«But Rod, when you rushed out on the balcony, you didn’t have the goggles on any more. Couldn’t he have stopped you, by hypnosis?»
«Well, he didn’t. I guess there wasn’t time for him to take over control of me. He did flash an illusion at me. It wasn’t either Barr Maxon or Willem Deem I saw standing there at the last minute. It was you, Jane.»
«I?»
«Yep, you. I guess he knew I’m in love with you, and that’s the first thing flashed into his mind; that I wouldn’t dare use the sword if I thought it was you standing there. But it wasn’t you, in spite of the evidence of my eyes, so I swung it.»
He shuddered slightly, remembering the will power he had needed to bring that sword down.
«The worst of it was that I saw you standing there like I’ve always wanted to see you — with your arms out toward me, and looking at me as though you loved me.»
«Like this, Rod?»
And this time he was not too dumb to get the idea.
NOTHING SIRIUS
PLEASANTLY, I was taking the last coins out of the machines and counting them while Ma was entering the figures in the little red book. I called them out as usual. Nice figures they were.
Yes, we’d had a good play on both of the Sirius planets, Freda and Thor. Especially on Thor. Those little Earth colonies out there are starved to death for entertainment of any kind, and money doesn’t mean a thing to them. They’d stood in line to get into our tent and push their coins into the machines. So even with the plenty high expense of the trip, we’d done all right by ourselves.
Yes, they were right comforting, those figures Ma was entering. ’Course she’d add them up wrong, but then Ellen would straighten it out when Ma finally gave up. Ellen’s good at figures, and got a good one herself, even if I do say it of my own daughter. Credit for that goes to Ma, anyway, not to me. I’m built on the general lines of a space tug.
I put back the coin-box of the Rocket Race and looked up. «Ma,» I started to say. Then the door of the pilot’s compartment opened and John Lane stood there. Ellen, across the table from Ma, put down her book and looked up too. She was all eyes and they were shining.
Johnny saluted smartly, the regulation salute with which a private-ship pilot is supposed to honor the owner and captain of the ship. It always got under my skin, that salute, but I couldn’t talk him out of it because the rules said he should do it.
He said, «Object ahead, Captain Wherry.»
«Object?» I queried. «What kind of object?»
You see, from Johnny’s voice and Johnny’s face you couldn’t guess whether it meant anything or not. Mars City Polytech trains ’em to be strictly deadpan and Johnny had graduated magna cum laude. He’s a nice kid but he’d announce the end of the world in the same tone of voice he’d used to announce dinner, if it was a pilot’s job to announce dinner.
«It seems to be a planet, sir,» was all he said.
Quite a while it took for his words to sink in.
«A planet?» I asked, not particularly brilliantly. I stared at him, hoping that he’d been drinking or something. Not because I had any objections to his seeing a planet sober, but because if Johnny ever unbent to the stage of taking a good drink, the alky would probably dissolve some of the starch out of his backbone. Then I’d have someone to swap stories with. It gets lonesome traveling through space with two women and a conscientious Polytech grad who follows the rules.
«A planet, sir. An object of planetary dimensions, I should say. Diameter three thousand miles, distance two million, course apparently an orbit about Sirius A.»
«Johnny,» I began, «we’re inside the orbit of Thor, which is Sirius I, which means it’s the first planet of Sirius and how can there be a planet inside of that? You wouldn’t be kidding me, Johnny?»
«You may inspect the teleplate, sir, and check my calculations,» he replied stiffly.
I got up and went into the pilot’s compartment. There was a disc in the center of the teleplate, all right. So Johnny wasn’t seeing things. Checking his calculations was something else again. My mathematics end at counting coins out of coin machines. But I was willing to take his word for it.
«Johnny,» I almost shouted, «We’ve discovered a new planet. Ain’t that something?»
«Yes, sir,» he commented, in his usual, matter-of-fact voice.
It was something, but not much. I mean, the Sirius system hasn’t been colonized long and it wasn’t too surprising that a little three thousand mile planet hadn’t been noticed yet. Especially as the orbits swing high, wide and handsome on Thor and Freda. So far out, they’d be colder than Pluto if the Dog Star wasn’t twenty-six times as bright as Sol.
There hadn’t been room for Ma and Ellen to follow us into the pilot’s compartment, but they stood looking in at the doorway and I moved to one side so they could see the disc in the viewplate.
«How soon do we get there, Johnny?» Ma wanted to know.
«Our point of nearest approach on this course will be within an hour, Mrs. Wherry,» he replied. «We come within half a million miles of it.»
«Oh, do we?» I wanted to know.
«Unless, sir, you think it advisable to change course and give it more clearance.»
I gave clearance to my throat instead and looked at Ma and Ellen and saw it would be okay by them. «Johnny,» I continued, «we’re going to give it less clearance. I’ve always hankered to see a new planet all to myself. We’re going to land there.»
He said, «Yes, sir,» and saluted, but there was, I thought, disapproval in his eyes. Oh, he’d have had cause for it if there had been. You never know what you’ll run into bursting into virgin territory out here. A cargo of canvas and slot-machines isn’t the proper equipment for exploring, now is it?
But the Perfect Pilot never questions an owner’s orders, doggone him! Johnny sat down and started punching keys on the calculator and we eased out to let him do it.
«Ma,» I said, «I’m a blamed fool.»
«You would be if you weren’t,» she came back. I grinned when I got that sorted out, and looked at Ellen.
But she wasn’t looking at me. She had that dreamy look in her eyes again. It made me want to go into the pilot’s compartment and take a poke at Johnny to see if it would wake him up.
«Listen, honey,» I said, «that Johnny —»
But something burned the side of my face and I knew it was Ma looking at me, so I shut up. I got out a deck of cards and played solitaire until we landed.
Johnny popped out of the pilot’s compartment. And saluted.
«Landed, sir. Atmosphere one-oh-sixteen on the gauge.»
«And what,» Ellen asked, «does that mean in English?»
«It’s breathable, Miss Wherry. A bit high in nitrogen and low in oxygen compared to Earth air, but nevertheless breathable.»
He was a caution, that young man was, when it came to being precise.
«Then what are we waiting for?» I wanted to know.
«Your orders, sir.»
«Shucks with my orders, Johnny. Let’s get the door open and get going.»
He saluted, and we got the door open. That was that. Johnny stepped out first, strapping on a pair of heatojectors as he went. The rest of us were right behind him.
It was cool outside, but not cold. The landscape looked just like Thor, with bare rolling hills of hard-baked, greenish clay. There was plant life, a brownish bushy stuff that looked something like tumbleweed.
I took a look up to gauge the time and Sirius was almost at the zenith, which meant Johnny had landed us smack in the middle of the day side.
«Got any idea, Johnny,» I asked, «what the period of rotation is?»
«I had time for only a rough check, sir. It came out twenty-one hours, seventeen and a half minutes.»