Land, whatever that was--right away, before everybody went under, got
plumb ruined. They were all for taking the escape ship and hightailing
it back to Earth. Sure, they knew there'd be a stink, and they'd get a
little black mark in somebody's book for not obeying orders to stick it
out. But that was better than losing their trade, their desire to follow
it. Maybe there'd be a penalty and they'd be marooned to stay on Earth
for a while. But they'd bet there was a hundred planets laying idle
right now because there weren't enough experimentals to go around.
They'd get a black mark, but after a while they'd get another job too.
Anyway, living on Earth couldn't be any worse for them than living here.
Half of them wanted to stay here permanently. The other half wanted to
leave right now. That was what the committee was going to decide today.
He'd done some checking around, and it looked like they were going to
vote to go. He'd also checked with them who wanted to stay permanently,
and it looked like, in a showdown, they'd come along. They were proud to
be men, too, men and women. Everybody would join. He'd been pretty sure
of it.
Even the dissenters who'd moved away across the ridge. That was the
trouble with them. There hadn't been enough hardship to bind the
community together. People forgot how to be kind to one another and get
along when there wasn't any hardship to share among themselves.
It would mean deserting the planet entirely. Even though his sympathies
were with the ones who wanted to go, Jed felt there was something wrong,
real bad, about deserting the planet. Still and all, if they voted to go
he couldn't stop them.
Maybe Earth would let the three-generation colonists come on out without
the total test period. But maybe not. Maybe E.H.Q. would decide that
Eden was too hard to colonize because it was too easy. Maybe they'd
abandon the planet entirely. There'd be no more humans here, and no more
coming.
That was when he hit the ground with a solid thump!
He first thought the hammock had somehow twisted out from under him, and
he looked up at it resentfully, the way a man blames something else for
his own fault. There wasn't any hammock.
At the same time, he heard Martha cry out. He craned his neck quickly in
the direction of the house. There wasn't any house. Martha was standing
there on bare ground, and there wasn't a dad-blamed thing else, not a
stove, nor a chair, a dish, nothing.
And Martha didn't have a stitch of clothes on her!
His first thought was that she ought to have more sense than to stand
right out in the yard plumb naked. What was the matter with her anyhow?
He peered quickly down toward the village to see if anybody was looking
up in this direction.
The whole thing hit him like a blow on top the head. There wasn't any
hammock. There wasn't any house.
There wasn't any village.
He saw a whole passel of people squirming around down there where the
village ought to be. They were standing, or crouched, or lying around as
if they'd fallen down.
And every one of the crazy galoots was plumb naked.
And so was he! He'd just realized it.
It had all happened so quietly that that fool bird up in the tree was
still singing. Hadn't missed a note. Funny how a thing like that stood
out above all the rest. Still singing.
Jed got up on his knees, scrambled to his feet, and dodged behind a
tree. Fine lot of authority he'd have as village mayor if anybody saw
him standing out in his front yard naked as a jay bird.
The reminder of his responsibility caused him to sweep his eyes beyond
the sight of the village to where their spaceship should be in its
hangar, always ready for instant escape if anything should go wrong,
real wrong, that is. This ship wasn't there. The hangar wasn't there.
Nothing.
For a little bit he thought he must be looking in the wrong direction.
He'd got turned around or something in the confusion, because there was
a grove of trees where the hangar ought to be. And it was the same grove
they'd cleared away over two years ago. He recognized one of the trees
because it had a peculiar shape.
And he remembered feeding the trunk of that very tree into the power saw
for lumber. It was twisted and gnarled, and Martha had asked him to save
the wood for furniture because it was real pretty. That was the tree,
there on the edge of the grove.
He felt drunk, in a daze. He turned the other direction and looked out
where the experimental fields ought to be. They'd cleared that whole
area of timber and brush because it was a good, flat land. Only they
hadn't, because that was virgin forest, too.
Maybe he'd gone insane? He felt a flood of relief. Sure, that was it.
He'd just gone insane, that was all. Everything else was all right.
"The calves have got loose to the cows and they're going to take all the
milk, Jed."
He turned around and looked at Martha. If he was crazy, so was she. Her
eyes showed it. Her words showed it, at a time like this to be worrying
about them fool calves getting out. It took all the comfort away from
him. Her face was white, her eyes were dazed.
"You got some dirt on your cheek, Martha," he heard himself saying. "And
for Pete's sake, woman, put on some clothes. The committee's coming
over, and you running around like that!"
He thought he had the solution then. He'd fallen asleep in the hammock
after all, while he was waiting for the committee, and he was dreaming.
Of course, he ought to have known all along. This was just the way
things happened in a dream--even him and Martha running around naked. He
even chuckled to himself. He must be a pretty moral kind of fellow after
all, because even in a dream it was his own wife that was next to him
there, naked--not some other man's.
The fool things a man can dream! Might as well make the most of it. He
took her into his arms, and she clung to him.
Must have got the sheet tangled around his throat to choke him, and he
was dreaming it was her arms. But there hadn't been any sheet in the
hammock when he went to sleep.
And he wasn't dreaming.
"What's happened, Jed?" she whispered. Even her whisper was shaking with
fear, and her arms were wound around his neck so tight now he could
hardly breathe.
"Now, now, Martha," he cautioned. "Don't you go getting hysterical."
"What has happened?" she asked again.
"I don't know," he said. They were both talking in low tones.
"It's some kind of a miracle," she whispered.
"Now there's a woman's thinking for you," he chided her fondly, joshing
her a little. "Nothing of the sort. It's just plain ... Well any
scientist would tell you that ..." And then he stopped. He was pretty
sure the frameworks of science, as he knew them, wouldn't be able to
tell you.
He guessed that while they stood there clinging to one another, they
both went a little nuts. It was sort of like drowning, he guessed. You'd
have the feeling of sinking down and down, and there'd be nothing but
blinding, swirling chaos all around you. Then you'd kind of come to for
a minute, and there'd be the trees, the sky, the farm animals, the sea
in the distance.
You'd look down toward the village, and make a mental note, almost
absently, that people were getting to their feet now, some of them
clinging together the way you and Martha were--and then back down into
mental chaos you'd go again.
That went on several times, he remembered, before he'd begun to snap out
of it a little.
"But the funniest thing of all," Jed said, and looked at Cal quickly,
penetratingly. "I had the feeling all the time that we were being
watched!"
Cal said nothing.
"You know," Jed explained. "Like catching an animal in a trap? Then
watching it, to see what it will do?"
Cal nodded, without speaking.
"It was just another crazy thought, I guess," Jed said deprecatingly.
"Plumb crazy."
But, clearly, he didn't believe it was.
14
At E.H.Q. on Earth communication had been working fine. The operator sat
back and listened with trained ear alert for flaw or fade. A glance at
the adjacent recording instrument told him it was taking down everything
said--had been for hours.
Nice deal about those naked colonists. Maybe the astronavigator on the E
cruiser had been right. Maybe they'd all just gone back to nature, all
the way back.
He wondered if there were any pretty young female colonists. And how far
did that word experimental take you? Some experiment! He realized his
interest was running deeper than that of a detached technician's concern
for well-operated equipment--mechanical, that is. Well, let it. Live a
little once in a while. At least dream.
The department supervisor hovered near the back of the operator's chair,
breathing down his neck. He gnawed at the knuckles of his hand, and
hoped nothing would go wrong this time. That astronavigator, Louie
LeBeau, was probably right. Those colonists had turned nudist, and were
afraid to report what they'd done back to Earth!
Well!
He looked around guiltily, wondering if he'd exclaimed it aloud. He
decided he hadn't.
If _he_ were out there, instead of that E, _he'd_ make them put their
clothes back on, on the double. Getting everything all upset, causing
all this trouble, getting everybody excited, all of E.H.Q. aroused,
taking up the time of an E--just because they wanted to frolic around
without any clothes on!
If they were going to act like irresponsible children, they should be
spanked like irresponsible children.
He wondered if there were any young pretty female colonists who ought to
be spanked.
"... E Gray has just stepped off the landing ramp," the pilot out there
was reporting. "He is walking toward the three colonists. Now they have
started walking toward him. They do not seem hostile. They seem glad to
see us. My crew and I are still at our stations, ready for ..."
Silence.
The set simply didn't register anything more except that faint sigh of
uncompleted force fields in space.
"What now? What now?" the supervisor pushed the operator to one side,
and barely restrained the impulse to cuff him on the side of the head.
"Now what did you do? Why did you meddle with it when it was coming in
so clear and strong? What's happened?"
"I didn't do anything. I didn't meddle with it. I don't know what's
happened," the operator flared back. "The signal just stopped. That's
all."
There was an imperative flashing of the signal light on the line that
had been rigged to give direct connection of the running report to
Hayes's office. The operator hesitated, then flipped open the key, as if
he were touching a rattlesnake.
"What's happened down there?" Hayes complained abruptly, without
diplomatic softness. "This is a very crucial point!"
"I don't know what happened. I don't know," the supervisor quarreled
back. "The signal just stopped coming. We weren't doing anything to the
equipment."
He looked up at the continuously changing tri-di star map which made
the far wall appear to be a view into a miniature universe. "There's no
reason for an occlusion," he said to Hayes. "And the set here is alive.
It must be at the other end."
He turned to the operator, and said loudly, "Bounce a beam on Eden's
surface. Just see if any booster has gone out between here and there."
Most of it was making a show of efficiency for Hayes.
"Here we go again," the operator mumbled to himself, and pressed down a
key. The returning pips showed the signal was getting through to Eden.
"Pilot Lynwood! Pilot Lynwood!" the supervisor nagged into the mike.
"Speak up! Do you hear me?"
The operator sighed deeply. His panel partner grimaced something halfway
between a grin and a sneer of disgust.
"They don't answer," the supervisor said at last to Hayes. "It's the
same as before."
"Here we go again," Hayes groaned, but not only to himself. "All right,"
he said wearily, after a moment's hesitation. "Keep the channel open.
Keep trying to contact them. Let me know if signal resumes."
But he already felt the conviction that it would do no good. It was too
much of the same pattern as before. What could have happened?
There'd have to be another review, he supposed. A longer and more
detailed one. There must be, had to be, something they'd overlooked in
the first one. Had he been right in freezing out so many who wanted to
speculate in that first one? But in the interests of time!
The scientists would grumble, even worse than before, because now each
one of them would be worried lest it was his own field of knowledge that
had failed. Hunting a needle in a haystack was easy. At least you knew
what a needle looked like, could recognize it when you saw it.
It would probably all end with nothing solved. E McGinnis would go out
in a rescue ship. He'd already told E Gray that he would be available
in an emergency, and this looked like an emergency. And that would leave
E.H.Q. without a single E in residence.
Why didn't General Administration get busy and qualify more E's? It
shouldn't be so difficult as all that to teach people to think! There
was something mighty wrong with the way kids were brought up if only one
in a million could still think by the time he was grown. Less than one
in a million could qualify as an E.
A boy had to be a natural rebel to start with, because if he believed
what people said he wouldn't get anywhere, no farther than the people
who said it. And if he didn't believe what they told him, they punished
him, outcast him, whipped him, violenced him into submission if they
could. If they couldn't they shut him up in a prison, labeled him
dangerous to society.
It was a wonder that any were able to walk the thin line between
rebelliousness and delinquency! And if a few were able, they were still
of no use unless they learned what science had to offer as a base. Ah,
there was the rub. How to keep alive the curiosity, the inquisitiveness,
the skepticism; and at the same time teach him the basics he must have
for constructive thought? For if he were not beaten into submission by
the punitive methods of society, he was persuaded into it by his
teachers, who were ever so sure of their facts and proofs.
Now you take this Eden problem. Probably wouldn't be tough at all if a
guy could just think. But what could have happened?
He understood there was an observer ship out there, sent out by the
attorney general's office. Why wasn't it reporting? Probably was--to the
attorney general's office. Fine lot of good E.H.Q. would get out of
that. He was no fool. He knew the attorney general would gladly
sacrifice the whole lot of colonists, if it would give him a weapon to
fight E.H.Q.
Why hadn't E.H.Q. sent along an observer ship also? These cocky E's!
Probably hadn't thought it necessary. Always ready to assume they could
handle the situation by themselves!
He wondered if he dared voice that criticism during the review, get it
on record. He thought about it, and decided in favor of playing it safe.
Maybe that was the trouble. Everybody was too concerned with his own
skin, too willing to play it safe. But an employee of E.H.Q. to make a
public criticism of an E! No, better play it safe.
He sighed heavily, and asked the operator to please see if E McGinnis
would talk to him.
He suspected that E McGinnis would just stand off from the planet and
wait for E Gray to get in touch. Nothing seemed to have happened while E
Gray's cruiser was out in space. It must be something connected with
landing, being on the surface of the planet.
But E Gray could signal to E McGinnis. Those pesky colonists! Why hadn't
they signaled to E Gray? Why hadn't they come out of their bushes and
signaled the danger? Surely they must know what it was. They were alive
and healthy, three of them at least. Why hadn't they used their stupid
heads?
But then, how could they have known E Gray was out in space, or even in
their stratosphere? Well, they had telescopes, didn't they? Or did they?
Sure they did. No matter what happened to the buildings, they must have
all sorts of equipment hidden under the trees, or in caves.
Why hadn't E Gray been more cautious about landing? Rushing in there
like a green school kid, without even rudimentary precautions. That's
what came from sending out a boy to do a man's job. Maybe the attorney
general's office had been right in its attempt to prevent a Junior from
going. What was the use of all that E training, if the boy didn't have
enough sense ...
At least E McGinnis would have enough sense to stand off, not go rushing
in blindly. Grand old man, E McGinnis. Now there was a _real_ product of
E science, the veritable dean of the E's.
E Gray would probably have enough sense to know he'd be followed by a
rescue ship as soon as something went wrong. And between an E out in
space and another on the ground, they shouldn't have any trouble in
working it out. He wondered if he should suggest that to E McGinnis as
soon as the operator located him. Even if the grand, lovable old man
thought of it for himself, he'd compliment Hayes for thinking it,
reasoning it all out!
The intercom operator came on his line.
"Sir," she said, and cleared her throat. He could hear her gulp. Her
voice was very small, thin. "Sir," she began again. "I contacted E
McGinnis. He said some things. He told me to tell you exactly what he
said, word for word. I took it down in shorthand, so I could."
"Well! Well!" he exclaimed impatiently. His brusqueness seemed to give
her courage.
"Sir," she said a little stronger. "E McGinnis won't talk to you. He
says the foggy, rambling way that review was conducted was a disgrace.
He says why don't you get on with what you have to do instead of
bothering people. He says not to waste any more of his time unless you
can come up with something he doesn't already know. He says he doubts
you'd know what that was even if it hit you in the face. He said to tell
you the exact words, so I took it down in shorthand, so I could.
Because--he said to."
She was all but wailing, as she finished.
"All right," Hayes sighed tiredly. Senile old devil! No wonder things
were going to pot, if this was a sample of E training. "Send me your
notes so I can follow them carefully," he told the operator.
"So you can tear them up before they get spread all over the joint," she
mumbled, but she had already thrown the key so he couldn't hear her.
Resignedly, because he knew he was going to catch it from the scientists
just as bad, because he was feeling very sorry for himself that he must
always be in the middle of things, he began to arouse the scientists.
He felt so sorry for himself that he dropped his tentative plan to have
the midgit-idgit check the personal attributes of the individual
colonists out there--to see if some of them might be young, pretty,
female--34-24-34.
As if the idea were now red hot, he dropped the plan of telling General
Administration that, since Eden was in his sector, perhaps he should go
out there, personally.
15
The observer ship, with an assistant attorney general aboard was,
indeed, reporting directly to the attorney general's office--to
Gunderson in person. On their own secret channel, of course. Had to be
secret. All right for them to know, because they were very special
persons, but the people should not be told.
"Gray is coming out of the ship," the assistant was saying. "He is
starting down the ramp. He is alone. He has no apparent weapons. Making
a grandstand play of it. Far as we can tell, the crew isn't covering
him. Now he is at the foot of the ramp. The three unclothed men are
moving toward him, spread out a little, crouching, obviously going to
attack. The stupid fool doesn't seem to realize it. He's ...
"Wait a minute. I don't believe it...."
"Well, what?" Gunderson exploded from his end.
"Sir," the assistant gulped, "the ship disappeared, just like that."
"Nonsense!"
"No, sir. It did. The three crewmen are sprawled on the ground. Now two
of them are getting up. There isn't a sign of the ship, the ramp, or
anything."
"Can't be. Has to be around somewhere."
"No, sir. Isn't. Sorry to contradict you, sir. It isn't anywhere."
"They probably set controls to send the ship back into space, and
jumped out before it took off. Search space. You'll find it. Ships don't
just disappear."
"I'll search, of course. But this ship just disappeared."
"All right, what's going on? What else?"
"They're naked. Naked as the day they were born. All four of them. Same
as the colonists."
"Keep track of where they put their clothes. Photograph it. Get the
evidence."
"Sir, their clothes disappeared right off their bodies. First they were
fully dressed, Gray was, anyhow. Maybe the crew could have undressed
inside the ship, but Gray was fully dressed--and then he wasn't. Just
like that."
"Hm-m."
"Shall I land, sir? Place them under arrest?"
"Wait a minute. Let's think of a good charge. Something to stand up in
court. Have to make this airtight right from the beginning in case some
stupid judge decides to make a show of independence."
"Indecent exposure, sir? Lewd public behavior?"
"Pretty weak, in view of what's involved."
"A suggestion, sir. Maybe a morals charge is the most effective weapon
we could have. Attack the E structure on the grounds of bad scientific
judgment, and every egghead on Earth will feel compelled to rise up in
their defense--except, of course, those employed by the government. But
on a morals charge there wouldn't be one voice raised--fear of being
tarred with the same brush. Except maybe a few radicals that are already
discredited. Any other charge might get public sentiment aroused against
us, but a morals charge--think of the backing we'd get from the women's
clubs, P.T.A., all the pressure groups determined to dictate to the rest
of the world how it should behave. It's worked for hundreds of years,
sir. Never fails."
"Hm-m," Gunderson mused. "You may be right."
"Shall I land, sir, make the arrest?"
"You've got plenty of photographic evidence?"
"All we'd need, sir, at least for the lewd, public indecent exposure
charge."
"Wait a minute. How about the colonists? Got pictures of them?"
"The three men, sir. No others."
"Let's don't rush into this," Gunderson said slowly. "Without a ship
they're not going to get far. Hold off, and keep taking pictures. Maybe
we can get something stronger on Gray than just an indecent exposure, or
at least get some pictures that could be interpreted as more than just
that. Get pictures of as many colonists as possible, too, in case
they've gone nudist."
"You'd want to prosecute the colonists, too?"
"Might be a smart idea. That way, nobody could claim we'd been gunning
for the Junior E. Make it impartial, play no favorites. Hm-m, even if we
decided not to prosecute, we'd have the pictures in their dossiers, so
that anytime in the future, for the rest of their lives, if any of them
gave us any trouble, we could quietly let them know what we've got, and
they'll just fold up and quit. That's worked for hundreds of years,
too."
"Yes, sir. Smart thinking, sir." The assistant knew that already
Gunderson had adopted the idea as his own, and to hold his job he'd
better let Gunderson go on thinking so. Of course, if the idea should
backfire, then Gunderson would remember quickly enough where it had
originated.
"Hm-m, you know," Gunderson was saying. "This could work out all right.
If their ship's gone they're not communicating with E.H.Q. And if
they're not communicating, E.H.Q. will send out another ship to see why.
Maybe there'll be an E on it. I hear the only one available is
McGinnis--that guy who's planning to fight us on that injunction.
"Now suppose he landed. Suppose he went nudist, or we could make
pictures look like he did. The guy would have to undress sometime, take
a bath. Slap a morals charge on him. Nobody with a public reputation
ever fights a charge like that, guilty or innocent. They pay up or
knuckle under to keep it quiet. Have, for hundreds of years; always
will, as long as a bunch of fat, old, ugly biddies, male and female, who
nobody wants that way are viciously resentful that they can't have what
somebody else is enjoying. Young ones, too, so twisted and warped with
frustrations they don't dare try what they daydream about. They're even
worse. Yeah, a morals charge is the way to get at him."
"But I understood there was a law, that we couldn't charge an E for any
offense."
"We can try him in the newspapers, can't we? On the televiewers. That's
the whole point. We can't charge an E now, but wait until we get things
stirred up on a morals basis. That law'll be changed in a hurry, because
any legislator that tried to hold out against changing it would be drawn
and quartered by his constituents--and has enough sense to know it.
"Hm-m," he breathed in satisfaction. "That's the way to go about it.
Don't know why I haven't thought of it before. If you guys would read
your history of how police enforcement officers got things back under
control each time some idealist started squawking about human rights,
you'd think of these things, too.