just been arrested make models of the planned
bomber from the papers of the Alternative
Resources Project.
He didn't know why he bothered staying, but what
the hell
' so you see when you're producing so much
material from a factory ship that size you have to
maximize the optimum output both in terms of real
numbers and as a viable proportion of total units
produced.With the high rates of production
attainable using light atoms and dust to build up or
break down to basic molecules which then go to
construct artefacts, naturally you have a certain
proportion that fail to meet the quite perfect
standards we set.
'All such material is dumped onto the surface of a
nearby star or, in the case of high heat-resistance
articles, dumped somewhere inside it.The material
cannot be recycled economically because as a rule
even the shoddy goods that we produce are very
difficult to break up, and the Transmuters are tuned
only to accept matter in comparatively small
quanta.In this case there seems to have been rather
a serious leak.The new machinery we've just
installed has made a mistake in the relevant
coordinates, and well, you know the rest.'
'You mean all this stuff is RUBBISH?' said Cesare
from the bathroom.
'Yes, I'm afraid so.There shouldn't be any more
after a little while.I've already contacted the
factory ship.Please accept our sincere apologies.'
'Wait a minute,' Fosse said as the alien turned to
go. 'Have these things been arriving just anywhere
? I mean is it a random thing?'
'Yes.The Transporter got that right, at least.They've
been distributed fairly evenly over the globe.Most
of them have sunk in the oceans of course, and
quite a few are still undiscovered in rain forests
and deserts and in the Antarctic and so on, but
we'll locate those through their coverings and get
rid of them once we get another new machine on-
line.' It held up three paws as Fosse started to
speak again. 'I know,' it said, 'you'd like to keep the
things, but I'm afraid that isn't possible.We do have
a responsibility, after all.Now you must excuse
me.Goodbye.'
The alien disappeared out of the window and went
straight up into the sky, narrowly missing a passing
S.S.T.
Suddenly the alarm started sounding.Five armed
guards rushed into the room and began restraining
Fosse.Cesare succeeded in stopping them before
Fosse had anything worse than severe bruising and
a broken jaw.He shooed the guards out and closed
the door.
'You realize what this means?' he said to Fosse.
'I'll tell you what it means; we're using junk ; that's what it means!'
'It'sh worsh than that, shir,' Fosse said. 'That shing
shaid the Gi - rubbish wash appearing all over the
surfashe of the Earth; that meansh the bigg - ow! -
the bi'er the country the more of thoshe thingsh
they're going to get; and rubbish or not they can
probably all be ushed.'
'So?'
'Do you know what country hash the greatesht land-
area in the whole world, shir?'
Cesare nodded confidently. 'The good old U.S. of
A.'
'No, shir,' Fosse said shaking his head slowly.
Cesare looked into Fosse's eyes.His own eyes
gradually widened and his upper lip trembled.
'Not'
'Yesh!'
'Hot-damn!'
The Gifts kept appearing for two more weeks,
which they guessed was the time it took for the
Alien's message to get to the factory ship, and/or
the time it took for the rubbish to get from the ship
to Earth.
They kept testing the equipment but if there was
anything wrong with it they couldn't find out what it
was.The aliens must be really fussy.
The very last Gift to arrive, as far as they knew,
was the most interesting of all.The New
Technology Project was racing ahead, budget
vastly increased now that it was known the
Communists probably had the same stuff.The spy
satellites hadn't spotted anything, but then they'd
managed to keep pretty tight security themselves,
so that didn't prove anything.
They were near Alamogordo, where the last, very
large Gift had appeared.They had had to construct
a special building around it to do the business with
the covering.Cesare looked up at it.
'OK.But what does it do?'
'It's a matter transmission machine,' said one
scientist.
'No, it isn't,' said another. 'Whatever it is it isn't
that; it doesn't leave an original behind.I think it
uses continua to-'
'Rubbish.It's a true matter transmission machine,
Mr Borges.We can't hope to recreate this with our
own technology, but we can certainly use it;
shifting commodities, urgently needed drugs,
disaster aid'
'There's nothing wrong with it?'
'Wrong with it?Why, this is the most perfect piece
of machinery in existence on the planet.We've
already shifted two hundred brand-new Cadillacs
from here to Tampa and back again just as a trial.It