"How many would jump ship if they could?"
"Perhaps ten."
"Can you go on without those ten?"
"Some would have been useful in setting up the actual colony." Grove's dark face showed the unhurried working of his mind. "I think we could manage."
Cartwright's hands twitched. "Where would they go? Back to Pluto? There's a Hill base on Pluto; they might tip off Verrick."
"We're billions of miles from Pluto. And the lifeboat has almost no thrust; they'd have to beat back our velocity to zero before they could even start moving. It'd take them weeks to cover the distance to the nearest possible patrol station."
Cartwright licked his dry lips. "How about the emergency ipvic in the boat?"
"It's been out of commission since we purchased it."
"Go ahead, then, if it won't jeopardize the ship."
Groves was worried, but not about the ship. "When we talked before, I didn't have a chance to congratulate you. I wish I could shake your hand, Leon." Groves held his hand to the ipvic screen; Cartwright did the same, and their fingers appeared to touch separated though they were by millions of miles of dust and heatless waste. Groves kept his worry from showing and with an effort managed to smile. "You people on Earth are used to your status by this time. But here we still look upon it as a miracle."
A muscle in Cartwright's cheek jerked spasmodically. "It still seems almost—dreamlike. A kind of nightmare I can't wake up from."
"Nightmare! You mean the assassin?"
"I'm sitting here waiting for him."
"Do you know any more about him?"
"My telepaths say the name of Keith Pellig has been in the minds of Verrick and his staff for months, but what it means..."
Groves went on: "If news comes that you're dead we'll drop out of sight. We'll cut our transmission to Batavia, perhaps even demolish the transmitter."
"I hope," Cartwright replied, "that when I'm killed you'll be in sight of the Disc." He moved away from the screen. "If you'll excuse me, Wakeman is briefing me on the Corps's strategy."
"Good luck," Groves said as he broke the transmission connection.
He called Konklin into the control bubble and unemotionally briefed him in a few words. "Cartwright agrees to let them jump ship. That takes care of them; it's the rest of us I'm worried about. I suppose you know the reactors are eating up fuel faster than we had expected? Efficiency is down almost to nil; if we have to spend a lot of time looking for the Disc..."
He had intended to continue: '... then we may never be able to get back to the known system.'
"I know what you're thinking," Konklin said. "It may be hard to find because it may not be there."
Inside Groves was a gnawing fear. They had come a long way; the area of charted space was far behind them. Suppose, after all this, there was really no tenth planet? "It's too late to change our minds now," he said aloud.
"Well," Konklin said, "we could all take off in the lifeboat... just an empty ship heading out..."
"At dinner I'll announce that anybody can jump who wants to."
Groves opened one of Preston's metal-bound log-books. "Do you know Preston's article on the origin of Flame Disc?" He summarized Preston's ancient words. "The Disc probably wasn't always one of Sol's. It may have come in only a few centuries ago, perhaps in Preston's lifetime."
"Then you're not going to suggest there may be no Disc?"
Groves scowled. "Of course there's a Disc! We wouldn't have come this far otherwise."
But his fear remained.
For dinner a case of frozen pork was opened. It should have been the first meal on Flame Disc, the landing cele- bration. Watching the faces of the forty-odd men, women and children, Groves knew it had been a good idea to get non-protine food on the table.
"How long has it been since you ate real meat?" Konklin asked Mary Uzich.
"I've never had any real meat before," Mary said simply.
Groves sipped at a tin cup of brandy, his meal almost untouched. The others gradually finished and pushed their dishes away. The thick metallic dust in the air became darkened by the smoke of cigarettes.
"Is it true we've passed the final marker buoys?" Larry Thompson asked Groves.
"A few hours ago."
"Then we're actually beyond the known system."
"This is outside," Groves said, "because nobody expects to find anything here but wastes and monsters." He finished his brandy and pushed the cup away. "Gardner says the lifeboat is in good shape. It's loaded with supplies and signal equipment."
"What about navigation?" Louise Tyler asked. "You're the only one who knows navigation and you're not coming."
"The lifeboat is essentially an automatic guided missile. Once it's lined up with Neptune it'll find its way there."
"What happens after we get to Neptune?" Flood demanded.
"Supply ships reach the inner planets every ten days," Groves answered.
"What if one of the Hills patrols grabbed us on the supply ship?" McLean asked. "They might force us into work-camps."
"Maybe you're safer here," Konklin said. "Maybe going back isn't such a hot idea after all."
"I'm going back," Thompson said firmly. He forced himself not to look at Louise Tyler.
Groves made a note on a tablet beside his arm. "That's Thompson."
"Let me explain," Thompson pleaded. "Louise and
I are going to marry. We want our kids to grow up to be human beings, not freaks. We want them to grow up on Earth."
Groves turned to Louise. "You're going back then?"
Louise nodded.
"I'm sticking," Jereti said.
Mary Uzich was astonished. "You're staying?"
"I can't stand Earth any more. Dirty people crowded together in slums; noise and filth..." He tapped his dish. "This meal has made me remember what I'm missing; I can't go back to protine."
"I'm staying," Janet Sibley whispered in an almost inaudible voice. Her eyes were fixed avidly on Captain Groves.
"I'm staying," Mary Uzich said, with a glance at Konklin.
Nat Gardner stirred restlessly. "I'm staying," he announced, and then flushed scarlet. "I have to make up for that." He gestured in embarrassment. "That son of a gun McLean. I want to make up, for having been a fool."
"I don't have to ask if you're going," Groves said to Paul Flood. "I'm not giving you any choice."
Flood grinned. Things were satisfactory. The ipvic-tap was in place, concealed within the transmitting antenna. Half the Society was turning back. The ship was short of fuel—and, most important, for a brief time he had been President. The score had been settled. He had shown Cartwright up for what he was.
Groves addressed the people round him. "Those who are leaving must collect their personal possessions and valuables."
Gardner slammed the hull-locks of the lifeboat and stood for a moment inspecting the jet flanges. A blur of pale, terrified faces gleamed from the window of the boat, and then Gardner signalled Captain Groves. The boat was dropped into the sphincter of the ship. It held for a short while as the atmosphere-envelope carefully sealed itself behind, and then all at once it fell like a stone into the empty void. Its jets came on with a furious splutter. Groves, in the control bubble of the ship, followed its course on his instrument board. The lifeboat hesitated, then very slowly began to fall behind as its sighting mechanism focused on the distant orb of Neptune.
Konklin lingered at the entrance of the bubble, not wanting to go into the deserted cargo hold. "The only people left are you, me, and the Japanese optical workers."