Tom and Jed helped as best they could by maintaining contact with the
old reality. They spent much of the daytime with the colonists. At night
they turned their faces to the dark sky to watch the ships, now grown to
four, bathed in the light of Ceti like a constellation of bright stars
above them. They read the intermittent flashes of light from McGinnis,
and from the E.H.Q. laboratory. McGinnis told of the police ship's
attempts to break through the barrier surrounding Eden, and its
failure. The laboratory told of Linda's presence on board, and now and
then flashed out a message to Cal from Linda of her love, her nearness,
her faith in him, her desire to be with him, her patience in waiting.

McGinnis told of the arrival of a fifth ship, carrying Gunderson in
person. He had been unable to believe his police captain. Unable to
believe that the ship could not land at will. He had come in person to
take charge, and apparently fumed his frustration in idleness, unable to
do anything with the situation, unwilling to go back to Earth and leave
it alone.

Tom and Jed told Cal the content of these messages, but to Cal the
reports of the police activity seemed noises heard from far away and
unrelated to himself. The messages from Linda seemed the haunting
strains of a song remembered from long ago.

For his mind was wholly enrapt with the problem. He had been given the
key--reality is a matter of proportion, change the concept of proportion
and you change the material form--but he had not found the lock and the
door it would open. He knew it, but he couldn't do it.

Perhaps Tom might help? Tom was well-grounded in math, had to be for his
job as pilot.

"Look, Tom," Cal said one morning after they had given him the night's
messages from the ships. He squatted on the ground and brushed away some
leaves from an area of dirt. "Watch the equals sign." He scratched a
formula in the dirt:

"2 + 2 = 4"

The = changed to : . Then to {d}. Then through the series of variable
relationships.

Tom leaped to his feet from the log where he had been sitting.

"That's crazy," he exclaimed. "It isn't just proportionate, it isn't
variable. It equals."

Jed was looking from one to the other, obviously at a loss.

"Well," Cal said drily, "I'm much more interested in what They have to
say than in trying to convince Them that They're wrong."

"But if everything were only proportionate and variable," Tom argued,
"then you'd have n