Chapter 3

"Radio from New York says that a bomb missed LA and hit the ocean. That was a close one."

Karnes nodded silently, and leaned back in the stewardess' seat to think.

* * * * *

No wonder Brittain had been so anxious to get out of New York.

New York would be destroyed, but that was inevitable. The thing that had bothered him, his dilemma, was solved.

Was this the real Earth that he lived in, or a museum that had been set up by the Galactics? If it was old Earth, then man would solve his present problems and go on to solve the problem of time travel and interstellar transportation. The present war would be just another little incident in the far past, like the battles of Gettysburg and Agincourt.

* * * * *

And if it were the museum Earth? No difference. For the Galactics had decided not to interfere. They had decided to let the race of Earth go on as it was--exactly as it had gone before. It made no difference, really. _No difference at all._ A perfect duplication of an original _was_ the original, in every meaningful way.

"Funny," said the pilot abruptly, "I'm not getting any signal from New York."

Karnes took a deep breath and bit at his lower lip. But he did not look toward the horror that was New York. The city was gone, but the world was there--solid and real!

_You'd better expand your museum a little bit, boys_, he thought. _We'll need to include Mars and Venus before very long. And then the stars._

* * * * *

End of Project Gutenberg's Instant of Decision, by Gordon Randall Garrett