"Nonsense," the old man snapped waspishly. "This gives me new life, just seeing what you youngsters are up to. Of course, though, continuous creation can't make any difference as far as parsec travel is concerned."
"But it does!" they all shouted.
Huddleston laughed. "Now, now, gentlemen. Just because hydrogen atoms are springing into being from nothingness throughout space doesn't mean—."
"That's not how it is," Crane said, speaking down to Huddleston as if he were the tallest man in the room, not the shortest. "Lowen has shown that continuous creation does not take place everywhere. That's his great practical discovery and—"
"It happens at specific, restricted points," Lowen broke in. "Great streams of hydrogen and free electrons welling into our universe the way water does out of dry ground."
Huddleston let the report slip from his hands onto a table and stared at them. He was very pale now. "My God, I think I see what you're getting at."
They considered each other, bewildered by his reaction to such good news. "You must be missing the real point, Learned Master," said Lowen. "The wellsprings are spaced at approximately one million parsecs apart. I've already pinpointed hundreds of them. We established the first one from the Jupiter readings and the rest practically mapped themselves out. It has checked out a dozen different ways. That was one place where the computers could handle the job—on the checkout." He tapped the report with his thumb. "Nodes of lifesaving electrons across the deepest reaches of space—."
"—where each spaceship can bathe its weakened structure," suggested Huddleston, "refill every lattice gap where electrons have dropped out."
"Exactly. You still can always see to the heart of the matter, Learned Master."
Huddleston sank into a chair, shaking his head as if dazed. "It won't work."