Free Element 79 by Fred Hoyle Page B

from all large centers of population. It was a long, hazardous journey to reach the City, so immigrants came at first only in a tiny trickle. The immigrants brought labor, craftsmanship, and knowledge. In most ways they gave as much to the City as they took from it. The fields became trimmer, the buildings more substantial, the initial crudities of life were smoothed away. The City became widely known for its beauty, yet because of the remoteness it grew only slowly.
    At last came transportation, first the railroad. Yet the immediate effects of making access to the City much less arduous than before were more preparatory than dramatic. It was the same thing as before, but
a poco a poco
. More immigrants, more development, more prosperity. The railway permitted exports, at first mostly fruit, which at this stage was still of excellent quality. Orange groves were now to be found everywhere throughout the fertile strip of land, stretching back from the sea by the full fifty miles in some places. Prosperity and the amenities of life became added to the natural beauty of the City. Everybody who lived there was entirely convinced of the City’s preeminence as a desirable place to live. This conviction they passed on to their children, so a mystique concerning the City became firmly established. Wealthy folk came from great distances to live there. Spacious homes were built. The way of life was leisurely, almost casual, at this stage.
    Great, far-off industrial centers took note of the City’s “potential.” It was a most pleasant place for successful executives to live in. It would be possible for well-paid executives to live cheek by jowl with the wealthy, for them to build similar homes, for them to share in the social life of the City, even for them to marry into the families of the truly wealthy. Industrial buildings could be erected more cheaply than elsewhere, in spite of the remoteness of the City, because the equable, all round the year, climate demanded very little in the way of tough, solid construction. Some industrial activities could indeed be carried on with advantage in the open air, without any buildings at all. So industry began to move in, at first in a small way of course, then
poco più mosso
. It was while industrial development was thus in its early acceleration that extensive oil deposits were discovered in the vicinity of the City. Here was the first one of the Devil’s jokers slipped into the pack.
    A forest of derricks soon appeared on what used to be a beautiful beach. For the first time an amenity of the City had been destroyed.
    Great riches fell suddenly and unexpectedly into the lap of those who happened to own the oil-bearing land. These riches became the envy of other members of the community. The concept of the desirability of “wealth” had now become firmly established. The concept had first been imported with the rich people from outside, then emphasized by the industrialists from outside. Among the new seekers after wealth were the “real estate men.” So far, dealings in property had consisted in the straightforward buying and selling of houses of quality. It was realized now by the real estate men that an ever-increasing flow of immigrants would eventually yield great profits to those with the cunning to buy more and more of the extensive open areas around the City. These could be “developed,” as the term had it.
    Water was an obvious problem. The natural daily air movement back and forth between land and sea was quite insufficient to provide for a vast increase in the population of the City. Water was therefore taken from the surrounding mountains, water was pumped across the desert from distant rivers. Outlying communities lost their water and their lands became scrub. Once-green mountain valleys became sand-blown.
    There is an old story of a man who chanced to save the life of a king. The king invited his rescuer to demand any reward he should please, expecting, no doubt, that