"Is he the same way to them?"
"And how! Operations have been dragging along at half of capacity because he says we haven't filled out the necessary forms for those spare parts we need. And we can't fill them out, because the forms have to be countersigned by the vice-president in charge of Operation M54, and that gentleman is vacationing somewhere in space with a new bride, and can't be located. So you see, darling, you're cursing him in good company."
Even at that, as Anthony might have pointed out, he was suppressing a good part of what might have been said of Mr. Tapling. At the mines where Anthony and his fellow engineers worked, everything was completely automatic, and the dozen men were needed only for checking and repairs. It was T. I. Tapling who had done his best to ruin their lives.
The houses he had ordered built for them were not too bad. To be reasonably invulnerable to the drill-toothed animals who abounded on these wastes, the walls would have had to be about a dozen feet thick; and Tapling had had no grounds for suspecting that fact, which had not been in any of the reports he had read. But it was unquestionably his fault that the houses were so widely scattered. Dealing with a planet where the sunlight was weak and ultra-violet was obtained chiefly from artificial radiation, a planet where the air was so cold that no one went outdoors unless he had to, T. I. Tapling had been worried about living space and had generously allotted to each engineer and his family territory uninhabited for a couple of miles in every direction. Possibly he expected them to grow vegetables next to their houses. Apparently he had no suspicion that he was making things as easy as possible for the predatory animals.
And of all locations, Anthony and Alice had the worst. Their house was most isolated, was the most difficult to get to from the office, and was in the part of the country most liable to attack. It was little wonder that Alice said, as she had said so often before, "But we must do something. Do you think we could have an electric barrier set up?"
"We could not. That's against regulation something or other too. Might kill friendly animals."
"But there isn't a single animal that's friendly!"
"Tell that to regulations and their guardian, Mr. Tapling."
Small looked up and said, "Mommy, we ought to get a dog."