"Yes, Billy. That's why we left. The problem was to find some place new; some place where a man had room to move--room to breathe. For a long while it didn't look as if there was such a place--not in our solar system anyhow. But one day a few years before you were born, a fellow by the name of Vincent Taibi made a trip out here to Centauri.... It was a long trip. Took him thirteen years to get out here and back. But the important thing is that he came back with some news.... He came back and reported that there was an uninhabited planet out here, just about the size of the Earth, that was as fresh and new as it was the day God made it." "That's when we got on this ship. Right, Pop?" Claude frowned. "Well, not exactly. You see, Son, to begin with this is a long trip--so long, and so expensive, that no one except maybe a few millionaires would be able to afford it. Anyhow, the government wanted _young_ people out here: people who could colonize the place.... They ran a lot of tests, Son." "Tests?" Claude nodded and turned to his wife. "The tests," he said. "You remember the tests, Joan?" "Yes, Claude. I remember. It's been six years, but I remember them as if they happened yesterday." "I don't, Pop." "That's 'cause you were too young, Son. You didn't have to take the tests.... You were lucky." "Claude! Billy's not interested in that. Besides they were necessary." "Necessary! All those psychiatrists? Oh come, Joan.... I felt as if they were picking my brain with an ice pick!" "But they had to be careful, Claude." "Careful, yes.... But eight months of tests--every day!" "Claude!" The woman's tone was severe. "Why did they have to be careful, Pop?" Billy asked. "They wanted to be sure, Son. They didn't want anyone out here who was sick, or lazy, or who wanted to start a war. They figured if the right kind of people came out here, Centifor would stay as fresh and clean as it was the day that Captain Taibi first landed here." The boy looked out the porthole. "We'll sure have lots of room here, won't we, Pop?" "Yes, Son. We'll have lots of room. The government's given us title to a hundred acres of what's just about the best land in the Universe.... I showed you the pictures of our land, didn't I?" "Sure, Pop. Lots of times." The woman laughed. "About a thousand times, I'd imagine.... Those pictures have been looked at so much, they're frayed at the corners." * * * * * They landed on a concrete apron, nestled between ridges of rolling hills. The jets belched, hissed, went out, and from a ranch type structure at the edge of the area, a jeep, towing a portable ramp moved out to meet them. There was a gentle bump. Hatches hissed open. And then the passengers began to move down the ramp.