Shadows began to play across the crystal. Off-focus images and flashes of color. The little old guy murmured to himself and his fingers plucked at the keyboard in a quick fugue of motion. Finally he said: "Ah!" and sat back to watch the crystal. So did I. * * * * * I was looking through a window in space, and beyond that window I saw a single bright star in the blackness. It was sharp and cold and so brilliant it hurt your eyes. Just beyond the window, in the foreground, I saw a spaceship. No, none of your cigar things or ovate spheroids or any of that. It was a spaceship that seemed to have been built mostly in after-thoughts. A great rambling affair with added wings and towers and helter-skelter ports. It looked like it'd been built just to hang there in one place. The old coot said: "Watch close now, Mr. Muggins, things happen rather quickly at this tempo." Quickly? They practically sprinted. There was a spurt of activity around the spaceship. Towers went up and came down; the buglike figures of people in space armor bustled about; a little cruiser, shaped like a fat needle, sped up to it, hung around a while and then sped away. There was a tense second of waiting and then the star blotted out. In another moment the spaceship was blotted out, too. The crystal was black. My friend, the goofy professor, touched a couple of studs and we had a long view. There were clusters of stars spread before me, sharply, brilliantly in focus. As I watched, the upper side of the crystal began to blacken. In a few swift moments the stars were blacked out. Just like that. Blooey! It reminded me of school when we added carbon ink to a drop under the mike just to see how the amoebae would take it. He punched the buttons like crazy and we had more and more views of the Universe, and always that black cloud crept along, blotting everything out. After a while he couldn't find any more stars. There was nothing but blackness. It seemed to me that it wasn't more than an extra-special Stereo Show, but it chilled me nevertheless. I started thinking about those amoebae and feeling sorry for them. The lights went on and I was back inside the clock again. He turned to me and said: "Well, what do you think?" I said: "I think it's swell." That seemed to disappoint him. He said: "No, no--I mean, what do you make of it? Do you agree with the others?" "With Stabilizer Groating, you mean?" He nodded. I said: "You'll have to give me a little time to think it over. It's rather--startling." "By all means," he said, escorting me to the door, "do think it over. Although"--he hesitated with his hand on the knob--"I shouldn't agree with your choice of the word 'startling.' After all, it's only what we expected all along. The Universe must come to an end one way or another."