“Well, take a look at it this way,” Hastings said after the transaction. “A blue garnet is valuable. So valuable that a man might bribe his way to freedom with it. That’s a commendable price. Perhaps there are no blues, so the authorities believe they’re safe; or it may be their subtle way of telling us that there is no such thing as a reprieve. But if there is such a thing—a blue garnet, I mean—it is certain that it is a lot more valuable than a prisoner or a principle. Now all of us here are criminals—”

“I ain’t!” Framy yelled. “I ain’t no criminal. I was—”

“FRAMED!” the group chorused.

“Well, I was,” Framy said, hurt.

“...Criminals, imprisoned here for the rest of our unnatural lives. There isn’t any one of us here who doesn’t want to get out more than anything else he can think of. There isn’t any one of us who has a chance at all, unless he wants to take the Hard Trek. Except for the one who happens to uncover the blue stone.

“Now if I had a blue garnet right here in my hand, like this”—he extended a closed fist—“and I said, ‘Gentlemen, I have found eureka and I’m going to leave you now...!’”

The fingers of his hand slipped apart a little, accidentally, it seemed. A touch of blue showed through. They watched in shocked silence.

Hastings made as if to rise. “Well, freedom is calling me!” he sang out gaily. “Be seeing you—never!”

Three flying bodies crashed him to the floor, as two men and a woman launched themselves simultaneously. One grabbed his outflung arm and wrenched the hand open with cruel force. A fragment of blue cloth fluttered out.

They turned him loose silently, the avarice in their faces fading. Hastings heaved himself upright, rubbing his arm. “Maybe you get my meaning now,” he said. “You can’t go free unless you make your garnet known. And when you do...”

•  •  •

Garnet was hard on Aton. She reviled him every time she saw him, and lost no opportunity to make him miserable. His meals were difficult. Garnet claimed that his offerings were too small or had flaws, or merely denied he had given her one, thus forcing two or even three for a single package.

Aton took it. He never argued with her, always thanked her for the food as though she were doing him a favour. He stood silent while she yelled at him, simply looking at her. At times he would come to her for no apparent reason, just to sit and listen to her scream at him.