ly; in sunlight gleaming
With silver hue upon the blue.
And the universe waits, dreaming._

"_For men must go where the flame-winds blow,
The gas clouds softly plaiting;
Where stars are spun and worlds begun,
And men will find them waiting._

"_The song that roars where the rocket soars
Is the song of the stellar flame;
The dreams of Man and galactic span
Are equal and much the same._"

What was he thinking of? Make your own choice. I think I came close to
knowing him, at that moment, but until human beings turn telepath, no
man can be sure of another.

He shook himself like a dog out of cold water, and got into his bunk. I
got into mine, and after a while I fell asleep.

* * * * *

I don't know what MacReidie may have told the skipper about the stoker,
or if he tried to tell him anything. The captain was the senior ticket
holder in the Merchant Service, and a good man, in his day. He kept
mostly to his cabin. And there was nothing MacReidie could do on his own
authority--nothing simple, that is. And the stoker had saved the ship,
and ...

I think what kept anything from happening between MacReidie and the
stoker, or anyone else and the stoker, was that it would have meant
trouble in the ship. Trouble, confined to our little percentage of the
ship's volume, could seem like something much more important than the
fate of the human race. It may not seem that way to you. But as long as
no one began anything, we could all get along. We could have a good
trip.

MacReidie worried, I'm sure. I worried, sometimes. But nothing happened.

When we reached Alpha Centaurus, and set down at the trading field on
the second planet, it was the same as the other trips we'd made, and the
same kind of landfall. The Lud factor came out of his post after we'd
waited for a while, and gave us our permit to disembark. There was a Jek
ship at the other end of the field, loaded with the cargo we would get
in exchange for our holdful of goods. We had the usual things; wine,
music tapes, furs, and the like. The Jeks had been giving us light
machinery lately--probably we'd get two or three more loads, and then
they'd begin giving us something else.

But I found that this trip wasn't quite the same. I found myself looking
at the factor's post, and I realized for the first time that the Lud
hadn't built it. It was a leftover from the old colonial human
government. An