No more for me the small-time gambler who folded on a bluff when only a few dollars were at stake. I knew where the big fish swam, and I went after them.

Naturally, dice was my game. Since childhood I had been an expert at cards, but cards do not lend themselves readily to psychokinetic manipulation, without the additional talent of clairvoyance, and Dori had none of that. But how she could make those dice tumble!

By the time the people who had both money and the gambling instinct realized I was one of those infallible phenomena to be avoided, we were rich beyond even my dreams. Suicides and paupers were left in our wake.

It seems that for every advantage a man gains in life, he is faced with a corresponding disadvantage. He must pay the piper. Here I have wealth, and West o' Mars, without Dori.... Well, I anticipate myself.

You may not know it, Mr. Peache, but even now I might find it dangerous to be back on Earth again. It certainly was advisable for me to leave Earth at that time. Some of the men I had broken had not been left without the means to avenge themselves on me.

So Dori and I came to Mars.

Those were the days before there were luxurious space liners. Laugh if you will, Mr. Peache, but they are luxurious; I haven't traveled in them, but I've gone through them at Marsport. When Dori and I came to Mars, passengers were strictly expensive cargo who slept and ate on the centerdeck with the crew and were told brusquely to stay out of the way if they went north of the centerdeck. For a modest woman like Dori—the only woman aboard on this trip—it was an ordeal; always at least one crew member was sleeping or relaxing on the centerdeck, and I had to shield her with a blanket when she dressed or undressed. An inadequate towel was her only screen when she took a shower or went to the toilet.

I had feared trouble because my wife would be the only woman aboard, among a dozen men, on a trip that would last for months. Those fears were groundless. I understand that now women make up an adequate percentage of the crews, but at that time they solved the problem by doctoring the food while aspace.

But tensions mount under such conditions, perhaps more so when their main outlet is suppressed. The terrible thing about the trip, for me, was the deadly monotony. The crewmen had their jobs which, surprisingly to me, kept them busy throughout their duty shifts. Dori, being a woman, was more 

 Prev. P 7/15 next