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Certainly essentials like food, rent, and clothing couldn’t be taxed. People would buy as cheaply as possible, which would force down prices. Which would–

* * * * *

“Where would it go from there?” Sam asked Condley in a shaken voice.

Condley glanced over at the Russian. “I believe Dr. Artomonov can answer that one for you.”

Artomonov was a red-faced, fleshy man with almost no hair and a huge, bristling, gray mustache. His eyes were a startling blue. “Mr. Bending,” he said in excellent English, “you may recall that your depression of the Thirties was not confined to America. All of Europe became involved. The same will happen again, to a greater degree, if your machine is released to the world at this time.” He brushed at his mustache with a fingertip.

“You may wonder what I am doing here, Mr. Bending. You might think that the traditional rivalry which has existed between our countries for so many decades would preclude my being admitted to such a secret session as this one. I might have thought so, too, fifteen years ago. But when something threatens both our countries, the picture changes. We fought together during the Motherland War–what you call World War II–because of the common threat of German Nazi terrorism. We co-operated to suppress the brush-fires that threatened us in Europe and the Middle East during the so-called Tense War. In big things we must co-operate.

“Again we are both threatened by a common source, Mr. Bending, and again we must co-operate.”

Sam Bending felt a chill. The thought that he and his machine were a threat as great as that, a threat to the two greatest nations of Earth, was appalling.

“I am not a scientist, Mr. Bending,” the Russian went on. “My title comes from a degree in economics and political science, not in physical science. As soon as this machine was demonstrated to me, however, I could appreciate its power–not only physically, but economically. I immediately contacted my superiors in Moscow to discuss the problem.

“Naturally, we would like to know the … ah … ‘elegant’ principle behind its operation. Equally naturally”–he smiled politely at Secretary Condley–“you will not tell us. However, my superiors in Moscow assure me that we need not worry on that score; a machine identically similar to yours was invented by one of our brilliant young scientists at the University of Moscow over four years ago. As a patriot, of course, he was willing to have the machine suppressed, and no news of it has leaked out.”

Sam Bending found it difficult to keep from smiling. Sure, he thought, and a man named Popov invented radio, and Yablochkov invented the electric light.

“You see, Mr. Bending,” Dr Artomonov continued, “while we do not have the unstable setup of money-based capitalism, and while we do not need to worry about such antiquated and dangerous things as fluctuating stock markets, we would still find your machine a threat. Communism is based on the work of the people; our economy is based on the labor of the working man. It is thus stable, because every man must work.

“But we, too, have a vast, power network, the destruction of which would cause the unemployment of millions of our citizens. The unemployment alone would cause repercussions all over the Soviet Republics which would be difficult to deal with. We would eventually recover, of course, because of the inherent stability of our system, but the shock would not be good for us.

“The same thing would happen in every industrialized nation on Earth,” Artomonov went on. “In my work with the United Nations, I have studied just such problems. European governments would fall overnight. In Germany, in the 1920s, it was cheaper to burn bundles of one-mark notes than it was to buy firewood with them. Such things will be repeated, not only in the Germanies, but all over Europe.