The Project Gutenberg EBook of Half Around Pluto, by Manly Wade Wellman

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license


Title: Half Around Pluto

Author: Manly Wade Wellman

Release Date: October 30, 2019 [EBook #60595]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF AROUND PLUTO ***




Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

Their glassite space helmets fogged, and their metal glove joints stiffened in the incredible surface cold: but the two men who could work finished their job. In the black sky glistened the little arclight of the sun, a sixteen-hundredth of the blaze that fell on Earth. Around them sulked Pluto's crags and gullies, sheathed with the hard-frozen pallor that had been Pluto's atmosphere, eons ago.

From the wrecked cylinder of the scout rocket they had dragged two interior girders, ready-curved at the ends. These, clamped side by side with transverse brackets and decked with bulkhead metal, managed to look like a sled.

At the rear they set a salvaged engine unit. For steering, they rigged a boom shaft to warp the runners right or left. For cargo, they piled the sled with full containers, ration boxes, the foil tent, what instruments they could detach and carry, armfuls of heat-tools, a crowbar, a hatchet, a few other items.

Moving back from the finished work, one of them stumbled against the other. Instantly the two puffy, soot-black shapes were crouched, gloved fists up, fierce in the system's duskiest corner.

Then the moment passed. Warily, helmets turned toward each other, they went back in the half-stripped wreck.

In the still airtight control room, lighted by one bulb, their officer stirred on his bedstrip. His tunic had been pulled off, his broken left arm and collarbone set and splinted. Under a fillet of bandage, his gaunt young face looked pale, but he had his wits back.

"The appropriate question," he said, "is 'What happened?'"

The two men were removing their helmets. "Conked and crashed, sir," said Jenks, the smaller one, uncovering a sallow, hollow-cheeked face.

Lieutenant Wofforth sat up, supporting himself on his sound arm. "How long have I been out?"

"Maybe forty hours, sir. Delirious. Corbett and me did the best we could. Take it easy, sir," he said as Wofforth began to get up. "Lie back. We've done what Emergency Plan Six says—bolted a sled together and coupled on a sound engine unit for power."

"Quite a haul back to base," said Wofforth, almost cheerfully. His eyes were bright, as though he savored the idea. "About halfway around Pluto. We'd better start now, or they'll get tired of waiting."

"They've gone, sir," Corbett growled before Jenks could gesture him to silence. He was beefy, slit-eyed. "We saw the jets going sunward this morning."

Wofforth winced. "Gone," he said. "That's right. I didn't stop to think. You said forty hours.... They couldn't wait that long. We're past opposition already, getting farther away all the time. They had to go, or they wouldn't have made it."

He stood up uncertainly and reached for his ripped tunic. Corbett stepped over and helped him slide his uninjured arm into the right sleeve, then to fasten and drape the tunic over his splinted left arm and shoulder.

"We'll just have to get back to Base Camp and wait," said Wofforth grimly.

"Sir," said Jenks, "our radio is gone. I tried to patch it up, but it was gone. When they didn't get a signal, they must have thought—"

"Nonsense!" Wofforth broke in. "They'll have left us supplies. They couldn't wait, signal or none. Our job is to get back, and stick it out there until they come for us."

He sat at the control and began to write in the log book. Corbett and Jenks drifted together at the other end of the room.

"You meat-head," snarled Jenks under his breath. "You knew he took the berth to Pluto because the first mate was a lady—Lya Stromminger."

"He had to know they were gone," protested Corbett, equally fierce.

"Not flat like you gave it. He came here to be with her. Now she's jetted away without him. How does a man feel when a woman's done that—"

"Stop blathering, you two, and help me into my suit," called Wofforth, rising again. "We're going to rev up that sled engine and get out of here!"

Outside, the sled lay ready under the frigid sky. Wofforth tramped around it, leaned over and poked the load.

"Too much," said his voice in their radios. "Keep the synthesizer, the tent, these two ration boxes. Wait, keep the crowbar and the hatchet. Dump the rest."

"We travel that light, sir?" said Jenks doubtfully.

"I've been figuring," said Wofforth. "We're on the far side of Pluto from Base Camp. That makes ten thousand miles, more or less. Pluto's day is nineteen hours and a minute or so, Earth time. We can travel only by what they humorously call daylight. And we'd better get there in ten days—a thousand miles every nine and a half hours—or maybe we won't get there at all."

"How's that, sir?" asked Corbett.

"The heaters in these suits," Wofforth reminded him. "Two hundred and forty hours of efficiency, and that's all. Well, it's noon. Let's take off."

His voice shook. He was still weak. Jenks helped him sit on the two lashed ration boxes, and slung a mooring strap across his knees. Then Jenks took the steering boom, and Corbett bent to start the engine.

When the arclight sun set in the west, they had traveled more than four hours over country not too rugged to slow them much. Darkness closed in fast while Jenks and Corbett pitched the pyramidal tent of metal foil and clamped it down solidly. They spread and zipped in the ground fabric, set up lights and heater inside, and began to pipe in thawed gases from the drifts outside.

After their scanty meal, Corbett and Jenks sought their bedstrips, on opposite sides of the tent. Wofforth tended the atomic heater for minutes, until the sound of deep breathing told him that his companions were asleep.

Then he put on his spacesuit, clumsy with his single hand to close seams. He picked up sextant and telescope, and slipped out into the Plutonian night.

It was as utterly black as the bottom of a pond of ink. But above Wofforth shone the faithful stars, in the constellations mapped by the first star-gazers of long ago. He made observations, checked for time and position. He chuckled inside his helmet, as though congratulating himself. Back in the tent, he opened the log book and wrote:

Wriggling out of his space gear, he lay down, asleep almost before his weary limbs relaxed.

Everyone was awake before dawn. They made coffee on the heater, and broke out protein biscuits for breakfast.

As the tiny sun winked into view over the horizon, they loaded the sled. Corbett slouched toward the idling engine at the tail of the sled.

"No, get on amidships," said Wofforth. "I'll take over engine."

"My job—" began Corbett.

"You're relieved. Strap yourself on the ration boxes. That's right. Jenks, steer again. Make for the level ahead."

With his right hand Wofforth ran a length of pliable cable around his waist and through a ring-bolt on the decking. He touched the engine controls, and they pulled away from camp.

The sled coursed over great knoll-like swellings of the terrain, coated with the dull-pale frozen atmosphere. Beyond, it gained speed on a vast flat plain, almost as smooth as a desert of glass.

"What's this big rink. Lieutenant?" asked Jenks.

"Maybe a sea, or maybe just a sunken area, full of solid gases. Stand by the helm, I'm going to gun a few more M. P. H. out of her."

"No wind," grunted Corbett. "Nothing moving except us. The floor of hell."

"If you was in hell, the rest of us would be better off," said Jenks sourly.

Wofforth began to sing, though he did not feel like it:

At camp that night he wrote in the log book:

"What's for supper?" bawled Corbett, entering. "I could eat a horse."

"That'd be cannibalism," said Jenks at once.

"Yah, you splinter! Don't eat any lizards, then."

Spirits good, Wofforth corrected his entry, and closed the log book. He thought of Lya Stromminger. She was a most efficient officer. Her hair was black as night on Pluto, and her eyes as bright as the faraway sun.

Wofforth wrote in his log book:

He wrote in his log book:

He wrote in his log book:

"Lieutenant," said Jenks from across the tent, as Wofforth closed the book.

"Well?"

"We know you're in command. This party and all of Pluto. But we ask permission to state our case."

"What case is your case?" demanded Wofforth, rising. "I'm doing my best to get you back to Base Camp."

"Sure," said Corbett. "Sure. But why Base Camp?"

"You know why."

"That's right, we know why," agreed Jenks, and Corbett grinned in his ten days' tussock of beard.

"They'll have left supplies for us," Wofforth went on. "Shelter and food and fuel and instruments. They'll expect us to reach Base Camp and hold it down for the next attempt to reach Pluto."

"We know why," repeated Jenks. "And that's not why, lieutenant. Let me talk, sir. It's a dead man talking."

"You won't die," snapped Wofforth. "I'll get you both there alive."

He stepped to where, in one corner, he had managed a bath—a hollow in the frozen ground, lined by pushing the floor fabric into it. From the heater he ran tepid, clean water into it. He clipped a mirror to the tent foil, searched out an automatic razor, and began to shave his own dark young thatch of beard.

"You're proving my point, lieutenant," said Jenks. "Policing up your face to look pretty."

"Why not?" growled Wofforth, mowing another swath of whiskers.

"No reason why not. Ten, twenty years from now they'll find your body—whenever the inner orbits get to where they can boom off another expedition. You'll look young and clean-shaved. You know who'll weep."

Wofforth lowered the razor in his good hand and glared at the two. They grinned in the bright light opposite him. They looked as if they hoped he'd see the joke.

"I said it's a dying man that's talking," said Jenks again. "Won't you let me say my dying say, lieutenant? Let's all die honest."

"I'm going to get you there," Wofforth insisted.

"Ah, now," said Corbett, as though persuading a naughty child. "You think they've left twenty years' worth of supplies to keep us going? The ship didn't carry that much, even if they left it all." He grinned mirthlessly. "I can figure what you're figuring, lieutenant," he went on, with a touch of Jenks' sly manner. "You die, young and brave. You'll shave up again before you lie down and let go. And when the next shipload arrives there'll be you, lying like a statue of your good-looking young self, frozen stiff. Am I right?"

Corbett was right, Wofforth admitted to himself. The man was more than a great meaty lump, after all, to see another man's unspoken thought so clearly.

"Then," Jenks took it up, "First Mate Lya Stromminger will have a look. She may command the new expedition. She'll be promoted away up to Admiral or higher—twenty years of brilliant service—gone gray around the edges, but still a lovely lady. There you'll lie before her eyes, young and brave as you was when she deserted you. She'll cry, won't she? And hot tears can't thaw you out or wake you up—"

"Shut your heads, both of you!" shouted Wofforth, so fierce and loud that the foil tent wall vibrated as with a gale in the airless night.

But they had guessed true. He'd wanted to be found at Base Camp. He'd wanted Lya Stromminger to know, some day, that she'd blasted off and left behind the man most worthy of all men on all worlds....

"Everybody takes a hot bath tonight," said Wofforth. "We'll all sleep better for it. Tomorrow's our last day on the trail."

"To do two thousand miles?" said Jenks.

"To do all of that. The expedition mapped an area at least that wide around Base Camp, and it's slick and smooth. We can almost slide in."

"All slick and smooth but just this side of Base Camp, lieutenant," said Jenks.

"How do you mean?"

"That string of craters. Don't you remember? It's just this side—east of Base Camp. This sled'll never go over that, sir."

"Nor around," Corbett put in. "We'd have to detour maybe three thousand miles. And the heaters in our suits won't last."

"I know about the craters," said Wofforth. "Well take care of them when we reach them."

Stripping, he lowered his body into the makeshift tub and began to scrub himself one-handed.

He wakened in the morning to the sound of furious argument.

Corbett and Jenks, of course. A trifle—division of the breakfast ration, or of the breakfast chores—had set off their nerves like trains of explosive. Even as Wofforth rose from his bedstrip, Corbett swung a cobble-like fist at Jenks' gaunt, grimacing face. The nimbler, smaller man ducked and sidled away. Corbett took a lumbering step to close in on his enemy, and Jenks darted a hand to his belt behind, then brought it forward again with an electro-automatic pistol.

"I've been keeping this for you!" Jenks shrilled. "I'll just diminish the population of Pluto by thirty-three and one-third percent!"

"Hold it!" bellowed Wofforth.

He was too late. A stream of bullets chattered through Corbett's body, folding him over and ripping through the paper-thin wall of the tent. Air whistled out; the tent began to collapse.

Jenks, pinned under Corbett's body, was squealing like a pig. "Lieutenant, help me—!"

Wofforth saw in an instant that the wall could not be patched in time; the bullets had torn loose an irregular strip, pressure had done the rest: even now, the tent was only a few seconds away from complete collapse. As he stumbled across the floor toward the spacesuits, his heart was laboring and his chest straining for breath. Spots swam in front of his eyes. He found the topmost spacesuit by touch, and fumbled for the helmet. The tent drifted down on his head in soft, murderous folds. He opened the valve, shoved his face into the helmet, and gulped precious oxygen. His dulled awareness brightened again, momentarily; but he knew he was still a dead man unless he could get into the suit before pressure fell completely. Numbed fingers plucked at the suit opening. Somehow he got the awkward garment over his legs, closed and locked the torso, pulled down the helmet....

He was lying in darkness, with a low, steady hiss of oxygen in his ears. He rolled over weakly, got to his feet. He turned on his helmet light. He was propping up a gray cave of metal foil, that fell in stiff creases all around him. At his feet were the bodies of Jenks and Corbett. Both were dead.

After a while, clumsily, painfully, he dragged the two corpses free of the tent. He found the heater and thawed a hole in the frozen surface, big enough for both. He tumbled them in, then undercut the edges of the hole with the heater, so that chunks fell in and covered them. While he watched, the cloud of vapor he had made began to settle, slowly congealing on the broken surface and blurring it over again. In a year, there would be no mark here to show that the surface had been disturbed. In a thousand years, it would still be the same.

In the first ray of dawn he flung all supplies from the sled except the fuel containers. He checked the engine, and started it.

Into his belt-bag he thrust the log book. Nothing else went aboard the sled—no food, no water container, no tools, instruments or oxygen tanks. The tent he left lying there, with all that had been carried inside the night before.

As the sun rose clear of the distant rim of the plain to eastward, he rigged a line to the steering boom, then lashed himself securely within reach of the engine. Steering by the taut line, he started westward, slowly at first, then faster. It was as he had hoped. The lightened sled attained and held a greater speed than on any previous day.

"I'll make it," he said aloud, with nobody else to listen on all Pluto. "I'll make it!"

Faster he urged the engine's rhythm, and faster. He clocked its speed by the indicators on the housing. A hundred and fifty miles an hour. A hundred and sixty; not enough. Whipping the boom line tight around his waist to hold his course steady, he sighted between the upcurve of the runner forward. There was level, smooth-frozen country, mile upon mile. He speeded up to one hundred and seventy-five miles an hour. More. The sled hummed at every joining.

At noon, he had done a good thousand miles. At mid-afternoon, sixteen hundred. Two and a half hours of visibility left, and more than four hundred miles to go.

"I can do those on my head," muttered Wofforth to himself, and then, far in the distance, the flat rim of the horizon was flat no longer.

It had sprung up jagged, full of points and bulges. Speeding toward it, he steered by the line around his waist while he cut his engine. He came close at fifty miles an hour, almost a crawl.

Some ancient volcanic action had thrown up those mountains, like a rank of close-drawn sentries. The sled could not cross them anywhere. Still reducing speed, Wofforth drew close to a notch, but the notch gave into a crater, a great shallow saucer two miles in diameter and filled with shadows below, so that Wofforth could not gauge its depth. Opposite, another notch—perhaps once the crater had been a lake, with water running in and out. If he had come there at noon, he could have seen the bottom, and perhaps—

"But it isn't noon." Wofforth was talking to himself again. His voice sounded thin and petulant in his own ears. "By noon tomorrow, the heat will be out of this suit."

He stopped the sled, unlashed himself and trudged to the notch. He stood in it, looking down, then across.

The little bright jewel of the sun, sagging toward the horizon, showed him the upper reaches of the crater's interior, pitched at an angle of perhaps fifty degrees.

Even if it had been noon, it would have been no use. The sled could never climb a slope like that.

Then he looked again, this way and that. He nodded inside his helmet.

He might as well try.

Returning to the sled, he started the engine and lashed himself fast again. He steered away from the crater, and around. He made a great looping journey of twenty miles or so across the plain, building speed all the time.

As he rounded the rear curve of his course, he was driving along at two hundred and sixty miles an hour, and he had to apply pressure to the boom with both hand and knees to point the sled back straight for the notch. Straightening his humming vehicle into a headlong course, he leaned forward and sighted between the upcurved runners.

"Now!" he urged himself, and watched the break in the crater wall rush toward him.

It greatened, yawned. He leaped through, and with a groaning gasp of prayer he dragged the boom over to steer the sled right.

It worked, as he had not dared hope. The runners bounced, bit. Then he was racing around the inside of the great cup's rim, like a hurtling bubble on the inner surface of a whirlpool's funnel. Two miles across, three miles and more on the half diameter—the engine laboring up to three hundred miles an hour, centrifugal force holding it there—

Little more than thirty seconds raced by when he knew he had won. He saw the far notch growing near. He came to it in a last booming rush, and hurled his whole weight against the boom to face the runners into the notch.

Under the low-dropping sun, he and his sled shot into open country beyond the range.

His right arm felt dead from shoulder to fingertip. His head roared and drummed with the racing of his blood. His face had tired spots in it, where muscles he had never used before had locked into an agonized grimace.

On he sped, straight west, gasping and gurgling and mumbling in crazy triumph.

An hour, an anticlimactic hour wherein the sled almost steered itself over the smoothest of plain, and up ahead he spied the black outline of Base Camp.

It was a sprawling, low structure, prefabricated metal and plastic and insulation, black outside to gather what heat might come from outer space. It held aloof on the dull frozen plain from the irregular stain where the expedition ship had braked off with one set of rockets and had soared away with another set. Larger, more familiar, grew Base Camp with each second of approach. Shakily Wofforth cut his engine, slowed from high speed to medium, to a hundred miles an hour, to sixty, to fifty. He made a final circle around Base Camp, and let it coast in with the engine off, to within twenty yards of the main lock panel.

He got up, on legs that shook inside his boots. He felt his heart still racing, his head still ringing. He sighed once, and walked close, his gauntlet fumbling at the release button on the lock panel.

But the button did not respond.

"Jammed," he said. "No—locked."

He couldn't get in. He had reached Base Camp, but he could not get in. They hadn't counted on his return. They'd gone off and left Base Camp locked up.

He sagged against the lock panel, and cursed once, with an utter and furious resignation.

He felt himself slipping. He was going to faint. His legs would not hold him up. He was slipping forward—seemed to be sinking into the massive and unyielding outer surface of Base Camp. It was a dream. Or it was death.

He did not lose all hold on his awareness. He had a sense of lying at full length, and blinding light flashes that made his eyelids jump. And a tug somewhere, as though his helmet was coming off. He would have put out a hand to see, but his left arm was broken, and his right arm limp from weariness.

"You're back," said a voice he knew, a voice strained with wonder. "You managed. I knew you would."

"Now," said Wofforth, "I know it's a dream. We dream after we die."

A hand was cupped behind his neck, lifting him to a sitting position. He felt warm fluid at his lips. "It's no dream," said the voice beseechingly. "Look at me."

"I don't dare. The dream will go away."

But he opened his eyes and looked at her hair like Plutonian night, her eyes like bright stars. "Lya," he said. "I'm going to call you Lya."

"Please call me Lya."

"I'd be bound to dream about you. I've dreamed about you so much.... Owww!"

He got his right hand up to cherish his tingling cheek.

"So you felt that," she said. "Now you know you're awake. Or must I slap you again?"

"I'm sorry, Madame."

"You called me Lya. Can you stand up? I'll help you."

She helped him. He stood up, there in the admission chamber of Base Camp. Lya Stromminger was smiling, and she was crying, too.

"You didn't go away," he said. "You're still here." The weight of his odyssey, half around Pluto, was beginning to stagger him.

"No, I stayed. I knew you'd come back. I knew Pluto couldn't kill you or keep you from coming back."

He drank more from the cup she held to his lips.

"We'll wait together for them to come with the next expedition," she promised him.

"Twenty years? Supplies—"

"There'll be plenty. Don't you know about Pluto? Didn't those craters, those old volcanoes, tell you?"

Thinking of how he had crossed the crater, Wofforth shuddered.

"Pluto is colder than anybody even guessed—outside. But inside are the internal fires—like all the solid planets. We made our tests and we can tap them. I kept the instruments for that. It means we'll have power, and can make our synthetic foods and so on for as long as we need them. You are I are the inhabitants here—"

He stumbled to a chair and sat. "Twenty years—" he said.

Her arm was still around him. Her hair brushed his cheek. "It won't be long. We have so much to say to each other."

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Half Around Pluto, by Manly Wade Wellman

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF AROUND PLUTO ***

***** This file should be named 60595-h.htm or 60595-h.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
        http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/5/9/60595/

Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net


Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
redistribution.



*** START: FULL LICENSE ***

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
http://gutenberg.org/license).


Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
electronic works

1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.

1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
works.  See paragraph 1.E below.

1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.

1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
States.

1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
copied or distributed:

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license

1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
1.E.9.

1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.

1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.

1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg-tm License.

1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.

1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
that

- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."

- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
     License.  You must require such a user to return or
     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
     Project Gutenberg-tm works.

- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
     of receipt of the work.

- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.

1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.

1.F.

1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
your equipment.

1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.

1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
opportunities to fix the problem.

1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.

1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.

1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.


Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm

Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
people in all walks of life.

Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.


Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation

The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.

The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
page at http://pglaf.org

For additional contact information:
     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
     Chief Executive and Director
     gbnewby@pglaf.org


Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation

Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.

The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
particular state visit http://pglaf.org

While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.

International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.

Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate


Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
works.

Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.


Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.


Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:

     http://www.gutenberg.org

This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.