oid Belt toughs--the Jolly
Lads--that you heard about. He thought about how terribly vulnerable to
attack Pallastown seemed, even with its encirclement of outriding guard
stations. He thought of Paul Hendricks, Two-and-Two Baines, Charlie
Reynolds, Otto Kramer, Mitch Storey, and Miss Rosalie Parks who was his
old Latin teacher.

He thought of trying to beam some of them. But hell, they all seemed so
long-lost, and he wasn't in the mood, now. He even thought about how it
was, trying to give yourself a dry shave with a worn-out razor, inside
an Archer. He thought that sometime, surely, perhaps soon, the Big
Vacuum would finish him.

He wound up with a simple sentimental impulse, full of nostalgia and
tenderness for things that seemed to stay steady and put. The way he
felt was half-hearted apology for human moods in which murder would have
been easy. He even had a strange envy for David Lester.

Into the synthetic cellulose lining of a small carton bought at a
souvenir shop, he placed the sixty million-year old golden band with its
odd arabesques and its glinting chips of mineral. Regardless of its
mysterious intentional function, it could be a bracelet. To him, just
then, it was only a trinket that he had picked up.

Before he wrapped and addressed the package, he put a note inside:

"Hi, Nance Codiss! Thinking about you and all the neighbors. This might
reach you by Christmas. Remember me? Frank Nelsen."

Postage was two hundred dollars, which seemed a trifle. And he didn't
quite realize how like a king's ransom a gift like this would seem in
Jarviston, Minnesota.

On leaving the post office, he promptly forgot the whole matter, as
hard, practical concerns took hold of him, again.

At the loading quays, special catapults hurled the gigantic bales of
supplies clear of Pallas. To the Kuzaks, this shipment would now have
seemed small, but it was much larger than the loads Ramos and Nelsen had
handled before. Gimp and Lester saw them off. Then they were in space,
with extra ionics pushing the bales. The guard of six new men was
posted. Nelsen wasn't sure that they'd be any good, or whether he could
trust them all, but they looked eagerly alert. Riding a mile off was the
Space Force patrol bubb.

All through the long journey--beam calls ahead were avoided for added
safety--Nelsen kept wondering if he'd find the post in ruins, with what
was left of Art and Joe drifting and drying. But nothing like that
happened yet