George O. Smith

“ In construction, I mean. We have accidents where a man is hit by a flying grab hook that is not in any way temporal treated. Common accidents. The real problem, Peter, is to stop accidents. Not to try to avert them after they have happened."
"But this one—"
"So far as the temporal treatment goes, is—or has happened."
"Could you temporal treat the stuff so the mislinks pass through first?"
"Sure," laughed Ben. "Not practical. They have no forewarning then. They just go where the tools will go when used. We can't tell when one of the men will try to grind a mislink chisel. ”

“ Ben lit a cigarette and said: "The box-car crane is a gadget made possible by the temporal treating. Prior to its use they put heavy machinery into the box car by running to the door on a crane and then they dropped it on a dolly and slid and levered it inside and in place. Now they have a crane with a mislink between the pulley block and the grab hook. They hook it on, lift it up, and slide it inside the car, suspended on the mislink that permits the roof of the car to intervene." ”

“ And the same mob-instinct that makes people gather around an injured man will keep the entire gang here, morbidly waiting to see who gets it in what way. There is that element of wonder, too, you know. ”

“ In the war, one country discovers a means of nullifying gravity, which after the war is used to start interplanetary travel. Several years after interplanetary travel starts, the rare metals are discovered in plenty and the cost of shipping is such that the monetary system fails and the system enters a trying period of depression. Now, could you, a man suffering because of the depression, go back and turn aside the avalanche? ”

“ Men outside were working feverishly, however.
"Why?" asked Peter.
"They want to get done. They must get done so that the engine can remove the car where the accident will happen."
"Where is this scene?" asked Peter.
It was out on the loading platform. A mislink crane shunted large cases from the platform, swung around in an arc, and the missing section passed through the door and the crane ran down the length of the car, dropping the case at the far end. The mislink crane returned, the far end reappeared, and another case was hooked to the boom. ”

“ If it does not find room, the man handling the tool several hours before will not be able to set his tool."
"Which was why I couldn't enter with the riveter," added Ben.
"It acts quite normally," said Simpkins, though with some doubt. "You couldn't bring the thing through a barrier if no time-difference exists. Actually, there is a temporal offset in the thing. It may pass through the same space as another time, but not at the same time."
"And you can't lick it," said Ben solemnly. "I purposely left the door open. ”

“ This one is a boom-type crane. The mislinks are in the booms, and when it was swinging back from dropping a case inside, it hit something."
"Something? Can this be identified?"
"With a minor interference, we can feel it," said Simpkins. "With a mislink screwdriver, we can feel the interference. If it is hard, we know that someone has—or will drop something in the way."
"And if it is soft, and moves, you can estimate it to be animal," added Ben.
"Can't you probe with a feeler of some sort?"
"We do—and did. There was a body on the ground after the accident." ”

“ Then, someone would have to forget the victim to keep the rest of the men from getting in the way of the mislink as it resumed operations. But, of course, no one else had been hit, so this, at least, would be successful, and the men were very confident that no matter what they did, they would not be hit. ”

“ We don't really drill or cut metal any more. We beam-drill it and beam-cut it. It's possible to set a screw-cutting beam, but tapping a three-quarter inch hole is not for any construction company."
"I follow."
"Well, in setting blind screws and blind rivets, we have a method whereby the bucker need not crawl around on the inside. Actually, we don't use a bucker any more. The riveter does it all from one side."
"I've heard of blind rivets."
"This is not a self-setting rivet," said Simpkins. "This is a real rivet-set system. Wait, I'll show you one." ”

“ I still say that there is some means of averting the accident, somehow."
"Well, Ben, we've always claimed that we'd tried everything. But they didn't try the electric light until Edison got the idea, and the airplane was a new science when they went to work on it. Young man," said Simpkins, to Peter Wright, "you are a young man with a bright mind for legal intricacies. It usually makes little difference so long as the mind is capable of handling the intricacies, just what the mind was specialized in. ”

“ A man atop of the mountain sees an avalanche start toward a railroad track. The avalanche takes out the track, preventing a meeting between two emissaries on a vital question. The vital question is not settled, and two countries go to war. ”