Short Stories by Robert A. Heinlein Vol 2 Part 57

'But you must stay for dinner, Uncle Gus,' Waldo continued. 'You can't run out on me like that; you don't come often enough for that. I can stir something up.'

'Maybe we will,' Grimes admitted. 'Don't worry about the menu. You know me. I can eat a turtle with the sh.e.l.l.'

It had really been a bright idea, Stevens congratulated himself, to get Doc Grimes to bring him. Not here five minutes and Waldo was insisting on them staying for dinner. Good omen!

He had not noticed that Waldo had addressed the invitation to Grimes alone, and that it had been

Grimes who had a.s.sumed the invitation to be for both of them.

'Where are you, Waldo?' Grimes continued. 'In the lab?' He made a tentative movement, as if to leave the reception room.

'Oh, don't bother,' Waldo said hastily. 'I'm sure you will be more comfortable where you are. Just a moment and I will put some spin on the room so that you may sit down.'

'What's eating you, Waldo?' Grimes said testily.

'You know I don't insist on weight. And I don't care for the company of your talking doll. I want to see you.'

Stevens was a little surprised by the older man's insistence; he had thought it considerate of Waldo to offer to supply acceleration. Weightlessness put him a little on edge.

Waldo was silent for an uncomfortable period. At last he said frigidly, 'Really, Uncle Gus, what you ask is out of the question. You must be aware of that.'

Grimes did not answer him. Instead, he took Stevens's arm. 'Come on, Jimmie. We're leaving.'

'Why, Doc! What's the matter?'

'Waldo wants to play games. I don't play games.'

'But-'

'Ne' mind! Come along. Waldo, open the lock.'

'Uncle Gus!'

'Yes, Waldo?'

'Your guest - you vouch for him?'

'Naturally, you dumb fool, else I wouldn't have brought him.'

'You will find me in my workshop. The way is open.'

Grimes turned to Stevens. 'Come along, son.'

Stevens trailed after Grimes as one fish might follow another, while taking in with his eyes as much of Waldo's fabulous house as he could see.

The place was certainly unique, he conceded to himself - unlike anything he had ever seen. It completely lacked up-and-down orientation. s.p.a.ce craft, even s.p.a.ce stations, although always in free fall with respect to any but internally impressed accelerations, invariably are designed with up-and- down; the up-and-down axis of a s.h.i.+p is determined by the direction of its accelerating drive; the up-and down of a s.p.a.ce station is determined by its centrifugal spin. Some few police and military craft use more than one axis of acceleration; their up- and-down s.h.i.+fts, therefore, and their personnel, must be harnessed when the s.h.i.+p manoeuvres. Some s.p.a.ce stations apply spin only to living quarters.

Nevertheless, the rule is general; human beings are used to weight; all their artifacts have that a.s.sumption implicit in their construction - except

Waldo's house.

It is hard for a groundhog to dismiss the notion of weight. We seem to be born with an instinct which demands it. If one thinks of a vessel in a free orbit around the Earth, one is inclined to think of the direction towards the Earth as 'down', to think of oneself as standing or sitting on that wall of the s.h.i.+p, using it as a floor. Such a concept is completely mistaken. To a person inside a freely falling body there is no sensation of weight whatsoever and no direction of up-and-down, except that which derives from the gravitatioiial field of the vessel itself. As for the latter, neither

Waldo's house nor any s.p.a.ce craft as yet built is ma.s.sive enough to produce a field dense enough for the human body to notice it. Believe it or not, that is true. It takes a ma.s.s as gross as a good-sized planetoid to give the human body a feeling of weight.

It may be objected that a body in a free orbit around the Earth is not a freely falling body. The concept involved is human, Earth surface in type, and completely erroneous. Free flight, free fall, and free orbit are equivalent terms. The Moon falls constantly towards the Earth; the Earth falls constantly towards the Sun, but the sideways vector of their several motions prevents them from approaching their primaries. It is free fall nonetheless. Consult any ballistician or any astrophysicist.

Where there is free fall there is no sensation of weight. A gravitational field must be opposed to be detected by the human body.

Some of these considerations pa.s.sed through

Stevens's mind as he handwalked his way to

Waldo's workshop. Waldo's home had been constructed without any consideration being given to up-and-down.

Furniture and apparatus were affixed to any wall; there was no 'floor'. Decks and platforms were arranged at any convenient angle and of any size or shape, since they had nothing to do with standing or walking. Properly speaking, they were bulkheads and working surfaces rather than decks. Furthermore, equipment was not necessarily placed close to such surfaces; frequently it was more convenient to locate it with s.p.a.ce all around it, held in place by light guys or slender stanchions.

The furniture and equipment was all odd in design and frequently odd in purpose. Most furniture on

Earth is extremely rugged, and at least 90 per cent of it has a single purpose - to oppose, in one way or another, the acceleration of gravity. Most of the furniture in an Earth-surface - or subsurface - house is stator machines intended to oppose gravity. All tables, chairs, beds, couches, clothing racks, shelves, drawers, et cetera, have that as their one purpose. All other furniture and equipment have it as a secondary purpose which strongly conditions design and strength.

The lack of need for the rugged strength necessary to all terrestrial equipment resulted in a fairylike grace in much of the equipment in

Waldo's house. Stored supplies, ma.s.sive in themselves, could be retained in convenient order by compartmentation of eggsh.e.l.l-thin transparent plastic. Ponderous machinery, which on Earth would necessarily be heavily cased and supported, was here either open to the air or covered by gossamer- like envelopes and held stationary by light elastic lines.

Everywhere were pairs of waldoes, large, small, and life-size, with vision pickups to match. It was evident that Waldo could make use of the compartments through which they were pa.s.sing without stirring out of his easy chair -~ if he used an easy chair. The ubiquitous waldoes, the insubstantial quality of the furniture, and the casual use of all walls as work or storage surfaces, gave the place a madly fantastic air.

Stevens felt as if he were caught in a Disney.

So far the rooms were not living quarters. Stevens wondered what Waldo's private apartments could be like and tried to visualize what equipment would be appropriate. No chairs, no rugs, no bed. Pictures, perhaps. Something pretty clever in the way of indirect lighting, since the eyes might be turned in any direction.

Communication instruments might be much the same. But what could a washstand be like? Or a water tumbler?

A trap bottle for the last - or would any container be necessary at all? He could not decide and realized that even a competent engineer may he confused in the face of mechanical conditions strange to him.

What const.i.tutes a good ashtray when there is no gravity to hold the debris in place? Did Waldo smoke?

Suppose he played solitaire; how did he handle the cards? Magnetized cards, perhaps, and a magnetized playing surface.

'In through here, Jim.' Grimes steadied himself with one hand, gesturing with the other. Stevens slid through the manhole indicated. Before he had had time to look around he was startled by a menacing ba.s.s growl.

He looked up; charging through the air straight at him was an enormous mastiff, lips drawn back, jaws slavering.

Its front legs were spread out stiffly as if to balance in flight; its hind legs were drawn up under its lean belly. By voice and manner it announced clearly its intention of tearing the intruder into pieces, then swallowing the pieces.

'Baldur!' A voice cut through the air from some point beyond. The dog's ferocity wilted, but it could not check its lunge. A waldo snaked out a good thirty feet and grasped it by the collar. 'I am sorry, sir,' the voice added.

'My friend was not expecting you.'