Tunnel In The Sky

1. The Marching Hordes

The bulletin board outside lecture hall 1712-A of Patrick Henry High School showed a flashing red light. Rod Walker pushed his way into a knot of students and tried to see what the special notice had to say. He received an elbow in the stomach, accompanied by: "Hey! Quit shoving!"

"Sorry. Take it easy, Jimmy." Rod locked the elbow in a bone breaker but put no pressure on, craned his neck to look over Jimmy Throxton's head. "What's on the board?"

"No class today."

"Why not?"

A voice near the board answered him. "Because tomorrow it's 'Hail, Caesar, we who are about to die-'"

"So?" Rod felt his stomach tighten as it always did before an examination. Someone moved aside and he managed to read the notice:

PATRICK HENRY HIGH SCHOOL

Department of Social Studies

SPECIAL NOTICE to all students Course 410

(elective senior seminar) Advanced Survival,

instr. Dr. Matson, 1712-A MWF

1. There will be no class Friday the 14th.

2. Twenty-Four Hour Notice is hereby given of final examination in Solo Survival. Students will present themselves for physical check at 0900 Saturday in the dispensary of Templeton Gate and will start passing through the gate at 1000, using three-minute intervals by lot.

3. TEST CONDITIONS:

(a) ANY planet, ANY climate, ANY terrain;

(b) NO rules, ALL weapons, ANY equipment;

(c) TEAMING IS PERMITTED but teams will not be allowed to pass through the gate in company;

(d) TEST DURATION is not less than forty-eight hours, not more than ten days.

4. Dr. Matson will be available for advice and consultation until 1700 Friday.

5. Test may be postponed Only on recommendation of examining physician, but any student may withdraw from the course without administrative penalty up until 1000 Saturday.

6. Good luck and long life to you all!

(s) B. P. Matson, Sc.D.

Approved:

J. R. ROERICH, for the Board

Rod Walker reread the notice slowly, while trying to quiet the quiver in his nerves. He checked off the test conditions-why, those were not "conditions" but a total lack of conditions, no limits of any sort! They could dump you through the gate and the next instant you might be facing a polar bear at forty below-or wrestling an Octopus deep in warm salt water.

Or, he added, faced up to some three-headed horror on a planet you had never heard of.

He heard a soprano voice complaining, "'Twenty-four hour notice!' Why, it's less than twenty hours now. That's not fair."

Another girl answered, "What's the difference? I wish we were starting this minute. I won't get a wink of sleep tonight."

"If we are supposed to have twenty-four hours to get ready, then we ought to have them. Fair is fair."

Another student, a tall, husky Zulu girl, chuckled softly. "Go on in. Tell the Deacon that."

Rod backed out of the press, taking Jimmy Throxton with him. He felt that he knew what "Deacon" Matson would say... something about the irrelevancy of fairness to survival. He chewed over the bait in paragraph five; nobody would say boo if he dropped the course. After all, "Advanced Survival' was properly a college. course; he would graduate without it.

But he knew down deep that if he lost his nerve now, he would never take the course later.

Jimmy said nervously, "What d'you think of it, Rod?"

"All right, I guess. But I'd like to know whether or not to wear my long-handled underwear. Do you suppose the Deacon would give us a hint?"

"Him? Not him! He thinks a broken leg is the height of humor. That man would eat his own grandmother- without salt."

"Oh, come now! He'd use salt. Say, Jim? You saw what it said about teaming."

"Yeah... what about it?" Jimmy's eyes shifted away. Rod felt a moment's irritation. He was making a suggestion as delicate as a proposal of marriage, an offer to put his own life in the same basket with Jimmy's. The greatest risk in a solo test was that a fellow just had to sleep sometime... but a team could split it up and stand watch over each other.

Jimmy must know that Rod was better than he was, with any weapon or bare hands; the proposition was to his advantage. Yet here he was hesitating as if he thought Rod might handicap him. "What's the matter, Jim?" Rod said bleakly. "Figure you're safer going it alone?"

"Uh, no, not exactly."

"You mean you'd rather not team with me?"

"No, no, I didn't mean that!"

"Then what did you mean?"

"I meant- Look, Rod, I surely do thank you. I won't forget it. But that notice said something else, too."

"What?"

"It said we could dump this durned course and still graduate. And I just happened to remember that I don't need it for the retail clothing business."

"Huh? I thought you had ambitions to become a wideangled lawyer?'

"So exotic jurisprudence loses its brightest jewel... so what do I care? It will make my old man very happy to learn that I've decided to stick with the family business."

"You mean you're scared."

"Well, that's one way of putting it. Aren't you?"

Rod took a deep breath. "Yes. I'm scared."

"Good! Now let's both give a classic demonstration of how to survive and stay alive by marching down to the Registrar's office and bravely signing our names to withdrawal slips."

"Uh, no. You go ahead."

"You mean you're sticking?"

"I guess so."

"Look, Rod, have you looked over the statistics on last year's classes?"

"No. And I don't want to. So long." Rod turned sharply and headed for the classroom door, leaving Jimmy to stare after him with a troubled look.

The lecture room was occupied by a dozen or so of the seminar's students. Doctor Matson, the "Deacon," was squatting tailor-fashion on one corner of his desk and holding forth informally. He was a small man and spare, with a leathery face, a patch over one eye, and most of three fingers missing from his left hand. On his chest were miniature ribbons, marking service in three famous first expeditions; one carried a tiny diamond cluster that showed him to be the last living member of that group.

Rod slipped into the second row. The Deacon's eye flicked at him as he went on talking. "I don't understand the complaints," he said jovially. "The test conditions say 'all weapons' so you can protect yourself any way you like... from a slingshot to a cobalt bomb. I think final examination should be bare hands, not so much as a nail file. But the Board of Education doesn't agree, so we do it this sissy way instead." He shrugged and grinned.

"Uh, Doctor, I take it then that the Board knows that we are going to run into dangerous animals?"

"Eh? You surely will! The most dangerous animal known."

"Doctor, if you mean that literally-"

"Oh, I do, I do!"

"Then I take it that we are either being sent to Mithra and will have to watch out for snow apes, or we are going to stay on Terra and be dumped where we can expect leopards. Am I right?"

The Deacon shook his head despairingly. "My boy, you had better cancel and take this course over. Those dumb brutes aren't dangerous."

"But Jasper says, in Predators and Prey, that the two trickiest, most dangerous-"

"Jasper's maiden aunt! I'm talking about the real King of the Beasts, the only animal that is always dangerous, even when not hungry. The two-legged brute. Take a look around you!"

The instructor leaned forward. "I've said this nineteen dozen times but you still don't believe it. Man is the one animal that can't be tamed. He goes along for years as peaceful as a cow, when it suits him. Then when it suits him not to be, he makes a leopard look like a tabby cat. Which goes double for the female of the species. Take another look around you. All friends. We've been on group-survival field tests together; we can depend on each other. So? Read about the Donner Party, or the First Venus Expedition. Anyhow, the test area will have several other classes in it, all strangers to you." Doctor Matson fixed his eye on Rod. "I hate to see some of you take this test, I really do. Some of you are city dwellers by nature; I'm afraid I have not managed to get it through your heads that there are no policemen where you are going. Nor will I be around to give you a hand if you make some silly mistake."

His eye moved on; Rod wondered if the Deacon meant him. Sometimes he felt that the Deacon took delight in rawhiding him. But Rod knew that it was serious; the course was required for all the Outlands professions for the good reason that the Outlands were places where you were smart - or you were dead. Rod had chosen to take this course before entering college because he hoped that it would help him to get a scholarship - but that did not mean that he thought it was just a formality. He looked around, wondering who would be willing to team with him now that Jimmy had dropped out. There was a couple in front of him, Bob Baxter and Carmen Garcia. He checked them off, as they undoubtedly would team together; they planned to become medical missionaries and intended to marry as soon as they could.

How about Johann Braun? He would make a real partner, all right-strong, fast on his feet, and smart. But Rod did not trust him, nor did he think that Braun would want him. He began to see that he might have made a mistake in not cultivating other friends in the class besides Jimmy.

That big Zulu girl, Caroline something-unpronounceable. Strong as an ox and absolutely fearless. But it would not do to team with a girl; girls were likely to mistake a cold business deal for a romantic gambit. His eyes moved on until at last he was forced to conclude that there was no one there to whom he wished to suggest partnership.

"Prof, how about a hint? Should we take suntan oil? Or chilblain lotion?"

Matson grinned and drawled, "Son, I'll tell you every bit that I know. This test area was picked by a teacher in Europe... and I picked one for his class. But I don't know what it is any more than you do. Send me a post card."

"But-" The boy who had spoken stopped. Then he suddenly stood up. "Prof, this isn't a fair test. I'm checking out."

"What's unfair about it? Not that we meant to make it fair."

"Well, you could dump us any place-"

"That's right."

"-the back side of the Moon, in vacuum up to our chins. Or onto a chlorine planet. Or the middle of an ocean. I don't know whether to take a space suit, or a canoe. So the deuce with it. Real life isn't like that."

"It isn't, eh?" Matson said softly. "That's what Jonah said when the whale swallowed him." He added, "But I will give you some hints. We mean this test to be passed by anyone bright enough to deserve it. So we won't let you walk into a poisonous atmosphere, or a vacuum, without a mask. If you are dumped into water, land won't be too far to swim. And so on. While I don't know where you are going, I did see the list of test areas for this year's classes. A smart man can survive in any of them. You ought to realize, son, that the Board of Education would have nothing to gain by killing off all its candidates for the key professions."

The student sat down again as suddenly as he had stood up. The instructor said, "Change your mind again?"

"Uh, yes, sir. If it's a fair test, I'll take it."

Matson shook his head. "You've already flunked it. You're excused. Don't bother the Registrar; I'll notify him."

The boy started to protest; Matson inclined his head toward the door. "Out!" There was an embarrassed silence while he left the room, then Matson said briskly, "This is a class in applied philosophy and I am sole judge of who is ready and who is not. Anybody who thinks of the world in terms of what it 'ought' to be, rather than what it is, isn't ready for final examination. You've got to relax and roll with the punch... not get yourself all worn out with adrenalin exhaustion at the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Any more questions?"

There were a few more but it became evident that Matson either truthfully did not know the nature of the test area, or was guarding the knowledge; his answers gained them nothing. He refused to advise as to weapons, saying simply that the school armorer would be at the gate ready to issue all usual weapons, while any unusual ones were up to the individual. "Remember, though, your best weapon is between your ears and under your scalp - provided it's loaded."

The group started to drift away; Rod got up to leave.

Matson caught his eye and said, "Walker, are you planning to take the test?"

"Why, yes, of course, sir."

"Come here a moment." He led him into his office, closed the door and sat down. He looked up at Rod, fiddled with a paperweight on his desk and said slowly, "Rod, you're a good boy... but sometimes that isn't enough."

Rod said nothing.

"Tell me," Matson continued, "why you want to take this test?"

"Sir?"

"'Sir' yourself," Matson answered grumpily. "Answer my question."

Rod stared, knowing that he had gone over this with Matson before he was accepted for the course. But he explained again his ambition to study for an Outlands profession. "So I have to qualify in survival. I couldn't even get a degree in colonial administration without it, much less any of the planetography or planetology specialities."

"Want to be an explorer, huh?"

"Yes, sir."

"Like me."

"Yes, Sir. Like you."

"Hmm. .. would you believe me if I told you that it was the worst mistake I ever made?"

"Huh? No, sir!"

"I didn't think you would. Son, the cutest trick of all is how to know then what you know now. No way to, of course. But I'm telling you straight: I think you've been born into the wrong age.

"Sir?"

"I think you are a romantic. Now this is a very romantic age, so there is no room in it for romantics; it calls for practical men. A hundred years ago you would have made a banker or lawyer or professor and you could have worked out your romanticism by reading fanciful tales and dreaming about what you might have been if you hadn't had the misfortune to be born into a humdrum period. But this happens to be a period when adventure and romance are a part of daily existence. Naturally it takes very practical people to cope with it."

Rod was beginning to get annoyed. "What's the matter with me?"

"Nothing. I like you. I don't want to see you get hurt. But you are 'way too emotional, too sentimental to be a real survivor type."

Matson pushed a hand toward him. "Now keep your shirt on. I know you can make fire by rubbing a couple of dry words together. I'm well aware that you won merit badges in practically everything. I'm sure you can devise a water filter with your bare hands and know which side of the tree the moss grows on. But I'm not sure that you can beware of the Truce of the Bear."

"'The Truce of the Bear?'"

"Never mind. Son, I think you ought to cancel this course. If you must, you can repeat it in college."

Rod looked stubborn. Matson sighed. "I could drop you. Perhaps I should."

"But why, sir?"

"That's the point. I couldn't give a reason. On the record, you're as promising a student as I have ever had." He stood up and put out his hand. "Good luck. And remember- when it gets down to fundamentals, do what you have to do and shed no tears."

Rod should have gone straight home. His family lived in an out-county of Greater New York City, located on the Grand Canyon plateau through Hoboken Gate. But his commuting route required him to change at Emigrants' Gap and he found himself unable to resist stopping to rubberneck.

When he stepped out of the tube from school he should have turned right, taken the rotary lift to the level above, and stepped through to Arizona Strip. But he was thinking about supplies, equipment, and weapons for tomorrow's examination; his steps automatically bore left, he got on the slideway leading to the great hall of the planetary gates.

He told himself that he would watch for only ten minutes; he would not be late for dinner. He picked his way through the crowd and entered the great hall- not Onto the emigration floor itself, but onto the spectator's balcony facing the gates. This was the new gate househe was in, the one opened for traffic in '68; the original Emigrants' Gap, now used for Terran traffic and trade with Luna, stood on the Jersey Flats a few kilometers east alongside the pile that powered it.

The balcony faced the six gates. It could seat eighty-six hundred people but was half filled and crowded only in the center. It was here, of course, that Rod wished to

sit so that he might see through all six gates. He wormed his way down the middle aisle, squatted by the railing, then spotted someone leaving a front row seat. Rod grabbed it, earning a dirty look from a man who had started for it from the other aisle.

Rod fed coins into the arm of the seat; it opened out, he sat down and looked around. He was opposite the replica Statue of Liberty, twin to the one that had stood for a century where now was Bedloe Crater. Her torch reached to the distant ceiling; on both her right and her left three great gates let emigrants into the outer worlds.

Rod did not glance at the statue; he looked at the gates. It was late afternoon and heavily overcast at east coast North America, but gate one was open to some planetary spot having glaring noonday sun; Rod could catch glimpses through it of men dressed in shorts and sun hats and nothing else. Gate number two had a pressure lock rigged over it; it carried a big skull & crossbones sign and the symbol for chlorine. A red light burned over it. While he watched, the red light flickered out and a blue light replaced it; the door slowly opened and a traveling capsule for a chlorine-breather crawled out. Waiting to meet it were eight humans in diplomatic full dress. One carried a gold baton.

Rod considered spending another half pluton to find out who the important visitor was, but his attention was diverted to gate five. An auxiliary gate had been set up on the floor, facing gate five a nd almost under the balcony. Two high steel fences joined the two gates, forming with them an alley as wide as the gates and as long as the space between, about fifteen meters by seventy-five. This pen was packed with humanity moving from the temporary gate toward and through gate five-and onto some planet light-years away. They poured out of nowhere, for the floor back of the auxiliary gate was bare, hurried like cattle between the two fences, spilled through gate five and were gone. A squad of brawny Mongol policemen, each armed with a staff as tall ashimself, was spread out along each fence. They were using their staves to hurry the emigrants and they were not being gentle. Almost underneath Rod one of them prodded an old coolie so hard that he stumbled and fell. The man had been carrying his belongings, his equipment for a new world, in two bundles supported from a pole balanced on his right shoulder.

The old coolie fell to his skinny knees, tried to get up, fell flat. Rod thought sure he would be trampled, but

somehow he was on his feet again- minus his baggage. He tried to hold his place in the torrent and recover his possessions, but the guard prodded him again and he was forced to move on barehanded. Rod lost sight of him before he had moved five meters.

There were local police outside the fence but they did not interfere. This narrow stretch between the two gates was, for the time, extraterritory; the local police had no jurisdiction. But one of them did seem annoyed at the brutality shown the old man; he put his face to the steel mesh and called out something in lingua terra. The

Mongol cop answered savagely in the same simple language, telling the North American what he could do about it, then went back to shoving and shouting and prodding still more briskly.

The crowd streaming through the pen were Asiatics- Japanese, Indonesians, Siamese, some East Indians, a few Eurasians, but predominantly South Chinese. To Rod they all looked much alike- tiny women with babies on hip or back, or often one on back and one in arms, endless runny-nosed and shaven-headed children, fathers with household goods ill enormous back packs or pushed ahead on barrows. There were a few dispirited ponies dragging two-wheeled carts much too big for them but most of the torrent had only that which they could carry.

Rod had heard an old story which asserted that if all the Chinese on Terra were marched four abreast past a given point the column would never pass that point, as more Chinese would be born fast enough to replace those who had marched past. Rod had taken his slide rule and applied arithmetic to check it- to find, of course, that the story was nonsense; even if one ignored deaths, while counting all births, the last Chinese would pass the reviewing stand in less than four years. Nevertheless, while watching this mob being herded like brutes into a slaughterhouse, Rod felt that the old canard was true even though its mathematics was faulty. There seemed to be no end to them.

He decided to risk that half pluton to find out what was going on. He slid the coin into a slot in the chair's speaker; the voice of the commentator reached his ears:

"-the visiting minister. The prince royal was met by officials of the Terran Corporation including the Director General himself and now is being escorted to the locks of the Ratoonian enclave. After the television reception tonight staff level conversations will start. A spokesman close to the Director General has pointed out that, in view of the impossibility of conflict of interest between oxygen types such as ourselves and the Ratoonians, any outcome of the conference must be to our advantage, the question being to what extent.

"If you will turn your attention again to gate five, we will repeat what we said earlier: gate five is on fortyeight hour loan to the Australasian Republic. The temporary gate you see erected below is hyperfolded to a point in central Australia in the Arunta Desert, where this emigration has been mounting in a great encampment for the past several weeks. His Serene Majesty Chairman Fung Chee Mu of the Australasian Republic has informed the Corporation that his government intends to move in excess of two million people in forty-eight hours, a truly impressive figure, more than forty thousand each hour. The target figure for this year for all planetary emigration gates taken together - Emigrants' Gap, Peter the Great, and Witwatersrand Gates - is only seventy million emigrants or an average of eight thousand per hour. This movement proposes a rate live times as great using only one gate!"

The commentator continued: "Yet when we watch the speed, efficiency and the, uh- forthrightness with which they are carrying out this evolution it seems likely that they will achieve their goal. Our own figures show them to be slightly ahead of quota for the first nine hours. During those same nine hours there have been one hundred seven births and eighty-two deaths among the emigrants, the high death rate, of course, being incident to the temporary hazards of the emigration.

"The planet of destination, GO-8703-IV, to be called henceforth 'Heavenly Mountains' according to Chairman Fung, is classed as a bounty planet and no attempt had been made to colonize it. The Corporation has been assured that the colonists are volunteers." It seemed to Rod that the announcer's tone was ironical. "This is understandable when one considers the phenomenal population pressure of the Australasian Republic. A brief historical rundown may be in order. After the removal of the remnants of the former Australian population to New Zealand, pursuant to the Peiping Peace Treaty, the first amazing effort of the new government was the creation of the great inland sea

Rod muted the speaker and looked back at the floor below. He did not care to hear school-book figures on how the Australian Desert had been made to blossom like the rose... and nevertheless haa been converted into a slum with more people in it than all of North America. Something new was happening at gate four-Gate four had been occupied by a moving cargo belt when he had come in; now the belt had crawled away and lost itself in the bowels of the terminal and an emigration party was lining up to go through.

This was no poverty-stricken band of refugees chivvied along by police; here each family had its own wagon....ong, sweeping, boat-tight Conestogas drawn by three-pair teams and housed in sturdy glass canvas square and businesslike Studebakers with steel bodies, high mudcutter wheels, and pulled by one or two-pair teams. The draft animals were Morgans and lordly Clydesdales and jug-headed Missouri mules with strong shoulders and shrewd, suspicious eyes. Dogs trotted between wheels, wagons were piled high with household goods and implements and children, poultry protested the indignities of fate in cages tied on behind, and a little Shetland pony, riderless but carrying his saddle and just a bit too tall to run underneath with the dogs, stayed close to the tailgate of one family's rig.

Rod wondered at the absence of cattle and stepped up the speaker again. But the announcer was still droning about the fertility of Australasians; he muted it again and watched. Wagons had moved onto the floor and taken up tight echelon position close to the gate, ready to move, with the tail of the train somewhere out of sight below. The gate was not yet ready and drivers were getting down and gathering at the Salvation Army booth under the skirts ot the Goddess of Liberty, for a cup of coffee and some banter. It occurred to Rod that there probably was no coffee where they were going and might not be for years, since Terra never exported food - on the contrary, food and fissionable metals were almost the only permissible imports; until an Outland colony produced a surplus of one or the other it could expect precious little help from Terra.

It was extremely expensive in terms of uranium to keep an interstellar gate open and the people in this wagon train could expect to be out of commercial touch with Earth until such a time as they had developed surpluses valuable enough in trade to warrant reopening the gate at regular intervals. Until that time they were on their own and must make do with what they could take with them... which made horses more practical than helicopters, picks and shovels more useful than bulldozers. Machinery gets out of order and requires a complex technology to keep it going- but good old "hayburners" keep right on breeding, cropping grass, and pulling loads.

Deacon Matson had told the survival class that the real hardships of primitive Outlands were not the lack of plumbing, heating, power, light, nor weather conditioning, but the shortage of simple things like coffee and tobacco.

Rod did not smoke and coffee he could take or let alone; he could not imagine getting fretful over its absence. He scrunched down in his seat, trying to see through the gate to guess the cause of the hold up. He could not see well, as the arching canvas of a prairie schooner blocked his view, but it did seem that the gate operator had a phase error; it looked as if the sky was where the ground ought to be. The extradimensional distortions necessary to match places on two planets many light-years apart were not simply a matter of expenditure of enormous quantities of energy; they were precision problems fussy beyond belief, involving high mathematics and high art-the math was done by machine but the gate operator always had to adjust the last couple of decimal places by prayer and intuition.

In addition to the dozen-odd proper motions of each of the planets involved, motions which could usually be added and canceled out, there was also the rotation of each planet. The problem was to make the last hyperfold so that the two planets were internally tangent at the points selected as gates, with their axes parallel and their rotations in the same direction. Theoretically it was possible to match two points in contra-rotation, twisting the insubstantial fabric of space-time in exact step with "real' motions; practically such a solution was not only terribly wasteful of energy but almost unworkable- the ground surface beyond the gate tended to skid away like a slidewalk and tilt at odd angles.

Rod did not have the mathematics to appreciate the difficulties. Being only about to finish high school his training had gone no farther than tensor calculus, statistical mechanics, simple transfinities, generalized geometries of six dimensions, and, on the practical side, analysis for electronics, primary cybernetics and robotics, and basic design of analog computers; he had had no advanced mathematics as yet. He was not aware of his ignorance and simply concluded that the gate operator must be thumb-fingered. He looked back at the emigrant party.

The drivers were still gathered at the booth, drinking coffee and munching doughnuts. Most of the men were growing beards; Rod concluded from the beavers that the party had been training for several months. The captain of the party sported a little goatee, mustaches, and rather long hair, but it seemed to Rod that he could not be many years older than Rod himself. He was a professional, of course, required to hold a degree in Outlands arts- hunting, scouting, jackleg mechanics, gunsmithing, farming, first aid, group psychology, survival group tactics, law, and a dozen other things the race has found indispensable when stripped for action.

This captain's mount was a Palomino mare, lovely as a sunrise, and the captain was dressed as a California don of an earlier century-possibly as a compliment to his horse. A warning light flashed at the gate's annunciator panel and he swung into saddle, still eating a doughnut, and cantered down the wagons for a final inspection, riding toward Rod. His back was straight, his seat deep and easy, his bearing confident. Carried low on a fancy belt he wore two razor guns, each in a silver-chased holster that matched the ornate silver of his bridle and saddle.

Rod held his breath until the captain passed out of sight under the balcony, then sighed and considered studying to be like him, rather than for one of the more intellectual Outlands professions. He did not know just what he did want to be... except that he meant to get off Earth as soon as he possibly could and get out there where things were going on!

Which reminded him that the first hurdle was tomorrow; in a few days he would either be eligible to matriculate for whatever it was he decided on, or he would be-but no use worrying about that. He remembered uneasily that it was getting late and he had not even decided on equipment, nor picked his weapons. This party captain carried razor guns; should he carry one? No, this party would fight as a unit, if it had to fight. Its leader carried that type of weapon to enforce his authority-not for solo survival. Well, what should he take?

A siren sounded and the drivers returned to their wagons. The captain came back at a brisk trot. "Reins up!" he called out. "Reeeeeeiiiins up!" He took station by the gate, facing the head of the train; the mare stood quivering and tending to dance.

The Salvation Army lassie came out from behind her counter carrying a baby girl. She called to the party captain but her voice did not carry to the balcony.

The captain's voice did carry. "Number four! Doyle! Come get your child!" A red-headed man with a spade beard climbed down from the fourth wagon and sheepishly reclaimed the youngster to a chorus of cheers and cat calls. He passed the baby up to his wife, who upped its skirt and commenced paddling its bottom. Doyle climbed to his seat and took his reins.

"Call off!" the captain sang out.

"One."

"Tuh!"

"Three!"

"Foah!"

"Five!"

The count passed under the balcony, passed down the chute out of hearing. In a few moments it came back, running down this time, ending with a shouted "ONE!" The captain held up his right arm and watched the lights of the order panel.

A light turned green. He brought his arm down smartly with a shout of "Roll 'em! Ho!" The Palomino took off like a race horse, cut under the nose of the nigh lead horse of the first team, and shot through the gate.

Whips cracked. Rod could hear shouts of "Git, Molly! Git, Ned!" and "No, no, you jugheads!" The train began to roll. By the time the last one on the floor was through the gate and the much larger number which had been in the chute below had begun to show it was rolling at a gallop, with the drivers bracing their feet wide and their wives riding the brakes. Rod tried to count them, made it possibly sixty-three wagons as the last one rumbled through the gate... and was gone, already half a galaxy away.

He sighed and sat back with a warm feeling sharpened with undefined sorrow. Then he stepped up the speaker volume: "-onto New Canaan, the premium planet described by the great Langford as 'The rose without thorns.' These colonists have paid a premium of sixteen thousand four hundred per person-not counting exempt or co-opted members-for the privilege of seeking their fortunes and protecting their posterity by moving to New Canaan. The machines predict that the premium will increase for another twenty-eight years; therefore, if you are considering giving your children the priceless boon of citizenship on New Canaan, the time to act is now. For a beautiful projection reel showing this planet send one pluton to 'Information, Box One, Emigrants' Gap, New Jersey County, Greater New York.' For a complete descriptive listing of all planets now open plus a speclal list of those to be opened in the near future add another half pluton. Those seeing this broadcast in person may obtain these items at the information booth in the foyer outside the great hall."

Rod did not listen. He had long since sent for every free item and most of the non-free ones issued by the Commission for Emigration and Trade. Just now he was wondering why the gate to New Canaan had not relaxed.

He found out at once. Stock barricades rose up out of the floor, forming a fenced passage from gate four to the chute under him. Then a herd of cattle filled the gate and came flooding toward him, bawling and snorting. They were prime Hereford steers, destined to become tender steaks and delicious roasts for a rich but slightly hungry Earth. After them and among them rode New Canaan cowpunchers armed with long goads with which they urged the beasts to greater speed- the undesirability of running weight off the animals was offset by the extreme cost of keeping the gate open, a cost which had to be charged against the cattle.

Rod discovered that the speaker had shut itself off; the half hour he had paid for was finished. He sat up with sudden guilt, realizing that he would have to hurry or he would be late for supper. He rushed out, stepping on feet and mumbling apologies, and caught the slide-way to Hoboken Gate.

This gate, being merdy for Terra-surface commuting, was permanently dilated and required no operator, since the two points brought into coincidence were joined by a rigid frame, the solid Earth. Rod showed his commuter's ticket to the electronic monitor and stepped through to Arizona, in company with a crowd of neighbors.

"The (almost) solid Earth-" The gate robot took into account tidal distortions but could not anticipate minor seismic variables. As Rod stepped through he felt his feet quiver as if to a small earthquake, then the terra was again firma. But he was still in an airlock at sea-level pressure. The radiation from massed bodies triggered the mechanism, the lock closed and air pressure dropped. Rod yawned heavily to adjust to the pressure of Grand Canyon plateau, North Rim, less than three quarters that of New Jersey. But despite the fact that he made the change twice a day he found himself rubbing his right ear to get rid of an ear ache.

The lock opened, he stepped out. Having come two thousand miles in a split second he now had ten minutes by slide tube and a fifteen minute walk to get home. He decided to dogtrot and be on time after all. He might have made it if there had not been several thousand other people trying to use the same facilities.