long as you have to keep the blouse on, it being inside the suit, at least get that off your chest"
"Funny, funny word play! . . . I'd like to tell them, 'Look, madam, why the hell should we be interested in your damned world? We don't want to be hanging on the outside of any planet and waiting to fall off or get blown off. We don't want raw air puffing at us and dirty water falling on us. We don't want your damned germs and your smelly grass and your dull blue sky and your dull white clouds. We can see Earth in our own sky when we want to, and we don't often want to. The Moon is our home and it's what we make it; exactly what we make it. We own it and we build our own ecology, and we don't need you here being sorry for us going our own way. Go back to your own world and let your gravity pull your breasts down to your knees.' That's what I'd say."
Denison said, "All right. Whenever you get too close to saying that to some Earthie, you come say it to me and you'll feel better."
"You know what? Every once in a while, some Immie suggests that we build an Earth-park on the Moon; some little spot with Earth-plants brought in as seeds or seedlings; maybe some animals. A touch of home - that's the usual expression."
"I take it you're against that,"
"Of course, I'm against it. A touch of whose home? The Moon is our home. An Immie who wants a touch of home had better get back to his home. Immies can be worse than Earthies sometimes."
'Til keep that in mind," said Denison.
"Not you - so far," said Selene.
There was silence for a moment and Denison wondered if Selene were going to suggest a return to the caverns. On the one hand, it wouldn't be long before he would feel a fairly strenuous craving to visit a rest-room. On the other, he had never felt so relaxed. He wondered how long the oxygen in his pack would hold out
Then Selene said, "Ben, do you mind if I ask you a question?"
"Not at all. If it's my private life that interests you, I am without secrets. I'm five-foot-nine, weigh twenty-eight pounds on the Moon, had one wife long ago, now divorced, one child, a daughter, grown-up and married, attended University of - "
"No, Ben. I'm serious. Can I ask about your work?"
"Of course you can, Selene. I don't know how much I can explain to you, though."
"Well - You know that Barron and L - M
"Yes, I know," said Denison, brusquely.
"We talk together. He tells me things sometimes. He said you think the Electron Pump might make the Universe explode."
"Our section of the Universe. It might convert a part of our Galactic arm into a quasar."
"Really? Do you really think so?"
Denison said, "When I came to the Moon, I wasn't sure. Now I am. I am personally convinced that this will happen."
"When do you think it will happen?"
"That I can't say exactly. Maybe a few years from now. Maybe a few decades."
There was a short silence between them. Then Selene said, in a subdued voice, "Barron doesn't think so."
"I know he doesn't. I'm not trying to convert him. You don't beat refusal to believe in a frontal attack. That's Lamont's mistake."
Denison turned to one side, facing her. "All right," he said. "I have no objection to telling you. Lamont, a physicist back on Earth, tried in his way to alert the world to the dangers of the Pump. He failed. Earthmen want the Pump; they want the free energy; they want it enough to refuse to believe they can't have it."
"But why should they want it, if it means death?"
"All they have to do is refuse to believe it means death. The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists. Your friend, Dr. Neville, does the same thing. He dislikes the surface, so he forces himself to believe that Solar batteries are no good - even though to any impartial observer they would seem the perfect energy source for the Moon. He wants the Pump so he can stay underground, so he refuses to believe that there can be any danger from it."
Selene said, "I don't think Barron would refuse to believe something for which valid