basket.
Dr. Nale pointed over in the corner where one of the guards lay dead.
"What happened to him, Doc?" one of the men asked.
"He got shot through the head," Dr. Hargrave explained. "One of the menoff the _Endore_ did it. They're all being taken over to observation. Ithink I'll have to go over with them. I'm beginning to get an inkling ofwhat's going on, and I'm very much afraid of what I think it is."
The two men set the basket down and lifted the wicker lid. Dr. Bemiscame out of the inner office and laid down in the corner. The two menwaited until he had settled himself, then lifted him into the basket.
Dr. Hargrave held open the outer door for them. He returned to the deskbeside Martha and took a gun out of his coat pocket. He pointed it ather, frowned in indecision, then slowly, with perspiration standing outon his forehead, pulled out the clip and emptied the barrel of the gun.
"Good for you," Martha said. She picked up her book and started reading.Dr. Hargrave put the gun back in his pocket and went to the door.
"Take a few days off starting tomorrow," he said before going out. "I'mgoing to be slowly going crazy trying to figure this mess out. That'swhy I insisted to Dr. Bemis that I be confined _with_ the crew of the_Endore_--just in case."
His heels made loud noises on the marble floor of the corridor. Hepushed through the revolving doors to the sidewalk.
There was an argument going on between a small newsboy and an elderlygentlemen type of man.
"I tell you there's only two pennies," the boy insisted.
"There's four," the man insisted just as strongly. "See?"
He pried open the boy's fingers and looked.
"Sorry," he said. "You're right." His hand went into his pocket to makeup the deficit.
"Hey! Wait a minute," the boy said. "I was wrong. You gave me twopennies too much."
A small pudgy finger took two of the pennies. The boy glanced at theothers to make sure the right number were left.
Nale was close enough to see what happened. He saw the pennies takenfrom what seemed to be seven or eight in the boy's palm. When the twowere taken away there seemed to be a slight blur--and there was only asolitary penny left.
He didn't wait. The paper boy and the customer were still patientlyarguing as he climbed into his car and drove away. He drove slowly withhis foot close to the brakes.
Although his eyes were warily watching each car on the street, his mindwas busy. _He was trying to figure out who had been shot._
"It might even have been me!" he thought. And there was no way ofknowing.
He drove the car another block. There was doubt growing in his mind. Ona sudden impulse he pulled the car over to the curb and stopped themotor. Getting out, he started walking rapidly. There would be threemiles of walking before he reached observation, but it would be safer towalk.
A block further he stopped abruptly in surprise. The spaceportobservation hospital was just in front of him.
"I should have guessed," he muttered as he pushed through the heavydoors. "The speedometer, of course. Naturally it would go first."
* * * * *
Martha Ryan saw the door close on Dr. Hargrave, then started readingagain. She finished the page and turned it over. The first few words ofthe opposite side of the sheet showed the continuity to be difficult.
Thinking she might have turned two sheets by mistake, she turned backone. It was still wrong. She sighed exasperatedly. She distinctlyremembered that she had been on page twenty-five, so the next pageshould be twenty-six. Since it hadn't been, she would have to look fortwenty-six.
She looked through the book, page by page, and it wasn't there. Gettingover her exasperation she made a game of it. Finally she developed tothe stage where she would open the book at random, note the number ofthe page, close the book, and then try to find that page she had justseen.
It was a very peculiar book. She found that, (a) she could find any pagenumber she wasn't looking for, and (b) any page number she looked forwas not in the book, even though it had been a moment before.
Resting thoughtfully for several minutes on this achievement ofdeduction she decided to try another experiment. She counted the numberof sheets of paper in the book and wrote the number down. It was onehundred twenty-four.
Then she counted them again. There were one hundred eighty-six. Shecounted them five more times, making seven times she had counted them.She got nine different numbers of sheets in the book. She decided shecouldn't get nine different numbers after counting only seven times, andcounted the numbers. There were five. She closed her eyes and counted toten rapidly, then counted them again. There were fourteen.
She held out her hands. She had seven fingers on her right hand andthree on her left. She chuckled dryly and thought, "Well, anyway thereare ten altogether." She counted them to be sure, and there werethirteen.
Pursing her lips stubbornly she held up two fingers and counted them.There were two. She held them rigid and closed her eyes, countingrapidly to ten. Opening her eyes she looked cautiously at the upraisedfingers. There were two.
She raised a third finger to join the other two, and there were fiveupraised fingers. Not only that, there were seven of them clenched. Sheclosed her eyes and counted to ten quickly, then opened them. There werethree upraised fingers. She counted the clenched ones and there weretwo. Relieved, she checked on the upraised fingers again--and there wereseven.
She gave up in disgust. Deciding she ought to go home she stood up andstarted to cross to the coat tree.
The door to the corridor opened and Ren Gravenard stepped in.
"Hello!" Martha said in surprise. "I thought you were sent toobservation."
"I was," Ren said. "That's where I am now, but when there are forty ofyou, you can sort of get lost in the group and wind up anywhere you wantto."
"Well, I'm glad you're here," Martha said dryly. "Maybe you can explaina few things."
Ren grinned crookedly.
"Suppose I do the explaining over something to eat," he said. "I almoststopped and had something on the way over here, but I wanted to wait andeat with you. Do you mind?"
"Of course not," Martha frowned. She was taking a closer look at thisspaceman second class. He had a nice way of smiling at her. His eyes haddepths she hadn't noticed before.
* * * * *
The illogical thought came to her that maybe now that things didn'tbehave the way they should, maybe he and his fellow spacemen were theonly ones that knew what it was all about.
"All this," Martha waved her hand vaguely. "It must have been caused bysomething about the _Endore_, mustn't it?"
Ren nodded, holding the door open for her. They walked along thecorridor to the revolving doors, his hand tucked protectively under herarm.
"Is it mental?" Martha asked when they were on the sidewalk.
"No," Ren answered. "But let's wait until we eat. I'm starved to death.If you run into any trouble I'll help you out. You see, I know how towork things."
"Like finding page twenty-six in the book I'm reading?" Martha asked.
"That's simple," Ren said. "All you have to do is look for pagetwenty-nine and you'll run across page twenty-six right away. Thingslike that are mental, partly. I mean, you have to have the rightattitude to get results you want."
"I don't understand," Martha said.
"Well, it's like this," Ren explained. "If you're looking for pagetwenty-six it won't be one of the first two pages you look at,regardless of where you open the book. But after you've looked at threeof them you've passed the page you want unless you're not looking forit. If you're not looking for it you REACH the right page."
"But why page twenty-nine to find twenty-six?" Martha persisted.
"It has to do with the new arithmetic," Ren said.
"Oh," Martha said dully. "So that's the whole trouble with everything."
"No, that's only part of it," Ren said. "But here's a good place toeat." He guided her th
rough the door.
An hour later Ren lit a cigarette and took a long drag on it, his eyeslooking longingly into Martha's. He exhaled the smoke in a long whiteplume. Then he began talking.
"I don't know whether you read it on the report sheet or not, but thetrip of the _Endore_ began from this same spaceport two years ago. Theobservatory on Pluto had reported a free planet passing within twohundred quadrillion miles of the solar system. The _Endore_ was assignedthe task of landing on it, if feasible.
"I had been a member of the crew for only four months when the _Endore_turned outward from its position just the other side of