What had seemed to be a long flat meadow was in reality, just beneath the surface, an emergency airport that was used in place of the moving chairs or the underground freight-railway when speed was imperative. Seldom used, but always in a state of preparedness, the port now buzzed with activity as the roof of simulated grass rolled back, disclosing a resplendent green space-ship waiting on the take-off ways.
So simple was the ship in construction that less than an hour of intensive instruction from Gion, on a model control board set up in the underground room, was sufficient to acquaint him perfectly with the management of the craft.
It almost frightened him to think that he and Myra were about to undertake a journey in a ship so swift that they would arrive on Jupiter, in an inestimably distant solar system, almost as soon as they would have in their Skypiercer, had they not been interrupted by Peachy.
At last, all was ready. Steve and Myra waved good-bye to the people they had come to know as friends in such a short time, and sealed themselves inside the ship.
Steve consulted the charts for a second, then sent the ship into a noiseless take-off that soon left the field far below, already being retransformed into a green meadow. He followed his instructions carefully and kept the ship at a moderate speed, to wait until the gravitational pull of the planet had been left behind before beginning the almost unbelievable acceleration of which the ship was capable.
Myra sat in thought for a moment, then: "Steve," she said, "I don't want to seem skeptical, but doesn't Gion's theory about the beginning of man on Earth sort of conflict with our time-honored theory of evolution? Apes and men from the same source, and all that?"
"Not exactly," Steve said. "The evidence seems to point to the fact that those third-generation refugees landed on North America a few ages ago, and founded the Indian nations. It's the only tenable explanation of the origin of the American Indian that I've ever heard."
The planet was rapidly growing smaller behind them.
"If only they hadn't mutinied against discipline, it's probable that with their advanced knowledge, the Indians would have discovered Europe long before Columbus—or Lief Erickson—crossed the Atlantic. Their culture, if they had kept it, might have been a better incentive to European development than theirs was—"
"Brrr!" Myra shivered suddenly. "I get the creeps when I think of talking to a corpse."