He told them very concisely what the Beller technique was, how it had been developed, and what it could do. He used a few technical terms that he had picked up from his weekend reading. He did not mention the fact that the technique was not without flaws. When he had finished his explanation, he called for questions. Surprisingly few were forthcoming. The news seemed to have stilled the tongues of even these veteran reporters. At the close of the conference he said, "Headquarters for further Beller news will be right here. I'll try to make myself available for comment about the same time every afternoon." He watched them go. He wondered how much of what he had said would reach the public undistorted, and how much would emerge in garbled and sensationalized form. Toward evening, he started finding out. Harker reached his home in Larchmont about seven that evening, utterly exhausted. Lois was at the door, anxious-faced, tense. "Jim! I've been listening to the news all day. So have the boys. Your name's been mentioned every time." "That's nice," Harker said wearily. He unsnapped his shoes and nodded hello to his sons, who stared at him strangely as if he had undergone some strange transformation during the day. "I'll be spending most of my time at Litchfield until things get calmer," he said. "I may even have to sleep out there for a while." The phone rang suddenly. Harker started to go for it, then changed his mind and said, "Find out who it is, first. If it's anybody official tell them I'm not home yet. Except Raymond." Lois nodded and glided off toward the phone alcove. When she returned, she looked even more pale, more tense. "Who was it?" "Some--some crank. There've been a lot of those calls today, Jim." He tightened his lips. "I'll have the number changed tomorrow. Nuisances." The late editions of two of the New York papers lay on the hassock near his chair. He picked up the Seventh Edition of the _Star-Post_. A red-inked banner said, CAN LIFE BE RESTORED? READ NOBEL WINNER'S OPINION! Harker glanced at the article. It was by Carlos Rodriguez, the Peruvian poet, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2018. Evidently it was a philosophical discussion of man's right to bring back the dead. Harker read about three paragraphs, then abruptly lost interest when another headline at the lower right-hand corner caught his eye. It said, RICK BRYANT REMAINS DEAD, SAY SPACE PIONEER'S HEIRS _New York, May 20--The body of 73-year-old Richard Bryant, early hero of the space age, will be cremated on schedule tomorrow morning, according to a family spokesman. Commenting on the growing public sentiment that the famed Bryant be granted a reprieve from death for his epochal flight to Mars, Jonathan Bryant, his oldest son, declared:_