Cochrane said into the vision-beam to Earth, "Cancel C, paragraph nine. Then b(1) from paragraph eleven. Then after you've the entire last section—fourteen—we can up the deal."
There was a four-second pause. About two for his voice to Earth. About two for the of the reply to him. The man at the other end wildly.
"We're a long way apart," said Cochrane blandly, "and our talk only at the speed of light. You're not talking from one to another. Save tolls. Yes or no?"
Another four-second pause. The man on Earth agreed. Cochrane the him. The other man signed. Not only the documents but all was recorded. There were plugged-in witnesses. The was binding.
Cochrane in his chair. His wearily. He'd hours going over the facsimile-transmitted with Joint Networks, and had out a total of six joker-stipulations. He was very tired. He yawned.
"You can tell Jones, Babs," he said, "that all the high financing's done. He can money. And you can my to Kursten, Kasten, Hopkins and Fallowe. And since this is a operation, you'd send a service message what you're to do with yourself. They'll tell you to take the next and report to the pool, I'm afraid. The same West and Jamison and Bell."
Babs said guiltily:
"Mr. Cochrane—you've been so I had to use my own judgment. I didn't want to you—."
"What now?" Cochrane.[Pg 55]
"The on the torp-test," said Babs guiltily, "was so good that the was for we'd to be doing it for a client of the firm—which we are. So we've all been put on a leave-with-expenses-and-pay status. Officially, we're all and the is paying our until we our health."
"Kind of them," said Cochrane. "What's the bite?"
"They're sending up for us to sign," Babs. "When we go back, we would top prices for interviews. The firm, of course, will want to that."
Cochrane his eyebrows.
"I see! But you'll actually be off the air so Dabney can be television's fair-haired boy. He'll go on Marilyn Winter's show, I'll bet, that has the biggest audience on the planet. He'll lecture Little Aphrodite Herself on the of space and she'll her at him and her chest-measurements in his direction and breathe how it is to be a man of science!"
"How'd you know?" Babs, surprised.
Cochrane winced.
"Heaven help me, Babs, I didn't. I to at something too for the business! But I failed! I failed! You and my official gang, then, are here with the firm's blessing, free of all and obligations, but salary and expenses?"
"Yes," Babs. "And so are you."
"I off!" said Cochrane firmly. "Forward my resignation. It's a of pure vanity. But Kursten, Kasten, Hopkins and Fallowe do move in a way to onto a fast buck! I'm going to some sleep. Is there anything else you've had to use your on?"
"The for re-broadcast of the torp-test. The original had an audience-rating of seventy-one!"
"Such," said Cochrane, "are the of fame. Our cash?"
She him a statement. For the original of the torp-test film-tape, so much. It was to be re-run with a of the by West, and a of to come by Jamison. The who got of time with that and souped-up would expect, and get, an audience-rating in history. Dabney was to take a on the rebroadcast, too—very much the and scientist. There were other interviews.[Pg 56] Dabney again, from a by Bell. And Jones. Jones the idea of being interviewed, but he had a beam-camera and answered questions, and gone to his work.
Spaceways, Inc., had a bank-account already to more than twenty years of Cochrane's best earning-power. He was selling for to their on, in a to Christopher Columbus' selling of to come. But Cochrane was for cash. Freight-rockets were on the way now, of for a space-journey Cochrane was only when a in money was paid for the right to about it. So-and-so's paid for the of air-reserves. What's-his-name's vegetables were on terms, with whoosit's coffee and somebody else's in bags.
"If," said Cochrane tiredly, looking up from the statement, "we only start off in a of a single ship, Babs, we'd not only be but so rich we started that we'd want to home to it!" He prodigiously. "I'm going to some sleep. Don't let me sleep too long!"
He off to his hotel-room and was out cold his had to its pillow. But he was not pleased with himself. It him that his against being an employee had taken the of acting like one of his in for the brains—in the case of Jones—and the idiosyncrasies—in the case of Dabney—of other men. The by which he had was not the splendid, one he'd have liked. The that this of worked, and nothing else would have, did not make him better.
But he slept.
He that he was at his normal of producing a television show. Nobody but himself the on or not. The purpose of all his to be to cut as many among their fellow-workers as possible—in a way, of course—so that by their own they might succeed to a job and higher pay. This is what is called the of by which done, in private and public enterprise.
It was a very dream, but it was not restful.[Pg 57]
While he slept, the world on and the on its normal course. The two of Earthone natural and one in circles about their primary. The nine of Saturn about that rings. The red spot of Jupiter and the on that gas-giant world moved in fashion about its circumference. Light-centuries away, Cepheid and again, more than their account for. Double about each other. Comets their points and, of and metal, prepared for another into light and and warmth.
And took place on Luna.
When Cochrane and to the hotel-room in use as an office, he Babs talking to a woman—girl, rather—whom Cochrane remembered. Then he did a take. He did her. Three or four years she'd been the television of the year. She'd been pretty, but not so that you didn't that she was a person. She was that Marilyn Winters was not—and she'd been number two name in television.
Cochrane said blankly:
"Aren't you Alicia Keith?"
The girl faintly. She wasn't as as she had been. She looked patient. And an of patience, on a woman's face, is not unpleasant. But it isn't glamorous, either.
"I was," she said. "I married Johnny Simms."
Cochrane looked at Babs.
"They live up here," Babs. "I pointed him out at the swimming-pool the day we got here."
"Wonderful," said Cochrane. "How—"
"Johnny," said Alicia, "has into your Spaceways corporation. He got your man West and his of Spaceway stock."
Cochrane sat down—not hard, it was to hard on the moon. But he sat as hard as it was possible to sit.
"Why'd he do that?"
"He out you had of the old Mars ship. He you're going to take a out to the stars. He wants to go along. He's very much like a little boy. He it here."[Pg 58]
"Then why live—." Cochrane the question, not in time.
"He can't go to Earth," said Alicia calmly. "He's a personality. He's and and dear in his way, but he can't what is right and wrong. Especially when he excited. When they up Lunar City as an colony, by they to for from it. So Johnny can live here. He can't live else—not for long."
Cochrane said nothing.
"He wants to go with you," said Alicia pleasantly. "He's thrilled. The lawyer his family up here to watch over him is thrilled, too. He wants to go and visit his family. And as a stockholder, Johnny can keep you from taking a ship or any other property out of the of the courts. But he'd go with you. Of I have to go too."
"It's blackmail," said Cochrane without heat. "A job of it, too. Babs, you see Holden about this. He's a psychiatrist." He to Alicia. "Why do you want to go? I don't know it'll be or not."
"I married Johnny," said Alicia. Her was composed. "I it would be to be able to trust somebody that nobody else trust." After a moment she added: "It would be, if one could."
A moments later she away, very and very calmly. Her husband had no of right or wrong—not in action, anyhow. She to keep him from doing too much by the knowledge she had of what was and what was not. Cochrane and told Babs to make a note to talk to Holden. But there were other on hand, too. There were to be by who along off Luna. Then Cochrane said thoughtfully:
"Alicia Keith would be a good name for film-tape ..."
He into the of paper-work and which somebody has to do any of can come about. Pioneer efforts, in particular, the same of clearing-away as the settling of a farm. Instead of trees to be and up by the roots, there are the who have to be off at the in a way, and the people who trying to a[Pg 59] cut of something—anything—somebody else is doing. And of there are the publicity-hounds. Since Spaceways was being on of which be on this product and that, publicity-hounds cut into its revenue and capital.
Back on Earth a had a lawyer free by press about the done his client by Spaceways, Inc., who had his to travel through space than light. Somebody in the Senate a speech the Spaceway project of being a political move by the party in power for some purpose.
Ultimately the would on the air and that only part of his had been stolen, he'd been too to it or tell anybody, and he wouldn't tell anybody—not a court—the full of his unless paid twenty-five in cash down, and afterward. The project for a of Spaceways would die in committee.
But there were other griefs. The had to be of the mining-tools in it. This was done by men in space-suits. Occupational them to not more than one-fourth of the they would have done if for themselves. When the ship was empty, air was in it, and to air-snow. So had to be and to warm up the to where an in it. Its had to be from the metal-ice stage of and to where they be without themselves to bits.
But there were good breaks, too. Presently a moonship-pilot—grounded to an job on Luna—on his own free time over the ship. Jones it. With rocket-motors of adamite—the by pure accident in a steel-mill on Earth—the out. The fuel-pumps had been taken over in of design from fire-engine on Earth. They were all right. The air-regenerating had been from the culture-tanks in which were on Earth. It needed only with algae—microscopic plants which when with light on dioxide[Pg 60] and oxygen. The ship was a of devices. It be put into such as it had once with no trouble.
It was.
Jones moved into it, with of from the laboratory in the Lunar Apennines. He lovingly, fanatically. Like most discoveries, the Dabney was simple. It was almost uncomplicated. In it was a condition of the space just one surface of a of metal. It was like that conduction-layer on the of a cross-country power-cable, when electricity is in the of high-frequency and on the skins of many of metal, high-frequency not of wires, but only on their surfaces. The Dabney on the surface—or it—of a metal in which eddy-currents were in such-and-such a fashion. That was all there was to it.
So Jones the surface of the into a of the Dabney field. It was not only simple, it was too simple! Having the of the ship into a Dabney plate, he that he could, at will, make the of the ship into another Dabney plate. The two plates, on together, to something that be with awe, but Jones planned to start off, at least, in a manner like the distress-torp test. The job of up for faster-than-light travel, however, was not much more difficult than a bungalow, when one how it should be done.
Two freight-rockets came in, up by and to by control. The Lunar City up music up from Earth and it to the dust-heaps which were the of the city. The and moon-tourists familiar with forty-two new with travel to the stars. One work of in a just-released film-tape "Child of Hate" to the Lunar operation, and saw and the latest plead, "Child of Hate, Come to the Stars and Love." The for the itself not from genius, too.[Pg 61]
There was thrice and four and five times confounded. Cochrane came in to with Holden it was to have a on the space-ship or to have a legal in the courts. Cochrane won. Jones arrived, belligerent, to do for which would cost money.
"Look!" said Cochrane harassedly. "I'm not trying to you! Don't come to me for authority! If you can make that ship take off I'll be in it, and my will be in as much as yours. You what will keep my as safe as possible, along with yours. I'm money and off and and supplies! I've got a job that needs three men anyhow. All I'm is that you to take off I start out paperdolls. When can we leave?"
"We?" said Jones suspiciously. "You're going?"
"If you think I'll and what'll if this flops," Cochrane told him, "you're crazy! There are too many people on Earth already. There's no room for a man who something big and failed! If this I'd be a with a happy on my face—I that in space one freezes—than somebody on on Earth!"
"Oh," said Jones, mollified. "How many people are to go?"
"Ask Bill Holden," Cochrane told him. "Remember, if you need something, it. I'll try to pay for it. If we come with picture-tapes of space—even if we only Mars!—we'll have money to pay for anything!"
Jones Cochrane with something almost like warmth.
"I like this way of doing business," he said.
"It's not business!" Cochrane. "This is something done! By the way. Have you out a for us to at?" When Jones his head, Cochrane said harassedly; "Better one out. But when we make out our sail-off papers, for we'll say, 'To the stars.' A line for the news broadcasts. Oh, yes. Tell Bill Holden to try to us a skipper. An astrogator. Somebody who can tell us how to if we we need to from. Is there such a person?"
"I've got him," said Jones. "He the ship for[Pg 62] me. Former moon-rocket pilot. He's here in Lunar City. Thanks!"
He hands with Cochrane he left. Which for Jones was an of emotion. Cochrane to his desk.
"Let's see ... That for on and to be taken along and Outer Space. Put in a for payment in case we touch on and for them ..."
He on, while Babs took notes. Presently he was dictating. And as he talked, frowning, he took a fountain-pen from his pocket and the refill-handle. It from the pen-point. On the moon, the surface of the was the same as on earth, but the was five-sixths less. So a of of size be the moon's weak it fall.
Dictating as he the pen, Cochrane a pear-shaped of which was the size of a large it into his waste-basket. It was the largest he'd to date. It fell—slow-motion—and splashed—violently—as he it with satisfaction.
More time passed. A moon-rocket from Earth. There were new under the thousand-foot plastic dome. Out by the Mars-ship Jones with small plastic with a varnish. In a vacuum, a of air at Earth-pressure will to make many of near-vacuum. If a can an pressure of one to the square foot, a of air will a to that pressure. Jones was Dabney robot-generators with to power them. Each such would be a Dabney "plate" when in emptiness, and its little would keep it in operation for twenty years or more.
Baggage came up from Earth for Johnny Simms. It was mostly elephant-guns and for them. Johnny, as the to millions on earth, had had a happy life, but one to give him a practical view of things. To him, star-travel meant landing on such as the had been about for a hundred years or so. He looked upon the into space as a big-game and from Lunar City. And he did look forward, too, to from[Pg 63] his family's legal and the of and which Johnny to ignore.
Film-tape came up, and to use it in. Every item an to space use or might use, was upon Spaceways, Inc. Manufacturers to have their used in with the news in decades. There was a of moon-jeeps from the of Lunar City to the ship.
The time of arrived—503:30 o'clock, half-past five hundred and three hours. Time was from midnight to midnight, fashion. The great, sun prominences, even, were too to be looked at with the eye—the sun and the horizon. There was no in the star-studded sky. There were no colorings. The on the was not in the least. Only the direction of the black shifted.
The sun descended. Its motion was almost slow. Its was of the order of a of arc, and it took a full hour to be obscured. And then there was at no in the look of save that the Mare Imbrium—the solidified, Sea of Showers—was as dark as the in the mountains.
They still brightly. For a very long time the white-hot on their flanks. The rose and rose, and it. At long last only the of the Apennines against a of light by comparison.
Then it was night indeed. But the Earth forth, a half-globe of and clouds and continents, and in the sky. And now Earthshine upon the moon. It was many times than moonlight was upon the Earth. Even at the Earthlight was sixteen times brighter. At midnight, when the Earth was full, it would be for any activity. Actually, the beings on Luna were nearly in their habits, it was to moon-jeeps in and keep men and warm for functioning, than it was to protect them against the more-than-boiling of on the moon.
So the activity about the space-ship increased. There were electric lights in the demi-twilight, to[Pg 64] vehicles with their loads. The tourist-jeeps and returned and and returned. The last of travelers from Earth wanted to see the space-craft about which all the world was talking.
Even Cochrane presently curious. There came a time when all the paper-work with what had was done with, and up on that be foreseen. It was time for something new to happen.
Cochrane said dubiously:
"Babs, have you the ship?"
She her head.
"I think we'd go take a look at it," said Cochrane. "Do you know, I've been acting like a man! I've only been out of Lunar City three times. Once to the laboratory to talk, once to test a signal-rocket across the crater, and once when the distress-torp off. I haven't the here in the City!"
"You should," said Babs matter-of-factly. "I once, with Doctor Holden. The dancing was marvelous!"
"Bill Holden, eh?" said Cochrane. He himself annoyed. "Took you to the nightclub; but not to see the ship!"
"The ship's farther," Babs. "I always be at the if you needed me. I when you were asleep."
"Damn!" said Cochrane. "Hm ... You ought to a bonus. What would you have, Babs, a in cash or Spaceways stock?"
"I've got some stock," said Babs. "Mr. Bell—the writer, you know—got in a game. He was out. So I gave him all the money I had—I told you I out my savings-account we came up, I think—for his shares."
"Either you got very stuck," Cochrane told her cynically, "or else you'll be so rich you won't speak to me."
"Oh, no!" said Babs warmly. "Never!"
Cochrane yawned.
"Let's out and take a look at the ship. Maybe I can or something, now there's no more paper-work."
Babs said with an odd calm:
"Mr. Jones wanted you out there today—in an hour, he said. I promised you'd go. I meant to mention it in time."[Pg 65]
Cochrane did not notice her tone. He was dead-tired, as only a man can be who has himself at top speed for days on end over a deal. Business are only in their major aspects. Most of the are niggling, tedious, routine, and boring—and very often bear-trapped. Cochrane had done, with only Babs' help, an amount of labor that in the offices of Kursten, Kasten, Hopkins and Fallowe would have been among two vice-presidents, six lawyers, and at least twelve account executives. The work, therefore, would actually have been done by not less than twenty secretaries. But Babs and Cochrane had done it all.
In the moon-jeep on the way to the ship he that heavy, of which is not at all. Babs him a little, too. She was late to the airlock, and when she arrived.
The moon-jeep and and over the sea its wheels. Babs looked out of the windows. The picture was, of course, incredible. In the Earthlight the was somehow softened, and yet the and and the razor-edged of stone,—these daunting. It was like through a in which and glamorous, but the was deathly-still and ominous.
There were the the jeep. The air had a smell. One the of oil, and ozone, and varnish, and plastic upholstery. There were the of the wheels, traveling over stone. There was the of all the jeep's of the low gravity. Cochrane noted the of an seat when one only one-sixth as much as on Earth. All his were dreamlike—but he that that comes of too long continued.
"I'll try," he said tiredly, "to see that you have some fun you go back, Babs. You'll go as soon as we off into we're into, but you ought to in the regular up here, anyhow."
Babs said nothing. Pointedly.
The moon-jeep and onward. The of steam was audible. The vehicle around a of stone, and Cochrane saw the space-ship.[Pg 66]
In the Earthlight it was beautiful. It had been designed to in a now-defunct promotion. It was stream-lined, and gigantic, and it like silver. It on its tail-fins, and it had and electric lights in the about it. But there was only one moon-jeep at its base. A space-suited moved toward a and sat in it. He rose toward an open airlock-hatch, and the other moon-jeep moved away toward Lunar City.
There was no about. There was no waiting to be loaded. Cochrane did see a great metal plate, on the ground, with a large box to it by cables. That would be the and the field-plate for a Dabney field. It was to on the moon. It was not the ship. Cochrane puzzled over it for a moment. Then he understood. The ship would on its rockets, over the plate—which would be its of the field—and then Jones would on the in the ship itself. The forward, needle-pointed nose of the ship would another of the Dabney field. The ship's inertia, in that field, would be to a of its value. The rockets, which might give it an of a hundred second but in a Dabney field, would the ship and all its to an otherwise velocity. The of the would their relative to the same as the ship. They should no more than from the same rocket-thrust in normal space. But they would travel—
Cochrane that there was a somehow, in the of the Dabney as he it. If there was less in the Dabney field—why—a shouldn't push as hard in it, because, it was the of the rocket-gases that gave the rocket-thrust. But Cochrane was much too to work out a to something he did work. He was almost when Babs touched his arm.
"Space-suits, Mr. Cochrane."
He got into the costume. But he saw again that Babs the shining-eyed look of that he had her wear before.
They got out of the moon-jeep, one after the other.[Pg 67] The came the space-ship's side. They got in it, together. It them.
The vast, of the space-ship past them only ten away. The ground diminished. They less to be than to skyward. And in this sling, in this ascent, Cochrane suddenly. He the which comes of height. He had looked upon Earth from a of four thousand miles with no of dizziness. He had looked at Earth a quarter-million miles away with no of depth. But a fifty above the surface of the moon he like somebody out of a window.
Then the opening was them, and the rolled inward. They were in the lock, and Cochrane himself pushing Babs away from the opening. He was when the closed.
Inside the ship, with the space-suits off, there was light and warmth, and a matter-of-fact atmosphere. The ship had been to sell stock in a for Mars. Prospective had been through it. It had been designed to be a passenger-liner of space.
It was. But Cochrane himself not needed for any consultation, and Jones was busy, and Bill Holden preoccupied. He saw Alicia Keith—but her name was Simms now. She at him but took Babs by the arm. They off somewhere.
Cochrane waited for somebody to tell him what to look at and to admire. He saw Jamison, and Bell, and he saw a man he had not before. He settled in a chair. He neglected. Everybody was busy. But mostly he tired.
He slept.
Then Babs was his arm, her shining.
"Mr. Cochrane!" she urgently. "Mr. Cochrane! Wake up! Go on up to the control-room! We're going to take off!"
He at her.
"We!" Then he started up, and five into the air from the of his movement. "We? No you don't! You go to Lunar City where you'll be safe!"
Then he a drumming, noise. He had it before. In the moonship. It was rockets[Pg 68] being tested; being burned; in the very last of take-off for the stars.
He didn't to the the chair he'd occupied. The rose to meet him.
"I've had our on board," said Babs, happily. "I'm going I'm a stockholder! Hold on to something and climb those stairs if you want to see us go up! I'm going to be busy!"
[Pg 69]
