“Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the Earth? Declare if thou hast understanding.

“Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? Or hast thou walked in the recesses of the depth? Or hast thou seen the doors of deepest darkness? Canst thou bind the chains of the Pleiades or loosen the cords of Orion? Hast thou comprehended the expanse of the Earth?

“Declare if thou knowst all!”

Three thousand years ago, when those questions had entered the oral history of the Hebrew tribes, they were meant to define the wonders of creation and dare man to comprehend them. According to the Book of Job, man was incompetent to cope with the universe. Man, a poor little beast who, measured against the mind of God and the time frames of the Earth, lived for an instant and then died. The roaring storm declared that God’s reasons were hidden—beyond Hollis, beyond Wayville, beyond all mankind. The answer, it seemed, was simply this: the universe did not necessarily make sense. The cause of all Hollis’s sorrows—the emptiness, her horror at the fate of the Earth—came from a universe now likely to keep more information to itself than she was ever likely to discover from the confines of her stateroom. But that did not discourage her from trying.

When she awoke, with the scraps of the storm still bubbling up from her subconscious, she declared to herself that thou didst indeed have understanding. Had she entered the springs of the sea, or comprehended the expanse of the Earth?

Yes, she told herself pridefully, one could say I’ve done that.

Walked the recesses of the depth, or seen the doors of deepest darkness?

Yes and yes.

Bound the chains of the Pleiades, or explored the shoulder of Orion?

Yes—if we’d had time, we could certainly have done that, too.

Was it blasphemy to say so? Hollis wondered. In a universe that was not supposed to make sense, did it matter?

After she had showered and awakened Jonathan, the illumination slowly brightened, as it did every “morning.” Breakfast was waiting on a “rosewood” table—Earl Grey tea with lemons and honey on the side, English muffins, and a warm dish of something indistinguishable in texture and taste from filet mignon and fried eggs. Hollis could not begin to explain how the silver crabs had managed to replicate Earthly meals without having a chance to taste or analyze them firsthand.

She had barely begun to puzzle over this, as she did every morning, when she noticed that a “porcelain” clock had been added to the room while she slept, and fine “woolen” curtains now framed the place where a cityscape window would have been, but where instead Thaw Tint’s tank wall rose to the ceiling.

“Tell me,” Hollis said, cutting herself a strip of beef, “what it was like in your iceworld. How did you come to discover space?”

“Why?” Thaw Tint asked.

“Because you understand that it would be easier for me if I knew more about you. That’s all. How does one who lives in eternal darkness discover the light-year? On Earth, where the stars are visible at night, men like Galileo were persecuted for saying that the universe was very large and that there existed other worlds. For your own Galileo it must have been a thousand times harder. I can imagine an expedition swimming up to see if and where the sky ended, and finding that it really did end—that you could go up only so far, and you’d bang your head against a ceiling of solid ice. I almost hear your priests on the ground shouting, ‘See! What did we tell you? The universe ends at the crystal sphere. We are at its center. And we are all there is.”