"But as close as we are," Kinsman went on, "I'll never 346 know what it's like to be black. And neither will you. He's fought goddamned hard to get where he is now. He's had to jump over hurdles that we can't even imagine."

"Come on now, Chet," Kelly said. "That poor little underprivileged kid from the ghetto—I've been hearing that routine all my life. It's phony as hell."

"People still burn synagogues, Pat. And they still kick niggers. It's getting worse, not better. Frank's got the scars to prove it."

"And I'm supposed to—"

"You're supposed to act like an adult," Kinsman snapped. "You do the job that needs to be done and you bring your family up here where they'll be safe."

"Even with him around?"

"Even with him around," Kinsman said.

Kelly looked doubtful. But some of the anger had left his face.

"Start the paperwork tomorrow first thing," Kinsman said. "That's an order. You are now my aide. And your family comes up on the next available shuttle space."

"Well . . ."

"And while we're at it, dig into the personnel files and find out how many of the permanent residents here have immediate family Earthside."

"My God, are you going to start a rescue service?"

"Call it an immigration service," Kinsman replied. He snapped off the phone and Kelly's face faded from the screen.

Then he touched another button and turned to the big wall screen across from his chair. It showed the Earth.

"You know damned well you can't take them all," he whispered to himself. "I can't save them all. God, there's seven billion of them!"

Kinsman could not sleep that night. He got into his bed and turned off all the lights and display screens and stayed wide awake.

Seven billion of them.

And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars . . . For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against king- dom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes . . . And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days! 347

But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor shall ever be.

"Apocalypse," he whispered to himself.

Sitting up in the sweaty, wrinkled bed he fumbled with the keyboard on the nightstand and then stared at the display screen image of Earth floating in the darkness of his room.

". . . famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes . . . nation shall rise against nation ..."

He squeezed his eyes shut and saw the dead cosmonaut again. Hanging in space. Oxygen lines ripped out.

"By my hand."