'Not inside!' he said. 'OH, not inside!' 'Well, okay,' I said. 'We'll sit here for now' He sat on the step below me and looked up, his face wet and shining in the moonlight. I fished in the pocket of my robe for a tissue and swabbed his eyes. Then I gave him another. 'Blow,' I said. He did. 'Now, from the beginning.' 'I-' He had recourse to the tissue again. 'I came to get the capsule. It was the only way I could think of to get the man.' Silence crept around his flat statement until I said 'That's the beginning?' Tears started again. I handed him another tissue. 'Now look, Vincent, something's been bothering you for several days. Have you talked it over with your parents?' 'No,' he hiccoughed. 'I'm not supp-upposed to listen in on people. It isn't fair. But I didn't really. He came in first and I can't shut him out now because I know he's in trouble, and you can't not help if you know about somebody's need-' Maybe, I thought hopefully, maybe this is still my nap that I'll soon wake from-but I sighed. 'Who is this man? The one that's orbiting?' 'Yes,' he said, and cut the last hope for good solid sense from under my feet. 'He's up in a capsule and its retro-rockets won't fire. Even if he could live until the orbital decay dropped him back into the atmosphere, the re- enty would burn him up. And he's so afraid! He's trapped! He can't get out!' I took hold of both of his shaking shoulders. 'Calm down,' I said. 'You can't help him like this:' He buried his face against the skirt of my robe. I slid one of my hands over to his neck and patted him for a moment. 'How did you make the capsule move?' I asked. 'It did move, didn't it?' 'Yes,' he said. 'I lifted it. We can, you know-lift things. My People can. But I'm not big enough. I'm not supposed to anyway, and I can't sustain the lift. And if I can't even get it out of this canyon, how can I lift clear out of the atmosphere? And he'll die-scared!' You can make things fly?' I asked. 'Yes, all of us can. And ourselves, too. See?' And there he was, floating! His knees level with my head! His shoe laces drooped forlornly down, and one used tissue tumbled to the steps below him. 'Come down,' I said, swallowing a vast lump of some kind. He did. 'But you know there's no air in space, and our capsule-Good Lord! Our capsule? In space? –wasn't airtight. How did you expect to breathe?' 'We have a shield,' he said. 'See?' And there he sat, a glint of something about him. I reached out a hand and drew back my stubbed fingers. The glint was gone. 'It keeps out the cold and keeps in the air,' he said. 'Let's-let's analyze this a little,' I suggested weakly, nursing my fingers unnecessarily. 'You say there's a man orbiting in a disabled capsule, and you planned to go up in our capsule with only the air you could take with you and rescue him?' He nodded wordlessly. 'Oh, child! Child!' I cried. 'You couldn't possibly!' 'Then he'll die.' Desolation flattened his voice and he sagged forlornly. Well, what comfort could I offer him? I sagged, too. Lucky, I thought then, that it's moonlight tonight. People traditionally believe all kinds of arrant nonsense by moonlight. So. I straightened. Let's believe a little-or at least act as if. 'Vincent?' 'Yes, ma'am.' His face was shadowed by his hunched shoulders. 'If you can lift our capsule this far, how far could your daddy lift it?' 'Oh, lots farther!' he cried. 'My daddy was studying to be a regular Motiver when he went to the New Home, but he stopped when he came back across space to Earth again because Outsiders don't accept-oh!' His eyes rounded and he pressed his hands to his mouth. 'Oh, I forgot!' His voice came muffled. 'I forgot! You're an Outsider! We're forbidden to tell-to show-Outsiders don't-' 'Nonsense,' I said, 'I'm not an Outsider. I'm a teacher. Can you call your mother tonight the way you did the day you and Gene had that fight?' 'A fight? Me and Gene?' The fight was obviously an event of the neolithic period for Vincent. 'Oh, yes, I remember. Yes, I guess I could, but she'll be mad because I left-and I told-and-and-' Weeping was close again. 'You'll have to choose,' I pointed out, glad to the bone, that it wasn't my choice to make, 'between letting the man die or having her mad at you. You should have told then when you first knew about him.' 'I didn't want to tell that I'd listened to the man-' 'Is he Russian?' I asked, just for curiosity's sake. 'I don't know,' he said. 'His words are strange. Now he keeps saying something like Hospodi pomelui. I think he's talking to God.' 'Call your mother,' I said, no linguist I. 'She's probably worried to death by now.' Obediently, he closed his eyes and sat silent for a while on the step below me. Then he opened his eyes. 'She'd just found out I wasn't in bed,' he said. 'They're coming.' He shivered a little. 'Daddy gets so mad sometimes. He hasn't the most equitable of temperaments!' 'Oh, Vincent!' I laughed. 'What an odd mixture you are!' 'No, I'm not,' he said. 'Both my mother and daddy are of the People. Remy is a mixture 'cause his grampa was of the Earth, but mine came from the Home. You know-when it was destroyed. I wish I could have seen the ship our People came to Earth in. Daddy says when he was little, they used to dig up pieces of it from the walls and floors of the canyon where it crashed. But they still had a life ship in a shed behind their house and they'd play they were escaping again from the big ship.' Vincent shivered. 'But some didn't escape. Some died in the sky and some died because Earth people were scared of them.' I shivered too and rubbed my cold ankles with both hands. I wondered wistfully if this wasn't asking just a trifle too much of my ability to believe, even in the name of moonlight. Vincent brought me back abruptly to my particular Earth. 'Look! Here they are already! Gollee! That was fast. They sure must be mad!' And he trailed out onto the playground. I looked expectantly toward the road and only whirled the other way when I heard the thud of feet. And there they stood, both Mr. and Mrs. Kroginold. And he did look mad! His-well-rough-hewn is about the kindest description-face frowning in the moonlight. Mrs. Kroginold surged toward Vincent and Mr. Kroginold swelled preliminary to a vocal blast-or so I feared-so I stepped quickly into the silence. 'There's our school capsule,' I said, motioning towards the crushed clutter at the base of the boulder. 'That's what he was planning to go up in to rescue a man in a disabled sputnik. He thought the air inside that shiny whatever he put around himself would suffice for the trip. He says a man is dying up there, and he's been carrying that agony around with him, all alone, because he was afraid to tell you.' I stopped for a breath and Mr. Kroginold deflated and –amazingly-grinned a wide, attractive grin, half silver, half shadow. 'Why the gutsy little devil!' he said admiringly. 'And 'I've been fearing the stock was running out! When I was a boy in the canyon-' But he sobered suddenly and turned to Vincent. 'Vince! If there's need, let's get with it. What's the deal?' He gathered Vincent into the curve of his arm, and we all went back to the porch. 'Now. Details.' We all sat. Vincent, his eyes intent on his father's face and his hand firmly holding his mother's, detailed. 'There are two men orbiting up there. The capsule won't function properly. One man is dead. I never did hear him. The other one is crying for help.' Vincent's face tightened anxiously. 'He-he feels so bad that it nearly kills me. Only sometimes I guess he passes out because the feeling goes away-like now. Then it comes back worse-' 'He's orbiting,' said Mr. Kroginold, his eyes intent on Vincent's face. 'Oh,' said Vincent weakly, 'of course! I didn't think of that! Oh, Dad! I'm so stupid!' And he flung himself on Mr. Kroginold. 'No,' said Mr. Kroginold, wrapping him around with the dark strength of his arms. 'Just young. You'll learn. But first learn to bring your problems to your mother and me. That's what we're for!' 'But,' said Vincent. 'I'm not supposed to listen in 'Did you seek him out?' asked Mr. Kroginold. 'Did you know about the capsule?' 'No,' said Vincent. 'He just came in to me-' 'See?' Mr. Kroginold set Vincent back on the step 'You weren't listening in. You were invaded. You just happened to be the right receptivity. Now, what were your plans?'
