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It so happened that for many long weeks there had been lying in New York space port an urgent shipment for Alsakan. And not only was that urgency a one-way affair. For, with the possible exception of a few packets, whose owners had locked them in vaults and would not part with them at any price, there was not a single Alsakanite cigarette left on Earth!
Luxuries, then as now, soared feverishly in price with scarcity. Only the rich smoked Alsakanite cigarettes, and to those rich the price of anything they really wanted was a matter of almost complete indifference. And plenty of them wanted, and wanted badly, their Alsakanite cigarettes. There was no doubt of that.