Gateway - Frederik Pohl Page 0,105

got out."

And I think of something and look at my watch. "Speaking of time, my hour's been up for the last five minutes!"

"I have no other appointments this afternoon, Rob."

I stare. "What?"

Gently:

"I cleared my calendar before your appointment, Rob."

I don't say "Holy Christ" again, but I surely think it. "This makes me feel right up against the wall, Sigfrid!" I say angrily.

"I am not forcing you to stay past your hour, Rob. I am pointing out that you have that option if you choose."

I mull that for a while.

"You are one brassbound ringding of a computer, Sigfrid," I say. "All right. Well, you see, there was no way we could get out considered as a unit. Our ships were caught, well inside the of point of no return, and there just ain't no way home from there. But Danny A., he was a sharp article. And he knew all about the holes in the laws. Considered as a unit, we were stuck.

"But we weren't a unit! We were two ships! And each of those came apart into two other ships! And if we could somehow transfer acceleration from one part of our system to the other and you know, kick part of us deeper into the well and at the same kick the other part up and out — then part of the unit could get free!"

Long pause.

"Why don't you have another drink, Rob?" says Sigfrid courteously. "After you finish crying, I mean."

Chapter 30

Fear! There was so much terror jumping around inside my skin that I couldn't feel it anymore; my senses were saturated with it; I don't know if I screamed or babbled, I only did what Danny A. told me to do. We'd backed the two ships together and linked up, lander-to-lander, and we were trying to manhandle gear, instruments, clothes, everything that moved out of the first ship into whatever corners we could find of the second, to make room for ten people where five were a tight fit. Hand to hand, back and forth, we bucket-brigaded the stuff. Dane Metchnikov's kidneys must have been kicked black-and-blue; he was the one who was in the landers, changing the fuel-metering switches to blow every drop of hydrox at once. Would we survive that? We had no way of knowing. Both our Fives were armored, and we didn't expect to damage the Heechee-metal shells. But the contents of the shells would be us, all of us in the one of them that went free — or we hoped would go free — and there wasn't really any way to tell whether we could come free in the first place, or whether what would come free would be nothing but jelly, anyway. And all we had was minutes, and not very many of them. I guess I passed Klara twenty times in ten minutes, and I remember that once, the

Dear Voice of Gateway:

On Wednesday of last week I was crossing the parking lot at the Safeway Supermarket (where I had gone to deposit my food stamps) on the way to the shuttle bus to my apartment, when I saw an unearthly green light. A strange spacecraft landed nearby. Four beautiful, but very tiny, young women in filmy white robes emerged and subjected me helpless by means of a paralyzing ray. They kept me prisoner on their craft for nineteen hours. During that time they subjected me to certain indignities of a sexual nature which I am honor-bound not to reveal. The leader of the four, whose name was Moira Glow-Fawn, stated that, like us, they have not succeeded in fully overcoming their animal heritage. I accepted their apology and agreed to deliver four messages to Earth. Messages One and Four I may not announce until the proper time. Message Two is a private one for the manager of my apartment project. Message Three is for you at Gateway, and it has three parts: 1, there must be no more cigarette smoking; 2, there must be no more mixed schooling of boys and girls at least until the second year of college; 3, you must stop all exploration of space at once. We are being watched. first time, we kissed. Or aimed at each other's lips, and came close enough. I remember the smell of her, and once lifting my head because the musk oil was so strong and not seeing her, and then forgetting it again. And all the time, out of one viewscreen or another, that immense broad, baleful