Astounding Science Fiction (British edition) — page 80: what you’re looking at

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

78 ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION And the world adopted them from the start. The weekly TV show transmitted from the island, ‘Project Peace,” maintained the highest audience rating ever tabulated. Cautiously edited at first, in deference to the prodigious multiplicity of international taboos, the films showed merely the fat, healthy youngsters cooing and laugh- ing and playing happily in the bright Pacific sunlight. Careful shots, with shadows and branches amending the nakedness, to begin with, but by the time the toddlers were beginning their wide-eyed exploration of the island, people had, for the most, grown quite accustomed to their undress. Mistakes ~ were made,-of course; the hilarious, and now famous episode, in which two eight-year-olds—a Caucasian boy and his little Japanese girl companion— discovered the effects of fermented coconut sap, was poorly received in some quarters. But on the whole, Earth widened its moral outlook considerably to make room for its beloved castaways. And the castaways, as if responding to this generous adoration, thrived and multiplied. The intercom buzzed and Ted flicked it on. ‘‘Jepson,”’ he said. ““Margate,’’ came the nasal reply, ‘in Transmission. Look, Ted, we’re mighty short on next week’s show, and I hate to pad it out with any more library stuff. How about getting me a platter of something good?” “Such as?” “Oh, you know. Something inter- esting. New. Some shots of them in- venting horses, or biting out doilies with their teeth. You know.” “Yeah. New.” “If you like, Pll go topside and stir them up a little. There’s a certain red- head with long brown legs—”’ “V’ll get you something,” Ted in- terrupted. He clicked off. Did Mar- gate, he wondered sourly, have to be so typical? Every new man seemed to go through the same pattern. First, a detached, veddy professional attitude toward the droves of nubile beauties who wandered around topside. Next, with their probationary periods suc- cessfully over, they frequently found it necessary to visit the View Room —some of the excuses Jepson had listened to had been dillies. And finally, after becoming more or less blasé about what was so near, yet so far, they began to be obsessed with the temptation to “go topside and stir them up a little,” as Margate had ut it. That last stage was what nearly got ’em, Ted knew. Even the gray- beards on the project, who certainly realized the experiment was predi- cated entirely on strict noninterven- tion, occasionally voiced wistful, half- serious desires to have the islanders find a phonograph and an album of blues records, a flashlight, or an illus- trated encyclopedia—anything that would jar them into an interesting reaction. And there. were those others who wanted to go topside once just for the hell of it. Himself, for example. He supposed that’s why he’d done it. Ted decided to get Margate some shots of the octopus kill. Ought to go over well, he figured: Good-looking youngsters; the azure, crystal-clear depths of the lagoon; sun setting into a glory of cerise and golden clouds; and the poor squid providing the ele- ment of “danger.” He flicked on two screens from a supplemental bank on the right wall, turned up the corre- sponding mikes. The room came alive with excited sounds and brilliant color. After starting a recorder going and setting up the proper circuits, he backed away from the lively scene with a twist of the zoomar pot and Cconnicloooks.c© iim