They walked through the city, and he created roses for her, white and yellow and red, and gardens of strange blossoms. Between two domed and spired buildings he created a vast pool of water; on it he put a purple-canopied pleasure barge, loading it with every kind of food and drink he could remember.
They floated across the lagoon, fanned by the soft breeze he had created.
"And all this is false," he reminded her after a little while.
She smiled. "No, it's not. You can touch it. It's real."
"Will it be here after I die?"
"Who cares? Besides, if you can do all this, you can cure any sickness. Perhaps you can even cure old age and death." She plucked a blossom from an overhanging bough and sniffed its fragrance. "You could keep this from fading and dying. You could probably do the same for us, so where's the problem?"
"Would you like to go away?" he said, puffing on a newly created cigarette. "Would you like to find a new planet, untouched by war? Would you like to start over?"
"Start over? You mean ... Later perhaps. Now I don't even want to go near the ship. It reminds me of the war."
They floated on a little way.
"Are you sure now that I'm real?" she asked.
"If you want me to be honest, no," he replied. "But I want very much to believe it."
"Then listen to me," she said, leaning towards him. "I'm real." She slipped her arms around his neck. "I've always been real. I always will be real. You want proof? Well, I know I'm real. So do you. What more can you ask?"
He stared at her for a long moment, felt her warm arms around his neck, listened to her breathing. He could smell the fragrance of her skin and hair, the unique essence of an individual.
Slowly he said, "I believe you. I love you. What — what is your name?"
She thought for a moment. "Joan."
"Strange," he said. "I always dreamed of a girl named Joan. What's your last name?"
She kissed him.
Overhead, the swallows he had created — his swallows-wheeled in wide circles above the lagoon, his fish darted aimlessly to and fro, and his city stretched, proud and beautiful, to the edge of the twisted lava mountains.
"You didn't tell me your last name," he said.
"Oh, that. A girl's maiden name never matters — she always takes her husband's."
"That's an evasion!"
She smiled. "It is, isn't it?"
The Laxian Key
Richard Gregor was at his desk in the dusty office of the AAA Ace Interplanetary Decontamination Service. It was almost noon, but Arnold, his partner, hadn't showed up yet. Gregor was just laying out an unusually complicated game of solitaire. Then he heard a loud crash in the hall.
The door of AAA Ace opened, and Arnold stuck his head in.
"Banker's hours?" Gregor asked.
"I have just made our fortunes," Arnold said. He threw the door fully open and beckoned dramatically. "Bring it in, boys."
Four sweating workmen lugged in a square black machine the size of a baby elephant.
"There it is," Arnold said proudly. He paid the workmen, and stood, hands clasped behind his back, eyes half shut, surveying the machine.
Gregor put his cards away with the slow, weary motions of a man who has seen everything. He stood up and walked around the machine. "All right, I give up. What is it?"
"It's a million bucks, right in our fists," Arnold said.
"Of course. But what is it?"
"It's a Free Producer." Arnold said. He smiled proudly. "I was walking past Joe's Interstellar Junkyard this morning, and there it was, sitting in the window. I picked it up for next to nothing. Joe didn't even know what it was."
"I don't either," Gregor said. "Do you?"
Arnold was on his hands and knees, trying to read the instructions engraved on the front of the machine. Without looking up, he said, "You've heard of the planet Meldge, haven't you?"
Gregor nodded. Meldge was a third-rate little planet on the northern periphery of the galaxy, some distance from the trade routes. At one time, Meldge had possessed an extremely advanced civilization, made possible by the so-called Meldgen Old Science. The Old Science techniques had been lost ages ago, although an occasional artifact still turned up here and there.
"And this is a product of the Old Science?" Gregor asked.
"Right. It's a Meldgen Free Producer. I doubt if there are more than four or five of them in the entire universe. They're unduplicatable."
"What does it produce?" Gregor asked.
"How should I know?" Arnold said. "Hand me the Meldge-English dictionary, will you?"
Keeping a stern rein on his patience, Gregor walked to the bookshelf. "You don't know what it produces—"
"Dictionary. Thank you. What does it matter what it produces? It's free! This machine grabs energy out of the air, out of space, the sun, anywhere. You don't have to plug it in, fuel or service. It runs indefinitely."
Arnold opened the dictionary and started to look up the words on the front of the Producer.
"Free energy—"
"Those scientists were no fools," Arnold said, jotting down his translation on a pocket pad. "The Producer just grabs energy out of the air. So it really doesn't matter what it turns out. We can always sell it, and anything we get will be pure profit."
Gregor stared at his dapper little partner, and his long, unhappy face became sadder than ever.
"Arnold," he said, "I'd like to remind you of something. First of all, you are a chemist. I am an ecologist. We know nothing about machinery and less than nothing about complicated alien machinery."
Arnold nodded absently and turned a dial. The Producer gave a dry gurgle.
"What's more," Gregor said, retreating a few steps, "we are planetary decontaminationists. Remember? We have no reason to—"
The Producer began to cough unevenly.
"Got it now," Arnold said. "It says, 'The Meldge Free Producer, another triumph of Glotten Laboratories. This Producer is Warranted Indestructible, Unbreakable, and Free of All Defects. No Power Hook-up Is Required. To Start, Press Button One. To Stop, Use Laxian Key. Your Meldge Free Producer Comes With an Eternal Guarantee against Malfunction. If Defective in Any Way, Please Return at Once to Glotten Laboratories.'"
"Perhaps I didn't make myself clear," Gregor said. "We are planetary—"
"Don't be stodgy," Arnold said. "Once we get this thing working, we can retire. Here's Button One."
The machine began to clank ominously, then shifted to a steady purr. For long minutes, nothing happened.
"Needs warming up," Arnold said anxiously.
Then, out of an opening at the base of the machine, a grey powder began to pour.
"Probably a waste product," Gregor muttered. But the powder continued to stream over the floor for fifteen minutes.
"Success!" Arnold shouted.
"What is it?" Gregor asked.
"I haven't the faintest idea. I'll have to run some tests."
Grinning triumphantly, Arnold scooped some powder into a test tube and hurried over to his desk.
Gregor stood in front of the Producer, watching the grey powder stream out. Finally he said, "Shouldn't we turn it off until we find out what it is?"
"Of course not," Arnold said. "Whatever it is, it must be worth money." He lighted his bunsen burner, filled a test tube with distilled water, and went to work.
Gregor shrugged his shoulders. He was used to Arnold's harebrained schemes. Ever since they had formed AAA Ace, Arnold had been looking for a quick road to wealth. His shortcuts usually resulted in more work than plain old-fashioned labour, but Arnold was quick to forget that.
Well, Gregor thought, at least it kept things lively. He sat down at his desk and dealt out a complex solitaire.