Pandora's Millions
Date: 2022-05-06T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Science fiction; Inventions -- Fiction; Space stations -- Fiction; Technology -- Fiction

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Pandora's Millions

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Title: Pandora's Millions

Author: George O. Smith

Illustrator: Paul Orban

Release date: May 6, 2022 [eBook #68004]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Original publication: United States: Street & Smith Publications, Incorporated, 1945

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/68004

Credits: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PANDORA'S MILLIONS ***

Pandora's Millions

By George O. Smith

Illustrated by Orban

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Astounding Science-Fiction, June 1945.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

"A lot has been written about mankind starving amid plenty. But never before was a civilization confronted with the prospect of luxury amid bankruptcy—"

Keg Johnson was the executive type. He was the chief executive of Interplanet Transport, a position of no mean height. Keg had become the chief executive by sheer guts, excellent judgment, and the ability to gamble and win.

Like any high executive in a culture based on a technical background, Keg was well aware of science. He was no master of the scientific method nor of laboratory technique. He was able to understand most of the long-haired concepts if they were presented in words of less than nine syllables, and he was more than anxious to make use of any scientific discovery that came from the laboratory. He knew that the laboratory paid off in the long run.

Keg Johnson was strictly a good business man. He played a good game and usually won, because he could size up any situation at a glance and prepare his next move while his opponent was finishing his preparatory speech.

So when Keg Johnson met Don Channing in the hallway of the courtroom in Buffalo, he was dangling an exact duplicate of the judge's watch—a timepiece no longer a rare collector's item.

He waved the watch before Channing's face.

"Brother," he said with a worried smile, "what have you done!"

"We won," said Channing cheerfully.

"You've lost!" said Keg.

"Lost?"

Keg's eyes followed the Terran Electric lawyer, Mark Kingman, as he left the courtroom.

"He's been trying to put you out of business for a couple of years, Don, without any success. But you just put your own self out of commish. Venus Equilateral is about done for, Channing."

"Meaning?" asked Don, lowering his eyebrows. "Seems to me that you're the one that should worry. As I said, we'll give you your opportunity to buy in."

"Interplanet Transport is finished," agreed Johnson. He did not seem overly worried about the prospect of tossing a triplanetary corporation into the furnace. "So is Venus Equilateral."

"Do go on," snapped Don. "It seems to me that we've just begun. We can take over the job of shipping on the beams. The matter-transmitter will take anything but life, so far. Pick it up here, shove it down the communications beams and get it over there. Just like that."

"That's wonderful," said Keg in a scathing voice. "But who and why will ship what?"

"Huh?"

"Once they get recordings of Palanortis Whitewood logs on Mars, will we ship? Once they get recordings of the Martian Legal to Northern Landing, who will take the time to make the run by ship?"

"Right," agreed Channing.

"The bulk of your business, my brilliant friend, comes not from lovesick swains calling up their gal friends across a hundred million miles of space. It comes from men sending orders to ship thirty thousand tons of Venusian Arachnia-web to Terra, and to ship ten thousand fliers to Southern Point, Venus, and to send fifty thousand cylinders of acetylene to the Solar Observatory on Mercury, and so forth. Follow me?"

"I think so," said Channing slowly. "There'll still be need for communications, though."

"Sure. And also spacelines. But there's one more item, fella."

"Yes?"

"You've got a terrific laboratory job ahead of you, Don. It is one that must be done—and quick! You owe it to the world, and to yourself, and to your children, and their children's children. You've brought forth the possibility of a system of plenty, Don, and left it without one very necessary item.

"Channing, can you make one item that can not be duplicated?"

"No, but—"

"Uh-huh. Now we go back to barter and exchange."

"Golly!"

"Furthermore, chum, what are you going to barter with? A ton of pure gold is the same value as a ton of pure silver. That is, aside from their relative technical values. A ton of pure radium won't bother us at all, and if we want Uranium Two-thirty-five, we make it by the ton also. Oh brother, you've really screwed the works this time."

"Now what?"

"You and your crew start looking for something that is absolutely un-reproducible. It should be a light, metalloid substance of readily identifiable nature, and it should be ductile and workable. We need a coin-metal, Channing, that cannot be counterfeited!"

"Yum. That's one for the book. Meanwhile, we'll retrench on Venus Equilateral and get set for a long, long drought."

"Check. I'm about to do likewise with Interplanet Transport. You don't know anybody who'd like to buy the major holdings in a spaceline, do you? It's on the market, cheap. In fine condition, too, in spite of the depredations of Hellion Murdoch."

"Might swap you a communications company for your spaceline, Keg."

Johnson smiled. "No dice. I'm looking for a specialized business, Don. One that will pay off in a world where there is no money!"

"What are you going to sell—and for what?"

"I'm going to sell security—for service!"

"So?"

"Those are items that your devil-gadget won't duplicate, Channing. But they're intangible. Barter and exchange on the basis of a washed-car's worth of dug postholes."

Linna Johnson looked up with some annoyance as Keg entered her room. She was a tall woman, lissome in spite of her fifty years, but the artificial stamp of the "woman-of-fashion" spoke louder than her natural charm.

"Yes?" she asked without waiting for salutation.

"Linna, I need a hundred and seventy thousand dollars."

"Remarkable. What do you want me to do about it?"

"You've got a quarter of a million tied up in baubles. I want 'em."

"Give up my jewelry?" scoffed Linna. "What kind of tramp deal have you got into this time, Keg?"

"No tramp deal, Linna," he said. "I've just sold the spaceline."

"So—you've sold your spaceline. That should have brought you in a pretty penny. What do you need more for?"

"I want to buy Fabriville."

"Who or what is Fabri ... what-is-it?"

"Fabriville. A fairly large manufacturing village south of Canalopsis, here. They have a complete village, assembly plant, stores, and all that's needed to be self-sufficient if you permit a thorough income and outgo of fabricated articles."

"Never heard of it."

"Well," said Keg dourly, "there are a lot of things you have never heard of nor taken the interest to find out, Linna. Better shell out the baubles. They won't be worth an exhausted cathode inside of a year."

"Why?"

"The economic structure of the system is about to be shot to pieces in a box. Nothing will be worth anything in money. A diamond as big as your fist will be just so much carbon crystal. I want to butter us up, Linna, before the crash. That's the way to do it."

"What is this crash coming from?"

"Don Channing and Walt Franks have just developed a gadget that will transmit articles over any distance. That shoots Interplanet. The articles—or the signal-impulses from them—can be recorded, and the recording can be used to duplicate, exactly, the same thing as many times as you want it."

"You idiot," scorned Linna, "why not just get one and duplicate your present money?"

"Merely because an operator as large as myself cannot palm off two hundred one thousand dollar bills with the serial number AG334557990HHL-6. Counterfeiting will become a simple art soon enough, Linna, but until it is accepted, I'm not going to break any laws. I can't if I'm going to shove ahead."

"But my jewels."

"So much junk."

"But everything I have is tied up in jewelry."

"Still so much junk."

"Then we're bankrupt?"

"We're broke."

"But the house ... the cars...."

"Not worth a farthing. We'll keep 'em, but their trade-in value will be zero."

"If we have no money," said Linna, "how are we going to pay for them?"

"Not going to. They'll pay for themselves. We'll send 'em back and keep duplicates which we'll make."

"But—"

"Look, Linna. Shell out. I've got to hit the market this afternoon if I'm going to grab Fabriville."

"Seems to me that getting that place is slightly foolish," objected Linna. "If nothing will have any value, why bother?"

"Oh, certain items will have value, Linna. That's what I'm working on."

"I still do not like the idea of giving up my jewels."

"If the junk is that important," exploded Keg, "I'll promise to replace them all with interest as soon as we get running."

"Promise?" whined Linna.

"Yes," said Keg wearily. "It's a promise. I've got to make an option-payment immediately. From then on in, the place will be mine."

"But if you gamble and lose?" asked Linna worriedly. "I'll lose my jewelry."

"I can't lose."

"But if the economic structure falls?"

"I can't miss. All I want to do is to get what I need before the bottom falls out. Inflation of the worst kind will set in, and the wheels will stop dead—except at Fabriville. That's where I enter the picture."

"Good," said Linna in a bored voice. "As long as I am assured of my jewelry, I don't care how you play the market. Run along, Keg. I've got a dinner engagement. May I have just a few, though? I'll feel naked without at least a ring."

"Take what you need," said Keg and was immediately appalled at the necessities of life.

An hour later, Keg Johnson was making some quiet trading and slowly but surely gaining control over the manufacturing village of Fabriville. The market was steady and strong. The traders worked noisily and eagerly, tossing millions back and forth with the flick of a finger. It was a normal scene, this work of theirs, and when it was done, they would take their usual way home to a quiet evening beside a roaring fireplace.

But this was surface quiet. Deep down below there was a minuscule vortex that churned and throbbed, and other, equally minute forces fought the vortex—and strove in a battle that was lost before it began.

Terran Electric bought a full page advertisement in every paper. A five-minute commercial assailed the ears from every radio that listened to the Interplanetary Network. A full column emerged from the morning news-facsimile machines. Terran Electric, it said, was announcing the most modern line of household electrical appliances. Everything from deep-freezers to super-cookers. Everything from cigarette lighters to doorbell chimes.

The prices they quoted were devastating.

But on page seventeen, hidden among the financial and labor-situation news, was a tiny, three-line squib that told the story to those who knew the truth. Terran Electric had just released sixty percent of their production-line labor.

Don Channing caught the squib, and headed for Evanston less than fifteen minutes after reading it.

Unannounced, Don Channing entered Kingman's office and perched himself on the end of Kingman's desk. His bright blue eyes met Kingman's lowering brown eyes in a challenge.

"Meaning?" asked Kingman.

"You utter fool," snapped Don. He lit a cigarette and blew a cloud of smoke at Kingman, making the other cough.

"Am I?"

"You idiot. How long do you think this will last?"

"Not long," admitted Kingman. "But while it does, I'm going to get mine."

"What good will it do you?"

"Plenty. Until the crash comes, I'm laying in a stock of stuff for my personal use."

"Lovely set-up," grunted Channing. "Have you started duplicating the duplicating machines yet?"

"Just today."

"Don't do it, Kingman. Venus Equilateral has all the rights sewed up tight."

"What shall I do, Dr. Channing?" asked Kingman sourly. The title grated on Don's ears and Kingman knew it.

"Stop the whole thing."

"And what are you going to do about it?" asked Kingman. "Take me to court, Channing. Go ahead. Get some litigation started."

"Oh, sure. And you'll tie the thing up for seventy years. And all the time the plant here will be duplicating the whole solar system into the worst mess it ever got itself into. Better stop until we can get something sensible figured out to take care of the conversion."

"That in itself will take ten years," said Kingman. "Meanwhile, money is still of value because the thing is not widespread. People will buy and sell, and I'm going to buy up enough to keep me and mine in the running until things settle down. You have no idea how much stuff is needed to keep a man running for ten years, Channing. Especially when you try to store it all away at once. Oh, sure. Recordings. I know. I'm making them. Also making recordings of everything that I can think of that I might like. But getting the originals takes money at the present time, and I am going to ride the inflation market right up to the peak by being one step ahead all the way."

"How?"

"When butter is ten dollars a pound, Channing, I'll be producing and selling its equivalent at fifteen."

"Very nice picture, Kingman. But it doesn't work that way. You're licked."

"Am I?"

"You're licked. You'll be no better off than any of us in the long run. What happens when everybody has duplicators in their own homes and are having their Sunday dinner coming out of the gadget complete; hot, delicious, and costlessly complete from the salt-cellar to the butter square? What price butter?"

"That'll happen," admitted Kingman. "But by the time it does, I'll be set to weather the storm."

"You make it sound very easy, Mark. But it isn't going to work that way."

"This is going to be a nice, level civilization by the time we get through it," said Kingman. "There'll be no more shopping for food. No more working thirty-five hours a week for your pay so that you can buy the niceties of life. With your household duplicator, you can make everything you need for life, Channing. The Terran Electric label on your duplicator is the label of the New Way of Living."

Channing snorted and crushed his cigarette out with a vicious gesture. "You've been reading your own advertising," he gritted. "Kingman, what do you hope to gain?"

Kingman leaned back in his chair and put both feet on the desk. "I don't mind telling you," he said, gloatingly. "Venus Equilateral is going to have the name of having invented and developed the matter transmitter and matter duplicator. That's fine. It will carry quite an honor, that reputation, up to the time that the big crash comes, when people realize that they're being trapped. Terran Electric, selling duplicators for home use at a song, will emerge as the savior of mankind. All I'm going to gain out of this is security for Mark Kingman and a big, black eye for Venus Equilateral."

Don Channing swore. He stood up. "You fool," he snapped, "you blind, bigoted fool. A little co-operation on your part would save a lot of trouble, but you prefer to let a petty quarrel ruin the entire economic system immediately. We could work this out sensibly, Kingman. Will you help?"

"No. Nothing you can say will convince me that I'm doing wrong."

"But why fire your help? That's what is going to hurt."

"I don't need a production line full of people, Channing, to sit around and watch a duplicator turn out vacuum cleaners, complete in their packing cartons."

Channing took Kingman's under ankle where they were crossed on the edge of the desk. He lifted, and the pudgy attorney went over backwards with a roaring crash, hitting his head on the carpet and spilling over backwards out of the chair onto the floor behind his desk. He arose with a roar of hate, but the door slammed behind Channing before Kingman could become coherent.

Channing returned to Venus Equilateral immediately, a trip that took four days. In touch with events by driver beam, Don heard the news advertising agencies announce the Terran Electric Duplicator of a size suitable for a medium home, complete with a recording attachment and a supply of disks. Channing gritted his teeth and stepped up the drive of the Relay Girl another notch. His first query upon reaching the Station was to Wes Farrell.

"Nothing yet, Don," answered Wes. "We've been running some very interesting experiments, though."

Channing was interested in nothing but the non-duplicatable material, but he nodded. Wes Farrell's sideline experiments often paid off more than the main line of research.

"By inserting a filter circuit in the transmission beam, we can filter out other responses," said Wes. "Meaning that we can take a cube of regular iron, for instance, and run it through. The integrated iron in the receiver is pure iron, the purity of which is dependent upon the band-pass of the filter. Using alloy selectivity disks for filters in the circuits, we can make iron that is 99.99997% pure."

"Might be useful for metallurgical work, and so forth," mused Don. "Nine-nines iron is valuable and almost impossible—and it takes a gadget that destroys value to make it. Nice paradox, that."

"Another thing," said Wes. "We re-transmit the pure iron, and heterodyne the impulses into other elements. We can start with iron and end up with any of the other elements, merely by introducing the proper heterodyning impulse."

"That's not bad."

"I've got several elements that start off where the Periodic Chart ends. The boys in the chemistry lab are investigating the properties of Venium, Channium, Frankine, Ardenium, and Farrelline right now."

"Who picked the names?" grinned Don.

"Arden."

"O.K., Wes. But keep looking for that non-reproducible substance."

"I will. It may be—"

Farrell was interrupted by the insistent call on the Station intercom for Don Channing. Don went to his office to find the Terran beam awaiting his presence. He lifted the phone and identified himself.

"This is P. L. Hughes of the Interplanetary Criminal Office," came the answer.

"I didn't do it," grinned Channing. "Besides, I gotta alibi."

"O.K.," came the amused answer. "No use talking then."

"Just a minute," said Don. "I might as well know what I'm being suspected of. Whom have I murdered?"

"No one, yet. Look, Channing, we're having a time here."

"What kind?"

"Phony money."

"So?"

"Yes. The trouble is that it isn't phony. You can always detect spurious coinage and counterfeit bills by some means or another. We have bits of nita-fluorescin in the bills that is printed into the paper in a pattern which is symbolically keyed to the issue-date, the serial number, and the identifying marks on the face of the bill. It takes a bit of doing to duplicate the whole shooting-match, but we've been getting stuff that we know is phony—but, Channing, having the original and the duplicate here on my desk I can't tell which is which!"

"Give me more."

"I have a hundred dollar bill here—two of them in fact. They are absolutely alike. They are both bona fide, as far as I or my men can tell from very complete analysis, right down to the bits of stuff that gets ground into a bill from much handling. I have coinage the same way. Isn't there something that can be done?"

"We are trying to find a substance that can not be duplicated," explained Channing. "Given time, we will. Until then, I'm helpless."

"What do you suggest?"

"I don't know. I've been hoping that we could control the situation until something sensible could be worked out. It slipped out of hand. I'd suggest that you stop operations because of the absolute impossibility of keeping your thumb on things. I'd forget the counterfeiting angle entirely and start building up a force to guard against riots, mob rules and minor, inter-community warfare."

"I think you're right," said Hughes, and Channing knew that the head of the Interplanetary Criminal Office was nodding his head.

Channing hung up the telephone and toyed with three copies of the judge's watch that were keeping identical time. He shook his head and wondered how it was all going to end.

Conversion from production line to duplicator came all over the Solar System in about ten days. Terran Electric's own staff fabricated a duplicator capable of handling an object the size of a locomotive, and plant-sized duplicators were formed, one after the other on flat cars that rolled through the maw of the huge machine. For payment, Terran Electric accepted blocks of stock in the purchasing companies, and the wealth and holdings of Terran Electric mounted high and began to look like the major company that would ultimately control all merchandising and manufacture in the System.

And thirty days after the conversion came, the wheels ground to a stop. Industry was finished. Work had ceased. Plants lay idle, nothing to do—and no one to do it for them.

Keg Johnson looked up as Linna entered. There was a worried look on her face that caused Keg to inquire immediately as to its cause.

She tossed a diamond bracelet on his desk and snorted: "That!"

Keg picked it up. "Looks all right to me," he said. "Like the real article. What's wrong with it?"

"Nothing that I can tell," grumbled his wife. "Excepting that my maid has one like it, exactly."

"I'm not too surprised," laughed Keg. "I've been warning you of that."

"But what's the world coming to? If my maid can afford a diamond bracelet like this, she won't be working for me very long."

"At that, you're probably right. I'd treat her with the most delicate of care," said Keg.

"She's my maid!"

"Look, Linna. You're not up-to-date. I can predict people sleeping in gold beds and eating from solid platinum dishes before the hysteria dies out. The economic set-up has gone to pot, Linna, and we're trying to work it out."

"But what's the world coming to?"

"It isn't a matter of what it is coming to, it's a matter of where it has gone. As best as my technicians tell me, metals will be rated in value as per their atomic number. Uranium is more expensive than lithium because the transmutation-factor is higher. It takes a little more power and more matter from the matter bank in the instrument to make uranium than lithium, ergo uranium will cost more."

"Then if this diamond bracelet is worthless, can't we get some uranium jewelry?"

"Sure—if you want it. But remember it is radioactive and therefore not to be worn too close to the skin. It isn't as bad as radium, for instance, but it is bad enough. Besides, Linna, the matter of uranium's value over lithium is a matter of a few tenths of a percent."

"Um. And how much is a pound of uranium worth, these days?"

"In Terran dollars, about forty-seven million, six hundred and fifty-two thousand, three hundred and eight."

"Are you kidding?" demanded Linna. "How can Marie afford—"

"Linna, dollars are worthless, these days. Monetary holdings are valueless. Stocks and bonds are likewise useless. Interplanet isn't shipping a thing. Terran Electric isn't selling anything. Venus Equilateral is handling sentimental messages only, and they'd be running at a loss if it weren't for the fact that they're out in space where power comes from Sol."

"But what is going on?"

"The death of an economic system."

"But why? Keg, you know I've never questioned your ability. You have always enjoyed the run of big business. Whenever I've needed or wanted anything, it has been available. I write checks and never question the balance. But this has me stopped. What has happened, specifically?"

"Channing and Franks invented a gadget that will reproduce anything."

"It is just that?"

"That and only that," said Keg.

"But it seems to me that this would make everybody live in a world of plenty."

"It will. That's why we'll have people sleeping in solid gold beds and enjoying solid silver plumbing. Platinum will have no more value than a slab of lead of the same weight. You see, Linna, when they can duplicate anything—in quantity—it includes money, stocks, bonds, and jewelry as well as radio receivers, automobiles, refrigerators, and table lamps. No one will take one dime's worth of money because it is valueless. Why should I sell my fountain pen for fifty dollars when I can make fifty dollars by pushing a button—or the other guy can make a fountain pen by pushing a button? Follow?"

"But the public utilities? What of them?"

"That's the cinder in the eye, Linna. Somebody's got to work!"

"Well, I've heard it said that somebody will like to do everything—someone will find pleasure in digging latrines if you look for him long enough."

"Not good enough. Barney Carroll likes to tinker with radio. He's good, too. But it is a hobby, and Barney's tinkering will not produce anything like a commercial receiver. Oh, it'll work, and as good as any set, but no one would have the thing in the living room because it has no artistic appeal. But say it did. Fine. Then what about the automobile boys? Has anyone ever tried to make his own automobile? Can you see yourself trusting a homemade flier? On the other hand, why should an aeronautical engineer exist. Study is difficult, and study alone is not sufficient. It takes years of practical experience to make a good aeronautical engineer. If your man can push buttons for his living, why shouldn't he relax?"

"But what are we going to do?"

"Linna, I bought this place so that we could work it out. There is one thing that cannot be duplicated."

"Yes?"

"Service."

"Meaning?"

"You can't machine-clean the house. You can't machine-invent new gadgets. You can't machine-write books, music, or moving pictures. You can't machine-maintain machinery. You can't machine-doctor a burst appendix. And so forth. You can duplicate the antiques until they have no value. Rembrandt is going to be a household word. The day of the antique is gone, Linna, and the eventual trend will be to the unique. Mark my words, there will some day be unique shops that deal in nothing but items which they can certify as never having been duplicated."

"But if service is of value," said Linna doubtfully. "How am I going to get along?"

"You'll be of service," said Keg harshly, "or you'll not get along."

"So?"

"Look, Linna. You're my wife. As my wife, you've been spoiled. That's my fault. I liked to spoil you. In the early days I couldn't spoil you because we were in no financial position to do any spoiling, but now you've become a parasite, Linna. You and your dinners and your jewels and your cars and your sleek, vacuum-brained friends. Patron of the arts! Nuts. Bum poetry, slapdash canvases, weird discordant music. No, it's not entirely your fault. I've sponsored it because I thought it gave you pleasure.

"But we're all on the same level now," he continued reflectively. "No one is any better than his brains. I've been graced. It has been my very lucky lot to be in a position where I can sway men to my will. Fabriville is mine—and yet it belongs to every man in it equally. I can't get along without them, and they can't get along without Fabriville."

"But how is it going to work out?"

"I don't know. It is tough. We have three physicians and two surgeons and a couple of high-powered diagnosticians. The question is this: How much time should Mrs. Jones demand of Dr. Hansen? She has a bit of rheumatism. Larkin, on the other hand, has a bad case of gallstones. Obviously, these two must not enjoy equal call upon Doc Hansen. Furthermore, these two must not be expected to pay the same figure."

"Pay the same figure?"

"In service, Linna. The board of strategy sits for several hours each day deciding things like this—and it is not simple. How many hours of gardening is worth removing gallstones? And what happens to Doc Hansen when he has seventeen gardeners, four butlers, nine chauffeurs, fifteen cooks, and twelve of each of the rest?"

"Um. I see."

"But how do we tackle it? Until someone gets a medium of exchange, we're forced to go on the barter-and-trade basis. Fabriville will toss out anyone who isn't paying his way by working. In return, he has free call upon the market, the manufacturing center, and the professionals. Thank God that hoarding is silly in a realm of ultra-plenty."

"But what can I do?" wailed Linna.

"Help. Go out and help in the hospital."

"But I'm your wife."

"So what?" said Keg flatly. "I'm working. I get no more for this than Joe Doakes, who is out there painting the flagpole."

"But—"

"Sure. I like to do this. But Joe Doakes always wanted to run up a flagpole on a bosun's chair and paint it. We're exactly even. At least in Fabriville, we aren't going without anything. Eventually the rest of the worlds will fall in line and there will be enough of stuff for everyone, but until that time arrives, we'll be seeing trouble."

"The rest of the worlds?"

"There'll be riots and small-town wars. I only hope we can get our fence up before they decide to call on us."

"You've sort of created an oasis here," said Linna. "But how long will it last?"

"Until Channing and Franks come up with some substance that can not be run through their own duplicator. I hope it will not be too long."

Out in the Trojan Position ahead of Venus, the famous Relay Station better known as Venus Equilateral moved in its quiet way. Like Fabriville, Venus Equilateral was self-sufficient. Furthermore, Don Channing had declared a closed corporation, and the three thousand inhabitants of the relay station were all in accord.

Business was running low. Yet the salaries went on, even increased, while prices went dropping to ridiculously low levels.

With a closed system such as Venus Equilateral, such an artificial economy was possible by mere basic control. The crime angle was nil on Venus Equilateral. With three thousand people living in a cylinder of steel three miles long and a mile in diameter, crime and general nastiness were eradicated by the simple means of making it too hard to conduct anything illegal. The citizens of Venus Equilateral were patriotic to the nth degree.

So the situation was less strained than in Fabriville. Though work moved slowly, there was still more than plenty for everyone, and the people were satisfied.

They were an unsuspicious lot, and so they did not think it off-color when a small spacecraft of the plutocrat class came circling up to the South End landing stage. The craft landed, and a tall, broad-shouldered man emerged and asked for Channing. He was escorted along a mile of car-way in the outer skin of the Station and then whipped up towards the center of the Station for five hundred feet. He was led along the broad corridor and shown the main office of the Director of Communications.

Don Channing's secretary opened the door and said: "A Mr. Laurus Towle to see you, Dr. Channing."

Don nodded.

Towle entered behind the girl, who introduced him to Don and to Walt Franks. Then she left.

And as the door closed, Towle whipped out a revolver and pointed it at Channing. Walt slid forward off his chair and brought the chair around over his head with a single, flowing motion. Towle ducked the thrown chair, faded backwards, and fired at Don.

The shot pinged against the steel wall, flaking off some of the plastic covering. Don dropped to the floor, and came up with his wastebasket, which he hurled at Towle. Towle ducked, fended it aside with his left hand, and tried to level the gun again. Walt Franks reached into an open file drawer and grabbed a large handful of papers, which he threw at Towle. They fluttered and filled the air for a moment, which distracted Towle long enough for Channing to leap over the desk.

Don and Walt closed on Towle in a high-low tackle, Don jumping at Towle's head and shoulders from the desk top while Franks hit Towle sidewise at the thigh-level in a crashing tackle. They rolled over and over and Towle lost his revolver.

The papers were still fluttering to the floor when they came to rest with Towle neatly squelched beneath Channing and Franks.

Towle tried to heave them off. Don almost knocked Towle's jaw loose with a stinging backhand slap. "Don't try," snarled Don. "You're mad—right now!"

"You stinking—"

"Shaddup," growled Channing. "And start explaining what this is for."

"I'm ruined!"

"Try it again and we'll ruin you some more," promised Don. "I have an aversion to being shot at."

"So have I," said Walt.

"He wasn't shooting at you," said Don.

"No, but I'd have been next, wouldn't I, Lazarus?"

"Laurus," snarled Towle.

"Now look," said Channing in a voice that gave no idea of softness, "you're licked from here on in. This weapon of yours is now ours, and we'll hang it in the museum with other mementos of our having been shot at. Luckily, this makes the first time that it came close. Say—you aren't an old crony of Hellion Murdoch?"

"Never heard of him."

"Good. Now, as I was saying, we've disarmed you.... Walt, take a prowl of his person and see if he has any more lethal instruments concealed thereupon ... and we're inclined to get up off the floor and resume our roles as gentlemen. Besides, I want to know what you had in mind besides assassination."

They lifted the man from his supine position and planted him roughly in an overstuffed chair. Don and Walt sat on one edge of the desk, ready to move in with the first wrong move. Don snapped the communicator and spoke to the girl outside. "Mr. Towle had a little trouble with an exploding cigar, Lorraine. No one need enter."

"Now," he said to Towle, "precisely what gives?"

"I'm ruined."

"Yup. You are. But why?"

"You ruined me."

"Me?" asked Channing. "Not that I know of."

"I'm bankrupt."

"Bankrupt?" laughed Channing.

Towle bristled at the laugh. "It's no laughing matter, Channing. For most of my life I've been saving to retire. In the turn of a wrist, you have made all my savings useless."

"Are you starving?"

"No."

"Are you homeless?"

"No."

"Are you being deprived of anything?"

"Um—no."

"Then what's all the shooting for?"

"But my savings?"

"Look, Towle. You worked hard for them, I do not doubt. But you've got just what you wanted anyway. You have a duplicator?"

"Of course. I bought it early."

"Good. Then use it and quit worrying about your savings."

"But the years of deprivation to build up that fortune."

"Tough," said Channing. "I suppose you're mad because the foolish grasshopper is now enjoying the same benefit as the ambitious ant. That's not right, I suppose. But on the other hand, why should any man be a slave to toil?"

"Man shall earn his bread by the sweat of his brow."

"Baloney. Next you'll be telling me that men were better off with a ten-hour day and a six-day week."

"They didn't seem to get into trouble as much."

"Nor did they have as much fun," said Channing. "Nor were there as many developments made in the fields of science and industry. Men slaved and worked and lived and died without ever seeing the pleasure of the country sky. The radio would have been useless without leisure to enjoy its offerings. And who will say that radio is a useless science?"

"But it is not right that I should have slaved to acquire a retirement fortune only to see it wiped out."

"Look, Towle, the whole system is undergoing a radical change in the economic structure. By the same token, Venus Equilateral is a ruined concern. We've dropped from ten million paid messages per day to a mere handful. Those we send through because we are bound by agreement to maintain service at all costs. We aren't making expenses, if you feel like hollering about money. Would you like a few million?" asked Channing suddenly.

"I have—"

"And you used your duplicator to run up your fortune first thing, didn't you?" asked Channing scathingly.

"Naturally."

"And you're sore because every one else did the same thing. Towle, you're a dope. You've been feeling very virtuous about having worked like a slave for your fortune, which would probably keep you in cakes and lodging for the rest of your life. You've been promising starvation and pauperism to anyone who bought anything that seemed the slightest bit frivolous to you. Now that the ax has slipped, you're mad because the guy who liked to ramble amid the roses is not going to starve to death as per schedule. What's wrong with you? You're not going hungry. You'll be better off than before. As soon as we get this mess ironed out, you'll be able to enjoy life as before. Your savings are safe. As soon as we get a medium of exchange that works, you'll be credited—the government took care of that as soon as the bottom fell out of the monetary system. Call 'em dollars, credits, or whathaveyous, they'll all be pro-rated and you'll then enjoy your fortune—though it won't be as much fun because no man is going to have to slave again. You're a crazy man, Towle, and as such I'm sending you back to Terra under guard. We'll let the psychologists work over you. Maybe they can make you behave."

They stood Towle up, rang and waited for a guard, and then saw the man off under the guard's eye.

And Don Channing said to Walt Franks: "Until we find a medium of exchange, there'll be the devil to pay and no pitch hot."

Walt nodded. "I'm glad we're out here with our little colony instead of where lots and lots of people can come storming at the gates demanding that we do something. Hope Keg Johnson is holding his own at Fabriville."

It was a growling mob that tramped across the desert towards Fabriville. A growling, quarreling mob, that fought in its own ranks and stole from its own men. A hungry, cold, and frightened mob that followed a blustering man named Norton, who had promised them peace and plenty if they did his bidding. His law did not include sharing among themselves, and so men fought and stole food and clothing and women.

Had the mob been anything but a shaggy, travel-weary band, Fabriville might have been wiped from the map of Mars.

It swept forward without form and like an ocean wave, it laved against the cyclone fencing that surrounded that part of Fabriville and was repulsed. A determined, well-fed band would have crushed the fencing, but this was a dispirited mob that would have sold its leader for a square meal and would have worked for the promise of a second meal in a row.

Keg Johnson came to the edge of Fabriville in a medium-sized tank that could withstand the entire mob to the last man. He ran the tank out of the gate and right to the edge of the mob, who shrank back to permit the thundering monster to pass. He stopped the tank and stood up in the top turret and spoke.

A built-in amplifier carried his voice to the edge of the mob.

"Who is your leader?"

Norton came forward boldly. "I am."

"What do you intend?"

"We want a haven. We are cold and hungry and needy."

Johnson nodded. "I can see that," he said dryly. "How did you collect this gang?"

"Most of this outfit were caught in the crash. Their incomes did not permit them to buy duplicators, and their friends were too busy running up their money to bother handing any out."

"Fine friends."

"And in the smaller cities, the attendants at the power stations left. There are a horde of dead towns on Mars today. That is why we have come here. We know that Fabriville is self-sufficient. We intend to join you."

"Sorry," said Keg. "We have no openings."

"We'll join you by force, if need be."

"Want to try it?" asked Keg, patting the twin 105-mm. short rifles that looked out over the mob.

No answer for a moment.

"I'll try appealing to your better nature," said Norton softly. "Shall we starve and shiver while Fabriville eats and is warm?"

"How willing are you to take part?" asked Keg.

"Name it."

"Then listen. We need a more sturdy fence around Fabriville. We have the material—who hasn't—but we have not the manpower. Get your mob to run up this fence, Norton, and I'll see that you are paid by giving each and every man a house-hold-size duplicator complete with a set of household recordings. Is that a deal?"

Norton smiled wryly. "And what good is a duplicator with no place to plug it in? The power stations are down all over Mars."

"In building this fence," said Keg, "you are working out the value of the duplicators. Now look, Norton, in order to make this thing tick, I want to know whether you and your motley crew are honest. There are enough of you to man every vacant power station on Mars. If you, as leader of this gang, will see to it that the stations are manned and running every minute of the day, I'll see that you are given the benefits of Fabriville's more massive duplicators. That means fliers, and equipment of that size, Norton. Are you game?"

"What are you getting out of this?" asked Norton suspiciously.

"No more than you. I can eat only so much. I can wear only so much. I can use only so much. But it is my pleasure to run things, and I like to do it. Therefore I shall run things until people decide that they want another man to run things. Until that date, Norton, you'll answer to me."

"And if I do not kowtow?"

"You don't have to. No one is going to kill you for spitting in my eye. But if you have sense, you'll see that working my way will ultimately bring you more reward than going on as an unruly mob. Replace me if you can, Norton, but remember that it cannot be done by force. I have too many real friends out across the face of Mars who won't let me be shot to pieces. I've done them the same service I'm doing you. Take it or leave it."

"Why can't we remain?"

"We have thirteen thousand people in Fabriville. To take on another ten thousand would complicate our work-system to the breaking point. We're running perilously close to chaos as it is, and we couldn't take more. If you'll set up the power stations and start small communities at these points, you'll all be better off."

"And what do I get for all this?"

"Nothing. You'll be fed and clothed and housed. That's all that any of us are. Men out there are all the same, Norton. No one has a dime. They're all bankrupt. There isn't one of them that can buy a thing—even if the stores were open. But not one of them is starving, not one of them is going unclothed, and not one of them is going without the luxuries of life, except for those communities of which you speak. Take life to them, Norton, and you'll be the ultimate gainer."

"Why do they remain?" wondered Norton.

"The duplicator will run on direct current," said Keg. "They just have a set of fully charged batteries recorded. They have a set in spare. When battery one runs down, battery two takes its place and the first thing run off is a spare battery number three, and so on. The exhausted batteries are dumped into the matter bank and re-converted. But it is not a real luxury, running on batteries. They need the high power that your stations will deliver. They need the telephone and the radio which your men can maintain. Go and seek the officials of the various companies, and tell them what you want to do. Work at it, Norton. There will be a lot of men in your gang that would rather do something else. Eventually you will be able to release them to do the jobs they are best fitted for. Until we get a medium of exchange, it is a job for job proposition. I'll add this inducement: The medical service of Fabriville is yours—providing that you and your men work with us."

Norton thought for a moment. "Done," he said shortly. "Can you give us warmth and food until we take care of the details?"

"That we can."

A stilted monster rolled out from Fabriville under its own power. Four great girdered legs supported a housing the size of a freight car, and the legs moved on small tractor treads. Out it came, and it paused just outside of the gate. A faint violet glow emerged from the bottom of the housing, and the whirling-skirling of Martian sands obscured the vastness of the space between the legs of the monster machine.

It moved again, and the original dust settled to disclose a very small but completely finished and furnished house. Around the encircling fence went the monstrous duplicator, and at each pause it dropped the carbon copy of the original house. Hour after hour it hummed, and when it completed the circle, Norton's mob was housed, fed, and clothed.

Venus Equilateral resounded and re-echoed from the force of the blast. It rocked, and precession tilted it away from its true North and South axial positioning. Men raced along the car-way to the blister laboratory and Channing led the wild rush.

The blister was gone. A shaken Wes Farrell clung to a stanchion, his face white behind the spacesuit mask. They fished him out of the wreckage and took him inside.

"What happened?" asked Don.

"Was making artificial elements," explained Wes. "Far outside of the Periodic Chart. I'd been stacking them over in a corner—they come in six-inch cubes, you know. But the last one—Bang!"

Channing shook his head. "That's dangerous," he said solemnly. "If you had a six-inch cube of every known element, would you stack 'em all side by side?"

"It might be all right—until you came to putting phosphorus on top of a hunk of iodine," said Walt.

"There's no reason to suppose that Wes didn't get a couple of very active elements side by each. We know nothing of the extra-charted elements. We can make 'em, but until we do, what can we know of them?"

"Well, we didn't lose the Station," said Walt. "And business is so punk that tossing the beams won't harm us much; we'll have to spend some time aligning the place again."

"We're all here, anyway," agreed Don, looking over the ruined blister laboratory. "But look, Wes, I think you're running on the wrong gear. Anything that can be made with this gadget can be duplicated. Right?"

"I guess so."

"What we need is a substance that will be stabilized under some sort of electronic pressure. Then it might come unglued when the matter-dingbat beam hit it. Follow?"

Wes Farrell thought for a few seconds. "We might make an electronic alloy," he said.

"A what?"

"A substance that is overbalanced as goes electrons. They will be inserted by concocting the stuff under extremely high electron pressure. Make it some sort of station that has an intrinsic charge of ten to the fiftieth electron volts, or so; that'll make queer alloys, I'll bet. Then it can be stabilized by inter-alloying something with a dearth of electrons. The two metals will be miscible, say, when liquid, and so their electron balance will come out even. They are cooled under this stress and so forth. When the disintegrator beam hits them, it will liberate the electrons and the whole thing will go plooey."

"Looks like a matter of finding the right stuff," said Walt. "Don, what about running the Station charge up as Wes says?"

"No dice. The Station is too big. Besides, the chargo-changing gear would be overworked all over the Station to maintain the charge, once made.

"Take the Relay Girl out and try it, Wes."

"Come along?"

"We don't mind if we do," grinned Walt, winking at Don. "There'll be nothing didding about business until we get a medium of exchange."

The Reverend Thomas Doylen speared Keg Johnson with a fishy glance and thundered: "A plague on both your houses!"

Johnson grinned unmercifully. "You didn't get that out of the Bible," he said.

"But it is none the less true," came the booming reply.

"So what? Mind telling me what I'm doomed to eternal damnation for?"

"Sacrilege and blasphemy," exploded Doylen. "I came to plead with you. I wanted to bring you into the fold—to show you the error of your sinful way. And what do I find? I find, guarding the city, a massive gate of mother-of-pearl and platinum. Solid gold bars on the gates which swing wide at the approach. A bearded man in a white cloak recording those who enter. Once inside—"

"You find a broad street paved with gold. Diamonds in profusion stud the street for traction since gold is somewhat slippery as a pavement. The sidewalks are pure silver and the street stop-lights are composed of green emeralds, red rubies, and amber amethysts. They got sort of practical at that point, reverend. Oh, I also see that you have taken your sample."

Doylen looked down at the brick. It was the size of a housebrick—but of pure gold. Stamped in the top surface were the words:

"99.99% pure gold. A souvenir of Fabriville."

"What means all this?" stormed the reverend, waving the brick.

"My very good friend, it is intended to prove only one thing. Nothing—absolutely nothing—is worth anything. The psychological impact of the pearly gate and the street of gold tends to strike home the fact that here in Fabriville, nothing of material substance is of value. Service, which cannot be duplicated, is the medium of exchange in Fabriville—have you anything to offer, reverend?"

"The Lord saith: 'Six days shalt thou labor—' You have destroyed that law, Johnson."

"That's no law. That's an admonition not to overdo your labor. He didn't want us laboring seven days per week. If He were running things under the present set-up, He'd be tickled pink to see people taking it easy five days per week, believe me."

"Sacrilege!"

"Is it? Am I being sacrilegious to believe that He has a sense of humor and a load more common sense than you and me?"

"To speak familiarly—"

"If I've offended Him, let Him strike me where I stand," smiled Keg.

"He is far too busy to hear the voice of an agnostic."

"Then He is far too busy to have heard that I mentioned Him in familiar terms. What is your point, reverend? What do you want?"

"A return to religion."

"Good. Start it."

"People will not come to church. They are too busy satiating themselves with the worldly goods and luxuries."

"Your particularly private sect, like a lot of others," said Keg Johnson harshly, "has been catering to the wishful-thinking of the have-nots. That used to be all right, I suppose. You gave them hope that in the next life they could live in peace, quiet, and also luxury, believe it or not. You call down the troubles of hell upon the shoulders of the ambitious, and squall that it is impossible for a rich man to get ahead in heaven. Nuts, reverend. You've been getting your flock from people who have no chance to have the pleasure of fine homes and good friends. You've been promising them streets of gold, pearly gates, and the sound of angelic music. Fine. Now we have a condition where people can have those—worldly goods—luxuries right here on earth and without waiting for death to take them there. If you want to start a return to church movement, reverend, you might start it by making your particular outfit one of the first to eschew all this palaver about streets of gold. Start being a spiritual organization, try to uplift the poor in spirit instead of telling them that they will be blessed because of it. Don't ever hope to keep your position by telling people that material made with a duplicator is a product of Hell, Devil, & Co., because they won't believe it in the first place and there won't be anything manufactured by any other means in the second place."

"And yet you have all of Mars under your thumb," scolded the Reverend Thomas Doylen. "Of what value is it to gain the whole world and lose your soul?"

"My soul isn't in bad shape," responded Keg cheerfully. "I think I may have done as much toward lifting civilization out of the mire as you have."

"Sacril—"

"Careful, reverend. It is you that I am criticizing now, not God. Just remember this, people are not going to fall for a bit of salving talk when they want nothing. You promise them anything you like in the way of fancy embroidery, but they'll have it at home now instead of getting it in heaven. Give 'em something to hope for in the way of greater intelligence, or finer personality, or better friends, and they'll eat it up.

"As far as having all of Mars under my thumb, someone had to straighten out this mess. I gave them the only thing I had worth giving. I gave them the product of my ability to organize; to operate under any conditions; and to serve them as I can. I'm no better off than I would have been to sit at home and watch the rest run wild. They'd have done it, too, if there hadn't been a strong hand on their shoulder. Where were you when the bottom fell out? Were you trying to help them or were you telling them that this was the result of their sinful way of life?"

The reverend flushed. "They wouldn't listen to my pleas that they forsake this devil's invention."

"Naturally not. Work with this thing and you'll come out all right. But you've got to revise your thinking as well as the rest of the world has had to revise theirs, or you'll fall by the wayside. Now good day, reverend, and I wish you luck."

"Your argument may have merit," said the reverend, "though it is against the nature of things to fall in with any scheme without considerable thought."

"Think it over, then, and see if I'm not correct. I don't expect any immediate change, though, until you find that your former doctrines do not fit the people's wants now."

The reverend left, and as the door closed, a wave of pain swept through Keg Johnson's body. He reached for the telephone painfully and put a call through for the doctor.

"It's here again," he said.

"O.K., Keg. You're it."

"I'm licked, all right. Can I be back in seven days?"

"Make it three days with no mention of work. In five days you can have official visitors for three hours. In seven you may be up and around the hospital. You'll not be back there for eleven days."

"I'll have to put it off."

"Put it off another day and you'll not be back at all," snapped Dr. Hansen. "Take it or leave it!"

"How do I pay?"

"We'll take it out of your hide," said Hansen. "You're under the same rules as the rest of us. You do your day's work, and you receive the same medical blessing. Do you want to hoe the garden or will you wash my car?"

"I'll wash the car."

"That's what you say. Get over here in an hour—and bring Linna with you."

"What for?"

"Someone's got to drive—and it shouldn't be you!"

"That an order?"

"Nothing else but. Official order from the medical council. You'll play or else we'll have an interne take out that appendix."

Keg realized the sageness of the doctor's order by the time he reached the hospital. He was doubled over with pain and they did not permit him to walk from the car to the front door, but came out and got him on a stretcher. He was whisked inside, leaving Linna to straighten out the details at the Incoming desk.

He went up to the operating room immediately, and the anaesthetic blacked him out and released him from both pain and consciousness.

The days that followed were hazy; they kept him drugged because his energetic nature would have prevented rapid healing. And it was four days after the operation that they gave him a quick shot of counter-drug that brought him out of the fog immediately.

There were people there.

Don Channing, Walt Franks, Wes Farrell, and Dr. Hansen.

"Hello," he said, looking up with a wry smile. "How many car-washings do I owe you?"

"Plenty, brother. I tinkered for three hours over that frame of yours. Why did they have to run through an engineering change when they got to hanging your appendix in? I had to dig for it."

"That's the trouble with this system," Keg mumbled to Don. "He'll get the same credit for tinkering with me as he would for removing the cat's appendix."

"Well, you're worth the same as any cat," grinned Walt.

"Thanks," grunted Keg. "Don't tell me that you guys were worried?"

"Nope. We came to give you a hunk of something interesting. Wes Farrell hauled it out of space, electrons, and considerable high-powered theory. Identium. Corrosion-proof, inert, malleable but hard enough for coins, and you can roll it out into ten-thousandths sheets and use it for paper money. But don't ever put it into a duplicator. It'll blow the top right off of your roof if you do. There's our medium of exchange, Keg."

"Now," breathed Keg, "we can all get back to normal. Thanks, fellows."

"The government is making the stuff in reams," said Don. "It won't be too long before you'll be able to pay Hansen what he's really worth, as well as the rest of your crew. But in spite of this trinket, Life has still made a big change. I can foresee the four-hour week right now."

"It's here and been here for some time," said Keg. "But—Hey! Linna!"

Keg's wife entered. She was clad in hospital whites and was carrying a tray.

"Hello, Keg," she said solemnly. Keg hadn't heard that tone of voice for years.

"What happened?" he asked.

"Someone had to help. I was doing nothing and so I pitched in to help Dr. Hansen when he worked on you. He said I did fine."

"Linna is a good nurse's aid," responded Hansen. "Mind if we keep her on a bit?"

"Not if she minds staying."

"I want to, Keg," she said quietly. "With Marie wearing a platinum-mounted diamond tiara to dust the house, and Briggs coming to work in a limousine—imagine the idea of a butler's chauffeur!—and as you said, people eating from gold plates and using iridium tableware, there's nothing to get long-nosed about but one's inventiveness, talent, or uniqueness."

"Linna, you're an ace," grinned Keg. He smiled up at her and said, while waving the sheet of Identium before their faces, "Do me a job, Linna. Go out and buy me back the spaceline."

"Huh?" blurted Channing, Franks and Hansen. "What for?"

"When the tumult and the shouting dies, fellers, we'll all be back in business again. Identium! The only thing you can write a contract on and not have it fouled or duplicated. The only thing you can write a check on, or use for credit. Identium—the first page of the new era—and when we get the mess cleared up Keg Johnson and company will be carrying the mail! Linna, go out and buy me back my spaceline!"

THE END.

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