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Robin was re-educating the patients (all head injuries who had lost the power to jaunte) to the express stops, so to speak, of the public jaunte stages. Later they would memorize the local stops at street intersections. As their horizons expanded (and their powers returned) they would memorize jaunte stages in widening circles, limited as much by income as ability; for one thing was certain: you had to actually see a place to memorize it, which meant you first had to pay for the transportation to get you there. Even 3-D photographs would not do the trick. The Grand Tour had taken on a new significance for the rich.
«Location. Elevation. Situation,» Robin Wednesbury lectured, and the class jaunted by express stages from Washington Heights to the Hudson Bridge and back again in primer jumps of a quarter mile each; following their lovely Negro teacher earnestly.
The little technical sergeant with the platinum skull suddenly spoke in the gutter tongue: «But there ain't no elevation, m'ain. We're on the ground, us.,'
«Isn't, Sgt. Logan. 'Isn't any' would be better. I beg your pardon. Teaching becomes a habit and I'm having trouble controlling my thinking today. The war news is so bad. We'll get to Elevation when we start memorizing the stages on top of skyscrapers, Sgt. Logan.»
The man with the rebuilt skull digested that, then asked: «We hear you when you think, is a matter you?»
«Exactly.»
«But you don't hear us?»
«Never. I'm a one-way telepath.»
«We all hear you, or just I, is all?»
«That depends, Sgt. Logan. When I'm concentrating, just the one I'm thinking at, when I'm at loose ends, anybody and everybody. . . poor souls. Excuse me.» Robin turned and called: «Don't hesitate before jaunting, Chief Harris. That starts doubting, and doubting ends jaunting. Just step up and bang off.»
«I worry sometimes, m'am,» a chief petty officer with a tightly bandaged head answered. He was obviously stalling at the edge of the jaunte stage.
«Worry? About what?»
«Maybe there's go
«Now I've explained that a hundred times. Experts have gauged every jaunte stage in the world to accommodate peak traffic. That's why private jaunte stages are small, and the Times Square stage is two hundred yards wide. It's all been worked out mathematically and there isn't one chance in ten million of a simultaneous arrival. That's less than your chance of being killed in a jet accident.»
The bandaged C.P.O. nodded dubiously and stepped up on the raised stage. It was of white concrete, round, and decorated on its face with vivid black and white patterns as an aid to memory. In the center was an illuminated plaque which gave its name and jaunte co-ordinates of latitude, longitude, and elevation.
At the moment when the bandaged man was gathering courage for his primer jaunte, the stage began to flicker with a sudden flurry of arrivals and departures. Figures appeared momentarily as they jaunted in, hesitated while they checked their surroundings and set new co-ordinates, and then disappeared as they jaunted off. At each disappearance there was a faint «Pop» as displaced air rushed into the space formerly occupied by a body.
«Wait, class,» Robin called. «There's a rush on. Everybody off the stage, please.»
Laborers in heavy work clothes, still spattered with snow, were on their way south to their homes after a shift in the north woods. Fifty white clad dairy clerks were headed west toward St. Louis. They followed the morning from the Eastern Time Zone to the Pacific Zone. And from eastern Greenland, where it was already noon, a horde of white-collar office workers was Pouring into New York for their lunch hour.
The rush was over in a few moments. «All right, class,» Robin called. «We'll continue. Oh dear, where is Mr. Foyle? He always seems to be missing.»
«With a face like he's got, him, you can't blame him for hiding it, m'am. Up in the cerebral ward we call him Boogey.»
«He does look dreadful, doesn't he, Sgt. Logan. Can't they get those marks off?»
«They're trying, Miss Robin, but they don't know how yet. It's called 'tattooing' and it's sort of forgotten, is all.»
«Then how did Mr. Foyle acquire his face?»
«Nobody knows, Miss Robin. He's up in cerebral because he's lost his mind, him. Can't remember nothing. Me personal, if I had a face like that I wouldn't want to remember nothing too.»
«It's a pity. He looks frightful. Sgt. Logan, d'you suppose I've let a thought about Mr. Foyle slip and hurt his feelings?»
The little man with the platinum skull considered. «No, m'am. You wouldn't hurt nobody's feelings, you. And Foyle ain't got none to hurt, him. He's just a big, dumb ox, is all.»
«I have to be so careful, Sgt. Logan. You see, no one likes to know what another person really thinks about him. We imagine that we do, but we don't. This telesending of mine makes me loathed. And lonesome. I…Please don't listen to me. I'm having trouble controlling my thinking. Ah! There you are, Mr. Foyle. Where in the world have you been wandering?»
Foyle had jaunted in on the stage and stepped off quietly, his hideous face averted. «Been practicing, me,» he mumbled.
Robin repressed the shudder of revulsion in her and went to him sympathetically. She took his a
Foyle refused to meet her glance. As he pulled his arm away from her sullenly, Robin suddenly realized that his sleeve was soaking wet. His entire hospital uniform was drenched.
«Wet? He's been in the rain somewhere. But I've seen the morning weather Teports. No rain east of St. Louis. Then he must have jaunted further than that. But he's not supposed to be able. He's supposed to have lost all memory and ability to jaunte. He's malingering.»
Foyle leapt at her. «Shut up, you!» The savagery of his face was terrifying.
«Then you are malingering.»
«How much do you know?»
«That you're a fool. Stop making a scene.»
«Did they hear you?»
«I don't know. Let go of me.» Robin turned away from Foyle. «All right, class. We're finished for the day. All back to school for the hospital bus. You jaunte first, Sgt. Logan. Remember: L-E-S. Location. Elevation. Situation . . .»
«What do you want?» Foyle growled, «A pay-off, you?»
«Be quiet. Stop making a scene. Now don't hesitate, Chief Harris. Step up and jaunte off.»
«I want to talk to you,»
«Certainly not. Wait your turn, Mr. Peters. Don't be in such a hurry.» «You going to report me in the hospital?»
«Naturally.»
«I want to talk to you.»
«They gone now, all. We got time. I'll meet you in your apartment.» «My apartment?» Robin was genuinely frightened.
«In Green Bay, Wisconsin.»
«This is absurd. I've got nothing to discuss with this…”
«You got plenty, Miss Robin. You got a family to discuss.»
Foyle gri
«You can't possibly know where it is,» she faltered.
«Just told you, didn't I?»
«Y…You couldn't possibly jaunte that far. You…»
«No?» The mask gri
Robin Wednesbury's apartment was in a massive building set alone on the shore of Green Bay. The apartment house looked as though a magician had removed it from a city residential area and abandoned it amidst the Wisconsin pines. Buildings like this were a commonplace in the jaunting world. With self-contained heat and light plants, and jaunting to solve the transportation problem, single and multiple dwellings were built in desert, forest, and wilderness.
The apartment itself was a four-room flat, heavily insulated to protect neighbors from Robin's telesending. It was crammed with books, music, paintings, and prints . . . all evidence of the cultured and lonely life of this unfortunate wrong-way telepath.