"It's true that many people have disappeared. But they don't just disappear. Their names appear in gold on the passenger roster until the next platform day, when they walk across the platform to the turnstyle and vanish through it. That suggests to me that the train has something to do with their leaving, that it's planned. I don't buy that idea that it's due to an unstable tether. Most of the people I have known who have disappeared seemed not to be engaged with train life, or even if they were, they have become disengaged for a while before their departure. I'm thinking that the train is aware of that and chooses to send them back where they came from. I don't know how many have gone since I've been on the train; I haven't been keeping count. And I have no real knowledge of why or what happens when a person disappears, only theories. I think that unstable tether idea is merely a theory."

He scratches his head. "I still believe the risks are worth the opportunity to help planets that are in trouble. That's true for me, anyway, and it is true for some of the other passengers. I am just dubious about that unstable tethering theory, as I have said. And as far as my concerns go, yes, I still have only one -- the involuntary tethering. I believe that people should be asked for their permission before they are brought aboard the train, and the best way to do that would be to go to their worlds and set up a recruitment station and ask for volunteers. And give them all the information about the train and its missions, so everybody knows what they're getting themselves into."