Beyond This Horizon

CHAPTER EIGHT

"Thou, beside me, in the wilderness"

"FELIX! What do you mean? What's come over you?" His expression was so completely surprised, so utterly innocent of wrongdoing, that Hamilton was momentarily disconcerted. Was it possible that Monroe-Alpha, like himself, was in it as an agent of the government and knew that Hamilton was one also?

"Wait a minute," he said grimly. "What's your status here? Are you loyal to the Survivors Club, or are you in it as a spy?"

"A spy? Did you think I was a spy? Was that why you grabbed my gun?"

"No," Hamilton answered savagely, "I was afraid you weren't a spy."

"But-"

"Get this. I am a spy. I'm in this thing to bust it up. And, damn it, if I were a good one, I'd blow your head off and get on with my work. You bloody fool, you've gummed the whole thing up!"

"But ... but Felix, I knew you were in it. That was one of the things that persuaded me. I knew you wouldn't-"

"Well, I'm not! Where does that put you? Where do you stand? Are you with me, or against me?"

Monroe-Alpha looked from Hamilton's face to the gun in his fist, then back to his face. "Go ahead and shoot," he said.

"Don't be a fool!"

"Go ahead. I may be a fool-I'm not a traitor."

"Not a traitor-you! You've already sold out the rest of us."

Monroe-Alpha shook his head. "I was born into this culture. I had no choice and I owe it no loyalty. Now I've had a vision of a worthwhile society. I won't sacrifice it to save my own skin."

Hamilton swore. "'God deliver us from an idealist.' Would you let that gang of rats run the country?"

The telephone said softly but insistently, "Someone's calling. Someone's calling. Someone's-" They ignored it.

"They aren't rats. They propose a truly scientific society and I'm for it. Maybe the change will be a little harsh but that can't be helped. It's for the best-"

"Shut up. I haven't time to argue ideologies with you." He stepped toward Monroe-Alpha, who drew back a little, watching him.

Hamilton suddenly, without taking his eyes off Monroe-Alpha's face, kicked him in the groin. "Someone's calling. Someone's calling." Hamilton bolstered his gun-fast-bent over the disabled man and punched him in the pit of the stomach, not with-his fist but with stiffened fingers. It was nicely calculated to paralyse the diaphragm-and did. He dragged Monroe-Alpha to a point under the telephone, placed a knee in the small of his back, and seized his throat with the left hand.

"One move is all you'll get," he warned. With his right hand he cut in the phone. His face was close to the pick-up; nothing else would be transmitted.

McFee Norbert's face appeared in the frame. "Hamilton!" he said. "What in the hell are you doing there?"

"I went home with Monroe-Alpha."

"That's direct disobedience. You'll answer for it-later. Where's Monroe-Alpha?"

Hamilton gave a brief, false, but plausible, explanation.

"A fine time to have to do that," McFee commented. "Give him these orders: he is relieved from duty. Tell him to get far away and stay away for forty-eight hours. I've decided to take no chances with him."

"Right," said Hamilton.

"And you-do you realize how near you came to missing your orders? You should be in action ten minutes before the section group moves in. Get going."

"Now?"

"Now."

Hamilton cleared the circuit. Monroe-Alpha had started to struggle the second the phone came to life. Hamilton had ground his knee into his spine and clamped down hard on his throat, but it was a situation which could mot be maintained indefinitely.

He eased up on Monroe-Alpha a little. "You heard those orders?"

"Yes," Monroe-Alpha acknowledged hoarsely.

"You are going to carry them out. Where's your runabout?"

No answer. Hamilton dug in viciously. "Answer me. On the roof?"

"Yes."

Hamilton did not bother to answer. He took his heavy automatic from its holster and struck Monroe-Alpha behind his right ear. The man's head jerked once, then sagged limply. Hamilton turned to the phone and signalled Mordan's personal number. He waited apprehensively while distant machinery hunted, fearful that the report would come back, "NOWHERE AVAILABLE." He was relieved when the instrument reported instead, "Signalling."

After an interminable time-all of three or four seconds- Mordan's face lighted up the frame. "Oh-hello, Felix."

"Claude-the time's come! This is it."

"Yes, I know. That's why I'm here." The background behind him showed his office.

"You-knew?"

"Yes, Felix."

"But ... Never mind. I'm coming over."

"Yes, certainly." He cut off.

Hamilton reflected grimly that one more surprise would be just enough to cause him to start picking shadows off the wall. But he had no time to worry about it. He rushed into his friend's bedchamber, found what he wanted immediately-small pink capsules, Monroe-Alpha's habitual relief from the peril of sleepless worry. He returned then and examined Monroe-Alpha briefly. He was still out cold.

He picked him up in his arms, went out into the corridor, and sought the lift. He passed one startled citizen on the way. Hamilton looked at him, said, "Sssh-you'll waken him. Open the lift for me, will you please?"

The citizen looked dubious, shrugged, and did as he was requested.

He found Monroe-Alpha's little skycar without trouble, removed the key from his friend's pocket, and opened it. He dumped his burden inside, set the pilot for the roof of the Clinic, and depressed the impeller bar. He had done all he could for the moment; in over-city traffic automatic operation was faster than manual. It would be five minutes, or more, before he reached Mordan, but, even at that, he had saved at least ten minutes over what it would have taken by tube and slideway.

It consoled him somewhat for the time he had wasted on Monroe-Alpha.

The man was beginning to stir. Hamilton took a cup from the cooler, filled it with water, dissolved three of the capsules in it, and went to his side. He slapped him.

Monroe-Alpha sat up. "Whassa matter?" he said. "Stop it. What's happened?"

"Drink this." Hamilton put the cup to his lips.

"What happened? My head hurts."

"It ought to-you had quite a fall. Drink it. You'll feel better."

Monroe-Alpha complied docilely. When he had finished, Hamilton watched him narrowly, wondering if he would have to slug him again before the hypnotic took hold. But Monroe-Alpha said nothing more, seemed still dazed, and shortly was sleeping soundly.

The car grounded gently.

Hamilton raised the panel of the communicator, shoved his foot inside, and pushed. There was a satisfying sound of breaking crystal and snapping wires. He set the pilot on due South, without destination, opened the door, and stepped out. He turned, reached inside, sought the impeller bar-but hesitated without depressing it. He stepped back inside and removed the selector key from the pilot. He stepped out again, depressed the impeller-and ducked. As the door slammed shut, the little runabout angled straight up, seeking cruising altitude.

He did not wait for it to go out of sight, but turned and started below.

Monroe-Alpha awoke with a dry mouth, an excruciatingly throbbing head, a nauseous feeling at his midriff, and a sense of impending disaster. He became aware of things in that order.

He knew that he was in the air, in a skycar, and alone, but how had he gotten there, why he was there, escaped him. He had had some dreadful nightmares-they seemed to have some bearing on it. There was something he should be doing.

This was the Day, the Day of the Change! That was it!

But why was he here? He should be with his section. No. No, McFee had said-

What was it he had said? And where was Hamilton? Hamilton was a spy! Hamilton was about to betray them all!

He must inform McFee at once. Where was he? No matter-call him!

It was then that he found the wrecked communicator. And the bright sunlight outside told him it was too late, too late. Whatever had come of Hamilton's treachery had already happened. Too late.

The pieces were beginning to fall into place. He recalled the ugly interview with Hamilton, the message from McFee, the fight. Apparently he had been knocked out. There was nothing left to do but to go back, turn himself in to his leader, and confess his failure.

No. McFee had given him orders to stay out, to stay away for two days. He must obey. The Whole is greater than the parts.

But those orders did not apply-McFee had not known about Hamilton.

He knew now. That was certain. Therefore, the orders did apply. What was it McFee had said? "I've decided to take no chances on him."

They didn't trust him. Even McFee knew him for what he was-a thumb-fingered idiot who could be depended on to do the wrong thing at the wrong time.

He never had been any good. All he was fit for was to do fiddling things with numbers. He knew it. Everybody knew it. Hazel knew it. If he met a girl he liked, the best he could do was to knock her off her feet. Hamilton knew it. Hamilton hadn't even bothered to kill him-he wasn't worth killing. They hadn't really wanted him in the Survivors Club-not in a pinch. They just wanted him available to set up the accounting for the New Order. McFee had spoken to him about that, asked him if he could do it. Naturally, he could. That's all he was-a clerk.

Well, if they wanted him for that, he'd do it. He wasn't proud. All he asked was to serve. It would be a fairly simple matter to set up foolproof accounting for a collective-type state. It would not take him long; after that, his usefulness ended, he would be justified in taking the long sleep.

He got up, having found some comfort in complete self-abnegation. He rinsed out his mouth, drank more than a litre of water, and felt a little better. He rummaged in the larder, opened a seal of tomato juice, drank it, and felt almost human, in a deeply melancholy way.

He then investigated his location. The car was hovering; it had reached the extreme limit of its automatic radius. The ground was concealed by clouds, though it was bright sunlight where he was. The pilot showed him the latitude and longitude; a reference to the charts placed him somewhere over the Sierra Nevada Mountains-almost precisely over the Park of the Giant Redwoods, he noticed.

He derived a flicker of interest from that. The Survivors Club, in their public, social guise, claimed the Generalsherman Tree as president emeritus. It was a nice jest, he thought-the unkillable, perfectly adapted Oldest Living Thing on Earth. The sabotaged pilot put wrinkles between his eyes. He could fly it manually, but he could not enter the traffic of the Capital until it was repaired. He would have to seek some small town-

- No, McFee had said to go away and stay away-and McFee meant what he said. If he went to any town, he would be mixed up in the fighting.

He did not admit to himself that he no longer had any stomach for it-that Hamilton's words had left him with unadmitted doubts.

Still, it must be repaired. There might be a repair station at the Park-must be, in fact, in view of the tourist traffic. And surely the Change would not cause any fighting there. He cut in the fog eyes and felt his way down. When he grounded a single figure approached. "You can't stay," the man said, when he was in earshot. "The Park's closed."

"I've got to have a repair," said Monroe-Alpha. "Why is the Park closed?"

"Can't say. Some trouble down below. The rangers were called on special duty hours ago, and we sent the tourists out. There's nobody here but me."

"Can you repair?"

"Could ... maybe. What's the trouble?" Monroe-Alpha showed him. "Can you fix it?"

"Not the talkie box. Might scare up some parts for the pilot. What happened? Looks like you smashed it yourself."

"I didn't." He opened a locker, located his car gun, and stuck it in his holster. The caretaker was brassarded; he shut up at once. "I think I'll take a walk while you fix it."

"Yes sir. It won't take long."

Monroe-Alpha took out his credit folder, tore out a twenty credit note, and handed it to the man. "Here. Leave it in the hangar." He wanted to be alone, to talk to no one at all, least of all this inquisitive stranger. He turned and walked away. He had seen very little of the Big Trees in landing; he had kept his eyes glued to the fog eyes and had been quite busy with the problem of landing. Nor had he ever been in the Park before. True, he had seen pictures-who has not?-but pictures are not the trees. He started out, more intent on his inner turmoil than on the giants around him. But the place got him.

There was no sun, no sky. The trees lost themselves in a ceiling of mist, a remote distance overhead. There was no sound. His own footsteps lost themselves in a carpet of evergreen needles. There was no limiting horizon; endless succession only of stately columns, slim green columns of sugar pine, a mere meter in thickness, massive red-brown columns of the great ones themselves. They receded from him on all sides, the eye could see nothing but trees-trees, the mist overhead, and the carpet of their debris, touched in spots by stubborn patches of old snow.

An occasional drop of purely local rain fell, dripping from the branches far above.

There was no time there. This had been, was and would be. Time was not. There was no need for time here; the trees negated it, ignored it. Seasons they might recognize, lightly, as one notes and dismisses a passing minute. He had a feeling that he moved too frantically for them to notice, that he was too small for them to see.

He stopped, and approached one of the elders, cautiously, as befits a junior in dealing with age. He touched its coat, timidly at first, then with palm-flat pressure, as he gained confidence. It was not cool, as bark is, but warm and live in spite of the moisture that clung to it. He drew from the tree, through its warm shaggy pelt, a mood of tranquil strength. He felt sure, on a level of being just below that of word-shaped thoughts, that the tree was serene and sure of itself, and, in some earth-slow somber fashion, happy.

He was no longer capable of worrying over the remote problems of his own ant hill. His scales had changed, and the frenetic struggles of that world had faded both in time and distance until he no longer discerned their details.

He came upon the Old One unexpectedly. He had been moving through the forest, feeling it rather than thinking about it. If there were signs warning him of what lay ahead he had not seen them. But he needed no signs to tell him what he saw. The other giants had been huge and old; this one dwarfed them as they dwarfed the sugar pines.

Four thousand years it had stood there, maintaining, surviving, building its giant thews of living wood. Egypt and Babylon were young with it-it was still young. David had sung and died. Great Caesar stained the Senate floor with his ambitious blood. Mohamet fled. Colon Christopher importuned a queen, and the white men found the tree, still standing, still green. They named him for a man known only through that fact-Generalsherman. The Generalsherman Tree.

It had no need of names. It was itself, the eldest citizen, quiet, untroubled, alive and unworried.

He did not stay near it long. It helped him, but its presence was overpowering to him, as it has been to every man who has ever seen it. He went back through the woods, finding the company of those lesser immortals almost jovial by contrast. When he got back near the underground hangar in front of which he had left his runabout, he skirted around it, not wishing to see anyone as yet. He continued on.

Presently he found his way blocked by a solid grey mass of granite which labored on up out of sight in the mist. A series of flights of steps, cleverly shaped to blend into the natural rock, wound up through its folds. There was a small sign at the foot of these stairs: MORO ROCK. He recognized it, both from pictures and a brief glimpse he had had of it through the fog in landing. It was a great grey solid mass of stone, peak-high and mountain-wide, a fit place for a Sabbat.

He started to climb. Presently the trees were gone. There was nothing but himself, the grey mist, and the grey rock. His feeling for up-and-down grew shaky, he had to watch his feet and the steps to hang on to it.

Once he shouted. The sound was lost and nothing came back.

The way led along a knife edge, on the left a sheer flat slide of rock, on the right bottomless empty grey nothingness. The wind cut cold across it. Then the path climbed the face of the rock again.

He began to hurry; he had reached a decision. He could not hope to emulate the serene, eternal certainty of the old tree-he was not built for it. Nor was he built, he felt sure, for the life he knew. No need to go back to it, no need to face it out with Hamilton nor McFee, whichever won their deadly game. Here was a good place, a place to die with clean dignity.

There was a clear drop of a thousand meters down the face of the rock.

He reached the top at last and paused, a little breathless from his final exertion. He was ready and the place was ready-when he saw that he was not alone. There was another figure, prone, resting on elbows, looking out at the emptiness.

He turned, and was about to leave. His resolution was shaken by another's presence. He felt nakedly embarrassed.

Then he turned and looked at him. Her gaze was friendly and unsurprised. He recognized her-without surprise, and was surprised that he had not been. He saw that she recognized him.

"Oh, hello," he said stupidly.

"Come sit down," she answered.

He accepted silently, and squatted beside her. She said nothing more at the time, but remained resting on one elbow, watching him-not narrowly, but with easy quietness. He liked it. She gave out warmth, as the redwoods did.

Presently she spoke. "I intended to speak to you after the dance. You were unhappy."

"Yes. Yes, that is true."

"You are not unhappy now."

"No," he found himself saying and realized with a small shock that it was true. "No, I am happy now."

They were silent again. She seemed to have no need for small speech, nor for restless movement. He felt calmed by her manner himself, but his own calm was not as deep. "What were you doing here?" he asked.

"Nothing. Waiting for you, perhaps." The answer was not logical, but it pleased him.

Presently the wind became more chill and the fog a deeper grey. They started down. The way seemed shorter this time. He made a show of helping her, and she accepted it, although she was more surefooted than he and they both knew it. Then they were on the floor of the forest and there was no further excuse to touch her hand or arm.

They encountered a group of mule deer-a five-point-buck who glanced at them and returned to the serious business of eating, his dignity undisturbed; two does who accepted them with the calm assurance of innocence long protected; and three fawns. The does were passively friendly, but enjoyed being scratched, especially behind their ears.

The fawns were skittishly curious. They crowded around, stepping on their feet and nuzzling their clothes, then would skitter away in sudden alarm at an unexpected movement, their great soft ears flopping foolishly.

The girl offered them leaves plucked from a shrub, and laughed when her fingers were nibbled. Monroe-Alpha tried it and smiled broadly-the nibbling tickled. He would have liked to have wiped his fingers, but noticed that she did not, and refrained.

He felt a compulsion to unburden himself to her, as they walked along, and tried to, stumbling. He stopped long before he had made himself clear, and looked at her, half expecting to see disgusted disapproval in her eyes. There was none. "I don't know what it is you have done," she said, "but you haven't been bad. Foolish, perhaps, but not bad." She stopped, looked a little puzzled, and added reflectively, "I've never met any bad people."

He tried to describe some of the ideals of the Survivors Club. He spoke of the plans for dealing with the control naturals as being the easiest and clearest to explain. No inhumanity, a bare minimum of necessary coercion, a free choice between a simple sterilizing operation and a trip to the future-all this in the greater interest of the race. He spoke of these things as something that might be done if the people were wise enough to accept it.

She shook her head. "I don't think I would care for it," she said gently, but with clear finality. He dropped the subject.

He was surprised when it became dark. "I suppose we should hurry on to the lodge," he said.

"The lodge is closed." That was true, he remembered. The Park was closed; they were not supposed to be there. He started to ask her if she had a skycar there, or had she come up through the tunnel, but checked himself. Either way, she would be leaving him. He did not want that; he himself was not pressed for time-his forty-eight hours would not be up until the morrow. "I saw some cabins as I came this way," he suggested.

They found them, nestling half hidden in a hollow. They were unfurnished and, quite evidently out of service, but strong and weather-tight. He rummaged around in the cupboards and found a little glow-heater with more than enough charge showing on its dial for their needs. Water there was, but no food. It did not matter.

There were not even cushion beds available, but the floor was warm and clean. She lay down, seemed to nestle out a bed in the floor as an animal might, said, "Good night," and closed her eyes. He believed that she went to sleep at once.

He expected to find it hard to get to sleep, but he fell asleep before he had time to worry about it.

When he awoke it was with a sense of well-being such as he had not enjoyed in many days-months. He did not attempt to analyze it at once, but simply savored it, wallowed in it, stretching luxuriously while his soul fitted itself, catlike, back into its leasehold.

Then he caught sight of her face, across the cabin floor, and knew why he felt cheerful. She was still asleep, her head cradled on the curve of her arm. Bright sun flooded in through the window and illuminated her face. It was, he decided, not necessarily a beautiful face, although he could find no fault with it. Its charm lay more in a childlike quality, a look of fresh wonder, as if she greeted each new experience as truly new and wholly delightful-so different, he thought, from the jaundiced melancholy he had suffered from.

Had suffered from. For he realized that her enthusiasm was infectious, that he had caught it, and that he owed his present warm elation to her presence.

He decided not to wake her. He had much to think of, anyhow, before he was ready to talk with another. He saw now that his troubles of yesterday had been sheer funk. McFee was a careful commander; if McFee saw fit to leave him off the firing line, he should not complain or question. The Whole was greater than the parts. McFee's decision was probably inspired by Felix, anyhow-from the best of intentions.

Good old Felix! Misguided, but a good sort anyhow. He would have to see if he couldn't intercede for Hamilton, in the reconstruction. They could not afford to hold grudges-the New Order had no place for small personal emotions. Logic and science.

There would be much to be done and he could still be useful. The next phase started today-rounding up control naturals, giving them their choice of two humane alternatives. Questioning public officials of every sort and determining whether or not they were temperamentally suited to continue to serve under the New Order. Oh, there was much to be done-he wondered why he had felt yesterday that there was no place for him.

Had he been as skilled in psychologies as he was in mathematics he might possibly have recognized his own pattern for what it was-religious enthusiasm, the desire to be a part of a greater whole and to surrender one's own little worries to the keeping of an over-being. He had been told, no doubt, in his early instruction, that revolutionary political movements and crusading religions were the same type-form process, differing only in verbal tags and creeds, but he had never experienced either one before. In consequence, he failed to recognize what had happened to him. Religious frenzy? What nonsense-he believed himself to be an extremely hard-headed agnostic.

She opened her eyes, saw him and smiled, without moving. "Good morning," she said.

"Good morning, good morning," he agreed. "I neglected to ask your name yesterday."

"My name is Marion," she answered. "What is yours?"

"I am Monroe-Alpha Clifford."

"'Monroe-Alpha,'" she mused. "That's a good line, Clifford. I suppose you-" She got no further with her remark; her expression was suddenly surprised; she made two gasping quick intakes of breath, buried her face in her hands, and sneezed convulsively.

Monroe-Alpha sat up abruptly, at once alert and no longer happy. She? Impossible!

But he faced the first test of his new-found resolution firmly. It was going to be damned unpleasant, he realized, but he had to do it. The Whole is greater than the parts.

He even derived unadmitted melancholy satisfaction from the realization that he could do his duty, no matter how painful. "You sneezed," he said accusingly.

"It was nothing," she said hastily. "Dust-dust and the sunshine."

"Your voice is thick. Your nose is stopped up. Tell me the truth. You're a 'natural'-aren't you?"

"You don't understand," she protested. "I'm a-oh, dear!" She sneezed twice in rapid succession, then left her head bowed.

Monroe-Alpha bit his lip. "I hate this as much as you do," he said, "but I'm bound to assume that you are a control natural until you prove the contrary."

"Why?"

"I tried to explain to you yesterday. I've got to take you in to the Provisional Committee-what I was talking about is already an established fact."

She did not answer him. She just looked. It made him still more uncomfortable. "Come now," he said. "No need to be tragic about it. You won't have to enter the stasis. A simple, painless operation that leaves you unchanged-no disturbance of your endocrine balance at all. Besides, there may be no need for it. Let me see your tattoo."

Still she did not answer. He drew his gun and levelled it at her. "Don't trifle with me. I mean it." He lowered his sights and pinged the floor just in front of her. She flinched back from the burnt wood and the little puff of smoke. "If you force me, I'll burn you. I'm not joking. Let me see your tattoo."

When still she made no move, he got up, went to her, grabbed her roughly by the arm, dragging her to her feet. "Let's see your tattoo."

She hesitated, then shrugged her shoulders. "All right ... but you'll be sorry." She lifted her left arm. As he lowered his head to read the figures tattooed near the arm pit she brought her hand down sharply near the wrist joint of his right hand. At the same instant her right fist made a painful surprise in the pit of his stomach.

He dropped his gun.

He dived after the gun before it had clattered to a stop and was up after her. But she was already gone. The cabin door stood open, framing a picture of sugar pines and redwoods, but no human figure. A bluejay cursed and made a flicker of blue; nothing else moved.

Monroe-Alpha leaped to the door and looked both ways, covering the same arc with his weapon, but the Giant Forest had swallowed her. She was somewhere close at hand, of course; her flight had disturbed the jay. But where? Behind which of fifty trees? Had there been snow on the ground he would have known, but the snow had vanished, except for bedraggled hollows, and the pine needles carpet of an evergreen forest left no tracks perceptible to his untrained eye-nor was it cluttered with undergrowth to impede and disclose her flight.

He cast around uncertainly like a puzzled hound. He caught a movement from the corner of his eye, turned, saw a flash of white, and fired instantly.

He had hit-that was sure. His target had fallen behind a baby pine which blocked his view, thrashed once, and was quiet. He went toward the little tree with reluctant steps, intending to finish her off mercifully, if, by chance, his first bolt had merely mutilated her.

It was not she, but a mule deer fawn. His charge had burnt away half the rump and penetrated far up into the vitals. The movement he had seen and heard could have been no more than dying reflex. Its eyes were wide open, deer soft, and seemed to him to be filled with gentle reproach. He turned away at once, feeling a little sick. It was the first non-human animal he had ever killed.

He spent only a few minutes more searching for her. His sense of duty he quieted by telling himself that she stood no chance of getting away here in a mountain forest anyhow, infected, as he knew her to be, with a respiratory ailment. She would have to give up and turn herself in.

Monroe-Alpha did not return to the cabin. He had left nothing there, and he assumed that the little glow-heater which had kept them warm through the night was equipped with automatic cut-off. If not, no matter-it did not occur to him to weigh his personal convenience against the waste involved. He went at once to the parking lot underground where he found his runabout, climbed in, and started its impeller. There was an immediate automatic response from the Park's traffic signal system, evidenced by glowing letters on the runabout's annunciator: NO CRUISING OVER GIANT FOREST-ANGLE THREE THOUSAND AND SCRAMBLE. He obeyed without realizing it; his mind was not on the conning of the little car.

His mind was not on anything in particular. The lethargy, the bitter melancholy, which had enervated him before the beginning of the Readjustment, descended on him with renewed force. For what good? To what purpose was this blind senseless struggle to stay alive, to breed, to fight? He drove the little capsule as fast as its impeller would shove it straight for the face of Mount Whitney, with an unreasoned half-conscious intention of making an ending there and then.

But the runabout was not built to crash. With the increase in speed the co-pilot extended the range of its feelers; the klystrons informed the tracker; solenoids chattered briefly and the car angled over the peak.