Read Online The Crack In Space by Philip K Dick - Free Book Online Page A

few more minutes, possibly half an hour  . . .’ She strained to hear what James Briskin was saying on the television ; almost, she could make out the low murmur of words. What was his new news? Where were they going to emigrate to? A virgin environment? Well, obviously; it would have to be. But precisely where is it? Myra wondered. Are you about to pull this virgin world out of your sleeve, Mr Briskin? Because if you are, I would like to see it done; that would be worth watching.
    ‘Okay,’ Art Chaffy said. ‘I’ll call you later, Mrs Sands. And I’m sorry to pester you.’ He rang off, then.
    ‘You ought to be listening to Briskin’s speech,’ Myra murmured aloud as she swung her chair back to face the television set; bending, she turned the audio knob and the sound of Briskin’s voice rose once more to clear audibility. You of all people, she said to herself.
    ‘  . . . and according to reports reaching me,’ Briskin said slowly and gravely, ‘it has an atmosphere nearly identical to that of earth, and a similar mass as well.’
    Good grief, Myra Sands said to herself. If that’s the case then I’m out of a job. Her heart labored painfully. No one would need abort brokers any more. But frankly I’m just as glad, she decided. It’s a task I’d like to see end—forever.
    Hands pressed together tautly, she listened to the remainder of Jim Briskin’s momentous Chicago speech.
    My god, she thought. This is a piece of history being made, this discovery. If it’s true. If this isn’t just a campaign stunt.
    Somewhere inside her she knew that it was true. Because Jim Briskin was not the kind of person who would make this up.
    At the Oakland, California, branch of the U.S. Government Department of Special Public Welfare, Herbert Lackmore also sat listening to presidential candidate Jim Briskin’s Chicago speech, being carried on all channels of the TV as it was beamed from the R-L satellite above.
    He’ll be elected now, Lackmore realized. We’ll have a Col president at last, just what I was afraid of.
    And, if what he’s saying is so, this business about a new possibility of emigration to an untouched world with fauna and flora like Earth’s, it means the bibs will be awakened. In fact, he realized with a thrill of fright, it means there won’t be any more bibs. At all.
    That would mean that Herb Lackmore’s job would come to an end. And right away.
    Because of him, Lackmore said to himself, I’m going to be out of work; I’ll be in the same spot as all the Cols who come by here in a steady stream, day in day out—I’ll be like some nineteen-year-old Mexican or Puerto Rican or Negro kid, without prospects or hope. All I’ve established over the years—wiped out by this. Completely.
    With shaking fingers, Herb Lackmore opened the local phone book and turned the pages.
    It was time to get hold of—and join—the organization of Verne Engel’s which called itself CLEAN. Because CLEAN would not sit idly by and let this happen, not if CLEAN believed as Herb Lackmore did.
    Now was the time for CLEAN to do something. And not necessarily of a non-violent nature; it was too late for non-violence to work. Something more was required, now. Much more. The situation had taken a dreadful turn and it would have to be rectified, by direct and quick action.
    And if they won’t do it, Lackmore said to himself, I will. I’m not afraid to; I know it has to be done.
    On the TV screen Jim Briskin’s face was stem as he said, ‘ . . . will provide a natural outlet for the biological pressures at work on everyone in our society. We will be free at last to  . . .’
    ‘You know what this means?’ George of George Walt said to his brother Walt.
    ‘I know,’ Walt answered. ‘It means that nurf Sal Heim got nothing for us, nothing at all. You watch Briskin; I’m going to call Verne Engel and make some kind of arrangements. Him we can work with.’
    ‘Okay,’ George said, nodding their shared head. He kept