"Cut," said Cochrane.

West automatically abandoned his professional delivery. He placidly
re-addressed himself to his beer.

"How about it, Jones?" asked Cochrane. "Dabney's got a variation? What
is it?"

"It's a field of force that doesn't spread out. You set up two plates
and establish this field between them," said Jones curtly. "It's
circularly polarized and it doesn't expand. It's like a searchlight beam
or a microwave beam, and it stays the same size like a pipe. In that
field--or pipe--radiation travels faster than it does outside. The
properties of space are changed between the plates. Therefore the speed
of all radiation. That's all."

Cochrane meditatively seated himself. He approved of this Jones, whose
eyebrows practically met in the middle of his forehead. He was not more
polite than politeness required. He did not express employer-like
rapture at the mention of his employer's name.

"But what can be done with it?" asked Cochrane practically.

"Nothing," said Jones succinctly. "It changes the properties of space,
but that's all. Can you think of any use for a faster-than-light
radiation-pipe? I can't."

Cochrane cocked an eye at Jamison, who could extrapolate at the drop of
an equation. But Jamison shook his head.