Izya broke off in midword and eagerly turned his face toward Andrei, flinging one arm over the back of his chair. The colonel drew himself erect again and folded his hands on the knob of his cane.
“You have the floor, Quejada,” Andrei said.
The head of the science section was sitting right in front of him, with his fat weightlifter’s legs set wide apart to avoid getting damp in the crotch, and Ellisauer, as always, had installed himself behind Quejada’s back, hunching right over there so he wouldn’t stick out too much.
“Nothing new on the geology,” Quejada said sullenly. “The same clay and sand as before. No signs of water. The local water main here dried out a long time ago. Maybe that’s the reason why they left, I don’t know… The data on the sun, the wind, and so on…” He took a sheet of paper out of his breast pocket and tossed it across to Andrei. “That’s all I have for now.”
Andrei didn’t like that “for now” at all, but he just nodded and started looking at Ellisauer.
“And on transport?”
Ellisauer straightened up and started talking over Quejada’s head. “Today we covered thirty-eight kilometers. The motor of tractor number two needs to be laid up for a major overhaul. I very much regret, Mr. Counselor, but—unfortunately…”
“I see,” said Andrei. “What does that mean, a major overhaul?”
“Two or three days,” said Ellisauer. “Some elements will have to be replaced and others will need to be fixed. Maybe even four days. Or five.”
“Or ten,” said Andrei. “Give me your report.”
“Or ten,” Ellisauer agreed, still with the same vague smile. “I’m afraid to say exactly. We’re not in a garage here, and then my Permyak… he has some kind of rash, and he’s been vomiting all day long. He’s my lead mechanic, Mr. Counselor…”
“What about you?” asked Andrei.
“I’ll do everything I can… But the problem is, in our conditions… I mean, in field conditions…”
For a while he carried on babbling something about motor mechanics, about a crane that they hadn’t brought with them, although he had warned them, hadn’t he… about a bench drill that they didn’t have here and, unfortunately, couldn’t possibly have had here, about the motor mechanic again, and something else about wrist pins and pistons… With every minute that passed he spoke more and more quietly, less and less distinctly, and finally fell completely silent, and all this time Andrei stared him in the eye without looking away, and it was absolutely clear that this lanky, cowardly con artist had lied his way into a tight corner, and he’d already realized this, and he could see everyone else had realized it too, and he was trying to squirm out of it somehow, only he didn’t know how, but even so, he firmly intended to stick to his lies until the victory was won.
After that Andrei lowered his eyes and stared at Ellisauer’s report, at the slovenly lines scratched out in chicken-claw scribble, but he didn’t see or understand anything. They’ve conspired, the bastards, he thought in quiet despair. These men are in the conspiracy too. So now what do I do with them? A pity my pistol’s not here… Wallop Ellisauer… or frighten him so badly that he shits himself… No, it’s Quejada. Quejada’s the one in charge of them all. He wants to dump all the responsibility on me… He wants to dump this entire rotten, stinking lost cause on me, and only me… the scumbag, the fat pig… Andrei wanted to yell out loud and slam his fist down on the table with all his might.
The silence was becoming unbearable. Izya suddenly started nervously squirming on his chair and mumbling. “What actually is the problem here? After all, we’re not in any particular hurry to get anywhere. Let’s make a halt… There could be manuscripts in the buildings. There’s no water here, it’s true, but we can send a separate team on ahead for water…”
And at that point Quejada interrupted him. “Rubbish,” he said harshly. “No more idle talk, gentlemen. Let’s dot the i’s and cross the t’s. The expedition has failed. We haven’t found water. Or oil. And there’s no way we could have found them with the geological prospecting organized like this. We tear along like lunatics; we’ve run the men into the ground and totally wrecked our transport. Discipline in the crew is shot to hell, we feed stray girls and ferry rumormongers around with us… All sense of perspective was lost a long time ago; no one gives a damn for anything. The men don’t want to go on, they can’t see why we need to go on, and there’s nothing we can tell them. The cosmographic data have simply turned out to be absolutely damned useless: we prepared for freezing polar conditions but we drove into a red-hot desert. The personnel for the expedition were badly selected, completely at random; the medical arrangements are appalling. And the result is that we get what we were bound to get: a slump in morale, a collapse of discipline, veiled insubordination, and today or tomorrow—mutiny. That’s all.”
Quejada stopped talking, took out a cigarette case, and lit up. “What are you actually suggesting, Mr. Quejada?” Andrei said in a stale, flat voice. That loathsome face with the fat mustache hovered in front of him, suspended in a web of blurred, indistinct lines. He really wanted to smash it good and hard. With the lamp. Right on that mustache…
“In my opinion, it’s absolutely obvious,” Quejada said contemptuously. “We have to pack it in and go back where we came from. Immediately. While we’re still in one piece.”
Keep calm, Andrei told himself. Right now, calm, nothing but calm. As few words as possible. No arguing, no matter what. Listen calmly and say nothing. Ah, how I’d love to whop him!
“Yes, really,” Ellisauer spoke up. “How long can we keep going? My men ask me, What’s going on here, Mr. Engineer? We agreed to keep going until the sun sank behind the horizon. But instead of sinking, it gets higher. And then we agreed to keep going until it reaches its zenith… But it doesn’t rise toward any zenith, it just keeps skipping up and down…”
Just don’t argue, Andrei kept telling himself. Let them babble. In fact it’s quite interesting to see what they’ll come up with… The colonel won’t betray me. The army decides everything. The army! Could they really have talked Vogel onto joining them, the bastards?
“And what do you say?” Izya asked Ellisauer. “You?”
“What about me?”
“Your men ask you, that’s clear enough… But how do you answer them?”
Ellisauer started shrugging his shoulders and wiggling his sparse eyebrows. “A strange question…” he mumbled as he did it. “What answer can I give them, I ask you? I’d like to know what answer I’m supposed to give them. How do I know?”
“That is, you don’t give them any answer?”
“But what answer can I give them? What? I tell them the boss knows best.”
“What an answer!” said Izya, glaring horrendously. “With answers like that you can demoralize an entire army, never mind the poor drivers… ‘Well guys, I’m ready to go back right now, only the big bad boss won’t let me…’ Do you even understand why we’re making this journey? You’re a volunteer, aren’t you—no one forced you to come!”
“Listen, Katzman…” Quejada tried to interrupt. “Let’s get down to brass tacks!”
“You knew it was going to be hard, didn’t you, Ellisauer? You did. You knew we weren’t going for a walk in the park, didn’t you? You did. You knew the City needed this expedition, didn’t you? You did—you’re an educated man, an engineer… You knew what the orders were, didn’t you: keep going as long as the fuel and water last? You knew that perfectly well, Ellisauer!”
“I’m not objecting, am I!” Ellisauer gabbled hastily, absolutely terrified. “I’m only trying to explain to you that my explanations… That is, I mean it’s not clear to me how I should answer them, because after all, they ask me—”