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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Anchorite, by Randall Garrett, Illustrated by
+ Schelling
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Anchorite
+
+
+Author: Randall Garrett
+
+
+
+Release Date: November 20, 2007  [eBook #23561]
+[Date last updated: January 16, 2009]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANCHORITE***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 23561-h.htm or 23561-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/3/5/6/23561/23561-h/23561-h.htm)
+      or
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/3/5/6/23561/23561-h.zip)
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+      This etext was produced from _Analog Science Fact Science Fiction_,
+      November, 1962. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
+      that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+
+
+
+
+ANCHORITE
+
+by
+
+JOHNATHAN BLAKE MACKENZIE
+
+Illustrated by Schelling
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+     There are two basic kinds of fools--the ones who know they are
+     fools, and the kind that, because they do not know that, are
+     utterly deadly menaces!
+
+
+
+The mountain was spinning.
+
+Not dizzily, not even rapidly, but very perceptibly, the great mass of
+jagged rock was turning on its axis.
+
+Captain St. Simon scowled at it. "By damn, Jules," he said, "if you can
+see 'em spinning, it's too damn fast!" He expected no answer, and got
+none.
+
+He tapped the drive pedal gently with his right foot, his gaze shifting
+alternately from the instrument board to the looming hulk of stone
+before him. As the little spacecraft moved in closer, he tapped the
+reverse pedal with his left foot. He was now ten meters from the surface
+of the asteroid. It was moving, all right. "Well, Jules," he said in his
+most commanding voice, "we'll see just how fast she's moving. Prepare to
+fire Torpedo Number One!"
+
+"Yassuh, boss! Yassuh, Cap'n Sain' Simon, suh! All ready on the firin'
+line!"
+
+He touched a button with his right thumb. The ship quivered almost
+imperceptibly as a jet of liquid leaped from the gun mounted in the nose
+of the ship. At the same time, he hit the reverse pedal and backed the
+ship away from the asteroid's surface. No point getting any more gunk on
+the hull than necessary.
+
+The jet of liquid struck the surface of the rotating mountain and
+splashed, leaving a big splotch of silvery glitter. Even in the vacuum
+of space, the silicone-based solvents of the paint vehicle took time to
+boil off.
+
+"How's that for pinpoint accuracy, Jules?"
+
+"Veddy good, M'lud. Top hole, if I may say so, m'lud."
+
+"You may." He jockeyed the little spacecraft around until he was
+reasonably stationary with respect to the great hunk of whirling rock
+and had the silver-white blotch centered on the crosshairs of the peeper
+in front of him. Then he punched the button that started the timer and
+waited for the silver spot to come round again.
+
+The asteroid was roughly spherical--which was unusual, but not
+remarkable. The radar gave him the distance from the surface of the
+asteroid, and he measured the diameter and punched it through the
+calculator. "Observe," he said in a dry, didactic voice. "The diameter
+is on the order of five times ten to the fourteenth micromicrons." He
+kept punching at the calculator. "If we assume a mean density of two
+point six six times ten to the minus thirty-sixth metric tons per cubic
+micromicron, we attain a mean mass of some one point seven four times
+ten to the eleventh kilograms." More punching, while he kept his eye on
+the meteorite, waiting for the spot to show up again. "And that, my dear
+Jules, gives us a surface gravity of approximately two times ten to the
+minus sixth standard gees."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Oberstleutnant._"
+
+"Und zo, mine dear Chules, ve haff at least der grave zuspicion dot der
+zurface gravity iss less dan der zentrifugal force at der eqvator!
+_Nein? Ja!_ Zo."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Konzertmeister._"
+
+Then there was a long, silent wait, while the asteroid went its
+leisurely way around its own axis.
+
+"There it comes," said Captain St. Simon. He kept his eyes on the
+crosshair of the peeper, one hand over the timer button. When the silver
+splotch drifted by the crosshair, he punched the stop button and looked
+at the indicator.
+
+"Sixteen minutes, forty seconds. How handy." He punched at the
+calculator again. "Ah! You see, Jules! Just as we suspected! Negative
+gees at the surface, on the equator, comes to ten to the minus third
+standard gees--almost exactly one centimeter per second squared. So?"
+
+"Ah, so, honorabu copton! Is somesing rike five hundred times as great
+as gravitationar attraction, is not so?"
+
+"Sukiyaki, my dear chap, sometimes your brilliance amazes me."
+
+Well, at least it meant that there would be no loose rubble on the
+surface. It would have been tossed off long ago by the centrifugal
+force, flying off on a tangent to become more of the tiny rubble of the
+belt. Perhaps "flying" wasn't exactly the right word, though, when
+applied to a velocity of less than one centimeter per second. _Drifting_
+off, then.
+
+"What do you think, Jules?" said St. Simon.
+
+"Waal, Ah reckon we can do it, cap'n. Ef'n we go to the one o' them thar
+poles ... well, let's see--" He leaned over and punched more figures
+into the calculator. "Ain't that purty! 'Cordin' ter this, thar's a spot
+at each pole, 'bout a meter in diameter, whar the gee-pull is _greater_
+than the centry-foogle force!"
+
+Captain St. Simon looked at the figures on the calculator. The forces,
+in any case, were negligibly small. On Earth, where the surface gravity
+was ninety-eight per cent of a Standard Gee, St. Simon weighed close to
+two hundred pounds. Discounting the spin, he would weigh about four
+ten-thousandths of a pound on the asteroid he was inspecting. The spin
+at the equator would try to push him off with a force of about two
+tenths of a pound.
+
+But a man who didn't take those forces into account could get himself
+killed in the Belt.
+
+"Very well, Jules," he said, "we'll inspect the poles."
+
+"Do you think they vill velcome us in Kraukau, _Herr Erzbischof_?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The area around the North Pole--defined as that pole from which the body
+appears to be spinning counterclockwise--looked more suitable for
+operations than the South Pole. Theoretically, St. Simon could have
+stopped the spin, but that would have required an energy expenditure of
+some twenty-three thousand kilowatt-hours in the first place, and it
+would have required an anchor to be set somewhere on the equator. Since
+his purpose in landing on the asteroid was to set just such an anchor,
+stopping the spin would be a waste of time and energy.
+
+Captain St. Simon positioned his little spacecraft a couple of meters
+above the North Pole. It would take better than six minutes to fall that
+far, so he had plenty of time. "Perhaps a boarding party, Mr. Christian!
+On the double!"
+
+"Aye, sir! On the double it is, sir!"
+
+St. Simon pushed himself over to the locker, took out his vacuum suit,
+and climbed into it. After checking it thoroughly, he said: "Prepare to
+evacuate main control room, Mr. Christian!"
+
+"Aye, aye, Sir! All prepared and ready. I hope."
+
+Captain St. Simon looked around to make sure he hadn't left a bottle of
+coffee sitting somewhere. He'd done that once, and the stuff had boiled
+out all over everywhere when he pulled the air out of the little room.
+Nope, no coffee. No obstacles to turning on the pump. He thumbed the
+button, and the pumps started to whine. The whine built up to a
+crescendo, then began to die away until finally it could only be felt
+through the walls or floor. The air was gone.
+
+Then he checked the manometer to make sure that most of the air had
+actually been pumped back into the reserve tanks. Satisfied, he touched
+the button that would open the door. There was a faint jar as the
+remaining wisps of air shot out into the vacuum of space.
+
+St. Simon sat back down at the controls and carefully repositioned the
+ship. It was now less than a meter from the surface. He pushed himself
+over to the open door and looked out.
+
+He clipped one end of his safety cable to the steel eye-bolt at the edge
+of the door. "Fasten on carefully, Jules," he said. "We don't want to
+lose anything."
+
+"Like what, _mon capitain_?"
+
+"Like this spaceship, _mon petit tête de mouton_."
+
+"Ah, but no, my old and raw; we could not afford to lose the so-dear
+_Nancy Bell_, could we?"
+
+The other end of the long cable was connected to the belt of the suit.
+Then St. Simon launched himself out the open door toward the surface of
+the planetoid. The ship began to drift--very slowly, but not so slowly
+as it had been falling--off in the other direction.
+
+He had picked the spot he was aiming for. There was a jagged hunk of
+rock sticking out that looked as though it would make a good handhold.
+Right nearby, there was a fairly smooth spot that would do to brake his
+"fall". He struck it with his palm and took up the slight shock with his
+elbow while his other hand grasped the outcropping.
+
+He had not pushed himself very hard. There is not much weathering on the
+surface of an asteroid. Micro-meteorites soften the contours of the rock
+a little over the millions of millennia, but not much, since the debris
+in the Belt all has roughly the same velocity. Collisions do occur, but
+they aren't the violent smashes that make the brilliant meteor displays
+of Earth. (And there is still a standing argument among the men of the
+Belt as to whether that sort of action can be called "weathering".) Most
+of the collisions tend to cause fracturing of the surface, which results
+in jagged edges. A man in a vacuum suit does not push himself against a
+surface like that with any great velocity.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+St. Simon knew to a nicety that he could propel himself against a bed of
+nails and broken glass at just the right velocity to be able to stop
+himself without so much as scratching his glove. And he could see that
+there was no ragged stuff on the spot he had selected. The slanting rays
+of the sun would have made them stand out in relief.
+
+Now he was clinging to the surface of the mountain of rock like a bug on
+the side of a cliff. On a nickel-iron asteroid, he could have walked
+around on the surface, using the magnetic soles of his vacuum suit. But
+silicate rock is notably lacking in response to that attractive force.
+No soul, maybe.
+
+But directly and indirectly, that lack of response to magnetic forces
+was the reason for St. Simon's crawling around on the surface of that
+asteroid. Directly, because there was no other way he could move about
+on a nonmetallic asteroid. Indirectly, because there was no way the big
+space tugs could get a grip on such an asteroid, either.
+
+The nickel-iron brutes were a dead cinch to haul off to the smelters.
+All a space tug had to do was latch on to one of them with a magnetic
+grapple and start hauling. There was no such simple answer for the
+silicate rocks.
+
+The nickel-iron asteroids were necessary. They supplied the building
+material and the major export of the Belt cities. They averaged around
+eighty to ninety per cent iron, anywhere from five to twenty per cent
+nickel, and perhaps half a per cent cobalt, with smatterings of
+phosphorous, sulfur, carbon, copper, and chromium. Necessary--but not
+sufficient.
+
+The silicate rocks ran only about twenty-five per cent iron--in the form
+of nonmagnetic compounds. They averaged eighteen per cent silicon,
+fourteen per cent magnesium, between one and one point five per cent
+each of aluminum, nickel, and calcium, and good-sized dollops of sodium,
+chromium, phosphorous, manganese, cobalt, potassium, and titanium.
+
+But more important than these, as far as the immediate needs of the Belt
+cities were concerned, was a big, whopping thirty-six per cent oxygen.
+In the Belt cities, they had soon learned that, physically speaking, the
+stuff of life was _not_ bread. And no matter how carefully oxygen is
+conserved, no process is one hundred per cent efficient. There will be
+leakage into space, and that which is lost must be replaced.
+
+There is plenty of oxygen locked up in those silicates; the problem is
+towing them to the processing plants where the stuff can be extracted.
+
+Captain St. Simon's job was simple. All he had to do was sink an anchor
+into the asteroid so that the space tugs could get a grip on it. Once he
+had done that, the rest of the job was up to the tug crew.
+
+He crawled across the face of the floating mountain. At the spot where
+the North Pole was, he braced himself and then took a quick look around
+at the _Nancy Bell_. She wasn't moving very fast, he had plenty of time.
+He took a steel piton out of his tool pack, transferred it to his left
+hand, and took out a hammer. Then, working carefully, he hammered the
+piton into a narrow cleft in the rock. Three more of the steel spikes
+were hammered into the surface, forming a rough quadrilateral around the
+Pole.
+
+"That looks good enough to me, Jules," he said when he had finished.
+"Now that we have our little anchors, we can put the monster in."
+
+Then he grabbed his safety line, and pulled himself back to the _Nancy
+Bell_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The small craft had floated away from the asteroid a little, but not
+much. He repositioned it after he got the rocket drill out of the
+storage compartment.
+
+"Make way for the stovepipe!" he said as he pushed the drill ahead of
+him, out the door. This time, he pulled himself back to his drilling
+site by means of a cable which he had attached to one of the pitons.
+
+The setting up of the drill didn't take much time, but it was done with
+a great deal of care. He set the four-foot tube in the center of the
+quadrilateral formed by the pitons and braced it in position by
+attaching lines to the eyes on a detachable collar that encircled the
+drill. Once the drill started working, it wouldn't need bracing, but
+until it did, it had to be held down.
+
+All the time he worked, he kept his eyes on his lines and on his ship.
+The planetoid was turning under him, which made the ship appear to be
+circling slowly around his worksite. He had to make sure that his lines
+didn't get tangled or twisted while he was working.
+
+As he set up the bracing on the six-inch diameter drill, he sang a song
+that Kipling might have been startled to recognize:
+
+    _"To the tables down at Mory's,
+    To the place where Louie dwells,
+      Where it's always double drill and no canteen,
+    Sit the Whiffenpoofs assembled,
+    With their glasses raised on high,
+      And they'll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din."_
+
+When the drill was firmly based on the surface of the planetoid, St.
+Simon hauled his way back to his ship along his safety line. Inside, he
+sat down in the control chair and backed well away from the slowly
+spinning hunk of rock. Now there was only one thin pair of wires
+stretching between his ship and the drill on the asteroid.
+
+When he was a good fifty meters away, he took one last look to make sure
+everything was as it should be.
+
+"Stand by for a broadside!"
+
+"Standing by, sir!"
+
+"You may fire when ready, Gridley!"
+
+"Aye, sir! Rockets away!" His forefinger descended on a button which
+sent a pulse of current through the pair of wires that trailed out the
+open door to the drill fifty meters away.
+
+A flare of light appeared on the top of the drill. Almost immediately,
+it developed into a tongue of rocket flame. Then a glow appeared at the
+base of the drill and flame began to billow out from beneath the tube.
+The drill began to sink into the surface, and the planetoid began to
+move ever so slowly.
+
+The drill was essentially a pair of opposed rockets. The upper one,
+which tried to push the drill into the surface of the planetoid,
+developed nearly forty per cent more thrust than the lower one. Thus,
+the lower one, which was trying to push the drill _off_ the rock, was
+outmatched. It had to back up, if possible. And it was certainly
+possible; the exhaust flame of the lower rocket easily burrowed a hole
+that the rocket could back into, while the silicate rock boiled and
+vaporized in order to get out of the way.
+
+Soon there was no sign of the drill body itself. There was only a small
+volcano, spewing up gas and liquid from a hole in the rock. On the
+surface of a good-sized planet, the drill would have built up a little
+volcanic cone around the lip of the hole, but building a cone like that
+requires enough gravity to pull the hot matter back to the edge of the
+hole.
+
+The fireworks didn't last long. The drill wasn't built to go in too
+deep. A drill of that type could be built which would burrow its way
+right through a small planetoid, but that was hardly necessary for
+planting an anchor. Ten meters was quite enough.
+
+Now came the hard work.
+
+On the outside of the _Nancy Bell_, locked into place, was a
+specially-treated nickel-steel eye-bolt--thirty feet long and eight
+inches in diameter. There had been ten of them, just as there had been
+ten drills in the storage locker. Now the last drill had been used, and
+there was but one eye-bolt left. The _Nancy Bell_ would have to go back
+for more supplies after this job.
+
+The anchor bolts had a mass of four metric tons each. Maneuvering them
+around, even when they were practically weightless, was no easy job.
+
+St. Simon again matched the velocity of the _Nancy Bell_ with that of
+the planetoid, which had been accelerated by the drill's action. He
+positioned the ship above the hole which had been drilled into the huge
+rock. Not directly above it--rocket drills had been known to show spurts
+of life after they were supposed to be dead. St. Simon had timed the
+drill, and it had apparently behaved as it should, but there was no need
+to take chances.
+
+"Fire brigade, stand by!"
+
+"Fire brigade standing by, sir!"
+
+A nozzle came out of the nose of the _Nancy Bell_ and peeped over the
+rim of the freshly-drilled hole.
+
+"Ready! Aim! Squirt!"
+
+A jet of kerosene-like fluosilicone oil shot down the shaft. When it had
+finished its work, there was little possibility that anything could
+happen at the bottom. Any unburned rocket fuel would have a hard time
+catching fire with that stuff soaking into it.
+
+"Ready to lower the boom, Mr. Christian!" bellowed St. Simon.
+
+"Aye, sir! Ready, sir!"
+
+"Lower away!"
+
+His fingers played rapidly over the control board.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Outside the ship, the lower end of the great eye-bolt was released from
+its clamp, and a small piston gave it a little shove. In a long, slow,
+graceful arc, it swung away from the hull, swiveling around the pivot
+clamp that held the eye. The braking effect of the pivot clamp was
+precisely set to stop the eye-bolt when it was at right angles to the
+hull. Moving carefully, St. Simon maneuvered the ship until the far end
+of the bolt was directly over the shaft. Then he nudged the _Nancy Bell_
+sideways, pushing the bolt down into the planetoid. It grated a couple
+of times, but between the power of the ship and the mass of the
+planetoid, there was enough pressure to push it past the obstacles. The
+rocket drill and the eye-bolt had been designed to work together; the
+hole made by the first was only a trifle larger than the second. The
+anchor settled firmly into place.
+
+St. Simon released the clamps that held the eye-bolt to the hull of the
+ship, and backed away again. As he did, a power cord unreeled, for the
+eye-bolt was still connected to the vessel electrically.
+
+Several meters away, St. Simon pushed another button. There was no
+sound, but his practiced eye saw the eye of the anchor quiver. A small
+explosive charge, set in the buried end of the anchor, had detonated,
+expanding the far end of the bolt, wedging it firmly in the hole. At the
+same time, a piston had been forced up a small shaft in the center of
+the bolt, forcing a catalyst to mix with a fast-setting resin, and
+extruding the mixture out through half a dozen holes in the side of the
+bolt. When the stuff set, the anchor was locked securely to the sides of
+the shaft and thus to the planetoid itself.
+
+St. Simon waited for a few minutes to make sure the resin had set
+completely. Then he clambered outside again and attached a heavy towing
+cable to the eye of the anchor, which projected above the surface of the
+asteroid. Back inside the ship again, he slowly applied power. The cable
+straightened and pulled at the anchor as the _Nancy Bell_ tried to get
+away from the asteroid.
+
+"Jules, old bunion," he said as he watched the needle of the tension
+gauge, "we have set her well."
+
+"Yes, m'lud. So it would appear, m'lud."
+
+St. Simon cut the power. "Very good, Jules. Now we shall see if the
+beeper is functioning as it should." He flipped a switch that turned on
+the finder pickup, then turned the selector to his own frequency band.
+
+_Beep!_ said the radio importantly. _Beep!_
+
+The explosion had also triggered on a small but powerful transmitter
+built into the anchor. The tugs would be able to find the planetoid by
+following the beeps.
+
+"Ah, Jules! Success!"
+
+"Yes, m'lud. Success. For the tenth time in a row, this trip. And how
+many trips does this make?"
+
+"Ah, but who's counting? Think of the money!"
+
+"And the monotony, m'lud. To say nothing of molasses, muchness, and
+other things that begin with an M."
+
+"Quite so, Jules; quite so. Well, let's detach the towing cable and be
+on our way."
+
+"Whither, m'lud, Vesta?"
+
+"I rather thought Pallas this time, old thimble."
+
+"Still, m'lud, Vesta--"
+
+"Pallas, Jules."
+
+"Vesta?"
+
+"Hum, hi, ho," said Captain St. Simon thoughtfully. "Pallas?"
+
+The argument continued while the tow cable was detached from the
+freshly-placed anchor, and while the air was being let back into the
+control chamber, and while St. Simon divested himself of his suit.
+Actually, although he would like to go to Vesta, it was out of the
+question. Energywise and timewise, Pallas was much closer.
+
+He settled back in the bucket seat and shot toward Pallas.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Edway Tarnhorst was from San Pedro, Greater Los Angeles, California,
+Earth. He was a businessman of executive rank, and was fairly rich. In
+his left lapel was the Magistral Knight's Cross of the Sovereign
+Hierosolymitan Order of Malta, reproduced in miniature. In his wallet
+was a card identifying him as a Representative of the Constituency of
+Southern California to the Supreme Congress of the People of the United
+Nations of Earth. He was just past his fifty-third birthday, and his
+lean, ascetic face and graying hair gave him a look of saintly wisdom.
+Aside from the eight-pointed cross in his lapel, the only ornamentation
+or jewelry he wore consisted of a small, exquisitely thin gold watch on
+his left wrist, and, on the ring finger of his left hand, a gold signet
+ring set with a single, flat, unfaceted diamond which was delicately
+engraved with the Tarnhorst coat of arms. His clothing was quietly but
+impressively expensive, and under Earth gravity would probably have
+draped impeccably, but it tended to fluff oddly away from his body under
+a gee-pull only a twentieth of Earth's.
+
+He sat in his chair with both feet planted firmly on the metal floor,
+and his hands gripping the armrests as though he were afraid he might
+float off toward the ceiling if he let go. But only his body betrayed
+his unease; his face was impassive and calm.
+
+The man sitting next to him looked a great deal more comfortable. This
+was Mr. Peter Danley, who was twenty years younger than Mr. Tarnhorst
+and looked it. Instead of the Earth-cut clothing that the older man was
+wearing, he was wearing the close-fitting tights that were the common
+dress of the Belt cities. His hair was cropped close, and the fine blond
+strands made a sort of golden halo about his head when the light from
+the panels overhead shone on them. His eyes were pale blue, and the
+lashes and eyebrows were so light as to be almost invisible. That
+effect, combined with his thin-lined, almost lipless mouth, gave his
+face a rather expressionless expression. He carried himself like a man
+who was used to low-gravity or null-gravity conditions, but he talked
+like an Earthman, not a Belt man. The identification card in his belt
+explained that; he was a pilot on the Earth-Moon shuttle service. In the
+eyes of anyone from the Belt cities, he was still an Earthman, not a
+true spaceman. He was looked upon in the same way that the captain of a
+transatlantic liner might have looked upon the skipper of the Staten
+Island ferry two centuries before. The very fact that he was seated in a
+chair gave away his Earth habits.
+
+The third man was standing, leaning at a slight angle, so that his back
+touched the wall behind him. He was not tall--five nine--and his face
+and body were thin. His tanned skin seemed to be stretched tightly over
+this scanty padding, and in places the bones appeared to be trying to
+poke their way through to the surface. His ears were small and lay
+nearly flat against his head, and the hair on his skull was so sparse
+that the tanned scalp could be easily seen beneath it, although there
+was no actual bald spot anywhere. Only his large, luminous brown eyes
+showed that Nature had not skimped on everything when he was formed. His
+name was lettered neatly on the outside of the door to the office:
+Georges Alhamid. In spite of the French spelling, he pronounced the name
+"George," in the English manner.
+
+He had welcomed the two Earthmen into his office, smiling the automatic
+smile of the diplomat as he welcomed them to Pallas. As soon as they
+were comfortably seated--though perhaps that word did not exactly apply
+to Edway Tarnhorst--Georges Alhamid said:
+
+"Now, gentlemen, what can I do for you?"
+
+He asked it as though he were completely unaware of what had brought the
+two men to Pallas.
+
+Tarnhorst looked as though he were privately astonished that his host
+could speak grammatically. "Mr. Alhamid," he began, "I don't know
+whether you're aware that the industrial death rate here in the Belt has
+been the subject of a great deal of discussion in both industrial and
+governmental circles on Earth." It was a half question, and he let it
+hang in the air, waiting to see whether he got an answer.
+
+"Certainly my office has received a great deal of correspondence on the
+subject," Alhamid said. His voice sounded as though Tarnhorst had
+mentioned nothing more serious than a commercial deal. Important, but
+nothing to get into a heavy sweat over.
+
+Tarnhorst nodded and then held his head very still. His actions betrayed
+the fact that he was not used to the messages his semicircular canals
+were sending his brain when he moved his head under low gee.
+
+"Exactly," he said after a moment's pause. "I have 'stat copies of a
+part of that correspondence. To be specific, the correspondence between
+your office and the Workers' Union Safety Control Board, and between
+your office and the Workingman's Compensation Insurance Corporation."
+
+"I see. Well, then, you're fully aware of what our trouble is, Mr.
+Tarnhorst. I'm glad to see that an official of the insurance company is
+taking an interest in our troubles."
+
+Tarnhorst's head twitched, as though he were going to shake his head and
+had thought better of it a fraction of a second too late. It didn't
+matter. The fluid in his inner ears sloshed anyway.
+
+"I am not here in my capacity as an officer of the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation," he said carefully. "I am here as a
+representative of the People's Congress."
+
+Alhamid's face showed a mild surprise which he did not feel. "I'm
+honored, of course, Mr. Tarnhorst," he said, "but you must understand
+that I am not an official of the government of Pallas."
+
+Tarnhorst's ascetic face betrayed nothing. "Since you have no unified
+government out here," he said, "I cannot, of course, presume to deal
+with you in a governmental capacity. I have spoken to the Governor of
+Pallas, however, and he assures me that you are the man to speak to."
+
+"If it's about the industrial death rate," Alhamid agreed, "then he's
+perfectly correct. But if you're here as a governmental representative
+of Earth, I don't understand--"
+
+"Please, Mr. Alhamid," Tarnhorst interrupted with a touch of irritation
+in his voice. "This is not my first trip to the Belt, nor my first
+attempt to deal with the official workings of the Confederated Cities."
+
+Alhamid nodded gently. It was, as a matter of fact, Mr. Tarnhorst's
+second trip beyond the Martian orbit, the first having taken place some
+three years before. But the complaint was common enough; Earth, with its
+strong centralized government, simply could not understand the
+functioning of the Belt Confederacy. A man like Tarnhorst apparently
+couldn't distinguish between _government_ and _business_. Knowing that,
+Alhamid could confidently predict what the general sense of Tarnhorst's
+next sentence would be.
+
+"I am well aware," said Tarnhorst, "that the Belt Companies not only
+have the various governors under their collective thumb, but have thus
+far prevented the formation of any kind of centralized government. Let
+us not quibble, Mr. Alhamid; the Belt Companies run the Belt, and that
+means that I must deal with officials of those companies--such as
+yourself."
+
+Alhamid felt it necessary to make a mild speech in rebuttal. "I cannot
+agree with you, Mr. Tarnhorst. I have nothing to do with the government
+of Pallas or any of the other asteroids. I am neither an elected nor an
+appointed official of any government. Nor, for that matter, am I an
+advisor in either an official or unofficial capacity to any government.
+I do not make the laws designed to keep the peace, nor do I enforce
+them, except in so far as I am a registered voter and therefore have
+some voice in those laws in that respect. Nor, again, do I serve any
+judiciary function in any Belt government, except inasmuch as I may be
+called upon for jury duty.
+
+"I am a business executive, Mr. Tarnhorst. Nothing more. If you have
+governmental problems to discuss, then I can't help you, since I'm not
+authorized to make any decisions for any government."
+
+Edway Tarnhorst closed his eyes and massaged the bridge of his thin nose
+between thumb and forefinger. "I understand that. I understand that
+perfectly. But out here, the Companies have taken over certain functions
+of government, shall we say?"
+
+"Shall we say, rather, that on Earth the government has usurped certain
+functions which rightfully belong to private enterprise?" Alhamid said
+gently. "Historically, I think, that is the correct view."
+
+Tarnhorst opened his eyes and smiled. "You may be quite correct.
+Historically speaking, perhaps, the Earth government has usurped the
+functions that rightfully belong to kings, dictators, and warlords. To
+say nothing of local satraps and petty chieftains. Hm-m-m. Perhaps we
+should return to that? Perhaps we should return to the human suffering
+that was endemic in those times?"
+
+"You might try it," said Alhamid with a straight face. "Say, one year
+out of every ten. It would give the people something to look forward to
+with anticipation and to look back upon with nostalgia." Then he changed
+his tone. "If you wish to debate theories of government, Mr. Tarnhorst,
+possibly we could get up a couple of teams. Make a public affair of it.
+It could be taped and televised here and on Earth, and we could charge
+royalties on each--"
+
+Peter Danley's blond, blank face became suddenly animated. He looked as
+though he were trying to suppress a laugh. He almost succeeded. It came
+out as a cough.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the same time, Tarnhorst interrupted Alhamid. "You have made your
+point, Mr. Alhamid," he said in a brittle voice. "Permit me to make
+mine. I have come to discuss business with you. But, as a member of the
+Congressional Committee for Industrial Welfare, I am also in search of
+facts. Proper legislation requires facts, and legislation passed by the
+Congress will depend to a great extent upon the report on my findings
+here."
+
+"I understand," said Alhamid. "I'll certainly be happy to provide you
+with whatever data you want--with the exception of data on industrial
+processes, of course. That's not mine to give. But anything else--" He
+gestured with one hand, opening it palm upwards, as though dispensing a
+gift.
+
+"I'm not interested in industrial secrets," said Tarnhorst, somewhat
+mollified. "It's a matter of the welfare of your workers. We feel that
+we should do something to help. As you know, there have been protests
+from the Worker's Union Safety Control Board and from the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation."
+
+Alhamid nodded. "I know. The insurance company is complaining about the
+high rate of claims for deaths. They've threatened to raise our premium
+rates."
+
+"Considering the expense, don't you, as a businessman, think that a fair
+thing to do?"
+
+"No," Alhamid said. "I have pointed out to them that the total amount of
+the claims is far less per capita than, for instance, the Steel
+Construction Workers' Union of Earth. Granted, there are more death
+claims, but these are more than compensated for by the fact that the
+claims for disability and hospitalization are almost negligible."
+
+"That's another thing we don't understand," Tarnhorst said carefully.
+"It appears that not only are the safety precautions insufficient, but
+the post-accident care is ... er ... inefficient."
+
+"I assure you that what post-accident care there is," Alhamid said, "is
+quite efficient. But there is a high mortality rate because of the very
+nature of the job. Do you know anything about anchor-placing, Mr.
+Tarnhorst?"
+
+"Very little," Tarnhorst admitted. "That is one of the things I am here
+to get information on. You used the phrase 'what post-accident care
+there is'--just how do you mean that?"
+
+"Mr. Tarnhorst, when a man is out in space, completely surrounded by a
+hard vacuum, _any_ accident is very likely to be fatal. On Earth, if a
+man sticks his thumb in a punch press, he loses his thumb. Out here, if
+a man's thumb is crushed off while he's in space, he loses his air and
+his life long before he can bleed to death. Anything that disables a man
+in space is deadly ninety-nine times out of a hundred.
+
+"I can give you a parallel case. In the early days of oil drilling,
+wells occasionally caught fire. One of the ways to put them out was to
+literally blow them out with a charge of nitroglycerine. Naturally, the
+nitroglycerine had to be transported from where it was made to where it
+was to be used. Sensibly enough, it was not transported in tank-car
+lots; it was carried in small special containers by a single man in an
+automobile, who used the back roads and avoided traffic and stayed away
+from thickly populated areas--which was possible in those days. In many
+places these carriers were required to paint their cars red, and have
+the words _Danger Nitroglycerine_ painted on the vehicle in yellow.
+
+"Now, the interesting thing about that situation is that, whereas
+insurance companies in those days were reluctant to give policies to
+those men, even at astronomical premium rates, disability insurance cost
+practically nothing--provided the insured would allow the insertion of a
+clause that restricted the covered period to those times when he was
+actually engaged in transporting nitroglycerine. You can see why."
+
+"I am not familiar with explosives," Tarnhorst said. "I take it that the
+substance is ... er ... easily detonated?"
+
+"That's right," said Alhamid. "It's not only sensitive, but it's
+unreliable. You might actually drop a jar of the stuff and do nothing
+but shatter the jar. Another jar, apparently exactly similar, might go
+off because it got jiggled by a seismic wave from a passing truck half a
+mile away. But the latter was a great deal more likely than the former."
+
+"Very well," said Tarnhorst after a moment, "I accept that analogy. I'd
+like to know more about the work itself. What does the job entail,
+exactly? What safety precautions are taken?"
+
+It required the better part of three hours to explain exactly what an
+anchor setter did and how he did it--and what safety precautions were
+being taken. Through it all, Peter Danley just sat there, listening,
+saying nothing.
+
+Finally, Edway Tarnhorst said: "Well, thank you very much for your
+information, Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to think this over. May I see you in
+the morning?"
+
+"Certainly, sir. You're welcome at any time."
+
+"Thank you." The two Earthmen rose from their seats--Tarnhorst
+carefully, Danley with the ease of long practice. "Would nine in the
+morning be convenient?"
+
+"Quite convenient. I'll expect you."
+
+Danley glided over to the door and held it open for Tarnhorst. He was
+wearing magnetic glide-shoes, the standard footwear of the Belt, which
+had three ball-bearings in the forward part of the sole, allowing the
+foot to move smoothly in any direction, while the rubber heel could be
+brought down to act as a brake when necessary. He didn't handle them
+with the adeptness of a Belt man, but he wasn't too awkward. Tarnhorst
+was wearing plain magnetic-soled boots--the lift-'em-up-and-lay-'em-down
+type. He had no intention of having his dignity compromised by shoes
+that might treacherously scoot out from under him.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As soon as the door had closed behind them, Georges Alhamid picked up
+the telephone on his desk and punched a number.
+
+When a woman's voice answered at the other end, he said: "Miss Lehman,
+this is Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to speak to the governor." There was a
+pause. Then:
+
+"George? Larry here."
+
+Alhamid leaned back comfortably against the wall. "I just saw your
+guests, Larry. I spent damn near three hours explaining why it was
+necessary to put anchors in rocks, how it was done, and why it was
+dangerous."
+
+"Did you convince him? Tarnhorst, I mean."
+
+"I doubt it. Oh, I don't mean he thinks I'm lying or anything like that.
+He's too sharp for that. But he _is_ convinced that we're negligent,
+that we're a bunch of barbarians who care nothing about human life."
+
+"You've got to unconvince him, George," the governor said worriedly.
+"The Belt still isn't self-sufficient enough to be able to afford an
+Earth embargo. They can hold out longer than we can."
+
+"I know," Alhamid said. "Give us another generation, and we can tell the
+World Welfare State where to head in--but right now, things are touchy,
+and you and I are in the big fat middle of it." He paused, rubbing
+thoughtfully at his lean blade of a nose with a bony forefinger. "Larry,
+what did you think of that blond nonentity Tarnhorst brought with him?"
+
+"He's not a nonentity," the governor objected gently. "He just looks it.
+He's Tarnhorst's 'expert' on space industry, if you want my opinion. Did
+he say much of anything while he was with you?"
+
+"Hardly anything."
+
+"Same here. I have a feeling that his job is to evaluate every word you
+say and report his evaluation to Tarnhorst. You'll have to be careful."
+
+"I agree," Alhamid said. "But he complicates things. I have a feeling
+that if I tell Tarnhorst a straight story he'll believe it. He seems to
+be a pretty shrewd judge. But Danley just might be the case of the man
+who is dangerous because of his little learning. He obviously knows a
+devil of a lot more about operations in space than Tarnhorst does, and
+he's evidently a hand-picked man, so that Tarnhorst will value his
+opinion. But it's evident that Danley doesn't know anything about space
+by our standards. Put him out on a boat as an anchor man, and he'd be
+lucky if he set a single anchor."
+
+"Well, there's not much chance of that. How do you mean, he's
+dangerous?"
+
+"I'll give you a f'rinstance. Suppose you've got a complex circuit using
+alternatic current, and you're trying to explain to a reasonably
+intelligent man how it works and what it does. If he doesn't know
+anything about electricity, he mightn't understand the explanation, but
+he'll believe that you're telling him the truth even if he doesn't
+understand it. But if he knows the basic theory of direct currents,
+you're likely to find yourself in trouble because he'll know just enough
+to see that what you're telling him doesn't jibe with what he already
+knows. Volts times amperes equal watts, as far as he's concerned, and
+the term 'power factor' does nothing but confuse him. He knows that
+copper is a conductor, so he can't see how a current could be cut off by
+a choke coil. He knows that a current can't pass through an insulator,
+so a condenser obviously can't be what you say it is. Mentally, he tags
+you as a liar, and he begins to try to dig in to see how your gadget
+_really_ works."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Hm-m-m. I see what you mean. Bad." He snorted. "Blast Earthmen, anyway!
+Have you ever been there?"
+
+"Earth? Nope. By careful self-restraint, I've managed to forego that
+pleasure so far, Larry. Why?"
+
+"Brrr! It's the feel of the place that I can't stand. I don't mean the
+constant high-gee; I take my daily exercise spin in the centrifuge just
+like anyone else, and you soon get used to the steady pull on Earth. I
+mean the constant, oppressive _psychic_ tension, if you see what I mean.
+The feeling that everyone hates and distrusts everyone else. The curious
+impression of fear underneath every word and action.
+
+"I'm older than you are, George, and I've lived with a kind of fear all
+my life--just as you and everyone else in the Belt has. A single mistake
+can kill out here, and the fear that it will be some fool who makes a
+mistake that will kill hundreds is always with us. We've learned to live
+with that kind of fear; we've learned to take steps to prevent any idiot
+from throwing the wrong switch that would shut down a power plant or
+open an air lock at the wrong time.
+
+"But the fear on Earth is different. It's the fear that everyone else is
+out to get you, the fear that someone will stick a figurative knife in
+your back and reduce you to the basic subsistence level. And that fear
+is solidly based, believe me. The only way to climb up from basic
+subsistence is to climb over everyone else, to knock aside those in your
+way, to get rid of whoever is occupying the position you want. And once
+you get there, the only way you can hold your position is to make sure
+that nobody below you gets too big for his britches. The rule is: Pull
+down those above you, hold down those below you.
+
+"I've seen it, George. The big cities are packed with people whose sole
+ambition in life is to badger their local welfare worker out of another
+check--they need new clothes, they need a new bed, they need a new
+table, they need more food for the new baby, they need this, they need
+that. All they ever do is _need_! But, of course, they're far to
+aristocratic to _work_.
+
+"Those who do have ambition have to become politicians--in the worst
+sense of the word. They have to gain some measure of control over the
+dispersal of largesse to the mob; they have to get themselves into a
+position where they can give away other people's money, so that they can
+get their cut, too.
+
+"And even then, the man who gets to be a big shot doesn't dare show it.
+Take a look at Tarnhorst. He's probably one of the best of a bad lot. He
+has his fingers in a lot of business pies which make him money, and he's
+in a high enough position in the government to enable him to keep some
+of his money. But his clothing is only a little bit better than the
+average, just as the man who is on basic subsistence wears clothes that
+are only a little bit worse than the average. That diamond ring of his
+is a real diamond, but you can buy imitations that can't be told from
+the real thing except by an expert, so his diamond doesn't offend anyone
+by being ostentatious. And it's unfaceted, to eliminate offensive flash.
+
+"All the color has gone out of life on Earth, George. Women held out
+longer than men did, but now no man or woman would be caught wearing a
+bright-colored suit. You don't see any reds or yellows or blues or
+greens or oranges--only grays and browns and black.
+
+"It's not for me, George. I'd much rather live in fear of the few fools
+who might pull a stupid trick that would kill me than live in the
+constant fear of everyone around me, who all want to destroy me
+deliberately."
+
+"I know what you mean," said Alhamid, "but I think you've put the wrong
+label on what you're calling 'fear'; there's a difference between fear
+and having a healthy respect for something that is dangerous but not
+malignant. That vacuum out there isn't out to 'get' anybody. The only
+people it kills are the fools who have no respect for it and the
+neurotics who think that it wants to murder them. You're neither, and I
+know it."
+
+The governor laughed. "That's the advantage we have over Earthmen,
+George. We went through the same school of hard knocks together--all of
+us. And we know how we stack up against each other."
+
+"True," Alhamid said darkly, "but how long will that hold if Tarnhorst
+closes the school down?"
+
+"That's what you've got to prevent," said the governor flatly. "If you
+need help, yell."
+
+"I will," Alhamid said. "Very loudly." He hung up, wishing he knew what
+Tarnhorst--and Danley--had in mind.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"The trouble with these people, Danley," said Edway Tarnhorst, "is that
+they have no respect whatever for human dignity. They have a tendency to
+overlook the basic rights of the individual."
+
+"They're certainly--different," Peter Danley said.
+
+Tarnhorst juggled himself up and down on the easy-chair in which he was
+seated, as though he could hardly believe that he had weight again. He
+hated low gee. It made him feel awkward and undignified. The only thing
+that reminded him that this was not "real" gravity was the faint, but
+all-pervasive hum of the huge engines that drove the big centrifuge. The
+rooms had cost more, but they were well worth it, as far as Tarnhorst
+was concerned.
+
+"How do you mean, 'different'?" he asked almost absently, settling
+himself comfortably into the cushions.
+
+"I don't know exactly. There's a hardness, a toughness--I can't quite
+put my finger on it, but it's in the way they act, the way they talk."
+
+"Surely you'd noticed that before?" Tarnhorst asked in mild surprise.
+"You've met these Belt men on Luna."
+
+"And their women," Danley said with a nod. "But the impact is somewhat
+more pronounced on their own home ground--seeing them _en masse_."
+
+"Their women!" Tarnhorst said, caught by the phrase. "_Fah!_
+Bright-colored birds! Giggling children! And no more morals than a
+common house-cat!"
+
+"Oh, they're not as bad as all that," Danley objected. "Their clothing
+is a little bright, I'll admit, and they laugh and kid around a lot, but
+I wouldn't say that their morals were any worse than those of a girl
+from New York or London."
+
+"Arrogance is the word," said Tarnhorst. "Arrogance. Like the way that
+Alhamid kept standing all the time we were talking, towering over us
+that way."
+
+"Just habit," Danley said. "When you don't weigh more than six or seven
+pounds, there's not much point in sitting down. Besides, it leaves them
+on their feet in case of emergency."
+
+"He could have sat down out of politeness," Tarnhorst said. "But no.
+They try to put on an air of superiority that is offensive to human
+dignity." He leaned back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and
+crossed his ankles. "However, attitude itself needn't concern us until
+it translates itself into anti-social behavior. What cannot be tolerated
+is this callous attitude toward the dignity and well-being of the
+workers out here. What did you think of Alhamid's explanation of this
+anchor-setting business?"
+
+Danley hesitated. "It sounded straightforward enough, as far as it
+went."
+
+"You think he's concealing something, then?"
+
+"I don't know. I don't have all the information." He frowned, putting
+furrows between his almost invisible blond brows. "I know that neither
+government business nor insurance business are my specialty, but I would
+like to know a little more about the background before I render any
+decision."
+
+"Hm-m-m. Well." Tarnhorst frowned in thought for a moment, then came to
+a decision. "I can't give you the detailed data, of course; that would
+be a violation of the People's Mutual Welfare Code. But I can give you
+the general story."
+
+"I just want to know what sort of thing to look for," Danley said.
+
+"Certainly. Certainly. Well." Tarnhorst paused to collect his thoughts,
+then launched into his speech. "It has now been over eighty years since
+the first colonists came out here to the Belt. At first, the ties with
+Earth were quite strong, naturally. Only a few actually intended to stay
+out there the rest of their lives; most of them intended to make
+themselves a nice little nest egg, come back home, and retire. At the
+same time, the World State was slowly evolving from its original loosely
+tied group of independent nations toward what it is today.
+
+"The people who came out here were mostly misfits, sociologically
+speaking." He smiled sardonically. "They haven't changed much.
+
+"At any rate, as I said, they were strongly tied to Earth. There was the
+matter of food, air, and equipment, all of which had to be shipped out
+from Earth to begin with. Only the tremendous supply of metal--almost
+free for the taking--made such a venture commercially possible. Within
+twenty-five years, however, the various industrial concerns that managed
+the Belt mining had become self-supporting. The robot scoopers which are
+used to mine methane and ammonia from Jupiter's atmosphere gave them
+plenty of organic raw material. Now they grow plants of all kinds and
+even raise food animals.
+
+"They began, as every misfit does, to complain about the taxes the
+government put on their incomes. The government, in my opinion, made an
+error back then. They wanted to keep people out in the Belt, since the
+mines on Earth were not only rapidly being depleted, but the mining
+sites were needed for living space. Besides, asteroid metals were
+cheaper than metals mined on Earth. To induce the colonists to remain in
+the Belt, no income tax was levied; the income tax was replaced by an
+eighty per cent tax on the savings accumulated when the colonist
+returned to Earth to retire.
+
+"They resented even that. It was explained to them that the asteroids
+were, after all, natural resources, and that they had no moral right to
+make a large profit and deprive others of their fair share of the income
+from a natural resource, but they insisted that they had earned it and
+had a right to keep it.
+
+"In other words, the then government bribed them to stay out here, and
+the bribe was more effective than they had intended."
+
+"So they stayed out here and kept their money," Danley said.
+
+"Exactly. At that time, if you will recall, there was a great deal of
+agitation against colonialism--there had been for a long time, as a
+matter of fact. That agitation was directed against certain
+industrialist robber-baron nations who had enslaved the populace of
+parts of Asia and Africa solely to produce wealth, and not for the
+benefit of the people themselves. But the Belt operators took advantage
+of the anticolonialism of the times and declared that the Belt cities
+were, and by right ought to be, free and independent political entities.
+It was a ridiculous assumption, of course, but since the various Belt
+cities were, at that time, under the nominal control of three or four of
+the larger nations, the political picture required that they be allowed
+to declare themselves independent. It was not anticipated at the time
+that they would be so resistant toward the World Government."
+
+He smiled slightly. "Of course, by refusing to send representatives to
+the People's Congress, they have, in effect, cut themselves off from any
+voice in human government."
+
+Then he shrugged. "At the moment, that is neither here nor there. What
+interests us at the moment is the death rate curve of the anchor-sinkers
+or whatever they are. Did you know that it is practically impossible for
+anyone to get a job out there in the Belt unless he has had experience
+in the anchor-setting field?"
+
+"No," Danley admitted.
+
+"It's true. For every other job, they want only men with space
+experience. And by 'space experience' they mean anchor-setting, because
+that's the only job a man can get without previous space experience.
+They spend six months in a special school, learning to do the work,
+according to our friend, Mr. Georges Alhamid. Then they are sent out to
+set anchors. Small ones, at first, in rocks only a few meters in
+diameter--then larger ones. After a year or so at that kind of work,
+they can apply for more lucrative positions.
+
+"I see nothing intrinsically wrong in that, I will admit, but the
+indications are that the schooling, which should have been getting more
+efficient over the years, has evidently been getting more lax. The death
+rate has gone up."
+
+"Just a minute," Danley interrupted. "Do you mean that a man has to have
+what they call 'space experience' before he can get _any_ kind of job?"
+
+Tarnhorst shook his head and was pleased to find that no nausea
+resulted. "No, of course not. Clerical jobs, teaching jobs, and the like
+don't require that sort of training. But there's very little chance for
+advancement unless you're one of the elite. A physician, for example,
+wouldn't have many patients unless he had had 'space experience'; he
+wouldn't be allowed to own or drive a space boat, and he wouldn't be
+allowed to go anywhere near what are called 'critical areas'--such as
+air locks, power plants, or heavy industry installations."
+
+"It sounds to me as though they have a very strong union," said Danley.
+
+"If you want to call it that, yes," Tarnhorst said. "Anything that has
+anything to do with operations in space requires that sort of
+experience--and there are very few jobs out here that can avoid having
+anything to do with space. Space is only a few kilometers away." The
+expression on his face showed that he didn't much care for the thought.
+
+"I don't see that that's so bad," Danley said. "Going out there isn't
+something for the unexperienced. A man who doesn't know what he's doing
+can get himself killed easily, and, what's worse, he's likely to take
+others with him."
+
+"You speak, of course, from experience," Tarnhorst said with no trace of
+sarcasm. "I accept that. By not allowing inexperienced persons in
+critical areas, the Belt Companies are, at least indirectly, looking out
+for the welfare of the people. But we mustn't delude ourselves into
+thinking that that is their prime objective. These Belt Companies are no
+better than the so-called 'industrial giants' of the nineteenth and
+twentieth centuries. The government here is farcical. The sole job is to
+prevent crime and to adjudicate small civil cases. Every other function
+of proper government--the organization of industry, the regulation of
+standards the subsidizing of research, the control of prices, and so
+on--are left to the Belt Companies or to the people. The Belt Cities are
+no more than what used to be called 'company towns'."
+
+"I understand that," Danley said. "But they seem to function fairly
+smoothly."
+
+Tarnhorst eyed him. "If, by, 'smoothly functioning', you mean the denial
+of the common rights of human freedom and dignity yes. Oh, they give
+their sop to such basic human needs as the right of every individual to
+be respected--but only because Earth has put pressure on them.
+Otherwise, people who, through no fault of their own, were unable to
+work or get 'space experience' would be unable to get jobs and would be
+looked down upon as pariahs."
+
+"You mean there are people here who have no jobs? I wouldn't think that
+unemployment would be a problem out here."
+
+"It isn't," said Tarnhorst, "yet. But there are always those
+unfortunates who are psychologically incapable of work, and society must
+provide for them. The Belt Cities provide for a basic education, of
+course. As long as a person is going to school, he is given a stipend.
+But a person who has neither the ability to work nor the ability to
+study is an outcast, even though he is provided for by the companies. He
+is forced to do something to earn what should be his by right; he is
+given menial and degrading tasks to do. We would like to put a stop to
+that sort of thing, but we ... ah ... have no ... ah ... means of doing
+so." He paused, as though considering whether he had said too much.
+
+"The problem at hand," he went on hurriedly, "is the death curve. When
+this technique for taking the rocks to the smelters was being worked
+out, the death rate was--as you might imagine--quite high. The Belt
+Companies had already been operating out here for a long time before the
+stony meteorites were mined commercially. At first, the big thing was
+nickel-iron. That's what they came here to get in the beginning. That's
+where most of the money still is. But the stony asteroids provide them
+with their oxygen.
+
+"This anchor-setting technique was worked out at a time when the Belt
+Companies were trying to find ways to make the Belt self-sufficient.
+After they got the technique worked out so that it operated smoothly,
+the death rate dropped 'way down. It stayed down for a little while, and
+then began to rise again. It has nearly reached an all-time high.
+Obviously, something is wrong, and we have to find out what it is."
+
+Danley scratched ruminatively behind his right ear and wished he'd had
+the opportunity to study history. He had been vaguely aware, of the
+broad outlines, but the details had never been brought to his attention
+before. "Suppose Alhamid _is_ trying to hide something," he said after a
+moment. "What would it be, do you think?"
+
+Tarnhorst shrugged and spread his hands. "What could it be but some sort
+of money-saving scheme? Inferior materials being used at a critical
+spot, perhaps. Skimping on quality or quantity. Somewhere, somehow, they
+are shaving costs at the risk of the workers' lives. We have to find out
+what it is."
+
+Peter Danley nodded. _You don't mean_ "_we_," Danley thought to himself.
+I _am the one who's going to have to go out there and find it, while you
+sit here safe_. He felt that there was a pretty good chance that these
+Belt operators might kill him to keep him from finding out what it was
+they were saving money on.
+
+Aloud, he said: "I'll do what I can, Mr. Tarnhorst."
+
+Tarnhorst smiled. "I'm certain you will. That's why I needed someone who
+knows more about this business than I."
+
+"And when we do find it--what then?"
+
+"Then? Why, then we will force them to make the proper changes or there
+will be trouble."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Georges Alhamid heard the whole conversation early the next morning. The
+governor himself brought the recording over to his office.
+
+"Do you think he knew he was being overheard?"
+
+The governor shrugged. "Who knows. He waltzed all around what he was
+trying to say, but that may have been just native caution. Or he may not
+want Danley to know what's on his mind."
+
+"How could he bring Danley out here without telling him anything
+beforehand?" Alhamid asked thoughtfully. "Is Danley really that
+ignorant, or was the whole conversation for our ears?"
+
+"I'm inclined to think that Danley really didn't know. Remember, George,
+the best way to hold down the ones below you is to keep them from
+gaining any knowledge, to keep data out of their hands--except for the
+carefully doctored data you want them to have."
+
+"I know," Alhamid said. "History isn't exactly a popular subject on
+Earth." He tapped his fingers gently on the case of the playback and
+looked at it as if he were trying to read the minds of the persons who
+had spoken the words he had just heard.
+
+"I really think he believed that his nullifying equipment was doing its
+job," the governor continued. "He wouldn't have any way of knowing we
+could counteract it."
+
+Alhamid shrugged. "It doesn't matter much. We still have to assume that
+he's primarily out to bring the Belt Cities under Earth control. To do
+that, all he'd have to do is find something that could be built up into
+a scandal on Earth."
+
+"Not, _all_, George," the governor said. "It would take a lot more than
+that alone. But it would certainly be a start in the right direction."
+
+"One thing we do know," Alhamid said, "is that nobody on Earth will
+allow any action against the Belt unless popular sentiment is definitely
+against us. As long as we are apparently right-thinking people, we're
+all right. I wonder why Tarnhorst is so anxious to get us under the
+thumb of the People's Congress? Is it purely that half-baked idealism of
+his?"
+
+"Mostly. He has the notion that everybody has a right to be accorded the
+respect of his fellow man, and that that right is something that every
+person is automatically given at birth, not something he has to earn.
+What gave him his particular gripe against us, I don't know, but he's
+been out to get us ever since his trip here three years ago."
+
+"You know, Larry," Alhamid said slowly, "I'm not quite sure which is
+harder to understand: How a whole civilization could believe that sort
+of thing, or how a single intelligent man could."
+
+"It's a positive feedback," the governor said. "That sort of thing has
+wrecked civilizations before and will do it again. Let's not let it
+wreck ours. Are you ready for the conference with our friend now?"
+
+Georges Alhamid looked at the clock on the wall. "Ready as I'll ever be.
+You'd better scram, Larry. We mustn't give Mr. Tarnhorst the impression
+that there's some sort of collusion between business and government out
+there in the Belt."
+
+"Heaven forfend! I'll get."
+
+When he left, the governor took the playback with him. The recording
+would have to be filed in the special secret files.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Captain St. Simon eased his spaceboat down to the surface of Pallas and
+threw on the magnetic anchor which held the little craft solidly to the
+metal surface of the landing field. The traffic around Pallas was fairly
+heavy this time of year, since the planetoid was on the same side of the
+sun as Earth, and the big cargo haulers were moving in and out, loading
+refined metals and raw materials, unloading manufactured goods from
+Earth. He'd had to wait several minutes in the traffic pattern before
+being given clearance for anchoring.
+
+He was already dressed in his vacuum suit, and the cabin of the boat was
+exhausted of its air. He checked his control board, making sure every
+switch and dial was in the proper position. Only then did he open the
+door and step out to the gray surface of the landing field. His
+suitcase--a spherical, sealed container that the Belt men jokingly
+referred to as a "bomb"--went with him. He locked the door of his boat
+and walked down the yellow-painted safety lane toward the nearest air
+lock leading into the interior of the planetoid.
+
+He lifted his feet and set them down with precision--nobody but a fool
+wears glide boots on the outside. He kept his eyes moving--up and
+around, on both sides, above, and behind. The yellow path was supposed
+to be a safety lane, but there was no need of taking the chance of
+having an out-of-control ship come sliding in on him. Of course, if it
+was coming in really fast, he'd have no chance to move; he might not
+even see it at all. But why get slugged by a slow one?
+
+He waited outside the air-lock door for the green light to come on.
+There were several other space-suited figures around him, but he didn't
+recognize any of them. He hummed softly to himself.
+
+The green light came on, and the door of the air lock slid open. The
+small crowd trooped inside, and, after a minute, the door slid shut
+again. As the elevator dropped, St. Simon heard the familiar _whoosh_ as
+the air came rushing in. By the time it had reached the lower level, the
+elevator was up to pressure.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On Earth, there might have been a sign in such an elevator, reading: _DO
+NOT REMOVE VACUUM SUITS IN ELEVATOR._ There was no need for it here;
+every man there knew how to handle himself in an air lock. If he hadn't,
+he wouldn't have been there.
+
+After he had stepped out of the elevator, along with the others, and the
+door had closed behind him, St. Simon carefully opened the cracking
+valve on his helmet. There was a faint hiss of incoming air, adjusting
+the slight pressure differential. He took off his helmet, tucked it
+under his arm, and headed for the check-in station.
+
+He was walking down the corridor toward the checker's office when a hand
+clapped him on the shoulder. "Bless me if it isn't St. Simon the Silent!
+Long time no, if you'll pardon the cliché, see!"
+
+St. Simon turned, grinning. He had recognized the voice. "Hi, Kerry.
+Good to see you."
+
+"Good to see me? Forsooth! Od's bodkins! Hast turned liar on top of
+everything else, Good Saint? Good to see me, indeed! 'From such a face
+and form as mine, the noblest sentiments sound like the black utterances
+of a depraved imagination.' No, dear old holy pillar-sitter, no indeed!
+It may be a pleasure to hear my mellifluous voice--a pleasure I often
+indulge in, myself--but it couldn't possibly be a pleasure to _see_ me!"
+And all the while, St. Simon was being pummeled heartily on the
+shoulder, while his hand was pumped as though the other man was
+expecting to strike oil at any moment.
+
+His assailant was not a handsome man. Years before, a rare, fast-moving
+meteor had punched its way through his helmet and taken part of his face
+with it. He had managed to get back to his ship and pump air in before
+he lost consciousness. He had had to stay conscious, because the only
+thing that held the air in his helmet had been his hand pressed over the
+quarter-inch hole. Even so, the drop in pressure had done its damage.
+The surgeons had done their best to repair the smashed face, but Kerry
+Brand's face hadn't been much to look at to begin with. And the mottled
+purple of the distended veins and capillaries did little to improve his
+looks.
+
+But his ruined face was a badge of honor, and Kerry Brand knew the fact
+as well as anyone.
+
+Like St. Simon, Captain Brand was a professional anchor-setter. Most of
+the men who put in the necessary two years went on to better jobs after
+they had the required space experience. But there were some who liked
+the job and stuck with it. It was only these men--the real experts among
+the anchor-setting fraternity--who rated the title of "Captain". They
+were free-lancers who ran things pretty much their own way.
+
+"Just going to the checker?" St. Simon asked.
+
+Kerry Brand shook his head. "I've already checked in, old sanctus. And
+I'll give you three and one-seventh guesses who got a blue ticket."
+
+St. Simon said nothing, but he pointed a finger at Brand's chest.
+
+"A mild surmise, but a true one," said Brand. "You are, indeed, gazing
+upon Professor Kerry Brand, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.--that is to say, Borer of
+Asteroids, Master of Anchors, and Planetoid-hauler De-luxe. No, no;
+don't look sorry for me. _Some_body has to teach the tadpoles How To
+Survive In Space If You're Not Too Stupid To Live--a subject upon which
+I am an expert."
+
+"On Being Too Stupid To Live?" St. Simon asked gently.
+
+"A touch! A distinct touch! You are developing a certain unexpected vein
+of pawky humor, Watson, against which I must learn to guard myself." He
+looked at the watch on his wrist. "Why don't you go ahead and check in,
+and then we'll go pub-crawling. I have it on good authority that a few
+thousand gallons of Danish ale were piped aboard Pallas yesterday, and
+you and I should do our best to reduce the surplus."
+
+"Sounds good to me," said St. Simon agreeably. They started on toward
+the checker's office.
+
+"Consider, my dear St. Simon," said Brand, "how fortunate we are to be
+living in an age and a society where the dictum, 'Those who can, do;
+those who can't, teach,' no longer holds true. It means that we weary,
+work-hardened experts are called in every so often, handed our little
+blue ticket, and given six months off--_with_ pay--if we will only do
+the younger generation the favor of pounding a modicum of knowledge into
+their heads. During that time, if we are very careful, we can try to
+prevent our muscles from going to flab and our brains from corroding
+with ennui, so that when we again debark into the infinite sea of
+emptiness which surrounds us to pursue our chosen profession, we don't
+get killed on the first try. Isn't it wonderful?"
+
+"Cheer up," said St. Simon. "Teaching isn't such a bad lot. And, after
+all, you do get paid for it."
+
+"And at a salary! A Pooh-Bah paid for his services! I a salaried minion!
+But I do it! It revolts me, but I do it!"
+
+The short, balding man behind the checker's desk looked up as the two
+men approached. "Hello, captain," he said as St. Simon stepped up to the
+desk.
+
+"How are you, Mr. Murtaugh?" St. Simon said politely. He handed over his
+log book. "There's the data on my last ten. I'll be staying here for a
+few days, so there's no need to rush the refill requisition. Any calls
+for me?"
+
+The checker put the log book in the duplicator. "I'll see if there are,
+captain." He went over to the autofile and punched St. Simon's serial
+number.
+
+Very few people write to an anchor man. Since he is free to check in and
+reload at any of the major Belt Cities, and since, in his search for
+asteroids, his erratic orbit is likely to take him anywhere, it might be
+months or years before a written letter caught up with him. On the other
+hand, a message could be beamed to every city, and he could pick it up
+wherever he was. It cost money, but it was sure.
+
+"One call," the checker said. He handed St. Simon a message slip.
+
+It was unimportant. Just a note from a girl on Vesta. He promised
+himself that he'd make his next break at Vesta, come what may. He stuck
+the flimsy in his pocket, and waited while the checker went through the
+routine of recording his log and making out a pay voucher.
+
+There was no small talk between himself and the checker. Mr. Murtaugh
+had not elected to take the schooling necessary to qualify for other
+than a small desk job. He had no space experience. Unless and until he
+did, there would be an invisible, but nonetheless real barrier between
+himself and any spaceman. It was not that St. Simon looked down on the
+man, exactly; it was simply that Murtaugh had not proved himself, and,
+therefore, there was no way of knowing whether he could be trusted or
+not. And since trust is a positive quality, lack of it can only mean
+mistrust.
+
+Murtaugh handed Captain St. Simon an envelope. "That's it, captain.
+Thank you."
+
+St. Simon opened the envelope, took out his check--and a blue ticket.
+
+Kerry Brand broke into a guffaw.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When the phone on his desk rang, Georges Alhamid scooped it up and
+identified himself.
+
+"This is Larry, George," said the governor's voice. "How are things so
+far?"
+
+"So far, so good," Alhamid said. "For the past week, Mr. Peter Danley
+has been working his head off, under the tutelage of two of the
+toughest, smartest anchor men in the business. But you should have seen
+the looks on their faces when I told them they were going to have an
+Earthman for a pupil."
+
+The governor laughed. "I'll bet! How's he coming along?"
+
+"He's learning. How are you doing with your pet?"
+
+"I think I'm softening him, George. I found out what it was that got his
+goat three years ago."
+
+"Yeah?"
+
+"Sure. On Ceres, where he went three years ago, he was treated as if he
+weren't as good as a Belt man."
+
+Alhamid frowned. "Someone was disrespectful?"
+
+"No--that is, not exactly. But he was treated as if we didn't trust his
+judgment, as though we were a little bit afraid of him."
+
+"Oh-_ho_! I see what you mean."
+
+"Sure. We treated him just as we would anyone who hasn't proved himself.
+And that meant we were treating him the same way we treated our own
+'lower classes', as he thought of them. I had Governor Holger get his
+Ceres detectives to trace down everything that happened. You can read
+the transcript if you want. There's nothing particularly exciting in it,
+but you can see the pattern if you know what to look for.
+
+"I'm not even certain it was fully conscious on his part; I'm not sure
+he knew why he disliked us. All he was convinced of was that we were
+arrogant and thought we were better than he is. It's kind of hard for us
+to see that a person would be that deeply hurt by seeing the plain truth
+that someone else is obviously better at something than he is, but
+you've got to remember that an Earthman is brought up to believe that
+every person is just exactly as good as every other--and no better. A
+man may have a skill that you don't have, but that doesn't make him
+superior--oh, my, no!
+
+"Anyway, I started out by apologizing for our habit of standing up all
+the time. I managed to plant the idea in his mind that the only thing
+that made him think we felt superior was that habit. I've even got him
+to the point where he's standing up all the time, too. Makes him feel
+very superior. He's learned the native customs."
+
+"I get you," Alhamid said. "I probably contributed to that inferiority
+feeling of his myself."
+
+"Didn't we all? Anyway, the next step was to take him around and
+introduce him to some of the execs in the government and in a couple of
+the Companies--I briefed 'em beforehand. Friendly chats--that sort of
+thing. I think we're going to have to learn the ancient art of diplomacy
+out here if we're going to survive, George.
+
+"The crowning glory came this afternoon. You should have been there."
+
+"I was up to here in work, Larry. I just couldn't take the time off to
+attend a club luncheon. Did the great man give his speech?"
+
+"Did he? I should hope to crack my helmet he did! We must all pull
+together, George, did you know that? We must care for the widow and the
+orphan--and the needy, George, the needy. We must be sure to provide the
+fools, the idiots, the malingerers, the moral degenerates, and such
+useful, lovable beings as that with the necessities and the luxuries of
+life. We must see to it that they are respected and permitted to have
+their dignity. We must see to it that the dear little things are
+permitted the rights of a human being to hold his head up and spit in
+your eye if he wishes. We must see to it that they be fruitful,
+multiply, and replenish the Earth."
+
+"They've already done that," Alhamid said caustically. "And they can
+have it. Let's just see that they don't replenish the Belt. So what
+happened?"
+
+"Why, George, you'll never realize how much we appreciated that speech.
+We gave him a three-minute rising ovation. I think he was surprised to
+see that we could stand for three minutes under a one-gee pull in the
+centrifuge. And you should have seen the smiles on our faces, George."
+
+"I hope nobody broke out laughing."
+
+"We managed to restrain ourselves," the governor said.
+
+"What's next on the agenda?"
+
+"Well, it'll be tricky, but I think I can pull it off. I'm going to take
+him around and show him that we _do_ take care of the widow and the
+orphan, and hope that he assumes we are as solicitous toward the rest of
+his motley crew. Wish me luck."
+
+"Good luck. You may need it."
+
+"Same to you. Take care of Danley."
+
+"Don't worry. He's in good hands. See you, Larry."
+
+"Right."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There were three space-suited men on the bleak rocky ground near the
+north pole of Pallas, a training area of several square miles known as
+the North Forty. Their helmets gleamed in the bright, hard light from a
+sun that looked uncomfortably small to an Earthman's eyes. Two of the
+men were standing, facing each other some fifteen feet apart. The third,
+attached to them by safety lines, was hanging face down above the
+surface, rising slowly, like a balloon that has almost more weight than
+it can lift.
+
+"No, no, _no_, Mr. Danley! You are not _crawling_, Mr. Danley, you are
+climbing! Do you understand that? _Climbing!_ You have to _climb_ an
+asteroid, just as you would climb a cliff on Earth. You have to hold on
+every second of the time, or you will fall off!" St. Simon's voice
+sounded harsh in Danley's earphones, and he felt irritatingly helpless
+poised floatingly above the ground that way.
+
+His instructors were well anchored by metal eyes set into the rocky
+surface for just that purpose. Although Pallas was mostly nickel-iron,
+this end of it was stony, which was why it had been selected as a
+training ground.
+
+"_Well?_" snapped St. Simon. "What do you do now? If this were a small
+rock, you'd be drifting a long ways away by now. Think, Mr. Danley,
+_think_."
+
+"Then shut up and let me think!" Danley snarled.
+
+"If small things distract you from thinking about the vital necessity of
+saving your own life, Mr. Danley, you would not live long in the Belt."
+
+Danley reached out an arm to see if he could touch the ground. When he
+had pushed himself upwards with a thrust of his knee, he hadn't given
+himself too hard a shove. He had reached the apex of his slow flight,
+and was drifting downward again. He grasped a jutting rock and pulled
+himself back to the surface.
+
+"Very good, Mr. Danley--but that wouldn't work on a small rock. You took
+too long. What would you have done on a rock with a millionth of a gee
+of pull?"
+
+Danley was silent.
+
+"_Well?_" St. Simon barked. "_What would you do?_"
+
+"I ... I don't know," Danley admitted.
+
+"Ye gods and little fishhooks!" This was Kerry Brand's voice. It was
+supposed to be St. Simon's turn to give the verbal instructions, but
+Brand allowed himself an occasional remark when it was appropriate.
+
+St. Simon's voice was bitingly sweet. "What do you think those safety
+lines are for, Mr. Danley? Do you think they are for decorative
+purposes?"
+
+"Well ... I thought I was supposed to think of some other way. I mean,
+that's so obvious--"
+
+"Mr. Danley," St. Simon said with sudden patience, "we are not here to
+give you riddles to solve. We're here to teach you how to stay alive in
+the Belt. And one of the first rules you must learn is that you will
+_never_ leave your boat without a safety line. _Never!_
+
+"An anchor man, Mr. Danley, is called that for more than one reason. You
+cannot anchor your boat to a rock unless there is an eye-bolt set in it.
+And if it already has an eye-bolt, you would have no purpose on that
+rock. In a way, _you_ will be the anchor of your boat, since you will be
+tied to it by your safety line. If the boat drifts too far from your
+rock while you are working, it will pull you off the surface, since it
+has more mass than you do. That shouldn't be allowed to happen, but, if
+it does, you are still with your boat, rather than deserted on a rock
+for the rest of your life--which wouldn't be very long. When the power
+unit in your suit ran out of energy, it would stop breaking your exhaled
+carbon dioxide down into carbon and oxygen, and you would suffocate.
+Even with emergency tanks of oxygen, you would soon find yourself
+freezing to death. That sun up there isn't very warm, Mr. Danley."
+
+Peter Danley was silent, but it was an effort to remain so. He wanted to
+remind St. Simon that he, Danley, had been a spaceman for nearly fifteen
+years. But he was also aware that he was learning things that weren't
+taught at Earthside schools. Most of his professional life had been
+spent aboard big, comfortable ships that made the short Earth-Luna hop.
+He could probably count the total hours he had spent in a spacesuit on
+the fingers of his two hands.
+
+"All right, Mr. Danley; let's begin again. Climb along the surface. Use
+toeholds, handholds, and fingerholds. Feel your way along. Find those
+little crevices that will give you a grip. It doesn't take much. You're
+a lot better off than a mountain climber on Earth because you don't have
+to fight your weight. You have only your mass to worry about. That's it.
+Fine. Very good, Mr. Danley."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And, later:
+
+"Now, Mr. Danley," said Captain Brand, "you are at the end of your
+tether, so to speak."
+
+The three men were in a space boat, several hundred miles from Pallas.
+Or, rather, two of them were in the boat, standing at the open door.
+Peter Danley was far out from it, at the end of his safety line.
+
+"How far are you from us, Mr. Danley?" Brand asked.
+
+"Three hundred meters, Captain Brand," Danley said promptly.
+
+"Very good. How do you know?"
+
+"I am at the end of my safety line, which is three hundred meters long
+when fully extended."
+
+"Your memory is excellent, Mr. Danley. Now, how will you get back to the
+boat?"
+
+"Pull myself hand over hand along the line."
+
+"Think, Mr. Danley! _Think!_"
+
+"Uh. Oh. Well, I wouldn't keep pulling. I'd just give myself a tug and
+then coast in, taking up the line slowly as I went."
+
+"Excellent! What would happen if you, as you put it, pulled yourself in
+hand over hand, as if you were climbing a rope on Earth?"
+
+"I would accelerate too much," Danley said. "I'd gain too much momentum
+and probably bash my brains out against the boat. And I'd have no way to
+stop myself."
+
+"Bully for you, Mr. Danley! Now see if you can put into action that
+which you have so succinctly put into words. Come back to the boat.
+Gently the first time. We'll have plenty of practice, so that you can
+get the feel of the muscle pull that will give you a maximum of velocity
+with a minimum of impact at this end. Gently, now."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Still later:
+
+"Judgment, Mr. Danley!" St. Simon cautioned. "You have to use judgment!
+A space boat is not an automobile. There is no friction out here to slow
+it to a stop. Your accelerator is just exactly that--an accelerator.
+Taking your foot off it won't slow you down a bit; you've got to use
+your reverse."
+
+Peter Danley was at the controls of the boat. There were tiny beads of
+perspiration on his forehead. Over a kilometer away was a good-sized
+hunk of rock; his instructors wouldn't let him get any closer. They
+wanted to be sure that they could take over before the boat struck the
+rock, just in case Danley should freeze to the accelerator a little too
+long.
+
+He wasn't used to this sort of thing. He was used to a taped
+acceleration-deceleration program which lifted a big ship, aimed it, and
+went through the trip all automatically. All he had ever had to do was
+drop it the last few hundred feet to a landing field.
+
+"Keep your eyes moving," St. Simon said. "Your radar can give you data
+that you need, just remember that it can't think for you."
+
+_Your right foot controls your forward acceleration._
+
+_Your left foot controls your reverse acceleration._
+
+_They can't be pushed down together; when one goes down, the other goes
+up. Balance one against the other._
+
+_Turning your wheel controls the roll of the boat._
+
+_Pulling your wheel toward you, or pushing it away, controls the pitch._
+
+_Shifting the wheel left, or right, controls the yaw._
+
+The instructions had been pounded into his head until each one seemed to
+ring like a separate little bell. The problem was coordinating his body
+to act on those instructions.
+
+One of the radar dials told him how far he was from the rock. Another
+told him his radial velocity relative to it. A third told him his
+angular velocity.
+
+"Come to a dead stop exactly one thousand meters from the surface, Mr.
+Danley," St. Simon ordered.
+
+Danley worked the controls until both his velocity meters read zero, and
+the distance meter read exactly one kilometer.
+
+"Very good, Mr. Danley. Now assume that the surface of your rock is at
+nine hundred ninety-five meters. Bring your boat to a dead stop exactly
+fifty centimeters from that surface."
+
+Danley worked the controls again. He grinned with satisfaction when the
+distance meter showed nine nine five point five on the nose.
+
+Captain St. Simon sighed deeply. "Mr. Danley, do you feel a little
+shaken up? Banged around a little? Do you feel as though you'd just
+gotten a bone-rattling shock?"
+
+"Uh ... no."
+
+"You should. You slammed this boat a good two feet into the surface of
+that rock before you backed out again." His voice changed tone. "Dammit,
+Mr. Danley, when I say 'surface at nine nine five', I mean _surface_!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Edway Tarnhorst had been dictating notes for his reports into his
+recorder, and was rather tired, so when he asked Peter Danley what he
+had learned, he was rather irritated when the blond man closed his blue
+eyes and repeated, parrotlike:
+
+"Due to the lack of a water-oxygen atmosphere, many minerals are found
+in the asteroids which are unknown on Earth. Among the more important of
+these are: Oldhamite (CaS); Daubréelite (FECr_{2}S_{4}); Schreibersite
+and Rhabdite (Fe_{3}Ni_{3}P); Lawrencite (FeCl_{2}); and Taenite, an
+alloy of iron containing--"
+
+"That's not precisely the sort of thing I meant," Tarnhorst interrupted
+testily.
+
+Danley smiled. "I know. I'm sorry. That's my lesson for tomorrow."
+
+"So I gathered. May I sit down?" There were only two chairs in the room.
+Danley was occupying one, and a pile of books was occupying the other.
+
+Danley quickly got to his feet and began putting the books on his desk.
+"Certainly, Mr. Tarnhorst. Sit down."
+
+Tarnhorst lowered himself into the newly emptied chair. "I apologize for
+interrupting your studies," he said. "I realize how important they are.
+But there are a few points I'd like to discuss with you."
+
+"Certainly." Danley seated himself and looked at the older man
+expectantly. "The nullifiers are on," he said.
+
+"Of course," Tarnhorst said absently. Then, changing his manner, he said
+abruptly: "Have you found anything yet?"
+
+Danley shook his head. "No. It looks to me as though they've done
+everything possible to make sure that these men get the best equipment
+and the best training. The training instructors have been through the
+whole affair themselves--they know the ropes. The equipment, as far as I
+can tell, is top grade stuff. From what I have seen so far, the Company
+isn't stinting on the equipment or the training."
+
+Tarnhorst nodded. "After nearly three months of investigation, I have
+come to the same conclusion myself. The records show that expenditures
+on equipment has been steadily increasing. The equipment they have now,
+I understand, is almost failure-proof?" He looked questioningly at
+Danley.
+
+Danley nodded. "Apparently. Certainly no one is killed because of
+equipment failure. It's the finest stuff I've ever seen."
+
+"And yet," Tarnhorst said, "their books show that they are constantly
+seeking to improve it."
+
+"I don't suppose there is any chance of juggling the books on you, is
+there?"
+
+Tarnhorst smiled a superior smile. "Hardly. In the first place, I know
+bookkeeping. In the second, it would be impossible to whip up a complete
+set of balancing books--covering a period of nearly eighty
+years--overnight.
+
+"I agree," Danley said. "I don't think they set up a special training
+course just for me overnight, either. I've seen classes on Vesta, Juno,
+and Eros--and they're all the same. There aren't any fancy false fronts
+to fool us, Mr. Tarnhorst: I've looked very closely."
+
+"Have you talked to the men?"
+
+"Yes. They have no complaints."
+
+Again Tarnhorst nodded. "I have found the same thing. They all insist
+that if a man gets killed in space, it's not the fault of anyone but
+himself. Or, as it may be, an act of God."
+
+"One of my instructors ran into an act of God some years ago," Danley
+said. "You've met him. Brand--the one with the scarred face." He
+explained to Tarnhorst what had caused Brand's disfigurement. "But he
+survived," he finished, "because he kept his wits about him even after
+he was hit."
+
+"Commendable; very commendable," Tarnhorst said. "If he'd been an
+excitable fool, he'd have died."
+
+"True. But what I was trying to point out was that it wasn't equipment
+failure that caused the accident."
+
+"No. You're quite right." Tarnhorst was silent for a moment, then he
+looked into Danley's eyes. "Do you think you could take on a job as
+anchor man now?"
+
+"I don't know," said Danley evenly. "But I'm going to find out
+tomorrow."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Peter Danley took his final examination the following day. All by
+himself, he went through the procedure of positioning his ship, setting
+up a rocket drill, firing it, and setting in an anchor. It was only a
+small rock, nine meters through, but the job was almost the same as with
+the big ones. Not far away, Captain St. Simon watched the Earthman's
+procedure through a pair of high-powered field glasses. He breathed a
+deep sigh of relief when the job was done.
+
+"Jules," he said softly, "I am sure glad that man didn't hurt himself
+any."
+
+"Yes, _suh_! We'd of sho' been in trouble if he'd of killed hisself!"
+
+"We will have to tell Captain Brand that our pupil has done pretty well
+for such a small amount of schooling."
+
+"I think that would be proper, m'lud."
+
+"And we will also have to tell Captain Brand that this boy wouldn't last
+a month. He wouldn't come back from his first trip."
+
+There was no answer to that.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Three days later, amid a cloud of generally satisfied feelings, Edway
+Tarnhorst and Peter Danley took the ship back to Earth.
+
+"I cannot, of course, give you a copy of my report," Tarnhorst had told
+Georges Alhamid. "That is for the eyes of the Committee only. However, I
+may say that I do not find the Belt Companies or the governments of the
+Belt Cities at fault. Do you want to know my personal opinion?"
+
+"I would appreciate it, Mr. Tarnhorst," Georges had said.
+
+"Carelessness. Just plain carelessness on the part of the workers. That
+is what has caused your rise in death rates. You people out here in the
+Belt have become too used to being in space. Familiarity breeds
+contempt, Mr. Alhamid.
+
+"Steps must be taken to curb that carelessness. I suggest a publicity
+campaign of some kind. The people must be thoroughly indoctrinated in
+safety procedures and warned against carelessness. Just a few months of
+schooling isn't enough, Mr. Alhamid. You've got to start pounding it
+into their heads early.
+
+"If you don't--" He shook his head. (He had grown used to doing so in
+low gravity by now.) "If the death rate isn't cut down, we shall have to
+raise the premium rates, and I don't know what will happen on the floor
+of the People's Congress. However, I think I can guarantee six months to
+a year before any steps are taken. That will give you time to launch
+your safety campaign. I'm certain that as soon as this carelessness is
+curbed, the claims will drop down to their former low point."
+
+"We'll certainly try that," Alhamid had said heartily. "Thank you very
+much, Mr. Tarnhorst."
+
+When they had finally gone, Alhamid spoke to the governor.
+
+"That's that, Larry. You can bring it up at the next meeting of the
+Board of Governors. Get some kind of publicity campaign going. Plug
+safety. Tell 'em carelessness is bad. It can't hurt anything and
+actually might help, who knows?"
+
+"What are you going to do at your end?"
+
+"What we should have done long ago: finance the insurance ourselves. For
+the next couple of years, we'll only make death claims to Earth for a
+part of the total. We'll pay off the rest ourselves. Then we'll tell 'em
+we've brought the cost down so much that we can afford to do our own
+insurance financing.
+
+"We let this insurance thing ride too long, and it has damn near got us
+in a jam. We needed the income from Earth. We still could use it, but we
+need our independence more."
+
+"I second the motion," the governor said fervently. "Look, suppose you
+come over to my place tonight, and we'll work out the details of this
+report. O.K.? Say at nine?"
+
+"Fine, Larry. I'll see you then."
+
+Alhamid went back to his office. He was met at the door by his
+secretary, who handed him a sealed envelope. "The Earthman left this
+here for you. He said you'd know what to do with it."
+
+Alhamid took the envelope and looked at the name on the outside. "Which
+Earthman?" he asked.
+
+"The young one," she said, "the blond one."
+
+"It isn't even addressed to me," Alhamid said with a note of puzzled
+speculation in his voice.
+
+"No. I noticed that. I told him he could send it straight to the school,
+but he said you would know how to handle it."
+
+Alhamid looked at the envelope again, and his eyes narrowed a little.
+"Call Captain St. Simon, will you? Tell him I would like to have him
+come to my office. Don't mention this letter; I don't want it breezed
+all over Pallas."
+
+It was nearly twenty minutes before St. Simon showed up. Alhamid handed
+him the envelope. "You have a message from your star pupil. For some
+reason, he wanted me to deliver it to you. I have a hunch you'll know
+what that reason is after you read it." He grinned. "I'd appreciate it
+if you'd tell me when you find out. This Mr. Danley has worried me all
+along."
+
+St. Simon scowled at the envelope, then ripped off one end and took out
+the typed sheets. He read them carefully, then handed them over to
+Alhamid. "You'd better read this yourself, George."
+
+Georges Alhamid took the pages and began to read.
+
+     Dear Captain St. Simon:
+
+     I am addressing this to you rather than anyone else because I think
+     you will understand more than anyone else. Captain Brand is a fine
+     person, but I have never felt very much at ease with him. (I won't
+     go into the psychological reasons that may exist, other than admit
+     that my reasons are purely emotional. I don't honestly know how
+     much they are based on his disfigurement.) Mr. Alhamid is almost a
+     stranger to me. You are the only Belt man I feel I know well.
+
+     First, I want to say that I honestly enjoyed our three months
+     together. There were times when I could have cheerfully bashed your
+     head in, I'll admit, but the experience has left me feeling more
+     like a real human being, more like a person in my own right, than I
+     have ever felt before in my life. Believe me, I appreciate it
+     deeply. I know now that I can do things on my own without being
+     dependent on the support of a team or a committee, and for that I
+     am grateful.
+
+     Tarnhorst has heard my report and accepted it. His report to the
+     People's Congress will lay the entire blame for the death rate rise
+     on individual carelessness rather than on any fault of management.
+
+     I think, in the main, I am justified in making such a report to
+     Tarnhorst, although I am fully aware that it is incomplete. I know
+     that if I had told him the whole truth there would be a ruckus
+     kicked up on Earth that would cause more trouble in the Belt than
+     I'd care to think about. I'm sure you're as aware of the political
+     situation as I am.
+
+     You see, I know that anchor-setting could be made a great deal
+     safer. I know that machines could be developed which would make the
+     job so nearly automatic that the operator would never be exposed to
+     any more danger than he would be in a ship on the Earth-Luna run.
+     Perhaps that's a little exaggerated, but not much.
+
+     What puzzled me was: _Why?_ Why shouldn't the Companies build these
+     machines if they were more efficient? Why should every Belt man
+     defend the system as it was? Why should men risk their necks when
+     they could demand better equipment? (I don't mean that the
+     equipment presently used is poor; I just mean that full
+     mechanization would do away with the present type of equipment and
+     replace it with a different type.)
+
+     Going through your course of instruction gave me the answer to
+     that, even though I didn't take the full treatment.
+
+     All my life, I've belonged to an organization of some kind--the
+     team, the crew, whatever it might be. But the Team was everything,
+     and I was recognized only as a member of the Team. I was a
+     replaceable plug-in unit, not an individual in my own right. I
+     don't know that I can explain the difference exactly, but it seems
+     to me that the Team is something outside of which the individual
+     has no existence, while the men of the Belt can form a team because
+     they know that each member is self-sufficient in his own right.
+
+     On Earth, we all depend on the Team, and, in the long run, that
+     means that we are depending on each other--but none of us feels he
+     can depend on himself. Every man hopes that, as a member of the
+     Team, he will be saved from his own errors, his own failures. But
+     he knows that everyone else is doing the same thing, and, deep down
+     inside, he knows that they are not deserving of his reliance. So he
+     puts his reliance in the Team, as if that were some sort of
+     separate entity in itself, and had magical, infallible powers that
+     were greater than the aggregate of the individuals that composed
+     it.
+
+     In a way, this is certainly so, since teamwork can accomplish
+     things that mobs cannot do. But the Team is a failure if each
+     member assumes that he, himself, is helpless and can do nothing,
+     but that the Team will do it for him.
+
+     Men who have gone through the Belt training program, men who have
+     "space experience," as you so euphemistically put it, are men who
+     can form a real team, one that will get things done because each
+     man knows he can rely on the others, not only as a team, but as
+     individuals. But to mechanize the anchor-setting phase would
+     destroy all that completely.
+
+     I don't want to see that destroyed, because I have felt what it is
+     to be a part of the Belt team, even though only a small and
+     unreliable part. Actually, I know I was not and could never be a
+     real member of that team, but I was and am proud to have scrimmaged
+     with the team, and I'm glad to be able to sit on the side-lines and
+     cheer even if I can't carry the ball. (It just occurred to me that
+     those metaphors might be a little cloudy to you, since you don't
+     have football in the Belt, but I think you see what I mean.) I
+     imagine that most of the men who have no "space experience" feel
+     the same way. They know they'd never make a go of it out in space,
+     but they're happy to be water boys.
+
+     I wish I could stay in the Belt. I'm enough of a spaceman to
+     appreciate what it really is to be a member of a space society. But
+     I also know that I'd never last. I'm not fitted for it, really.
+     I've had a small taste of it, but I know I couldn't take a full
+     dose. I've worked hard for the influence and security I have in my
+     job, and I couldn't give it up. Maybe this brands me as a coward in
+     your eyes, and maybe I am a coward, but that's the way I'm built. I
+     hope you'll take that into account when you think of me.
+
+     At any rate, I have done what I have done. On Earth, there are men
+     who envy you and hate you, and there will be others who will try to
+     destroy you, but I have done what I could to give you a chance to
+     gain the strength you need to resist the encroachment of Earth's
+     sickness.
+
+     I have a feeling that Tarnhorst saw your greatness, too, although
+     he'd never admit it, even to himself. Certainly something changed
+     him during the last months, even though he doesn't realize it. He
+     came out wanting to help--and by that, he meant help the common
+     people against the "tyranny" of the Companies. He still wants to
+     help the common people, but now he wants to do it _through_ the
+     Companies. The change is so subtle that he doesn't think he's
+     changed at all, but I can see it.
+
+     I don't deserve any thanks for what I have done. All I have done is
+     repay you in the only way I knew how for what you have done for me.
+     I may never see you again, captain, but I will always remember you.
+     Please convey my warmest regards to Captain Brand and to Mr.
+     Alhamid.
+
+     Sincerely,
+
+     Peter Danley
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Georges Alhamid handed the letter back to St. Simon. "There's your star
+pupil," he said gently.
+
+St. Simon nodded. "The wise fool. The guy who's got sense enough to know
+that he isn't competent to do the job."
+
+"Did you notice that he waltzed all around the real reason for the
+anchor-setting program without quite hitting it?"
+
+St. Simon smiled humorlessly. "Sure. Notice the wording of the letter.
+He still thinks in terms of the Team, even when he's trying not to. He
+thinks we do this just to train men to have a real good Team Spirit. He
+can't see that that is only a very useful by-product."
+
+"How could he think otherwise?" Alhamid asked. "To him, or to Tarnhorst,
+the notion of deliberately tailoring a program so that it would kill off
+the fools and the incompetents, setting up a program that will
+deliberately destroy the men who are dangerous to society, would be
+horrifying. They would accuse us of being soulless butchers who had no
+respect for the dignity of the human soul."
+
+"We're not butchering anybody," St. Simon objected. "Nobody is forced to
+go through two years of anchor setting. Nobody is forced to die. We're
+not running people into gas chambers or anything like that."
+
+"No; of course not. But would you expect an Earthman like Tarnhorst to
+see the difference? How could we explain to him that we have no
+objection to fools other than that we object to putting them in
+positions where they can harm others by their foolishness? Would you
+expect him to understand that we must have a method of eliminating those
+who are neither competent enough to be trusted with the lives of others
+nor wise enough to see that they are not competent? How would you tell
+him that the reason we send men out alone is so that if he destroys
+anyone by his foolishness--after we have taught him everything we know
+in the best way we know how--he will only destroy himself?"
+
+"I wouldn't even try," St. Simon said. "There's an old saying that
+neither money, education, liquor, nor women ever made a fool of a man,
+they just give a born fool a chance to display his foolishness. Space
+ought to be added to that list."
+
+"Did you notice something else about that letter?" Alhamid asked. "I
+mean, the very fact that he wrote a letter instead of telling you
+personally?"
+
+"Sure. He didn't trust me. He was afraid I, or someone else, would
+dispose of him if we knew he knew our secret."
+
+"I think that's it," Alhamid agreed. "He wanted to be safely away
+first."
+
+"Killing him would have brought down the biggest investigation the Earth
+Congress has launched since the crack-up of the Earth-Luna ship thirty
+years ago. Does he think we are fools?"
+
+"You can't blame him. He's been brought up that way, and three months of
+training isn't going to change him."
+
+St. Simon frowned. "Suppose he changes his mind? Suppose he tells
+Tarnhorst what he thinks?"
+
+"He won't. He's told his lie, and now he'll have to stick by it or lose
+his precious security. If he couldn't trade that for freedom, he sure
+isn't going to throw it away." Alhamid grinned. "But can you imagine a
+guy thinking that anchor setting could be completely mechanized?"
+
+St. Simon grinned back. "I guess I'm not a very good teacher after all.
+I told him and told him and told him for three solid months that the job
+required judgment, but it evidently didn't sink in. He's got the heart
+of a romantic and the soul of an Earthman--a very bad combination."
+
+"He has my sympathy," Alhamid said with feeling. "Now, about you. Your
+blue ticket still has three months to run, but I can't give you a class
+if you're only going to run through the first half of the course with
+them, and I don't have any more Earthmen for you to give special
+tutoring to. You have three choices: You can loaf with pay for three
+months; you can go back to space and get double pay for three months; or
+you can take a regular six-month class and get double pay for the last
+three months. Which'll it be?"
+
+St. Simon grinned widely. "I'm going to loaf until I get sick of it,
+then I'll go back to space and collect double pay for what's left of the
+three months. First off, I'm going to take a run over to Vesta. After
+that, who knows?"
+
+"I thought so. Most of you guys would stay out there forever if you
+didn't have to come back for supplies."
+
+St. Simon shook his head. "Nope. Not true. A man's got to come back
+every so often and get his feet on the ground. If you stay out there too
+long, you get to talking to yourself."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+An hour later, the spaceboat _Nancy Bell_ lifted from the surface of
+Pallas and shot toward Vesta.
+
+"Jules, old cobblestone, we have just saved civilization."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Hassenpfefferesser!_ Und now ve go to find _das Mädchen,
+nicht war_?"
+
+"Herr _Professor_ Hassenpfefferesser to you, my boy."
+
+And then, all alone in his spaceboat, Captain Jules St. Simon burst into
+song:
+
+    "Oh, I'm the cook and the captain, too,
+    And the men of the _Nancy's_ brig;
+    The bosun tight, and the midshipmite,
+    And the crew of the captain's gig!"
+
+And the _Nancy Bell_ sped on toward Vesta and a rendevous with Eros.
+
+
+
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+<body>
+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Anchorite, by Randall Garrett, Illustrated by
+ Schelling</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: Anchorite</p>
+<p>Author: Randall Garrett</p>
+<p>Release Date: November 20, 2007  [eBook #23561]</p>
+<p>[Date last updated: January 16, 2009]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANCHORITE***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>E-text prepared by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan,<br />
+    and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (http://www.pgdp.net)</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="10" style="background-color: #ccccff;">
+  <tr>
+    <td>
+      Transcriber's Note:<br />
+      <br />
+      This etext was produced from <i>Analog Science Fact Science
+      Fiction</i>, November, 1962. Extensive research did not uncover
+      any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
+    </td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h1>Anchorite</h1>
+
+<h2>by Johnathan Blake Mackenzie</h2>
+
+<h3>Illustrated by Schelling</h3>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>There are two basic kinds of fools&mdash;the ones who know they are
+fools, and the kind that, because they do not know that, are
+utterly deadly menaces!</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor2.jpg"><img src="images/anchor2.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+
+<p>The mountain was spinning.</p>
+
+<p>Not dizzily, not even rapidly, but very perceptibly, the great mass of
+jagged rock was turning on its axis.</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon scowled at it. "By damn, Jules," he said, "if you can
+see 'em spinning, it's too damn fast!" He expected no answer, and got
+none.</p>
+
+<p>He tapped the drive pedal gently with his right foot, his gaze shifting
+alternately from the instrument board to the looming hulk of stone
+before him. As the little spacecraft moved in closer, he tapped the
+reverse pedal with his left foot. He was now ten meters from the surface
+of the asteroid. It was moving, all right. "Well, Jules," he said in his
+most commanding voice, "we'll see just how fast she's moving. Prepare to
+fire Torpedo Number One!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yassuh, boss! Yassuh, Cap'n Sain' Simon, suh! All ready on the firin'
+line!"</p>
+
+<p>He touched a button with his right thumb. The ship quivered almost
+imperceptibly as a jet of liquid leaped from the gun mounted in the nose
+of the ship. At the same time, he hit the reverse pedal and backed the
+ship away from the asteroid's surface. No point getting any more gunk on
+the hull than necessary.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor1.jpg"><img src="images/anchor1.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+
+<p>The jet of liquid struck the surface of the rotating mountain and
+splashed, leaving a big splotch of silvery glitter. Even in the vacuum
+of space, the silicone-based solvents of the paint vehicle took time to
+boil off.</p>
+
+<p>"How's that for pinpoint accuracy, Jules?"</p>
+
+<p>"Veddy good, M'lud. Top hole, if I may say so, m'lud."</p>
+
+<p>"You may." He jockeyed the little spacecraft around until he was
+reasonably stationary with respect to the great hunk of whirling rock
+and had the silver-white blotch centered on the crosshairs of the peeper
+in front of him. Then he punched the button that started the timer and
+waited for the silver spot to come round again.</p>
+
+<p>The asteroid was roughly spherical&mdash;which was unusual, but not
+remarkable. The radar gave him the distance from the surface of the
+asteroid, and he measured the diameter and punched it through the
+calculator. "Observe," he said in a dry, didactic voice. "The diameter
+is on the order of five times ten to the fourteenth micromicrons." He
+kept punching at the calculator. "If we assume a mean density of two
+point six six times ten to the minus thirty-sixth metric tons per cubic
+micromicron, we attain a mean mass of some one point seven four times
+ten to the eleventh kilograms." More punching, while he kept his eye on
+the meteorite, waiting for the spot to show up again. "And that, my dear
+Jules, gives us a surface gravity of approximately two times ten to the
+minus sixth standard gees."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Jawohl, Herr Oberstleutnant.</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"Und zo, mine dear Chules, ve haff at least der grave zuspicion dot der
+zurface gravity iss less dan der zentrifugal force at der eqvator!
+<i>Nein? Ja!</i> Zo."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Jawohl, Herr Konzertmeister.</i>"</p>
+
+<p>Then there was a long, silent wait, while the asteroid went its
+leisurely way around its own axis.</p>
+
+<p>"There it comes," said Captain St. Simon. He kept his eyes on the
+crosshair of the peeper, one hand over the timer button. When the silver
+splotch drifted by the crosshair, he punched the stop button and looked
+at the indicator.</p>
+
+<p>"Sixteen minutes, forty seconds. How handy." He punched at the
+calculator again. "Ah! You see, Jules! Just as we suspected! Negative
+gees at the surface, on the equator, comes to ten to the minus third
+standard gees&mdash;almost exactly one centimeter per second squared. So?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, so, honorabu copton! Is somesing rike five hundred times as great
+as gravitationar attraction, is not so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sukiyaki, my dear chap, sometimes your brilliance amazes me."</p>
+
+<p>Well, at least it meant that there would be no loose rubble on the
+surface. It would have been tossed off long ago by the centrifugal
+force, flying off on a tangent to become more of the tiny rubble of the
+belt. Perhaps "flying" wasn't exactly the right word, though, when
+applied to a velocity of less than one centimeter per second. <i>Drifting</i>
+off, then.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think, Jules?" said St. Simon.</p>
+
+<p>"Waal, Ah reckon we can do it, cap'n. Ef'n we go to the one o' them thar
+poles ... well, let's see&mdash;" He leaned over and punched more figures
+into the calculator. "Ain't that purty! 'Cordin' ter this, thar's a spot
+at each pole, 'bout a meter in diameter, whar the gee-pull is <i>greater</i>
+than the centry-foogle force!"</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon looked at the figures on the calculator. The forces,
+in any case, were negligibly small. On Earth, where the surface gravity
+was ninety-eight per cent of a Standard Gee, St. Simon weighed close to
+two hundred pounds. Discounting the spin, he would weigh about four
+ten-thousandths of a pound on the asteroid he was inspecting. The spin
+at the equator would try to push him off with a force of about two
+tenths of a pound.</p>
+
+<p>But a man who didn't take those forces into account could get himself
+killed in the Belt.</p>
+
+<p>"Very well, Jules," he said, "we'll inspect the poles."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think they vill velcome us in Kraukau, <i>Herr Erzbischof</i>?"</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>The area around the North Pole&mdash;defined as that pole from which the body
+appears to be spinning counterclockwise&mdash;looked more suitable for
+operations than the South Pole. Theoretically, St. Simon could have
+stopped the spin, but that would have required an energy expenditure of
+some twenty-three thousand kilowatt-hours in the first place, and it
+would have required an anchor to be set somewhere on the equator. Since
+his purpose in landing on the asteroid was to set just such an anchor,
+stopping the spin would be a waste of time and energy.</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon positioned his little spacecraft a couple of meters
+above the North Pole. It would take better than six minutes to fall that
+far, so he had plenty of time. "Perhaps a boarding party, Mr. Christian!
+On the double!"</p>
+
+<p>"Aye, sir! On the double it is, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon pushed himself over to the locker, took out his vacuum suit,
+and climbed into it. After checking it thoroughly, he said: "Prepare to
+evacuate main control room, Mr. Christian!"</p>
+
+<p>"Aye, aye, Sir! All prepared and ready. I hope."</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon looked around to make sure he hadn't left a bottle of
+coffee sitting somewhere. He'd done that once, and the stuff had boiled
+out all over everywhere when he pulled the air out of the little room.
+Nope, no coffee. No obstacles to turning on the pump. He thumbed the
+button, and the pumps started to whine. The whine built up to a
+crescendo, then began to die away until finally it could only be felt
+through the walls or floor. The air was gone.</p>
+
+<p>Then he checked the manometer to make sure that most of the air had
+actually been pumped back into the reserve tanks. Satisfied, he touched
+the button that would open the door. There was a faint jar as the
+remaining wisps of air shot out into the vacuum of space.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon sat back down at the controls and carefully repositioned the
+ship. It was now less than a meter from the surface. He pushed himself
+over to the open door and looked out.</p>
+
+<p>He clipped one end of his safety cable to the steel eye-bolt at the edge
+of the door. "Fasten on carefully, Jules," he said. "We don't want to
+lose anything."</p>
+
+<p>"Like what, <i>mon capitain</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"Like this spaceship, <i>mon petit t&ecirc;te de mouton</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, but no, my old and raw; we could not afford to lose the so-dear
+<i>Nancy Bell</i>, could we?"</p>
+
+<p>The other end of the long cable was connected to the belt of the suit.
+Then St. Simon launched himself out the open door toward the surface of
+the planetoid. The ship began to drift&mdash;very slowly, but not so slowly
+as it had been falling&mdash;off in the other direction.</p>
+
+<p>He had picked the spot he was aiming for. There was a jagged hunk of
+rock sticking out that looked as though it would make a good handhold.
+Right nearby, there was a fairly smooth spot that would do to brake his
+"fall". He struck it with his palm and took up the slight shock with his
+elbow while his other hand grasped the outcropping.</p>
+
+<p>He had not pushed himself very hard. There is not much weathering on the
+surface of an asteroid. Micro-meteorites soften the contours of the rock
+a little over the millions of millennia, but not much, since the debris
+in the Belt all has roughly the same velocity. Collisions do occur, but
+they aren't the violent smashes that make the brilliant meteor displays
+of Earth. (And there is still a standing argument among the men of the
+Belt as to whether that sort of action can be called "weathering".) Most
+of the collisions tend to cause fracturing of the surface, which results
+in jagged edges. A man in a vacuum suit does not push himself against a
+surface like that with any great velocity.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon knew to a nicety that he could propel himself against a bed of
+nails and broken glass at just the right velocity to be able to stop
+himself without so much as scratching his glove. And he could see that
+there was no ragged stuff on the spot he had selected. The slanting rays
+of the sun would have made them stand out in relief.</p>
+
+<p>Now he was clinging to the surface of the mountain of rock like a bug on
+the side of a cliff. On a nickel-iron asteroid, he could have walked
+around on the surface, using the magnetic soles of his vacuum suit. But
+silicate rock is notably lacking in response to that attractive force.
+No soul, maybe.</p>
+
+<p>But directly and indirectly, that lack of response to magnetic forces
+was the reason for St. Simon's crawling around on the surface of that
+asteroid. Directly, because there was no other way he could move about
+on a nonmetallic asteroid. Indirectly, because there was no way the big
+space tugs could get a grip on such an asteroid, either.</p>
+
+<p>The nickel-iron brutes were a dead cinch to haul off to the smelters.
+All a space tug had to do was latch on to one of them with a magnetic
+grapple and start hauling. There was no such simple answer for the
+silicate rocks.</p>
+
+<p>The nickel-iron asteroids were necessary. They supplied the building
+material and the major export of the Belt cities. They averaged around
+eighty to ninety per cent iron, anywhere from five to twenty per cent
+nickel, and perhaps half a per cent cobalt, with smatterings of
+phosphorous, sulfur, carbon, copper, and chromium. Necessary&mdash;but not
+sufficient.</p>
+
+<p>The silicate rocks ran only about twenty-five per cent iron&mdash;in the form
+of nonmagnetic compounds. They averaged eighteen per cent silicon,
+fourteen per cent magnesium, between one and one point five per cent
+each of aluminum, nickel, and calcium, and good-sized dollops of sodium,
+chromium, phosphorous, manganese, cobalt, potassium, and titanium.</p>
+
+<p>But more important than these, as far as the immediate needs of the Belt
+cities were concerned, was a big, whopping thirty-six per cent oxygen.
+In the Belt cities, they had soon learned that, physically speaking, the
+stuff of life was <i>not</i> bread. And no matter how carefully oxygen is
+conserved, no process is one hundred per cent efficient. There will be
+leakage into space, and that which is lost must be replaced.</p>
+
+<p>There is plenty of oxygen locked up in those silicates; the problem is
+towing them to the processing plants where the stuff can be extracted.</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon's job was simple. All he had to do was sink an anchor
+into the asteroid so that the space tugs could get a grip on it. Once he
+had done that, the rest of the job was up to the tug crew.</p>
+
+<p>He crawled across the face of the floating mountain. At the spot where
+the North Pole was, he braced himself and then took a quick look around
+at the <i>Nancy Bell</i>. She wasn't moving very fast, he had plenty of time.
+He took a steel piton out of his tool pack, transferred it to his left
+hand, and took out a hammer. Then, working carefully, he hammered the
+piton into a narrow cleft in the rock. Three more of the steel spikes
+were hammered into the surface, forming a rough quadrilateral around the
+Pole.</p>
+
+<p>"That looks good enough to me, Jules," he said when he had finished.
+"Now that we have our little anchors, we can put the monster in."</p>
+
+<p>Then he grabbed his safety line, and pulled himself back to the <i>Nancy
+Bell</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The small craft had floated away from the asteroid a little, but not
+much. He repositioned it after he got the rocket drill out of the
+storage compartment.</p>
+
+<p>"Make way for the stovepipe!" he said as he pushed the drill ahead of
+him, out the door. This time, he pulled himself back to his drilling
+site by means of a cable which he had attached to one of the pitons.</p>
+
+<p>The setting up of the drill didn't take much time, but it was done with
+a great deal of care. He set the four-foot tube in the center of the
+quadrilateral formed by the pitons and braced it in position by
+attaching lines to the eyes on a detachable collar that encircled the
+drill. Once the drill started working, it wouldn't need bracing, but
+until it did, it had to be held down.</p>
+
+<p>All the time he worked, he kept his eyes on his lines and on his ship.
+The planetoid was turning under him, which made the ship appear to be
+circling slowly around his worksite. He had to make sure that his lines
+didn't get tangled or twisted while he was working.</p>
+
+<p>As he set up the bracing on the six-inch diameter drill, he sang a song
+that Kipling might have been startled to recognize:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0"><i>"To the tables down at Mory's,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>To the place where Louie dwells,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i2"><i>Where it's always double drill and no canteen,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Sit the Whiffenpoofs assembled,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>With their glasses raised on high,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i2"><i>And they'll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din."</i><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>When the drill was firmly based on the surface of the planetoid, St.
+Simon hauled his way back to his ship along his safety line. Inside, he
+sat down in the control chair and backed well away from the slowly
+spinning hunk of rock. Now there was only one thin pair of wires
+stretching between his ship and the drill on the asteroid.</p>
+
+<p>When he was a good fifty meters away, he took one last look to make sure
+everything was as it should be.</p>
+
+<p>"Stand by for a broadside!"</p>
+
+<p>"Standing by, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>"You may fire when ready, Gridley!"</p>
+
+<p>"Aye, sir! Rockets away!" His forefinger descended on a button which
+sent a pulse of current through the pair of wires that trailed out the
+open door to the drill fifty meters away.</p>
+
+<p>A flare of light appeared on the top of the drill. Almost immediately,
+it developed into a tongue of rocket flame. Then a glow appeared at the
+base of the drill and flame began to billow out from beneath the tube.
+The drill began to sink into the surface, and the planetoid began to
+move ever so slowly.</p>
+
+<p>The drill was essentially a pair of opposed rockets. The upper one,
+which tried to push the drill into the surface of the planetoid,
+developed nearly forty per cent more thrust than the lower one. Thus,
+the lower one, which was trying to push the drill <i>off</i> the rock, was
+outmatched. It had to back up, if possible. And it was certainly
+possible; the exhaust flame of the lower rocket easily burrowed a hole
+that the rocket could back into, while the silicate rock boiled and
+vaporized in order to get out of the way.</p>
+
+<p>Soon there was no sign of the drill body itself. There was only a small
+volcano, spewing up gas and liquid from a hole in the rock. On the
+surface of a good-sized planet, the drill would have built up a little
+volcanic cone around the lip of the hole, but building a cone like that
+requires enough gravity to pull the hot matter back to the edge of the
+hole.</p>
+
+<p>The fireworks didn't last long. The drill wasn't built to go in too
+deep. A drill of that type could be built which would burrow its way
+right through a small planetoid, but that was hardly necessary for
+planting an anchor. Ten meters was quite enough.</p>
+
+<p>Now came the hard work.</p>
+
+<p>On the outside of the <i>Nancy Bell</i>, locked into place, was a
+specially-treated nickel-steel eye-bolt&mdash;thirty feet long and eight
+inches in diameter. There had been ten of them, just as there had been
+ten drills in the storage locker. Now the last drill had been used, and
+there was but one eye-bolt left. The <i>Nancy Bell</i> would have to go back
+for more supplies after this job.</p>
+
+<p>The anchor bolts had a mass of four metric tons each. Maneuvering them
+around, even when they were practically weightless, was no easy job.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon again matched the velocity of the <i>Nancy Bell</i> with that of
+the planetoid, which had been accelerated by the drill's action. He
+positioned the ship above the hole which had been drilled into the huge
+rock. Not directly above it&mdash;rocket drills had been known to show spurts
+of life after they were supposed to be dead. St. Simon had timed the
+drill, and it had apparently behaved as it should, but there was no need
+to take chances.</p>
+
+<p>"Fire brigade, stand by!"</p>
+
+<p>"Fire brigade standing by, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>A nozzle came out of the nose of the <i>Nancy Bell</i> and peeped over the
+rim of the freshly-drilled hole.</p>
+
+<p>"Ready! Aim! Squirt!"</p>
+
+<p>A jet of kerosene-like fluosilicone oil shot down the shaft. When it had
+finished its work, there was little possibility that anything could
+happen at the bottom. Any unburned rocket fuel would have a hard time
+catching fire with that stuff soaking into it.</p>
+
+<p>"Ready to lower the boom, Mr. Christian!" bellowed St. Simon.</p>
+
+<p>"Aye, sir! Ready, sir!"</p>
+
+<p>"Lower away!"</p>
+
+<p>His fingers played rapidly over the control board.</p>
+
+<p>Outside the ship, the lower end of the great eye-bolt was released from
+its clamp, and a small piston gave it a little shove. In a long, slow,
+graceful arc, it swung away from the hull, swiveling around the pivot
+clamp that held the eye. The braking effect of the pivot clamp was
+precisely set to stop the eye-bolt when it was at right angles to the
+hull. Moving carefully, St. Simon maneuvered the ship until the far end
+of the bolt was directly over the shaft. Then he nudged the <i>Nancy Bell</i>
+sideways, pushing the bolt down into the planetoid. It grated a couple
+of times, but between the power of the ship and the mass of the
+planetoid, there was enough pressure to push it past the obstacles. The
+rocket drill and the eye-bolt had been designed to work together; the
+hole made by the first was only a trifle larger than the second. The
+anchor settled firmly into place.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon released the clamps that held the eye-bolt to the hull of the
+ship, and backed away again. As he did, a power cord unreeled, for the
+eye-bolt was still connected to the vessel electrically.</p>
+
+<p>Several meters away, St. Simon pushed another button. There was no
+sound, but his practiced eye saw the eye of the anchor quiver. A small
+explosive charge, set in the buried end of the anchor, had detonated,
+expanding the far end of the bolt, wedging it firmly in the hole. At the
+same time, a piston had been forced up a small shaft in the center of
+the bolt, forcing a catalyst to mix with a fast-setting resin, and
+extruding the mixture out through half a dozen holes in the side of the
+bolt. When the stuff set, the anchor was locked securely to the sides of
+the shaft and thus to the planetoid itself.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon waited for a few minutes to make sure the resin had set
+completely. Then he clambered outside again and attached a heavy towing
+cable to the eye of the anchor, which projected above the surface of the
+asteroid. Back inside the ship again, he slowly applied power. The cable
+straightened and pulled at the anchor as the <i>Nancy Bell</i> tried to get
+away from the asteroid.</p>
+
+<p>"Jules, old bunion," he said as he watched the needle of the tension
+gauge, "we have set her well."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, m'lud. So it would appear, m'lud."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon cut the power. "Very good, Jules. Now we shall see if the
+beeper is functioning as it should." He flipped a switch that turned on
+the finder pickup, then turned the selector to his own frequency band.</p>
+
+<p><i>Beep!</i> said the radio importantly. <i>Beep!</i></p>
+
+<p>The explosion had also triggered on a small but powerful transmitter
+built into the anchor. The tugs would be able to find the planetoid by
+following the beeps.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, Jules! Success!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, m'lud. Success. For the tenth time in a row, this trip. And how
+many trips does this make?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, but who's counting? Think of the money!"</p>
+
+<p>"And the monotony, m'lud. To say nothing of molasses, muchness, and
+other things that begin with an M."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite so, Jules; quite so. Well, let's detach the towing cable and be
+on our way."</p>
+
+<p>"Whither, m'lud, Vesta?"</p>
+
+<p>"I rather thought Pallas this time, old thimble."</p>
+
+<p>"Still, m'lud, Vesta&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Pallas, Jules."</p>
+
+<p>"Vesta?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hum, hi, ho," said Captain St. Simon thoughtfully. "Pallas?"</p>
+
+<p>The argument continued while the tow cable was detached from the
+freshly-placed anchor, and while the air was being let back into the
+control chamber, and while St. Simon divested himself of his suit.
+Actually, although he would like to go to Vesta, it was out of the
+question. Energywise and timewise, Pallas was much closer.</p>
+
+<p>He settled back in the bucket seat and shot toward Pallas.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Mr. Edway Tarnhorst was from San Pedro, Greater Los Angeles, California,
+Earth. He was a businessman of executive rank, and was fairly rich. In
+his left lapel was the Magistral Knight's Cross of the Sovereign
+Hierosolymitan Order of Malta, reproduced in miniature. In his wallet
+was a card identifying him as a Representative of the Constituency of
+Southern California to the Supreme Congress of the People of the United
+Nations of Earth. He was just past his fifty-third birthday, and his
+lean, ascetic face and graying hair gave him a look of saintly wisdom.
+Aside from the eight-pointed cross in his lapel, the only ornamentation
+or jewelry he wore consisted of a small, exquisitely thin gold watch on
+his left wrist, and, on the ring finger of his left hand, a gold signet
+ring set with a single, flat, unfaceted diamond which was delicately
+engraved with the Tarnhorst coat of arms. His clothing was quietly but
+impressively expensive, and under Earth gravity would probably have
+draped impeccably, but it tended to fluff oddly away from his body under
+a gee-pull only a twentieth of Earth's.</p>
+
+<p>He sat in his chair with both feet planted firmly on the metal floor,
+and his hands gripping the armrests as though he were afraid he might
+float off toward the ceiling if he let go. But only his body betrayed
+his unease; his face was impassive and calm.</p>
+
+<p>The man sitting next to him looked a great deal more comfortable. This
+was Mr. Peter Danley, who was twenty years younger than Mr. Tarnhorst
+and looked it. Instead of the Earth-cut clothing that the older man was
+wearing, he was wearing the close-fitting tights that were the common
+dress of the Belt cities. His hair was cropped close, and the fine blond
+strands made a sort of golden halo about his head when the light from
+the panels overhead shone on them. His eyes were pale blue, and the
+lashes and eyebrows were so light as to be almost invisible. That
+effect, combined with his thin-lined, almost lipless mouth, gave his
+face a rather expressionless expression. He carried himself like a man
+who was used to low-gravity or null-gravity conditions, but he talked
+like an Earthman, not a Belt man. The identification card in his belt
+explained that; he was a pilot on the Earth-Moon shuttle service. In the
+eyes of anyone from the Belt cities, he was still an Earthman, not a
+true spaceman. He was looked upon in the same way that the captain of a
+transatlantic liner might have looked upon the skipper of the Staten
+Island ferry two centuries before. The very fact that he was seated in a
+chair gave away his Earth habits.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor3.jpg"><img src="images/anchor3.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>The third man was standing, leaning at a slight angle, so that his back
+touched the wall behind him. He was not tall&mdash;five nine&mdash;and his face
+and body were thin. His tanned skin seemed to be stretched tightly over
+this scanty padding, and in places the bones appeared to be trying to
+poke their way through to the surface. His ears were small and lay
+nearly flat against his head, and the hair on his skull was so sparse
+that the tanned scalp could be easily seen beneath it, although there
+was no actual bald spot anywhere. Only his large, luminous brown eyes
+showed that Nature had not skimped on everything when he was formed. His
+name was lettered neatly on the outside of the door to the office:
+Georges Alhamid. In spite of the French spelling, he pronounced the name
+"George," in the English manner.</p>
+
+<p>He had welcomed the two Earthmen into his office, smiling the automatic
+smile of the diplomat as he welcomed them to Pallas. As soon as they
+were comfortably seated&mdash;though perhaps that word did not exactly apply
+to Edway Tarnhorst&mdash;Georges Alhamid said:</p>
+
+<p>"Now, gentlemen, what can I do for you?"</p>
+
+<p>He asked it as though he were completely unaware of what had brought the
+two men to Pallas.</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst looked as though he were privately astonished that his host
+could speak grammatically. "Mr. Alhamid," he began, "I don't know
+whether you're aware that the industrial death rate here in the Belt has
+been the subject of a great deal of discussion in both industrial and
+governmental circles on Earth." It was a half question, and he let it
+hang in the air, waiting to see whether he got an answer.</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly my office has received a great deal of correspondence on the
+subject," Alhamid said. His voice sounded as though Tarnhorst had
+mentioned nothing more serious than a commercial deal. Important, but
+nothing to get into a heavy sweat over.</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst nodded and then held his head very still. His actions betrayed
+the fact that he was not used to the messages his semicircular canals
+were sending his brain when he moved his head under low gee.</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly," he said after a moment's pause. "I have 'stat copies of a
+part of that correspondence. To be specific, the correspondence between
+your office and the Workers' Union Safety Control Board, and between
+your office and the Workingman's Compensation Insurance Corporation."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Well, then, you're fully aware of what our trouble is, Mr.
+Tarnhorst. I'm glad to see that an official of the insurance company is
+taking an interest in our troubles."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst's head twitched, as though he were going to shake his head and
+had thought better of it a fraction of a second too late. It didn't
+matter. The fluid in his inner ears sloshed anyway.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not here in my capacity as an officer of the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation," he said carefully. "I am here as a
+representative of the People's Congress."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid's face showed a mild surprise which he did not feel. "I'm
+honored, of course, Mr. Tarnhorst," he said, "but you must understand
+that I am not an official of the government of Pallas."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst's ascetic face betrayed nothing. "Since you have no unified
+government out here," he said, "I cannot, of course, presume to deal
+with you in a governmental capacity. I have spoken to the Governor of
+Pallas, however, and he assures me that you are the man to speak to."</p>
+
+<p>"If it's about the industrial death rate," Alhamid agreed, "then he's
+perfectly correct. But if you're here as a governmental representative
+of Earth, I don't understand&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Please, Mr. Alhamid," Tarnhorst interrupted with a touch of irritation
+in his voice. "This is not my first trip to the Belt, nor my first
+attempt to deal with the official workings of the Confederated Cities."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid nodded gently. It was, as a matter of fact, Mr. Tarnhorst's
+second trip beyond the Martian orbit, the first having taken place some
+three years before. But the complaint was common enough; Earth, with its
+strong centralized government, simply could not understand the
+functioning of the Belt Confederacy. A man like Tarnhorst apparently
+couldn't distinguish between <i>government</i> and <i>business</i>. Knowing that,
+Alhamid could confidently predict what the general sense of Tarnhorst's
+next sentence would be.</p>
+
+<p>"I am well aware," said Tarnhorst, "that the Belt Companies not only
+have the various governors under their collective thumb, but have thus
+far prevented the formation of any kind of centralized government. Let
+us not quibble, Mr. Alhamid; the Belt Companies run the Belt, and that
+means that I must deal with officials of those companies&mdash;such as
+yourself."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid felt it necessary to make a mild speech in rebuttal. "I cannot
+agree with you, Mr. Tarnhorst. I have nothing to do with the government
+of Pallas or any of the other asteroids. I am neither an elected nor an
+appointed official of any government. Nor, for that matter, am I an
+advisor in either an official or unofficial capacity to any government.
+I do not make the laws designed to keep the peace, nor do I enforce
+them, except in so far as I am a registered voter and therefore have
+some voice in those laws in that respect. Nor, again, do I serve any
+judiciary function in any Belt government, except inasmuch as I may be
+called upon for jury duty.</p>
+
+<p>"I am a business executive, Mr. Tarnhorst. Nothing more. If you have
+governmental problems to discuss, then I can't help you, since I'm not
+authorized to make any decisions for any government."</p>
+
+<p>Edway Tarnhorst closed his eyes and massaged the bridge of his thin nose
+between thumb and forefinger. "I understand that. I understand that
+perfectly. But out here, the Companies have taken over certain functions
+of government, shall we say?"</p>
+
+<p>"Shall we say, rather, that on Earth the government has usurped certain
+functions which rightfully belong to private enterprise?" Alhamid said
+gently. "Historically, I think, that is the correct view."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst opened his eyes and smiled. "You may be quite correct.
+Historically speaking, perhaps, the Earth government has usurped the
+functions that rightfully belong to kings, dictators, and warlords. To
+say nothing of local satraps and petty chieftains. Hm-m-m. Perhaps we
+should return to that? Perhaps we should return to the human suffering
+that was endemic in those times?"</p>
+
+<p>"You might try it," said Alhamid with a straight face. "Say, one year
+out of every ten. It would give the people something to look forward to
+with anticipation and to look back upon with nostalgia." Then he changed
+his tone. "If you wish to debate theories of government, Mr. Tarnhorst,
+possibly we could get up a couple of teams. Make a public affair of it.
+It could be taped and televised here and on Earth, and we could charge
+royalties on each&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Peter Danley's blond, blank face became suddenly animated. He looked as
+though he were trying to suppress a laugh. He almost succeeded. It came
+out as a cough.</p>
+
+<p>At the same time, Tarnhorst interrupted Alhamid. "You have made your
+point, Mr. Alhamid," he said in a brittle voice. "Permit me to make
+mine. I have come to discuss business with you. But, as a member of the
+Congressional Committee for Industrial Welfare, I am also in search of
+facts. Proper legislation requires facts, and legislation passed by the
+Congress will depend to a great extent upon the report on my findings
+here."</p>
+
+<p>"I understand," said Alhamid. "I'll certainly be happy to provide you
+with whatever data you want&mdash;with the exception of data on industrial
+processes, of course. That's not mine to give. But anything else&mdash;" He
+gestured with one hand, opening it palm upwards, as though dispensing a
+gift.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not interested in industrial secrets," said Tarnhorst, somewhat
+mollified. "It's a matter of the welfare of your workers. We feel that
+we should do something to help. As you know, there have been protests
+from the Worker's Union Safety Control Board and from the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid nodded. "I know. The insurance company is complaining about the
+high rate of claims for deaths. They've threatened to raise our premium
+rates."</p>
+
+<p>"Considering the expense, don't you, as a businessman, think that a fair
+thing to do?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Alhamid said. "I have pointed out to them that the total amount of
+the claims is far less per capita than, for instance, the Steel
+Construction Workers' Union of Earth. Granted, there are more death
+claims, but these are more than compensated for by the fact that the
+claims for disability and hospitalization are almost negligible."</p>
+
+<p>"That's another thing we don't understand," Tarnhorst said carefully.
+"It appears that not only are the safety precautions insufficient, but
+the post-accident care is ... er ... inefficient."</p>
+
+<p>"I assure you that what post-accident care there is," Alhamid said, "is
+quite efficient. But there is a high mortality rate because of the very
+nature of the job. Do you know anything about anchor-placing, Mr.
+Tarnhorst?"</p>
+
+<p>"Very little," Tarnhorst admitted. "That is one of the things I am here
+to get information on. You used the phrase 'what post-accident care
+there is'&mdash;just how do you mean that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Tarnhorst, when a man is out in space, completely surrounded by a
+hard vacuum, <i>any</i> accident is very likely to be fatal. On Earth, if a
+man sticks his thumb in a punch press, he loses his thumb. Out here, if
+a man's thumb is crushed off while he's in space, he loses his air and
+his life long before he can bleed to death. Anything that disables a man
+in space is deadly ninety-nine times out of a hundred.</p>
+
+<p>"I can give you a parallel case. In the early days of oil drilling,
+wells occasionally caught fire. One of the ways to put them out was to
+literally blow them out with a charge of nitroglycerine. Naturally, the
+nitroglycerine had to be transported from where it was made to where it
+was to be used. Sensibly enough, it was not transported in tank-car
+lots; it was carried in small special containers by a single man in an
+automobile, who used the back roads and avoided traffic and stayed away
+from thickly populated areas&mdash;which was possible in those days. In many
+places these carriers were required to paint their cars red, and have
+the words <i>Danger Nitroglycerine</i> painted on the vehicle in yellow.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, the interesting thing about that situation is that, whereas
+insurance companies in those days were reluctant to give policies to
+those men, even at astronomical premium rates, disability insurance cost
+practically nothing&mdash;provided the insured would allow the insertion of a
+clause that restricted the covered period to those times when he was
+actually engaged in transporting nitroglycerine. You can see why."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not familiar with explosives," Tarnhorst said. "I take it that the
+substance is ... er ... easily detonated?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's right," said Alhamid. "It's not only sensitive, but it's
+unreliable. You might actually drop a jar of the stuff and do nothing
+but shatter the jar. Another jar, apparently exactly similar, might go
+off because it got jiggled by a seismic wave from a passing truck half a
+mile away. But the latter was a great deal more likely than the former."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," said Tarnhorst after a moment, "I accept that analogy. I'd
+like to know more about the work itself. What does the job entail,
+exactly? What safety precautions are taken?"</p>
+
+<p>It required the better part of three hours to explain exactly what an
+anchor setter did and how he did it&mdash;and what safety precautions were
+being taken. Through it all, Peter Danley just sat there, listening,
+saying nothing.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, Edway Tarnhorst said: "Well, thank you very much for your
+information, Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to think this over. May I see you in
+the morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly, sir. You're welcome at any time."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you." The two Earthmen rose from their seats&mdash;Tarnhorst
+carefully, Danley with the ease of long practice. "Would nine in the
+morning be convenient?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite convenient. I'll expect you."</p>
+
+<p>Danley glided over to the door and held it open for Tarnhorst. He was
+wearing magnetic glide-shoes, the standard footwear of the Belt, which
+had three ball-bearings in the forward part of the sole, allowing the
+foot to move smoothly in any direction, while the rubber heel could be
+brought down to act as a brake when necessary. He didn't handle them
+with the adeptness of a Belt man, but he wasn't too awkward. Tarnhorst
+was wearing plain magnetic-soled boots&mdash;the lift-'em-up-and-lay-'em-down
+type. He had no intention of having his dignity compromised by shoes
+that might treacherously scoot out from under him.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>As soon as the door had closed behind them, Georges Alhamid picked up
+the telephone on his desk and punched a number.</p>
+
+<p>When a woman's voice answered at the other end, he said: "Miss Lehman,
+this is Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to speak to the governor." There was a
+pause. Then:</p>
+
+<p>"George? Larry here."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid leaned back comfortably against the wall. "I just saw your
+guests, Larry. I spent damn near three hours explaining why it was
+necessary to put anchors in rocks, how it was done, and why it was
+dangerous."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you convince him? Tarnhorst, I mean."</p>
+
+<p>"I doubt it. Oh, I don't mean he thinks I'm lying or anything like that.
+He's too sharp for that. But he <i>is</i> convinced that we're negligent,
+that we're a bunch of barbarians who care nothing about human life."</p>
+
+<p>"You've got to unconvince him, George," the governor said worriedly.
+"The Belt still isn't self-sufficient enough to be able to afford an
+Earth embargo. They can hold out longer than we can."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Alhamid said. "Give us another generation, and we can tell the
+World Welfare State where to head in&mdash;but right now, things are touchy,
+and you and I are in the big fat middle of it." He paused, rubbing
+thoughtfully at his lean blade of a nose with a bony forefinger. "Larry,
+what did you think of that blond nonentity Tarnhorst brought with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's not a nonentity," the governor objected gently. "He just looks it.
+He's Tarnhorst's 'expert' on space industry, if you want my opinion. Did
+he say much of anything while he was with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hardly anything."</p>
+
+<p>"Same here. I have a feeling that his job is to evaluate every word you
+say and report his evaluation to Tarnhorst. You'll have to be careful."</p>
+
+<p>"I agree," Alhamid said. "But he complicates things. I have a feeling
+that if I tell Tarnhorst a straight story he'll believe it. He seems to
+be a pretty shrewd judge. But Danley just might be the case of the man
+who is dangerous because of his little learning. He obviously knows a
+devil of a lot more about operations in space than Tarnhorst does, and
+he's evidently a hand-picked man, so that Tarnhorst will value his
+opinion. But it's evident that Danley doesn't know anything about space
+by our standards. Put him out on a boat as an anchor man, and he'd be
+lucky if he set a single anchor."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, there's not much chance of that. How do you mean, he's
+dangerous?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll give you a f'rinstance. Suppose you've got a complex circuit using
+alternatic current, and you're trying to explain to a reasonably
+intelligent man how it works and what it does. If he doesn't know
+anything about electricity, he mightn't understand the explanation, but
+he'll believe that you're telling him the truth even if he doesn't
+understand it. But if he knows the basic theory of direct currents,
+you're likely to find yourself in trouble because he'll know just enough
+to see that what you're telling him doesn't jibe with what he already
+knows. Volts times amperes equal watts, as far as he's concerned, and
+the term 'power factor' does nothing but confuse him. He knows that
+copper is a conductor, so he can't see how a current could be cut off by
+a choke coil. He knows that a current can't pass through an insulator,
+so a condenser obviously can't be what you say it is. Mentally, he tags
+you as a liar, and he begins to try to dig in to see how your gadget
+<i>really</i> works."</p>
+
+<p>"Hm-m-m. I see what you mean. Bad." He snorted. "Blast Earthmen, anyway!
+Have you ever been there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Earth? Nope. By careful self-restraint, I've managed to forego that
+pleasure so far, Larry. Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Brrr! It's the feel of the place that I can't stand. I don't mean the
+constant high-gee; I take my daily exercise spin in the centrifuge just
+like anyone else, and you soon get used to the steady pull on Earth. I
+mean the constant, oppressive <i>psychic</i> tension, if you see what I mean.
+The feeling that everyone hates and distrusts everyone else. The curious
+impression of fear underneath every word and action.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm older than you are, George, and I've lived with a kind of fear all
+my life&mdash;just as you and everyone else in the Belt has. A single mistake
+can kill out here, and the fear that it will be some fool who makes a
+mistake that will kill hundreds is always with us. We've learned to live
+with that kind of fear; we've learned to take steps to prevent any idiot
+from throwing the wrong switch that would shut down a power plant or
+open an air lock at the wrong time.</p>
+
+<p>"But the fear on Earth is different. It's the fear that everyone else is
+out to get you, the fear that someone will stick a figurative knife in
+your back and reduce you to the basic subsistence level. And that fear
+is solidly based, believe me. The only way to climb up from basic
+subsistence is to climb over everyone else, to knock aside those in your
+way, to get rid of whoever is occupying the position you want. And once
+you get there, the only way you can hold your position is to make sure
+that nobody below you gets too big for his britches. The rule is: Pull
+down those above you, hold down those below you.</p>
+
+<p>"I've seen it, George. The big cities are packed with people whose sole
+ambition in life is to badger their local welfare worker out of another
+check&mdash;they need new clothes, they need a new bed, they need a new
+table, they need more food for the new baby, they need this, they need
+that. All they ever do is <i>need</i>! But, of course, they're far to
+aristocratic to <i>work</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"Those who do have ambition have to become politicians&mdash;in the worst
+sense of the word. They have to gain some measure of control over the
+dispersal of largesse to the mob; they have to get themselves into a
+position where they can give away other people's money, so that they can
+get their cut, too.</p>
+
+<p>"And even then, the man who gets to be a big shot doesn't dare show it.
+Take a look at Tarnhorst. He's probably one of the best of a bad lot. He
+has his fingers in a lot of business pies which make him money, and he's
+in a high enough position in the government to enable him to keep some
+of his money. But his clothing is only a little bit better than the
+average, just as the man who is on basic subsistence wears clothes that
+are only a little bit worse than the average. That diamond ring of his
+is a real diamond, but you can buy imitations that can't be told from
+the real thing except by an expert, so his diamond doesn't offend anyone
+by being ostentatious. And it's unfaceted, to eliminate offensive flash.</p>
+
+<p>"All the color has gone out of life on Earth, George. Women held out
+longer than men did, but now no man or woman would be caught wearing a
+bright-colored suit. You don't see any reds or yellows or blues or
+greens or oranges&mdash;only grays and browns and black.</p>
+
+<p>"It's not for me, George. I'd much rather live in fear of the few fools
+who might pull a stupid trick that would kill me than live in the
+constant fear of everyone around me, who all want to destroy me
+deliberately."</p>
+
+<p>"I know what you mean," said Alhamid, "but I think you've put the wrong
+label on what you're calling 'fear'; there's a difference between fear
+and having a healthy respect for something that is dangerous but not
+malignant. That vacuum out there isn't out to 'get' anybody. The only
+people it kills are the fools who have no respect for it and the
+neurotics who think that it wants to murder them. You're neither, and I
+know it."</p>
+
+<p>The governor laughed. "That's the advantage we have over Earthmen,
+George. We went through the same school of hard knocks together&mdash;all of
+us. And we know how we stack up against each other."</p>
+
+<p>"True," Alhamid said darkly, "but how long will that hold if Tarnhorst
+closes the school down?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's what you've got to prevent," said the governor flatly. "If you
+need help, yell."</p>
+
+<p>"I will," Alhamid said. "Very loudly." He hung up, wishing he knew what
+Tarnhorst&mdash;and Danley&mdash;had in mind.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>"The trouble with these people, Danley," said Edway Tarnhorst, "is that
+they have no respect whatever for human dignity. They have a tendency to
+overlook the basic rights of the individual."</p>
+
+<p>"They're certainly&mdash;different," Peter Danley said.</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst juggled himself up and down on the easy-chair in which he was
+seated, as though he could hardly believe that he had weight again. He
+hated low gee. It made him feel awkward and undignified. The only thing
+that reminded him that this was not "real" gravity was the faint, but
+all-pervasive hum of the huge engines that drove the big centrifuge. The
+rooms had cost more, but they were well worth it, as far as Tarnhorst
+was concerned.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you mean, 'different'?" he asked almost absently, settling
+himself comfortably into the cushions.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know exactly. There's a hardness, a toughness&mdash;I can't quite
+put my finger on it, but it's in the way they act, the way they talk."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely you'd noticed that before?" Tarnhorst asked in mild surprise.
+"You've met these Belt men on Luna."</p>
+
+<p>"And their women," Danley said with a nod. "But the impact is somewhat
+more pronounced on their own home ground&mdash;seeing them <i>en masse</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Their women!" Tarnhorst said, caught by the phrase. "<i>Fah!</i>
+Bright-colored birds! Giggling children! And no more morals than a
+common house-cat!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, they're not as bad as all that," Danley objected. "Their clothing
+is a little bright, I'll admit, and they laugh and kid around a lot, but
+I wouldn't say that their morals were any worse than those of a girl
+from New York or London."</p>
+
+<p>"Arrogance is the word," said Tarnhorst. "Arrogance. Like the way that
+Alhamid kept standing all the time we were talking, towering over us
+that way."</p>
+
+<p>"Just habit," Danley said. "When you don't weigh more than six or seven
+pounds, there's not much point in sitting down. Besides, it leaves them
+on their feet in case of emergency."</p>
+
+<p>"He could have sat down out of politeness," Tarnhorst said. "But no.
+They try to put on an air of superiority that is offensive to human
+dignity." He leaned back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and
+crossed his ankles. "However, attitude itself needn't concern us until
+it translates itself into anti-social behavior. What cannot be tolerated
+is this callous attitude toward the dignity and well-being of the
+workers out here. What did you think of Alhamid's explanation of this
+anchor-setting business?"</p>
+
+<p>Danley hesitated. "It sounded straightforward enough, as far as it
+went."</p>
+
+<p>"You think he's concealing something, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I don't have all the information." He frowned, putting
+furrows between his almost invisible blond brows. "I know that neither
+government business nor insurance business are my specialty, but I would
+like to know a little more about the background before I render any
+decision."</p>
+
+<p>"Hm-m-m. Well." Tarnhorst frowned in thought for a moment, then came to
+a decision. "I can't give you the detailed data, of course; that would
+be a violation of the People's Mutual Welfare Code. But I can give you
+the general story."</p>
+
+<p>"I just want to know what sort of thing to look for," Danley said.</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. Certainly. Well." Tarnhorst paused to collect his thoughts,
+then launched into his speech. "It has now been over eighty years since
+the first colonists came out here to the Belt. At first, the ties with
+Earth were quite strong, naturally. Only a few actually intended to stay
+out there the rest of their lives; most of them intended to make
+themselves a nice little nest egg, come back home, and retire. At the
+same time, the World State was slowly evolving from its original loosely
+tied group of independent nations toward what it is today.</p>
+
+<p>"The people who came out here were mostly misfits, sociologically
+speaking." He smiled sardonically. "They haven't changed much.</p>
+
+<p>"At any rate, as I said, they were strongly tied to Earth. There was the
+matter of food, air, and equipment, all of which had to be shipped out
+from Earth to begin with. Only the tremendous supply of metal&mdash;almost
+free for the taking&mdash;made such a venture commercially possible. Within
+twenty-five years, however, the various industrial concerns that managed
+the Belt mining had become self-supporting. The robot scoopers which are
+used to mine methane and ammonia from Jupiter's atmosphere gave them
+plenty of organic raw material. Now they grow plants of all kinds and
+even raise food animals.</p>
+
+<p>"They began, as every misfit does, to complain about the taxes the
+government put on their incomes. The government, in my opinion, made an
+error back then. They wanted to keep people out in the Belt, since the
+mines on Earth were not only rapidly being depleted, but the mining
+sites were needed for living space. Besides, asteroid metals were
+cheaper than metals mined on Earth. To induce the colonists to remain in
+the Belt, no income tax was levied; the income tax was replaced by an
+eighty per cent tax on the savings accumulated when the colonist
+returned to Earth to retire.</p>
+
+<p>"They resented even that. It was explained to them that the asteroids
+were, after all, natural resources, and that they had no moral right to
+make a large profit and deprive others of their fair share of the income
+from a natural resource, but they insisted that they had earned it and
+had a right to keep it.</p>
+
+<p>"In other words, the then government bribed them to stay out here, and
+the bribe was more effective than they had intended."</p>
+
+<p>"So they stayed out here and kept their money," Danley said.</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. At that time, if you will recall, there was a great deal of
+agitation against colonialism&mdash;there had been for a long time, as a
+matter of fact. That agitation was directed against certain
+industrialist robber-baron nations who had enslaved the populace of
+parts of Asia and Africa solely to produce wealth, and not for the
+benefit of the people themselves. But the Belt operators took advantage
+of the anticolonialism of the times and declared that the Belt cities
+were, and by right ought to be, free and independent political entities.
+It was a ridiculous assumption, of course, but since the various Belt
+cities were, at that time, under the nominal control of three or four of
+the larger nations, the political picture required that they be allowed
+to declare themselves independent. It was not anticipated at the time
+that they would be so resistant toward the World Government."</p>
+
+<p>He smiled slightly. "Of course, by refusing to send representatives to
+the People's Congress, they have, in effect, cut themselves off from any
+voice in human government."</p>
+
+<p>Then he shrugged. "At the moment, that is neither here nor there. What
+interests us at the moment is the death rate curve of the anchor-sinkers
+or whatever they are. Did you know that it is practically impossible for
+anyone to get a job out there in the Belt unless he has had experience
+in the anchor-setting field?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Danley admitted.</p>
+
+<p>"It's true. For every other job, they want only men with space
+experience. And by 'space experience' they mean anchor-setting, because
+that's the only job a man can get without previous space experience.
+They spend six months in a special school, learning to do the work,
+according to our friend, Mr. Georges Alhamid. Then they are sent out to
+set anchors. Small ones, at first, in rocks only a few meters in
+diameter&mdash;then larger ones. After a year or so at that kind of work,
+they can apply for more lucrative positions.</p>
+
+<p>"I see nothing intrinsically wrong in that, I will admit, but the
+indications are that the schooling, which should have been getting more
+efficient over the years, has evidently been getting more lax. The death
+rate has gone up."</p>
+
+<p>"Just a minute," Danley interrupted. "Do you mean that a man has to have
+what they call 'space experience' before he can get <i>any</i> kind of job?"</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst shook his head and was pleased to find that no nausea
+resulted. "No, of course not. Clerical jobs, teaching jobs, and the like
+don't require that sort of training. But there's very little chance for
+advancement unless you're one of the elite. A physician, for example,
+wouldn't have many patients unless he had had 'space experience'; he
+wouldn't be allowed to own or drive a space boat, and he wouldn't be
+allowed to go anywhere near what are called 'critical areas'&mdash;such as
+air locks, power plants, or heavy industry installations."</p>
+
+<p>"It sounds to me as though they have a very strong union," said Danley.</p>
+
+<p>"If you want to call it that, yes," Tarnhorst said. "Anything that has
+anything to do with operations in space requires that sort of
+experience&mdash;and there are very few jobs out here that can avoid having
+anything to do with space. Space is only a few kilometers away." The
+expression on his face showed that he didn't much care for the thought.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see that that's so bad," Danley said. "Going out there isn't
+something for the unexperienced. A man who doesn't know what he's doing
+can get himself killed easily, and, what's worse, he's likely to take
+others with him."</p>
+
+<p>"You speak, of course, from experience," Tarnhorst said with no trace of
+sarcasm. "I accept that. By not allowing inexperienced persons in
+critical areas, the Belt Companies are, at least indirectly, looking out
+for the welfare of the people. But we mustn't delude ourselves into
+thinking that that is their prime objective. These Belt Companies are no
+better than the so-called 'industrial giants' of the nineteenth and
+twentieth centuries. The government here is farcical. The sole job is to
+prevent crime and to adjudicate small civil cases. Every other function
+of proper government&mdash;the organization of industry, the regulation of
+standards the subsidizing of research, the control of prices, and so
+on&mdash;are left to the Belt Companies or to the people. The Belt Cities are
+no more than what used to be called 'company towns'."</p>
+
+<p>"I understand that," Danley said. "But they seem to function fairly
+smoothly."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst eyed him. "If, by, 'smoothly functioning', you mean the denial
+of the common rights of human freedom and dignity yes. Oh, they give
+their sop to such basic human needs as the right of every individual to
+be respected&mdash;but only because Earth has put pressure on them.
+Otherwise, people who, through no fault of their own, were unable to
+work or get 'space experience' would be unable to get jobs and would be
+looked down upon as pariahs."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean there are people here who have no jobs? I wouldn't think that
+unemployment would be a problem out here."</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't," said Tarnhorst, "yet. But there are always those
+unfortunates who are psychologically incapable of work, and society must
+provide for them. The Belt Cities provide for a basic education, of
+course. As long as a person is going to school, he is given a stipend.
+But a person who has neither the ability to work nor the ability to
+study is an outcast, even though he is provided for by the companies. He
+is forced to do something to earn what should be his by right; he is
+given menial and degrading tasks to do. We would like to put a stop to
+that sort of thing, but we ... ah ... have no ... ah ... means of doing
+so." He paused, as though considering whether he had said too much.</p>
+
+<p>"The problem at hand," he went on hurriedly, "is the death curve. When
+this technique for taking the rocks to the smelters was being worked
+out, the death rate was&mdash;as you might imagine&mdash;quite high. The Belt
+Companies had already been operating out here for a long time before the
+stony meteorites were mined commercially. At first, the big thing was
+nickel-iron. That's what they came here to get in the beginning. That's
+where most of the money still is. But the stony asteroids provide them
+with their oxygen.</p>
+
+<p>"This anchor-setting technique was worked out at a time when the Belt
+Companies were trying to find ways to make the Belt self-sufficient.
+After they got the technique worked out so that it operated smoothly,
+the death rate dropped 'way down. It stayed down for a little while, and
+then began to rise again. It has nearly reached an all-time high.
+Obviously, something is wrong, and we have to find out what it is."</p>
+
+<p>Danley scratched ruminatively behind his right ear and wished he'd had
+the opportunity to study history. He had been vaguely aware, of the
+broad outlines, but the details had never been brought to his attention
+before. "Suppose Alhamid <i>is</i> trying to hide something," he said after a
+moment. "What would it be, do you think?"</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst shrugged and spread his hands. "What could it be but some sort
+of money-saving scheme? Inferior materials being used at a critical
+spot, perhaps. Skimping on quality or quantity. Somewhere, somehow, they
+are shaving costs at the risk of the workers' lives. We have to find out
+what it is."</p>
+
+<p>Peter Danley nodded. <i>You don't mean</i> "<i>we</i>," Danley thought to himself.
+I <i>am the one who's going to have to go out there and find it, while you
+sit here safe</i>. He felt that there was a pretty good chance that these
+Belt operators might kill him to keep him from finding out what it was
+they were saving money on.</p>
+
+<p>Aloud, he said: "I'll do what I can, Mr. Tarnhorst."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst smiled. "I'm certain you will. That's why I needed someone who
+knows more about this business than I."</p>
+
+<p>"And when we do find it&mdash;what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Then? Why, then we will force them to make the proper changes or there
+will be trouble."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Georges Alhamid heard the whole conversation early the next morning. The
+governor himself brought the recording over to his office.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think he knew he was being overheard?"</p>
+
+<p>The governor shrugged. "Who knows. He waltzed all around what he was
+trying to say, but that may have been just native caution. Or he may not
+want Danley to know what's on his mind."</p>
+
+<p>"How could he bring Danley out here without telling him anything
+beforehand?" Alhamid asked thoughtfully. "Is Danley really that
+ignorant, or was the whole conversation for our ears?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm inclined to think that Danley really didn't know. Remember, George,
+the best way to hold down the ones below you is to keep them from
+gaining any knowledge, to keep data out of their hands&mdash;except for the
+carefully doctored data you want them to have."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Alhamid said. "History isn't exactly a popular subject on
+Earth." He tapped his fingers gently on the case of the playback and
+looked at it as if he were trying to read the minds of the persons who
+had spoken the words he had just heard.</p>
+
+<p>"I really think he believed that his nullifying equipment was doing its
+job," the governor continued. "He wouldn't have any way of knowing we
+could counteract it."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid shrugged. "It doesn't matter much. We still have to assume that
+he's primarily out to bring the Belt Cities under Earth control. To do
+that, all he'd have to do is find something that could be built up into
+a scandal on Earth."</p>
+
+<p>"Not, <i>all</i>, George," the governor said. "It would take a lot more than
+that alone. But it would certainly be a start in the right direction."</p>
+
+<p>"One thing we do know," Alhamid said, "is that nobody on Earth will
+allow any action against the Belt unless popular sentiment is definitely
+against us. As long as we are apparently right-thinking people, we're
+all right. I wonder why Tarnhorst is so anxious to get us under the
+thumb of the People's Congress? Is it purely that half-baked idealism of
+his?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mostly. He has the notion that everybody has a right to be accorded the
+respect of his fellow man, and that that right is something that every
+person is automatically given at birth, not something he has to earn.
+What gave him his particular gripe against us, I don't know, but he's
+been out to get us ever since his trip here three years ago."</p>
+
+<p>"You know, Larry," Alhamid said slowly, "I'm not quite sure which is
+harder to understand: How a whole civilization could believe that sort
+of thing, or how a single intelligent man could."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a positive feedback," the governor said. "That sort of thing has
+wrecked civilizations before and will do it again. Let's not let it
+wreck ours. Are you ready for the conference with our friend now?"</p>
+
+<p>Georges Alhamid looked at the clock on the wall. "Ready as I'll ever be.
+You'd better scram, Larry. We mustn't give Mr. Tarnhorst the impression
+that there's some sort of collusion between business and government out
+there in the Belt."</p>
+
+<p>"Heaven forfend! I'll get."</p>
+
+<p>When he left, the governor took the playback with him. The recording
+would have to be filed in the special secret files.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon eased his spaceboat down to the surface of Pallas and
+threw on the magnetic anchor which held the little craft solidly to the
+metal surface of the landing field. The traffic around Pallas was fairly
+heavy this time of year, since the planetoid was on the same side of the
+sun as Earth, and the big cargo haulers were moving in and out, loading
+refined metals and raw materials, unloading manufactured goods from
+Earth. He'd had to wait several minutes in the traffic pattern before
+being given clearance for anchoring.</p>
+
+<p>He was already dressed in his vacuum suit, and the cabin of the boat was
+exhausted of its air. He checked his control board, making sure every
+switch and dial was in the proper position. Only then did he open the
+door and step out to the gray surface of the landing field. His
+suitcase&mdash;a spherical, sealed container that the Belt men jokingly
+referred to as a "bomb"&mdash;went with him. He locked the door of his boat
+and walked down the yellow-painted safety lane toward the nearest air
+lock leading into the interior of the planetoid.</p>
+
+<p>He lifted his feet and set them down with precision&mdash;nobody but a fool
+wears glide boots on the outside. He kept his eyes moving&mdash;up and
+around, on both sides, above, and behind. The yellow path was supposed
+to be a safety lane, but there was no need of taking the chance of
+having an out-of-control ship come sliding in on him. Of course, if it
+was coming in really fast, he'd have no chance to move; he might not
+even see it at all. But why get slugged by a slow one?</p>
+
+<p>He waited outside the air-lock door for the green light to come on.
+There were several other space-suited figures around him, but he didn't
+recognize any of them. He hummed softly to himself.</p>
+
+<p>The green light came on, and the door of the air lock slid open. The
+small crowd trooped inside, and, after a minute, the door slid shut
+again. As the elevator dropped, St. Simon heard the familiar <i>whoosh</i> as
+the air came rushing in. By the time it had reached the lower level, the
+elevator was up to pressure.</p>
+
+<p>On Earth, there might have been a sign in such an elevator, reading: <i>DO
+NOT REMOVE VACUUM SUITS IN ELEVATOR.</i> There was no need for it here;
+every man there knew how to handle himself in an air lock. If he hadn't,
+he wouldn't have been there.</p>
+
+<p>After he had stepped out of the elevator, along with the others, and the
+door had closed behind him, St. Simon carefully opened the cracking
+valve on his helmet. There was a faint hiss of incoming air, adjusting
+the slight pressure differential. He took off his helmet, tucked it
+under his arm, and headed for the check-in station.</p>
+
+<p>He was walking down the corridor toward the checker's office when a hand
+clapped him on the shoulder. "Bless me if it isn't St. Simon the Silent!
+Long time no, if you'll pardon the clich&eacute;, see!"</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor4.jpg"><img src="images/anchor4.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p>St. Simon turned, grinning. He had recognized the voice. "Hi, Kerry.
+Good to see you."</p>
+
+<p>"Good to see me? Forsooth! Od's bodkins! Hast turned liar on top of
+everything else, Good Saint? Good to see me, indeed! 'From such a face
+and form as mine, the noblest sentiments sound like the black utterances
+of a depraved imagination.' No, dear old holy pillar-sitter, no indeed!
+It may be a pleasure to hear my mellifluous voice&mdash;a pleasure I often
+indulge in, myself&mdash;but it couldn't possibly be a pleasure to <i>see</i> me!"
+And all the while, St. Simon was being pummeled heartily on the
+shoulder, while his hand was pumped as though the other man was
+expecting to strike oil at any moment.</p>
+
+<p>His assailant was not a handsome man. Years before, a rare, fast-moving
+meteor had punched its way through his helmet and taken part of his face
+with it. He had managed to get back to his ship and pump air in before
+he lost consciousness. He had had to stay conscious, because the only
+thing that held the air in his helmet had been his hand pressed over the
+quarter-inch hole. Even so, the drop in pressure had done its damage.
+The surgeons had done their best to repair the smashed face, but Kerry
+Brand's face hadn't been much to look at to begin with. And the mottled
+purple of the distended veins and capillaries did little to improve his
+looks.</p>
+
+<p>But his ruined face was a badge of honor, and Kerry Brand knew the fact
+as well as anyone.</p>
+
+<p>Like St. Simon, Captain Brand was a professional anchor-setter. Most of
+the men who put in the necessary two years went on to better jobs after
+they had the required space experience. But there were some who liked
+the job and stuck with it. It was only these men&mdash;the real experts among
+the anchor-setting fraternity&mdash;who rated the title of "Captain". They
+were free-lancers who ran things pretty much their own way.</p>
+
+<p>"Just going to the checker?" St. Simon asked.</p>
+
+<p>Kerry Brand shook his head. "I've already checked in, old sanctus. And
+I'll give you three and one-seventh guesses who got a blue ticket."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon said nothing, but he pointed a finger at Brand's chest.</p>
+
+<p>"A mild surmise, but a true one," said Brand. "You are, indeed, gazing
+upon Professor Kerry Brand, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.&mdash;that is to say, Borer of
+Asteroids, Master of Anchors, and Planetoid-hauler De-luxe. No, no;
+don't look sorry for me. <i>Some</i>body has to teach the tadpoles How To
+Survive In Space If You're Not Too Stupid To Live&mdash;a subject upon which
+I am an expert."</p>
+
+<p>"On Being Too Stupid To Live?" St. Simon asked gently.</p>
+
+<p>"A touch! A distinct touch! You are developing a certain unexpected vein
+of pawky humor, Watson, against which I must learn to guard myself." He
+looked at the watch on his wrist. "Why don't you go ahead and check in,
+and then we'll go pub-crawling. I have it on good authority that a few
+thousand gallons of Danish ale were piped aboard Pallas yesterday, and
+you and I should do our best to reduce the surplus."</p>
+
+<p>"Sounds good to me," said St. Simon agreeably. They started on toward
+the checker's office.</p>
+
+<p>"Consider, my dear St. Simon," said Brand, "how fortunate we are to be
+living in an age and a society where the dictum, 'Those who can, do;
+those who can't, teach,' no longer holds true. It means that we weary,
+work-hardened experts are called in every so often, handed our little
+blue ticket, and given six months off&mdash;<i>with</i> pay&mdash;if we will only do
+the younger generation the favor of pounding a modicum of knowledge into
+their heads. During that time, if we are very careful, we can try to
+prevent our muscles from going to flab and our brains from corroding
+with ennui, so that when we again debark into the infinite sea of
+emptiness which surrounds us to pursue our chosen profession, we don't
+get killed on the first try. Isn't it wonderful?"</p>
+
+<p>"Cheer up," said St. Simon. "Teaching isn't such a bad lot. And, after
+all, you do get paid for it."</p>
+
+<p>"And at a salary! A Pooh-Bah paid for his services! I a salaried minion!
+But I do it! It revolts me, but I do it!"</p>
+
+<p>The short, balding man behind the checker's desk looked up as the two
+men approached. "Hello, captain," he said as St. Simon stepped up to the
+desk.</p>
+
+<p>"How are you, Mr. Murtaugh?" St. Simon said politely. He handed over his
+log book. "There's the data on my last ten. I'll be staying here for a
+few days, so there's no need to rush the refill requisition. Any calls
+for me?"</p>
+
+<p>The checker put the log book in the duplicator. "I'll see if there are,
+captain." He went over to the autofile and punched St. Simon's serial
+number.</p>
+
+<p>Very few people write to an anchor man. Since he is free to check in and
+reload at any of the major Belt Cities, and since, in his search for
+asteroids, his erratic orbit is likely to take him anywhere, it might be
+months or years before a written letter caught up with him. On the other
+hand, a message could be beamed to every city, and he could pick it up
+wherever he was. It cost money, but it was sure.</p>
+
+<p>"One call," the checker said. He handed St. Simon a message slip.</p>
+
+<p>It was unimportant. Just a note from a girl on Vesta. He promised
+himself that he'd make his next break at Vesta, come what may. He stuck
+the flimsy in his pocket, and waited while the checker went through the
+routine of recording his log and making out a pay voucher.</p>
+
+<p>There was no small talk between himself and the checker. Mr. Murtaugh
+had not elected to take the schooling necessary to qualify for other
+than a small desk job. He had no space experience. Unless and until he
+did, there would be an invisible, but nonetheless real barrier between
+himself and any spaceman. It was not that St. Simon looked down on the
+man, exactly; it was simply that Murtaugh had not proved himself, and,
+therefore, there was no way of knowing whether he could be trusted or
+not. And since trust is a positive quality, lack of it can only mean
+mistrust.</p>
+
+<p>Murtaugh handed Captain St. Simon an envelope. "That's it, captain.
+Thank you."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon opened the envelope, took out his check&mdash;and a blue ticket.</p>
+
+<p>Kerry Brand broke into a guffaw.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>When the phone on his desk rang, Georges Alhamid scooped it up and
+identified himself.</p>
+
+<p>"This is Larry, George," said the governor's voice. "How are things so
+far?"</p>
+
+<p>"So far, so good," Alhamid said. "For the past week, Mr. Peter Danley
+has been working his head off, under the tutelage of two of the
+toughest, smartest anchor men in the business. But you should have seen
+the looks on their faces when I told them they were going to have an
+Earthman for a pupil."</p>
+
+<p>The governor laughed. "I'll bet! How's he coming along?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's learning. How are you doing with your pet?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think I'm softening him, George. I found out what it was that got his
+goat three years ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Yeah?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. On Ceres, where he went three years ago, he was treated as if he
+weren't as good as a Belt man."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid frowned. "Someone was disrespectful?"</p>
+
+<p>"No&mdash;that is, not exactly. But he was treated as if we didn't trust his
+judgment, as though we were a little bit afraid of him."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh-<i>ho</i>! I see what you mean."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. We treated him just as we would anyone who hasn't proved himself.
+And that meant we were treating him the same way we treated our own
+'lower classes', as he thought of them. I had Governor Holger get his
+Ceres detectives to trace down everything that happened. You can read
+the transcript if you want. There's nothing particularly exciting in it,
+but you can see the pattern if you know what to look for.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not even certain it was fully conscious on his part; I'm not sure
+he knew why he disliked us. All he was convinced of was that we were
+arrogant and thought we were better than he is. It's kind of hard for us
+to see that a person would be that deeply hurt by seeing the plain truth
+that someone else is obviously better at something than he is, but
+you've got to remember that an Earthman is brought up to believe that
+every person is just exactly as good as every other&mdash;and no better. A
+man may have a skill that you don't have, but that doesn't make him
+superior&mdash;oh, my, no!</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway, I started out by apologizing for our habit of standing up all
+the time. I managed to plant the idea in his mind that the only thing
+that made him think we felt superior was that habit. I've even got him
+to the point where he's standing up all the time, too. Makes him feel
+very superior. He's learned the native customs."</p>
+
+<p>"I get you," Alhamid said. "I probably contributed to that inferiority
+feeling of his myself."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't we all? Anyway, the next step was to take him around and
+introduce him to some of the execs in the government and in a couple of
+the Companies&mdash;I briefed 'em beforehand. Friendly chats&mdash;that sort of
+thing. I think we're going to have to learn the ancient art of diplomacy
+out here if we're going to survive, George.</p>
+
+<p>"The crowning glory came this afternoon. You should have been there."</p>
+
+<p>"I was up to here in work, Larry. I just couldn't take the time off to
+attend a club luncheon. Did the great man give his speech?"</p>
+
+<p>"Did he? I should hope to crack my helmet he did! We must all pull
+together, George, did you know that? We must care for the widow and the
+orphan&mdash;and the needy, George, the needy. We must be sure to provide the
+fools, the idiots, the malingerers, the moral degenerates, and such
+useful, lovable beings as that with the necessities and the luxuries of
+life. We must see to it that they are respected and permitted to have
+their dignity. We must see to it that the dear little things are
+permitted the rights of a human being to hold his head up and spit in
+your eye if he wishes. We must see to it that they be fruitful,
+multiply, and replenish the Earth."</p>
+
+<p>"They've already done that," Alhamid said caustically. "And they can
+have it. Let's just see that they don't replenish the Belt. So what
+happened?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, George, you'll never realize how much we appreciated that speech.
+We gave him a three-minute rising ovation. I think he was surprised to
+see that we could stand for three minutes under a one-gee pull in the
+centrifuge. And you should have seen the smiles on our faces, George."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope nobody broke out laughing."</p>
+
+<p>"We managed to restrain ourselves," the governor said.</p>
+
+<p>"What's next on the agenda?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it'll be tricky, but I think I can pull it off. I'm going to take
+him around and show him that we <i>do</i> take care of the widow and the
+orphan, and hope that he assumes we are as solicitous toward the rest of
+his motley crew. Wish me luck."</p>
+
+<p>"Good luck. You may need it."</p>
+
+<p>"Same to you. Take care of Danley."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't worry. He's in good hands. See you, Larry."</p>
+
+<p>"Right."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>There were three space-suited men on the bleak rocky ground near the
+north pole of Pallas, a training area of several square miles known as
+the North Forty. Their helmets gleamed in the bright, hard light from a
+sun that looked uncomfortably small to an Earthman's eyes. Two of the
+men were standing, facing each other some fifteen feet apart. The third,
+attached to them by safety lines, was hanging face down above the
+surface, rising slowly, like a balloon that has almost more weight than
+it can lift.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor5.jpg"><img src="images/anchor5.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<p>"No, no, <i>no</i>, Mr. Danley! You are not <i>crawling</i>, Mr. Danley, you are
+climbing! Do you understand that? <i>Climbing!</i> You have to <i>climb</i> an
+asteroid, just as you would climb a cliff on Earth. You have to hold on
+every second of the time, or you will fall off!" St. Simon's voice
+sounded harsh in Danley's earphones, and he felt irritatingly helpless
+poised floatingly above the ground that way.</p>
+
+<p>His instructors were well anchored by metal eyes set into the rocky
+surface for just that purpose. Although Pallas was mostly nickel-iron,
+this end of it was stony, which was why it had been selected as a
+training ground.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Well?</i>" snapped St. Simon. "What do you do now? If this were a small
+rock, you'd be drifting a long ways away by now. Think, Mr. Danley,
+<i>think</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Then shut up and let me think!" Danley snarled.</p>
+
+<p>"If small things distract you from thinking about the vital necessity of
+saving your own life, Mr. Danley, you would not live long in the Belt."</p>
+
+<p>Danley reached out an arm to see if he could touch the ground. When he
+had pushed himself upwards with a thrust of his knee, he hadn't given
+himself too hard a shove. He had reached the apex of his slow flight,
+and was drifting downward again. He grasped a jutting rock and pulled
+himself back to the surface.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good, Mr. Danley&mdash;but that wouldn't work on a small rock. You took
+too long. What would you have done on a rock with a millionth of a gee
+of pull?"</p>
+
+<p>Danley was silent.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Well?</i>" St. Simon barked. "<i>What would you do?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"I ... I don't know," Danley admitted.</p>
+
+<p>"Ye gods and little fishhooks!" This was Kerry Brand's voice. It was
+supposed to be St. Simon's turn to give the verbal instructions, but
+Brand allowed himself an occasional remark when it was appropriate.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon's voice was bitingly sweet. "What do you think those safety
+lines are for, Mr. Danley? Do you think they are for decorative
+purposes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well ... I thought I was supposed to think of some other way. I mean,
+that's so obvious&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Danley," St. Simon said with sudden patience, "we are not here to
+give you riddles to solve. We're here to teach you how to stay alive in
+the Belt. And one of the first rules you must learn is that you will
+<i>never</i> leave your boat without a safety line. <i>Never!</i></p>
+
+<p>"An anchor man, Mr. Danley, is called that for more than one reason. You
+cannot anchor your boat to a rock unless there is an eye-bolt set in it.
+And if it already has an eye-bolt, you would have no purpose on that
+rock. In a way, <i>you</i> will be the anchor of your boat, since you will be
+tied to it by your safety line. If the boat drifts too far from your
+rock while you are working, it will pull you off the surface, since it
+has more mass than you do. That shouldn't be allowed to happen, but, if
+it does, you are still with your boat, rather than deserted on a rock
+for the rest of your life&mdash;which wouldn't be very long. When the power
+unit in your suit ran out of energy, it would stop breaking your exhaled
+carbon dioxide down into carbon and oxygen, and you would suffocate.
+Even with emergency tanks of oxygen, you would soon find yourself
+freezing to death. That sun up there isn't very warm, Mr. Danley."</p>
+
+<p>Peter Danley was silent, but it was an effort to remain so. He wanted to
+remind St. Simon that he, Danley, had been a spaceman for nearly fifteen
+years. But he was also aware that he was learning things that weren't
+taught at Earthside schools. Most of his professional life had been
+spent aboard big, comfortable ships that made the short Earth-Luna hop.
+He could probably count the total hours he had spent in a spacesuit on
+the fingers of his two hands.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor6.jpg"><img src="images/anchor6.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+
+
+<p>"All right, Mr. Danley; let's begin again. Climb along the surface. Use
+toeholds, handholds, and fingerholds. Feel your way along. Find those
+little crevices that will give you a grip. It doesn't take much. You're
+a lot better off than a mountain climber on Earth because you don't have
+to fight your weight. You have only your mass to worry about. That's it.
+Fine. Very good, Mr. Danley."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>And, later:</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Mr. Danley," said Captain Brand, "you are at the end of your
+tether, so to speak."</p>
+
+<p>The three men were in a space boat, several hundred miles from Pallas.
+Or, rather, two of them were in the boat, standing at the open door.
+Peter Danley was far out from it, at the end of his safety line.</p>
+
+<p>"How far are you from us, Mr. Danley?" Brand asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Three hundred meters, Captain Brand," Danley said promptly.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good. How do you know?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am at the end of my safety line, which is three hundred meters long
+when fully extended."</p>
+
+<p>"Your memory is excellent, Mr. Danley. Now, how will you get back to the
+boat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Pull myself hand over hand along the line."</p>
+
+<p>"Think, Mr. Danley! <i>Think!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"Uh. Oh. Well, I wouldn't keep pulling. I'd just give myself a tug and
+then coast in, taking up the line slowly as I went."</p>
+
+<p>"Excellent! What would happen if you, as you put it, pulled yourself in
+hand over hand, as if you were climbing a rope on Earth?"</p>
+
+<p>"I would accelerate too much," Danley said. "I'd gain too much momentum
+and probably bash my brains out against the boat. And I'd have no way to
+stop myself."</p>
+
+<p>"Bully for you, Mr. Danley! Now see if you can put into action that
+which you have so succinctly put into words. Come back to the boat.
+Gently the first time. We'll have plenty of practice, so that you can
+get the feel of the muscle pull that will give you a maximum of velocity
+with a minimum of impact at this end. Gently, now."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Still later:</p>
+
+<p>"Judgment, Mr. Danley!" St. Simon cautioned. "You have to use judgment!
+A space boat is not an automobile. There is no friction out here to slow
+it to a stop. Your accelerator is just exactly that&mdash;an accelerator.
+Taking your foot off it won't slow you down a bit; you've got to use
+your reverse."</p>
+
+<p>Peter Danley was at the controls of the boat. There were tiny beads of
+perspiration on his forehead. Over a kilometer away was a good-sized
+hunk of rock; his instructors wouldn't let him get any closer. They
+wanted to be sure that they could take over before the boat struck the
+rock, just in case Danley should freeze to the accelerator a little too
+long.</p>
+
+<p>He wasn't used to this sort of thing. He was used to a taped
+acceleration-deceleration program which lifted a big ship, aimed it, and
+went through the trip all automatically. All he had ever had to do was
+drop it the last few hundred feet to a landing field.</p>
+
+<p>"Keep your eyes moving," St. Simon said. "Your radar can give you data
+that you need, just remember that it can't think for you."</p>
+
+<p><i>Your right foot controls your forward acceleration.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Your left foot controls your reverse acceleration.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>They can't be pushed down together; when one goes down, the other goes
+up. Balance one against the other.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Turning your wheel controls the roll of the boat.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Pulling your wheel toward you, or pushing it away, controls the pitch.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Shifting the wheel left, or right, controls the yaw.</i></p>
+
+<p>The instructions had been pounded into his head until each one seemed to
+ring like a separate little bell. The problem was coordinating his body
+to act on those instructions.</p>
+
+<p>One of the radar dials told him how far he was from the rock. Another
+told him his radial velocity relative to it. A third told him his
+angular velocity.</p>
+
+<p>"Come to a dead stop exactly one thousand meters from the surface, Mr.
+Danley," St. Simon ordered.</p>
+
+<p>Danley worked the controls until both his velocity meters read zero, and
+the distance meter read exactly one kilometer.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good, Mr. Danley. Now assume that the surface of your rock is at
+nine hundred ninety-five meters. Bring your boat to a dead stop exactly
+fifty centimeters from that surface."</p>
+
+<p>Danley worked the controls again. He grinned with satisfaction when the
+distance meter showed nine nine five point five on the nose.</p>
+
+<p>Captain St. Simon sighed deeply. "Mr. Danley, do you feel a little
+shaken up? Banged around a little? Do you feel as though you'd just
+gotten a bone-rattling shock?"</p>
+
+<p>"Uh ... no."</p>
+
+<p>"You should. You slammed this boat a good two feet into the surface of
+that rock before you backed out again." His voice changed tone. "Dammit,
+Mr. Danley, when I say 'surface at nine nine five', I mean <i>surface</i>!"</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Edway Tarnhorst had been dictating notes for his reports into his
+recorder, and was rather tired, so when he asked Peter Danley what he
+had learned, he was rather irritated when the blond man closed his blue
+eyes and repeated, parrotlike:</p>
+
+<p>"Due to the lack of a water-oxygen atmosphere, many minerals are found
+in the asteroids which are unknown on Earth. Among the more important of
+these are: Oldhamite (CaS); Daubr&eacute;elite (FECr<sub>2</sub>S<sub>4</sub>); Schreibersite
+and Rhabdite (Fe<sub>3</sub>Ni<sub>3</sub>P); Lawrencite (FeCl<sub>2</sub>); and Taenite, an
+alloy of iron containing&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That's not precisely the sort of thing I meant," Tarnhorst interrupted
+testily.</p>
+
+<p>Danley smiled. "I know. I'm sorry. That's my lesson for tomorrow."</p>
+
+<p>"So I gathered. May I sit down?" There were only two chairs in the room.
+Danley was occupying one, and a pile of books was occupying the other.</p>
+
+<p>Danley quickly got to his feet and began putting the books on his desk.
+"Certainly, Mr. Tarnhorst. Sit down."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst lowered himself into the newly emptied chair. "I apologize for
+interrupting your studies," he said. "I realize how important they are.
+But there are a few points I'd like to discuss with you."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly." Danley seated himself and looked at the older man
+expectantly. "The nullifiers are on," he said.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," Tarnhorst said absently. Then, changing his manner, he said
+abruptly: "Have you found anything yet?"</p>
+
+<p>Danley shook his head. "No. It looks to me as though they've done
+everything possible to make sure that these men get the best equipment
+and the best training. The training instructors have been through the
+whole affair themselves&mdash;they know the ropes. The equipment, as far as I
+can tell, is top grade stuff. From what I have seen so far, the Company
+isn't stinting on the equipment or the training."</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst nodded. "After nearly three months of investigation, I have
+come to the same conclusion myself. The records show that expenditures
+on equipment has been steadily increasing. The equipment they have now,
+I understand, is almost failure-proof?" He looked questioningly at
+Danley.</p>
+
+<p>Danley nodded. "Apparently. Certainly no one is killed because of
+equipment failure. It's the finest stuff I've ever seen."</p>
+
+<p>"And yet," Tarnhorst said, "their books show that they are constantly
+seeking to improve it."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't suppose there is any chance of juggling the books on you, is
+there?"</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst smiled a superior smile. "Hardly. In the first place, I know
+bookkeeping. In the second, it would be impossible to whip up a complete
+set of balancing books&mdash;covering a period of nearly eighty
+years&mdash;overnight.</p>
+
+<p>"I agree," Danley said. "I don't think they set up a special training
+course just for me overnight, either. I've seen classes on Vesta, Juno,
+and Eros&mdash;and they're all the same. There aren't any fancy false fronts
+to fool us, Mr. Tarnhorst: I've looked very closely."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you talked to the men?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. They have no complaints."</p>
+
+<p>Again Tarnhorst nodded. "I have found the same thing. They all insist
+that if a man gets killed in space, it's not the fault of anyone but
+himself. Or, as it may be, an act of God."</p>
+
+<p>"One of my instructors ran into an act of God some years ago," Danley
+said. "You've met him. Brand&mdash;the one with the scarred face." He
+explained to Tarnhorst what had caused Brand's disfigurement. "But he
+survived," he finished, "because he kept his wits about him even after
+he was hit."</p>
+
+<p>"Commendable; very commendable," Tarnhorst said. "If he'd been an
+excitable fool, he'd have died."</p>
+
+<p>"True. But what I was trying to point out was that it wasn't equipment
+failure that caused the accident."</p>
+
+<p>"No. You're quite right." Tarnhorst was silent for a moment, then he
+looked into Danley's eyes. "Do you think you could take on a job as
+anchor man now?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," said Danley evenly. "But I'm going to find out
+tomorrow."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Peter Danley took his final examination the following day. All by
+himself, he went through the procedure of positioning his ship, setting
+up a rocket drill, firing it, and setting in an anchor. It was only a
+small rock, nine meters through, but the job was almost the same as with
+the big ones. Not far away, Captain St. Simon watched the Earthman's
+procedure through a pair of high-powered field glasses. He breathed a
+deep sigh of relief when the job was done.</p>
+
+<p>"Jules," he said softly, "I am sure glad that man didn't hurt himself
+any."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, <i>suh</i>! We'd of sho' been in trouble if he'd of killed hisself!"</p>
+
+<p>"We will have to tell Captain Brand that our pupil has done pretty well
+for such a small amount of schooling."</p>
+
+<p>"I think that would be proper, m'lud."</p>
+
+<p>"And we will also have to tell Captain Brand that this boy wouldn't last
+a month. He wouldn't come back from his first trip."</p>
+
+<p>There was no answer to that.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Three days later, amid a cloud of generally satisfied feelings, Edway
+Tarnhorst and Peter Danley took the ship back to Earth.</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot, of course, give you a copy of my report," Tarnhorst had told
+Georges Alhamid. "That is for the eyes of the Committee only. However, I
+may say that I do not find the Belt Companies or the governments of the
+Belt Cities at fault. Do you want to know my personal opinion?"</p>
+
+<p>"I would appreciate it, Mr. Tarnhorst," Georges had said.</p>
+
+<p>"Carelessness. Just plain carelessness on the part of the workers. That
+is what has caused your rise in death rates. You people out here in the
+Belt have become too used to being in space. Familiarity breeds
+contempt, Mr. Alhamid.</p>
+
+<p>"Steps must be taken to curb that carelessness. I suggest a publicity
+campaign of some kind. The people must be thoroughly indoctrinated in
+safety procedures and warned against carelessness. Just a few months of
+schooling isn't enough, Mr. Alhamid. You've got to start pounding it
+into their heads early.</p>
+
+<p>"If you don't&mdash;" He shook his head. (He had grown used to doing so in
+low gravity by now.) "If the death rate isn't cut down, we shall have to
+raise the premium rates, and I don't know what will happen on the floor
+of the People's Congress. However, I think I can guarantee six months to
+a year before any steps are taken. That will give you time to launch
+your safety campaign. I'm certain that as soon as this carelessness is
+curbed, the claims will drop down to their former low point."</p>
+
+<p>"We'll certainly try that," Alhamid had said heartily. "Thank you very
+much, Mr. Tarnhorst."</p>
+
+<p>When they had finally gone, Alhamid spoke to the governor.</p>
+
+<p>"That's that, Larry. You can bring it up at the next meeting of the
+Board of Governors. Get some kind of publicity campaign going. Plug
+safety. Tell 'em carelessness is bad. It can't hurt anything and
+actually might help, who knows?"</p>
+
+<p>"What are you going to do at your end?"</p>
+
+<p>"What we should have done long ago: finance the insurance ourselves. For
+the next couple of years, we'll only make death claims to Earth for a
+part of the total. We'll pay off the rest ourselves. Then we'll tell 'em
+we've brought the cost down so much that we can afford to do our own
+insurance financing.</p>
+
+<p>"We let this insurance thing ride too long, and it has damn near got us
+in a jam. We needed the income from Earth. We still could use it, but we
+need our independence more."</p>
+
+<p>"I second the motion," the governor said fervently. "Look, suppose you
+come over to my place tonight, and we'll work out the details of this
+report. O.K.? Say at nine?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fine, Larry. I'll see you then."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid went back to his office. He was met at the door by his
+secretary, who handed him a sealed envelope. "The Earthman left this
+here for you. He said you'd know what to do with it."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid took the envelope and looked at the name on the outside. "Which
+Earthman?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"The young one," she said, "the blond one."</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't even addressed to me," Alhamid said with a note of puzzled
+speculation in his voice.</p>
+
+<p>"No. I noticed that. I told him he could send it straight to the school,
+but he said you would know how to handle it."</p>
+
+<p>Alhamid looked at the envelope again, and his eyes narrowed a little.
+"Call Captain St. Simon, will you? Tell him I would like to have him
+come to my office. Don't mention this letter; I don't want it breezed
+all over Pallas."</p>
+
+<p>It was nearly twenty minutes before St. Simon showed up. Alhamid handed
+him the envelope. "You have a message from your star pupil. For some
+reason, he wanted me to deliver it to you. I have a hunch you'll know
+what that reason is after you read it." He grinned. "I'd appreciate it
+if you'd tell me when you find out. This Mr. Danley has worried me all
+along."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon scowled at the envelope, then ripped off one end and took out
+the typed sheets. He read them carefully, then handed them over to
+Alhamid. "You'd better read this yourself, George."</p>
+
+<p>Georges Alhamid took the pages and began to read.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Dear Captain St. Simon:</p>
+
+<p>I am addressing this to you rather than anyone else because I think
+you will understand more than anyone else. Captain Brand is a fine
+person, but I have never felt very much at ease with him. (I won't
+go into the psychological reasons that may exist, other than admit
+that my reasons are purely emotional. I don't honestly know how
+much they are based on his disfigurement.) Mr. Alhamid is almost a
+stranger to me. You are the only Belt man I feel I know well.</p>
+
+<p>First, I want to say that I honestly enjoyed our three months
+together. There were times when I could have cheerfully bashed your
+head in, I'll admit, but the experience has left me feeling more
+like a real human being, more like a person in my own right, than I
+have ever felt before in my life. Believe me, I appreciate it
+deeply. I know now that I can do things on my own without being
+dependent on the support of a team or a committee, and for that I
+am grateful.</p>
+
+<p>Tarnhorst has heard my report and accepted it. His report to the
+People's Congress will lay the entire blame for the death rate rise
+on individual carelessness rather than on any fault of management.</p>
+
+<p>I think, in the main, I am justified in making such a report to
+Tarnhorst, although I am fully aware that it is incomplete. I know
+that if I had told him the whole truth there would be a ruckus
+kicked up on Earth that would cause more trouble in the Belt than
+I'd care to think about. I'm sure you're as aware of the political
+situation as I am.</p>
+
+<p>You see, I know that anchor-setting could be made a great deal
+safer. I know that machines could be developed which would make the
+job so nearly automatic that the operator would never be exposed to
+any more danger than he would be in a ship on the Earth-Luna run.
+Perhaps that's a little exaggerated, but not much.</p>
+
+<p>What puzzled me was: <i>Why?</i> Why shouldn't the Companies build these
+machines if they were more efficient? Why should every Belt man
+defend the system as it was? Why should men risk their necks when
+they could demand better equipment? (I don't mean that the
+equipment presently used is poor; I just mean that full
+mechanization would do away with the present type of equipment and
+replace it with a different type.)</p>
+
+<p>Going through your course of instruction gave me the answer to
+that, even though I didn't take the full treatment.</p>
+
+<p>All my life, I've belonged to an organization of some kind&mdash;the
+team, the crew, whatever it might be. But the Team was everything,
+and I was recognized only as a member of the Team. I was a
+replaceable plug-in unit, not an individual in my own right. I
+don't know that I can explain the difference exactly, but it seems
+to me that the Team is something outside of which the individual
+has no existence, while the men of the Belt can form a team because
+they know that each member is self-sufficient in his own right.</p>
+
+<p>On Earth, we all depend on the Team, and, in the long run, that
+means that we are depending on each other&mdash;but none of us feels he
+can depend on himself. Every man hopes that, as a member of the
+Team, he will be saved from his own errors, his own failures. But
+he knows that everyone else is doing the same thing, and, deep down
+inside, he knows that they are not deserving of his reliance. So he
+puts his reliance in the Team, as if that were some sort of
+separate entity in itself, and had magical, infallible powers that
+were greater than the aggregate of the individuals that composed
+it.</p>
+
+<p>In a way, this is certainly so, since teamwork can accomplish
+things that mobs cannot do. But the Team is a failure if each
+member assumes that he, himself, is helpless and can do nothing,
+but that the Team will do it for him.</p>
+
+<p>Men who have gone through the Belt training program, men who have
+"space experience," as you so euphemistically put it, are men who
+can form a real team, one that will get things done because each
+man knows he can rely on the others, not only as a team, but as
+individuals. But to mechanize the anchor-setting phase would
+destroy all that completely.</p>
+
+<p>I don't want to see that destroyed, because I have felt what it is
+to be a part of the Belt team, even though only a small and
+unreliable part. Actually, I know I was not and could never be a
+real member of that team, but I was and am proud to have scrimmaged
+with the team, and I'm glad to be able to sit on the side-lines and
+cheer even if I can't carry the ball. (It just occurred to me that
+those metaphors might be a little cloudy to you, since you don't
+have football in the Belt, but I think you see what I mean.) I
+imagine that most of the men who have no "space experience" feel
+the same way. They know they'd never make a go of it out in space,
+but they're happy to be water boys.</p>
+
+<p>I wish I could stay in the Belt. I'm enough of a spaceman to
+appreciate what it really is to be a member of a space society. But
+I also know that I'd never last. I'm not fitted for it, really.
+I've had a small taste of it, but I know I couldn't take a full
+dose. I've worked hard for the influence and security I have in my
+job, and I couldn't give it up. Maybe this brands me as a coward in
+your eyes, and maybe I am a coward, but that's the way I'm built. I
+hope you'll take that into account when you think of me.</p>
+
+<p>At any rate, I have done what I have done. On Earth, there are men
+who envy you and hate you, and there will be others who will try to
+destroy you, but I have done what I could to give you a chance to
+gain the strength you need to resist the encroachment of Earth's
+sickness.</p>
+
+<p>I have a feeling that Tarnhorst saw your greatness, too, although
+he'd never admit it, even to himself. Certainly something changed
+him during the last months, even though he doesn't realize it. He
+came out wanting to help&mdash;and by that, he meant help the common
+people against the "tyranny" of the Companies. He still wants to
+help the common people, but now he wants to do it <i>through</i> the
+Companies. The change is so subtle that he doesn't think he's
+changed at all, but I can see it.</p>
+
+<p>I don't deserve any thanks for what I have done. All I have done is
+repay you in the only way I knew how for what you have done for me.
+I may never see you again, captain, but I will always remember you.
+Please convey my warmest regards to Captain Brand and to Mr.
+Alhamid.</p>
+
+<p>Sincerely,</p>
+
+<p>Peter Danley</p></div>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Georges Alhamid handed the letter back to St. Simon. "There's your star
+pupil," he said gently.</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon nodded. "The wise fool. The guy who's got sense enough to know
+that he isn't competent to do the job."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you notice that he waltzed all around the real reason for the
+anchor-setting program without quite hitting it?"</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon smiled humorlessly. "Sure. Notice the wording of the letter.
+He still thinks in terms of the Team, even when he's trying not to. He
+thinks we do this just to train men to have a real good Team Spirit. He
+can't see that that is only a very useful by-product."</p>
+
+<p>"How could he think otherwise?" Alhamid asked. "To him, or to Tarnhorst,
+the notion of deliberately tailoring a program so that it would kill off
+the fools and the incompetents, setting up a program that will
+deliberately destroy the men who are dangerous to society, would be
+horrifying. They would accuse us of being soulless butchers who had no
+respect for the dignity of the human soul."</p>
+
+<p>"We're not butchering anybody," St. Simon objected. "Nobody is forced to
+go through two years of anchor setting. Nobody is forced to die. We're
+not running people into gas chambers or anything like that."</p>
+
+<p>"No; of course not. But would you expect an Earthman like Tarnhorst to
+see the difference? How could we explain to him that we have no
+objection to fools other than that we object to putting them in
+positions where they can harm others by their foolishness? Would you
+expect him to understand that we must have a method of eliminating those
+who are neither competent enough to be trusted with the lives of others
+nor wise enough to see that they are not competent? How would you tell
+him that the reason we send men out alone is so that if he destroys
+anyone by his foolishness&mdash;after we have taught him everything we know
+in the best way we know how&mdash;he will only destroy himself?"</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't even try," St. Simon said. "There's an old saying that
+neither money, education, liquor, nor women ever made a fool of a man,
+they just give a born fool a chance to display his foolishness. Space
+ought to be added to that list."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you notice something else about that letter?" Alhamid asked. "I
+mean, the very fact that he wrote a letter instead of telling you
+personally?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. He didn't trust me. He was afraid I, or someone else, would
+dispose of him if we knew he knew our secret."</p>
+
+<p>"I think that's it," Alhamid agreed. "He wanted to be safely away
+first."</p>
+
+<p>"Killing him would have brought down the biggest investigation the Earth
+Congress has launched since the crack-up of the Earth-Luna ship thirty
+years ago. Does he think we are fools?"</p>
+
+<p>"You can't blame him. He's been brought up that way, and three months of
+training isn't going to change him."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon frowned. "Suppose he changes his mind? Suppose he tells
+Tarnhorst what he thinks?"</p>
+
+<p>"He won't. He's told his lie, and now he'll have to stick by it or lose
+his precious security. If he couldn't trade that for freedom, he sure
+isn't going to throw it away." Alhamid grinned. "But can you imagine a
+guy thinking that anchor setting could be completely mechanized?"</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon grinned back. "I guess I'm not a very good teacher after all.
+I told him and told him and told him for three solid months that the job
+required judgment, but it evidently didn't sink in. He's got the heart
+of a romantic and the soul of an Earthman&mdash;a very bad combination."</p>
+
+<p>"He has my sympathy," Alhamid said with feeling. "Now, about you. Your
+blue ticket still has three months to run, but I can't give you a class
+if you're only going to run through the first half of the course with
+them, and I don't have any more Earthmen for you to give special
+tutoring to. You have three choices: You can loaf with pay for three
+months; you can go back to space and get double pay for three months; or
+you can take a regular six-month class and get double pay for the last
+three months. Which'll it be?"</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon grinned widely. "I'm going to loaf until I get sick of it,
+then I'll go back to space and collect double pay for what's left of the
+three months. First off, I'm going to take a run over to Vesta. After
+that, who knows?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought so. Most of you guys would stay out there forever if you
+didn't have to come back for supplies."</p>
+
+<p>St. Simon shook his head. "Nope. Not true. A man's got to come back
+every so often and get his feet on the ground. If you stay out there too
+long, you get to talking to yourself."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>An hour later, the spaceboat <i>Nancy Bell</i> lifted from the surface of
+Pallas and shot toward Vesta.</p>
+
+<p>"Jules, old cobblestone, we have just saved civilization."</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Jawohl, Herr Hassenpfefferesser!</i> Und now ve go to find <i>das M&auml;dchen,
+nicht war</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"Herr <i>Professor</i> Hassenpfefferesser to you, my boy."</p>
+
+<p>And then, all alone in his spaceboat, Captain Jules St. Simon burst into
+song:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Oh, I'm the cook and the captain, too,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the men of the <i>Nancy's</i> brig;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The bosun tight, and the midshipmite,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the crew of the captain's gig!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>And the <i>Nancy Bell</i> sped on toward Vesta and a rendevous with Eros.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/anchor7.jpg"><img src="images/anchor7.jpg" alt=""/></a>
+</div>
+
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+</pre>
+</body>
+</html>
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@@ -0,0 +1,2608 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Anchorite, by Randall Garrett, Illustrated by
+ Schelling
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Anchorite
+
+
+Author: Randall Garrett
+
+Release Date: November 20, 2007  [eBook #23561]
+[Date last updated: January 16, 2009]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANCHORITE***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 23561-h.htm or 23561-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/3/5/6/23561/23561-h/23561-h.htm)
+      or
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/3/5/6/23561/23561-h.zip)
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+      This etext was produced from _Analog Science Fact Science Fiction_,
+      November, 1962. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
+      that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+
+
+
+
+ANCHORITE
+
+by
+
+JOHNATHAN BLAKE MACKENZIE
+
+Illustrated by Schelling
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+     There are two basic kinds of fools--the ones who know they are
+     fools, and the kind that, because they do not know that, are
+     utterly deadly menaces!
+
+
+
+The mountain was spinning.
+
+Not dizzily, not even rapidly, but very perceptibly, the great mass of
+jagged rock was turning on its axis.
+
+Captain St. Simon scowled at it. "By damn, Jules," he said, "if you can
+see 'em spinning, it's too damn fast!" He expected no answer, and got
+none.
+
+He tapped the drive pedal gently with his right foot, his gaze shifting
+alternately from the instrument board to the looming hulk of stone
+before him. As the little spacecraft moved in closer, he tapped the
+reverse pedal with his left foot. He was now ten meters from the surface
+of the asteroid. It was moving, all right. "Well, Jules," he said in his
+most commanding voice, "we'll see just how fast she's moving. Prepare to
+fire Torpedo Number One!"
+
+"Yassuh, boss! Yassuh, Cap'n Sain' Simon, suh! All ready on the firin'
+line!"
+
+He touched a button with his right thumb. The ship quivered almost
+imperceptibly as a jet of liquid leaped from the gun mounted in the nose
+of the ship. At the same time, he hit the reverse pedal and backed the
+ship away from the asteroid's surface. No point getting any more gunk on
+the hull than necessary.
+
+The jet of liquid struck the surface of the rotating mountain and
+splashed, leaving a big splotch of silvery glitter. Even in the vacuum
+of space, the silicone-based solvents of the paint vehicle took time to
+boil off.
+
+"How's that for pinpoint accuracy, Jules?"
+
+"Veddy good, M'lud. Top hole, if I may say so, m'lud."
+
+"You may." He jockeyed the little spacecraft around until he was
+reasonably stationary with respect to the great hunk of whirling rock
+and had the silver-white blotch centered on the crosshairs of the peeper
+in front of him. Then he punched the button that started the timer and
+waited for the silver spot to come round again.
+
+The asteroid was roughly spherical--which was unusual, but not
+remarkable. The radar gave him the distance from the surface of the
+asteroid, and he measured the diameter and punched it through the
+calculator. "Observe," he said in a dry, didactic voice. "The diameter
+is on the order of five times ten to the fourteenth micromicrons." He
+kept punching at the calculator. "If we assume a mean density of two
+point six six times ten to the minus thirty-sixth metric tons per cubic
+micromicron, we attain a mean mass of some one point seven four times
+ten to the eleventh kilograms." More punching, while he kept his eye on
+the meteorite, waiting for the spot to show up again. "And that, my dear
+Jules, gives us a surface gravity of approximately two times ten to the
+minus sixth standard gees."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Oberstleutnant._"
+
+"Und zo, mine dear Chules, ve haff at least der grave zuspicion dot der
+zurface gravity iss less dan der zentrifugal force at der eqvator!
+_Nein? Ja!_ Zo."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Konzertmeister._"
+
+Then there was a long, silent wait, while the asteroid went its
+leisurely way around its own axis.
+
+"There it comes," said Captain St. Simon. He kept his eyes on the
+crosshair of the peeper, one hand over the timer button. When the silver
+splotch drifted by the crosshair, he punched the stop button and looked
+at the indicator.
+
+"Sixteen minutes, forty seconds. How handy." He punched at the
+calculator again. "Ah! You see, Jules! Just as we suspected! Negative
+gees at the surface, on the equator, comes to ten to the minus third
+standard gees--almost exactly one centimeter per second squared. So?"
+
+"Ah, so, honorabu copton! Is somesing rike five hundred times as great
+as gravitationar attraction, is not so?"
+
+"Sukiyaki, my dear chap, sometimes your brilliance amazes me."
+
+Well, at least it meant that there would be no loose rubble on the
+surface. It would have been tossed off long ago by the centrifugal
+force, flying off on a tangent to become more of the tiny rubble of the
+belt. Perhaps "flying" wasn't exactly the right word, though, when
+applied to a velocity of less than one centimeter per second. _Drifting_
+off, then.
+
+"What do you think, Jules?" said St. Simon.
+
+"Waal, Ah reckon we can do it, cap'n. Ef'n we go to the one o' them thar
+poles ... well, let's see--" He leaned over and punched more figures
+into the calculator. "Ain't that purty! 'Cordin' ter this, thar's a spot
+at each pole, 'bout a meter in diameter, whar the gee-pull is _greater_
+than the centry-foogle force!"
+
+Captain St. Simon looked at the figures on the calculator. The forces,
+in any case, were negligibly small. On Earth, where the surface gravity
+was ninety-eight per cent of a Standard Gee, St. Simon weighed close to
+two hundred pounds. Discounting the spin, he would weigh about four
+ten-thousandths of a pound on the asteroid he was inspecting. The spin
+at the equator would try to push him off with a force of about two
+tenths of a pound.
+
+But a man who didn't take those forces into account could get himself
+killed in the Belt.
+
+"Very well, Jules," he said, "we'll inspect the poles."
+
+"Do you think they vill velcome us in Kraukau, _Herr Erzbischof_?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The area around the North Pole--defined as that pole from which the body
+appears to be spinning counterclockwise--looked more suitable for
+operations than the South Pole. Theoretically, St. Simon could have
+stopped the spin, but that would have required an energy expenditure of
+some twenty-three thousand kilowatt-hours in the first place, and it
+would have required an anchor to be set somewhere on the equator. Since
+his purpose in landing on the asteroid was to set just such an anchor,
+stopping the spin would be a waste of time and energy.
+
+Captain St. Simon positioned his little spacecraft a couple of meters
+above the North Pole. It would take better than six minutes to fall that
+far, so he had plenty of time. "Perhaps a boarding party, Mr. Christian!
+On the double!"
+
+"Aye, sir! On the double it is, sir!"
+
+St. Simon pushed himself over to the locker, took out his vacuum suit,
+and climbed into it. After checking it thoroughly, he said: "Prepare to
+evacuate main control room, Mr. Christian!"
+
+"Aye, aye, Sir! All prepared and ready. I hope."
+
+Captain St. Simon looked around to make sure he hadn't left a bottle of
+coffee sitting somewhere. He'd done that once, and the stuff had boiled
+out all over everywhere when he pulled the air out of the little room.
+Nope, no coffee. No obstacles to turning on the pump. He thumbed the
+button, and the pumps started to whine. The whine built up to a
+crescendo, then began to die away until finally it could only be felt
+through the walls or floor. The air was gone.
+
+Then he checked the manometer to make sure that most of the air had
+actually been pumped back into the reserve tanks. Satisfied, he touched
+the button that would open the door. There was a faint jar as the
+remaining wisps of air shot out into the vacuum of space.
+
+St. Simon sat back down at the controls and carefully repositioned the
+ship. It was now less than a meter from the surface. He pushed himself
+over to the open door and looked out.
+
+He clipped one end of his safety cable to the steel eye-bolt at the edge
+of the door. "Fasten on carefully, Jules," he said. "We don't want to
+lose anything."
+
+"Like what, _mon capitain_?"
+
+"Like this spaceship, _mon petit tete de mouton_."
+
+"Ah, but no, my old and raw; we could not afford to lose the so-dear
+_Nancy Bell_, could we?"
+
+The other end of the long cable was connected to the belt of the suit.
+Then St. Simon launched himself out the open door toward the surface of
+the planetoid. The ship began to drift--very slowly, but not so slowly
+as it had been falling--off in the other direction.
+
+He had picked the spot he was aiming for. There was a jagged hunk of
+rock sticking out that looked as though it would make a good handhold.
+Right nearby, there was a fairly smooth spot that would do to brake his
+"fall". He struck it with his palm and took up the slight shock with his
+elbow while his other hand grasped the outcropping.
+
+He had not pushed himself very hard. There is not much weathering on the
+surface of an asteroid. Micro-meteorites soften the contours of the rock
+a little over the millions of millennia, but not much, since the debris
+in the Belt all has roughly the same velocity. Collisions do occur, but
+they aren't the violent smashes that make the brilliant meteor displays
+of Earth. (And there is still a standing argument among the men of the
+Belt as to whether that sort of action can be called "weathering".) Most
+of the collisions tend to cause fracturing of the surface, which results
+in jagged edges. A man in a vacuum suit does not push himself against a
+surface like that with any great velocity.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+St. Simon knew to a nicety that he could propel himself against a bed of
+nails and broken glass at just the right velocity to be able to stop
+himself without so much as scratching his glove. And he could see that
+there was no ragged stuff on the spot he had selected. The slanting rays
+of the sun would have made them stand out in relief.
+
+Now he was clinging to the surface of the mountain of rock like a bug on
+the side of a cliff. On a nickel-iron asteroid, he could have walked
+around on the surface, using the magnetic soles of his vacuum suit. But
+silicate rock is notably lacking in response to that attractive force.
+No soul, maybe.
+
+But directly and indirectly, that lack of response to magnetic forces
+was the reason for St. Simon's crawling around on the surface of that
+asteroid. Directly, because there was no other way he could move about
+on a nonmetallic asteroid. Indirectly, because there was no way the big
+space tugs could get a grip on such an asteroid, either.
+
+The nickel-iron brutes were a dead cinch to haul off to the smelters.
+All a space tug had to do was latch on to one of them with a magnetic
+grapple and start hauling. There was no such simple answer for the
+silicate rocks.
+
+The nickel-iron asteroids were necessary. They supplied the building
+material and the major export of the Belt cities. They averaged around
+eighty to ninety per cent iron, anywhere from five to twenty per cent
+nickel, and perhaps half a per cent cobalt, with smatterings of
+phosphorous, sulfur, carbon, copper, and chromium. Necessary--but not
+sufficient.
+
+The silicate rocks ran only about twenty-five per cent iron--in the form
+of nonmagnetic compounds. They averaged eighteen per cent silicon,
+fourteen per cent magnesium, between one and one point five per cent
+each of aluminum, nickel, and calcium, and good-sized dollops of sodium,
+chromium, phosphorous, manganese, cobalt, potassium, and titanium.
+
+But more important than these, as far as the immediate needs of the Belt
+cities were concerned, was a big, whopping thirty-six per cent oxygen.
+In the Belt cities, they had soon learned that, physically speaking, the
+stuff of life was _not_ bread. And no matter how carefully oxygen is
+conserved, no process is one hundred per cent efficient. There will be
+leakage into space, and that which is lost must be replaced.
+
+There is plenty of oxygen locked up in those silicates; the problem is
+towing them to the processing plants where the stuff can be extracted.
+
+Captain St. Simon's job was simple. All he had to do was sink an anchor
+into the asteroid so that the space tugs could get a grip on it. Once he
+had done that, the rest of the job was up to the tug crew.
+
+He crawled across the face of the floating mountain. At the spot where
+the North Pole was, he braced himself and then took a quick look around
+at the _Nancy Bell_. She wasn't moving very fast, he had plenty of time.
+He took a steel piton out of his tool pack, transferred it to his left
+hand, and took out a hammer. Then, working carefully, he hammered the
+piton into a narrow cleft in the rock. Three more of the steel spikes
+were hammered into the surface, forming a rough quadrilateral around the
+Pole.
+
+"That looks good enough to me, Jules," he said when he had finished.
+"Now that we have our little anchors, we can put the monster in."
+
+Then he grabbed his safety line, and pulled himself back to the _Nancy
+Bell_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The small craft had floated away from the asteroid a little, but not
+much. He repositioned it after he got the rocket drill out of the
+storage compartment.
+
+"Make way for the stovepipe!" he said as he pushed the drill ahead of
+him, out the door. This time, he pulled himself back to his drilling
+site by means of a cable which he had attached to one of the pitons.
+
+The setting up of the drill didn't take much time, but it was done with
+a great deal of care. He set the four-foot tube in the center of the
+quadrilateral formed by the pitons and braced it in position by
+attaching lines to the eyes on a detachable collar that encircled the
+drill. Once the drill started working, it wouldn't need bracing, but
+until it did, it had to be held down.
+
+All the time he worked, he kept his eyes on his lines and on his ship.
+The planetoid was turning under him, which made the ship appear to be
+circling slowly around his worksite. He had to make sure that his lines
+didn't get tangled or twisted while he was working.
+
+As he set up the bracing on the six-inch diameter drill, he sang a song
+that Kipling might have been startled to recognize:
+
+    _"To the tables down at Mory's,
+    To the place where Louie dwells,
+      Where it's always double drill and no canteen,
+    Sit the Whiffenpoofs assembled,
+    With their glasses raised on high,
+      And they'll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din."_
+
+When the drill was firmly based on the surface of the planetoid, St.
+Simon hauled his way back to his ship along his safety line. Inside, he
+sat down in the control chair and backed well away from the slowly
+spinning hunk of rock. Now there was only one thin pair of wires
+stretching between his ship and the drill on the asteroid.
+
+When he was a good fifty meters away, he took one last look to make sure
+everything was as it should be.
+
+"Stand by for a broadside!"
+
+"Standing by, sir!"
+
+"You may fire when ready, Gridley!"
+
+"Aye, sir! Rockets away!" His forefinger descended on a button which
+sent a pulse of current through the pair of wires that trailed out the
+open door to the drill fifty meters away.
+
+A flare of light appeared on the top of the drill. Almost immediately,
+it developed into a tongue of rocket flame. Then a glow appeared at the
+base of the drill and flame began to billow out from beneath the tube.
+The drill began to sink into the surface, and the planetoid began to
+move ever so slowly.
+
+The drill was essentially a pair of opposed rockets. The upper one,
+which tried to push the drill into the surface of the planetoid,
+developed nearly forty per cent more thrust than the lower one. Thus,
+the lower one, which was trying to push the drill _off_ the rock, was
+outmatched. It had to back up, if possible. And it was certainly
+possible; the exhaust flame of the lower rocket easily burrowed a hole
+that the rocket could back into, while the silicate rock boiled and
+vaporized in order to get out of the way.
+
+Soon there was no sign of the drill body itself. There was only a small
+volcano, spewing up gas and liquid from a hole in the rock. On the
+surface of a good-sized planet, the drill would have built up a little
+volcanic cone around the lip of the hole, but building a cone like that
+requires enough gravity to pull the hot matter back to the edge of the
+hole.
+
+The fireworks didn't last long. The drill wasn't built to go in too
+deep. A drill of that type could be built which would burrow its way
+right through a small planetoid, but that was hardly necessary for
+planting an anchor. Ten meters was quite enough.
+
+Now came the hard work.
+
+On the outside of the _Nancy Bell_, locked into place, was a
+specially-treated nickel-steel eye-bolt--thirty feet long and eight
+inches in diameter. There had been ten of them, just as there had been
+ten drills in the storage locker. Now the last drill had been used, and
+there was but one eye-bolt left. The _Nancy Bell_ would have to go back
+for more supplies after this job.
+
+The anchor bolts had a mass of four metric tons each. Maneuvering them
+around, even when they were practically weightless, was no easy job.
+
+St. Simon again matched the velocity of the _Nancy Bell_ with that of
+the planetoid, which had been accelerated by the drill's action. He
+positioned the ship above the hole which had been drilled into the huge
+rock. Not directly above it--rocket drills had been known to show spurts
+of life after they were supposed to be dead. St. Simon had timed the
+drill, and it had apparently behaved as it should, but there was no need
+to take chances.
+
+"Fire brigade, stand by!"
+
+"Fire brigade standing by, sir!"
+
+A nozzle came out of the nose of the _Nancy Bell_ and peeped over the
+rim of the freshly-drilled hole.
+
+"Ready! Aim! Squirt!"
+
+A jet of kerosene-like fluosilicone oil shot down the shaft. When it had
+finished its work, there was little possibility that anything could
+happen at the bottom. Any unburned rocket fuel would have a hard time
+catching fire with that stuff soaking into it.
+
+"Ready to lower the boom, Mr. Christian!" bellowed St. Simon.
+
+"Aye, sir! Ready, sir!"
+
+"Lower away!"
+
+His fingers played rapidly over the control board.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Outside the ship, the lower end of the great eye-bolt was released from
+its clamp, and a small piston gave it a little shove. In a long, slow,
+graceful arc, it swung away from the hull, swiveling around the pivot
+clamp that held the eye. The braking effect of the pivot clamp was
+precisely set to stop the eye-bolt when it was at right angles to the
+hull. Moving carefully, St. Simon maneuvered the ship until the far end
+of the bolt was directly over the shaft. Then he nudged the _Nancy Bell_
+sideways, pushing the bolt down into the planetoid. It grated a couple
+of times, but between the power of the ship and the mass of the
+planetoid, there was enough pressure to push it past the obstacles. The
+rocket drill and the eye-bolt had been designed to work together; the
+hole made by the first was only a trifle larger than the second. The
+anchor settled firmly into place.
+
+St. Simon released the clamps that held the eye-bolt to the hull of the
+ship, and backed away again. As he did, a power cord unreeled, for the
+eye-bolt was still connected to the vessel electrically.
+
+Several meters away, St. Simon pushed another button. There was no
+sound, but his practiced eye saw the eye of the anchor quiver. A small
+explosive charge, set in the buried end of the anchor, had detonated,
+expanding the far end of the bolt, wedging it firmly in the hole. At the
+same time, a piston had been forced up a small shaft in the center of
+the bolt, forcing a catalyst to mix with a fast-setting resin, and
+extruding the mixture out through half a dozen holes in the side of the
+bolt. When the stuff set, the anchor was locked securely to the sides of
+the shaft and thus to the planetoid itself.
+
+St. Simon waited for a few minutes to make sure the resin had set
+completely. Then he clambered outside again and attached a heavy towing
+cable to the eye of the anchor, which projected above the surface of the
+asteroid. Back inside the ship again, he slowly applied power. The cable
+straightened and pulled at the anchor as the _Nancy Bell_ tried to get
+away from the asteroid.
+
+"Jules, old bunion," he said as he watched the needle of the tension
+gauge, "we have set her well."
+
+"Yes, m'lud. So it would appear, m'lud."
+
+St. Simon cut the power. "Very good, Jules. Now we shall see if the
+beeper is functioning as it should." He flipped a switch that turned on
+the finder pickup, then turned the selector to his own frequency band.
+
+_Beep!_ said the radio importantly. _Beep!_
+
+The explosion had also triggered on a small but powerful transmitter
+built into the anchor. The tugs would be able to find the planetoid by
+following the beeps.
+
+"Ah, Jules! Success!"
+
+"Yes, m'lud. Success. For the tenth time in a row, this trip. And how
+many trips does this make?"
+
+"Ah, but who's counting? Think of the money!"
+
+"And the monotony, m'lud. To say nothing of molasses, muchness, and
+other things that begin with an M."
+
+"Quite so, Jules; quite so. Well, let's detach the towing cable and be
+on our way."
+
+"Whither, m'lud, Vesta?"
+
+"I rather thought Pallas this time, old thimble."
+
+"Still, m'lud, Vesta--"
+
+"Pallas, Jules."
+
+"Vesta?"
+
+"Hum, hi, ho," said Captain St. Simon thoughtfully. "Pallas?"
+
+The argument continued while the tow cable was detached from the
+freshly-placed anchor, and while the air was being let back into the
+control chamber, and while St. Simon divested himself of his suit.
+Actually, although he would like to go to Vesta, it was out of the
+question. Energywise and timewise, Pallas was much closer.
+
+He settled back in the bucket seat and shot toward Pallas.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Edway Tarnhorst was from San Pedro, Greater Los Angeles, California,
+Earth. He was a businessman of executive rank, and was fairly rich. In
+his left lapel was the Magistral Knight's Cross of the Sovereign
+Hierosolymitan Order of Malta, reproduced in miniature. In his wallet
+was a card identifying him as a Representative of the Constituency of
+Southern California to the Supreme Congress of the People of the United
+Nations of Earth. He was just past his fifty-third birthday, and his
+lean, ascetic face and graying hair gave him a look of saintly wisdom.
+Aside from the eight-pointed cross in his lapel, the only ornamentation
+or jewelry he wore consisted of a small, exquisitely thin gold watch on
+his left wrist, and, on the ring finger of his left hand, a gold signet
+ring set with a single, flat, unfaceted diamond which was delicately
+engraved with the Tarnhorst coat of arms. His clothing was quietly but
+impressively expensive, and under Earth gravity would probably have
+draped impeccably, but it tended to fluff oddly away from his body under
+a gee-pull only a twentieth of Earth's.
+
+He sat in his chair with both feet planted firmly on the metal floor,
+and his hands gripping the armrests as though he were afraid he might
+float off toward the ceiling if he let go. But only his body betrayed
+his unease; his face was impassive and calm.
+
+The man sitting next to him looked a great deal more comfortable. This
+was Mr. Peter Danley, who was twenty years younger than Mr. Tarnhorst
+and looked it. Instead of the Earth-cut clothing that the older man was
+wearing, he was wearing the close-fitting tights that were the common
+dress of the Belt cities. His hair was cropped close, and the fine blond
+strands made a sort of golden halo about his head when the light from
+the panels overhead shone on them. His eyes were pale blue, and the
+lashes and eyebrows were so light as to be almost invisible. That
+effect, combined with his thin-lined, almost lipless mouth, gave his
+face a rather expressionless expression. He carried himself like a man
+who was used to low-gravity or null-gravity conditions, but he talked
+like an Earthman, not a Belt man. The identification card in his belt
+explained that; he was a pilot on the Earth-Moon shuttle service. In the
+eyes of anyone from the Belt cities, he was still an Earthman, not a
+true spaceman. He was looked upon in the same way that the captain of a
+transatlantic liner might have looked upon the skipper of the Staten
+Island ferry two centuries before. The very fact that he was seated in a
+chair gave away his Earth habits.
+
+The third man was standing, leaning at a slight angle, so that his back
+touched the wall behind him. He was not tall--five nine--and his face
+and body were thin. His tanned skin seemed to be stretched tightly over
+this scanty padding, and in places the bones appeared to be trying to
+poke their way through to the surface. His ears were small and lay
+nearly flat against his head, and the hair on his skull was so sparse
+that the tanned scalp could be easily seen beneath it, although there
+was no actual bald spot anywhere. Only his large, luminous brown eyes
+showed that Nature had not skimped on everything when he was formed. His
+name was lettered neatly on the outside of the door to the office:
+Georges Alhamid. In spite of the French spelling, he pronounced the name
+"George," in the English manner.
+
+He had welcomed the two Earthmen into his office, smiling the automatic
+smile of the diplomat as he welcomed them to Pallas. As soon as they
+were comfortably seated--though perhaps that word did not exactly apply
+to Edway Tarnhorst--Georges Alhamid said:
+
+"Now, gentlemen, what can I do for you?"
+
+He asked it as though he were completely unaware of what had brought the
+two men to Pallas.
+
+Tarnhorst looked as though he were privately astonished that his host
+could speak grammatically. "Mr. Alhamid," he began, "I don't know
+whether you're aware that the industrial death rate here in the Belt has
+been the subject of a great deal of discussion in both industrial and
+governmental circles on Earth." It was a half question, and he let it
+hang in the air, waiting to see whether he got an answer.
+
+"Certainly my office has received a great deal of correspondence on the
+subject," Alhamid said. His voice sounded as though Tarnhorst had
+mentioned nothing more serious than a commercial deal. Important, but
+nothing to get into a heavy sweat over.
+
+Tarnhorst nodded and then held his head very still. His actions betrayed
+the fact that he was not used to the messages his semicircular canals
+were sending his brain when he moved his head under low gee.
+
+"Exactly," he said after a moment's pause. "I have 'stat copies of a
+part of that correspondence. To be specific, the correspondence between
+your office and the Workers' Union Safety Control Board, and between
+your office and the Workingman's Compensation Insurance Corporation."
+
+"I see. Well, then, you're fully aware of what our trouble is, Mr.
+Tarnhorst. I'm glad to see that an official of the insurance company is
+taking an interest in our troubles."
+
+Tarnhorst's head twitched, as though he were going to shake his head and
+had thought better of it a fraction of a second too late. It didn't
+matter. The fluid in his inner ears sloshed anyway.
+
+"I am not here in my capacity as an officer of the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation," he said carefully. "I am here as a
+representative of the People's Congress."
+
+Alhamid's face showed a mild surprise which he did not feel. "I'm
+honored, of course, Mr. Tarnhorst," he said, "but you must understand
+that I am not an official of the government of Pallas."
+
+Tarnhorst's ascetic face betrayed nothing. "Since you have no unified
+government out here," he said, "I cannot, of course, presume to deal
+with you in a governmental capacity. I have spoken to the Governor of
+Pallas, however, and he assures me that you are the man to speak to."
+
+"If it's about the industrial death rate," Alhamid agreed, "then he's
+perfectly correct. But if you're here as a governmental representative
+of Earth, I don't understand--"
+
+"Please, Mr. Alhamid," Tarnhorst interrupted with a touch of irritation
+in his voice. "This is not my first trip to the Belt, nor my first
+attempt to deal with the official workings of the Confederated Cities."
+
+Alhamid nodded gently. It was, as a matter of fact, Mr. Tarnhorst's
+second trip beyond the Martian orbit, the first having taken place some
+three years before. But the complaint was common enough; Earth, with its
+strong centralized government, simply could not understand the
+functioning of the Belt Confederacy. A man like Tarnhorst apparently
+couldn't distinguish between _government_ and _business_. Knowing that,
+Alhamid could confidently predict what the general sense of Tarnhorst's
+next sentence would be.
+
+"I am well aware," said Tarnhorst, "that the Belt Companies not only
+have the various governors under their collective thumb, but have thus
+far prevented the formation of any kind of centralized government. Let
+us not quibble, Mr. Alhamid; the Belt Companies run the Belt, and that
+means that I must deal with officials of those companies--such as
+yourself."
+
+Alhamid felt it necessary to make a mild speech in rebuttal. "I cannot
+agree with you, Mr. Tarnhorst. I have nothing to do with the government
+of Pallas or any of the other asteroids. I am neither an elected nor an
+appointed official of any government. Nor, for that matter, am I an
+advisor in either an official or unofficial capacity to any government.
+I do not make the laws designed to keep the peace, nor do I enforce
+them, except in so far as I am a registered voter and therefore have
+some voice in those laws in that respect. Nor, again, do I serve any
+judiciary function in any Belt government, except inasmuch as I may be
+called upon for jury duty.
+
+"I am a business executive, Mr. Tarnhorst. Nothing more. If you have
+governmental problems to discuss, then I can't help you, since I'm not
+authorized to make any decisions for any government."
+
+Edway Tarnhorst closed his eyes and massaged the bridge of his thin nose
+between thumb and forefinger. "I understand that. I understand that
+perfectly. But out here, the Companies have taken over certain functions
+of government, shall we say?"
+
+"Shall we say, rather, that on Earth the government has usurped certain
+functions which rightfully belong to private enterprise?" Alhamid said
+gently. "Historically, I think, that is the correct view."
+
+Tarnhorst opened his eyes and smiled. "You may be quite correct.
+Historically speaking, perhaps, the Earth government has usurped the
+functions that rightfully belong to kings, dictators, and warlords. To
+say nothing of local satraps and petty chieftains. Hm-m-m. Perhaps we
+should return to that? Perhaps we should return to the human suffering
+that was endemic in those times?"
+
+"You might try it," said Alhamid with a straight face. "Say, one year
+out of every ten. It would give the people something to look forward to
+with anticipation and to look back upon with nostalgia." Then he changed
+his tone. "If you wish to debate theories of government, Mr. Tarnhorst,
+possibly we could get up a couple of teams. Make a public affair of it.
+It could be taped and televised here and on Earth, and we could charge
+royalties on each--"
+
+Peter Danley's blond, blank face became suddenly animated. He looked as
+though he were trying to suppress a laugh. He almost succeeded. It came
+out as a cough.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the same time, Tarnhorst interrupted Alhamid. "You have made your
+point, Mr. Alhamid," he said in a brittle voice. "Permit me to make
+mine. I have come to discuss business with you. But, as a member of the
+Congressional Committee for Industrial Welfare, I am also in search of
+facts. Proper legislation requires facts, and legislation passed by the
+Congress will depend to a great extent upon the report on my findings
+here."
+
+"I understand," said Alhamid. "I'll certainly be happy to provide you
+with whatever data you want--with the exception of data on industrial
+processes, of course. That's not mine to give. But anything else--" He
+gestured with one hand, opening it palm upwards, as though dispensing a
+gift.
+
+"I'm not interested in industrial secrets," said Tarnhorst, somewhat
+mollified. "It's a matter of the welfare of your workers. We feel that
+we should do something to help. As you know, there have been protests
+from the Worker's Union Safety Control Board and from the Workingman's
+Compensation Insurance Corporation."
+
+Alhamid nodded. "I know. The insurance company is complaining about the
+high rate of claims for deaths. They've threatened to raise our premium
+rates."
+
+"Considering the expense, don't you, as a businessman, think that a fair
+thing to do?"
+
+"No," Alhamid said. "I have pointed out to them that the total amount of
+the claims is far less per capita than, for instance, the Steel
+Construction Workers' Union of Earth. Granted, there are more death
+claims, but these are more than compensated for by the fact that the
+claims for disability and hospitalization are almost negligible."
+
+"That's another thing we don't understand," Tarnhorst said carefully.
+"It appears that not only are the safety precautions insufficient, but
+the post-accident care is ... er ... inefficient."
+
+"I assure you that what post-accident care there is," Alhamid said, "is
+quite efficient. But there is a high mortality rate because of the very
+nature of the job. Do you know anything about anchor-placing, Mr.
+Tarnhorst?"
+
+"Very little," Tarnhorst admitted. "That is one of the things I am here
+to get information on. You used the phrase 'what post-accident care
+there is'--just how do you mean that?"
+
+"Mr. Tarnhorst, when a man is out in space, completely surrounded by a
+hard vacuum, _any_ accident is very likely to be fatal. On Earth, if a
+man sticks his thumb in a punch press, he loses his thumb. Out here, if
+a man's thumb is crushed off while he's in space, he loses his air and
+his life long before he can bleed to death. Anything that disables a man
+in space is deadly ninety-nine times out of a hundred.
+
+"I can give you a parallel case. In the early days of oil drilling,
+wells occasionally caught fire. One of the ways to put them out was to
+literally blow them out with a charge of nitroglycerine. Naturally, the
+nitroglycerine had to be transported from where it was made to where it
+was to be used. Sensibly enough, it was not transported in tank-car
+lots; it was carried in small special containers by a single man in an
+automobile, who used the back roads and avoided traffic and stayed away
+from thickly populated areas--which was possible in those days. In many
+places these carriers were required to paint their cars red, and have
+the words _Danger Nitroglycerine_ painted on the vehicle in yellow.
+
+"Now, the interesting thing about that situation is that, whereas
+insurance companies in those days were reluctant to give policies to
+those men, even at astronomical premium rates, disability insurance cost
+practically nothing--provided the insured would allow the insertion of a
+clause that restricted the covered period to those times when he was
+actually engaged in transporting nitroglycerine. You can see why."
+
+"I am not familiar with explosives," Tarnhorst said. "I take it that the
+substance is ... er ... easily detonated?"
+
+"That's right," said Alhamid. "It's not only sensitive, but it's
+unreliable. You might actually drop a jar of the stuff and do nothing
+but shatter the jar. Another jar, apparently exactly similar, might go
+off because it got jiggled by a seismic wave from a passing truck half a
+mile away. But the latter was a great deal more likely than the former."
+
+"Very well," said Tarnhorst after a moment, "I accept that analogy. I'd
+like to know more about the work itself. What does the job entail,
+exactly? What safety precautions are taken?"
+
+It required the better part of three hours to explain exactly what an
+anchor setter did and how he did it--and what safety precautions were
+being taken. Through it all, Peter Danley just sat there, listening,
+saying nothing.
+
+Finally, Edway Tarnhorst said: "Well, thank you very much for your
+information, Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to think this over. May I see you in
+the morning?"
+
+"Certainly, sir. You're welcome at any time."
+
+"Thank you." The two Earthmen rose from their seats--Tarnhorst
+carefully, Danley with the ease of long practice. "Would nine in the
+morning be convenient?"
+
+"Quite convenient. I'll expect you."
+
+Danley glided over to the door and held it open for Tarnhorst. He was
+wearing magnetic glide-shoes, the standard footwear of the Belt, which
+had three ball-bearings in the forward part of the sole, allowing the
+foot to move smoothly in any direction, while the rubber heel could be
+brought down to act as a brake when necessary. He didn't handle them
+with the adeptness of a Belt man, but he wasn't too awkward. Tarnhorst
+was wearing plain magnetic-soled boots--the lift-'em-up-and-lay-'em-down
+type. He had no intention of having his dignity compromised by shoes
+that might treacherously scoot out from under him.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As soon as the door had closed behind them, Georges Alhamid picked up
+the telephone on his desk and punched a number.
+
+When a woman's voice answered at the other end, he said: "Miss Lehman,
+this is Mr. Alhamid. I'd like to speak to the governor." There was a
+pause. Then:
+
+"George? Larry here."
+
+Alhamid leaned back comfortably against the wall. "I just saw your
+guests, Larry. I spent damn near three hours explaining why it was
+necessary to put anchors in rocks, how it was done, and why it was
+dangerous."
+
+"Did you convince him? Tarnhorst, I mean."
+
+"I doubt it. Oh, I don't mean he thinks I'm lying or anything like that.
+He's too sharp for that. But he _is_ convinced that we're negligent,
+that we're a bunch of barbarians who care nothing about human life."
+
+"You've got to unconvince him, George," the governor said worriedly.
+"The Belt still isn't self-sufficient enough to be able to afford an
+Earth embargo. They can hold out longer than we can."
+
+"I know," Alhamid said. "Give us another generation, and we can tell the
+World Welfare State where to head in--but right now, things are touchy,
+and you and I are in the big fat middle of it." He paused, rubbing
+thoughtfully at his lean blade of a nose with a bony forefinger. "Larry,
+what did you think of that blond nonentity Tarnhorst brought with him?"
+
+"He's not a nonentity," the governor objected gently. "He just looks it.
+He's Tarnhorst's 'expert' on space industry, if you want my opinion. Did
+he say much of anything while he was with you?"
+
+"Hardly anything."
+
+"Same here. I have a feeling that his job is to evaluate every word you
+say and report his evaluation to Tarnhorst. You'll have to be careful."
+
+"I agree," Alhamid said. "But he complicates things. I have a feeling
+that if I tell Tarnhorst a straight story he'll believe it. He seems to
+be a pretty shrewd judge. But Danley just might be the case of the man
+who is dangerous because of his little learning. He obviously knows a
+devil of a lot more about operations in space than Tarnhorst does, and
+he's evidently a hand-picked man, so that Tarnhorst will value his
+opinion. But it's evident that Danley doesn't know anything about space
+by our standards. Put him out on a boat as an anchor man, and he'd be
+lucky if he set a single anchor."
+
+"Well, there's not much chance of that. How do you mean, he's
+dangerous?"
+
+"I'll give you a f'rinstance. Suppose you've got a complex circuit using
+alternatic current, and you're trying to explain to a reasonably
+intelligent man how it works and what it does. If he doesn't know
+anything about electricity, he mightn't understand the explanation, but
+he'll believe that you're telling him the truth even if he doesn't
+understand it. But if he knows the basic theory of direct currents,
+you're likely to find yourself in trouble because he'll know just enough
+to see that what you're telling him doesn't jibe with what he already
+knows. Volts times amperes equal watts, as far as he's concerned, and
+the term 'power factor' does nothing but confuse him. He knows that
+copper is a conductor, so he can't see how a current could be cut off by
+a choke coil. He knows that a current can't pass through an insulator,
+so a condenser obviously can't be what you say it is. Mentally, he tags
+you as a liar, and he begins to try to dig in to see how your gadget
+_really_ works."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Hm-m-m. I see what you mean. Bad." He snorted. "Blast Earthmen, anyway!
+Have you ever been there?"
+
+"Earth? Nope. By careful self-restraint, I've managed to forego that
+pleasure so far, Larry. Why?"
+
+"Brrr! It's the feel of the place that I can't stand. I don't mean the
+constant high-gee; I take my daily exercise spin in the centrifuge just
+like anyone else, and you soon get used to the steady pull on Earth. I
+mean the constant, oppressive _psychic_ tension, if you see what I mean.
+The feeling that everyone hates and distrusts everyone else. The curious
+impression of fear underneath every word and action.
+
+"I'm older than you are, George, and I've lived with a kind of fear all
+my life--just as you and everyone else in the Belt has. A single mistake
+can kill out here, and the fear that it will be some fool who makes a
+mistake that will kill hundreds is always with us. We've learned to live
+with that kind of fear; we've learned to take steps to prevent any idiot
+from throwing the wrong switch that would shut down a power plant or
+open an air lock at the wrong time.
+
+"But the fear on Earth is different. It's the fear that everyone else is
+out to get you, the fear that someone will stick a figurative knife in
+your back and reduce you to the basic subsistence level. And that fear
+is solidly based, believe me. The only way to climb up from basic
+subsistence is to climb over everyone else, to knock aside those in your
+way, to get rid of whoever is occupying the position you want. And once
+you get there, the only way you can hold your position is to make sure
+that nobody below you gets too big for his britches. The rule is: Pull
+down those above you, hold down those below you.
+
+"I've seen it, George. The big cities are packed with people whose sole
+ambition in life is to badger their local welfare worker out of another
+check--they need new clothes, they need a new bed, they need a new
+table, they need more food for the new baby, they need this, they need
+that. All they ever do is _need_! But, of course, they're far to
+aristocratic to _work_.
+
+"Those who do have ambition have to become politicians--in the worst
+sense of the word. They have to gain some measure of control over the
+dispersal of largesse to the mob; they have to get themselves into a
+position where they can give away other people's money, so that they can
+get their cut, too.
+
+"And even then, the man who gets to be a big shot doesn't dare show it.
+Take a look at Tarnhorst. He's probably one of the best of a bad lot. He
+has his fingers in a lot of business pies which make him money, and he's
+in a high enough position in the government to enable him to keep some
+of his money. But his clothing is only a little bit better than the
+average, just as the man who is on basic subsistence wears clothes that
+are only a little bit worse than the average. That diamond ring of his
+is a real diamond, but you can buy imitations that can't be told from
+the real thing except by an expert, so his diamond doesn't offend anyone
+by being ostentatious. And it's unfaceted, to eliminate offensive flash.
+
+"All the color has gone out of life on Earth, George. Women held out
+longer than men did, but now no man or woman would be caught wearing a
+bright-colored suit. You don't see any reds or yellows or blues or
+greens or oranges--only grays and browns and black.
+
+"It's not for me, George. I'd much rather live in fear of the few fools
+who might pull a stupid trick that would kill me than live in the
+constant fear of everyone around me, who all want to destroy me
+deliberately."
+
+"I know what you mean," said Alhamid, "but I think you've put the wrong
+label on what you're calling 'fear'; there's a difference between fear
+and having a healthy respect for something that is dangerous but not
+malignant. That vacuum out there isn't out to 'get' anybody. The only
+people it kills are the fools who have no respect for it and the
+neurotics who think that it wants to murder them. You're neither, and I
+know it."
+
+The governor laughed. "That's the advantage we have over Earthmen,
+George. We went through the same school of hard knocks together--all of
+us. And we know how we stack up against each other."
+
+"True," Alhamid said darkly, "but how long will that hold if Tarnhorst
+closes the school down?"
+
+"That's what you've got to prevent," said the governor flatly. "If you
+need help, yell."
+
+"I will," Alhamid said. "Very loudly." He hung up, wishing he knew what
+Tarnhorst--and Danley--had in mind.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"The trouble with these people, Danley," said Edway Tarnhorst, "is that
+they have no respect whatever for human dignity. They have a tendency to
+overlook the basic rights of the individual."
+
+"They're certainly--different," Peter Danley said.
+
+Tarnhorst juggled himself up and down on the easy-chair in which he was
+seated, as though he could hardly believe that he had weight again. He
+hated low gee. It made him feel awkward and undignified. The only thing
+that reminded him that this was not "real" gravity was the faint, but
+all-pervasive hum of the huge engines that drove the big centrifuge. The
+rooms had cost more, but they were well worth it, as far as Tarnhorst
+was concerned.
+
+"How do you mean, 'different'?" he asked almost absently, settling
+himself comfortably into the cushions.
+
+"I don't know exactly. There's a hardness, a toughness--I can't quite
+put my finger on it, but it's in the way they act, the way they talk."
+
+"Surely you'd noticed that before?" Tarnhorst asked in mild surprise.
+"You've met these Belt men on Luna."
+
+"And their women," Danley said with a nod. "But the impact is somewhat
+more pronounced on their own home ground--seeing them _en masse_."
+
+"Their women!" Tarnhorst said, caught by the phrase. "_Fah!_
+Bright-colored birds! Giggling children! And no more morals than a
+common house-cat!"
+
+"Oh, they're not as bad as all that," Danley objected. "Their clothing
+is a little bright, I'll admit, and they laugh and kid around a lot, but
+I wouldn't say that their morals were any worse than those of a girl
+from New York or London."
+
+"Arrogance is the word," said Tarnhorst. "Arrogance. Like the way that
+Alhamid kept standing all the time we were talking, towering over us
+that way."
+
+"Just habit," Danley said. "When you don't weigh more than six or seven
+pounds, there's not much point in sitting down. Besides, it leaves them
+on their feet in case of emergency."
+
+"He could have sat down out of politeness," Tarnhorst said. "But no.
+They try to put on an air of superiority that is offensive to human
+dignity." He leaned back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and
+crossed his ankles. "However, attitude itself needn't concern us until
+it translates itself into anti-social behavior. What cannot be tolerated
+is this callous attitude toward the dignity and well-being of the
+workers out here. What did you think of Alhamid's explanation of this
+anchor-setting business?"
+
+Danley hesitated. "It sounded straightforward enough, as far as it
+went."
+
+"You think he's concealing something, then?"
+
+"I don't know. I don't have all the information." He frowned, putting
+furrows between his almost invisible blond brows. "I know that neither
+government business nor insurance business are my specialty, but I would
+like to know a little more about the background before I render any
+decision."
+
+"Hm-m-m. Well." Tarnhorst frowned in thought for a moment, then came to
+a decision. "I can't give you the detailed data, of course; that would
+be a violation of the People's Mutual Welfare Code. But I can give you
+the general story."
+
+"I just want to know what sort of thing to look for," Danley said.
+
+"Certainly. Certainly. Well." Tarnhorst paused to collect his thoughts,
+then launched into his speech. "It has now been over eighty years since
+the first colonists came out here to the Belt. At first, the ties with
+Earth were quite strong, naturally. Only a few actually intended to stay
+out there the rest of their lives; most of them intended to make
+themselves a nice little nest egg, come back home, and retire. At the
+same time, the World State was slowly evolving from its original loosely
+tied group of independent nations toward what it is today.
+
+"The people who came out here were mostly misfits, sociologically
+speaking." He smiled sardonically. "They haven't changed much.
+
+"At any rate, as I said, they were strongly tied to Earth. There was the
+matter of food, air, and equipment, all of which had to be shipped out
+from Earth to begin with. Only the tremendous supply of metal--almost
+free for the taking--made such a venture commercially possible. Within
+twenty-five years, however, the various industrial concerns that managed
+the Belt mining had become self-supporting. The robot scoopers which are
+used to mine methane and ammonia from Jupiter's atmosphere gave them
+plenty of organic raw material. Now they grow plants of all kinds and
+even raise food animals.
+
+"They began, as every misfit does, to complain about the taxes the
+government put on their incomes. The government, in my opinion, made an
+error back then. They wanted to keep people out in the Belt, since the
+mines on Earth were not only rapidly being depleted, but the mining
+sites were needed for living space. Besides, asteroid metals were
+cheaper than metals mined on Earth. To induce the colonists to remain in
+the Belt, no income tax was levied; the income tax was replaced by an
+eighty per cent tax on the savings accumulated when the colonist
+returned to Earth to retire.
+
+"They resented even that. It was explained to them that the asteroids
+were, after all, natural resources, and that they had no moral right to
+make a large profit and deprive others of their fair share of the income
+from a natural resource, but they insisted that they had earned it and
+had a right to keep it.
+
+"In other words, the then government bribed them to stay out here, and
+the bribe was more effective than they had intended."
+
+"So they stayed out here and kept their money," Danley said.
+
+"Exactly. At that time, if you will recall, there was a great deal of
+agitation against colonialism--there had been for a long time, as a
+matter of fact. That agitation was directed against certain
+industrialist robber-baron nations who had enslaved the populace of
+parts of Asia and Africa solely to produce wealth, and not for the
+benefit of the people themselves. But the Belt operators took advantage
+of the anticolonialism of the times and declared that the Belt cities
+were, and by right ought to be, free and independent political entities.
+It was a ridiculous assumption, of course, but since the various Belt
+cities were, at that time, under the nominal control of three or four of
+the larger nations, the political picture required that they be allowed
+to declare themselves independent. It was not anticipated at the time
+that they would be so resistant toward the World Government."
+
+He smiled slightly. "Of course, by refusing to send representatives to
+the People's Congress, they have, in effect, cut themselves off from any
+voice in human government."
+
+Then he shrugged. "At the moment, that is neither here nor there. What
+interests us at the moment is the death rate curve of the anchor-sinkers
+or whatever they are. Did you know that it is practically impossible for
+anyone to get a job out there in the Belt unless he has had experience
+in the anchor-setting field?"
+
+"No," Danley admitted.
+
+"It's true. For every other job, they want only men with space
+experience. And by 'space experience' they mean anchor-setting, because
+that's the only job a man can get without previous space experience.
+They spend six months in a special school, learning to do the work,
+according to our friend, Mr. Georges Alhamid. Then they are sent out to
+set anchors. Small ones, at first, in rocks only a few meters in
+diameter--then larger ones. After a year or so at that kind of work,
+they can apply for more lucrative positions.
+
+"I see nothing intrinsically wrong in that, I will admit, but the
+indications are that the schooling, which should have been getting more
+efficient over the years, has evidently been getting more lax. The death
+rate has gone up."
+
+"Just a minute," Danley interrupted. "Do you mean that a man has to have
+what they call 'space experience' before he can get _any_ kind of job?"
+
+Tarnhorst shook his head and was pleased to find that no nausea
+resulted. "No, of course not. Clerical jobs, teaching jobs, and the like
+don't require that sort of training. But there's very little chance for
+advancement unless you're one of the elite. A physician, for example,
+wouldn't have many patients unless he had had 'space experience'; he
+wouldn't be allowed to own or drive a space boat, and he wouldn't be
+allowed to go anywhere near what are called 'critical areas'--such as
+air locks, power plants, or heavy industry installations."
+
+"It sounds to me as though they have a very strong union," said Danley.
+
+"If you want to call it that, yes," Tarnhorst said. "Anything that has
+anything to do with operations in space requires that sort of
+experience--and there are very few jobs out here that can avoid having
+anything to do with space. Space is only a few kilometers away." The
+expression on his face showed that he didn't much care for the thought.
+
+"I don't see that that's so bad," Danley said. "Going out there isn't
+something for the unexperienced. A man who doesn't know what he's doing
+can get himself killed easily, and, what's worse, he's likely to take
+others with him."
+
+"You speak, of course, from experience," Tarnhorst said with no trace of
+sarcasm. "I accept that. By not allowing inexperienced persons in
+critical areas, the Belt Companies are, at least indirectly, looking out
+for the welfare of the people. But we mustn't delude ourselves into
+thinking that that is their prime objective. These Belt Companies are no
+better than the so-called 'industrial giants' of the nineteenth and
+twentieth centuries. The government here is farcical. The sole job is to
+prevent crime and to adjudicate small civil cases. Every other function
+of proper government--the organization of industry, the regulation of
+standards the subsidizing of research, the control of prices, and so
+on--are left to the Belt Companies or to the people. The Belt Cities are
+no more than what used to be called 'company towns'."
+
+"I understand that," Danley said. "But they seem to function fairly
+smoothly."
+
+Tarnhorst eyed him. "If, by, 'smoothly functioning', you mean the denial
+of the common rights of human freedom and dignity yes. Oh, they give
+their sop to such basic human needs as the right of every individual to
+be respected--but only because Earth has put pressure on them.
+Otherwise, people who, through no fault of their own, were unable to
+work or get 'space experience' would be unable to get jobs and would be
+looked down upon as pariahs."
+
+"You mean there are people here who have no jobs? I wouldn't think that
+unemployment would be a problem out here."
+
+"It isn't," said Tarnhorst, "yet. But there are always those
+unfortunates who are psychologically incapable of work, and society must
+provide for them. The Belt Cities provide for a basic education, of
+course. As long as a person is going to school, he is given a stipend.
+But a person who has neither the ability to work nor the ability to
+study is an outcast, even though he is provided for by the companies. He
+is forced to do something to earn what should be his by right; he is
+given menial and degrading tasks to do. We would like to put a stop to
+that sort of thing, but we ... ah ... have no ... ah ... means of doing
+so." He paused, as though considering whether he had said too much.
+
+"The problem at hand," he went on hurriedly, "is the death curve. When
+this technique for taking the rocks to the smelters was being worked
+out, the death rate was--as you might imagine--quite high. The Belt
+Companies had already been operating out here for a long time before the
+stony meteorites were mined commercially. At first, the big thing was
+nickel-iron. That's what they came here to get in the beginning. That's
+where most of the money still is. But the stony asteroids provide them
+with their oxygen.
+
+"This anchor-setting technique was worked out at a time when the Belt
+Companies were trying to find ways to make the Belt self-sufficient.
+After they got the technique worked out so that it operated smoothly,
+the death rate dropped 'way down. It stayed down for a little while, and
+then began to rise again. It has nearly reached an all-time high.
+Obviously, something is wrong, and we have to find out what it is."
+
+Danley scratched ruminatively behind his right ear and wished he'd had
+the opportunity to study history. He had been vaguely aware, of the
+broad outlines, but the details had never been brought to his attention
+before. "Suppose Alhamid _is_ trying to hide something," he said after a
+moment. "What would it be, do you think?"
+
+Tarnhorst shrugged and spread his hands. "What could it be but some sort
+of money-saving scheme? Inferior materials being used at a critical
+spot, perhaps. Skimping on quality or quantity. Somewhere, somehow, they
+are shaving costs at the risk of the workers' lives. We have to find out
+what it is."
+
+Peter Danley nodded. _You don't mean_ "_we_," Danley thought to himself.
+I _am the one who's going to have to go out there and find it, while you
+sit here safe_. He felt that there was a pretty good chance that these
+Belt operators might kill him to keep him from finding out what it was
+they were saving money on.
+
+Aloud, he said: "I'll do what I can, Mr. Tarnhorst."
+
+Tarnhorst smiled. "I'm certain you will. That's why I needed someone who
+knows more about this business than I."
+
+"And when we do find it--what then?"
+
+"Then? Why, then we will force them to make the proper changes or there
+will be trouble."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Georges Alhamid heard the whole conversation early the next morning. The
+governor himself brought the recording over to his office.
+
+"Do you think he knew he was being overheard?"
+
+The governor shrugged. "Who knows. He waltzed all around what he was
+trying to say, but that may have been just native caution. Or he may not
+want Danley to know what's on his mind."
+
+"How could he bring Danley out here without telling him anything
+beforehand?" Alhamid asked thoughtfully. "Is Danley really that
+ignorant, or was the whole conversation for our ears?"
+
+"I'm inclined to think that Danley really didn't know. Remember, George,
+the best way to hold down the ones below you is to keep them from
+gaining any knowledge, to keep data out of their hands--except for the
+carefully doctored data you want them to have."
+
+"I know," Alhamid said. "History isn't exactly a popular subject on
+Earth." He tapped his fingers gently on the case of the playback and
+looked at it as if he were trying to read the minds of the persons who
+had spoken the words he had just heard.
+
+"I really think he believed that his nullifying equipment was doing its
+job," the governor continued. "He wouldn't have any way of knowing we
+could counteract it."
+
+Alhamid shrugged. "It doesn't matter much. We still have to assume that
+he's primarily out to bring the Belt Cities under Earth control. To do
+that, all he'd have to do is find something that could be built up into
+a scandal on Earth."
+
+"Not, _all_, George," the governor said. "It would take a lot more than
+that alone. But it would certainly be a start in the right direction."
+
+"One thing we do know," Alhamid said, "is that nobody on Earth will
+allow any action against the Belt unless popular sentiment is definitely
+against us. As long as we are apparently right-thinking people, we're
+all right. I wonder why Tarnhorst is so anxious to get us under the
+thumb of the People's Congress? Is it purely that half-baked idealism of
+his?"
+
+"Mostly. He has the notion that everybody has a right to be accorded the
+respect of his fellow man, and that that right is something that every
+person is automatically given at birth, not something he has to earn.
+What gave him his particular gripe against us, I don't know, but he's
+been out to get us ever since his trip here three years ago."
+
+"You know, Larry," Alhamid said slowly, "I'm not quite sure which is
+harder to understand: How a whole civilization could believe that sort
+of thing, or how a single intelligent man could."
+
+"It's a positive feedback," the governor said. "That sort of thing has
+wrecked civilizations before and will do it again. Let's not let it
+wreck ours. Are you ready for the conference with our friend now?"
+
+Georges Alhamid looked at the clock on the wall. "Ready as I'll ever be.
+You'd better scram, Larry. We mustn't give Mr. Tarnhorst the impression
+that there's some sort of collusion between business and government out
+there in the Belt."
+
+"Heaven forfend! I'll get."
+
+When he left, the governor took the playback with him. The recording
+would have to be filed in the special secret files.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Captain St. Simon eased his spaceboat down to the surface of Pallas and
+threw on the magnetic anchor which held the little craft solidly to the
+metal surface of the landing field. The traffic around Pallas was fairly
+heavy this time of year, since the planetoid was on the same side of the
+sun as Earth, and the big cargo haulers were moving in and out, loading
+refined metals and raw materials, unloading manufactured goods from
+Earth. He'd had to wait several minutes in the traffic pattern before
+being given clearance for anchoring.
+
+He was already dressed in his vacuum suit, and the cabin of the boat was
+exhausted of its air. He checked his control board, making sure every
+switch and dial was in the proper position. Only then did he open the
+door and step out to the gray surface of the landing field. His
+suitcase--a spherical, sealed container that the Belt men jokingly
+referred to as a "bomb"--went with him. He locked the door of his boat
+and walked down the yellow-painted safety lane toward the nearest air
+lock leading into the interior of the planetoid.
+
+He lifted his feet and set them down with precision--nobody but a fool
+wears glide boots on the outside. He kept his eyes moving--up and
+around, on both sides, above, and behind. The yellow path was supposed
+to be a safety lane, but there was no need of taking the chance of
+having an out-of-control ship come sliding in on him. Of course, if it
+was coming in really fast, he'd have no chance to move; he might not
+even see it at all. But why get slugged by a slow one?
+
+He waited outside the air-lock door for the green light to come on.
+There were several other space-suited figures around him, but he didn't
+recognize any of them. He hummed softly to himself.
+
+The green light came on, and the door of the air lock slid open. The
+small crowd trooped inside, and, after a minute, the door slid shut
+again. As the elevator dropped, St. Simon heard the familiar _whoosh_ as
+the air came rushing in. By the time it had reached the lower level, the
+elevator was up to pressure.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On Earth, there might have been a sign in such an elevator, reading: _DO
+NOT REMOVE VACUUM SUITS IN ELEVATOR._ There was no need for it here;
+every man there knew how to handle himself in an air lock. If he hadn't,
+he wouldn't have been there.
+
+After he had stepped out of the elevator, along with the others, and the
+door had closed behind him, St. Simon carefully opened the cracking
+valve on his helmet. There was a faint hiss of incoming air, adjusting
+the slight pressure differential. He took off his helmet, tucked it
+under his arm, and headed for the check-in station.
+
+He was walking down the corridor toward the checker's office when a hand
+clapped him on the shoulder. "Bless me if it isn't St. Simon the Silent!
+Long time no, if you'll pardon the cliche, see!"
+
+St. Simon turned, grinning. He had recognized the voice. "Hi, Kerry.
+Good to see you."
+
+"Good to see me? Forsooth! Od's bodkins! Hast turned liar on top of
+everything else, Good Saint? Good to see me, indeed! 'From such a face
+and form as mine, the noblest sentiments sound like the black utterances
+of a depraved imagination.' No, dear old holy pillar-sitter, no indeed!
+It may be a pleasure to hear my mellifluous voice--a pleasure I often
+indulge in, myself--but it couldn't possibly be a pleasure to _see_ me!"
+And all the while, St. Simon was being pummeled heartily on the
+shoulder, while his hand was pumped as though the other man was
+expecting to strike oil at any moment.
+
+His assailant was not a handsome man. Years before, a rare, fast-moving
+meteor had punched its way through his helmet and taken part of his face
+with it. He had managed to get back to his ship and pump air in before
+he lost consciousness. He had had to stay conscious, because the only
+thing that held the air in his helmet had been his hand pressed over the
+quarter-inch hole. Even so, the drop in pressure had done its damage.
+The surgeons had done their best to repair the smashed face, but Kerry
+Brand's face hadn't been much to look at to begin with. And the mottled
+purple of the distended veins and capillaries did little to improve his
+looks.
+
+But his ruined face was a badge of honor, and Kerry Brand knew the fact
+as well as anyone.
+
+Like St. Simon, Captain Brand was a professional anchor-setter. Most of
+the men who put in the necessary two years went on to better jobs after
+they had the required space experience. But there were some who liked
+the job and stuck with it. It was only these men--the real experts among
+the anchor-setting fraternity--who rated the title of "Captain". They
+were free-lancers who ran things pretty much their own way.
+
+"Just going to the checker?" St. Simon asked.
+
+Kerry Brand shook his head. "I've already checked in, old sanctus. And
+I'll give you three and one-seventh guesses who got a blue ticket."
+
+St. Simon said nothing, but he pointed a finger at Brand's chest.
+
+"A mild surmise, but a true one," said Brand. "You are, indeed, gazing
+upon Professor Kerry Brand, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.--that is to say, Borer of
+Asteroids, Master of Anchors, and Planetoid-hauler De-luxe. No, no;
+don't look sorry for me. _Some_body has to teach the tadpoles How To
+Survive In Space If You're Not Too Stupid To Live--a subject upon which
+I am an expert."
+
+"On Being Too Stupid To Live?" St. Simon asked gently.
+
+"A touch! A distinct touch! You are developing a certain unexpected vein
+of pawky humor, Watson, against which I must learn to guard myself." He
+looked at the watch on his wrist. "Why don't you go ahead and check in,
+and then we'll go pub-crawling. I have it on good authority that a few
+thousand gallons of Danish ale were piped aboard Pallas yesterday, and
+you and I should do our best to reduce the surplus."
+
+"Sounds good to me," said St. Simon agreeably. They started on toward
+the checker's office.
+
+"Consider, my dear St. Simon," said Brand, "how fortunate we are to be
+living in an age and a society where the dictum, 'Those who can, do;
+those who can't, teach,' no longer holds true. It means that we weary,
+work-hardened experts are called in every so often, handed our little
+blue ticket, and given six months off--_with_ pay--if we will only do
+the younger generation the favor of pounding a modicum of knowledge into
+their heads. During that time, if we are very careful, we can try to
+prevent our muscles from going to flab and our brains from corroding
+with ennui, so that when we again debark into the infinite sea of
+emptiness which surrounds us to pursue our chosen profession, we don't
+get killed on the first try. Isn't it wonderful?"
+
+"Cheer up," said St. Simon. "Teaching isn't such a bad lot. And, after
+all, you do get paid for it."
+
+"And at a salary! A Pooh-Bah paid for his services! I a salaried minion!
+But I do it! It revolts me, but I do it!"
+
+The short, balding man behind the checker's desk looked up as the two
+men approached. "Hello, captain," he said as St. Simon stepped up to the
+desk.
+
+"How are you, Mr. Murtaugh?" St. Simon said politely. He handed over his
+log book. "There's the data on my last ten. I'll be staying here for a
+few days, so there's no need to rush the refill requisition. Any calls
+for me?"
+
+The checker put the log book in the duplicator. "I'll see if there are,
+captain." He went over to the autofile and punched St. Simon's serial
+number.
+
+Very few people write to an anchor man. Since he is free to check in and
+reload at any of the major Belt Cities, and since, in his search for
+asteroids, his erratic orbit is likely to take him anywhere, it might be
+months or years before a written letter caught up with him. On the other
+hand, a message could be beamed to every city, and he could pick it up
+wherever he was. It cost money, but it was sure.
+
+"One call," the checker said. He handed St. Simon a message slip.
+
+It was unimportant. Just a note from a girl on Vesta. He promised
+himself that he'd make his next break at Vesta, come what may. He stuck
+the flimsy in his pocket, and waited while the checker went through the
+routine of recording his log and making out a pay voucher.
+
+There was no small talk between himself and the checker. Mr. Murtaugh
+had not elected to take the schooling necessary to qualify for other
+than a small desk job. He had no space experience. Unless and until he
+did, there would be an invisible, but nonetheless real barrier between
+himself and any spaceman. It was not that St. Simon looked down on the
+man, exactly; it was simply that Murtaugh had not proved himself, and,
+therefore, there was no way of knowing whether he could be trusted or
+not. And since trust is a positive quality, lack of it can only mean
+mistrust.
+
+Murtaugh handed Captain St. Simon an envelope. "That's it, captain.
+Thank you."
+
+St. Simon opened the envelope, took out his check--and a blue ticket.
+
+Kerry Brand broke into a guffaw.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When the phone on his desk rang, Georges Alhamid scooped it up and
+identified himself.
+
+"This is Larry, George," said the governor's voice. "How are things so
+far?"
+
+"So far, so good," Alhamid said. "For the past week, Mr. Peter Danley
+has been working his head off, under the tutelage of two of the
+toughest, smartest anchor men in the business. But you should have seen
+the looks on their faces when I told them they were going to have an
+Earthman for a pupil."
+
+The governor laughed. "I'll bet! How's he coming along?"
+
+"He's learning. How are you doing with your pet?"
+
+"I think I'm softening him, George. I found out what it was that got his
+goat three years ago."
+
+"Yeah?"
+
+"Sure. On Ceres, where he went three years ago, he was treated as if he
+weren't as good as a Belt man."
+
+Alhamid frowned. "Someone was disrespectful?"
+
+"No--that is, not exactly. But he was treated as if we didn't trust his
+judgment, as though we were a little bit afraid of him."
+
+"Oh-_ho_! I see what you mean."
+
+"Sure. We treated him just as we would anyone who hasn't proved himself.
+And that meant we were treating him the same way we treated our own
+'lower classes', as he thought of them. I had Governor Holger get his
+Ceres detectives to trace down everything that happened. You can read
+the transcript if you want. There's nothing particularly exciting in it,
+but you can see the pattern if you know what to look for.
+
+"I'm not even certain it was fully conscious on his part; I'm not sure
+he knew why he disliked us. All he was convinced of was that we were
+arrogant and thought we were better than he is. It's kind of hard for us
+to see that a person would be that deeply hurt by seeing the plain truth
+that someone else is obviously better at something than he is, but
+you've got to remember that an Earthman is brought up to believe that
+every person is just exactly as good as every other--and no better. A
+man may have a skill that you don't have, but that doesn't make him
+superior--oh, my, no!
+
+"Anyway, I started out by apologizing for our habit of standing up all
+the time. I managed to plant the idea in his mind that the only thing
+that made him think we felt superior was that habit. I've even got him
+to the point where he's standing up all the time, too. Makes him feel
+very superior. He's learned the native customs."
+
+"I get you," Alhamid said. "I probably contributed to that inferiority
+feeling of his myself."
+
+"Didn't we all? Anyway, the next step was to take him around and
+introduce him to some of the execs in the government and in a couple of
+the Companies--I briefed 'em beforehand. Friendly chats--that sort of
+thing. I think we're going to have to learn the ancient art of diplomacy
+out here if we're going to survive, George.
+
+"The crowning glory came this afternoon. You should have been there."
+
+"I was up to here in work, Larry. I just couldn't take the time off to
+attend a club luncheon. Did the great man give his speech?"
+
+"Did he? I should hope to crack my helmet he did! We must all pull
+together, George, did you know that? We must care for the widow and the
+orphan--and the needy, George, the needy. We must be sure to provide the
+fools, the idiots, the malingerers, the moral degenerates, and such
+useful, lovable beings as that with the necessities and the luxuries of
+life. We must see to it that they are respected and permitted to have
+their dignity. We must see to it that the dear little things are
+permitted the rights of a human being to hold his head up and spit in
+your eye if he wishes. We must see to it that they be fruitful,
+multiply, and replenish the Earth."
+
+"They've already done that," Alhamid said caustically. "And they can
+have it. Let's just see that they don't replenish the Belt. So what
+happened?"
+
+"Why, George, you'll never realize how much we appreciated that speech.
+We gave him a three-minute rising ovation. I think he was surprised to
+see that we could stand for three minutes under a one-gee pull in the
+centrifuge. And you should have seen the smiles on our faces, George."
+
+"I hope nobody broke out laughing."
+
+"We managed to restrain ourselves," the governor said.
+
+"What's next on the agenda?"
+
+"Well, it'll be tricky, but I think I can pull it off. I'm going to take
+him around and show him that we _do_ take care of the widow and the
+orphan, and hope that he assumes we are as solicitous toward the rest of
+his motley crew. Wish me luck."
+
+"Good luck. You may need it."
+
+"Same to you. Take care of Danley."
+
+"Don't worry. He's in good hands. See you, Larry."
+
+"Right."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There were three space-suited men on the bleak rocky ground near the
+north pole of Pallas, a training area of several square miles known as
+the North Forty. Their helmets gleamed in the bright, hard light from a
+sun that looked uncomfortably small to an Earthman's eyes. Two of the
+men were standing, facing each other some fifteen feet apart. The third,
+attached to them by safety lines, was hanging face down above the
+surface, rising slowly, like a balloon that has almost more weight than
+it can lift.
+
+"No, no, _no_, Mr. Danley! You are not _crawling_, Mr. Danley, you are
+climbing! Do you understand that? _Climbing!_ You have to _climb_ an
+asteroid, just as you would climb a cliff on Earth. You have to hold on
+every second of the time, or you will fall off!" St. Simon's voice
+sounded harsh in Danley's earphones, and he felt irritatingly helpless
+poised floatingly above the ground that way.
+
+His instructors were well anchored by metal eyes set into the rocky
+surface for just that purpose. Although Pallas was mostly nickel-iron,
+this end of it was stony, which was why it had been selected as a
+training ground.
+
+"_Well?_" snapped St. Simon. "What do you do now? If this were a small
+rock, you'd be drifting a long ways away by now. Think, Mr. Danley,
+_think_."
+
+"Then shut up and let me think!" Danley snarled.
+
+"If small things distract you from thinking about the vital necessity of
+saving your own life, Mr. Danley, you would not live long in the Belt."
+
+Danley reached out an arm to see if he could touch the ground. When he
+had pushed himself upwards with a thrust of his knee, he hadn't given
+himself too hard a shove. He had reached the apex of his slow flight,
+and was drifting downward again. He grasped a jutting rock and pulled
+himself back to the surface.
+
+"Very good, Mr. Danley--but that wouldn't work on a small rock. You took
+too long. What would you have done on a rock with a millionth of a gee
+of pull?"
+
+Danley was silent.
+
+"_Well?_" St. Simon barked. "_What would you do?_"
+
+"I ... I don't know," Danley admitted.
+
+"Ye gods and little fishhooks!" This was Kerry Brand's voice. It was
+supposed to be St. Simon's turn to give the verbal instructions, but
+Brand allowed himself an occasional remark when it was appropriate.
+
+St. Simon's voice was bitingly sweet. "What do you think those safety
+lines are for, Mr. Danley? Do you think they are for decorative
+purposes?"
+
+"Well ... I thought I was supposed to think of some other way. I mean,
+that's so obvious--"
+
+"Mr. Danley," St. Simon said with sudden patience, "we are not here to
+give you riddles to solve. We're here to teach you how to stay alive in
+the Belt. And one of the first rules you must learn is that you will
+_never_ leave your boat without a safety line. _Never!_
+
+"An anchor man, Mr. Danley, is called that for more than one reason. You
+cannot anchor your boat to a rock unless there is an eye-bolt set in it.
+And if it already has an eye-bolt, you would have no purpose on that
+rock. In a way, _you_ will be the anchor of your boat, since you will be
+tied to it by your safety line. If the boat drifts too far from your
+rock while you are working, it will pull you off the surface, since it
+has more mass than you do. That shouldn't be allowed to happen, but, if
+it does, you are still with your boat, rather than deserted on a rock
+for the rest of your life--which wouldn't be very long. When the power
+unit in your suit ran out of energy, it would stop breaking your exhaled
+carbon dioxide down into carbon and oxygen, and you would suffocate.
+Even with emergency tanks of oxygen, you would soon find yourself
+freezing to death. That sun up there isn't very warm, Mr. Danley."
+
+Peter Danley was silent, but it was an effort to remain so. He wanted to
+remind St. Simon that he, Danley, had been a spaceman for nearly fifteen
+years. But he was also aware that he was learning things that weren't
+taught at Earthside schools. Most of his professional life had been
+spent aboard big, comfortable ships that made the short Earth-Luna hop.
+He could probably count the total hours he had spent in a spacesuit on
+the fingers of his two hands.
+
+"All right, Mr. Danley; let's begin again. Climb along the surface. Use
+toeholds, handholds, and fingerholds. Feel your way along. Find those
+little crevices that will give you a grip. It doesn't take much. You're
+a lot better off than a mountain climber on Earth because you don't have
+to fight your weight. You have only your mass to worry about. That's it.
+Fine. Very good, Mr. Danley."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And, later:
+
+"Now, Mr. Danley," said Captain Brand, "you are at the end of your
+tether, so to speak."
+
+The three men were in a space boat, several hundred miles from Pallas.
+Or, rather, two of them were in the boat, standing at the open door.
+Peter Danley was far out from it, at the end of his safety line.
+
+"How far are you from us, Mr. Danley?" Brand asked.
+
+"Three hundred meters, Captain Brand," Danley said promptly.
+
+"Very good. How do you know?"
+
+"I am at the end of my safety line, which is three hundred meters long
+when fully extended."
+
+"Your memory is excellent, Mr. Danley. Now, how will you get back to the
+boat?"
+
+"Pull myself hand over hand along the line."
+
+"Think, Mr. Danley! _Think!_"
+
+"Uh. Oh. Well, I wouldn't keep pulling. I'd just give myself a tug and
+then coast in, taking up the line slowly as I went."
+
+"Excellent! What would happen if you, as you put it, pulled yourself in
+hand over hand, as if you were climbing a rope on Earth?"
+
+"I would accelerate too much," Danley said. "I'd gain too much momentum
+and probably bash my brains out against the boat. And I'd have no way to
+stop myself."
+
+"Bully for you, Mr. Danley! Now see if you can put into action that
+which you have so succinctly put into words. Come back to the boat.
+Gently the first time. We'll have plenty of practice, so that you can
+get the feel of the muscle pull that will give you a maximum of velocity
+with a minimum of impact at this end. Gently, now."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Still later:
+
+"Judgment, Mr. Danley!" St. Simon cautioned. "You have to use judgment!
+A space boat is not an automobile. There is no friction out here to slow
+it to a stop. Your accelerator is just exactly that--an accelerator.
+Taking your foot off it won't slow you down a bit; you've got to use
+your reverse."
+
+Peter Danley was at the controls of the boat. There were tiny beads of
+perspiration on his forehead. Over a kilometer away was a good-sized
+hunk of rock; his instructors wouldn't let him get any closer. They
+wanted to be sure that they could take over before the boat struck the
+rock, just in case Danley should freeze to the accelerator a little too
+long.
+
+He wasn't used to this sort of thing. He was used to a taped
+acceleration-deceleration program which lifted a big ship, aimed it, and
+went through the trip all automatically. All he had ever had to do was
+drop it the last few hundred feet to a landing field.
+
+"Keep your eyes moving," St. Simon said. "Your radar can give you data
+that you need, just remember that it can't think for you."
+
+_Your right foot controls your forward acceleration._
+
+_Your left foot controls your reverse acceleration._
+
+_They can't be pushed down together; when one goes down, the other goes
+up. Balance one against the other._
+
+_Turning your wheel controls the roll of the boat._
+
+_Pulling your wheel toward you, or pushing it away, controls the pitch._
+
+_Shifting the wheel left, or right, controls the yaw._
+
+The instructions had been pounded into his head until each one seemed to
+ring like a separate little bell. The problem was coordinating his body
+to act on those instructions.
+
+One of the radar dials told him how far he was from the rock. Another
+told him his radial velocity relative to it. A third told him his
+angular velocity.
+
+"Come to a dead stop exactly one thousand meters from the surface, Mr.
+Danley," St. Simon ordered.
+
+Danley worked the controls until both his velocity meters read zero, and
+the distance meter read exactly one kilometer.
+
+"Very good, Mr. Danley. Now assume that the surface of your rock is at
+nine hundred ninety-five meters. Bring your boat to a dead stop exactly
+fifty centimeters from that surface."
+
+Danley worked the controls again. He grinned with satisfaction when the
+distance meter showed nine nine five point five on the nose.
+
+Captain St. Simon sighed deeply. "Mr. Danley, do you feel a little
+shaken up? Banged around a little? Do you feel as though you'd just
+gotten a bone-rattling shock?"
+
+"Uh ... no."
+
+"You should. You slammed this boat a good two feet into the surface of
+that rock before you backed out again." His voice changed tone. "Dammit,
+Mr. Danley, when I say 'surface at nine nine five', I mean _surface_!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Edway Tarnhorst had been dictating notes for his reports into his
+recorder, and was rather tired, so when he asked Peter Danley what he
+had learned, he was rather irritated when the blond man closed his blue
+eyes and repeated, parrotlike:
+
+"Due to the lack of a water-oxygen atmosphere, many minerals are found
+in the asteroids which are unknown on Earth. Among the more important of
+these are: Oldhamite (CaS); Daubreelite (FECr_{2}S_{4}); Schreibersite
+and Rhabdite (Fe_{3}Ni_{3}P); Lawrencite (FeCl_{2}); and Taenite, an
+alloy of iron containing--"
+
+"That's not precisely the sort of thing I meant," Tarnhorst interrupted
+testily.
+
+Danley smiled. "I know. I'm sorry. That's my lesson for tomorrow."
+
+"So I gathered. May I sit down?" There were only two chairs in the room.
+Danley was occupying one, and a pile of books was occupying the other.
+
+Danley quickly got to his feet and began putting the books on his desk.
+"Certainly, Mr. Tarnhorst. Sit down."
+
+Tarnhorst lowered himself into the newly emptied chair. "I apologize for
+interrupting your studies," he said. "I realize how important they are.
+But there are a few points I'd like to discuss with you."
+
+"Certainly." Danley seated himself and looked at the older man
+expectantly. "The nullifiers are on," he said.
+
+"Of course," Tarnhorst said absently. Then, changing his manner, he said
+abruptly: "Have you found anything yet?"
+
+Danley shook his head. "No. It looks to me as though they've done
+everything possible to make sure that these men get the best equipment
+and the best training. The training instructors have been through the
+whole affair themselves--they know the ropes. The equipment, as far as I
+can tell, is top grade stuff. From what I have seen so far, the Company
+isn't stinting on the equipment or the training."
+
+Tarnhorst nodded. "After nearly three months of investigation, I have
+come to the same conclusion myself. The records show that expenditures
+on equipment has been steadily increasing. The equipment they have now,
+I understand, is almost failure-proof?" He looked questioningly at
+Danley.
+
+Danley nodded. "Apparently. Certainly no one is killed because of
+equipment failure. It's the finest stuff I've ever seen."
+
+"And yet," Tarnhorst said, "their books show that they are constantly
+seeking to improve it."
+
+"I don't suppose there is any chance of juggling the books on you, is
+there?"
+
+Tarnhorst smiled a superior smile. "Hardly. In the first place, I know
+bookkeeping. In the second, it would be impossible to whip up a complete
+set of balancing books--covering a period of nearly eighty
+years--overnight.
+
+"I agree," Danley said. "I don't think they set up a special training
+course just for me overnight, either. I've seen classes on Vesta, Juno,
+and Eros--and they're all the same. There aren't any fancy false fronts
+to fool us, Mr. Tarnhorst: I've looked very closely."
+
+"Have you talked to the men?"
+
+"Yes. They have no complaints."
+
+Again Tarnhorst nodded. "I have found the same thing. They all insist
+that if a man gets killed in space, it's not the fault of anyone but
+himself. Or, as it may be, an act of God."
+
+"One of my instructors ran into an act of God some years ago," Danley
+said. "You've met him. Brand--the one with the scarred face." He
+explained to Tarnhorst what had caused Brand's disfigurement. "But he
+survived," he finished, "because he kept his wits about him even after
+he was hit."
+
+"Commendable; very commendable," Tarnhorst said. "If he'd been an
+excitable fool, he'd have died."
+
+"True. But what I was trying to point out was that it wasn't equipment
+failure that caused the accident."
+
+"No. You're quite right." Tarnhorst was silent for a moment, then he
+looked into Danley's eyes. "Do you think you could take on a job as
+anchor man now?"
+
+"I don't know," said Danley evenly. "But I'm going to find out
+tomorrow."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Peter Danley took his final examination the following day. All by
+himself, he went through the procedure of positioning his ship, setting
+up a rocket drill, firing it, and setting in an anchor. It was only a
+small rock, nine meters through, but the job was almost the same as with
+the big ones. Not far away, Captain St. Simon watched the Earthman's
+procedure through a pair of high-powered field glasses. He breathed a
+deep sigh of relief when the job was done.
+
+"Jules," he said softly, "I am sure glad that man didn't hurt himself
+any."
+
+"Yes, _suh_! We'd of sho' been in trouble if he'd of killed hisself!"
+
+"We will have to tell Captain Brand that our pupil has done pretty well
+for such a small amount of schooling."
+
+"I think that would be proper, m'lud."
+
+"And we will also have to tell Captain Brand that this boy wouldn't last
+a month. He wouldn't come back from his first trip."
+
+There was no answer to that.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Three days later, amid a cloud of generally satisfied feelings, Edway
+Tarnhorst and Peter Danley took the ship back to Earth.
+
+"I cannot, of course, give you a copy of my report," Tarnhorst had told
+Georges Alhamid. "That is for the eyes of the Committee only. However, I
+may say that I do not find the Belt Companies or the governments of the
+Belt Cities at fault. Do you want to know my personal opinion?"
+
+"I would appreciate it, Mr. Tarnhorst," Georges had said.
+
+"Carelessness. Just plain carelessness on the part of the workers. That
+is what has caused your rise in death rates. You people out here in the
+Belt have become too used to being in space. Familiarity breeds
+contempt, Mr. Alhamid.
+
+"Steps must be taken to curb that carelessness. I suggest a publicity
+campaign of some kind. The people must be thoroughly indoctrinated in
+safety procedures and warned against carelessness. Just a few months of
+schooling isn't enough, Mr. Alhamid. You've got to start pounding it
+into their heads early.
+
+"If you don't--" He shook his head. (He had grown used to doing so in
+low gravity by now.) "If the death rate isn't cut down, we shall have to
+raise the premium rates, and I don't know what will happen on the floor
+of the People's Congress. However, I think I can guarantee six months to
+a year before any steps are taken. That will give you time to launch
+your safety campaign. I'm certain that as soon as this carelessness is
+curbed, the claims will drop down to their former low point."
+
+"We'll certainly try that," Alhamid had said heartily. "Thank you very
+much, Mr. Tarnhorst."
+
+When they had finally gone, Alhamid spoke to the governor.
+
+"That's that, Larry. You can bring it up at the next meeting of the
+Board of Governors. Get some kind of publicity campaign going. Plug
+safety. Tell 'em carelessness is bad. It can't hurt anything and
+actually might help, who knows?"
+
+"What are you going to do at your end?"
+
+"What we should have done long ago: finance the insurance ourselves. For
+the next couple of years, we'll only make death claims to Earth for a
+part of the total. We'll pay off the rest ourselves. Then we'll tell 'em
+we've brought the cost down so much that we can afford to do our own
+insurance financing.
+
+"We let this insurance thing ride too long, and it has damn near got us
+in a jam. We needed the income from Earth. We still could use it, but we
+need our independence more."
+
+"I second the motion," the governor said fervently. "Look, suppose you
+come over to my place tonight, and we'll work out the details of this
+report. O.K.? Say at nine?"
+
+"Fine, Larry. I'll see you then."
+
+Alhamid went back to his office. He was met at the door by his
+secretary, who handed him a sealed envelope. "The Earthman left this
+here for you. He said you'd know what to do with it."
+
+Alhamid took the envelope and looked at the name on the outside. "Which
+Earthman?" he asked.
+
+"The young one," she said, "the blond one."
+
+"It isn't even addressed to me," Alhamid said with a note of puzzled
+speculation in his voice.
+
+"No. I noticed that. I told him he could send it straight to the school,
+but he said you would know how to handle it."
+
+Alhamid looked at the envelope again, and his eyes narrowed a little.
+"Call Captain St. Simon, will you? Tell him I would like to have him
+come to my office. Don't mention this letter; I don't want it breezed
+all over Pallas."
+
+It was nearly twenty minutes before St. Simon showed up. Alhamid handed
+him the envelope. "You have a message from your star pupil. For some
+reason, he wanted me to deliver it to you. I have a hunch you'll know
+what that reason is after you read it." He grinned. "I'd appreciate it
+if you'd tell me when you find out. This Mr. Danley has worried me all
+along."
+
+St. Simon scowled at the envelope, then ripped off one end and took out
+the typed sheets. He read them carefully, then handed them over to
+Alhamid. "You'd better read this yourself, George."
+
+Georges Alhamid took the pages and began to read.
+
+     Dear Captain St. Simon:
+
+     I am addressing this to you rather than anyone else because I think
+     you will understand more than anyone else. Captain Brand is a fine
+     person, but I have never felt very much at ease with him. (I won't
+     go into the psychological reasons that may exist, other than admit
+     that my reasons are purely emotional. I don't honestly know how
+     much they are based on his disfigurement.) Mr. Alhamid is almost a
+     stranger to me. You are the only Belt man I feel I know well.
+
+     First, I want to say that I honestly enjoyed our three months
+     together. There were times when I could have cheerfully bashed your
+     head in, I'll admit, but the experience has left me feeling more
+     like a real human being, more like a person in my own right, than I
+     have ever felt before in my life. Believe me, I appreciate it
+     deeply. I know now that I can do things on my own without being
+     dependent on the support of a team or a committee, and for that I
+     am grateful.
+
+     Tarnhorst has heard my report and accepted it. His report to the
+     People's Congress will lay the entire blame for the death rate rise
+     on individual carelessness rather than on any fault of management.
+
+     I think, in the main, I am justified in making such a report to
+     Tarnhorst, although I am fully aware that it is incomplete. I know
+     that if I had told him the whole truth there would be a ruckus
+     kicked up on Earth that would cause more trouble in the Belt than
+     I'd care to think about. I'm sure you're as aware of the political
+     situation as I am.
+
+     You see, I know that anchor-setting could be made a great deal
+     safer. I know that machines could be developed which would make the
+     job so nearly automatic that the operator would never be exposed to
+     any more danger than he would be in a ship on the Earth-Luna run.
+     Perhaps that's a little exaggerated, but not much.
+
+     What puzzled me was: _Why?_ Why shouldn't the Companies build these
+     machines if they were more efficient? Why should every Belt man
+     defend the system as it was? Why should men risk their necks when
+     they could demand better equipment? (I don't mean that the
+     equipment presently used is poor; I just mean that full
+     mechanization would do away with the present type of equipment and
+     replace it with a different type.)
+
+     Going through your course of instruction gave me the answer to
+     that, even though I didn't take the full treatment.
+
+     All my life, I've belonged to an organization of some kind--the
+     team, the crew, whatever it might be. But the Team was everything,
+     and I was recognized only as a member of the Team. I was a
+     replaceable plug-in unit, not an individual in my own right. I
+     don't know that I can explain the difference exactly, but it seems
+     to me that the Team is something outside of which the individual
+     has no existence, while the men of the Belt can form a team because
+     they know that each member is self-sufficient in his own right.
+
+     On Earth, we all depend on the Team, and, in the long run, that
+     means that we are depending on each other--but none of us feels he
+     can depend on himself. Every man hopes that, as a member of the
+     Team, he will be saved from his own errors, his own failures. But
+     he knows that everyone else is doing the same thing, and, deep down
+     inside, he knows that they are not deserving of his reliance. So he
+     puts his reliance in the Team, as if that were some sort of
+     separate entity in itself, and had magical, infallible powers that
+     were greater than the aggregate of the individuals that composed
+     it.
+
+     In a way, this is certainly so, since teamwork can accomplish
+     things that mobs cannot do. But the Team is a failure if each
+     member assumes that he, himself, is helpless and can do nothing,
+     but that the Team will do it for him.
+
+     Men who have gone through the Belt training program, men who have
+     "space experience," as you so euphemistically put it, are men who
+     can form a real team, one that will get things done because each
+     man knows he can rely on the others, not only as a team, but as
+     individuals. But to mechanize the anchor-setting phase would
+     destroy all that completely.
+
+     I don't want to see that destroyed, because I have felt what it is
+     to be a part of the Belt team, even though only a small and
+     unreliable part. Actually, I know I was not and could never be a
+     real member of that team, but I was and am proud to have scrimmaged
+     with the team, and I'm glad to be able to sit on the side-lines and
+     cheer even if I can't carry the ball. (It just occurred to me that
+     those metaphors might be a little cloudy to you, since you don't
+     have football in the Belt, but I think you see what I mean.) I
+     imagine that most of the men who have no "space experience" feel
+     the same way. They know they'd never make a go of it out in space,
+     but they're happy to be water boys.
+
+     I wish I could stay in the Belt. I'm enough of a spaceman to
+     appreciate what it really is to be a member of a space society. But
+     I also know that I'd never last. I'm not fitted for it, really.
+     I've had a small taste of it, but I know I couldn't take a full
+     dose. I've worked hard for the influence and security I have in my
+     job, and I couldn't give it up. Maybe this brands me as a coward in
+     your eyes, and maybe I am a coward, but that's the way I'm built. I
+     hope you'll take that into account when you think of me.
+
+     At any rate, I have done what I have done. On Earth, there are men
+     who envy you and hate you, and there will be others who will try to
+     destroy you, but I have done what I could to give you a chance to
+     gain the strength you need to resist the encroachment of Earth's
+     sickness.
+
+     I have a feeling that Tarnhorst saw your greatness, too, although
+     he'd never admit it, even to himself. Certainly something changed
+     him during the last months, even though he doesn't realize it. He
+     came out wanting to help--and by that, he meant help the common
+     people against the "tyranny" of the Companies. He still wants to
+     help the common people, but now he wants to do it _through_ the
+     Companies. The change is so subtle that he doesn't think he's
+     changed at all, but I can see it.
+
+     I don't deserve any thanks for what I have done. All I have done is
+     repay you in the only way I knew how for what you have done for me.
+     I may never see you again, captain, but I will always remember you.
+     Please convey my warmest regards to Captain Brand and to Mr.
+     Alhamid.
+
+     Sincerely,
+
+     Peter Danley
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Georges Alhamid handed the letter back to St. Simon. "There's your star
+pupil," he said gently.
+
+St. Simon nodded. "The wise fool. The guy who's got sense enough to know
+that he isn't competent to do the job."
+
+"Did you notice that he waltzed all around the real reason for the
+anchor-setting program without quite hitting it?"
+
+St. Simon smiled humorlessly. "Sure. Notice the wording of the letter.
+He still thinks in terms of the Team, even when he's trying not to. He
+thinks we do this just to train men to have a real good Team Spirit. He
+can't see that that is only a very useful by-product."
+
+"How could he think otherwise?" Alhamid asked. "To him, or to Tarnhorst,
+the notion of deliberately tailoring a program so that it would kill off
+the fools and the incompetents, setting up a program that will
+deliberately destroy the men who are dangerous to society, would be
+horrifying. They would accuse us of being soulless butchers who had no
+respect for the dignity of the human soul."
+
+"We're not butchering anybody," St. Simon objected. "Nobody is forced to
+go through two years of anchor setting. Nobody is forced to die. We're
+not running people into gas chambers or anything like that."
+
+"No; of course not. But would you expect an Earthman like Tarnhorst to
+see the difference? How could we explain to him that we have no
+objection to fools other than that we object to putting them in
+positions where they can harm others by their foolishness? Would you
+expect him to understand that we must have a method of eliminating those
+who are neither competent enough to be trusted with the lives of others
+nor wise enough to see that they are not competent? How would you tell
+him that the reason we send men out alone is so that if he destroys
+anyone by his foolishness--after we have taught him everything we know
+in the best way we know how--he will only destroy himself?"
+
+"I wouldn't even try," St. Simon said. "There's an old saying that
+neither money, education, liquor, nor women ever made a fool of a man,
+they just give a born fool a chance to display his foolishness. Space
+ought to be added to that list."
+
+"Did you notice something else about that letter?" Alhamid asked. "I
+mean, the very fact that he wrote a letter instead of telling you
+personally?"
+
+"Sure. He didn't trust me. He was afraid I, or someone else, would
+dispose of him if we knew he knew our secret."
+
+"I think that's it," Alhamid agreed. "He wanted to be safely away
+first."
+
+"Killing him would have brought down the biggest investigation the Earth
+Congress has launched since the crack-up of the Earth-Luna ship thirty
+years ago. Does he think we are fools?"
+
+"You can't blame him. He's been brought up that way, and three months of
+training isn't going to change him."
+
+St. Simon frowned. "Suppose he changes his mind? Suppose he tells
+Tarnhorst what he thinks?"
+
+"He won't. He's told his lie, and now he'll have to stick by it or lose
+his precious security. If he couldn't trade that for freedom, he sure
+isn't going to throw it away." Alhamid grinned. "But can you imagine a
+guy thinking that anchor setting could be completely mechanized?"
+
+St. Simon grinned back. "I guess I'm not a very good teacher after all.
+I told him and told him and told him for three solid months that the job
+required judgment, but it evidently didn't sink in. He's got the heart
+of a romantic and the soul of an Earthman--a very bad combination."
+
+"He has my sympathy," Alhamid said with feeling. "Now, about you. Your
+blue ticket still has three months to run, but I can't give you a class
+if you're only going to run through the first half of the course with
+them, and I don't have any more Earthmen for you to give special
+tutoring to. You have three choices: You can loaf with pay for three
+months; you can go back to space and get double pay for three months; or
+you can take a regular six-month class and get double pay for the last
+three months. Which'll it be?"
+
+St. Simon grinned widely. "I'm going to loaf until I get sick of it,
+then I'll go back to space and collect double pay for what's left of the
+three months. First off, I'm going to take a run over to Vesta. After
+that, who knows?"
+
+"I thought so. Most of you guys would stay out there forever if you
+didn't have to come back for supplies."
+
+St. Simon shook his head. "Nope. Not true. A man's got to come back
+every so often and get his feet on the ground. If you stay out there too
+long, you get to talking to yourself."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+An hour later, the spaceboat _Nancy Bell_ lifted from the surface of
+Pallas and shot toward Vesta.
+
+"Jules, old cobblestone, we have just saved civilization."
+
+"_Jawohl, Herr Hassenpfefferesser!_ Und now ve go to find _das Maedchen,
+nicht war_?"
+
+"Herr _Professor_ Hassenpfefferesser to you, my boy."
+
+And then, all alone in his spaceboat, Captain Jules St. Simon burst into
+song:
+
+    "Oh, I'm the cook and the captain, too,
+    And the men of the _Nancy's_ brig;
+    The bosun tight, and the midshipmite,
+    And the crew of the captain's gig!"
+
+And the _Nancy Bell_ sped on toward Vesta and a rendevous with Eros.
+
+
+
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