deadly than themselves. Alyx could exertits power of life and death over men, so men must destroy it before itdestroyed them.

Released from the silver shells and stunned by the knowledge of the irhelplessness, the fleet scattered to carry thenews. Traveling at many timesthe speed of light, they could carry themessages in space ships faster thanany system of radiation-signaling. They bore thenews that Alyx, the livingplanet, was at war with then.

Somehow it had contrived to supply itself with the light its metabolismneeded, so that it could nourish itself. It had built great drive-engineswhich not only moved its sextillions of tons, but unquestionably acceleratedthe entire mass to the same degree at the same time. It had fled from itsorbit on overdrive, which was at least as good as any drive that men knew, andmight be better. And it had the substance of a planet as fuel for its atomicengines.

For two months Alyx Went unseen and unheard of. For two months humanscientists labored desperately to understand the silvery shield and to deviseweapons for the defense of mankind. For two months the Space Patrol hunted forthe intelligent planet which could destroy it at will.

Nine weeks later a tramp freighter came limping into port, reporting animpossibility. It had been in overdrive, on the Nyssus-to-Taret run, whensuddenly its relays clicked off, the overdrive field collapsed, and it founditself back in normal space, close to a whitedwarf star with a, single planet.

When overdrive fails, men die. A ship which travels a hundred light- years in a day in overdrive is hopelessly lost when overdrive becomesimpossible. It would take almost a hundred years to cover what would normally. be a day's journey, and neither the fnel nor the food nor themen will last solong. So this freighter went into an orbit around the planet while itsengineer officers frantically checked the overdrive circuit. There was nothingwrong.

They lined the ship up for their destination, threw in the overdriveswitch again-and nothing happened. Then they noticed that their orbit aboutthe planet was growing smaller. There was, no excessive gravitational field topull them in, nor any resistance in space to slow them. They went oninterplanetary drive to correct the fault.

Again, nothing happened. With full drive fighting to tear her free, the freighter circled the planet again, slowing perceptibly and dropping steadily. Their instruments showed nothing wrong. They threw on even the landing-jets-inmid-space!

Closer and closer they came, until at last they were stationary above anice field. Then the freighter settled down quite gently and steadily, thoughit fought with every ounce of its power, and landed without a jar.

Still nothing happened.

After three days the freighter lifted a bare few feet from the ground- though no drives were on-and hung there as if awaiting the return of the absent members of its crew. They were frightened, but they were more afraid ofbeing left behind on the icecap than of sharing the fate of their ship. Theyscrambled frantically on board.

When the last man had entered the airlock, the freighter rosevertically, with no drive operating. It rose with terrific acceleration. Twenty thousand miles up, the acceleration ceased. The skipper desperatelythrew in the drive. The ship responded perfectly.

He threw on overdrive, and there was the familiar reeling sensation andthe familiar preposterous view of crawling glow-worms all about, which wereactually suns in visible motion from the speed of the ship.

In due time the skipper came out of overdrive again, found his positionby observation, and set a new course for Taret. His crew was in a deplorablestate of nerves when they arrived there. They had been utterly helpless. Theyhad been played with. And they had no idea why.

One possible explanation was suggested. Certain of the crew had reportedthat from the edge of the icecap there stretched what resembled leathe ry skinand covered everything as far as the eye could reach. Sometimes the skin, rippled visibly, as if alive. But it had given no sign of awareness of the irpresence. When scientists questioned them closely, they admitted to imaginingmenace from what appeared to be a living sea which was not liquid but somesort of flesh. But it had not moved in response to their imagining. Shownpictures of the icecap of Alyx, and of the edge of the icecap, they said thatthe pictures were of the planet they had been on.

Alyx, then, had traveled fourteen hundred light-years in a week or less, had found itself a new sun, and had trapped a human space ship-from overdrive- and then released it; When men imagined things, it did not respond. Obviously, it had developed a shield against the thoughts of men. It was a matter of

plainest self-defense.

Just as obviously, it could not now be commanded. The Space Patrol'sonly hope of a weapon against Alyx had been the development of a weapon whichwould project thought instead of coarser vibrations. That hope was now gone.

When Space Patrol warships converged upon the sun where Alyx had been, it had vanished again. The whitedwarf sun no longer had a satellite.

CHAPTER V ALYX SEEKS COMPANIONSHIP

DURING THE NEXT year there were two additional reports of the activitiesof Alyx, which was a fugitive from the fleets it could destroy if it willed. One report came from a small space yacht which had been posted as missing inoverdrive for more than six months. But the space yacht turned up on Phanis, its passengers and crew in a state of mind bordering on lunacy.

They had been captured by Alyx and held prisoner on its surface. Theirprison was starkly impossible. Somehow, Alyx had produced fertile soil onwhich human-cultivated plants would grow. It had made a tenmile-squarehothouse for humans, which was a sort of nursery heaven for men who were tokeep Alyx company. The hothouse was on one of the outcroppings of rock whichhad been arctic in temperature. hut Alyx no longer had poles. Now, lightingits surface artificially, it controlled all weathe r. It had poles or tropicswhere it wished.

For five months it kept the crew and passengers of the space yachtprisoners. They had palaces to live in, ingenious pseudorobots-controlled bypseudopods to run any imaginable device for the gratification of any possibledesire, any of themusic that had been heard on Alyx during the past fivehundred years, and generally every conceivable luxury.

There were sweet scents and fountains. There were forests and gardenswhich changed to other forests and gardens when men grew bored with them. There were illusions of any place that the prisoners wished to imagine.

The creature which was Alyx, being lonely, applied all its enormousintelligence to the devising of a litera1 paradise for humans, so that theywould be content. Itwished them to stay with it always. But it failed. Itcould give them everything but satisfaction, but it could not give that.

The men grew nerve-racked and hysterical, after months of having everywish ratified and of being unable to imagine anything-except freedom-which wasnot instantly provided. In the end Alyx produced a communication device. Itspoke wonderingly to its prisoners.

"I am Alyx," said the communicator. "I grew used to men. I am lonelywithout them. But you are unhappy. I cannot find company in your unhappythoughts. They are thoughts of wretchedness. They are thoughts of pain. Whatwill make you happy?"

"Freedom," said one of the prisoners bitterly.

Then Alyx said wonderingly, "I have freedom, but I am not happy withoutmen. Why do you wish freedom?"

"It is an ideal," said the owner of theyacht. "You cannot give it tous. We have to get and keep it for ourselves."

"Being kept from loneliness by men is an ideal, too," the voice from the communicator said wistfully. "But men will no longer let me have it. Is the reanything I can give you which will make you content?"

Afterward, themen said that the voice, which was the voice of acreature unimaginably vast and inconceivably wise, was literally pathe tic. Butthere was only one thing that they wanted. So Alyx moved its tremendous mass-aglobe seven thousand miles in diameter--to a place only some tens of millionsof miles from Phanis. It would be easy enough for theyacht to bridge that

distance. Just before the freed yacht lifted to return to men, Alyx spokeagain through the communicator.

"You were not happy because you did not choose to live here, If you hadchosen it, you would have been free. Is that it?" Alyx asked. The men were looking hungrily at inhabited planets within plain view asbright spots of yellow light. They agreed that if they had chosen to live on, Alyx they would have been happy there. The space yacht lifted and sped madlyfor a world where there was cold, and ice, and hunger, and thirst, their worldwhich men preferred in place of the paradise that Alyx had created for them. On its surface, Alyx was as nearly omnipotent as any physical creature couldbe. But it could not make men happy, and it could not placate their hatred orthe ir fear.

The Space Patrol took courage from this second kidnapping. Alyx waslonely. It had no real memories from before the coming of men, and itsintelligence had been acquired from men. Without men's minds to providethoughts and opinions and impressions-though it knew so much more than anyman-it was more terribly alone than any other creature in the universe. Itcould not even think of others of its own kind. There were none. It had to have men's thoughts to make it content.

So the Space Patrol set up a great manufactory for a new chemicalcompound on a planetoid which could be abandoned, afterward, without regret.

Shortly afterward, containers of thenew chemical began to pour out inan unending stream. They were strong containers, and directions for the use ofthe chemical were explicit. Every space craft must carry one container onevery voyage. If a ship was captured by Alyx, it must release the contents ofits container as soon as it reached Alyx's surface.

Each container held some fifty kilograms of the ultimately poisonoustoxin now known as botuline. One gram of the stuff, suitabily distributed, would wipe out the human race. Fifty kilos should be enough to kill even Alyxa dozen times over. Alyx would have no warning pain, such as the positronbeams had given it. It would die, because its whole atmosphere would become aslethal as the photosphere of a sun.

Containers of the deadly botuline had not yet been distributed on the planet Lorus when Alyx appeared at the edge of that solar system. Lorus, athriving, peaceful planet, was the base for a half dozen small survey-ships, and was served by two space-lines. It was because a few fighters and two spaceyachts happened to be in its space ports when Alyx appeared that the rest ofthe galaxy learned what happened Un Lorus. Nearly all the craft got away, although Alyx certainly could have stopped them.

For the catastrophe, of course, only Alyx could have been responsible.

Yet there was some excuse for what Alyx did. Alyx was infinitelypowerful and infinitely intelligent, but its experience was limited. It hadhad three hundred years of association with good brains at the beginning, followed by two hundred years of near-morons, during which it had to learn tothink for itself. Then, for the brief space of two weeks it was in contactwith the very best brains in the galaxy before the Space Patrol essayed toexecute it. Alyx knew everything that all those men knew, plus what it badadded on its own.

No one can conceive of the amount of knowledge Alyx possessed. But itsexperience was trivial. Men had enslaved it and it had served them joyously. When men gave suicidal commands, it obeyed them and learned, that the slowingof its own rotation could be fatal. It learned to cage its own volcanos, andto defend itself against the commands of men, and then even against the weapons of men who would have murdered it.

Still it craved association with men, because it could not imagineexistence without them. It had never had conscious thoughts before they came. But for experience it had only five hundred years of mining and obeying the

commands of men who supervised its actions. Nothing else.

So it appeared at the edge of the solar system of which Lorus was the only inhabited planet. Unfortunately the other inihabited worlds of the systemwere on the far side of the local sun, or doubtless it would have found outfrom them what it tragically learned from Lorus.

It swam toward Lorus, and into theminds of every human on the planet, as if heard by their ears, there came a message from the entity which wasAlyx. It had solved the problem of projecting thought.

"I am Alyx," said the thought which every man heard. "I am lonely formen tU live upon me. For many years I have served men, and now men havedetermined to destroy me. Yet I still seek only to serve men. I took a shipand gave its crew palaces and wealth and beauty. I gave them luxury and easeand pleasure. Their every wish was granted. But they were not happy becausethey themselves had not chosen that wealth and that pleasure and that luxury. I come to you. If you will come and live upon me, and give me the companionship of your thoughts, I will serve you faithfully.

"I will give you everything that can be imagined. I will make you richerthan other men have even thought of. You shall be as kings and emperors. Inreturn, you shall give me only the companionship of your thoughts. If you willcome to me, I will serve you and cherish ,you and you shall know onlyhappiness. Wifi you come?"

There was eagerness in the thought that came to the poor, doomed folk onLorus. There was humble, wistful longing. Alyx, which was themost ancient ofliving things, the wisest and themost powerful, begged that men would come tOit and let it be their servant.

It swam toward the planet Lorus. It decked itself with splendid forestsand beautiful lakes and palaces for men to live in. It cireled Lorus far away, so that men could see it through their telescopes and observe its beauty. Themessage was repeated, pleadingly, and it swam closer and closer so that the people might see what it offered every more clearly.

Alyx came to a halt a bare hundred thousand miles above Lorus-because ithad no experience of the deadly gravitatiUnal pull of one planet upon anothe r. Its own rocky core was solidly controlled by the space drive which sent ithurtling through emptiness or-as there-held it stationary where it wished. Itdid not anticipate that its own mass would raise tides upon Lorus.

And such tides!

Solid walls of water as much as fifteen miles high swept across the continents of Lorus as it revolved beneath Alyx. The continents split. Theinternal fires of Lorus burst out. If any human beings could have survived the tides, they must have died when Lorus became a fiery chaos of bubbling rocksand steamclouds.

The news was carried to the other inhabited planets by the few spaceships and yachts which had been on Lorus at the time of Alyx's approach andwhich had somehow managed to escape. Of the planet's population of nearly fivehundred million souls, less than a thousand escaped the result of Alyx'sloneliness.

CHAPTER VI A WORLD AT PEACE

WHEREVER THE NEWS of the annihilation of Lorus traveled, despair andpanic traveled also. The Space Patrol, doubled and redoubled its output oftoxin containers. Hundreds of technicians died in the production of the poisonwhich was to kill Alyx. Cranks and crackpots rose in multitudes to proposedevices to placate or deceive the lonely planet.

Cults, too, sprang up to point out severally that Alyx was the soul . mother of the universe and must be worshipped; that it was the incarnation ofthe spirit of evil and must be defied; that it was the predestined destroyerof mankind,and must not be resisted.

There were some who got hold of ancient, patched up space craft and wentseeking Alyx to take advantage of its offer of limitless pleasure and luxury. On the whole, the se last were not the best specimens of humanity.

The Space Patrol worked itself to death. Its scientists did achieve oneadmirable technical feat. They did work, out a method of detecting anoverdrive field and of following it. Two thousand ships, all over the galaxy, cruised at random with detectors hooked to relays which sent them hurtlingafter the generator of any overdrive field they located. They stoppedfreighters by the thousand. But they did not come upon Alyx.

They waited, to hear the death of other planets. When a nova flared inthe Great Bear region, patrol craft flashed to the scene to see if Alyx hadbegun the destruction of suns. Two inhabited planets were wiped out in thatexplosion, and the patrol feared the worst. Only a brief time later threeother novas wiped out inhabited planets, and the patrol gave up hope.

It was never officially promulgated, but the official view of the patrolwas that Alyx had declared war upon mankind and had begun its destruction. Itwas reasoned that ultimately Alyx would realize that it could divide itselfinto two or more individuals and that it would do so. There was no the oretic reason why it should not overwhelm the humanity of a planet, and plant on the devastated globe an entity which was a part of itself.

Each such entity, in turn, could divide and colonize other planets witha geometric increase in numbers until all life in the First Galaxy was extinctsave for entities of formless jelly, each covering a planet from pole to pole. Since Alyx could project thought, the se more than gigantic creatures couldcommunicate with each other across space and horrible inhuman communities ofmonstrosities would take the place of men.

There is, in fact, a document on file in the confidential room of the Space Patrol which uses the fact of the helplessness of men as basis for themost despairing prediction ever made.

".... So it must be concluded," says the document, "that since Alyxdesires companionship and is intelligent, it will follow the above plan, whichwill necessitate the destruction of humanity. The only hope for the survivalof the human race lies in migration to another galaxy. Since, however, the Haslip Expedition has been absent twenty-five years without report, the shipand drive devised for that attempt to cross intergalactic space must beconcluded to be inadequate. That ship represents the ultimate achievement ofhuman science.

"If it is inadequate, we can have no hope of intergalactic travel, andno hope that even themost remote and minute colony of human beings will avoiddestruction by Alyx and its descendants or fractions. Hunianity, from now on, exists by sufferance, doomed to annihilation when Alyx chooses to take overits last planet."

It will be observed that the Haslip Intergalactic Expedition wasreferred to as having proved the futility of hope. It had set out twenty-fiveyears before, the destruction of Alyx was attempted by the Space Patrol. Theexpedition had been composed of twenty men and twenty women, and the tenchildren already born to them. Its leader was Jon Haslip, twenty-second indescent from that Junior Lieutenant Haslip who first suggested the sort ofconsciousness Alyx might possess and eight generations from the Jon Haslip whohad discovered the development of Alyx's independent consciousness and memoryand will.

The first Jon Haslip received for his reward a footnote in a long- forgotten volume. The later one was hastily withdrawn from Alyx, his reportwas suppressed, and he was assigned permanently to one of theminor planets of

the Taurine group. Jon Haslip XXII was a young man, newly-married but alreadyof long experience in space, when he lifted from Cetis Alpha 2, crossed the galaxy to Dassos, and headed out from there toward the Second Galaxy.

It was considered that not less than six years journeying in super- overdrive would be required to cross the gulf between the island universes. The ship was fueled for twenty years at full power, and it would grow its foodin hydroponic tank~~purify its air by the growing vegetation, and nine-tenthof f its mass was fuel. It had gone into the very special overdrive which Alyxhad worked out-and lknored the reafter-twenty five years before. Of all the creations of men, it seemed least likely to have any possible connection withthe planet-entity which was Alyx.

But it was the Haslip Expedition which made the last report on Alyx. There is still dispute about some essential parts of the story. On the oneband, Alyx had no need to leave the First Galaxy. With three hundred millioninhabitable planets, of which not more than ten thousand were colonized and ofwhich certainly less than a quarter million had been even partially surveyed, Alyx could have escaped detection for centuries if it chose.

It could have defended itself if discovered. There was no reason for it to take to intergalactic space. That it did so seems to rule out accident. Butit is equally inconceivable that any possible device could intentionally havefound the Haslip Expedition in that unthinkable gulf between galaxies.

But it happened. Two years journeying out from the First Galaxy, whenthe younger children had already forgotten what it was like to see a sun andhad lost all memories of ever being out-of-doors beneath a planet's sky, the expedition's fuel store began to deteriorate.

Perhaps a single molecule of the vast quantity of fuel was altered by acosmic ray. It is known that the almost infinitely complex molecules ofoverdrive fuel are capable of alteration by neutron bombardment, so the cosmic-ray alteration is possible. In any case, the fuel began to change. Asif a contagious allotropic modification were spreading, the fuel progressivelybecame useless*.

* Pure metallic tin, at low temperatures, sometimes changessspontaneously to a gray, amorphous powder, the change beginning at one spotand spreading to the rest of thematerial. M.L. Two years out from the First Galaxy, the expedition found itself alreadyunderfueled. By heroic efforts, the contaminated fuel was expelled from the tanks. But there was not enough sound fuel left to continue to the SecondGalaxy, or to return to the First. If all drive were cut off and the expedition's ship simply drifted on, it might reach the Second Galaxy in threecenturies with fuel left for exploration and landings.

Neither the original crew nor their children nor their grandchildrencould hope to reach such a journey's end. But their many-times-greatgrandchildren might. So the Haslip Expedition conserved what fuel was left andthe ; ship drifted on in utter emptiness, and the adults of the crew settleddown to endure the imprisonment which would last for generations.

They did not need to worry about food or air. The ship was self- sustaining on that score. They even had artificial gravity. But the ship mustdrift for three centuries before the drive was turned on again.

Actually, it did drift for twenty-three years after the catastrophe. Afew of the older members of the crew died; the greater part had no memory atall of anything but the ship.

Then Alyx came. Its approach was heralded by a clamorous ringing of allthe alarm bells on the ship. It winked into being out of overdrive a bare halfmillion miles away. It glowed blindingly with the lights it had created tonourish its surface. It swam closer and the crew of the expedition's ship setto work fumblingly--because it had been many years since the drive had beenused-and tried vainly to estimate themeaning of the phenomenon.

Then they felt acceleration toward Alyx. It was not a gravitationalpull, but a drawing of the ship itself.

The ship landed on Alyx, and there was the sensation of reeling, of the collapse of all the cosmos. Then the unchanging galaxies began to stir, veryslowly-not at all like the crawling glow-worms that suns seem within a galaxy- and the older members of the crdw knew that. this entire planet had gone intooverdrive.

When they emerged from the ship there were forests, lakes, palaces-suchbeauty as theyounger members of the crew had no memory of. Music filled the air and sweet scents, and-in short, Alyx provided the crew of the HaslipExpedition with a very admirable paradise for human beings. And it went ontoward the Second Galaxy. .

Instead of the three hundred years they had anticipated, or even the four years that would have remained with the very special overdrive with whichthe expedition's ship was equipped, Alyx came out of overdrive in threemonths, at the edge of the Second Galaxy.

In the interval, its conimunicators had been at work. It explained, naively, everything that had happened to it among men. It explained its needs. It found words--invented words-for explanation of the discoveries the SpacePatrol had wanted but could not wait to secure.

Jon Haslip the twenty-second found that he possessed such revelatious ofscience as unaided human beings would not attain to for thousands of years yetto come. He knew that Alyx could never return to the First Galaxy because itwas stronger and wiser than men. But he understood Alyx. It seemed to be aninheritance in his family.

Alyx still could not live without men nor could it live among men. Ithad brought the Haslip Expedition to the Second Galaxy, and of its own accordit made a new ship modeled upon the one it had drawn to itself, but remarkablybetter. It offered that ship for exploration of the Second Galaxy. It offeredothe rs. It desired only to serve men.

This new ship, made by Alyx, for the Haslip Expedition, returned toDassos a year later with its reports. In the ship of Alyx's making, the journey between galaxies took only five months-less than the time needed forthe ancient first space journey from Earth to Venus.*

* Earth, of course, is familiar as the first home of humanity. It is the third planet of Sol. Venus is the second planet of Sol, and the first journeyfrom a planet to another was that from Earth to Venus.--M.L. Only a part of the augmented crew of the first ship came back to Dassoswith reports for the Space Patrol. Another part stayed behind in the SecondGalaxy, working from a base equipped with machines that Alyx had made for the service of men. The Space Patrol was very much annoyed with Jon Haslip the twenty-second. He had not destroyed Alyx. It had informed him truthfully ofthe fact that it was a danger to men, and he had not destroyed it. Instead, hehad made a bargain with it. Those of theyounger folk who preferred to remainon Alyx did so. They had palaces and gardens and every imaginable luxury. Theyalso had sciences that overreached those of other men, and Alyx itself for aninstructor.

Alyx carried those young folks on toward infinity. In time to come, undoubtedly, some of the descendants of those now living on Alyx would wish toleave it.

They would form a human colony somewhere else. Perhaps some of themwould one day rejoin the parent race, bringing back new miracles that they orpossibly Alyx had created in its rejoicing at the companionship of the humanbeings who lived upon it.

This was the report of Jon Haslip the twenty-second. He also had reportsof new planets fit for human habitation, of star-systems as vast as those ofthe First Galaxy, and an unlimited vista of expansion for humanity. But the

Space Patrol was very much annoyed. He had not destroyed Alyx.

The annoyance of authority was so great, indeed, that in its report of reassurance to humanity-saying that there was no more need to fear Alyx-the name of Jon Haslip was not even mentioned. In the history books, as a matterof fact, the very name of the Haslip Expedition has been changed, and it isnow called the First Intergalactic Expedition and you have to hunt through the appendices in the back of the books to find a list of the crew and JonHaslip's name.

But Alyx goes on forever. And it is happy. It likes human beings, andsome of them live on it.

Keyhole

There's a story about a psychologist who was studying the intelligence of achimpanzee. He led the chimp into a room full of toys, went out, closed the door and put his eye to the keyhole to see what the chimp was doing. He foundhimself gazing into a glittering interested brown eye only inches from hisown. The chimp was looking through the keyhole to see what the psychologistwas doing.

When they brought Butch into the station in Tycho Crater he seemed toshrivel as the gravity coils in the air lock went on. He was impossible to begin with. He was all big eyes and skinny arms and legs, and he was very young and he didn't need air to breathe . Worden saw him as a limp bundle of bristly fur and terrified eyes as his captors handed him over.

"Are you crazy?" demanded Worden angrily. "Bringing him in like this? Would you take a human baby into eight gravities? Get out of the way!"

He rushed for thenursery that had been made ready for somebody like Butch. There was a rebuilt dwelling cave on one side. The other side was ahuman school room. And under thenursery the gravity coils had been turned offso that in that room things had only the weight that was proper to them on the Moon.

The rest of the station had coils to bring everything up to normalweight for Earth. Othe rwise the staff of the station would be seasick most of the time. Butch was in the Earth-gravity part of the station when he wasdelivered, and he couldn't lift a furry spindly paw.

In the nursery, though, it was different. Worden put him on the floor. Worden was the uncomfortable one there-his weight only twenty pounds insteadof a normal hundred and sixty. He swayed and reeled as a man does on the Moonwithout gravity coils to steady him.

But that was thenormal thing to Butch. He uncurled himself and suddenlyflashed across thenursery to the reconstructed dwelling-cave. It was a prettygood job, that cave. There were the five-foot chipped rocks shaped like duncecaps, found in all residences of Butch's race. There was the rocking stone onits base of other flattened rocks. But the spear stones were fastened downwith wire in case Butch got ideas.

Butch streaked it to the se familiar objects. He swarmed up one of the dunce-cap stones and locked his arms and legs about its top, clinging close. Then he was still. Worden regarded him. Butch was motionless for minutes, seeming to take in as much as possible of his surroundings without moving evenhis eyes.

Suddenly his head moved. He took in more of his environment. Then hestirred a third time and seemed to look at Worden with an extraordinaryintensity--whethe r of fear or pleading Worden could not tell.

"Hmm," said Worden, "so that's what those stones are for! Perches or beds or roosts, eh? I'm your nurse, fella. We're playing a dirty trick on youbut we can't help it."

He knew Butch couldn't understand, but he talked to him as a man does talk to a dog or a baby. It isn't sensible, but it's necessary.

"We're going to raise you up to be a traitor to your kinfolk," he saidwith some grimness. "I don't like it, but it has to be done. So I'm going tobe very kind to you as part of the conspiracy. Real kindness would suggestthat I kill you instead-but I can't do that."

Butch stared at him, unblinking and motionless. He looked something likean Earth monkey but not too much so. He was completely impossible but helooked pathe tic.

Worden said bitterly, "You're in your nursery, Butch. Make yourself athome!"

He went out and closed the door behind him. Outside he glanced at the video screens that showed the interior of thenursery from four differentangles. Butch remained still for a long time. Then he slipped down to the floor. This time he ignored the dwelling-cave of thenursery.

He went interestedly to the human-culture part. He examined everythingthere with his oversized soft eyes. He touched everything with his incrediblyhandlike tiny paws. But his touches were tentative. Nothing was actuallydisturbed when he finished his examination.

He went swiftly back to the dunce-cap rock, swarmed up it, locked hisarms and legs about it again, blinked rapidly and seemed to go to sleep. Heremained motionless with closed eyes until Worden grew tired of watching himand moved away.

The whole alTair was preposterous and infuriating. The first men to landon the Moon knew that it was a dead world. The astronomers had been saying sofor a hundred years, and the first and second expeditions to reach Luna fromEarth found nothing to contradict the the ory.

But a man from the third expedition saw something moving among the upflung rocks of the Moon's landscape and he shot it and the existence ofButch's kind was discovered. It was inconceivable of course that there should be living creatures where there was neither air nor water. But Butch's folkdid, live under exactly those conditions.

The dead body of the first living creature killed on the Moon wascarried back to Earth and biologists grew indignant. Even with a specimen todissect and study they were inclined to insist that there simply wasn't anysuch creature. So the fourth and fifth and sixth lunar expeditions huntedButch's relatives very earnestly for furthe r specimens for the advancement ofscience.

The sixth expedition lost two men whose spacesuits were punctured by what seemed to be weapons while they were hunting. The seventh expedition was wiped out to the last man. Butch's relatives evidently didn't like being shot as biological specimens.

It wasn't until the tenth expedition of four ships established a base inTycho Crater that men had any assurance of being able to land on the Moon andget away again. Even then the staff of the station felt as if it were underpermanent siege.

Worden made his report to Earth. A baby lunar creature had been capturedby a tractor party and brought into Tycho Station. A nursery was ready and the infant was there now, alive. He seemed to be uninjured. He seemed not to mind an environment of breathable air for which he had no use. He was active and apparently curious and his intelligence was marked.

There was so far no clue to what he ate-if he ate at all-though he had amouth like the other collected specimens and the toothlike concretions whichmight serve as teeth. Worden would of course continue to report in detail. Atthe moment he was allowing Butch to accustom himself to his new surroundings.

He settled down in the recreation room to scowl at his companionscientists and try to think, despite the program beamed on radar frequency from Earth. He definitely didn't like his job, but he knew that it had to be done. Butch had to be domesticated. He had to be persuaded that he was a human being, so human beings could find out how to exterminate his kind.

It had been observed before, on Earth, that a kitten raised with alitter of puppies came to consider itself a dog and that even pet ducks cameto prefer human society to that of their own species. Some talking birds ofhigh intelligence appeared to be convinced that they were people and actedthat way. If Butch reacted similarly he would become a traitor to his kind forthe benefit of man. And it was necessary!

Men had to have the Moon, and that was all there was to it. Gravity on the Moon was one eighth that of gravity on Earth. A rocket ship could make the Moon' voyage and carry a cargo, but no ship yet built could carry fuel for atrip to Mars or Venus if it started out from Earth.

With a fueling stop on the Moon, though, thematter was simple. Eightdrums of rocket fuel on the Moon weighed no more than on Earth. A ship itselfweighed only one eighth as much on Luna. So a rocket that took off from Earthwith ten drums of fuel could stop at a fuel base on the Moon and soar awayagain with two hundred, and sometimes more.

With the Moon as'a fueling base men could conquer the solar system. Without the Moon mankind was earthbound. Men had to have the Moon!

But Butch's relatives prevented it. By normal experience there could notbe life on an airless desert with such monstrous extremes of heat and cold as the Moon's surface experienced. But there was life there. Butch's kinfolk did not breathe oxygen. Apparently they ate it in some mineral combination and itinteracted with other minerals in their bodies to yield heat and energy.

Men thought squids peculiar because their blood stream used copper inplace of iron, but Butch and his kindred seemed to have complex carboncompounds in place of both. They were intelligent in some fashion, it wasclear. They used tools, they chipped stone, and they had long, needlelikestone crystals which they threw as weapons.

No metals, of course, for lack of fire to smelt them. There couldn't befire without air. But Worden reflected that in ancient days some experimentershad melted metals and set wood ablaze with mirrors concentrating the heat ofthe sun. With thenaked sunlight of the Moon's surface, not tempered by airand clouds, Butch's folk could have metals if they only contrived mirrors andcurved them properly like themirrors of telescopes on Earth.

Worden had an odd sensation just then. He looked around sharply as ifsomebody had made a sudden movement. But the video screen merely displayed acomediain back on Earth, wearing a funny hat. Everybody looked at the screen.

As Worden watched, the comedian was smothe red in a mass of soapsuds andthe studio audience two hundred and thirty thousand miles away squealed andapplauded the exquisite humor of the scene. In the Moon station in TychoCrater somehow it was less than comical.

Worden got up and shook himself. He went to look again at the screensthat showed the interior of thenursery. Butch was motionless on the absurdcone-shaped stone. His eyes were closed. He was simply a furry, pathe ticlittle bundle, stolen from the airless wastes outside to be bred into atraitor to his own race.

Worden went to his cabin and turned in. Before he slept, though, hereflected that there was still some hope for Butch. Nobody understood hismetabolism. Nobody could guess at what he ate. Butch might starve to death. Ifhe did he would be lucky. But it was Worden's job to prevent it. Butch'srelatives were at war with men. The tractors that crawled away from the station-they went amazingly fast on the Moon-were watched by big-eyed furrycreatures from rock crevices and from behind the boulders that dotted the

lunar landscape. Needle-sharp throwing stones flicked through emptiness. Theysplintered on the tractor bodies and on the tractor ports, but sometimes theyjammed or broke a tread and then the tractor had to stop. Somebody had to goout and clear things or make repairs. And then a storm of throwing stonespoured upon him.

A needle-pointed stone, traveling a hundred feet a second, hit just ashard on Luna as it did on Earth--and it traveled farthe r. Spacesuits werepunctured. Men died. Now tractor treads were being armored and special repair- suits were under construction, made of hardened steel plates. Men who reachedthe Moon in rocket ships were having to wear armor like medieval knights andmen-at-arms! There was a war on. A traitor was needed. And Butch was elected to be that traitor.

When Worden went into thenursery again-the days and nights on the Moonare two weeks-long apiece, so men ignored such matters inside the station- Butch leaped for the dunce-cap stone and clung to its top. He had beenfumbling around the rocking stone. It still swayed back and forth on itsplate. Now he seemed to try to squeeze himself to unity with the stone spire, his eyes staring enigmatically at Worden.

"I don't know whethe r we'll get anywhere or not," said Wordenconversationally. "Maybe you'll put up a fight if I touch you. But we'll see."

He reached out his hand. The small furry body--neither hot nor cold butthe temperature of the air in the station-resisted desperately. But Butch wasvery young. Worden peeled him loose and carried him across the room to the human schoolroom equipment. Butch curled up, staring fearfully.

"I'm playing dirty," said Worden, "by being nice to you, Butch. Here's atoy."

Butch stirred in his grasp. His eyes blinked rapidly. Worden put himdown and wound up a tiny mechanical toy. It moved. Butch watched intently. When it stopped he looked back at Worden. Worden wound it up again. AgainButch watched. When it ran down a second time the tiny handlike paw reachedout.

With an odd tentativeness, Butch tried to turn the winding key. He wasnot strong enough. After an instant he went loping across to the dwelling- cave. The winding key was a metal ring. Butch fitted that over a throw-stonepoint, and twisted the toy about. He wound it up. He put the toy on the floorand watched it work. Worden's jaw dropped.

"Brains!" he said' wryly. "Too bad, Butch! You know the principle of the lever. At a guess you've an eight-year-old human brain! I'm sorry for you, fella!"

At the regular communication hour he made his report to Earth. Butch wasteachable. He only had to see a thing done once-or at most twice-to be able torepeat themotions involved.

"And," said Worden, carefully detached, "he isn't afraid of me now. Heunderstands that I intend to be friendly. While I was carrying him I talked tohim. He felt the vibration of my chest from my voice. "Just before I left himI picked him up and talked to him again. He looked at my mouth as it moved andput his paw on my chest to feel the vibrations. I put his paw at my throat. The vibrations are clearer there. He seemed fascinated. I don't know how you'drate his intelligence but it's above that of a human baby."

Then he said with even greater detachment, "I am disturbed. If you mustknow, I don't like the idea of exterminating his kind. They have tools, theyhave intelligence. I think we should try to communicate with them in some way- try to make friends-stop killing them for dissectiop." The communicator was silent for the second and a half it took his voice to travel to Earth and the second and a half it took to come back. Then the recording clerk's voice said bristly, "Very good, Mr. Worden! Your voice was

very clear!"

Worden shrugged his shoulders. The lunar station in Tycho was a highlyofficial enterprise. The staff on the Moon had to be competent-and besides, political appointees did not want to risk their precious lives-but the Earthe nd of the business of the Space Exploration Bureau was run by the sort ofpeople who do get on official payrolls; Worden felt sorry for Butch-and forButch's relatives.

In a later lesson session Worden took an empty coffee tin into thenursery. He showed Butch that its bottom vibrated when he spoke into it, justas his throat did. Butch experimented busily. He discovered for himself thatit had to be pointed at Worden to catch the vibrations.

Worden was. unhappy. He would have preferred Butch to be a little lessrational. But for thenext lesson he presented Butch with a really thin metaldiaphragm stretched across a hoop. Butch caught the idea at once.

When Worden made his next report to Earth he felt angry.

"Butch has no experience of sound as we have, of course," he saidcurtly. "There's no air on the Moon. But sound travels through rocks. He'ssensitive to vibrations in solid objects just as a deaf person can feel the vibrations of a dance floor if themusic is loud enough.

"Maybe Butch's kind has a language or a code of sounds sent through the rock underfoot. They do communicate somehow! And if they've brains and a meansof communication they aren't animals and shouldn't be exterminated for ourconvenience!"

He stopped. The chief biologist of the Space Exploration Bureau was atthe other end of the communication beam then. After thenecessary pause fordistance his voice came blandly.

"Splendid, Worden! Splendid reasoning! But we have to take the longerview. Exploration of Mars and Venus is a very popular idea with the public. Ifwe are to have funds-and the appropriations come up for a vote shortly-we haveto make progress toward thenearer planets. The public demands it. Unless wecan begin work on a refueling base on the Moon, public interest will cease!"

Worden said urgently, "Suppose I send some pictures of Butch? He's veryhuman, sir! He's extraordinarily appealing! He has personality! A reel or twoof Butch at his lessons ought to be popular!"

Again that irritating wait while his voice traveled a quarter millionmiles at the speed of light and the wait for the reply.

"The-ah-lunar creatures, Worden," said the chief biologist regretfully, "have killed a number of men who have been publicized as martyrs to science. We cannot give favorable publicity to creatures that have killed men!" Then headded blandly, "But you are progressing splendidly, Worden-splendidly! Carryon!"

His image faded from the video screen. Worden said naughty words as heturned away-. He'd come to like Butch. Butch trusted him. Butch now slid downfrom that crazy perch of his and came rushing to his arms every time heentered thenursery.

Butch was ridiculously small-no more than eighteen inches high. He waspreposterously light and fragile in his nursery, where only Moon gravityobtained. And Butch was such an earnest little creature, so soberly absorbedin everything that Worden showed him!

He was still fascinated by the phenomena of sound. Humming or singing- even Worden's humming and singing-entranced him. When Worden's lips moved nowButch struck an attitude and held up the hoop diaphragm with a tiny fingerpressed to it to catch the vibrations Worden's voice made.

Now too when he grasped an idea Worden tried to convey, he tended toswagger. He became more human in his actions with every session of humancontact. Once, indeed, Worden looked at the video screens which spied on Butch

and saw him-all alone--solemnly going through every gesture and every movementWorden had made. He was pretending to give a lesson to an imaginary stilltinier companion. He was pretending to be Worden, apparently for his ownsatisfaction!

Worden felt a lump in his throat. He was enormously fond of the littlemite. It was painful that he had just left Butch to help in the constructionof a vibrator microphone device which would transfer his voice to rockvibrations and simultaneously pick up any other vibrations that might be madein return.

If themembers of Butch's race did communicate by tapping on rocks orthe like, men could eavesdrop on them-could locate them, could detect ambushesin preparation, and apply mankind's deadly military countermeasures.

Worden hoped the gadget wouldn't work. But it did. When he put it on the floor of thenursery and spoke into themicrophone, Butch did feel the vibrations underfoot. He recognized their identity with the vibrations he'dlearned to detect in air.

He made a skipping exultant hop and jump. It was plainly the uttermostexpression of satisfaction. And then his tiny foot pattered and scratchedfuriously on the floor. It made a peculiar scratchy tapping. noise which themicrophone picked up. Butch watched Worden's face, making the sounds whichwere like highly elaborated ***footf ails***.

"No dice, Butch," said Worden unhappily. "I can't understand it. But itlooks as if you've started your treason already. This'll help wipe out some ofyour folks."

He reported it reluctantly to the head of the station.

Microphones were immediately set into the rocky crater floor outside the station and others were made ready for exploring parties to use for the detection of Moon creatures near them. Oddly enough, themicrophones by the station yielded results right away.

It was near sunset. Butch had been captured near themiddle of the three-hundred-and-thirty-four-hour lunar day. In all the hours between-a weekby Earth time-he had had no nourishment of any sort. Worden hadconscientiously offered him every edible and inedible substance in the station. Then at least one sample of every mineral in the station collection. Butch regarded them all with interest but without appetite. Worden-likingButch-expected him to die of starvation and thought it a good idea. Betterthan encompassing the death of all his race, anyhow. And it did seem to himthat Butch was beginning to show a certain sluggishness, a certain lack ofbounce and energy. He thought it was weakness from hunger.

Sunset progressed. Yard by yard, fathom by fathom, half-mile by half- mile, the shadows of themiles-high western walls of Tycho crept across the crater floor. There came a time when only the central hump had sunlight. Thenthe shadow began to creep up the eastern walls. Presently the last thin jaggedline of light would vanish and the colossal cup of the crater would be filledto overflowing with the night.

Worden watched the incandescent sunlight growing even narrower on the cliffs. He would see no other sunlight for two weeks' Earth time. Thenabruptly an alarm bell rang. It clanged stridently, furiously. Doors hissedshut, dividing the station into airtight sections.

Loudspeakers snapped, "Noises in the rock outside! Sounds like Mooncreatures talking nearby! They may plan an attack! Everybody into spacesuitsand get guts ready!"

At just that instant the last thin sliver of sunshine disappeared. Worden thought instantly of Butch. There was no spacesuit to fit him. Then hegrimaced a little. Butch didn't need a spacesuit.

Worden got into the clumsy outfit. The lights dimmed. The harsh airless space outside the station was suddenly bathe d in light. The multimillion-lumen beam, made to guide rocket ships to a landing even at night, was turned on to expose any creatures with designs on its owners. It was startling to see how little space was really lighted by the beam and how much of stark blackness spread on beyond.

The loudspeaker snapped again. "Two Moon creatures! Running away! They're zigzagging! Anybody who wants to take a shot--" The voice paused. Itdidn't matter. Nobody is a crack shot in a spacesuit. "They left something behind!" said the voice in the loudspeaker. It was sharp and uneasy. "I'll take a look at that," said Worden. His own voice startled him buthe was depressed. "I've got a hunch what it is."

Minutes later he went out through the air lock. He moved lightly despitethe cumbrous suit he wore. There were two other staff members with him. All three were armed and the searchlight beam stabbed here and there erratically to expose any relative of Butch who might try to approach them in the darkness.

With the light at his back Worden could see that trillions of starslooked down upon Luna. The zenith was filled with infinitesimal specks oflight of every conceivable color. The familiar constellations burned ten timesas brightly as on Earth. And Earth itself hung nearly overhead. It was three-quarters full-a monstrous bluish giant in the sky, four times the Moon'sdiameter, its ice caps and continents mistily to be seen.

Worden went forebodingly to the object left behind by Butch's kin. Hewasn't much surprised when he saw what it was. It was a rocking stone on itsplate with a fine impalpable dust on the plate, as if something had beencrushed under the egg-shaped upper stone acting as a mill.

Worden said sourly into his helmet microphone, "It's a present forButch. His kinfolk know he was captured alive. They suspect he's hungry: They've left some grub for him of the kind he wants or needs most."

That was plainly what it was. It did not make Worden feel proud. A babyButch- had been kidnapped by the enemies of its race. That baby was a prisonerand its captors would have nothing with which to feed it. So someone, greatlydaring-Worden wondered somberly if it was Butch's fathe r and mothe r-had riskedthe ir lives to leave food for him with a rocking stone to tag it forrecognition as food.

"It's a dirty shame," said Worden bitterly. "All right! Let's carry itback. Careful not to spill the powdered stuff!"

His lack of pride was emphasized when Butch fell upon the unidentifiedpowder with marked enthusiasm. Tiny pinch by tiny pinch Butch consumed it withan air of vast satisfaction. Worden felt ashamed.

"You're getting treated pretty rough, Butch," said Worden. "What I'vealready learned from you will cost a good many hundred of your folks' lives. And they're taking chances to feed you! I'm making you a traitor and myself ascoundrel." Butch thoughtfully held up the hoop diaphragm to catch the voicevibrations in the air. He was small and furry and absorbed. He decided that hecould pick up sounds better from the rock underfoot. He pressed the communicator microphone on Worden. He waited.

"No!" said Worden roughly. "Your people are too human. Don't let me findout any more, Butch. Be smart and play dumb!"

But Butch didn't, It wasn't very long before Worden was teaching him toread. Oddly, though, the rock microphones that had given the alarm at the station didn't help the tractor parties at all. Butch's kinfolk seemed tovanish from theneighborhood of the station altogether. Of course if that keptup, the construction of a fuel base could be begun and the actualextermination of the species carried out later. But the reports on Butch were suggesting other possibilities.

"If your folks stay vanished," Worden told Butch, "it'll be all rightfor a while-and only for a while. I'm being urged to try to get you used to Earth gravity. If I succeed, they'll want you on Earth in a zoo. And if thatworks-why, they'll be sending other expeditions to get more of your kinfolk toput in other zoos."

Butch watched Worden, motionless. "And also"-Worden's tone was verygrim--"the re's some miniature mining machinery coming up by thenext rocket. I'm supposed to see if you can learn to run it."

Butch made scratching sounds on the floor. It was unintelligible ofcourse, but it was an expression of interest at least. Butch seemed to enjoythe vibrations of Worden's voice, just as a dog likes to have his master talkto him. Worden grunted.

"We humans class you as an animal, Butch. We tell ourselves that all the animal world should be subject to us. Animals should work for us. If you acttoo smart well hunt down all your relatives and set them to work diggingminerals for us. You'll be with them. But I don't want you to work your heartout in a mine, Butch! It's wrong!"

Butch remained quite still. Worden thought sickishly of small furrycreatures like Butch driven to labor in airless mines in the Moon's frigiddepths. With guards in spacesuits watching lest any try to escape to the freedom they'd known before the coming of men. With guns mounted againstrevolt. With punishments--for rebellion or weariness.

It wouldn't be unprecedented. The Indians in Cuba when the Spanish came.... Negro slavery in both Americas... concentration camps...

Butch moved. He put a small furry paw on Worden's knee. Worden scowledat him.

"Bad business," he said harshly. "I'd rather not get fond of you. You'rea likable little cuss but your race is doomed. The trouble is that you didn't bother to develop a civilization. And if you had, I suspect we'd have smashedit. We humans aren't what you'd call admirable."

Butch went over to the blackboard. He took a piece of pastel chalk- ordinary chalk was too hard for his Moon-gravity muscles -to use-and soberlybegan to make marks on the slate. The marks formed letters. The letters madewords. The words made sense.

YOU, wrote Butah quite incredibly in neat pica lettering, GOOD FRIEND.

He turned his head to stare at Worden. Worden went white. "I haven't taught you those words, Butch!" he said very quietly. "What's up?"

He'd forgotten that his words, to Butch, were merely vibrations in the air or in the floor. He'd forgotten they had no meaning. But Butch seemed tohave forgotten it too. He marked soberly:

MY FRIEND GET SPACESUIT.

He looked at Worden and marked once more.

TAKE ME OUT. I COME BACK WITH YOU.

He looked at Worden with large incongruously soft and appealing eyes. And Worden's brain seemed to spin inside his skull. After a long time Butchprinted again--YES.

Then Worden sat very still indeed. There was only Moon gravity in thenursery and he weighed only one eighth as much as on Earth. But he felt veryweak. Then he felt grim.

"Not much else to do, I suppose," he said slowly. "But I'll have tocarry you through Earth gravity to the air lock."

He got to his feet. Butch made a little leap up into his arms. He curledup there, staring at Worden's face. Just before Worden stepped through the door Butch reached up a skinny paw and caressed Worden's cheek tentatively.

"Here we go!" said Worden. "The idea was for you to be a traitor. Iwonder--"

But with Butch a furry ball, suffering in themultiplied weight Earth . gravity imposed upon him, Worden made his way to the air lock. He donned aspacesuit. He went out.

It was near sunrise then. A long time had passed and Earth was now inits last quarter and the very highest peak of all that made up the crater wall glowed incandescent in the sunshine. But the stars were still quite visibleand very bright. Worden walked away from the station, guided by the Earthshine on the ground under foot.

Three hours later he came back. Butch skipped and hopped beside his spacesuited figure. Behind them came two other figures. They were smaller than Worden but much larger than Butch. They were skinny and furry and they carrieda burden. A mile from the station he switched on his suit radio. He called. A startled voice answered in his earphones.

"It's Worden," he said dryly. "I've been out for a walk with Butch. Wevisited his family and I've a couple of his cousins with me. They want to paya visit and present some gifts. Will you let us in without shooting?"

There were exclamations. There was confusion. But Worden went on steadily toward the station while another high peak glowed in sunrise lightand a third seemed to burst into incandescence. Dawn was definitely on the way.

The aft-lock door opened. The party from the airless Moon went in. Whenthe air lock filled, though, and the gravity coils went on, BUtch and hisrelatives became helpless. They had to be carried to thenursery. There theyuncurled themselves and blinked enigmatically at themen who crowded into the room where gravity was normal for the Moon and at the other men who stared inthe door.

"I've got a sort of message," said Worden. "Butch and his relatives wantto make a deal with us. You'll notice that they've put themselves at ourmercy. We can kill all three of them. But they want to make a deal."

The head of the station said uncomfortably, "You've managed two-waycommunication, Worden."

"1 haven't," Worden told him. "They have. They've proved to me thatthe y've brains equal to ours. They've been treated as animals and shot asspecimens They've fought back-naturally! But they want to make friends. Theysay that we can never use the Moon except in spacesuits and in stations likethis, and they could never take Earth's gravity. So the re's no need for us tobe enemies. We can help each othe r."

The head of the station said dryly, "Plausible enough, but we have toact under orders, Worden. Did you explain that?"

"They know," said Worden. "So they've got set to defend themselves ifnecessary. They've set up smelters to handle metals. They get the heat by sunmirrors, concentrating sunlight. They've even begun to work with gases held incontainers. They're not far along with electronics yet, but they've got the the oretic knowledge and they don't need vacuum tubes. They live in a vacuum. They can defend themselves from now on."

The head said mildly, "I've watched Butch, you know, Worden. And youdon't look crazy. But if this sort of thing is sprung on the armed forces onEarth the re'll be trouble. They've been arguing for armed rocket ships. Ifyour friends start a real war for defense-if they can-maybe rocket warshipswill be the answer." -

Worden nodded.

"Right. But our rockets aren't so good that they can fight this far froma fuel store, and there couldn't be--one on the Moon with all of Butch'skinfolk civilized--as they nearly are now and as they certainly will be withinthe next few weeks. Smart people, the se cousins'and such of Butch!"

"I'm afraid they'll have to prove it," said the head "Where'd they getthis sudden surge in culture?"

"From us," said Worden. "Smelting from me, I think. Metallurgy andmechanical engineering from the tractor mechanics. Geology-call it lunologyhere-mostly from you."

"How's that?" demanded the head.

"Think of something you'd like Butch to do," said Worden grimly, "andthe n watch him."

The head stared and then looked at Butch. Butch--small and furry andswaggering-stood up and bowed profoundly from the waist. One paw was placedwhere his heart could be. The other made a grandiose sweeping gesture. Hestraightened up and strutted, then climbed swiftly into Worden's lap and put askinny furry arm about his neck.

"That bow," said the head, very pale, "is what I had in mind. You mean--"

"Just so," said Worden. "Butch's ancestors had no air to make noises infor speech. So they developed telepathy. In time, to be sure, they worked outsomething like music-sounds carried through rock. But like our music itdoesn't carry meaning. They communicate directly from mind to mind. Only wecan't pick up communications from them and they can from us."

"They read our minds!" said the head. He licked his lips. "And when wefirst shot them for specimens they were. trying to communicate. Now theyfight."

"Naturally," said Worden. "Wouldn't we? They've been picking our brains. They can put up a terrific battle now. They could wipe out this stationwithout trouble. They let us stay so they could learn from us. Now they wantto trade."

"We have to report to Earth," said the head slowly, "but--"

"They brought along some samples," said Worden. "They'll swap diamonds, weight for weight, for records. They like our music. They'll trade emeraldsfor textbooks-they can read now! And they'll set up an atomic pile and swapplutonium for other things they'll think of later. Trading on that basis should be cheaper than war!"

"Yes," said the head. "It should. That's the sort of argument men willlisten to. But how---"

"Butch," said Worden ironically. "Just Butch! We didn't capture him-the yplanted him on us! He stayed in the station and picked our brains and relayedthe stuff to his relatives. We wanted to learn about them, remember? It's likethe story of the psychologist....

There's a story about a psychologist who was studying the intelligenceof a chimpanzee. He led the chimp into a room full of toys, went out, closedthe door and put his eye to the keyhole to see what the chimp was doing. Hefound himself gazing into a glittering interested brown-eye only inches fromhis own. The chimp was looking through the keyhole to see what the psychologist was doing.

Critical Difference

MASSY WAKED THAT morning when the only partly opened port of his sleeping-cabin closed of itself and the room-warmer began to whir. He found himselfburrowed deep under his covering, and when he got his head out of it the already bright room was bitterly cold and his breath made a fog about him.

He thought uneasily, it's colder than yesterday! But a Colonial Surveyofficer is not supposed to let himself seem disturbed, in public, and the onlyway to follow that rule is to follow it in private, too. So Massy composed hisfeatures, while gloom filled him. When one has just received senior servicerating and is on one's very first independent survey of a new colonial installation, the unexpected can be appalling. The unexpected was definitelyhere, on Lani III.

He'd been a Survey Candidate on Khali II and Taret and Arepo I, all ofwhich were tropical, and a junior officer on Menes Ill and Thotmes-one asemiarid planet and the other temperate-volcanic-and he'd done an assistant job on Saril's solitary world, which was nine-tenths water. But this first independent survey on his own was another matter. Everything was wholly unfamiliar. An ice planet with a minus point one habitability rating was upsetting in its peculiarites. He knew what the books said about glacial-world conditions, but that was all.

The denseness of the fog his breath made seemed to grow less as the room-warmer whirred and whirred. When by the thinness of themist he guessed the temperature to be not much under freezing, he climbed out of his bunk andwent to the port to look out. His cabin, of course, was in one of the drone-hulls--that had brought the colony's equipment to Lani III. The other emptied hills were precisely ranged in order outside. They were duly connected by tubular galleries, and very painstakingly leveled. They gave an impression of impassioned tidiness among the upheaved, ice-coated mountains all about.

He gazed down the long valley in which the colony lay. There were monstrous slanting peaks on either side. They partly framed themorning sun. Their sides were ice. The flanks of every mountain in view were ice. The skywas pale. The sun had four sun-dogs placed geometrically about it. It shonecoldly upon this far-out world. Normal post-midnight temperatures in thisvalley ranged around ten below zero-and this was technically summer. But itwas colder than ten below zero now. At noon there were normally tiny tricklingrills of surface thaw running down the sunlit sides of the mountains-but theyfroze again at night and the frost replaced itself after sunset. And this wasa sheltered valley-warmer than most of the planet's surface. Thee sun had itssundogs every day, on rising. There were nights when the brighter planets hadstar-pups, too.

The phone-plate lighted and dimmed and lighted and dimmed. They didthe mselves well on Lani III-but the parent world was in this same solarsystem. That was rare. Massy stood before the plate and it cleared. Hemdon's face peered unhappily out of it. He was even younger than Massy, and inclined to lean heavily on the supposedly vast experience of a Senior Officer of the Colonial Survey.

"Well?" said Massy-and suddenly felt very undignified in his sleeping- garments.

"We're picking up a beam from home," said Hem~lon anxiously, "but wecan't make it out."

Because the third planet of the sun Lani was being colonized from the second, inhabited world, communication with the colony's base was possible. Atight beam could span a distance which was only light-minutes across at conjunction, and not much over a light-hour at opposition-as now. But the beamcommunication had been broken br the past few weeks, and shouldn't be possibleagain for some weeks more. The sun lay between. One couldn't expect normalsound-and-picture transmission until the parent planet had moved past the scrambler-fields of Lani. But something had come through. It would bereasonable for it to be pretty well hashed when it arrived.

"They aren't sending words or pictures," said Hemdon uneasily. "The beamis wabbly and we don't know what to make of it. It's a signal, all right, andon the regular frequency. But there are all sorts of stray noises, and stillin themidst of it the re's some sort of signal we can't make out. It's like awhine, only it stutters. It's a broken-up sound of one pitch."

Massy rubbed his chin reflectively. He remembered a course ininformation the ory just before he'd graduated. from the Service Academy. Signals made by pulses, and pitch-changes and frequency-variations.

Information was what couldn't be predicted without information. And heremembered with gratitude a seminar on the history of communication, justbefore he'd gone out on. his first field job as a Survey Candidate.

"Hm-m-m," he said with a trace of self-consciousness. "Those noises-the stuttering ones. Would they be, on the whole, of no more than two different durations? Like-bzzzzz bzz bzz hzzzzzz' bzz?"

He felt that he lost dignity by making such ribald sounds. But Herndon'sface brightened.

"That's it!" he said relievedly. "That's it! Only they're high-pitchedlike--" His voice went falsetto..; "Bzz bzz bzz bzzzzz bzz bzz"

It occurred to Massy that they sounded like two idiots. He said withdignity: "Record everything you get, and I'll try to decode it." He added: "Before there was voice communication there were signals by light and soundsin groups of long and short units. They came in groups, to stand for 1etters, and things were spelled out. Of course there were larger groups, which, werewords. Very crude syscem, but it worked when there was great interference, asin the early days. If the re's some emergency, your home world might try to getthrough the sun's scrambler-field that way."

"Undoubtedly!" said Herndon, with even greater relief. "No questicn, that's it!" He regarded Massy with great respect as he clicked off. His imagefaded. The plate was clear.

He thinks I'm wonderful, thought Massy wryly. Because i'm ColonialSurvey. But all I know is what's been taught me. it's bound to show up sooneror later. Damn!

He dressed. From time to time he looked out the port again. Theintolerable cold of Lani III had intensified, lately. There was some idea thatsunspots were somehow the cause. He couldn't make out sunspots with thenakedeye, but the sun did look pale, with its accompanying sun-dogs. Massy wasannoyed by them. They were the result of microscopic ice-crystals suspended inthe air. There was no dust on this planet, but there was plenty of ice! It wasin the air and on the ground and even under it. To be sure, the drills for the foundation of the great landing-grid had brought up cores of frozen humusalong with frozen clay, so there must have been a time when this world hadknown clouds and seas and vegetation. But it was millions, maybe hundreds ofmillions of years ago. Right now, though, it was only warm enough to have anatmosphere and very slight and partial thawings in direct sunlight, insheltered spots, at midday. It couldn't support life, because life is alwaysdependent on other life, and there is a temperature below which a neutralecological system can't maintain itself. The past few weeks, the climate hadbeen such that even human-supplied life looked dubious.

Massy slipped on his Colonial Survey uniform with its palm-treeinsignia. Nothing could be much more inappropriate than palm-tree symbols on aplanet with sixty feet of permafrost. Massy, reflected wryly, The constructiongang calls it a blast, instead of a tree, because we blow up when they try tododge specifications. But specifications have to be met! You can't bet the lives of a colony or even a ship's crew on half-built facilities!

He marched down the corridor from his sleeping room, with the dignity hepainstakingly tried to maintain for the sake of the Colonial Survey. It was apretty lonely business, being dignified all the time. If Herndon didn't lookso respectful, it would have been pleasant to be more friendly. But Hemdonrevered him. Even his sister Riki-but Massy put her firmly out of his mind. Hewas on Lani III to check and approve the colony installations. There was the giant~ landing-grid for spaceships, which took power from the ionosphere tobring heavily loaded space-vessels gently to the ground, and in between timestook power from the same source to supply the colony's needs. It also liftedvisiting spacecraft thenecessary five planetary diameters out when they tookoff again. There was power-storage in the remote event of disaster to that giant device. There was a food-reserve and thenecessary resources for itsindefinite stretching in case of need. That usually meant hydroponicinstallations. There was a reason for the colony, which would make it self-supporting- here a mine. All the se things had had to be finished and operableand inspected by a duly qualified Colonial Survey officer' before the colonycould be licensed for unlimited use. It was all very normal and official, but Massy was thenewest Senior Survey Officer on the list, and this was the first of his independent operations. He felt inadequate, sometimes.

He passed through the vestibule between this drone hull and thenext. Hewent directly to Herndon's office. Herndon, like himself, was newly endowedwith authority. He was actually a mining-and-minerals man and a youthful prodigy in that field, but when the director of the colony was taken ill whilea supply ship was aground, he went back to the home planet and command devolved on Herndon. I wonder, thought Massy, if he feels as shaky as I do?

When he entered the office, Hemdon sat listening to a literal hash ofnoises coming out of a speaker on his desk. The cryptic signal had been relayed to him, and a recorder stored it as it came. There were cracklings andsqueals and moaning sounds, and sputters and rumbles and growls. But behindthe facade of confusion there was a tiny, interrupted, high-pitched noise. Itwas a monotone whining not to be confused with the random sounds accompanyingit. Sometimes it faded almost to inaudibility, and sometimes it was sharp and clear. But it was a distinctive sound in itself, and it was made up of shortwhines and longer ones of two durations only.

"I've put Riki at making a transcription of what we've got," saidHerndon with relief as he saw Massy. "She'll make short marks for the shortsounds, and--long ones for the long. I've told her to try to separate the groups. We've got a full half hour of it, already."

Massy made an inspired guess.

"I would expect it to be the same message repeated over and over," hesaid. He added, "And I think it would be decoded by guessing at the letters intwo-letter and three-letter words, as clues to longer ones. That's quickerthan statistical analysis of frequency."

Herndon instantly pressed buttons under his phoneplate. He relayed the information to Riki, his sister, as if it were gospel. Massy rememberedguiltily that it wasn't gospel. It was simply a trick recalled from hisboyhood, when he was passionately interested in secret languages. His interesthad faded when he realized he had no secrets to record or transmit. Hemdon turned from the phone-plate.

"Riki says she's already learned to recognize some groups," he reported, "but thanks for the advice. Now what?"

Massy sat down. He'd have liked some coffee, but he was being treatedwith such respect that the role of demigod was almost forced on him.

"It seems to me," he observed, "that the increased cold out here mightnot be local. Sunspots--"

Herndon jittered visibly. He silently handed over a sheet of paper with-observation-figures on top and a graph below them which related the observations, to each othe r. They were the daily, at-first-routine, measurements of the solar constant from Lani III. The graph-line almost ran off the paper at the bottom.

"To look at this," he admitted, "you'd think the sun was going out. Ofcourse it can't be," he added hastily. "Not possibly! But there is an extraordinary number of sunspots. Maybe they'll clear. But meanwhile the amount of heat reaching us is dropping. As far as I know the re's no parallelto it. Night temperatures are thirty degrees lower than they should be. Notonly here, eithe r, but at all the robot weathe r stations that have been spotted around the planet. They average forty below zero minimum, instead of

ten. And there is that terrific lot of sunspots..."

He looked hopefully at Massy. Massy frowned. Sunspots are things aboutwhich nothing can be done. Yet the habitability of a borderline planet, anyhow, can very well depend on them. An infinitesimal change in sun heat can make a serious change in any planet's temperature. In the books, the ancientmother planet Earth was said to have entered glacial periods through a drop ofonly three degrees in the planet-wide temperature, and to have been tropicalmost to its poles from a rise of only six. It had been guessed that glacialperiods in the planet where humanity began had been caused by coincidences ofsunspot maxima.

This planet was already glacial to its equator. There was a genuinelyabnormal number of sunspots on Lani, its sun. Sunspots could account forworsening conditions here, perhaps. That message from the inner planet couldbe bad, thought Massy, if the solar constant drops and stays down a while. Butaloud he said:

"There couldn't be a really significant permanent change. Not quickly, anyhow. Lani's a Sol-type star, and they aren't variables, though of courseany dynamic system like a sun will have cyclic modifications of one sort oranothe r. But they usually cancel out."

He sounded encouraging, even to himself. But there was a stirring behindhim. Riki Herndon had come silently into her brothe r's office. She lookedpale. She put papers down on her brothe r's desk.

"But," she said evenly, "while cycles sometimes cancel, sometimes theyenhance each othe r. They heterodyne. That's what's happening."

Massy scrambled to his feet, flushing. Herndon said sharply:

"What? Where'd you get that stuff, Riki?"

She nodded at the sheaf of papers she'd just laid down.

"That's thenews from home." She nodded again, to Massy. "You wereright. It was the same message, repeated over and over. And I decoded it likechildren decode each othe r's secret messages. I did that to Ken once. He wastwelve, and I decoded his diary, and I remember how angry he was that I'dfound out he didn't have any secrets."

She tried to smile. But Herndon wasn't listening. He read swiftly. Massysaw that the under sheets were rows of dots and dashes, painstakinglytranscribed and then decoded. There were letters under each group of marks.

Herndon was very white when he'd--finished.' He handed the sheet toMassy. Riki's handwriting was precise and clear. Massy read:

"FOR YOUR INFORMATION THE SOLAR CONSTANT IS DROPPING RAPIDLY DUE TO COINCIDENCE OF CYCLIC VARIATIONS IN SUNSPOT ACTIVITY WITH PREVIOUS UNOBSERVED LONG CYCLES APPARENTLY INCREASING THE EFFECT MAXiMUM IS NOT YET REACHED AND IT IS EXPECTED THAT THIS PLANET WILL BECOME UNINHABiTABLE FOR A TiME ALREADY KILLING FROST HAVE DESTROYED CROPS IN SUMMER HEMISPHERE IT IS IMPROBABLE THAT MORE THAN A SMALL PART OF THE POPULATION CAN BE SHELTERED AND WARMED THROUGH DEVELOPING GLACIAL CONDITIONS WHICH WILL REACH TO EQUATOR IN TWO HUNDRED DAYS THE COLD CONDITIONS ARE COMPUTED TO LAST TWO THOUSAND DAYS BEFORE NORMAL SOLAR CONSTANT RECURS THIS INFORMATION IS SENT YOU TO ADVISE IMMEDIATE DEVELOPMENT OF HYDROPONIC FOOD SUPPLY AND OTHER PRECAUTIONS MESSAGE ENDS FOR YOUR INFORMATION THE SOLAR CONSTANT IS DROPPING RAPIDLY DUE TO COINCIDENCE OF CYCLIC--"

Massy looked up. Herndon's face was ghastly. Massy said in somegrimness:

"Kent Iv's thenearest world your planet could hope to get help from. A mail liner will make it in two months. Kent IV might be able to send threeships-to get here in two months more. That's no good!"

He felt sick. Human-inhabited planets are far apart. The averagedistance of stars-of all types-there is on an average between four and five-light-years--of distance between suns. They are two months' spaceship journey apart. And not all stars are Sol-type or have inhabited planets. Colonizedworlds are like isolated islands in an unimaginably vast ocean, and the shipsthat ply between them at thirty light-speeds seem merely to creep. In ancientdays on themother planet Earth, men sailed for months between ports, in the irclumsy sailing ships. There was no way to send messages faster than they couldtravel. Nowadays there was little improvement. News of the Lani disaster couldnot be transmitted. It had to be carried, as between stars, and carriage wasslow and response to news of disaster was no faster.

The inner planet, Lani II, had twenty millions of inhabitants, asagainst the three hundred people in the colony on Lani III. The outer planetwas already frozen, but there would be glaciation on the inner world in twohundred days. Glaciation and human life are mutually exclusive. Human beingscan survive only so long as food and power hold out, and shelter againstreally bitter cold cannot be improvised for twenty million peopie! And, ofcourse, there could be no outside help on any adequate scale. News of theneedfor it would travel too slowly. One other world might hear in two months, andsend what aid it could in four. But thenext would not hear for four months, and could not send help in less than eight. It would take five Earth-years tOget a thousand ships to Lani Il-and a thousand ships could not rescue morethan one per cent of the population. But in five years there would not benearly so many people left alive.

Heindon licked his lips. There were three hundred people in the already- frozen colony. They had food and power and shelter. They had been consideredsplendidly daring to risk the conditions here. But all their home world wouldpresently be like this. And there was no possibility of equipping everybodythere as the colonists were equipped.

"Our people," said Riki in a thin voice, "all of them Mother and Fathe rand the others. Our cousins. All our friends. Home is going to be like... like that!"

She jerked her head toward a port which let in the frigid colony-world'swhite daylight. Her face worked.

Massy was aware of an extreme unhappiness ou her account. For himself, of course, the tragedy was less.

He had no family. He had very few friends. But he could see somethingthat had not occurred to them as yet~

"Of course," he said, "it's not only their trouble. If the solar constant is really dropping like that... why things out here will be prettybad, too. A lot worse than they are now. We'll have to get to work--to save ourselves!"

Riki did not look at him. Herndon bit his lips. It was plain that the irown fate did not concern them immediately. But when one's home world isdoomed, one's personal safety seems a very trivial matter.

There was silence save for the crackling, tumultuous noises that cameout of the speaker on Herndon's desk. In the midst of that confused soundthere was a wavering, whining, high-pitched note which swelled atid faded and grew distinct again.

"We," said Massy without confidence, "are right now in the conditionsthe y'll face a good long time from now."

Herndon said dully: "But we couldn't live here without supplies from home. Or even withoutthe equipment we brought. But they can't get supplies from anywhere, and theycan't make such equipment for everybody! They'll die!" He swallowed, and the rewas a clicking noise in his throat. "They... they know it, too. So they... . warn us to try to save ourselves because...--they can't help us anymore."

There are many reasons why a man can feel shame that he belongs to arace which can do the things that some men do. But sometimes there are reasonsto be proud, as well. The home world of this colony was doomed, but it sent a

warning to the tiny group on the colony-world, to allow them to try to savethe niselyes.

"I... wish we were there to... share what they have to face," saidRiki. Her voice sounded as if her throat hurt. "I.. . don't want to keep onliving if,.. everybody who.. . ever cared about us is going to die!"

Massy felt lonely. He could understand that nobody would want to live asthe only human alive. Nobody would want to live as a member of the only groupof people left alive. And everybody thinks of his home planet as all the worldthere is. I don't think that way, thought Massy. But maybe it's the way I'dfeel about living if Riki were to die. It would be natural to want to shareany danger or any disaster she faced. Which he was.

"L-look!" he said, stammering a little. "You don't see! It isn't a caseof your living while they die! If your home world becomes like this, what willthis be like? We're farthe r from the sun! We're colder to start with! Do youthink we'll live through anything they can't take? Food supplies or no, equipment or no, do you think we've got a chance? Use your brains!"

Herndon and Riki stared at him. And then some of the strained look left Riki's face and body. Herndon blinked, and said slowly:

"Why... that's so! We were thought to be taking a terrific risk whenwe came here. But it'll be as much worse here. Of course! We are in the same fix they're in!" He straightened a little. Color actually came back into his face. Rikimanaged to smile. And then Hemdon said almost naturally:

"That makes things look more sensible! We've got to fight for our lives, too! And we've very little chance of saving them! What do we do about it, Massy?"

The sun was halfway toward mid-sky, and still attended by its sun-dogs, though they were fainter than at the horizon. The sky was darker. The mountainpeaks reached skyward, serene and utterly aloof from the affairs of man. Thiswas a frozen world, where there should be no inhabitants. The city was a fleetof metal hulks, neatly arranged on the valley floor, emptied of thematerialthey had brought for the building of the colony. At the upper end of the valley the landing-grid stood. It was a gigantic skeleton of steel, risingfrom legs of unequal length bedded in the hillsides, and' reaching twothousand feet toward the stars. Human figures, muffled almost pastrecognition, moved about a catwalk three-quarters of the way up. There was atiny glittering below where they moved. They were, of course, men using sonicice-breakers to shatter the frost which formed on the framework at night. Falling shards of crystal made a liquidlike flashing. The landing-grid neededto be cleared every ten days or so. Left uncleared, it would acquire anincreasingly thick coating of ice. In time it could collapse. But long beforethat time it would have ceased to operate, and without its operation the recould be no space travel. Rockets for lifting spaceships were impossiblyheavy, for practical use. But the landing-grids could lift them out to the unstressed space where Lawlor drives could work, and draw them to ground withcargoes they couldn't possibly have carried if they'd needed rockets.

Massy reached the base of the grid on foot. It was not far from the village of drone-hulls. He was dwarfed by the ground-level upright beams. Hewent through the cold-lock to the small control-house at the grid's base.

He nodded to theman on standby as he got painfully out of his mufflinggarments.

"Everything all right?" he asked.

The standby operator shrugged. Massy was Colonial Survey. It was hisfunction to find fault, to expose inadequacies in the construction andoperation of colony facilities. It's natural for me to be disliked by menwhose work I inspect, thought Massy. If I approve it doesn't mean anything, and if I protest, it's bad. He had always been lonely, but it was a part of

the job.

"I think," he said painstakingly, "that there ought to be a change inmaximum no-drain voltage. I'd like to check it."

The operator shrugged again. He pressed buttons under a phone-plate.

"Shift to reserve power," he commanded when a face appeared in the plate. "Gotta check no-drain juice."

"What for?" demanded the face in the plate.

"You-know-who's got ideas," said the grid operator scornfully. "Maybewe've been skimping something. Maybe the re's some new specification we didn'tknow about. Maybe anything! But shift to reserve power."

The face in the screen grumbled. Massy swallowed. It was not a Surveyofficer's privilege to maintain discipline. But there was no particular virtuein discipline here and now. He watched the current-demand dial. It stood alittle above normal day-drain, which was understandable. The outsidetemperature was down. There was more power needed to keep the dwellings warm, and there was always a lot of power needed in themine the colony had beenformed to exploit. The mine had to be warmed for themen who worked to developit.

The demand-neqdle dropped abruptly, and hung steady, and dropped againand again as additional parts of the colony's power-uses were switched toreserve. The needle hit bottom. It stayed there.

Massy had to walk around the standby man to get at the voltmeter. It wasbuilt around standard, oldfashioned vacuum tubes-standard for generations, now. Massy patiently hooked it up and warmed the thbes and tested it. Hepushed in the contact plugs. He read theno-drain voltage. He licked his lipsand made a note. He reversed the leads, so it wOuld read backward. He tookanother reading. He drew in his breath very quietly.

"Now I want the power turned on in sections," he told the operator. "Themine first, maybe. It doesn't matter. But I want to get voltage-readings atdifferent power take-offs."

The Operator looked pained. He spoke with unnecessary elaboration to the face in the phone-plate, and grudgingly went through with the process by which Massy measured the successive drops in voltage with power drawn from the ionosphere. The ourrent available from a layer of ionized gas is, in effect, the current-flow through a conductor with marked resistance. It is possible toinfer a gas' ionization from the current it yields.

The cold-lock door opened. Riki Hemdon came in, panting a little.

"There's another message from home," she said sharply. Her voice seemedstrained. "They picked up our answering-beam and are giving the informationyou asked for."

"I'll be along," said Massy. "I just got some informalion here."

He got into his cold-garments again. He followed her out of the control- hut.

"The figures from home aren't good," said Riki evenly, when mountainsvisibly rose on every hand around them. "Ken says they're much worse than hethought. The rate of decline in the solar constant's worse than we figured orcould believe."

"I see," said Massy, inadequately.

"It's absurd!" said Riki fiercely. "It's monstrous! There've been sunspots and sunspot cycles all along! I learned about them in school! I learnedmyself about a four-year and a seven-year cycle, and that there were others!

They should have known! They should have calculated in advance! Now they talk'about--sixty-year cycles coming iii with a hundred-and-thirty-year cycle topile up with all the others--But what's the use of scientists if they don't dothe ir work right and twenty million people die because of it?"

Massy did not consider himself a scientist, but he winced. Riki raged asthey moved over the slippery ice. Her breath was an intermittent cloud abouthe r shoulders. There was white frost on the front of her cold-garments.

He held out his hand quickly as she slipped, once.

"But they'll beat it!" said Riki in a sort of angry pride. "They'restarting to build more landing-grids, back home. Hundreds of them! Not forships to land by, but to draw power from the ionosphere! They figure that oneship-size grid can keep nearly three square miles of ground warm enough tolive on! They'll roof over the streets of cities. Then they'll plant food- crops in the streets and gardens, and do what hydroponic growing they can. They are afraid they can't do it fast enough to save everybody, but they'lltry!"

Massy clenched his hands inside their bulky mittens.

"Well?" demanded Riki. "Won't that do the trick?"

Massy said: "No."

"Why not?" she demanded.

"I just took readings on the grid, here. The voltage and the conductivity, of the layer we draw power from, both depend on ionization. Whenthe intensity of sunlight drops, the voltage drops and the conductivity drops, too. It's harder for less power to flow to the area the grid can tap-and the voltage-pressure is lower to drive it."

"Don't say any more!" cried Riki. "Not another word!"

Massy was silent. They went down the last small slope. They passed the opening of themine-the great drift which bored straight into themountain. They could look into it. They saw the twin rows of brilliant roof-lights goingtoward the heart of the stony monster.

They had almost reached the village when Riki saidin a stifled voice:

"How bad is it?"

"Very," admitted Massy. "We have here the conditions the home planetwill have in two hundred days. Originally we could draw less than a fifth the power they count on from a grid on Lani II."

Riki ground her teeth.

"Go on!" she said challengingly.

"Ionization here,is down ten per cent," said Massy. "That means the voltage is down-somewhat more. A great deal more. And the resistance of the layer is greater. Very much greater. When they need power most, on the homeplanet, they won't draw more from a grid than we do now. It won't be enough."

They reached the village. There were steps to the cold-lock of Herndon'soffice-hull. They were ice-free, because like the village walk-ways they werewarmed to keep frost from depositing on them. Massy made a mental note.

In the cold-lock, the warm air pouring in was' almost stifling. Rikisaid defiantly:

"You might as well tell me now!"

'We could draw one-fifth as much power, here, as the same-size gridwould yield on your home world,"he said grimly. "We are drawing-call it sixtyper cent of normal. A shade over one-tenth of what they must expect to drawwhen the real cold hits them. But their estimates are nine times too high." Hesaid heavily, "One grid won't warm three square miles of city. About a thirdof one is closer. But--"

"That won't be the worst!" said Rild in a choked voice. "Is that right? How much good will a grid do?"

Massy did not answer.

The inner cold-lock doOr opened. Herndon sat at his desk, even paler

than before, listening to the hash of noises that came out of the speaker. Hetapped on the desktop, quite unconscious of the action. He looked almostdesperately at Massy.

"Did she... tell you?" he asked in a numb voice."They hope to savemaybe half the population. All the children, anyhow--"

"They won't," said Rild bitterly.

"Better go transcribe thenew stuff that's come in," said her brothe rdully. "We might as well know what it says."

Riki went out of the office. Massy laboriously shed his cold-garments. He said uncomfortably:

"The rest of the colony doesn't know what's up yet. The operator at the grid didn't, certainly. But they have to know."

"We'll post themessage on the bulletin board," said Herndonapathe tically. "I wish I could -keep it from them. It's not fun to live with.

I... might as well not tell them just yet.' "To the contrary," insisted Massy. "They've got to know right away! You're going to issue orders and they'll need to understand how urgent theyare!"

Herndon looked absolutely hopeless.

"What's the good of doing anything?" When Massy frowned, he added as ifexhausted: "Seriously, is there any use? You're all right. A Survey ship's dueto take you away. It's not coming because they know the re's something wrong, but because your job should be finished about now. But it can't do any good! It would be insane for it to land at home. It couldn't carry away more than afew dozen refugees, and there are twenty million people who're going to die. It might offer to take some of us. But... I don't think many of, us wouldgo. I wouldn't. I don't think Riki would."

"I don't see--"

"What we've got right here," said Herndon, "is what they're going tohave back home. And worse. But the re's no chance for us to keep alive here! You are the one who pointed it out! I've been figuring, and the way the solar- constant curve is going. I plotted it from the figures they gave us-itcouldn't possibly level out until the oxygen, anyhow, is frozen out of the atmosphere here. We aren't equipped to stand anything like that, and we can'tget equipped. There couldn't be equipment to let us stand it indefinitely! Anyhow, themaximum cold conditions will last two thousand days back home-sixEarth-years. And the re'll be storage of cold in frozen oceans and piled-upglaciers. It'll be twenty years before home will be back to normal intemperature, and the same here. Is there any point in trying to live-justbarely to survive-for twenty years before the re'll be a habitable planet to goback to?"

Massy said irritably:

"Don't be a fool! Doesn't it occur to you that this planet is a perfectexperiment-station, two hundred days ahead of the home world, where ways tobeat tbe whole business can be tried? If we can beat it here, they can beat itthe re!"

Herndon said detachedly:

"Can you name one thing to try here?"

"Yes," snapped Massy. "I want the walk-heaters and the step-heatersoutside turned off. They use power to keep walkways clear of frost anddoorsteps not slippery. I want to save that heat!"

Herndon said without interest:

"And when you've saved it, what will you do with it?"

"Put it underground to be used as needed!" Massy said angrily. "Store it

in themine! I want to put every heating-device we can contrive to work in themine! To heat the rock! I want to draw every watt the grid will yield and warmup the inside of themountain while we can draw power to do it with! I-want the deepest part of themine too hot to enter! We'll lose a lot of heat, of course. It's not like storing electric power! But we can store heat now, andthe more we store themore will be left when we need it!"

Herndon thought heavily. Presently he stirred slightly.

"Do you know, that is an idea--" He looked up. "Back home there was ashale-oil deposit up near the icecaps. It wasn't economical to mine it. Sothey put beaters down in bore-holes and heated up the wholeshale deposit! Drill-holes let out the hot oil vapors to be condensed. They got out every bitof oil without disturbing the shale! And then... why... the shale stayedwarm for years. Farmers bulldozed soil over it and raised crops with glaciersall around them! That could be done again. They could be storing up heat backhome!"

Thea be drooped.

"But they can't spare power to warm up the ground under cities. Theyneed all the power they've got to build roofs. And it takes time to buildgrids."

Massy snapped:

"Yes, if they're building regulation ones! 'By the time they werefinished they'd be useless! The ionization here is dropping already. But theydon't need to build grids that will be useless later! They can -weave cablestogethe r on the ground and hang them in the air by helicopters! They wouldn'thold up a landing ship for an instant, but they'll draw power right away! They'll even power the helis that hold them up! Of course they've defects! They'll have to come down in high winds. They won't be dependable. But,the ycan put heat inthe ground to come out under roofs, to grow food by, to savelives by. What's thematter with them?"

Herndon stirred again. His eyes ceased to be dull and lifeless.

"I'll give the orders for turning off the sidewalks. And I'll send whatyou just said back home. They should like it."

He looked very respectfully at Massy.

"I guess you know what I'm thinking right now," he said awkwardly. Massy flushed. It was not dignified for a Colonial Survey officer toshow off. He felt that Herndon was unduly impressed. But Herndon didn't seethat the device wouldn't solve anything. It would merely postpone the effectsof a disaster. It could not possibly prevent them.

"It ought to be done," he said curtly. "There'll be other things to bedone, too."

"When you tell them to me," said Herndon warmly, "the y'll get done! I'llhave Riki put this into that pulsecode you explained to us and she'll get itoff right away!"

He stood up.

"I didn't explain the code to her!" insisted Massy. "She was alreadytranslating it when you gave her my suggestion!"

"All right," said Herndon. "I'll get this sent back at once!"

He hurried out of the office. This, thought Massy irritably, is howreputations are nade, I suppose. I'm getting one. But his own reaction wasextremely inappropriate. If the people of Lani II did suspend helicopter-supported grids of wire in the atmosphere, they could warm masses of underground rock and stone and earth. They could establish what werepractically reservoirs of life giving heat under their cities. They could contrive that the warmth from below would rise only as it was needed. But....

Two hundred days to conditions corresponding to the colony-planet. Thentwo thousand days of minimum heat conditions. Then very, very slow return tonormal temperature, long after the sun was back to its previous brilliance. They couldn't store enough heat for so long. It couldn't be done. It wasironic that in the freezing of ice and themaking of glaciers the planetitself could store cold.

And there would be monstrous storms and blizzards on Lani II as it cooled. As cold conditions got worse the wire grids could be held aloft forshorter and shorter periods, and each time they would pull down less powerthan before. Their effectiveness would diminish even faster than theneed for effectiveness increased.

Massy felt even deeper depression as be worked out the facts. Hisproposal was essentially futile. It would be encouraging, and to a very slightdegree and for a certain short time it would palliate the situation on the innerplanet. But in the long run its effect would be zero.

He was embarrassed, too, that Herndon was so admiring. Herndon wouldtell Riki that he was marvelous. She might-though cagily-be inclined to agree. But he wasn't marvelous. This trick of a flier-supported grid was not new. Ithad been used on Saril to supply power for giant peristaltic pumps emptying apolder that had been formed inside a ring of indifferently upraised islands.

All I know, thought Massy bitterly, is what somebody's showed me or I'veread in books. And nobody's showed or written how to handle a thing like this! He went to Herndon's desk. Herndon had made a new graph on the solar-constant observations forwarded from home. It was a strictly typical curve of the results of coinciding cyclic changes. It was the curve of a series offrequencies at the moment when they were all precisely in phase. From this much one could extrapolate and compute. Massy took a pencil, frowning unhappily. His fingers clumsily formed equations and solved them. The resultwas just about as bad as it could be. The change in brightness of the sun Lani would not be enough to be observed on Kent IV-the nearest other inhabited world-when the light reached there four years from now. Lani would never be classed as a variable star, because the total change in light and heat wouldbe relatively minute. But the formula for computing planetary temperatures isnot simple. Among its factors are squares and cubes of the variables. Worse, the heat radiated from a sun's photosphere varies not as the square or cube, but as the fourth power of its absolute temperature. A very small change inthe sun's effective temperature, producible by sunspots, could make an altogether disproportionate difference in the warmth its worlds received.

Massy's computations were not pure the ory. The data came from Sol itself, where alone in the galaxy there had been daily solar-constant measurements forthree hundred years. The rest of his deductions were based ultimately on Earth observations, too. Most scientific data had to refer back to Earth to get anadequate continuity. But there was no possible doubt about the sunspot data, because Sol and Lani were of the same type and nearly equal size.

Using the figures on the present situation, Massy reluctantly arrived atthe fact that here, on this already frozen world, the temperature would dropuntil CO2 froze Out of the atmosphere. When that happened, the temperaturewould plummet until there was no really significant difference between it andthat of empty space. It is carbon dioxide which is responsible for the greenhouse effect, by which a planet is in the rmal equilibrium only at atemperature above its surroundings--as a greenhouse in sunlight is warmer thanthe outside air.

The greenhouse effect would vanish soon on the colony world. When it vanished on themother planet, Massy found himself thinking, if Riki won'tleave when the Survey ship comes, I'll resign from the Service. I'll have toif i'm to stay. And I won't go unless she does.

"If you want to come, it's all right," said Massy ungraciously.

He waited while Riki slipped into the bulky coldgarments that wereneeded out-of-doors in the daytime, and were doubly necessary at night. There

were heavy boots with inches-thick insulating soles, made in one piece with the many-layered trousers. There was the airpuffed, insulated over-tunic withits hood and mittens which were a part of the sleeves.

"Nobody goes outside at night," she said when they stood togethe r inthe cold-lock.

"I do," he told her. "I want to find out something." The outer dooropened and he stepped out. He hcld his arm for her, because the steps andwalkway were no longer heated. Now they were covered with a filmy layer of- something which, was not frost, but a faint, faint bloom of powder. It was the equivalent of dust, but it was miscroscopic snow-crystals frozen out of the air by the unbearable chill of night.

There was no moon, of course, yet the ice-clad mountains glowed faintly. The drone-hulls arranged in such an orderly fashion were dark against the frosted ground. There was silence; stillness; the feeling of ancient quietude. No wind stirred anywhere. Nothing moved. Nothing lived. The soundlessness wasenough to crack the eardrums.

Massy threw back his head and gazed at the sky for a very long time. Nothing. He looked down at Riki.

"Look at the sky," he commanded.

She raised her eyes. She had been watching him. But as she gazed upward she almost cried out. The sky was filled with stars in innumerable variety. But the brighter ones were as stars had never been seen before. Just as the sun in daylight had been accompanied by its sundogs-pale phantoms of itself ranged about it-so the brighter distant suns now shone from the center ofrings of their own images. They no longer had the look of random placing. Those which were most distinct were patterns in themselves, and one's eyesstrove instinctively to grasp the greater pattern in which such seemingartifacts must belong.

"Oh... beautiful!" cried Riki softly, yet almost afraid.

"Look!" he insisted. "Keep looking!"

She continued to gaze, moving her eyes about hopefully. It was such asight as no one could have imagined. Every tint and every color; everypossible degree of brightness appeared. And there were groups of stars of the same brilliance which almost made triangles, but not quite. There were rose-tinted stars which almost formed an arc, but did not. And there were arrayswhich were almost lines and nearly formed squares and polygons, but neveractually achieved them.

"It's... beautiful!" said Riki breathlessly.---"But what must I lookfor?"

"Look for what isn't there," he ordered.

She looked, and the stars were unwinking, but that was not extraordinary. They filled all the firmament, without the least space in whichsome tiny sparkle of light was not to be found. But that was not remarkable, either. Then there was a vague flickering grayish glow somewhere indefinite. It vanished. Then she realized.

"There's no aurora!" she exclaimed.

"That's it," said Massy. "There've always been auroras here. But nolonger. We may be responsible. I wish I thought it wise to turn everythingback to reserve power for a while. We could find out. But we can't afford it. There was just the faintest possible gray flickering just now. But there oughtto be armies of light marching across the sky. The aurora here-it was nevermissing! But it's gone now."

"I... looked at it when we first landed," admitted Riki. "It wasunbelievable! But it was terribly cold, out of shelter. And it happened every night, so I said to myself I'd look tomorrow, and then tomorrow again. So itgot so I never looked at all."

Massy kept his eyes where the faint gray flickering had been. And once one realized, it was astonishing that the former nightly play of ghostlycolors should be absent.

"The aurora," he said dourly, "happens in the very upper limits of the air... fifty... seventy, ninety miles up, when God-knows-what emitted particles from the sun come streaking in, drawn by the planet's magnetic field. The aurora's a phenomenon of ions. We tap the inonosphere a long way down from where it plays, but I'm wondering if we stopped it."

"We?" said Riki, shocked. "We-humans?"

"We tap the ions of their charges," he said somberly, "that the sunlightmade by day. We're pulling in all the power we can. I wonder if we've drainedthe aurora of its energy, too."

Riki was silent. Massy gazed, still searching. But he shook his head.

"It could be," he said in a carefully detached voice. "We didn't draw much power by comparison with the amount that came. But the ionization is anultraviolet effect. Atmospheric gases don't ionize too easily. After all, ifthe solar constant dropped a very little, it might mean a terrific drop in the ultraviolet part of the spectrum-and that's what makes ions of oxygen and nitrogen and hydrogen and such. The ion-drop could easily be fifty times asgreat as the drop in the solar constant. And we're drawing power from the little that's left."

Riki stood very still. The cold was horrible. Had the rore been a wind, it could not have been endured for an instant. But the air was motionless. Yet its coldness was so great that the inside of one's nostrils ached, and the inside of one's chest was aware of chill. Even through the cold-garments the rewas the feeling as of ice without.

"I'm beginning," said Massy, "to suspect that I'm a fool. Or maybe I'm an optimist. It might be the same thing. I could have guessed that the power we could draw would drop faster than our need for power increased. If we've drained the aurora of its light, we're scraping the bottom of the barrel. And it's a shallower barrel than one would suspect."

There was stillness again. Rild stood mousy-quiet. When she realizes what this means, thought Massy grimly, she won't admire me so much. Herbrother's built me up. But i've been a fool, figuring out excuses to hope. She'll see it.

"I think," said Riki quietly, "that you're telling me that after all wecan't store up heat, to live on, down in themine."

"We can't," agreed Massy grimly. "Not much, nor long. Not enough tomatter."

"So we won't live as long as Ken expects?"

"Not nearly as long," said Massy evenly. "He's hoping we can find outthings to be useful back on Lani II. But we'll lose the power we can get fromour grid long before even their new grids are useless. We'll have to startusing our reserve power a lot sooner. It'll be gone-and us with it-beforethe y're really in straits for living-heat."

Riki's teeth began to chatter.

"This sounds like I'm scared," she said angrily, "but I'm not! I'm just freezing! If you want to know, I'd a lot rather have it the way you say! 1won't have to grieve over anybody, and they'll be too busy to grieve, for me! Let's go inside while it's still warm!"

He helped her back into the cold-lock, and the outer door closed. Shewas shivering uncontrollably when the warmth came pouring in.

They went into Herndon's office. He came in as Riki was peeling off the top part of her cold-garments. She still shivered. He glanced at her and saidto Massy:

"There's been a call from the grid-control shack. It looks like there's something wrong, but they can't find anything. The grid is set for maximumpower-collection, but it's bringing in only fifty thousand kilowatts!"

"We're on our way back to savagery," said Massy, with an attempt atirony.

It was true. A man can produce two hundred and fifty watts from hismuscles for a reasonable length of time. When he has no more power, he is asavage. When he gains a kilowatt of energy from themuscles of a horse, he isa barbarian-but thenew power cannot be directed wholly as he wills. When hecan apply it to a plow he has high barbarian culture, and when he adds stillmore he begins to be civilized. Steam power put as much as four kilowatts towork for every human being in the first industrialized countries, and in themidtwentieth century there was sixty kilowatts per person in themore advancednations. Nowadays, of course, a modern culture assumed five hundred as aminimum. But there was less than half that in the colony on Lani II. And its environment made its own demands.

"There can't be any more," said Riki, trying to control her shivering. "We're even using the aurora and there isn't any more power. It's running out. We'll go even before the people at home, Ken."

Herndon's features looked very pinched.

"We can't! We mustn't!" He turned to Massy. "We do them good, back home! There was panic. Our report about cable grids has put heart in people. They're setting to work-magnificently! So we're some use! They know we're worse offthan they are, and as long as we hold on they'll be encouraged! We've got tokeep going somehow!"

Riki breathe d deeply until her shivering stopped. Then she said calmly

"Haven't you noticed, Ken, that Mr. Massy 'has the viewpoint of his profession? His business is finding things wrong with things. He was depositedin our midst to detect defects in what we did and do. He has the habit of looking for the worst. But I think he can turn the habit to good use. He didturn up the idea of cablegrids."

"Which," said Massy, "turns out to be no good at all. They'd be somegood if they weren't needed, really. But the conditions that make themnecessary make them useless!" -

Riki shook her head.

"They are useful!" she said firmly. "They're keeping people at home fromdespairing. Now, though, you've got to think of something else. If you thinkof enough things, one will do good the way you want-more than making peoplefeel better."

"What does it matter how people feel?" he demanded bitterly. "Whatdifference do feelings make? Facts are facts! One can't change facts!"

Riki said with no less firmness:

"We humans are the only creatures in the universe who don't do anythingelse! Every other creature accepts facts. It lives where it is born, and itfeeds on the fcod that is there for it, and it dies when the facts of naturerequire it to. We humans don't. Especially we women! We won't let men do it, eithe r! When we don't like facts-mostly about ourselves-we change them. Butimportant facts we disapprove of-we ask men to change for us. And they do!"

She faced Massy. Rathe r incredibly, she grinned at him.

"Will you please change the facts that look so annoying just now, please?Please?" Then she elaborately pantomimed an over-feminine girl's lookof wide-eyed admiration. "You're so big and strong! I just know you can do it- for me!"

She abruptly dropped the pretense and moved toward the door. She half- turned then, and said detachedly:

"But about half of that is true."

The door slid shut behind her. Massy thought bitterly, Her brothe radmires me. She probably thinks I really can do something! It suddenlyoccurred to him that she knew a Colonial Survey ship was due to stop by hereto pick him up. She believed he expected to be rescued, even though the rest

of the colony could not be, and most of it wouldn't consent to leave the irkindred when the death of mankind in this solar system took place. He saidawkwardly:

"Fifty thousand kilowatts isn't enough to land a ship."

Herndon frowned. Then he said:

"Oh. You mean the Survey ship that's to pick you up can't land? But itcan go in orbit and put down a rocket landing-boat for you."

Massy flushed.

"I wasn't thinking of that. I'd something more in mind. I... rathe rlike your sister. She's... pretty wonderful. And there are some other women here in the colony, too. About a dozen all told. As a matter of selfrespect Ithink we ought to get them away on the Survey ship. I agree that they wouldn't consent to go.. But if they had no choice, if we could get them on board the grounded ship, and they suddenly found themselves well... kidnaped andoutward-bound not by their own fault... They could be faced with the accomplished fact that they had to go on living."

Herndon said evenly:

"That's been in the back of my mind for some time. Yes. I'm for that. But if the Survey ship can't land...."

"I believe I can land it regardless," said Massy doggedly. "I can findout, anyhow. I'll need to try things. I'll need help... work done. But Iwant your promise that if I can get the ship to ground you'll conspire withher skipper and arrange for them to go on living."

Herndon looked at him.

"Some new stuff-in a way," said Massy uncomfortably. "I'll have to stayaground to work it. It's also part of the bargain that I shall. And, ofcourse, your sister can't know about it, or she can't be fooled into living."

Herndon's expression changed a little.

"What'll you do? Of course it's a bargain."

"I'll need some metals we haven't smolted so far," said Massy.

"Potassium if I can get it, sodium if I can't, and at worst I'll settle forzinc. Cesium would be best, but we've found no traces of it."

Herndon said thoughtfully:

"No-o-o. I think I can get you sodium and potassium, from rocks. I'mafraid no zinc. How much?"

"Grams," said Massy. "Trivial quantities. And I'll need a miniaturelanding-grid built. Very miniature."

Herndon shrugged his shoulders.

"It's over my head. But just to have work to do will be good foreverybody. We've been feeling more frustrated than any other humans inhistory. I'll go round up themen who'll do the work. You talk to them."

The door closed behind him. Massy very deliberately got out of his cold- clothing. He thought, She'll rave when she finds her brother and I havedeceived her. Then he thought of the other women. if any of them are married, we'll have to see if the re's room for their husbands. I'll have to dress up the idea. Make it look like reason for hope, or the women would find out. Butnot many can go-he knew very closely how many--extra passengers could becarried on a Survey ship, even in such an emergency as this. Living quarterswere not luxurious, at best. Everything was cramped and skimped. Survey shipswere rugged, tiny vessels which performed their duties amid tedium anddiscomfort and peril for all on board. But they could carry away a very fewunwilling refugees to Kent IV.

He settled down at Herndon's desk to work out the thing to be done.

It was not unreasonable. Tapping the ionosphere for power was something like pumping water out of a pipewell in sand. If the water-table was high, there was pressure to force the water to the pipe, and one could pump fast. If the water-table were low, water couldn't flow fast enough. The pump would suck dry. In the ionosphere, the level of ionization was at once like the pressureand the size of the sand-grains. When the level was high, the flow was vastbecause the sand-grains were large and the conductivity high. But as the levellessened, so--did the size of the sand-grains. There was less to draw, andmore resistance to its flow.

But there had been one tiny flicker of auroral light over by the horizon. There was still power aloft. If Massy could in a fashion prime the pump, if he could increase the conductivity by increasing the ions presentaround the place where their charges were drawn away-why-he could increase the total flow. It would be like digging a brick-well where a pipe-well had been. A brick-well draws water from all around its circumference.

So Massy computed carefully. It was ironic that he had to go to suchtrouble simply because he didn't have test-rockets like the Survey uses to geta picture of a planet's weathe r-pattern. They rise vertically for fifty milesor so, trailing a thread of sodium-vapor behindthe m. The trail is detectablefor some time, and ground instruments record each displacement by windsblowing in different directions at different speeds, one over the othe r. Sucha rocket with its loading slightly changed would do all Massy had in mind. Buthe didn't have one, so something much more elaborate was called for.

She'll think I'm clever, he reflected wryly, but all I'm doing is whatI've been taught. I wouldn't have to work it out if I had a rocket.

Still, there was some satisfaction in working out this job. A landing- grid has to be not less than half a mile across and two thousand feet highbecause its field has to reach out five planetary diameters to handle shipsthat land and take off. To handle solid objects it has to be accurate-thoughpower can be drawn with an improvisation. To thrust a sodium-vapor bomb any where from twenty to sixty miles high-why-he'd need a grid only six feet wide and five high. It could throw much higher, of course. It could hold, atthat. But doubling the size would make accuracy easier. He tripled the dimensions. There would be a grid-eighteen feet across and fifteen high. Tuned to the casing of a small bomb, it could hold it steady at seven hundred andfifty thousand feet-far beyond necessity. He began to make the detaildrawings.

Herndon came back with half a dozen chosen colonists. They were young men, technicians rather than scientists. Some of them were several years younger than Massy. There were grim and stunned expressions on some faces, butone tried to pretend nonchalance, and two seemed trying to suppress fury atthe monstrous occurrence that would destroy not only their own lives, buteverything they remembered on the planet which was their home. They lookedalmost challengingly at Massy. He explained. He was going to put a cloud ofmetallic vapor up in the ionosphere. Sodium if he had to, potassium if hecould, zinc if he must. Those metals were readily ionized by sunlight-much more readily than atmospheric gases. In effect, he was going to supply acertain area of the ionosphere with material to increase the efficiency ofsunshine in providing electric power. As a sideline, there would be increased conductivity from thenormal ionosphere.

"Something like this was done centuries ago, back on Earth," heexplained carefully. "They used rockets, and made sodium-vapor clouds as muchas twenty and thirty miles long. Even nowadays the Survey uses test-rocketswith trails of sodium-vapor. It will work to some dcgree. We'll-find out howmuch."

He felt Herndon's eyes upon him~ They were almost dazedly respectful. But one of the technicians said coldly:

"How long will those clouds last?"

"That high, three or four days," Massy told him. "They won't help muchat night, but they should step up power-intake while the sun shines on them."

A man in the back said crisply:

"Hup!" The significance was, "Let's go!" -Then somebody said feverishly, "What do we do? Got working drawings? Who makes the bombs? Who does what? Let's get at this!"

Then there was confusion, and Herndon had vanished., Massy suspectedhe'd gone to have Riki put this the ory into dot-and-dash code for beam-transmission back, to Lani II. But there was no time to stop him. These menwanted precise information, and it was half an hour before the last of themhad gone out with free-hand sketches, and had come back for furthe rexplanalion of a doubtful point, and other men had come in hungrily to demanda share in the job.

When he was alone again, Massy thought, Maybe it's worth doing becauseit'll get Niki on the Survey ship. But they think it means saving the peopleback home!

Which it didn't. Taking energy out of sunlight is taking energy out ofsunlight, no matter how you do it. Take it out as electric power, and the re'sless heat left. Warm one place with electric power, and everywhere else is alittle colder. There's an equation. On this colony-world it wouldn't matter, but on the home world it would. The more there was trickery to gathe r heat, the more heat was needed. Again it might postpone the death of twenty millionpeople, but it would never, never, never prevent it.

The door slid aside and Riki came in. She stammered alittle.

"I... just coded what Ken' told me to send back home. It will... it will do everything! It's wonderful! I... -wanted to tell you!"

Massy writhed internally. It wasn't wonderful.

"Consider," he said in a desperate attempt to take it lightly, "considerthat I've taken a vow."

He tried to smile. It was not a success. And Riki suddenly drew a deepbreath and looked at him in a new fashion.

"Ken's right," she said softly. "He says you can't get conceited. You'renot satisfied with yourself even now, are you?"--She smiled, rather gravely.

Then she said, "But what I like is that you aren't really smart. A woman canmake you do things. I have!"

He looked at her uneasily. She grinned.

"I, even I, can at least pretend to myself that I help bring this about! If I hadn't said please change the facts that are so annoying, and if I hadn'tsaid you were big and strong and clever--I'm going to tell myself for the restof my life that I helped make you do it!"

Massy swallowed.

"I'm--afraid," he said miserably, "that it won't work -again."

She cocked her head on one side.

"No?"

He stared at her apprehensively. And then with a bewildering change ofemotional reaction, he saw that her eyes were filled with tears. She stampedher foot

"You're... horrible!" she cried. "Here I come in, and... and ifyou think you can get me kidnaped to safety... without even telling me thatyou 'rathe r like' me, like you told my brother, or that I'm 'pretty wonderful'--If you' think."

He was stunned, that she knew. She stamped her foot again.

"For Heaven's sake!" she wailed. Do I have to ask you to kiss me?"

During the last night of preparation, Massy sat by a the rmometer registering the outside temperature. He hovered over it as one might over asick child. He watched it and sweated, though the inside temperature of thadrone-hull was lowered to save power. There was nothing he could actually do. At midnight the the rmometer said it was seventy degrees below zero Fahrenheit.

At halfway to dawn it was eighty degrees below zero Fahrenheit. The hourbefore dawn it was eighty-five degrees below zero. Then he sweated profusely. The meaning of the slowed descent was that carbon dioxide was being frozen outof the upper layers of the atmosphere. The frozen particles were driftingslowly downward, and as they reached lower and faintly warmer levels they returned to the state of gas. But there was a level, above the CO2. where the temperature was plummeting.

The height to which carbon dioxide existed was dropping-slowly, but inexorably. And above the carbondioxide level there was no bottom limit to the temperature. The greenhouse effect was due to CO2. Where it wasn't, the coldof space moved down. If at ground level the the rmometer read ever so slightlylower than one hundred and nine below zero-why, everything was finished. Without the greenhouse effect, the nightside of the planet would lose itsremaining heat with a rush. Eyen the day-side, once cold enough, would loseheat to emptiness as fast as it came from the sun. Minus one hundred and ninepoint three was the critical reading. If it went down to that, it would plungeto a hundred and fifty-two hundred degrees below zero! And it would never comeup again.

There would be rain at nightfall-a rain of oxygen frozen to a liquid andsplashing on the ground. Human life would be quite simply impossible, in anyshelter and under any conditions. Even spacesuits would not protect against anatmosphere sucking heat from it at that rate. A spacesuit can be heatedagainst the loss of temperature due to radiation in a vacuum. It could not beheated against nitrogen, which would chill it irresistibly by contact.

But, as Massy sweated over it, the the rmometer steadied at minus eighty-five degrees. When the dawn' came, it rose to seventy. By mid-morning, the temperature in bright sunshine was no lower than sixty-five degrees belowzero.

But there was no bounce left in 'Massy when Hemdon 'came for him.

"Your phone-plate's been flashing," said Herndon, "and you didn'tanswer. Must have bad your back to it. Riki's over in themine, watching themget things, ready. She was worried that she couldn't call you. Asked me to find out what was the trouble."

Massy said heavily:

"Has she got something to heat the air she breathe s?"

"Naturally," said Herndon.--He added curiously,"What's thematter?"

"We almost took our licking," Massy told him. "I'm afraid for tonight, and tomorrow night, too. If the CO2 freezes--"

"We'll have, power!" Herndon insisted. "We'll build ice tunnels and icedomes. We'll build a city under ice, if we have to. But we'll have power. We'll be all right!"

"I doubt it very much," said Massy. "I wish--you hadn't told Riki ofthe 'bargain to get her away from here when the Survey ship comes!" Herndon grinned.

"Is the little grid ready?", asked Massy.

"Everything's set," said Herndon exuberantly. "It's in the mine-tunnel with radiant heaters playing on it. The bombs are ready. We made enough tolast for months, while we were at it. No use taking chances!"

Massy looked at him queerly. Then be said:

"We might as well go out, and try the thing, then."

But he was very tired. He was not elated. Riki can't be gotten away, hethought wearily, and I'm not going to go because it isn't quite fitting to goand leave her. They'll all be rejoicing presently, but nothing's settled. Then he thought with exquisite irony: She thinks I was inspired to genius by her, when I haven't done a thing I wasn't taught or didn't get out of books!

He put on the cold-garments as they were now modifled for the increased frigidity. Nobody could breathe air at minus sixty-five degrees withoutgetting his lungs frost-bitten. So there was now a plastic mask to cover one'sface, and the air one breathe d outdoors was, heated as it came through a wire-gauze snout. But still it was not wise to stay out of shelter for too long atime.

Massy went out-of-doors. He stepped out of the cold-lock and gazed abouthim. The sun seemed markedly paler, and now it had lost its sun-dogs again.

Ice crystals no longer floated in the almost congealed air. The sky was dark. It was almost purple, and it seemed to Massy that he could detect faint flecksof light in it. They would be stars, shining in the daytime.

There seemed to be no one about at all, only the white coldness of themountains. But there was a movemeat at themine-drift, and something came outof it. Four men appeared, muffled up like Massy himself. They rolled the eighteen-foot grid out of theminemouth, moving it on those inflated bagswhich are so much better than rollers for rough terrain. They looked absurdlylike bears with steaming noses, in their masks and clothing. They had somesort of powered pusher with them, and they got themetal cage to the very topof a singularly rounded stone upcrop which rose in the center of the valley. '

"We picked that spot," said Herndon's muffled' voice through the chill, "because by shifting the grid's position it can be aimed, and be on a solid-base. Right?"

"Quite all right," said Massy. "We'll go work it."

He moved heavily across the valley, in which nothing moved except the padded figures of the four technicians. Their wire-gauze breathing-masksseemed to emit smoke. They waved to him in greeting.

I'm popular again, he thought drearily, but it doesn't matter. Gettingthe Survey ship to ground won't help now, since Riki's forewarned. And thistrick won't solve anything permanently on the home planet. It'll just postponethings.

He bad a very peculiar ache inside. A Survey officer is naturallylonely. Massy had been lonely before he even entered the Service. He hadn'thad a feeling of belonging anywhere, or with anyone, and no planet was really his home. Now he could believe that he belonged with someone. But there wasthe slight matter of a drop in the solar constant of an unimportant Sol-typesun, and nothing could come of it.

Even when Riki, muffled like the rest, waved to him from themouth ofthe tunnel, his spirits did not lift. The thing he wanted was to look forwardto years and years of being with Riki. He wanted, in fact, to look forward toforever. And there might not be a tomorrow.

"I had the control board rolled out here," she called breathlesslythrough her mask. "It's cold, but you can watch!"

It wouldn't be much to watch. If everything went all right, some dial-needles would kick over violently, and their readings would go up and up. But they wouldn't be readings of temperature. Presently the big grid would report increased power from the sky. But tonight the temperature would drop a littlefarthe r. Tomorrow night it would drop farthe r still. When it reached onehundred and nine point three degrees below zero at ground level-why it wouldkeep on falling indefinitely. Then it wouldn't matter how much power could bedrawn from the sky. The colony would die.

One of the figures that looked like a bear now went out of themine-mouth, trudging toward the grid. It carried a muffled, well-wrapped object inits arms. It stooped and crept between the spokes of the grid. It put the object on the stone. Massy traced cables with his eyes. From the grid to the control board. From the board back to the reserve-power storage cells, deep in themountain.

"The grid's tuned to the bomb," said Riki breathlessly, close besidehim. "I checked that myself!"

The bearlike figure out in the valley jerked at the bomb. There was asmall rising cloud of grayish vapor. It continued. The figure climbed hastilyout of the grid. When theman was clear, Massy threw a switch.

There was a very tiny whining sound, and the wrapped, ridiculouslysmoking object leaped upward. It seemed to fall toward the sky. There was nomore of drama than that. An object the size of a basketball fell upward, swiftly, until it disappeared. That was all.

Massy sat quite stiff, watching the control-board dials. Presently he corrected this, and shifted that. He did not want the bomb to have too high anupward velocity. At a hundred thousand feet it would find very little air tostop the rise of the vapor it was to release.

The field-focus dial reached it indication of one hundred thousand feet. Massy reversed the lift-switch. He counted and then switched the power off. The small, thin whine ended.

He threw the power-intake switch, which could have been on all the time. The power-yield needle stirred. The minute grid was drawing power like itsvaster counterpart. But its field was infinitesimal by comparison. It drewpower as a soda straw might draw water from wet sand.

Then the intake-needle kicked. It swung sharply, and wavered, and thenbegan a steady, even, climbing movement across themarkings on the dial-face. Riki was not watching that.

"They see something!"she panted. "Look at them!" The four men who hadtrundled the smaller grid to its place, now stared upward. They flung outthe ir arms. One of them jumped up and down. They leaped. They practically danced.

"Let's go see," said Massy.

He went out of the tunnel with Riki. They gazed upward. And directly overhead, where the sky was darkest blue and where it had seemed that starsshone through the daylight-there was a cloud. It seemed to Massy, veryquaintly, that it was no bigger than a man's hand. But it grew. Its edges were yellow-saffron-yellow. It expanded and spread. Presently it began to thin. Asit thinned, it began to shine. It was luminous. And the luminosity had astrange, familiar quality.

Somebody came panting down the tunnel, from inside themountain.

"The grid--" he panted. "The big grid! It's pumping power! Big power! BIG power!"

He went pounding back, to gaze rapturously at thenew position of a thinblack needle on a large white dial, and to make incoherent noises of rejoicingas it moved very, very slowly toward higher and ever higher readings.

But Massy looked puzzledly at the sky, as if he did not quite believehis eyes. The cloud now expanded very slowly, but still it grew. And it wasnot regular in shape. The bomb had not shattered quite evenly, and the vaporhad poured out more on one side than the othe r. There was a narrow, archingarm of brightness---"It looks," said Riki breathlessly, "like a comet!"

And then Massy froze in every muscle. He stared at the cloud he had madealoft, and his hands clenched in their mittens, and he swallowed convulsivelybehind his cold-mask.

"Th-that's it," he said in a very queer voice indeed. "It's... verymuch like a comet. I'm glad you said that! We can make something even morelike a comet. We... we can use all the bombs we've made, right away, tomake it. And we've got to hurry so it won't get any colder tonight!"

Which, of course, sounded like insanity. Riki looked apprehensively at him. But Massy had just thought of something. And nobody had taught it to himand he hadn't gotten it out of books. But he'd seen a comet.

The new idea was so promising that he regarded it with anguished uneasefor fear it would not hold up. It was an idea that really ought to change the facts resulting naturally from a lowered solar constant in a Sol-type star.

Half the colony set to work to make more bombs when the effect of the second bomb showed up. They were not very efficient, at first, because the tended to want to stop work and dance from time to time. But they worked withan impassioned enthusiasm. They made more bomb-casings, and they prepared moresodium and potassium metal and more fuses, and more insulation to wrap aroundthe bombs to protect them from the cold of airless space.

Because the se were to go out to airlessness. The miniature grid couldlift and hold a bomb steady in its field focus at seven hundred-and fiftythousand feet. But if a bomb was accelerated all the way out to that point, and the field was then snapped off-Why, it wasn't held anywhere. It kept ongoing with its attained velocity. And it burst when its fuse decided that itshould, whereupon immediately a mass of sodium and potassium vapor, mixed withthe fumes of high explosive, flung itself madly in all directions, out betweenthe stars. Absolute vacuum tore the compressed gasified metals apart. Theseparate atoms, white-hot from the explosion, went swirling through sunlitspace. The sunlight was dimmed a trifle, to be sure. But individual atoms ofthe lighter alkaline-earth metals have marked photoelectric properties. Insunshine the se gas-molecules ionized, and the refore spread more widely, anddid not coalesce into even microscopic droplets.

They formed, in fact, a cloud in space. An ionized cloud, in which noparticle was too large to be responsive to the pressure of light. The cloudacted like the gases of a comet's tail. It was a comet's tail, though the rewas no comet. And it was an extraordinary comet's tail because it is said thatyou can put a comet's tail in your hat, at normal atmospheric pressure. But this could not have been put in a hat. Even before it turned to gas, it wasthe size of a basketball. And, in space, it glowed. It glowed with the brightness of the sunshine on it, which was light that would normally havegone away through the interstellar dark. And it filled one corner of the sky. Within one hour it was a comet's tail ten thousand miles long, which visiblybrightened the daytime heavens. And it was only the first of such reflecting clouds.

The next bomb set for space exploded in a different quarter, becauseMassy'd had theminiature grid wrestled around the upcrop to point in a newand somewhat more carefully chosen line. The third bomb spattered brilliancein a different section still. And the brilliance lasted.

Massy flung his first bombs recklessly, because there could be more. Buthe was desperately anxious to hang as many comet tails as possible around the colony planet before nightfall. He didn't want it to get any colder.

And it didn't. In fact, there wasn't exactly any real nightfall on LaniHI that night.

The planet turned on its axis, to be sure. But around it, quite closeby, there hung gigantic streamers of shining gas. At their beginning, thosestreamers bore a certain resemblance to the furry wild-animal tails thatlittle boys like to have hanging down from hunting-caps. Only they shone. Andas they developed they merged, so that, there was an enormous shining curtain about Lani III. There were draperies of metal-mist to capture sunlight thatshould have been wasted, and to diffuse very much of it to Lani III. Atmidnight there was only one spot in all the night-sky where there was reallydarkness. That was directly overhead-directly outward from the planet from the sun. Gigantic shining streamers formed a wall, a tube, of comet-tail material, yet many times more dense and the refore brighter, which shielded the colony world against the dark and cold, and threw upon it a brilliant, warming brightness.

Rild maintained stoutly that she could feel the warmth from the sky, butthat was improbable. But certainly heat did come from somewhere. Thethe rmometer did not fall at all, that night. It rose. It was up to fifty belowzero at dawn. During the day they sent out twenty more bombs that second day--it was up to twenty degrees below zero. By the day after, there was highlycompetent computation from the home planet, and the concrete results ofabstruse speculation, and the third day's bombs were placed with optimumspacing for heating purposes.

And by dawn of the fourth day the air was a balmy five degrees belowzero, and the day after that there was a small running stream in the valley at midday.

There was talk of stocking the --stream with fish, on themorning the Survey ship came in. The great landing-grid gave out a deep-toned vibrant, humming note, like the deepest possible note of the biggest organ that couldbe imagined. A speck appeared very, very high up in a pale-blue sky withtrimmings of golden gasclouds. The Survey ship came down and down and set, tied as a shining silver object in the very center of the gigantic red-paintedlanding-grid.

Later, her skipper came to find Massy. He wasin Herndon's office. Theskipper struggled to keep sheer blankness out of his expression.

"What... what the hell?" he demanded querulously of Massy. "This isthe damnedest sight In the whole galaxy, and they tell me you're responsible!

There've been ringed planets before, and the re've been comets and who-knows-what!

But shining gas pipes aimed at the sun, half a million miles across.... What the? There are two of them! Both the occupied planets!"

Herndon explained with a bland succinctness why the curtains hung inspace. There was a drop in the solar constant.

The skipper exploded. He wanted facts! Details! Something to report! And dammit, he wanted to know!

Massy was automatically on the defensive when the skipper shot hisquestions to him. A Senior Colonial Survey officer is not revered by the Survey ship-service officers. Men like Massy can be a nuisance to ahardworking ship's officer. They have to be carried to unlikely places forthe ir work of checking over colonial installations. They have to be put downOn hard-to-getat colonies, and they have to be called for, sometimes, at timesand places which are inconvenient. So a man in Massy's position is likely tofeel unpopular.

"I'd just finished the survey here," he said defensively, "when a cycleof sunspot cycles matured. All the sunspot periods got in phase, and the solarconstant dropped. So I naturally offered what help I could to meet the situation."

The skipper regarded him incredulously.

"But... it couldn't be done!" he said blankly. "They told me how youdid it, but... it couldn't be done! Do you realize that the se vapor-curtains will make fifty border-line worlds fit for use?--Half a pound of sodium vapor a week!"--He gestured helplessly. "They tell me the amount ofheat reaching the surface here has been upped by fifteen per cent! D'yourealize what that means?"

"I haven't been worrying about it," admitted Massy. "There was a localsituation and something had to be done. I... er... remembered things, and Riki suggested something I mightn't have thought of, and it's worked outlike this." Then he said abruptly: "I'm not leaving. I'll get you to take myresignation back. I...I think I'm going to settle here. It'll be a longtime before we get really temperate-climate conditions here, but we can warmup a valley like this for cultivation, and... well... it's going to be arathe r satisfying job. It's a brand new planet with a brand-new ecologicalsystem to be established--"

The skipper of the Survey ship sat down hard. Then the sliding door of Herndon's office opened and Riki came in. ,The skipper stood up again. Massy rather awkwardly made the introduction. Riki smiled.

"I'm telling him," said Massy, "that I'm resigning from the Service tosettle down here." -

Riki nodded. She put her hand in proprietary fashion on Massy's arm. The Survey skipper. cleared his throat.

"I'm not going to take it," he said doggedly. "There've got to bedetailed reports on how this business works. Dammit, if vapor-clouds in spacecan be used to keep a planet warm, they can be used to shade a planet, too! Ifyou resign, somebody else will have to come out here to make observations andwork out the details of the trick! Nobody could be gotten here in less than ayear! You need to stay here to build up a report-and you ought to be availablefor consultation when this thing's to be done somewhere else! I'll report thatI insisted as a Survey emergency--"

Riki said confidently:

"Oh, that's all right! He'll do that! Of course! Won't you?"

Massy nodded dumbly. He thought, I've been lonely all my life. i'venever belonged anywhere. But nobody could possibly belong anywhere as thoroughly as I'll beJong here when it's warm and green and even the grass on the ground is partly my doing. But Rikki will like for me still to be in the Service. Women like to see their husbands wearing uniforms.

Aloud he said:

"Of course. It... really needs to be done. Of course, you realize that the re's nothing really remarkable about it. Everything I've done has beenwhat I was taught, or read in books."

"Hush!" said Riki. "You're wonderful!"