Split Infinity by Piers Anthony Page A

must have been a false alarm. Stile began to feel foolish, and his knees hurt; he had unconsciously put tension on them, and they could not stand up to much of that, anymore.
    Another man came, walking as the other had. This was a lot of traffic for a nonpersonal area like this, at this time of night. Suspicious in itself. Stile watched him carefully.
    The man walked without pause down the hall—and vanished. He did not step to one side, or duck down; he simply disappeared.
    Stile stared. He was a good observer, even through a crack in a crate; he had not mistaken what he had seen.
    Yet this was unlike anything he knew of on Planet Proton. Matter transmission did not exist, as far as he knew—but if it did, this was what it would be like. A screen, through which a person could step—to another location, instantly. Those two men—
    Yet Sheen had gone that way without disappearing, and so had the mech-mouse. So there could not be such a screen set up across the hall. Not a permanent one.
    Should he investigate? This could be important! But it could also be another trap. Again, like a Game-grid: what was the best course, considering the resources and strategy of his anonymous enemy?
    Stile decided to stand pat. He had evidently lost the pursuit, and these disappearing people did not relate to him. He had just happened to be in a position to observe them. Perhaps this was not coincidental. The same concealment this service hall offered for him, it offered for them. If they had a private matter transmitter that they wanted to use freely without advertising it, this was the sort of place to set it up.
    Yet aspects of this theory disturbed him. How could serfs have a matter transmitter, even if such a device existed? No serf owned anything, not even clothing for special occasions, for working outside the domes or in dangerous regions. Everything was provided by the sys-tem, as needed. There was no money, no medium of exchange; accounts were settled only when tenure ended. Serfs could not make such a device, except by adapting it from existing machines—and pretty precise computer accounts were kept, for sophisticated equipment. When such a part was lost, the machine tally gave the alarm. Which was another reason a criminal could not possess a laser weapon without at least tacit Citizen approval.
    Also, why would any serf possessing such a device remain a serf? He could sell it to some galactic interest and retire on another planet with a fortune to rival that of a Proton Citizen. That would certainly be his course, for Citizens were unlikely to be too interested in for-warding development and production of a transport system that did not utilize protonite. Why destroy their monopoly?
    Could the self-willed machines be involved in this?   They might have the ability. But those were men he had seen disappear, and the machines would not have betrayed their secret to men.
    No, it seemed more likely that this was an espionage operation, in which spies were ferried in and out of this dome, perhaps from another planet, or to and from some secret base elsewhere on Proton. If so, what would this spying power do to a genuine serf who stumbled upon the secret?
    A woman appeared in the hall. She had emerged full-formed from the invisible screen, as it were from no-where. She was of middle age, not pretty, and there was something odd about her. She had marks on her body as if the flesh had recently been pressed by something.   By clothing, perhaps.
    Serfs wore clothing on the other side? Only removing it for decent concealment in this society? These had to be from another world!
    Stile peered as closely as possible at the region of disappearances. Now he perceived a faint shimmer, as of a translucent curtain crossing the hall obliquely. Be-hind it there seemed to be the image of trees.
    Trees—in a matter-transmission station? This did not quite jibe! Unless it was not a city there, but a park.   But why decorate such equipment this way?