The going was just a trifle more difficult than covering rocky ground would have been on Earth; Vickers had figured Hastur's gravity as 125% that of Earth.
"Hold it," called out Edgar, punctuating the exclamation by easing himself onto the asteroid's surface. "Does anyone know where we're going?"
"We're off to find the Hartnetts," said Dorothy.
"How nice. And where, pray, may they be?"
"Right here—somewhere."
"Lovely," drawled Edgar, "just lovely. Have any of you stopped to consider how many days and how many weary miles you can cover on this not-as-small-as-it-looks world without finding anything at all except blisters?"
"We tried to contact them," cut in Nick, "but not a peep out of the radio at all. The thing just went dead."
"I'll have to admit," continued Edgar, "that at the very moment I can't think of any better procedure than just striking out in any direction at once. But I rest assured that there is a better way. Therefore, I move that we take it easy until we find one."
"We could use the ship," said Dorothy.
"Inadvisable," objected Nick. "Something tells me we are going to have trouble getting away from this little fiend of a planetoid."
"How about rocket cameras?" cut in Dorothy.
"Huh?"
"I can make them. We'll use just enough fuel to send them up half a mile or so. They'll take pictures, then glide down. We'll keep an eye on them and see where they land; Edgar will also take calculations while they're up—they'll be sort of periscopic photos. Of course we'll get our ship, but we may spot the other one."
Nick tapped the rocky surface pondering. "Only thing wrong with that is: why didn't we see the ship on the way down? We had a much bigger perspective."
"Perhaps too big. Besides we were too well occupied otherwise."
"Okay," sighed Nick. "I can't see any reason for not trying it."
CHAPTER III
MENACE UNSEEN
DOROTHY clasped Nick's hand as firmly as hands can be clasped when swathed in space-mitts. "If the photo didn't deceive us, the ship should be over this ridge."
Nick nodded, shot an impatient glance at the others straggling up the slight incline. Together he and Dorothy mounted the acclivity, peered anxiously at the sweep below.
A little scream of delight came from Dorothy's lips, "There, Nick!"
No doubt about it. The lost Orion lay, partly concealed by upcroppings of rock, less than a mile away. Hastily they made their way down the decline, ran in awkward, elephantine steps toward it. As they approached they could see how beaten and scarred it looked.
They bounded to the port and breathlessly clanged upon it. It was shut tightly. Impatiently they beat upon it until finally it swooshed open and they filed into the airlock. Imperturbably the outer door snapped close behind them, clamlike, and painfully slow the inner port dragged itself open.
The lost Orion!
The air was pure—that they noticed first of all when they had doffed cautiously their helmets. Pure and warm. Quickly they took off the clumsy suits and looked about them. No one was in sight; no greeting came to them.
"Hello!" yelled Nick.
No answer.
It was not as large as the Columbia, this ill-fated craft, but a big ship nonetheless. Hearts beating out ill omens, they searched room after room, finding no one.
"Hello! Hello!" cried Dorothy. Edgar grasped her arm. "Wait," he murmured. "I think I heard an answer."
Silently they followed him, as he led, to a small room. There was a bed, a set of controls—from this point the mechanisms for opening the double doors had been set in motion—a small heating unit, and a large armchair. As their eyes roved about the room, a figure arose unsteadily from the chair and faced them—a tall, gaunt man, white-haired, his eyes looking as if he had been lost for a thousand years.
Wordlessly he stared at them, as Nick stepped forward, his voice husky.
"Steve!"
THE older man looked at him, a sort of dull bewilderment spreading across his face. "Hello, Nick," he said softly. "I was sort of wondering when you'd come. Who are your friends?"
"I'm Dorothy Gilbert," spoke up that person coming forward, "and I think I'd better fix something for you right away, Steve. You look as if you haven't had a square meal since Sinbad went sailing."
The older man grinned wanly. "Guess I haven't been eating any too regularly. Haven't had much company, you see since—"
"Tell us about it later," interrupted Dorothy. "Edgar, break out the rations and help me with this thing. Looks like an old model."
"Nothing to it," murmured Vickers. "I'm Edgar Vickers," he added in Hartnett's direction; "my brother, Bob, is the slack-mouthed individual you see behind me. There's three other fellows in the party, but they stayed back in the ship."
Hartnett sat down on the bed, his eyes wandering from one to another. "Nice girl you have there, Nick," he whispered. "You're not letting any of these other lads get the jump on you, eh?"
"Not a chance," replied Dorothy without looking up, "I'm after the Hartnett fortune because there's no one else I know who is worth marrying, even for the kind of lab I want."
"Did you write the book you always said you would if you were ever marooned, Steve?" asked Nick.
Hartnett nodded. "Guess that's all that kept me from going nuts. All alone here—not strong enough to do much more than take care of myself, write, and send signals out. Didn't go outside much after—"
Dorothy faced him, her eyes misty. "Don't try to soften it Steve—I knew as soon as I came in the ship. Harry's dead, isn't he? Like all the others?"
Hartnett nodded. "Yes—like all the others."
THERE'S not much to tell," said Hartnett slowly, after the meal had been finished. "We started out in the Orion much the same as you did in the Columbia, tested the contracels and decided everything was all right. We noticed this little world here and landed to investigate.
"Only we couldn't get off.
"We'd been going virtually at the speed of light and that warped the fourth dimensional fields which were a basic part of the contracels. We found that the only way we had of getting off this planetoid was by rockets, and rockets weren't enough. We just slid along the surface, battered up the ship, then stopped.
"Then we began to find out things about this world. Some of them were interesting, and some—" he broke off suddenly. "Nick, you or none of your party have been out without full suits have you?"
Nick shook his head.
"Good. Don't. This little world is full of radiations, a good deal of which are undetectable, but nasty nonetheless. Seven of our party succumbed before we suspected anything was wrong, and five more died within the next fortnight from perfectly innocent things which must have acted as catalysts.
"So far as we know, an ordinary suit is protection, but we can't be sure."
"What happened to the others?" asked Bob Vickers.
Hartnett was silent for a moment. "When we landed, one of the rocket fuel tanks was ruptured. Not broken open, just cracked enough to let the stuff vaporize and escape. It started to flood the ship gradually, before we found out. We drew lots to see who would seal off the rooms where it had already penetrated, knowing that the chances were a hundred to one that everyone who went would be blown up. It was a suicide job, but those suicides could keep the entire ship from being blasted to free electrons.
"They did. If you'd come from the other side, you'd have seen the great gaping crater and the hole in the ship."
"I don't understand...." started Dorothy.