Earthman was dying of boredom; Hope had become
folly. Work merely a means to avoid insanity. And
death was the great reward ... until Cragin, step-son
of darkest space, dared the Barrier; dared to soar
beyond the X Ecliptic—to the machine-planet—where
The Owners grimly governed all the fading galaxies.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories November 1953.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Earth's eyes still blinked in the bright sunlight in which theysuddenly gloried again; Earth's throats, no longer fevered and parched,still wondered at the cool feel of fresh water, which had not trickleddown them for more than five centuries. Earth's minds were stillignorant of the answer; they knew only that this was Life, althoughthey had failed by themselves in cheating Death, and had alreadycalculated the dimensions for their graves.
The small calendar on the podium said Sunday, June 9, 3024. Craginplaced a small black notebook beside it. Neither his carriage nor mienwere those of the gaunt-faced, tall-browed men of science who sat,ill-at-ease, mute, in the broadly-aisled tiers of the echo-whisperingauditorium. For Cragin was not one of them. He was young-old, somethingof slate and steel; gray, something almost of legend and of the mysteryof Deep Space itself. He had the quiet voice of all men who had livedtheir lives within arm's length of the Barrier.
"Gentlemen," he began, "I doubt if I have many of the scientificanswers you want. In calculated, scientific terms, I am not able totell you why there is water once more in the river beds, clean air tobreathe again, snow once more in winter and rain again in springtime.I know little more than the simple facts that the grass is once moregreen; that the hell-deserts have vanished. I have come here withfew heretofore unknown scientific phenomena which I know you seek toexplain the rekindling of the Sun and the replacement of Earth in itsold path around it.
"The President told me that all I say is to be recorded so that you canpick it apart with the proverbial fine-tooth comb when I'm finishedto see if I've dropped some new hint on which you can go to work. Hetold me personally that I'm your last hope for a solution to the riddleof the Change, because I'm the only living man who ever took a shipfurther than a light-year beyond the Barrier; because I've flown moreparsecs of Deep Space than anybody else; because I know more aboutwhat's out there, and what is not, than you do.
"Add what I have to tell you to the many theories you've alreadyamassed but for which you can find no scientific proof in knowledge asyou know it, and you still may not have the kind of answer for whichyou're looking. Not unless, gentlemen, the Change has taken place inmen as well as in the solar system in which their graves were oncealready dug.
"If, somehow, the little I know is sufficient to give you your answer;an answer which satisfies you completely, then the Change has been toyourselves as well as the ground upon which you walk. If it is not,then perhaps you may never have one.
"A little more than ten years ago, this is how it was...."
He opened the notebook.
"I don't think it's a runner, sir. Not unless they've found a new placein Deep Space to bootleg their water. But we're hearing English allright."
The communications lieutenant tried for a new track on the com-beamand gambled that there were a few minutes of overload time left in theamptubes. The staccato whisper faded altogether for a moment, then cameback a trifle stron