He sat up quickly. He should have been up hours ago.

        He looked at his big old bedside alarm clock on Old George's little bedside table. It was nearly ten o'clock!

        Once again he heard laughter, and he recognized whose it was. Then he began to remember...

        Gosh - they'd given him one of the front rooms by the front door - the one on the right! Only his parents had that room at home. - But how had he gotten here? He must have fallen asleep, so they had somehow moved him in here and put him to bed. He couldn't remember anything about that.

        It was certainly a beautiful room. He looked around. The wall paper was like that in the lounge, only the flowers were nice yellow daffodils instead of roses; they were also picked out in bronze rather than gold. The ceiling, a creamier-looking white, had simpler moldings, and a square, less ornate, ceiling rose compared to the lounge's large round one. Old George's large easy chair reposed in the corner between the two pairs of French doors, his tall walnut wardrobe sat on the other side of the pair the sun was shining through. His dressing table with mirror stood a little way on the other side of his bed from George's old table, though Jamieson's own knick-knacks were on it. The gilt-framed paintings of New Zealand scenes hung round the walls including a very large one of the Pink and White Terraces by the hall door, were clearly Estelle's though. It crossed Jamieson's mind then that this painting was probably the duplicate of the screen in the lounge Estelle had mentioned.

        The bed he was lying in, an iron bedstead with cool cotton sheets and patchwork quilt, had the most comfortable feather mattress he had ever lain on in his life.

        There was a quick knock at the door.

         "Can I come in?" he heard Estelle ask in a bright, cheery voice.

         "Certainly..!" Jamieson called. He had begun to like Estelle very much indeed now.

        "Brought you your breakfast," she said as she came in bearing a tray with a plate full of bacon, two runny-looking eggs, and chips, which he'd never had before with such a breakfast. He hoped they didn't taste of fish. A small bowl beside this contained cornflakes and milk with a few slices of tinned peaches, and a small side-plate with little triangular slices of toast and marmalade. Salt and pepper shakers were also there, plus little jugs of tomato sauce and mustard, and a bowl of sugar with its own muslin cover.

        He was instantly ravenous.

        "Johnstone cooked all this for you - in fact he did it for everybody this morning," Estelle said as she laid the tray down in front of him after he sat up. " - Mind if I sit here?" she moved to sit on the side of his bed.

        "Not at all..!" he smiled at her enthusiastically as he moved his legs to make way for her. She was dressed in a white fluffy frock with big pink and mauve dots all over it. She looked all lovely and summery, and she smelled absolutely wonderful as he felt her weight press down on the bed...

        "That man is just full of surprises," she said as Jamieson started in on the bacon and eggs and chips while it was hot - not fishy, thank God. "You know, after we'd put you to bed and returned to the lounge, he pulled out this pack of cards from his back pocket and insisted we all play `500'. I had to be very firm with him and say `no'. I could see he just wanted to keep everybody up to all hours when Carol and Errol clearly needed to go to bed. Now that wasn't very good of him, was it?"

        Jamieson laughed. "No, Auntie Estelle."

        She reached over as if to clip him round the ear. Jamieson knew that if his breakfast hadn't been in the way, he would have pulled her over and ... had a pillow fight with her or something. He remembered that marvelous one he had had with his cousin Judy when they had both just turned fourteen...

        "All right, I promise," he said dutifully

         Another burst of laughter came from the direction of the front verandah.

         "That's Errol playing one of his silly word-games with the others," Estelle said. "You know the sort of thing. `Drunken Barber - Close Shave', `Wonky Fountain - Chucked only two coins in', `Pussy cat - Chicken Chop Suey'."

        Jamieson laughed even though he couldn't understand that last one. What was a chicken chop suey? Sounded Chinese.

        "Sorry to hold everybody up," he said. "I'll get up soon..."

        But he didn't really want to move a muscle with her sitting there.

        "That's all right," Estelle said to him. "The others haven't been up long themselves, in fact they've only just had their breakfast. Why they aren't out there looking around instead of just sitting on the verandah I don't know. Perhaps they are waiting for you," she looked at him archly.

        " - Heavens, I didn't say my prayers last night!" he sat bolt upright. "Look..." he said, looking round to see where he could put his tray.

        "I think it's more important you eat your breakfast first," Estelle looked at him firmly. "You are all going to have a very busy day today. Learn by doing, remember," she added with the loveliest smile. He only noticed now she had dimples. And he loved dimples...

        Suddenly a burst of song came from the front verandah. Jamieson knew it was opera, Auntie Cecilia had a pile of old 78's which she used to play once in a while, usually when Uncle Bert was down at the RSA. Some of these were Mario Lanza, and Johnstone now sounded like him as well as looked like him. Even through the French doors, he had an amazingly deep, rich voice.

        "Nissum Dorma", Estelle said. "He has his piano in his room, but he doesn't really need it, does he?"

        " - Where did all these things come from?" he asked her, looking round the room. "I mean, how did you get it? I guess you got everybody's."

        "With my Gates and my little helpers, just before we left, " she replied. "Unfortunately, I cannot guarantee I got all of it, or that everything is actually yours. Now, as I said earlier, you all have a lot to learn; about me, about the Universe, about all the worlds I hope we can all visit together. So you just finish your breakfast, and I'll leave you now so you can say your prayers in peace."

        Jamieson hoped her helpers, whatever they might be, hadn't picked up those horrible photos of Old George's. They would look doubly awful now. Surely they would still be safely hidden away at the back of the knife box?

        Just as Estelle started to get up, there was a knock at the door.

        "Come in," Estelle called. "He's awake and looking forward to seeing you all."

        He had noticed Johnstone had stopped singing, but it was Errol who came in.

        "Amazing, isn't he?" Errol said to Estelle, pointing towards the verandah. "Never liked opera much. But when you're standing next to someone actually singing it - well its magic... - Ah, good morning Jamieson," he grinned at him as if only just noticing he was there. "Hope you slept all right after all the excitement last night. - Oh, of course, you didn't see any of that, did you?" He winked at Estelle.

        "Come along Errol," she said, "Let him finish his breakfast in peace. I'm sure he'll be up just as soon as he feels like it. Just like you."

        "Ouch.." He grinned at her as he turned to leave. "Okay. - Charlie Darwin?" he shot at her."

        "Monkey's Uncle," she shot back as she followed him out the door and closed it behind her.

        Jamieson had rather they stayed as he began eating his breakfast once again.

        Then Johnstone started singing again, this time with piano accompaniment. Jamieson's spirits soared again.

        Jamieson wasn't sure whether to feel excited or apprehensive as they all walked across the grass to the garage with the picnic things. A whole new world! And they were actually going to have a picnic on it! At first he thought Estelle might have suggested it to make up for Carol's snide remark back on the Moon, but he knew it was really because they had gotten up later in the day than she had allowed for, so combining their visit with morning tea just made good sense.

        And the fact that it was possible at all meant they wouldn't be in any danger there.

        "How on Earth do you produce that brilliant sunshine," Carol asked Estelle as she gazed up at the sky and round at the landscape. "And the - whole impression - that this is a little piece of Earth?"

        "That is something I hope to be able to show you all tonight," Estelle said to them all. "That is, if you're not all too tired - "

        " - And Jamieson doesn't fall asleep and snore so loud we can't hear you anyway," Johnstone laughed.

        "I don't snore," Jamieson protested. Of course he didn't snore. Only Dad and Uncle Bert did that - though he thought he had heard Auntie Clarissa doing it once after that oily little music teacher, passing through the town from Auckland, had stayed the night.

        "Leaving that aside for the moment," Estelle smiled at Jamieson, "we should also have a lot of other things to talk about after today's little outing."

        Jamieson couldn't believe his eyes after Estelle opened the workshop Gate and they all stepped through it. They found themselves standing on a narrow strip of land, no more than fifty yards across, curving gently into the hazy distance in both directions as far as the eye could see. Wonderfully warm-looking seas of an even paler green nearer the shore lapped it on both sides. It made Jamieson think of what he had always imagined Farewell Spit in the South Island to be like. He had always wanted to go there but never had.

        The only thing that spoiled it was that this spit wasn't made up of sand at all, just pebbles of increasingly small size as one got to the center. Patches of it, like the one they were standing on, were a fine grit.

        Another odd thing he noticed was that the wind roughened the waters on one side, smoothed them on the other, yet he couldn't feel it as it passed over. Also, the sun, what he could see of it in that mist-shrouded sky, had two intensely bright white steaks coming out of it that reached right across the heavens. Perhaps it was some effect of the mist, like the ring he had sometimes seen around the sun back home. But then this was another world, he couldn't expect everything to be exactly the same as back home, could he?

        He looked quickly round to find the Gate they had just come through, but there was no sign of it. They were all just - here - somehow, all by themselves - wherever it was, he found he couldn't remember the name of this world at all.

        "Can I go back and get my togs," Johnstone said as he gazed out to sea, picnic chairs he was carrying forgotten. "That water looks marvelous."

        Errol laughed. "I was going to suggest we go for a walk, but that sounds like a better idea. Besides, there doesn't actually seem to be anywhere to walk to. We can pick thataway," he pointed, "or thataway, and whichever thataway you pick looks the same as the other thataway. All we get's the sunshine and exercise," he grinned round at them as he unfolded the chair he was carrying and plonked himself down in it, "though I'm sure that would be very nice."

        "Well," Estelle said as the laughter died down, "let's just settle ourselves down like Errol here and have our picnic. Then I can tell you the story of Kah Kahrain. I'm sure you will find it very interesting."

        She began to lay out the blanket while Errol got up again to set up the table he had also brought with him. They all then sorted out the other chairs and put the things out on the table from the hamper which Carol and Estelle had carried between them.

        "Oh, do tell," Carol mock-implored her once she'd settled down with her piece of fruit cake and cup of tea.

        "To begin with," Estelle said, "if Johnstone had waded into the water, it wouldn't have been too long before he noticed his feet dissolving in it. If he chanced to look down, he wouldn't have seen any blood, that would probably have vanished even more quickly than his feet."

        Jamieson had been enjoying his curried egg and mayonnaise sandwich, but now it didn't taste quite so good.

        " - Ugh..!" Carol said, nearly choking on her cake.

        "I guess by that stage, if I had noticed anything amiss at all, I would have lost my balance and fallen in the water," Johnstone put on a hoity-toity Pommy voice. "What a simply dwedful way to lose weight. Oh, thank you for telling me, Estelle. I won't bother dashing back to get my togs now."

        "Ah, but there's more," Estelle looked at him archly. "You probably wouldn't even have made it to the water. The fast-growing bacteria in the air here would have found some lovely places to grow inside your lungs. They would have filled them up very quickly and you would have suffocated before you'd gotten very far at all."

        Carol looked wildly around her, then stared at Estelle. Even Errol looked a little alarmed. Jamieson himself was too terrified to think at all.

        "It's all right everybody, no need to be alarmed," Estelle laughed. "We are inside a set of force fields, all of them more solid than those we had on the Moon since I had more time to set them up. And in their center, just under the sand, is a small atmosphere generator so we can breath properly. This also cools the air, the temperature is over 140 degrees Fahrenheit outside. - I'm afraid you wouldn't have been able to go too far with your walk, Errol, even if that had been the only difference between this world and the one you've been used to."

        "You know, I guess it's just as well you're telling us these things," he said, putting on a `deeply concerned' voice.

        "And now for the good news..." Johnstone laughed.

        "Not all the life on Kah Kahrain is restricted to the sea and the air," Estelle smiled sweetly at him. "Some of it on the land here is quite advanced, or rather within the land, none as yet can withstand the deadly ultraviolet and the X-radiation that gets through from that stellar system up there. One species in particular can coalesce into a jelly-like organism and ooze out of the ground to absorb whatever little creatures that do venture out of the sea - for a very short time."

        " - Yiii..!" Johnstone quickly lifted his feet of the ground, Jamieson found himself doing the same. But then he became frightened that his chair might collapse, so he put them down again.

        "It's all right," Estelle reassured them. "All the organisms within our fields have been killed or sterilised, it's quite safe in here. - It all still looks beautiful though, doesn't it? Enjoy your cake, drink your tea. - Just relax," she smiled pointedly at Errol.

        "I assume we don't have to worry about the radiation either," Carol asked her in a small voice after she had gingerly attempted to sip her tea.

        "No, of course not," Estelle reassured her. "One of my fields is specially designed to stop that. You won't even collect a tan."

        "Not even if she stripped off?"

        " - Johnstone!" she gave him a most severe look. Jamieson and Errol couldn't help laughing with him.

        She turned in a huff towards Estelle. "Would I be right in assuming that this world - Kah Kahrain - is at a similar stage in its evolution to what Earth would have been, say, two and a half thousand million years ago?"

        "Oh boy," Johnstone said to Errol under his breath. Jamieson didn't know what he meant.

        "That's right," Estelle said in that neutral tone of voice which meant she was about to say things that would go over Jamieson's head. "Except that it is really nearer to Earth three to even four thousand million years ago. The atmosphere is still mostly carbon dioxide and nitrogen, plus a lot of methane. There is no blue-green algae yet to get oxygen production started. And nothing with any shells on to become - well, sand." She looked round her.

        Jamieson did the same, even though he couldn't understand what shells had to do with it.

        "Is this - life - here likely to evolve along the same lines as Earth? I mean, obviously not exactly, but..."

        "If you mean fish would have evolved here, or birds - "

         " - Or bees," Johnstone interjected with a laugh.

        "Nothing specific like that, no," she laughed politely; Carol just stuck her tongue out at him. "Though insects of some sort probably would have, just as fish and birds of some sort - "

        " - The `of some sort' being the operative phrase," Carol said.

        "And - people - of some sort," said Errol.

        "Intelligent conscious beings, not necessarily human, yes. I'd rather come back to that question when we visit - well, a more advanced world," she said with a nice sunny smile.

        "You keep saying `would have', `could have'," Carol asked her, draining her cup. "Is there something wrong

        "You picked that up quickly," Estelle looked at her with obvious delight. "I was coming to that. Kah Kahrain's sun happens to be in orbit round something called a `black hole', out of sight behind it at the moment. I'll go into what those are in more detail when we get back home, but you could think of it as being a hole in space with an immense gravitational field which sucks everything into it, even light itself. Those brilliant white streaks you can see crossing the sky actually come out of that, not the sun; they are streams of gas moving at nearly the speed of light from its poles. So when it does come into view, in about fifteen minutes - "

        " - It'd be invisible wouldn't it?" Carol said. "If it can suck light into itself."

        "The hole itself is, but not the disk of matter round it, it's actually much brighter than the sun itself - so bright we'll have to be up and gone by then. And the matter it sucks in comes from that sun, it is slowly eating it alive. In about sixty million years, that sun will have shrunk to a tiny shadow of its former self, and this world will become a freezing radioactive hell."

        "That's really sad," Carol said.

        Jamieson couldn't understand that. The `life' here, if you could call it that at all, was nasty and vicious. It would be better if it was killed off, and the sooner the better. Sixty million years..?

        Johnstone made a long sucking noise, then spat out a `pip'.

        Errol and he then started laughing flat out. Jamieson looked at Carol, who was turning a deep shade of red.

        "You men are just - " Carol couldn't get the words out.

        "You really aren't doing too well, you two" Estelle said in a way which made Jamieson look at her, she actually looked angry. "The whole reason I brought you all here was to introduce you to certain ways of thinking vital to your survival in this Universe. Whatever form it might take, life has to eat, no matter what, and it can usually only eat other life. You and Carol and yes, even me and my ship, are just as much a part of that as the organisms on this world. Lesson one, and you've failed it. Once we start visiting worlds with people on them - "

        "When?" Carol looked pointedly at the two men.

         "Possibly even this afternoon," Estelle said simply. "Now, if you have all finished, perhaps we can gather up our things. Unless you'd like to stay a while longer, five minutes or so. Learn something. Nothing here can hurt you in the meantime. Hope not, anyway."

         "Gee, thanks a bunch for your reassurances," Johnstone laughed grimly.

         "Knock it off, Johnstone," Errol said.

        Jamieson had somehow never imagined Estelle could get angry, and he didn't want to see that again. God knew what might happen if she told them they were no longer welcome on her ship. Where would they go? Back to Earth? How?

        They picked up their things in silence. The two women packed the crockery into the hamper, Jamieson and Johnstone folded the chairs, Errol folded the blanket. Finally when they were ready to leave, Estelle seemed to look fixedly back along the strip.

        Jamieson was just in time to catch sight of a small ball of light appearing just a few feet above the ground. Suddenly it split into four smaller ones, these then quickly moved to form the corners of a vertical rectangle which came slowly towards them, then stopped a few feet away. Suddenly the same view into the workshop appeared just as they had seen it when they walked through Johnstone's dunny.

        Right now it looked very inviting.

        "You men can go first," Estelle said.

        "Mind the step now," Carol said in a way that made Jamieson feel like an idiot.

        Suddenly Johnstone burst into song, an operetta Jamieson couldn't identify. But just as suddenly he broke off and started coughing violently. He then doubled over and appeared to be coughing his lungs out.

        " - Johnstone..!" Carol shrieked, rushing over to him.

        "Oh my darling, will you ever forgive me?" he stood up and wrapped his arms around her. "My heart has become the instrument of my torture, my soul - "

        But that was as far as he got before Carol broke free and clouted him one so hard round the ears he nearly fell over.

        Then, in a way Jamieson knew then he would never understand about women, she started laughing at him. He gave her a pained look, went "ohhh... please don't laugh at me so," then suddenly grabbed her and clasped her to him passionately.

        Then they both began laughing their heads off.

        Errol looked at Jamieson, and across at Estelle, who looked completely mystified. This made him laugh too, and Jamieson couldn't help joining in.

        "Come on, Auntie Estelle," he went over to her and hugged her in a way that made Jamieson feel instantly jealous. "You're one of us too - well, you chose to be, didn't you? And it isn't so bad, is it?" he glanced back at the ocean.

        "No, I guess not," she relented, smiling at him. "Not if you'll promise not to call me Auntie Estelle again. I made Jamieson promise. I'm sure you can do the same."

        "I promise," he said, holding his fingers up in an elaborate Scout salute.

        "I promise too," Johnstone said, performing an even more exaggerated version of Errol's salute that nearly made him fall over.

        "As Estelle said, I already have," Jamieson said simply as he hopped through the Gate to the sound of their laughter.

        Since there was an hour or so until lunchtime, Estelle suggested that they `take the rest of the morning off' and rest, or go for a walk and explore the ship. `About time you all did that anyway.'

        At the last moment however, Carol changed her mind and said she wanted to find out a lot more about Kah Kahrain through Estelle's `encyclopedia.' Jamieson was mystified, did she mean that set on the shelf in the lounge? How could it possibly say anything about a world nobody had ever visited before?

        It didn't help matters to see that Johnstone appeared to be mystified too.

        Estelle saw this, and laughed. "Of course, Carol hasn't had a chance to tell you yet, but my screens can also act as an encyclopedia, as I showed her last night. You can ask them to show you virtually anything you want, and you can ask them questions, which they will do their best to answer. You can even find out more about me and my ship, if you like. The only thing they won't tell you about at this time are other worlds. I think it wiser that we visit at least some of those ourselves first. I'll show you how it all works at lunchtime, if you like. Now, if you really want to stay behind, Carol..."

        The three men deliberately set out in the opposite direction from the garage. They walked in silence at first, almost until they had come upon the first of the trees in the encircling forest.

        "All joking aside," Johnstone said in a low tone, "We really do have a lot to discuss."

         "Yes, I'm afraid so," Errol agreed. "How well do you know Carol?" Johnstone was completely taken aback by this. Jamieson found it surprising himself.

        "What do you mean?"

        "You may have noticed Estelle doesn't have a bedroom of her own - you wouldn't I guess, Jamieson, you haven't even had a chance to see through the house yet, have you? Where she sleeps is something I don't know and have never asked. She may not even sleep at all. But I do know she went to Carol's room last night and I also heard them this morning, giggling away. Got up to use the john. I may have heard other noises too, but I'd be the first to admit I may have imagined them."

        "Wow..." Johnstone stood stock still, then glanced back at the house. "I knew Carol had a reputation up at the varsity, - you wouldn't think it, I know, she doesn't look the sort. But then they never do, do they? That's the first time though I've ever heard anything - like that."

        Errol said nothing.

        "I see what you mean," Johnstone said a few moments later. "This has implications. Who - initiated who. Have you ever, I mean, - with Estelle?"

        Jamieson was confused. This sounded like more city-folk chatter, but he wasn't sure.

        "What's happened? Is something wrong?"

        "Errol has more or less said that Estelle and Carol are having some sort of - special relationship," Johnstone explained to him. " - But then I guess you've never heard of such a thing in all your sheltered life."

        "Hey - I've had a sheltered life too, you know," Errol laughed. "I grew up believing that `windbreakers' were some sort of device poor people had to strap on when they wanted to break wind."

        " - Yah..! I don't believe that..!" Johnstone laughed at him outright.

        Errol then decided Jamieson ought to know what a lesbian relationship was. Jamieson had never heard of homosexual relationships between women, though he had with men (`If God had meant arseholes to be for screwing, then he would have made them with screw-threads', Uncle Bert had said). He couldn't really believe it was possible at all, let alone between Carol and Estelle.

        He wondered if it wasn't this kind of city-folk nonsense that eventually lead to disaster, the sort of thing that had caused Carol's younger brother to lose his mind. That image of that nearly grown man crying like a baby was something he knew he would never forget.

        "Surely you've got it all wrong," he said to them. "You heard Carol say Estelle was showing her her encyclopedia. You know Carol is brainy, they might have been up all night. - Perhaps its got some funny things in it, and that's what they were giggling at," he added in a flash of inspiration.

        Johnstone laughed out loud and long.

        "Hey - you've got to admit the man could be right, Errol. It could have happened that way. We'll keep an eye out, sure, but even if we see anything, what do we do? The damage has been done so to speak, if any damage has been done at all. - Maybe it's none of our business, anyway," he looked back again at the house. "Ah, how did you and Estelle meet anyway? That's what I really want to know. Was it at one of those parties of yours?"

        "Yes and no," Errol replied as they entered the trees proper. For the first time Jamieson noticed the birds calling, he looked up and actually saw a native Wood Pigeon. "I found her the morning after the one I had about three months ago, sitting on the steps at my back door as if she had slept there all night. She looked all bedraggled and lost. I couldn't remember having seen her the night before, but of course the state I was in... Anyway, I brought her in for a spot of breakfast and a cup of tea, and it didn't take me long to realize she was a bit odd. But as you can imagine, I found her pretty damned attractive, so that didn't worry me too much at all."

        "Plenty of attractive women about these days though," Johnstone laughed. "-Well, were."

        Errol nodded sadly. "Anyway, I asked her where she was from. By that stage I had thought she had lost her memory, perhaps been in a road accident or something and somehow wandered the ten miles down to the beach, missed Jim's house and found mine. When she said she wanted to show me where she came from, I, well - "

        " - Thought she might have stepped out of a flying saucer or something," Johnstone laughed.

        "No, I think I can say absolutely that that thought did not cross my mind," Errol grinned. "I just said `okay'. When she led me up the path to the dunny, I though she was just going to carry on round it somehow, since it backs onto that little cliff. When she walked up to it and opened the door instead, I really wondered what the hell was going on."

        "I bet you did," Johnstone chuckled.

        "Well, it was then I realized I wasn't seeing the back of the dunny. I was looking into the workshop just as you two saw it when you came in. Just why she put her Gate there I've no idea. She does have a sense of humor as you've noticed, but - "

        " - Not that sort," Jamieson roared with laughter. "Far too nice a lady for that."

        "And that's exactly the impression she had been giving me all along," Errol looked at him. "And it's why I followed her through and across to the house. And, to cut a long story short, the last three months have been something of an education."

        "I'll bet," Johnstone said soberly.

        "Now I should say that she looked quite different back then, I mean, same blue eyes and blonde hair, but she was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, she was also thinner and, I swear, a little taller, plus she had her hair in a pony tail. And her house was different too. For a start it was smaller, only two bedrooms, and it looked more like Jamieson's place than it does now. I just put what's been happening since down to some sort of maturation process. It - and she - certainly look absolutely beautiful. But now I think it's as a result of sending her flies out to learn more about you people. The only thing that doesn't quite fit my theory is that none of us live in villas like that anymore - "

        " - Carol did," Johnstone interrupted him. "You saw that yourself. It was pretty run down and untidy though, Carol's dad took off about ten years ago and, well, her mum never got over it. Then I guess my old home in Waihi was something like it, New Zealand Railways interpretation anyway. And Jim here says he grew up in one - "

        " - And I did too, when my parents came out from Ol' Blightey in the early fifties," Errol said. "Lovely old place."

        "So you're probably right after all," Johnstone said. "She has gone for a sort of common denominator - and made herself one over the last few weeks as well. Good thinking, Errol. Love that house myself. And I've got to admit I've always sort of gone for good old fashioned mutton-chop sleeves and frilly dresses. But that of course wouldn't have gone down too well at your party," Johnstone laughed. "Well, it might've, with the locals who turned up. - Whoops, sorry, Jamieson."

        "That's all right," he said.

        " - Hey, you're rather keen on her yourself, aren't you? I've seen you go all moo-eyes at her when you think nobody's noticing," Johnstone clapped him on the shoulder and laughed. "That's all right, join the club," he looked at Errol. "She really is one hell of an attractive lady isn't she? In that cute matronly sort of way."

        "Sure is. I have to say I'd find it hard to live without her now, and that's a bit worrying. Because I suspect you will all come to feel that way before too long. And, well, Carol may have done already. But then we can't live without her anyway, can we? In the literal sense I mean. Without her we'd still be back in New Zealand, and on our way to dying horrible slow deaths. I for one prefer to take all the risks that might go with her," he looked all around him. " - And this is beautiful, isn't it?"

        They had come some way into the trees now, and to Jamieson they looked just like some of the patches of native bush left in the valleys of the old farm, indeed, just like the cathedral grove his father - and Roy...

        " - Are you all right, Jamieson?"

        Errol was gripping his arm. Johnstone was also peering at him with some concern.

        "I guess this is especially rough on you," he said. "It's not so bad for us, we're sort of used to - weird trips," he grinned at Errol, " - the booze, you know," he added. "But for you, well - "

        "Would you like to go back to the house Jamieson? Lie down for a while," Errol asked him.

        "No, I'll be all right. Besides, I want to hear what you two think," he tried to grin. "There's a lot I want to know too. It is beautiful here, but -"

        " - And that's just the problem..!" Johnstone laughed. "That's the spirit, Jamie-boy! We'll turn you into a journalist yet! So, what else can we come up with? - Where are we now, anyway? - How big's this - ship, whatever it is - Errol?"

        Jamieson, instantly forgiving him his lapse about his name, looked up and around with him. He then looked back towards the house but couldn't see it, though there was a brighter patch where the clearing would probably be.

        "We're not too far from the boundary now in fact," Errol said. "Our new home is nearly two miles across and one mile high," he glanced briefly up. " - Well, to us, anyway. The whole thing is a flattened sphere two miles thick. All the drive systems, everything else," he stamped his foot on the ground, "is under this deck, or whatever you might call it."

        "What do you mean, `to us anyway', Johnstone asked him. "My journalistic nose just twitched."

        "The fact is we are inside something like Dr Who's Tardis," Errol replied. "To cut a long story short - and I don't know how it works myself - all the - space - this ship occupies has actually been compressed into the size of a pebble. In fact, looking at this ship from the outside, it actually looks like a pebble. It was on top of a heap of them piled up behind my dunny."

        "Heavens..." said Johnstone without laughing. "That's incredible..." Jamieson didn't believe it either. The ship couldn't possibly be the size of a pebble. That was rubbish.

        "What's a Tardis?" he asked Errol.

        "Wow, I thought everybody'd seen Dr Who," Johnstone laughed at him.

        "Oh yes, that,." Jamieson remembered. "Visiting nephew of mine couldn't tear himself away from it while we were having dinner once. We couldn't see what he saw in it, cardboard sets and that spooky music. Couldn't have him growing up with that sort of nonsense. So he got a short sharp lesson in how to get along with people."

        Jamieson saw Johnstone and Errol glance quickly at each other and wondered what it meant.

        "So you really don't know what a Tardis is?" Johnstone looked at him as if he'd just come off the planet Mars.

        "Why should I?" Jamieson replied. "If it's anything to do with something like that."

        "Okay, guess we'd better leave it there," Errol grinned at Johnstone. " - whoops, here we go, coming up to the boundary," he said as he nearly lost his balance on a furrow in the ground that lead to a gradually steepening bank. Jamieson thought he heard the sound of running water.

        "Stream?" Johnstone said.

        "Yep," Errol replied. "Runs round the perimeter of the whole ship. Recirculates by means unknown, to me at least. That's not the boundary itself though, it's far bank is. It's near vertical and to my mind unclimbable, even without all the ferns and things, you'll see. - There..."

        Jamieson quickly passed the other two as they made their way down the now tree-root strewn bank, to him they served as steps. He could see the stream and the grassy bank that bordered it on this side through the trees well before he finally reached it.

        The stream was about as wide and deep-looking as he had expected from its sound; that had also told him it was much shallower on its nearer bank than its opposite one. And that bank was as vertical as Errol had said, he could see wedges of rock poke out through the heavy overhanging ferns and other damp-looking broad-leaf vegetation. It certainly did look unclimbable, even for him.

        "That's even more worryingly beautiful than I imagined it would be," Johnstone was visibly impressed. "Sort of reminds me of the Fernery at the Auckland Domain - that other bank, anyway. - Can one swim in that water?" he asked hopefully.

        "Sure can," Errol laughed. "But there's a special place for that which is even better - well there's half a dozen actually, spaced out round the perimeter. We've named them all after their nearest equivalents in New Zealand. The nearest, Hanmer Springs, is just along here to the right somewhere..."

        They followed him along the river bank in that already exquisitely beautiful place. There were even more birds here than in the forest, indeed Jamieson could even see a few Kaka, and he actually spotted a Kiwi running of up the bank and into its little hole. Yet in spite of that downward slope to the river bank, the sun was easily high enough to reach in and bring out its exquisite colors. It was just like being in one of those magical places pictured in those Rupert Books he got for Christmas when he was a kid.

        "And just in case you're about to ask," Errol said, "yes, we do have lousy weather here too. Obviously vital for the plants - which are as real as they look - as well as, I guess, for us."

        "Certainly got the old Civic Theater beat," Johnstone laughed. "They do a night-time sky almost as good as yours. But have you ever seen it lit up with floodlights? Went to a religious convention there once, Seventh Day Adventist I think, with an old flame of mine just for the fun of it. That sky up there certainly doesn't look like the flaky Plaster of Paris I saw. Could be right over our heads, and we'd never know."

        "Yeah - and will you just look at that, folks. There's our version of Hanmer Springs."

        "Wow. Too bad the girls aren't here," Johnstone agreed as they surveyed that magic scene in front of them as they skirted round a large angular rock embedded in that grassy bank. "I'm sure Estelle would be absolutely irresistible in togs."

        "Togs?" Errol asked as he started stripping off on his way down to that perfect waterhole. "What are togs?"

        The stream fell into the pool down a small waterfall, yet Jamieson could see steam coming off the waters. There was obviously some sort of hot springs under there. Paeroa had its wonderful pools too, but he knew of nothing that could remotely approach this.

        "Bugger paranoia," Johnstone said as he quickly stripped off and joined Errol in a pool that also turned out to be full of little bubbles.

        Jamieson wasn't too far behind him.

        " - Where the hell have you been..!" Carol screamed at them from the back verandah doorway. "I've had lunch ready for ages!"

        The three men looked sheepishly at each other as they stood out there on the back lawn. It was only the threat of rain that had made them even think about leaving that waterhole. "Maybe that's our lunch call," Errol had said as the first drops landed.

        "You won't believe where we've just been!" Johnstone said with a silly grin all over his face. But then Jamieson knew he had exactly the same grin on his own. "There's this most fantastic swimming hole out by the boundary. Get your togs on and come! On the other hand, leave out the - "

        " - I don't bloody care where you've been. Lunch is ruined!" Jamieson had to really struggle to stop himself giggling. Carol was just like Auntie Violet!

        Estelle then appeared behind Carol. She didn't look too pleased either.

        "You realize you've ruined Estelle's plans as well," Carol shouted when she became aware of her standing behind her. "We were supposed to go on to a new world this afternoon, one with people on it. I was really looking forward to that. Now it's going to be too late," she looked at Estelle in frustration.

        "We could go there, but I don't think it would be wise for us to actually land on it until tomorrow now."

        "We're sorry," Errol looked at the others, "we really are." Jamieson noticed he said that more to Estelle than Carol. " - Like me to make some lunch? You know what my salads are like."

        "Sure do," Johnstone laughed. "I didn't come down off that last one for days."

        "No, thank you," Carol said, folding her arms and glaring at Errol. "As it happens we made one. It won't be quite as good as it was an hour ago, but it will be good enough for you lot."

        It wasn't served in the dining room, but outside in the summerhouse, which to Jamieson looked more like a band rotunda. This was some way out on the back lawn, well past the small garden shed near the back of the house. This little shed contained the Gate they had come through from the swimming hole, thereby saving themselves a walk. Errol had simply walked up to a particular pair of tree trunks, said `garden shed' as he walked between them, and disappeared. Johnstone cottoned on quicker than Jamieson and walked through a full minute before Jamieson summoned up the courage to do it on his own. Errol had explained when he arrived that the garden shed was a sort of `terminus' for all the ship's other internal Gates, most of which lead to the other waterholes. He didn't say where the others went.

        The summerhouse also contained one, and it was through this that Carol, assisted by an apologetic Errol, brought their plates of salad accompanied by fruit juices, plus ice-cream and jelly. Jamieson thought the salad delicious even if the lettuce had gone a bit floppy and the grated carrot and cheese had acquired a slight browny color. As was becoming usual however, the raisin pud and the tea that followed all this was just fine.

        There was only a low table out there like the one in the lounge, so they just had their lunch sitting in their wicker chairs. These faced what appeared to be a portable version of a screen on a stand, it looked just like one of those roll-up projector screens. Carol, with only a little help from Estelle, then presented one of the most fascinating things Jamieson had ever seen on any cinema or TV screen. He had never had any illusions about his limited intelligence or his capacity for deep thought, but he felt he had understood everything he saw on it during that what turned out to be a fine lunch after all.

        He also noticed Carol's mood soften during that presentation, and for that he felt very relieved indeed. In spite of his initial amusement, her outburst had given him a feeling of real concern that she might one day go like her brother if she did not learn how to control herself better.

        Her show began with what Jamieson took to be a picture of a simple clump of grass at the bottom left of the picture, with what looked like a single stalk of barley grass sticking out of it. He nearly laughed outright, that was a noxious weed because when the heads broke off they could penetrate and ruin the hides of stock. But here it was being portrayed as being something beautiful, waving in the breeze against a golden sky lit up by a bright yellow sun in the top right-hand corner of the picture. In his present mood though Jamieson was perfectly happy to dismiss all this as the ignorance city-folk would have for such matters.

        As Carol pointed to it and called `ten, down', a little white rectangle then appeared about half-way up its stem, and suddenly the picture changed to a magnified version of that stem, upon which sat a small insect that looked like a weta of some sort. (On barley grass?) Another rectangle appeared around this, Carol called `ten, down' again, and once again its contents filled the screen. But inset round it this time were tiny images of the various stages of the insect's life, from egg to pupa, then as a miniature of its adult self.

        On Carol's command, a spoken commentary in a man's voice began, but she cut this short.

        "I'm working from memory here, but I remember my Uncle Mal giving me a book when I was a girl that started off with a photo of a young couple lying on a blanket in the middle of a field somewhere. I used this image instead because of something I remember from Zen or something, `the whole Universe in a blade of grass'. Anyway, on the next page that lovely book showed a piece of that first picture magnified it by ten, then on the next page, magnified by ten, and so on. After another twenty pages you were down to atoms and molecules -

        " - Hey, I remember that book," Johnstone said. "A friend of mine had a copy. `Powers of Ten' or something like that. It also went the other way, going up from - whatever it was - up to the world, the solar system, the galaxy, then the whole Universe."

        "And that's exactly how Estelle's encyclopedia is set up," she said happily, "only I added the grass bit myself as I said. Hers also has sound including voice and music, and motion, including bits from what look like documentaries. And you can move and change that rectangle, `cursor' it calls itself, by simply pointing to it and telling it what you want it to do. It even learns so you don't always have to point."

        She gave a rapid-fire demonstration of all this as she spoke. Jamieson found his mind flooding with sounds and images that connected in ways he could never have imagined before. And it was all ultimately linked to that simple stalk of barley grass.

        "Hey, can I have a go?" Johnstone asked.

        He quickly figured out how it all worked, though some of his effects were weirder, some downright funny, like Earth and The Moon and all the other planets and their moons spinning madly round each other and round the Sun in vastly speeded-up motion. Finally, when he began to explore outer space, he came upon an image of a bright yellow star accompanied by a small but unimaginably bright bluish-white spinning disk which stuff from the star seemed to be falling into. The spoken commentary explained how such `X-Ray Binaries' more commonly had something called `neutron stars' in them rather than black holes, and how such systems flared up with such brilliance every two or three hours that life on any nearby planet would end if the flare-ups weren't also very brief. Jamieson found all this surprisingly interesting - and realized with a certain joy that again none of it had gone over his head at all. He had even learned what light-years were (Heavens..!), and had learned that the Sun was really only just a star, and a pretty average one at that.

        " - That's actually where we are, isn't it Estelle?" Carol said. "That black hole sucking in all that matter from its companion star like that. It's so beautiful - and so deadly. - Is this your way of telling us you want to do your - Transfer now?" she grinned at her.

        "We will in fact need to begin in a few moments, Carol," Estelle replied. "Unlike ordinary stars, I can only approach and enter this one from a very limited set of angles in order to avoid the very intense gravitational fields of that black hole. This means the ship can only align itself with our new destination during particular intervals determined by their mutual orbit."

        "What would happen if something went wrong?" Johnstone asked.

        "I cannot guarantee that our death's would be instant," she replied in that flat, neutral way of hers when she said such things.

        That sent a chill down everyone's spine.

        "Okay," Errol said, "We'll just be quiet until, well, you're through."

        "We're on our way now in fact," Estelle said.

        This time Jamieson was able to see the entry into Tachyonic space in its entirety. The yellow star - its companion was behind it - varied even more wildly in size and color than the Sun had before, but then kept on getting bigger until it filled the screen. Suddenly a ghostly white patch appeared in the middle of it and spread until it filled the screen. And that was it, so far as he could see. Tachyonic Space was white instead of black, and nothing could be seen there at all. Logical, he supposed. But he was still a little disappointed.

        "We're through," Johnstone breathed a sigh of relief.

        "Forty-three minutes and forty-one seconds exactly to exit from any target star, wherever it may be," Carol looked wonderingly at Estelle. "Amazing."

        "Si-lent night..." Johnstone sang in a way that sent shivers down Jamieson's spine. Jamieson had completely forgotten Christmas was less than a fortnight away.

        "Ho-ly night..." They now all began to take up that ancient refrain.

        "All is calm...

        "All is bright...

        Jamieson began to think back to his family. They had had some wonderful Christmases together, singing Carols in the firelight with the piano in the lounge. Dad, his Mum, his sister Penny...

        And Roy.

        "'Round yon Vir-gin Moth-er and Child...

        He thought too of his Uncle `Dirty' Berty who had helped him so much over the past year, and with his endless fund of dirty jokes and stories that weren't quite Christian but still seemed in the spirit of it somehow. And of Auntie Clarissa, even if she was so snobbish, and Charmaine and Violet...

        "Ho-ly In-fant so ten-der and mild...

        He thought of all his other Uncles and Aunties, of Auntie Billie and Auntie Mavis, Auntie Violet, and Uncle Victor and Uncle Robert...

        "Sleep in heav-en-ly peace...

        And all his cousins, Athol, Henry, Keith, Murray, Hillary, Clare, Glenda, Judith, Winstone and Randolph, Ian, John, Cecil, Alfred...

        "Sleep in heav-en-ly peace.

        As the tears started to stream down his face, he barely noticed that it had started to rain outside.

        Then the heavens opened and it poured.