"That's right, honey," Mark said, and ruffled her hair gently. She looked a little less nervous now, he thought."Oh." "Anyway, he'd been experimenting with the process for quite some time before he informed the government of what he had," Mark went on, "and he only told them because he was running out of money and they weren't going to re-fund him." "Your money cheerfully refunded," Pat said, and giggled shrilly again. "Eccentric means a little bit crazy, dear," Marilys said, and smiled across the children at Mark. The reason we don't know the exact date is because Carune was something of an eccentric - " "You mean he was crazy, Dad?" Ricky asked. In the end it came down to either the government or the oil companies. and eventually the government took it over, of course. He did it as part of a private research project that was funded by some government money. "So far as we know," he began, "the Jaunt was invented about three hundred and twenty years ago, around the year 1987, by a fellow named Victor Carune. maybe it'll do something about my Jaunt-jumps, too. The kids would be going to the tiny Whitehead Combined School with the hundred-odd engineering and oil-company brats that were there his son might well be going on a geology field trip to Phobos not so many months distant. He told himself again that Ricky would be deep in the swamp of puberty and his daughter would likely be developing breast by the time they got back to earth, and again found it difficult to believe. Ricky and Pat were watching him seriously, his son twelve, his daughter nine. Who knew, maybe it would even cool Marilys out a little. and he supposed it would take the kids' minds off their nervousness. He glanced at his watch and saw it was still almost half an hour to Jaunt-time. He wondered now, looking at Marilys's pale face, if she was regretting the decision. Finally they had decided that all of them would go for the two years Mark would be stationed on Mars. He and Marilys had discussed the advantages and drawbacks of moving the whole family for the last six months - since he'd gotten notification from Texaco Water that he was being transferred to Whitehead City. She winked back, but she was almost as nervous as Patty sounded. Mark glanced over at Marilys Oates and winked. A Businessman with a build like a bull glanced over at them and went back to the fodder of papers he was examining as he lay on his back, his spit-shined shoes neatly together.įrom everywhere came the low murmur of conversation and the rustle of passengers settling down on the Jaunt couches. "You promised." "Yeah, Dad, you promised," Patricia added, and giggled shilly for no good reason. "Daddy, will you tell me about the Jaunt now?" Ricky asked. Mark Oates and his wife, Marilys, flanked the two children. The Oates family lay side by side on four Jaunt couches near the far end ofthe room. Directly opposite, the floor dropped away in a trough about five feet wide and perhaps ten feet long it passed through a doorless opening and looked a bit like a child's slide. At one side of the room was the entranceway, flanked by armed guards and another Jaunt attendant who was checking the validation papers of a latecomer, a harried-looking businessman with the New York World Times folded under one arm. Five Jaunt attendants circulate, speakingin low, cherry voices and offering glasses of milk. There were one hundred couches in the large room, neatly spaced in rows of ten. A steady, soothing progression of colors met and swirled on the ceiling.
The walls were an eggshell white and hung with plesant nonrepresentational prints. It was wall-to-wall carpeted in oyster gray.
Thank you."The upstairs lounge was not at all grungy. Make sure your validation papers are in order. "All ticketed passengers should now be in the Blue Concourse sleep lounge. "This is Jaunt Service to Whitehead City, Mars," the voice continued. The automated female voice was probably the most plesant thing about it. The PAT had not changed much in the last three hundred years or so - it was still gungy and a little frightening. "This is the last call for Jaunt-701," the pleasant female voice echoed through the Blue Concourse of New York's Port Authority Terminal.