Gibbons sat quietly, not letting his alertness show, until Warwick got them quieted down. Then Warwick said, wiping sweat from his-brow: "Ernie, I think you've got some explaining to do."

"Certainly, Mr. Moderator. The liquidation will be as orderly as you will let it be. Those who have: deposits will be paid...in banknotes, that being what was deposited. Those who owe money to the bank-well, I don't know; it depends on the policies the council sets up. I suppose I'm bankrupt. I can't know until you tell me what you mean when-you say my bank is being 'nationalized.'

"But I have bad to take this step: Top Dollar Trading Post is no longer buying with banknotes-they may be worthless. Each deal will have to be barter. But we will continue to sell for banknotes. But I took down the posted prices just before I came here tonight...because the stock I have on hand may be all I ever have with which to redeem those banknotes. Which could force me to raise prices. It all depends on whether 'nationalize' is simply another word for 'confiscate.'"

Gibbons spent several days explaining to Warwick the elementary principles of banking and currency, patiently and with good humor-to Warwick by Hobson's choice because, the other selectmen found that they were too busy with their farms or businesses to take on the chore. There had been one candidate for the job of national banker or state treasurer (no agreement as yet on title) from outside the selectmen, a farmer named Learner, but his self-nomination got nowhere despite his claim of generations of experience in banking plus a graduate degree in such matters.

Warwick got his first shock while he was taking inventory, with Gibbons, of the contents of the safe (almost the only safe on New Beginnings and the only one of Earth manufacture); "Ernie, where's the money?"

"What money, Duke?"

"What money?' Why, these account books show that you've taken in thousands and thousands of dollars. Your own trading post shows a balance of nearly a million. And I know you've been collecting mortgage payments on three or four dozen farms-and haven't loaned hardly anything for a year or more. That's been one of the major complaints, Ernie, why the selectmen just had to act-all that money going into the bank and none coming out. Money scarce everywhere. So where's the money, man?"

"I burned it," Gibbons answered cheerfully.

"What?"

"Certainly. It was piling up and getting too bulky. I didn't dare keep it outside the safe even though we don't have much theft here-if somebody stole it, it could ruin me. So far the past three years, as money came into the bank, I've been burning it. To keep it safe."

"Good God!"

"What's the trouble, Duke. It's just wastepaper."

"'Wastepaper'? It's money."

"What is 'money,' Duke? Got any on you? Say a ten-dollar bill?" Warwick, still looking shocked, dug out one. "Read it, Duke," Gibbons urged. "Never mind the fancy engraving and the pretty paper that can't be made here as yet-read what it says."

"It says it's ten dollars."

"So, it does. But the important part is where it says that this bank will accept that note at face, value in payment of debts to the bank." Gibbons took out of his sporran a thousand dollar banknote, set fire to it while Warwick watched in horrified fascination. Gibbons rubbed the char off his fingers. "Wastepaper, Duke, as long as it's in my possession. But if I let it get into circulation, it becomes my IOU that I must honor. Half a moment while I record that serial number; I keep track of what I burn so that I know how much is still in circulation. Quite a lot, but I can tell you to the dollar. Are you going to honor my IOU's? And what about debts owed to the bank? Who gets paid? You? Or me?"

Warwick looked baffled. "Ernie, I just don't know. Hell, man, I'm a mechanic by trade. But you heard what they said at the meeting."

"Yeah, I heard. People always expect a government to work miracles-even people who are fairly bright other ways. Let's lock up this junk and go over to the Waldorf and have a beer and discuss it."

"-or should be, Duke, simply a public bookkeeping service and credit system in which the medium of exchange is stable. Anything more and you are jiggering with other people's wealth, robbing Peter to pay Paul.

"Duke, I did my best to keep the dollar stable by keeping key prices stable-seed wheat in particular. For over twenty years the Top Dollar Trading Post has paid the same price for prime seed wheat, then resold it at the same markup- even if I took a loss and sometimes I did. Seed wheat isn't too good a money standard; it's perishable. But we don't have gold or uranium as yet, and it has to be something.

"Now look, Duke-when you reopen as a treasury, or a government central bank, or whatever you call it, you're certain to have pressures on you to do all sorts of things. Lower the interest rates. Expand the money supply. Guarantee high prices to the farmer for what he sells, guarantee low prices for what he buys. Brother, you're going to be called worse names than they call me, no matter what you, do."

"Ernie-there's only one thing for it. You know how...so you've got to take the job of community treasurer."

Gibbons laughed heartily. "No, sirree, bub, I've had that headache for more than twenty years; now it's your turn. You grabbed the sack, now you hold it. If I let you put me back in as banker, all that will happen is that they will lynch both of us."

Changes-Helen Mayberry married the Widower Parkinson, went to live with him in a small new house on the farm now worked by two of his sons; Dora Brandon became schoolmistress of what was still called "Miss Mayberry's Primary School." Ernest Gibbons, no longer banker, was now silent partner in Rick's General Store, while his own warehouses bulged with cargo for the Andy J. if and when. Soon, he hoped, as the new inventory tax was eating into cash he had held out for trading, and inflation was eating into the buying power of that cash. Better hurry, Zack, before we are nibbled to death by ducks!

At last the ship appeared in New Beginnings' sky, and Captain Zaccur Briggs came down with the first load of the fourth wave-almost all of them quite old. Gibbons refrained from comment until the partners were alone:

"Zack, where did you find those walking corpses?"

"Call it charity, Ernest. That sounds better than what did happen."

"Such as?"

"Captain Sheffield, if you want our ship to go back to Earth again, you are welcome to take her there yourself. Not me. Not there. If a man is seventy-five years old there now, he becomes officially dead. His heirs inherit, he can't own property, his ration books are canceled-anybody can kill him just for the hell of it. I didn't get these passengers on Earth; they were refugees at Luna City and I took as many as I could-no messroom passengers; cold-sleep or nothing. I insisted on payment in hardware and pharmaceuticals, but cold-sleep let me hold down the price per head. I think we'll break even. If not, we've got investments on Secundus; I haven't lost money for us. I think."

"Zack, you worry too much. Make money, lose money- who cares? The idea is to enjoy it. Tell me where we are going next, and I can begin picking cargo-I've got twice the metric tonnage we can stow. While you get her loaded, I'll liquidate what we aren't lifting and invest the proceeds. Leave it with a Howard, that is." Gibbons looked thoughtful. "This new situation probably means no Clinic here any time soon?"

"I think that is certain, Ernest. Any Howard who needs rejuvenation soon had better take passage with us; we are bound to hit Secundus in a leg or six, no matter where we go. Then you are definitely coming along? All over your problem? What became of that baby girl? The short-lifer."