Standing beside the mailbox, he glanced up at the early evening sky—shuddered, and hastily lowered his eyes. He took the straightest possible line for the nearest double Scotch.
“Y’ain’t been in for a long time, Dr. Hale,” said Mike, the bartender.
“That I haven’t, Mike. Pour me another.”
“Sure. On the house, this time. We had your broadcast tuned in on the radio just now. It was swell.”
“Yes.”
“It sure was. I was kind of worried what was happening up there, with my son an aviator and all. But as long as you scientific guys know what it’s all about, I guess it’s all right. That was sure a good speech, Doc. But there’s one question I’d like to ask you.”
“I was afraid of that,” said Dr. Hale.
“These stars. They’re moving, going somewhere. But where are they going? I mean, like you said, if they are.”
“There’s no way of telling that, exactly, Mike.”
“Aren’t they moving in a straight line, each one of them?” For just a moment the celebrated scientist hesitated.
“Well—yes and no, Mike. According to spectroscopic analysis, they’re maintaining the same distance from us, each one of them. So they’re really moving—if they’re moving—in circles around us. But the circles are straight, as it were. I mean, it seems that we’re in the center of those circles, so the stars that are moving aren’t coming closer to us or receding.”
“You could draw lines for those circles?”
“On a star-globe, yes. It’s been done. They all seem to be heading for a certain area of the sky, but not for a given point. They don’t intersect.”
“What part of the sky they going to?”
“Approximately between Ursa Major and Leo, Mike. The ones farthest from there are moving fastest, the ones nearest are moving slower. But darn you, Mike, I came in here to forget about stars, not to talk about them. Give me another.”
“In a minute, Doc. When they get there, are they going to stop or keep on going?”
“How the devil do I know, Mike? They started suddenly, all at the same time, and with full original velocity—I mean, they started out at the same speed they’re going now—without warming up, so to speak—so I suppose they could stop as unexpectedly.”
He stopped just as suddenly as the stars might. He stared at his reflection in the mirror back of the bar as though he’d never seen it before.
“What’s the matter Doc?”
“Mike!”
“Yes, Doc?”
“Mike, you’re a genius.”
“Me? You’re kidding.”
Dr. Hale groaned. “Mike, I’m going to have to go to the university to work this out. So I can have access to the library and the star-globe there. You’re making an honest man out of me, Mike. Whatever kind of Scotch this is, wrap me up a bottle.”
“It’s Tartan Plaid. A quart?”
“A quart, and make it snappy. I’ve got to see a man about a dog-star.”
“Serious, Doc?”
Dr. Hale sighed audibly. “You brought that on yourself, Mike. Yes, the dog-star is Sirius. I wish I’d never come in here, Mike. My first night out in weeks, and you ruin it.”
He took a cab to the university, let himself in, and turned on the lights in his private study and in the library. Then he took a good stiff slug of Tartan Plaid and went to work.
First, by telling the chief operator who he was and arguing a bit, he got a telephone connection with the chief astronomer of Cole Observatory.
“This is Hale, Armbruster,” he said. “I’ve got an idea, but I want to check my facts before I start to work on it. Last information I had, there were four hundred and sixty-eight stars exhibiting new proper motion. Is that still correct?”
“Yes, Milton. The same ones are still at it, and no others.”
“Good. I have a list, then. Has there been any change in speed of motion of any of them?”
“No. Impossible as it seems, it’s constant. What is your idea?”
“I want to check my theory first. If it works out into anything, I’ll call you.” But he forgot to.
It was a long, painful job. First, he made a chart of the heavens in the area between Ursa Major and Leo. Across that chart he drew four hundred and sixty-eight lines representing the projected path of each of the aberrant stars. At the border of the chart, where each line entered, he made a notation of the apparent velocity of the star—not in light years per hour—but in degrees per hour, to the fifth decimal.
Then he did some reasoning.
“Postulate that the motion which began simultaneously will end simultaneously,” he told himself. “Try a guess at the time. Let’s try ten o’clock tomorrow evening.”
He tried it and looked at the series of positions indicated upon the chart. No. Try one o’clock in the morning. It looked almost like—sense!
Try midnight.
That did it. At any rate, it was close enough. The calculation could be only a few minutes off one way or the other, and there was no point now in working out the exact time. Now that he knew the incredible fact.
He took another drink and stared at the chart grimly.
A trip into the library gave Dr. Hale the further information he needed. The address!
Thus began the saga of Dr. Hale’s journey. A useless journey, it is true, but one that should rank with the trip of the message to Garcia.
He started it with a drink. Then, knowing the combination, he rifled the safe in the office of the president of the university. The note he left in the safe was a masterpiece of brevity. It read:
Taking Money. Explain Later
Then he took another drink and put the bottle in his pocket. He went outside and hailed a taxicab. He got in. “Where to, sir?” asked the cabby.
Dr. Hale gave an address.
“Fremont Street?” said the cabby. “Sorry, sir, but I don’t know where that is.”
“In Boston,” said Dr. Hale. “I should have told you, in Boston.”
“Boston? You mean Boston, Massachusetts? That’s a long way from here.”
“Therefore, we better start right away,” said Dr. Hale reasonably. A brief financial discussion and the passing of money, borrowed from the university safe, set the driver’s mind at rest, and they started.
It was a bitter cold night for March, and the heater in the cab didn’t work any too well. But the Tartan Plaid worked superlatively for both Dr. Hale and the cabby, and by the time they reached New Haven, they were singing old-time songs lustily.
“Off we go, into the wide, wild yonder…” their voices roared.
It is regrettably reported, but possibly untrue that, in Hartford, Dr. Hale leered out of the window at a young woman waiting for a late streetcar and asked her if she wanted to go to Boston. Apparently, however, she didn’t, for at five o’clock in the morning, when the cab drew up in front of 614 Fremont Street, Boston, only Dr. Hale and the driver were in the cab.
Dr. Hale got out and looked at the house. It was a millionaire’s mansion, and it was surrounded by a high iron fence with barbed wire on top of it. The gate in the fence was locked, and there was no bell button to push.
But the house was only a stone’s throw from the sidewalk, and Dr. Hale was not to be deterred. He threw a stone. Then another. Finally he succeeded in smashing a window.
After a brief interval, a man appeared in the window. A butler, Dr. Hale decided.
“I’m Dr. Milton Hale,” he called out. “I want to see Rutherford R. Sniveley, right away. It’s important.”
“Mr. Sniveley is not at home, sir,” said the butler. “And about that window—”
“The devil with the window,” shouted Dr. Hale. “Where is Sniveley?”