them without getting yourself mangled. I'm ready to help when you have a plan. Think it over."

"I still think blowing the damn thing up would be—"

"They'd build a bigger one. And they'd persecute you and your family the rest of your life," explained Cross logically. "You and I may know that science hasn't contributed one whit to man's mental progress, but Mr. Everyman likes his babies diapered in disposable tissues and likes to travel from Siberia to Johnstown like an infuriated bullet. You can't stop them, you can only divert them a bit."

Stanley grasped the hand-audio, tightly. He listened.

A great roar of 'copters sounded out in the afternoon sky, directly overhead. The house shook. Althea sprang up lithely and ran to look out. "I can't talk any more, Cross. I'll call you back. They're outside, waiting for me, now...."

Cross' voice faded like a dream. "Remember what I tell you. Let them go ahead."

Stanley walked to the door, opened it, stepped half through.

A radio voice boomed out of the bright blue sky.

"STANLEY!" it shouted. It was Simpson's voice. "STANLEY! COME OUT AND TALK! COME OUT AND TELL US, STANLEY! STANLEY!"

Althea would not stay in. She walked with him out onto the moist green lawn, in the open.

The heavens were flooded with 'copters whirling. The sun shook in its place. 'Copters hung everywhere, like huge hummingbirds, swiveling, whirring. Five hundred of them, at least, shadowing the lawns and shaking the house-tops.

"OH, THERE YOUR ARE, STANLEY!"

Stanley shaded his eyes. His lips drew away from his teeth in a grimace, as he stared upward, tense and afraid.

"IT'S AFTER THREE O'CLOCK, STANLEY!" came the dull boom of words.

In this moment, with the spiraling 'copters suspended over his lawn, over his wife and children and house, over himself and his beliefs, Stanley swallowed, stepped back, put his hands down and let the idea grow within him. Yes, he would give them their rocket. He would give it to them. You cannot fight the children, he thought. They must have their green apples. If you refuse them, they will find a way around you. Go along with their illogical tide and make 

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