Spacetime Donuts Read Free Page A

swing into production. A good demand for the stuff had built up on the strength of Silver's mention of it, and the Us was not adverse to making hay while the sun shines. They asked, then demanded, that the Angels surrender their cache of the illegal substance, but to no avail. Finally a raid was staged, but no unfamiliar drugs were found in the Angels' possession.
    Vernor followed all this with interest, and he began looking into the writings of G. Kurtowski. His early papers were concerned with ironing out various imperfections in the Everett-Wheeler many-universe-interpretation of quantum mechanics. Toward the end of his publishing career, however, a number of surprising empirical predictions had begun to appear in his papers. Vernor was unable to discover if the experiments which Kurtowski suggested had ever been carried out, and Phizwhiz seemed to have no information at all on what the Professor had been doing for the last twenty years. Evidently Kurtowski was alive in an underground laboratory somewhere.
    Again, Vernor was tempted to try to join the Angels, but again his caution held him back. He was twenty-three. He might have spent the rest of his life in the library, preparing for an ever-receding future, but one day Andy Silver came to see him.
     

Chapter 2: The Happy Cloak
    Most days the library was practically deserted. There would be a few people viewing infocubes in the small Hollownests around the first-floor lounge, and maybe a couple of people punching questions into the Information Terminal in the middle of the lounge; but Vernor usually had the upstairs to himself. It was here that they had the microfiches with the marvelous access and viewing system that made picking out and reading any book in existence no harder than reaching across a desk and turning a dial.
    On an average day the only interruptions were from the cleaning robots. Occasionally someone might wander up and spend a few hours at one of the other viewers, but never before had someone come up to read over Vernor's shoulder. He turned in some annoyance and immediately recognized Andy Silver's ethereally cynical face.
    "I've been thinking about you a lot," Vernor said, standing up. "You got any of that dope?"
    Silver smiled at and through Vernor, "Vernor Maxwell," he said, "I came out here to find you."
    "How'd you know I was here?" Vernor asked.
    "The Professor told me. He keeps an eye out for people who read his stuff and ask about him. You want dope? You'll get it, don't worry." Silver felt in his pockets, "You got any seeweed on you?"
    "Sure," Vernor said. "This is where I live. Just a minute." Vernor kept most of his possessions wedged under a couch's cushions. He lifted up a cushion and took out a stick of weed. "This is really good shit," he said. "I grew this under ultraviolet light."
    "High energy," Silver said, lighting up and inhaling deeply. "You want to be an Angel, Vernor?" Just like that.
    "I don't know if I can handle it," Vernor confessed, "That's why I haven't come in for a test."
    "It's not as hard as you think," Silver said. "It's just the squares who can't handle it. You know how to trip, right?" He passed the reefer to Vernor.
    "Yeah." Deep drag.
    "Most people don't. I mean, hardly any one does. They know how to get wasted, or how to get high, or how to feel good, or how to pick the nose, or bleed on the floor, or booga-loo, or WHAT," Silver suddenly shouted, "WHAT AM I TALKING ABOUT?"
    "Tripping," Vernor shot back.
    Andy Silver chuckled through his smile. "You'll be O.K. Let's take a walk."
    They finished the seeweed on the way out to the street. It was good stuff, and being with Andy Silver provided an incredible contact high as well.
    They walked a few blocks in the gathering dusk. Vernor wanted to ask about the Professor Kurtowski, but the stoned silence was too comfortable to break. As they drew abreast of a staircase down through the sidewalk to the walk-tubes, Silver suddenly pressed something into Vernor's