The Fountains of Paradise

"Sorry!" he said. "Everyone tries that, when they realise what's happening. You could cut yourself very badly."

"So you do have an invisible wire. Clever – but what use is it, except for parlour tricks?"

Morgan gave a broad smile. "I can't blame you for jumping to that conclusion; it's the usual reaction. But it's quite wrong; the reason you can't see this sample is that it's only a few microns thick. Much thinner than a spider's web."

For once, thought Rajasinghe, an overworked adjective was fully justified. "That's – incredible. What is it?"

"The result of about two hundred years of solid state physics. For whatever good that does – it's a continuous pseudo-one-dimensional diamond crystal – though it's not actually pure carbon. There are several trace elements, in carefully controlled amounts. It can only be mass-produced in the orbiting factories, where there's no gravity to interfere with the growth process."

"Fascinating," whispered Rajasinghe, almost to himself. He gave little tugs on the ring hooked around his finger, to test that the tension was still there and that he was not hallucinating. "I can appreciate that this may have all sorts of technical applications. It would make a splendid cheese-cutter–"

Morgan laughed. "One man can bring a tree down with it, in a couple of minutes. But it's tricky to handle – even dangerous. We've had to design special dispensers to spool and unspool it – we call them 'spinnerettes'. This is a power-operated one, made for demonstration purposes. The motor can lift a couple of hundred kilos, and I'm always finding new uses for it. Today's little exploit wasn't the first, by any means."

Almost reluctantly, Rajasinghe unhooked his finger from the ring. It started to fall, then began to pendulum back and forth without visible means of support until Morgan pressed a button and the spinnerette reeled it in with a gentle whirr.

"You haven't come all this way, Dr. Morgan, just to impress me with this latest marvel of science – though I am impressed. I want to know what all this has to do with me."

"A very great deal, Mister Ambassador," answered the engineer, suddenly equally serious and formal. "You are quite correct in thinking that this material will have many applications, some of which we are only now beginning to foresee. And one of them, for better or for worse, is going to make your quiet little island the centre of the world. No – not merely the world. The whole Solar System. Thanks to this filament, Taprobane will be the steppingstone to all the planets. And one day, perhaps – the stars."

10. The Ultimate Bridge

Paul and Maxine were two of his best and oldest friends, yet until this moment they had never met nor, as far as Rajasinghe knew, even communicated. There was little reason why they should; no-one outside Taprobane had ever heard of Professor Sarath, but the whole Solar System would instantly recognise Maxine Duval, either by sight or by sound.

His two guests were reclining in the library's comfortable lounge chairs, while Rajasinghe sat at the villa's main console. They were all staring at the fourth figure, who was standing motionless.

Too motionless. A visitor from the past, knowing nothing of the everyday electronic miracles of this age, might have decided after a few seconds that he was looking at a superbly detailed wax dummy. However, more careful examination would have revealed two disconcerting facts. The "dummy" was transparent enough for highlights to be clearly visible through it; and its feet blurred out of focus a few centimetres above the carpet.

"Do you recognise this man?" Rajasinghe asked.

"I've never seen him in my life," Sarath replied instantly. "He'd better be important, for you to have dragged me back from Maharamba. We were just about to open the Relic Chamber."

"I had to leave my trimaran at the beginning of the Lake Saladin races," said Maxine Duval, her famous contralto voice containing just enough annoyance to put anyone less thick-skinned than Professor Sarath neatly in his place. "And I know him, of course. Does he want to build a bridge from Taprobane to Hindustan?"

Rajasinghe laughed. "No – we've had a perfectly serviceable causeway for two centuries. And I'm sorry to have dragged you both here – though you, Maxine, have been promising to come for twenty years."

"True," she sighed. "But I have to spend so much time in my studio that I sometimes forget there's a real world out there, occupied by about five thousand dear friends and fifty million intimate acquaintances."

"In which category would you put Dr. Morgan?"

"I've met him – oh, three or four times. We did a special interview when the Bridge was completed. He's a very impressive character."