Saunders realized suddenly that he had let his censors down. Have you? he answered cautiously.
That's beside the point. The best minds all agree Bill let him go on and did not contradict him again. It was a relief when Tully suggested that, since they all had to be up early, maybe it was about time to think about beginning to get ready to go to bed.
He said goodnight to Mrs. Tully and thanked her for a wonderful dinner, then followed Tully into the guest room. Only way to get rid of that family curse we're saddled with, Bill, he apologized. Stay up as long as you like. Tully stepped to the window and opened it. You'll sleep well here. We're up high enough to get honest-to-good-ness fresh air. He stuck his head out and took a couple of big breaths. Nothing like the real article, he continued as he withdrew from the window. I'm a country boy at heart. What's the matter, Bill?
Nothing. Nothing at all.
I thought you looked a little pale. Well, sleep tight. I've already set your bed for seven; that'll give us plenty of time.
Thanks, Joe. Goodnight. As soon as Tully was out of the room he braced himself, then went over and closed the window. Sweating, he turned away and switched the ventilation back on. That done, he sank down on the edge of the bed.
He sat there for a long time, striking one cigarette after another. He knew too well that the peace of mind he thought he had regained was unreal. There was nothing left to him but shame and a long, long hurt. To have reached the point where he had to knuckle under to a tenth-rate knothead like Ed Schultz it would have been better if he had never come out of the Valkyrie business.
Presently he took five grains of Fly-Rite from his pouch, swallowed it, and went to bed. He got up almost at once, forced himself to open the window a trifle, then compromised by changing the setting of the bed so that it would not turn out the lights after he got to sleep.
He had been asleep and dreaming for an indefinitely long time. He was back in space again indeed, he had never been away from it. He was happy, with the full happiness of a man who has awakened to find it was only a bad dream.
The crying disturbed his serenity. At first it made him only vaguely uneasy, then he began to feel in some way responsible he must do something about it. The transition to falling had only dream logic behind it, but it was real to him. He was grasping, his hands were slipping, had slipped and there was nothing under him but the black emptiness of space
He was awake and gasping, on Joe Tully's guestroom bed; the lights burned bright around him.
But the crying persisted.
He shook his head, then listened. It was real all right. Now he had it identified a cat, a kitten by the sound of it.
He sat up. Even if he had not had the spaceman's traditional fondness for cats, he would have investigated. However, he liked cats for themselves, quite aside from their neat shipboard habits, their ready adaptability to changing accelerations, and their usefulness in keeping the ship free of those other creatures that go wherever man goes. So he got up at once and looked for this one.
A quick look showed him that the kitten was not in the room, and his ear led him to the correct spot; the sound came in through the slightly opened window. He shied off, stopped, and tried to collect his thoughts.
He told himself that it was unnecessary to do anything more; if the sound came in through his window, then it must be because it came out of some nearby window. But he knew that he was lying to himself; the sound was close by. In some impossible way the cat was just outside his window, thirty-five stories above the street.
He sat down and tried to strike a cigarette, but the tube broke in his fingers. He let the fragments fall to the floor, got up and took six nervous steps toward the window, as if he were being jerked along. He sank down to his knees, grasped the window and threw it wide open, then clung to the windowsill, his eyes shut tight.
After a time the sill seemed to steady a bit. He opened his eyes, gasped, and shut them again. Finally he opened them again, being very careful not to look out at the stars, not to look down at the street. He had half expected to find the cat on a balcony outside his room it seemed the only reasonable explanation. But there was no balcony, no place at all where a cat could reasonably be.
However, the mewing was louder than ever. It seemed to come from directly under him. Slowly he forced his head out, still clinging to the sill, and made himself look down. Under him, about four feet lower than the edge of the window, a narrow ledge ran around the side of the building. Seated on it was a woebegone ratty-looking kitten. It stared up at him and meowed again.
It was barely possible that, by clinging to the sill with one hand and making a long arm with the other, he could reach it without actually going out the window, he thought if he could bring himself to do it. He considered calling Tully, then thought better of it. Tully was shorter than he was, had less reach. And the kitten had to be rescued now, before the fluff-brained idiot jumped or fell.
He tried for it. He shoved his shoulders out, clung with his left arm and reached down with his right. Then he opened his eyes and saw that he was a foot or ten inches away from the kitten still. It sniffed curiously in the direction of his hand.
He stretched till his bones cracked. The kitten promptly skittered away from his clutching fingers, stopping a good six feet down the ledge. There it settled down and commenced washing its face.
He inched back inside and collapsed, sobbing, on the floor underneath the window. I can't do it, he whispered. I can't do it. Not again
The Rocket Ship Valkyrie was two hundred and forty-nine days out from Earth-Luna Space Terminal and approaching Mars Terminal on Deimos, outer Martian satellite. William Cole, Chief Communications Officer and relief pilot, was sleeping sweetly when his assistant shook him. Hey! Bill! Wake up we're in a jam.
Huh? Wazzat? But he was already reaching for his socks. What's the trouble, Tom?
Fifteen minutes later he knew that his junior officer had not exaggerated; he was reporting the facts to the Old Man the primary piloting radar was out of whack. Tom Sandburg had discovered it during a routine check, made as soon as Mars was inside the maximum range of the radar pilot. The captain had shrugged. Fix it, Mister and be quick about it. We need it.
Bill Cole shook his head. There's nothing wrong with it, Captain inside. She acts as if the antenna were gone completely.
That's impossible. We haven't even had a meteor alarm.
Might be anything, Captain. Might be metal fatigue and it just fell off. But we've got to replace that antenna. Stop the spin on the ship and I'll go out and fix it. I can jury-rig a replacement while she loses her spin.
The Valkyrie was a luxury ship, of her day. She was assembled long before anyone had any idea of how to produce an artificial gravity field. Nevertheless she had pseudogravity for the comfort of her passengers. She spun endlessly around her main axis, like a shell from a rifled gun; the resulting angular acceleration miscalled centrifugal force kept her passengers firm in their beds, or steady on their feet. The spin was started as soon as her rockets stopped blasting at the beginning of a trip and was stopped only when it was necessary to maneuver into a landing. It was accomplished, not by magic, but by reaction against the contrary spin of a flywheel located on her center-line.
The captain looked annoyed. I've started to take the spin off, but I can't wait that long. Jury-rig the astrogational radar for piloting.
Cole started to explain why the astrogational radar could not be adapted to short-range work, then decided not to try. It can't be done, sir. It's a technical impossibility.
When I was your age I could jury-rig anything! Well, find me an answer, Mister. I can't take this ship down blind. Not even for the Harriman Medal.