He locked the door and followed her down the walk. She turned as he came up to her.

  “It’s a nice house,” she murmured.

  “Don’t think about it,” he said.

  They turned their backs on their home and got in the ground car.

  “Did you lock it?” asked the neighbor.

  “Yes.”

  The neighbor smiled wryly. “So did we,” he said. “I tried not to, but then I had to go back.”

  They moved through the quiet streets. The edges of the sky were beginning to redden. The neighbor’s wife and the four children were in back. His wife and the neighbor were in front with him.

  “Going to be a nice day,” said the neighbor.

  “I suppose so,” he said.

  “Have you told your children?” the neighbor asked softly.

  “Of course not.”

  “I haven’t, I haven’t,” insisted his neighbor, “I was just asking.”

  “Oh.”

  They rode in silence a while.

  “Do you ever get the feeling that we’re … running out?” asked the neighbor.

  He tightened. “No,” he said. His lips pressed together. “No.”

  “I guess it’s better not to talk about it,” his neighbor said hastily.

  “Much better,” he said.

  As they drove up to the guardhouse at the gate, he turned to the back.

  “Remember,” he said. “Not a word from any of you.”

  The guard was sleepy and didn’t care. The guard recognized him right away as the chief test pilot for the new ship. That was enough. The family was coming down to watch him off, he told the guard. That was all right. The guard let them drive to the ship’s platform.

  The car stopped under the huge columns. They all got out and stared up.

  Far above them, its nose pointed toward the sky, the great metal ship was beginning to reflect the early morning glow.

  “Let’s go,” he said. “Quickly.”

  As they hurried toward the ship’s elevator, he stopped for a moment to look back. The guardhouse looked deserted. He looked around at everything and tried to fix it all in his memory.

  He bent over and picked up some dirt. He put it in his pocket.

  “Good-bye,” he whispered.

  He ran to the elevator.

  The doors shut in front of them. There was no sound in the rising cubicle but the hum of the motor and a few self-conscious coughs from the children. He looked at them. To be taken so young, he thought, without a chance to help.

  He closed his eyes. His wife’s arm rested on his arm. He looked at her. Their eyes met and she smiled at him.

  “It’s all right,” she whispered.

  The elevator shuddered to a stop. The doors slid open and they went out. It was getting lighter. He hurried them along the enclosed platform.

  They all climbed through the narrow doorway in the ship’s side. He hesitated before following them. He wanted to say something fitting the moment. It burned in him to say something fitting the moment.

  He couldn’t. He swung in and grunted as he pulled the door shut and turned the wheel tight.

  “That’s it,” he said. “Come on, everybody.”

  Their footsteps echoed on the metal decks and ladders as they went up to the control room.

  The children ran to the ports and looked out. They gasped when they saw how high they were. Their mothers stood behind them, looking down at the ground with frightened eyes.

  He went up to them.

  “So high,” said his daughter.

  He patted her head gently. “So high,” he repeated.

  Then he turned abruptly and went over to the instrument panel. He stood there hesitantly. He heard someone come up behind him.

  “Shouldn’t we tell the children?” asked his wife. “Shouldn’t we let them know it’s their last look?”

  “Go ahead,” he said. “Tell them.”

  He waited to hear her footsteps. There were none. He turned. She kissed him on the cheek. Then she went to tell the children.

  He threw over the switch. Deep in the belly of the ship, a spark ignited the fuel. A concentrated rush of gas flooded from the vents. The bulkheads began to shake.

  He heard his daughter crying. He tried not to listen. He extended a trembling hand toward the lever, then glanced back suddenly. They were all staring at him. He put his hand on the lever and threw it over.

  The ship quivered a brief second and then they felt it rush along the smooth incline. It flashed up into the air, faster and faster. They all heard the wind rushing past.

  He watched the children turn to the ports and look out again.

  “Good-bye,” they said. “Good-bye.”

  He sank down wearily at the control panel. Out of the comer of his eyes he saw his neighbor sit down next to him.

  “You know just where we’re going?” his neighbor asked.

  “On that chart there.”

  His neighbor looked at the chart. His eyebrows raised.

  “In another solar system,” he said.

  “That’s right. It has an atmosphere like ours. We’ll be safe there.”

  “The race will be safe,” said his neighbor.

  He nodded once and looked back at his and his neighbor’s family. They were still looking out the ports.

  “What?” he asked.

  “I said,” the neighbor repeated, “which one of these planets is it?”

  He leaned over the chart, pointed.

  “That small one over there,” he said. “Near that moon.” “This one, third from the sun?”

  “That’s right,” he said. “That one. Third from the sun.”

  XX —

  LOVER WHEN YOU’RE NEAR ME

  THE SILVERY welded ship came rushing backwards through the veils of broken cloud, tobogganing down the atmosphere of Station Four. Fires of deceleration jetted red from the reactor ports, roaring their hurricane thrust against the clutch of gravity.

  Air thickened; the glittering rocket speck slid easier, settling itself downward like a parachuting missile. Sunlight splashed its metal sides with light and the blue ocean waters billowed wide to swallow it. The ship dipped in a wide arc and backed down toward the reddish-green clad land.

  Inside its tiny cabin, the three men lay strapped and waiting for the shock of contact. Their eyes were closed, their hands tight and blood-drained. Muscle blocks struggled against the drag.

  The earth swept up and blocked its way; the ship settled hard on its rear braces, trembling. Then, in an instant, it stood motionless and silent, successfully navigated through a thousand billion miles of vacuumed night.

  A quarter mile away were the warehouse, the village and the house.

  Critical. That was the official record. It was supposed to be secret but David Lindell knew it; all the Wentner men had known it. Station Four The Birds and the Three-Moon Psycho Ward. That was scuttlebutt and to be taken with a fistful of salt. Lindell knew that too.

  But it all meant something; the laughter, the ribbing, the silence from upstairs. They put a man on other stations for two years at a clip. Here on Four it was only for six months. That meant something. It adds up they used to say in the briefing room on Earth. Wentner’s Interstellar Trading Company doesn’t break its heart for nothing. And Lindell believed it.

  “But like I always say,” he said, “it’s no use worrying myself.”

  He said it to Martin, the ship’s co-pilot as the two of them trudged across the wide meadow toward the distant compound carrying Lindell’s luggage.

  “You have the right idea,” said Martin. “Don’t worry yourself.”

  “That’s what I always say,” said Lindell.

  After a while they passed the silent gargantuan warehouse. The sliding doors were half open and, inside, Lindell could see the concrete floor empty and sunlight filtering through the skylight. Martin told him the cargo ship had emptied it out a few weeks before. Lindell grunted and shifted his luggage.

  “Where are the workers?” he asked.

  Martin gestured his helmeted head toward the workers’ village about three hundred yards away. There was no sound from the low-slung white dwellings methodically arranged to form three sides of a rectangle. The windows blinked fiercely in the sunlight.

  “Guess they’re sacked out,” Martin judged. “They sleep a lot when work is done. You’ll see them tomorrow when shipments start coming in again.”

  “Got their families with them?” Lindell asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Thought it was company policy.”

  “Not here. The Gnees don’t have much family life. Too few men and they’re all pretty dumb.”

  “Great,” Lindell said. “Dandy.” He shrugged. “Well, it’s no use worrying myself about it.”

  While they were on the stairs to the hallway of the house, he asked Martin where Corrigan was.

  “He went home with the cargo ship,” Martin said. “They do that once in a while. There’s nothing here to do anyway after the goods are picked up.”

  “Oh,” said Lindell. “What’s this door?” He kicked it open and looked in at the combination livingroom-library.

  “AH the comforts of,” he said.

  “More,” said Martin, looking over Lindell’s shoulder. “Over there you have a movie projector and a tape recorder.”

  “Swell,” Lindell said. “I can talk to myself legal.” Then he grimaced. “Let’s dump these bags. My arms are falling off.”

  They shuffled down the hall and Lindell glanced into the small kitchen as they passed. It was porcelain paneled and well kept.

  “Can this Gnee woman cook?” he asked.

  “From what I hear,” said Martin, “you’ll be packing it in like a king.”

  “Glad to hear it. Say, incidentally, you got any idea why they call this joint the Three-Moon Psycho Ward?”

  “Who calls it?”

  “The boys back on Earth.”

  “The boys are all wet. You’ll like it here.”

  “But why is it only a six month stint?”

  “Here’s your bedroom,” Martin said.

  As they entered, she was making the bed, her back turned to the door. They thumped down the bags and she turned.

  Lindell’s hands twitched. Oh well, he rallied, I’ve seen worse in my day.

  She wore a heavy robe fastened at the neck and falling to the floor like a truncated cone of cloth. All he could see was her head.

  It was a squat, coarsely-grained head, pink and hairless. Like the mottled belly of an expecting bitch, he decided. For ears there were cavities on the sides of her flat, chinless face. Her nose was a stub, single nostriled. Her lips were thick and monkey-like, outlining a small circle of mouth. Hello Beautiful, Lindell decided not to say.

  She came across the room quietly and he blinked at her eyes. Then she placed a moist, spongy hand in his.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “She can’t hear,” Martin said. “Telepathic.”

  “That’s right, I forgot.” Hello, he thought, and Hello came back the answering welcome. It is good to have you.

  “Thanks,” he said. She seemed a decent kid, he thought to himself; weird but homey. A question touched his brain like a timid hand.

  “Yeah, sure,” he said. Yes, he added in his mind.

  “What’s that?” Martin asked.

  “She asked if she should unpack, I think.” Lindell slumped down on the bed. “Ahhh,” he said. “This I like.” He pushed exploring fingers into the mattress.

  “Say, how do you know it’s a she?” he asked when he and Martin were walking back down the hall while the Gnee woman unpacked.

  “The robe. The males don’t wear robes.”

  “That’s all?”

  Martin grinned. “A few other things of absolutely no interest to you.”

  They moved into the livingroom and Lindell tried out the easy chair for size. He leaned back and stroked the arms with satisfied fingers.

  “Critical or no,” he said, “this station has ’em all beat for comfort.”

  He sat there, momentarily reflecting on her eyes. They were huge eyes, covering a full third of her face; like big glass saucers with dark cup rings for pupils. And they were moist; bowls of liquid. He shrugged and let it go. So what, he thought, it’s nothing.

  “Hah? What?” he asked, hearing Martin’s voice.

  “I said—be careful.” Martin was holding up a shiny gas pistol. “This is loaded,” he warned.

  “Who needs it?”

  “You won’t. Just standard equipment.” Martin put it back in the desk drawer and shoved the drawer back in. “And you know where all your books are,” he said. “The warehouse office is set up like all the other station offices.” Lindell nodded.

  Martin glanced at his watch. “Well, I have to be going.”

  “Let’s see,” he continued as he and Lindell started for the door. “Anything else to tell you? You know the rule about not harming the people, of course?”

  “Who’s gonna harm—whoops!”

  They’d almost knocked her over as they exited from the room. She jumped back one more bouncey step and stared at them, eyes wide and frightened.

  “Take it easy, kiddo,” Lindell soothed. “What’s up?”

  Eat? The thought cringed before him like a beggar at the back door of his mind. He pursed his lips and nodded. “You took the words right out of my head.”

  He looked at her and concentrated. I’ll be back as soon as I walk the co-pilot back to his ship. Make something good.

  She nodded violently and rushed toward the kitchen.

  “Where’s she off to like a bat?” Martin asked as they turned for the stairs and Lindell told him.

  “That’s what I call service deluxe,” he said, chuckling, as they descended. “This telepathy is okay. At the other stations it was either learn half the language to get a ham sandwich or try and teach ’em English so I wouldn’t starve. Either way I really had to sweat for my supper until things got settled.”

  He looked pleased. “This is hot,” he said.

  Their heavy boots crushed down the tall crisp blue grass as they approached the upright ship. Martin held out his hand. “Take it easy, Lindell. See you in six.”

  “Right enough. Give old man Wentner a kick in the pants for me.”

  “Will do.”

  He watched the co-pilot dwindle in size ascending the metal ladder to the hatchway. A midget Martin pulled himself into the ship and clanged the metal port shut behind himself. Lindell waved back at the tiny figure at the port and then turned and ran away to escape the blast.

  He stood on a hill underneath the heavy scarlet foliage of a tree. Inside the ship’s belly he heard a liquid cough, a rush of exploding gasses. He watched the ship hang for a moment on its flaming exhaust and then flash up into the green-blue sky, leaving scorched plant life in its wake. In a moment it was gone.

  He walked in lazy strides back toward the house, gazing appreciatively at the profusion of livid plants and flowers in the meadow around him, bulbous insects hanging over them.

  He took off his jacket and let it hang from one hand as he walked. The sun felt good on his lean back.

  “Boys,” he said to the fragrant air. “You’re all wet.”

  The great blazing sun was almost gone, spraying the sky with the blood of its cyclic dying. Soon the three moons would rise; guaranteed to drive insane a man looking for a shadow to call his own.

  Lindell sat at the livingroom window gazing out over the countryside. You couldn’t beat it, he thought; for air or climate or all the things that grew in Earth’s paling technicolor. Nature had outdone herself in this tucked away comer of the galaxy. He sighed and stretched, wondering about supper.

  Drink?

  He started, chopping a yawn in half, and drew his fingers together so fast that the knuckle bones crackled.

  He saw her standing at his side, proffering a tray with a glass on it. He reached for it,- feeling his heart placate itself after the initial jolt.

  “I’d knock or something,” he suggested. The big eyes were elliptical now. They stared at him without comprehension.

  “Well, let it go,” he said, after a sip of the warm tangy liquid. He smacked his lips and took another sip, a long one.

  “Damn good,” he said. “Thanks, Lover.”

  He blinked at himself. That brings a guy up short, he decided. Lover? Of all the unlikely names in the universe— He glanced at her with a chuckle bubbling up in his throat.

  She hadn’t moved. Her face was screwed up into what he assumed was a smile. But her mouth wasn’t designed for smiling.

  “Hey, when are we eating?” he asked, feeling an edge uncomfortable under the unmoving gaze of her watery eye globes.

  She turned and hurried to the door. There she turned. All ready already, he got the message.

  He grinned, downed the drink, got up and followed her eager shuffle down the dim hallway.

  He pushed away the plate with a sigh and leaned back in the chair.

  “That’s what I call good,” he said.

  Like a hidden spring, he felt her pleasure well up in his mind. Lover thanks you. She certainly picked up the name fast, he thought. She looked at him, eyes wide. Was she trying to smile again, he wondered? To him the expression looked like all her others; the facial poses of an idiot. He thought she was smiling though because of the thoughts that accompanied the expression.

  Then he found his eyes watering in empathy and he turned his head, blinking. A trifle nervously, he dumped a teaspoon of sugar in his coffee and stirred. He could feel her eyes on him. A twinge of displeasure marred his thoughts and she turned away abruptly. That’s better, he thought, and felt all right again.

  “Hey, tell me Lover,” he started to say. Well, might as well get used to it, he figured. You have a husband? Her returned thoughts were confused.

  A mate? he reworded.

  Oh, yes.

  In the workers’ village?

  They have no mates, she answered and he thought he sensed a note of hauteur in her reply.

  He shrugged and took a sip of coffee. “Well,” he said to himself, “one satisfied worker would drive the rest of ’em crazy anyway. They’d be biting their nails if they had nails. And on that note, good night.”