Part 15 (1/2)

”Don't feel like that,” said young Alaric. ”I'm not in prison any longer, am I?”

”No. But you're not free of the Nowhere Journey, either. There is an unheralded special trip to Nowhere, two weeks from today, I have been informed.”

”Oh?”

”Yes, oh. I have also been informed that you will be on it. You didn't escape after all, Alaric.”

”Oh. Oh!”

”What bothers me most is that scoundrel Smith somehow managed to escape. They haven't found him yet, I have also been informed. And since my contract with him calls for ten million dollars 'for services rendered,' I'll have to pay.”

”But he didn't prevent me from--”

”I can't air this thing, Alaric! But listen, son: when you go where you are going, you're liable to find another Alaric Arkalion, your double. Of course, that would be Smith. If you can get him to cut his price in half because of what has happened, I would be delighted. If you could somehow manage to wring his neck, I would be even more delighted. Ten million dollars--for nothing.”

”I'm so excited,” murmured Mrs. Draper. Stephanie watched her on one of the new televiewers, recently installed in place of the telephone.

”What is it?”

”Our bill has been pa.s.sed by a landslide majority in both houses of Congress!”

”Ooo!” cried Stephanie.

”Not very coherent, my dear, but those are my sentiments exactly. In two weeks there will be a Journey to Nowhere, a special one which will include, among its pa.s.sengers, a woman.”

”But the study which had to be made--?”

”It's already been made. From what I gather, they can't take it very far. Most of their conclusions had to be based on supposition. The important thing, though, is this: a woman _will_ be sent. The way the C.E.L. figures it, my dear, is that a woman falling in the twenty-one to twenty-six age group should be chosen, a woman who meets all the requirements placed upon the young men.”

”Yes,” said Stephanie. ”Of course. And I was just thinking that I would be--”

”Remember those chickens!” cautioned Mrs. Draper. ”We already have one hundred seventy-seven volunteers who'd claw each other to pieces for a chance to go.”

”Wrong,” Stephanie said, smiling. ”You now have one hundred seventy-eight.”

”Room for only one, my dear. Only one, you know.”

”Then cross the others off your list. I'm already packing my bag.”

When Temple regained consciousness, it was with the feeling that no more than a split second of time had elapsed. So much had happened so rapidly that, until now, he hadn't had time to consider it.

Arkalion had vanished.

Vanished--he could use no other word. He was there, standing in the booth--and then he wasn't. Simple as that. Now you see it, now you don't. And goodbye, Arkalion.

But goodbye Temple, too. For hadn't Temple entered the same booth, waiting but a second until Arkalion activated the mechanism at the other end? And certainly Temple wasn't in the booth now. He smiled at the ridiculously simple logic of his thoughts. He stood in an open field, the blades of gra.s.s rising to his knees, as much brilliant purple as they were green. Waves of the gra.s.s, stirred like tide by the gentle wind, and hills rolling off toward the horizon in whichever direction he turned. Far away, the undulating hills lifted to a half soft mauve sky. A somber red sun with twice Sol's apparent disc but half its brightness hung midway between zenith and horizon completing the picture of peaceful other-worldliness.