, if
it's thick enough, but it's got to be pretty damn thick."

It took time to set the mechanism up. Ready, the massive apparatus,
within which glowed a larger and more powerful force field, was operated
by two monstrous material energy engines. The controls were equipped
with clockwork drives, designed so that the motion of the Earth could be
nullified completely and automatically for work upon outlying planets.

* * * * *

Russ stood back and looked at it. "Stand in front of that screen, Greg,"
he said, "and we'll try it on you."

Greg stepped in front of the screen. The purr of power came on.
Suddenly, materializing out of the air, came Greg's projection. Hazy and
undefined at first, it rapidly assumed apparent solidity. Greg waved his
arm; the image moved its arm.

Russ left the controls and walked across the laboratory to inspect the
image. Examined from all sides, it looked solid. Russ walked through
it and felt nothing. There was nothing there. It was just a
three-dimensional image. But even from two feet away, it was as if the
man himself stood there in all the actuality of flesh and blood.

"Hello, Russ," the image whispered. It held out a hand. "Glad to see you
again."

Laughing, Russ thrust out his hand. It closed on nothing in mid-air, but
the two men appeared to shake hands.

They tested the machine that afternoon. Their images strode above the
trees, apparently walking on thin air. Gigantic replicas of Greg stood
on a faraway mountain top and shouted with a thunderous voice. Smaller
images, no more than two inches high, shinnied up a table leg.

Satisfied, they shut off the machine.

"That's one of the possibilities you mentioned," suggested Russ.

Greg nodded grimly.

* * * * *

An autumn gale pelted the windows with driving rain, and a wild, wet
wind howled through the pines outside. The fire was leaping and flaring
in the fireplace.

Deep in his chair, Russ stared into the flame and puffed at his pipe.

"The factory wants more money on the spaceship," said Greg from the
other chair. "I had to put up some more shares as collateral on a new
loan."

"Market still going down?" asked Russ.

"Not the market," replied Greg. "My stocks. All of them hit new lows
today."

Russ dragged at the pipe thoughtfully. "I've been thinking about that
stock business, Greg."

"So have I, but it doesn't seem to do much good."

"Look," sa