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“A purely technological problem, Mr. Ross. Maintenance of a sprawling city is inevitably less efficient than that of a compact unit. Inevitably there has been a drift back to the central areas and the convenience of air-conditioned walkways, winterized plazas …”

Yes. It was a purely psychological-biological-technological-educational-demographic problem, and it was basically a step forward.

Ross wondered how many Ghost Towns lay corpselike on the surface of Halsey’s Planet. Decay, he thought. Decay.

“

Easy! You’ve said it, Marconi: ‘Easy.’ Everything’s so damned easy and so damned boring that I’m just about ready to blow!

I’ve got to do something,” he repeated. “I’m getting nowhere! I push papers around and then I push them back again. You know what happens next. You get soft and paunchy. You find yourself going by the book instead of by your head.

I’ve got to do something,” he repeated. “I’m getting nowhere! I push papers around and then I push them back again. You know what happens next. You get soft and paunchy. You find yourself going by the book instead of by your head.

You’re covered, if you go by the book⁠—no matter what happens. And you might just as well be dead!

”

Marconi was nudging him fiercely in the ribs. He ignored it.

They laughed amiably at his ignorance and explained that the box was the box, and that you put your newborn babies into it because you put your newborn babies into it.

A beep tone sounded from the ship.

But the techniques that gave them a faster-than-light drive gave them as well a weapon that threatened solar systems, not cities; that could detonate a sun as readily as uranium could destroy a building.

The child with his forbidden matches was now sitting atop a munitions dump; the danger was no longer a seared hand or blinded eye, but annihilation.

And the decision had been made: secrecy. By what condign struggles the secrecy had been enforced, the secrecy itself concealed. But it had worked.

Haarland’s face was suddenly, queerly gray. He said, almost to himself, “

It seems that there are things worse than war.

” Abruptly he smiled. “Let’s find Ma.”

There were grimy signs everywhere, including the isolated bay where braiding cord was dyed the standard code colors. The signs said things like:

Age is a privilege and not a right. Age must be earned by work. Gratitude is the index of your progress to maturity.

Helena said girlishly as she took his arm and hooked him out of the moving line: “Here’s Stinkville. Believe me, I’m not going to talk back again. After all, one’s maturity is measured by one’s acceptance of one’s environment, isn’t it?”

But it was a long, long way, Ross thought sardonically to himself, from the shining pictures he had painted to himself back on Halsey’s Planet. Ross the explorer, Ross the hero, Ross the savior of humanity …

Ross, the semipermanent K.P.

He had to admit it to himself: The expedition thus far had been a bust. Not only was it perfectly clear that there no longer was a Franklin Foundation on Gemser, but more had been lost than time and effort.

Helena said loudly and plaintively: “I don’t like it here after all, Ross. Can’t we get away from all these women?”

Should the impulse seize you, placard ancient Brooklyn with twenty-four sheets proclaiming the Dodgers to be cellar-dwelling bums.

Mount a detergent box and inform a crowd of Altairians that they are degenerate slith-fondlers if you must. Announce in a crowded Cephean bar room that Sadkia Revall is no better than she should be. From these situations you have some chance of emerging intact.

Mount a detergent box and inform a crowd of Altairians that they are degenerate slith-fondlers if you must. Announce in a crowded Cephean bar room that Sadkia Revall is no better than she should be. From these situations you have some chance of emerging intact.

But never, never pronounce the word “women” as Helena pronounced it on Fifteen Street, Novj Grad, Azor.

The mob took only seconds to form.

Virgin Willie led off and they followed him. Ross’s knees were shaky.

The virago had not known that to Helena “young” meant “stupid.”

The cook absently acknowledged smiles and nods as they walked. He was, obviously, a character. Between salutes he delivered a low-voiced, rapid-fire reaming to Ross and Helena. “Silly stunt. Didn’t you hear about the riots?

How could any female—no single member of which class had ever painted a great picture, written a great book, composed a great sonata, or discovered a great scientific truth—appreciate the ultimate importance of the F.T.L. drive?

It was like entrusting a first-folio Shakespeare to a broody hen; the shredded scraps would be made into a nest.

For the egg came first. Motherhood was all.

Ross found that he was able to smile.

There was a point, he realized with astonishment, where courage came easily; it was the only thing left.

He sat up straighter and breathed the air more deeply. Then it happened.

In the formula LT means the number of genes after the lapse of T years, L0 means the original number of genes, e means the base of the natural system of logarithms and N means number of generations.”

The surgeon said slowly and with wonder: “So that was my God!”

He stretched out his hands before him. The fingers were rock-steady.

One thing was clear: any gene-loss was bad for the survival of a planetary colony. Evolution had—on Earth—worked out in a billion trial-and-error years a working mechanism, man. Man exhibited a vast range of variation, which was why he survived almost any conceivable catastrophe.

Reduce man to a single type and he is certain to succumb, sooner or later, to the inevitable disaster that his one type cannot cope with.

The problem, now stated clearly, was bigger than he had dreamed. And now he knew only the problem—not the solution.

He picked it out and stared at it unbelievingly. He marveled, “It says in the manual, ‘On no account should any alterations be made in any part of the Wesley driving assembly by any technician under a C-Twelve rating.’

She didn’t like the alarm going off. So she fixed it. With a hairpin.

”

Gigantic doors unfolded from the vehicle. Thought-reading? Had the problem been snatched from his brain even before he stated it? Mutely he gestured at Helena and Bernie. Jones would be all right where he was for several hours if Ross was any judge of blackouts.

And you don’t quibble with demigods.

The man, the scientist, did something to a glittering control panel that was, literally, more complex than the Wesley board back on the starship. Noise filled the vehicle—noise that Ross identified as music for a moment.

When he opened his eyes they were in the traffic and the needle on the speedometer quivered at 275. He blew a great breath and thought admiringly: reflexes to match their superb intellects, of course. There couldn’t have been a crash.

Just then, across the safety island in the opposing lane, there was a crash.

The very brief flash of vision Ross was allowed told him, incredibly, that a vehicle had attempted to enter the lane going the wrong way, with the consequences you’d expect.