I Am Crying All Inside and Other Stories Read Online Free PDF Page A

shipping problem.
    And with the transmogs there was likewise no shortage of the kind of brains and skills and techniques—as there would otherwise have been—necessary to cope with the many problems found on the far-flung planets.
    He came to the edge of the camp area and stood, with the lights behind him, facing out into the dark from which came the sound of running waves and the faint moaning of the wind.
    He tilted back his head and stared up at the sky and marveled once again, as he had marveled many other times on many other planets, at the sheer, devastating loneliness and alienness of unfamiliar stars.
    Man pinned his orientation to such fragile things, he thought—to the way the stars were grouped, to how a flower might smell, to the color of a sunset.
    But this, of course, was not entirely unfamiliar ground. Two human expeditions already had touched down.
    And now the third had come, bringing with it a cargo sled piled high with merchandise.
    He swung around, away from the lake, and squinted at the area just beyond the camp and there the cargo was, piled in heaps and snugged down with tough plastic covers from which the starlight glinted. It lay upon the alien soil like a herd of hump-backed monsters bedded for the night.
    There was no ship built that could handle that much cargo—no ship that could carry more than a dribble of the merchandise needed for interstellar trade.
    For that purpose, there was the cargo sled.
    The sled, set in an orbit around the planet of its origin, was loaded by a fleet of floaters, shuttling back and forth. Loaded, the sled was manned by robots and given the start on its long journey by the expedition ship. By the dint of the engines on the sled itself and the power of the expedition ship, the speed built up and up.
    There was a tricky point when one reached the speed of light, but after that it became somewhat easier—although, for interstellar travel, there was need of speed many times in excess of the speed of light.
    And so the sled sped on, following close behind the expedition ship, which served as a pilot craft through that strange gray area where space and time were twisted into something other than normal space and time.
    Without robots, the cargo sleds would have been impossible; no human crew could ride a cargo ship and maintain the continuous routine of inspection that was necessary.
    Sheridan swung back toward the lake again and wondered if he could actually see the curling whiteness of the waves or if it were sheer imagination. The wind was moaning softly and the stranger stars were there, and out beyond the waters the natives huddled in their villages with the big red barns looming in the starlit village squares.
    II
    In the morning, the robots gathered around the conference table beneath the gay pavilion tent and Sheridan and Hezekiah lugged out the metal transmog boxes labeled SPECIAL—GARSON IV.
    â€œNow I think,” said Sheridan, “that we can get down to business, if you gentlemen will pay attention to me.” He opened one of the transmog boxes. “In here, we have some transmogs tailor-made for the job that we’re to do. Because we had prior knowledge of this planet, it was possible to fabricate this special set. So on this job we won’t start from scratch, as we are often forced to do …”
    â€œCut out the speeches, Steve,” yelled Reuben, “and let’s get started with this business.”
    â€œLet him talk,” said Abraham. “He certainly has the right to, just like any one of us.”
    â€œThank you, Abe,” Sheridan said.
    â€œGo ahead,” said Gideon. “Rube’s just discharging excess voltage.”
    â€œThese transmogs are basically sales transmogs, of course. They will provide you with the personality and all the techniques of a salesman. But, in addition to that, they contain as well all the data pertaining to the situation here and the language of the natives,