McCutcheon’s voice dropped to a silky whisper. “Now, now. Turner, don’t be hasty. You haven’t heard all I have to say yet. Roy Snead is to be your mate.”
“Huh! Snead! Why, that four-flusher wouldn’t have the guts to take a job like this in a million years. Tell me some other fairy tale.”
“Well, as a matter of fact, he has already accepted. I thought you might accompany him, but I guess he was right. He insisted you’d back down. I thought at first you wouldn’t.”
McCutcheon waved him away and bent his eyes unconcernedly on the report he had been scrutinizing at the time of Jimmy’s entrance. Jimmy wheeled, hesitated, then returned.
“Wait a while, Mr. McCutcheon; do you mean to say that Roy is actually going?” McCutcheon nodded, still apparently absorbed in other matters, and Jimmy exploded, “Why, that low-down, spindle-shanked, dish-faced mug! So he thinks I’m too yellow to go! Well, I’ll show him. I’ll take the job and I’ll put up ten dollars to a Venerian nickel that he gets sick at the last minute.”
“Good!” McCutcheon rose and shook hands, “I thought you’d see reason. Major Wade has all the details. I think you leave in about six weeks and as I’m leaving for Venus tomorrow, you’ll probably meet me there.”
Jimmy left, still boiling, and McCutcheon buzzed for the secretary. “Oh, Miss Wilson, get Roy Snead on the ‘visor.”
A few minutes’ pause and then the red signal-light shone. The ‘visor was clicked on and the dark-haired, dapper Snead appeared on the visi-plate.
“Hello, Snead,” McCutcheon growled. “You lose that bet, Turner accepted that job. I thought he’d laugh himself sick when I told him you said he wouldn’t go. Send over the twenty dollars, please.”
“Wait a while, Mr. McCutcheon,” Snead’s face was dark with fury, “what’s the idea of telling that punch-drunk imbecile I’m not going? You must have, you double-crosser. I’ll be there all right, but you can put up another twenty and I’ll bet he changes his mind yet. But /’// be there.” Roy Snead was still spluttering when McCutcheon clicked off.
The General Manager leaned back, threw away his mangled cigar, and lit a fresh one. His face remained sour, but there was a definite note of satisfaction in his tone when he said, “Ha! I thought that would get them.”
It was a tired and sweaty pair that blasted the good ship Helios across Mercury’s orbit. In spite of the perfunctory friendship enforced upon them by the weeks alone in space, Jimmy Turner and Roy Snead were scarcely on speaking terms. Add to this hidden hostility, the heat of the bloated sun and the torturing uncertainty of the final outcome of the trip and you have a miserable pair indeed.
Jimmy peered tiredly at the maze of dials confronting him, and, brushing a damp lock of hair from his eyes, grunted, “What’s the thermometer reading now, Roy?”
“One hundred twenty-five degrees Fahrenheit and still climbing,” was the growled response.
Jimmy cursed fluently, “The cooling system is on at maximum, the ship’s hull reflects 95% of the solar radiation, and it’s still in the hundred twenties.” He paused. “The gravometer indicates that we’re still some thirty-five million miles from the Sun. Fifteen millions miles to go before the Deflection Field becomes effective. The temperature will probably scale 150 yet. That’s a sweet prospect! Check the desiccators. If the air isn’t kept absolutely dry, we’re not going to last long.”
“Within Mercury’s orbit, think of it!” Snead’s voice was husky. “No one has ever been this close to the sun before. And we’re going closer yet.”
“There have been many this close and closer,” reminded Jimmy, “but they were out of control and landed in the sun. Friedlander, Debuc, Anton-” His voice trailed into a brooding silence,
Roy stirred uneasily. “How effective is this Deflection Field anyway, Jimmy? Your cheerful thoughts aren’t very soothing, you know.”
“Well, it’s been tested under the harshest conditions laboratory technicians could devise. I’ve watched them. It’s been bathed in radiation approximating the sun’s at a distance of twenty million. The Field worked like a charm. The light was bent about it so that the ship became invisible. The men inside the ship claimed that everything outside became invisible and that no heat reached them. A funny thing, though, the Field will work only under certain radiation strengths.”
“Well, I wish it were over one way or the other,” Roy glowered. “If Old Sourpuss is thinking of making this my regular run-, well, he’ll lose his ace pilot.”
“He’ll lose his two ace pilots,” Jimmy corrected.
The two lapsed into silence and the Helios blasted on.
The temperature climbed: 130, 135, 140. Then, three days later, with the mercury quivering at 148, Roy announced that they were approaching the critical belt, the belt where the solar radiation reached sufficient intensity to energize the Field.
The two waited, minds at feverish concentration, pulses pounding.
“Will it happen suddenly?”
“I don’t know. We’ll have to wait.”
From the portholes, only the stars were visible. The sun, three times the size as seen from Earth, poured its blinding rays upon opaque metal, for on this specially designed ship, portholes closed automatically when struck by powerful radiation.
And then the stars began disappearing. Slowly, at first, the dimmest faded-then the brighter ones: Polaris, Regulus, Arcturus, Sirius. Space was uniformly black.
“It’s working,” breathed Jimmy. The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when the sunward portholes clicked open. The sun was gone!
“Ha! I feel cooler already,” Jimmy Turner was jubilant. “Boy, it worked like a charm. You know, if they could adjust this Deflection field to all radiation strengths, we would have perfected invisibility. It would make a convenient war weapon.” He lit a cigarette and leaned back luxuriously.
“But meanwhile we’re flying blind,” Roy insisted.
Jimmy grinned patronizingly, “You needn’t worry about that, Dishface. I’ve taken care of everything. We’re in an orbit about the sun. In two weeks, we’ll be on the opposite side and then I’ll let the rockets blast and out of this band we go, zooming towards Venus.” He was very self-satisfied indeed.
“Just leave it to Jimmy ‘Brains’ Turner. I’ll have us through in two months, instead of the regulation six. You’re with United’s ace pilot, now.”
Roy laughed nastily. “To listen to you, you’d think you did all the work. All you’re doing is to run the ship on the course I’ve plotted. You’re the mechanic; I’m the brains.”
“Oh, is that so? Any damn pilot-school rookie can plot a course. It takes a man to navigate one.”
“Well, that’s your opinion. Who’s paid more, though, the navigator or the course-plotter?”
Jimmy gulped on that one and Roy stalked triumphantly out of the pilot room. Unmindful of all this, the Helios blasted on.
For two days, all was serene; then, on the third day. Jimmy inspected the thermometer, scratched his head and looked worried. Roy entered, watched the proceedings and raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“Is anything wrong?” He bent over and read the height of the thin, red column. “Just 100 degrees. That’s nothing to look like a sick goat over. From your expression, I thought something had gone wrong with the Deflection Field and that it was rising again,” he turned away with an ostentatious yawn.
“Oh, shut up, you senseless ape,” Jimmy’s foot lifted in a half-hearted attempt at a kick. “I’d feel a lot better if the temperature were rising. This Deflection Field is working a lot too good for my liking.”
“Huh! What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain, and if you listen carefully you may understand me. This ship is built like a vacuum bottle. It gains heat only with the greatest of difficulty and loses it likewise.” He paused and let his words sink in. “At ordinary temperatures this ship is not supposed to lose more than two degrees a day if no outside sources of heat are supplied. Perhaps at the temperature at which we were, the loss might amount to five degrees a day. Do you get me?”
Roy’s mouth was open wide and Jimmy continued. “Now this blasted ship has lost fifty degrees in less than three days.”
“But that’s impossible.”
“There it is.” Jimmy pointed ironically. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong. It’s that damn Field. It acts as a repulsive agent towards electromagnetic radiations and somehow is hastening the loss of heat of our ship.”
Roy sank into thought and did some rapid mental calculations. “If what you say is true,” he said at length, “we’ll hit freezing point in five days and then spend a week in what amounts to winter weather.”
“That’s right. Even allowing for the decrease in heat-loss as the temperature is lowered, we’ll probably end up with the mercury anywhere between thirty and forty below.”
Roy gulped unhappily. “And at twenty million miles away from the sun!”
“That isn’t the worst,” Jimmy pointed out. “This ship, like all others used for travel within the orbit of Mars, has no heating system. With the sun shining like fury and no way to lose heat except by ineffectual radiation, Mars and Venus space-ships have always specialized in cooling systems. We, for instance, have a very efficient refrigeration device.”