Astounding Science Fiction, British Edition, December 1955 — page 57: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE WAITABITS . 35 two years at most. How long it required here is anyone’s guess. Two hundred years perhaps. Or four hundred. Or more.” He tapped fidgety fingers on his desk. “It worries me.” ‘““We’re not worried. We’re frustrated. It’s not the same thing.” “IT tell you I’m worried. This planet is like a lighted fuse long ignored but now noticed. I don’t know where it leads or how big a bang is waiting at the other end.” ‘““That’s frustration,” insisted Pascoe, completely missing the point because he hadn’t thought of it yet. ““We’re thwarted and don’t like it. We’re the irresistible force at long last meeting the immovable object. The bang is within our own minds. No real explosion big enough to shake us can ever come from this world’s life forms. They’re too slow to catch cold.” “I’m not bothered about them in that respect. They worry me by their very existence.” “There always have been sluggards, even on our own world.”’ ‘*Precisely!’” indorsed Leigh with emphasis. “And that is what’s raising my hackles right now.” The loud-speaker interrupted with a polite cough and said, “Ogilvy here, sir. We’ve picked up granite chippings, quartz samples and other stuff. At the moment I’m at sixteen thousand feet and can see the ship in the distance. I don’t like the looks of things.”’ ‘““What’s the matter?” “The town is emptying itself. So are nearby villages. They’ve taken to the road in huge numbers and started heading your way. The vanguard should reach you in about three hours.’ A brief silence, then, ““There’s nothing to indicate hostile intentions, no sign of an organized advance. Just a rabble motivated by plain curiosity as far as I can tell. But if you get that mob gaping around the ship you won’t be able to move without incinerating thousands of them.” Leigh thought it over. The ship was a mile long. Its lifting blasts caroomed half a mile each side and its tail blast was equally long. He needed about two square miles of clear ground from which to take off without injury to others. | There were eleven hundred men aboard the Thunderer. Six hundred were needed to attend the boost. That left five hundred to stay grounded and keep the mob at bay around the perimeter of two square miles. And they’d have to be transferred by ’copter, a few at a time, to the new landing place. Could it be done? It could—but it was hopelessly inefficient. “We'll move a hundred miles beforg they get here,” he informed Ogilvy. “That should hold them for a couple of days.” ‘‘Want me to come in, sir?” ‘Please yourself.” “The passengers aren’t satisfied and want to add to their collections. So Pll stay out. If you drop out of sight I'll home on your beacon.”’ “Very well.’” Leigh turned to the intercom. “Sound the siren and bring in those yaps outside. Check crew all present and correct. Prepare to lift.” “Rule Seven,”’ said Pascoe, smirking. “‘Any action cousins juHnece Say, COMME IOO S.C