"If you say so," said Johannson. "You're the boss from now on. You know that wild bunch on the Station better than I do. For myself, I've always felt that an answer was desirable before we do anything."
"I know Franks and my wife pretty well—about as well as they know me. I've put myself in Walt's place—and I know that Walt would do. So—if Walt didn't think of it, Arden would—I can assume that they are aware of us, have received our signals, and are, therefore, coming along as fast as they can. They'll come zipping out here at from five- to seven-G to what they think is halfway and then decelerate again to a sane velocity. We won't catch sight of them for sixty or seventy hours, and when we do, they'll be going so fast that it will take another twenty hours worth of manipulation to match their speed with ours. Meanwhile, I've got the gun timed to shoot our signal. When the going gets critical, I'll cut the power and make it continuous."
"You're pretty sure of your timing?"
"Well, the best they can do as for direction and velocity and distance is a crude guess. They'll place us out here beyond Terra somewhere. They'll calculate the course requirements to get us this far in the time allotted, and come to a crude figure. I'd like to try keying this thing, but I know that keying it won't work worth a hoot at this distance. Each bundle of keyed electrons would act as a separate negative charge that would spread out and close up at this distance. It's tough enough to hope that the electron beam will hold together that far, let alone trying to key intelligence with it. We'll leave well enough alone—and especially if they're trying to get a fix on us; there's nothing worse than trying to fix an intermittent station. Where are we now?"
"We're on the inner fringe of the Asteroid Belt, about thirty million miles North, and heading on a secant course at thirty-four hundred MPS."
"Too bad Jupiter isn't in the neighborhood," said Channing. "We'll be flirting with his orbit by the time they catch us."
"Easily," said Johannson. "In sixty hours, we'll have covered about six hundred and fifty million miles. We'll be nearer the orbit of Saturn, in spite of the secant course."
"Your secant approaches a radius as you get farther out," said Don, absently. "As far as distances go. Ah, well, Titan, here we come!"
Johannson spoke to the doctor. "How're we doing?"
"Pretty well," said Doc. "There's as pretty an assortment of fractured ribs, broken limbs, cracked clavicles, and scars, mars, and abrasions as you ever saw. There are a number dead, worse luck, but we can't do a thing about them. We can hold on for a week as far as food and water goes. Everyone is now interested in the manner of our rescue rather than worrying about it." He turned to Channing. "The words Channing and Venus Equilateral have wonderful healing powers," he said. "They all think your gang are part magician and part sorcerer."
"Why, for goodness' sake?"
"I didn't ask. Once I told 'em you had a scheme to contact the Relay Station, they were all satisfied that things would happen for the better."
"Anything we can do to help you out?"
"I think not," answered Doc. "What I said before still goes. Your job is to bring aid—and that's the sum total of your job. Every effort must be expended on that and that alone. You've got too many whole people depending on you to spend one second on the hurt. That's my job."
"O.K.," said Channing, "But it's going to be a long wait."
"We can afford it."
"I hope we're not complicating the job of finding us by this quartering deceleration," said Johannson.
"We're not. We're making a sort of vector from our course, but the deviation is very small. As long as the fellows follow our radiation, we'll be found," Channing said with a smile. "The thing that is tough is the fact that all the floors seem to lean over."
"Not much, though."
"They wouldn't lean at all if we were running with the whole set of equipment," said Darlange. "We run a complete turnover without spilling a drop from the swimming pool."
"Or even making the passengers aware of it unless they're looking at the sky."
"Stop worrying about it," said Doc. "I'm the only guy who has to worry about it and as long as the floor is still a floor, I can stand sliding into the corner once in a while."
"We might tinker with the turnover drivers," offered Don. "We can bring 'em down to a place where the velocity-deceleration vectors are perpendicular to the floor upon which we stand while our ship is sluing. We've got a lot of time on our hands, and I, for one, feel a lot happier when I'm doing something."
"It's a thought," said Hadley. "Wanna try it?"
"Let's go."
Thirty hours after theRelay Girlleft the Station, Walt and Franklen held a council of war, in which Charley Bren was the prime factor.
"We've come about two hundred million miles, and our present velocity is something like four thousand miles per second," said Walt. "We're going out towards Mars on a slightly-off radial course, to the North of the ecliptic. That means we're a little over a quarter of a billion miles from Sol, or about to hit the Asteroid Belt. Thinking it over a little, I think we should continue our acceleration for another thirty hours. What say?"
"The field has shown no change in intensity that I can detect," said Bren. "If they haven't dropped their radiated intensity, that means that we are no closer to them than we were before. Of course, we'd probably have to cut the distance by at least a half before any measurable decrement made itself evident."
"They must be on the upper limit of that four thousand MPS," observed Walt. "There's one thing certain, we'll never catch them by matching their speed."
"Where will another thirty hours at 6-G put us and how fast?" asked Franklen.
Silence ensued while they scribbled long figures on scratch paper.
"About eight hundred million miles from Sol," announced Walt.
"And about eight thousand MPS," added Charley.
"That's a little extreme, don't you think?" asked Franklen.
"By about thirty percent," said Walt, scratching his chin. "If we hold to our original idea of hitting it for six thousand, where will we be?"
"That would make it about forty-five hours from take-off, and we'd be about four hundred and sixty million miles from Sol." Charley grinned widely and said: "By Jove!"
"What?"
"By Jove!"
"'By Jove!' What?"
"That's where we'd be—By Jove!"
"Phew."
"I agree with you," said Franklen to Walt. "Better ignore him."
"Sure will after that. So then we'll be 'By Jove' at six thousand. That would be a swell place to make turnover, I think. At 1-G decel, to about four thousand MPS, that'll put us about ... um, that'd take us ninety hours! We'll make that 3-G, at twenty hours, which will put us about three hundred and fifty million miles along, which plus the original four hundred and sixty million adds up to eight hundred and ten million miles—"
"When an astronaut begins to talk like that," interrupted Arden, "we of the skyways say that he is talking in Congressional figures. The shoe is on the other foot. What on earth are you fellows figuring?"
"Where we'll be and how fast we'll be going at a given instant of no particular importance," offered Walt. "When did you wake up?"
"About the third hundred million. All of those ciphers going by made a hollow sound, like a bullet whistling in the wind."
"Well, we're trying to make the theories of probability match with figures. We'll know in about forty-five hours whether we were right or not."
"It's a good thing we have all space to go around in. Are you sure that we have all eternity?"
"Don't get anxious. They're still coming in like a ton of bricks four times per hour, which means that they're riding easy. I don't want to overrun them at about three thousand MPS and have to spend a week decelerating, returning, more decelerating, and then matching velocities."
"I see. You know best. And where is this Asteroid Belt that I've heard so much about?"
"To the South of us by a few million miles. Those bright specks that you can't tell from stars are asteroids. The common conception of the Asteroid Belt being filled to overflowing with a collection of cosmic rubble like the rings of Saturn is a lot of hooey. We'll be past in a little while and we haven't even come close to one. Space is large enough for all of us, I think."
"But not when all of us want the same space."
"I don't care for their area," said Walt with a smile. "Let 'em have it, I don't care. I'll stay up here and let them run as they will."
"You mean the ones that are moving downward?" asked Arden, indicating the sky.
"Those are asteroids, yes. We're to the North, as you may check by going around the ship to the opposite side. You'll see Polaris almost directly opposite, there. Sol is almost directly below us, and that bright one that you can see if you squint almost straight up out of the port is Saturn."
"I won't bother crossing the ship to see Polaris. I prefer the Southern Cross anyway. The thing I'm most interested in is: Are we accomplishing anything?"
"I think that we've spent the last thirty hours just catching up," explained Walt. "Up to right now we were going backwards, so to speak: we're on even terms now, and will be doing better from here on in."
"It's the waiting that gets me down," said Arden. "Oh, for something to do!"
"Let's eat," suggested Walt. "I'm hungry, and now that I think of it, I have not eaten since we left the Station. Arden, you are hereby elected to the post of galley chief. Get Jimmy from the dome if you need help."
"Help? What for?"
"He can help you lift it out of the oven. Don must have a cast-iron stomach."
"That's hearsay. I'll show you! As soon as I find the can opener, breakfast will be served."
"Make mine dinner," said Charley. "We've been awake all the time."
"O.K., we will have a combined meal, from grapefruit to ice cream. Those who want any or all parts may choose at will. And fellows, please let me know as soon as you get something tangible."
"That's a promise," said Walt. "Take it easy, and don't worry. We'll be catching up with them one of these days."
"Hadley, how much coating have we got on those cathodes?"
"Not too much. We had about twenty G-hours to begin with. We went to a half-G for about twenty hours, and now we're running on a quarter-G, which would leave us go for forty hours more. That's a grand total of about sixty hours."
"And the batteries?"
"In pretty good shape."
"Well, look. If it should come to a choice between floor and signal gun, we'll choose the gun. We've about twelve hours left in the cathodes, and since everybody is now used to quarter-G we might even slide it down to an eighth-G, which would give us about twenty-four hours."
"Your gun is still putting out?"
"So far as I can tell. Ten hours from now, we should know, I think, predicating my guess on whatever meager information they must have."
"We could save some juice by killing most of the lights in the ship."
"That's a thought. Johannson, have one of your men run around and remove all lights that aren't absolutely necessary. He can kill about three quarters of them, I'm certain. That'll save us a few kilowatt hours," said Channing. "And another thing. I'm about to drop the power of our electron gun and run it continuously. If the boys are anywhere in the neighborhood, they'll be needing the continuous disturbance for direction finding. I'd say in another five hours that we should start continuous radiation."
"You know, Channing, if this thing works out all right, it will be a definite vote for pure, deductive reasoning."
"I know. But the pure deduction is not too pure. It isn't guesswork. There are two factors of known quantity. One is that I know Walt Franks, and the other is that he knows me. The rest is a simple matter of the boys on the Station knowing space to the last inch, and applying the theory of probabilities to it. We'll hear from them soon, or I'll miss my guess. You wait."
"Yeah," drawled Captain Johannson, "we'll wait!"
Charley Bren made another computation and said: "Well, Walt, we've been narrowing them down for quite a time now. We're getting closer and closer to them, according to the field intensity. I've just got a good idea of direction on that last five-minute shot. Have Franklen swivel us around on this course; pretty soon we'll be right in the middle of their shots."
"We're approaching them asymptotically," observed Walt. "I wish I knew what our velocity was with respect to theirs. Something tells me that it would be much simpler if I knew."
"Walt," asked Arden, "how close can you see a spaceship?"
"You mean how far? Well, I don't know that it's ever been tried and recorded. But we can figure it out easy enough, by analogy. A period is about thirty thousandths of an inch in diameter, and visible from a distance of thirty inches. I mean visible with no doubt about it's being there. That's a thousand to one. Now, theSolar Queenis about six hundred feet tall and about four hundred feet in its major diameter, so we can assume a little more than the four hundred feet—say five hundred feet average of circular area, say—follow me?"
"Go on, you're vague, but normal."
"Then at a thousand to one, that becomes five hundred thousand feet, and dividing by five thousand—round figures because it isn't important enough to use that two hundred and eighty feet over the five thousand—gives us one thousand miles. We should be able to see theSolar Queenfrom a distance of a thousand miles."
"Then at four thousand miles per second we'll be in and out of visual range in a half second?"
"Oh no. They're rambling on a quite similar course at an unknown but high velocity. Our velocity with respect to theirs is what will determine how long they're within visual range."
"Hey, Walt," came the voice of Charley Bren. "The intensity of Don's beam has been cut to about one quarter and is now continuous. Does that mean anything?"
"Might mean trouble for them. Either they're running out of soup and mean for us to hurry up, or they assume we're close enough to obviate the need for high power. We'd better assume they want haste and act accordingly. How're the boys on the radio detectors coming along?"
"Fine. They've taken over the direction finding and claim that we are right on their tail."
"Anything in the sights, Jimmy?"
"Not yet. But the electroscope boys claim that quarter power or not, the input is terrific."
"Take a rest, Jimmy. We won't be there for a while yet. No use burning your eyes out trying to see 'em. There'll be time enough for you to do your share after we get 'em close enough to see with the naked eye. What do the beam-scanners say?"
"Shucks," answered the man on the scanners, "they're still radiating. How are we going to fix 'em on a reflected wave when they're more powerful on their own hook? The whole plate is glaring white. And, incidentally, so is the celestial globe in the meteor-spotter. I've had the threshold cut to the devil on that or we'd never be able to hold this course. Anything like a meteor that comes in our way now will not register until we're right on top of it and—"
TheRelay Girllurched sickeningly. All over the ship, things rattled and fell to the floors. Men grabbed at the closest solid object, and then theRelay Girlstraightened out once more.
"Woosh," said Franks. "That was a big one."
"Big one?" called Charley Bren. "That, my friend, was none other than theSolar Queen!"
"Can you prove that?"
"Sure. Our electroscopes now indicate a positive charge; they crossed over just as we lurched."
"Jimmy, get your scope a-top and get looking. Franklen, hang on about 7-G and follow Jimmy's orders. Charley, see if you can get anything cogent out of your gadget. Holy Green Fire, with all of a cubic million million million megaparsecs in which to run, we have to be so good that we run right into our quarry. Who says that radio direction finding is not a precise science? Who says that we couldn't catch—"
"Walt, they're in sight, but losing fast."
"O.K., Jimmy, can you give me any idea as to their velocity with respect to ours?"
"How long is she?"
"Six hundred feet."
Jimmy was silent for some seconds. "They're out of sight again, but I make it about four to seven hundred miles per second."
"At 7-G we should match that seven hundred in about four hours."
"And then go on decelerating so that they'll catch up?"
"No," said Walt. "I used the max figure and we can assume that they aren't going that fast, quite. At the end of four hours, we'll turnover and wait until they heave in sight again and then we'll do some more oscillating. We can match their velocity inside of ten hours, or Franklen will get fired."
"If I don't," promised Franklen, "I'll quit. You can't fire me!"
"We should be able to contact them by radio," said Walt.
"Their beam is off," said Bren.
"And they are using the landing set," called the radio man, "It's Channing. He says: 'Fancy meeting you here.' Any answer?"
"Just say, 'Dr. Channing, I presume?'"
Channing's voice came out of the ship's announcer system as the radio man made the necessary connections. It said: "Right—but what kept you so long?"
"Our boss was away," said Walt. "And we can't do a thing without him."
"Some boss. Some crew of wild men. Can't go off on a fishing trip without having my bunch chasing all over the Solar System."
"What's wrong with a little sightseeing tour? We didn't mean any harm. And speaking of harm, how are you and the rest of that bunch getting along?"
"We're O.K. What do you plan after we finally get close enough together to throw stones across?"
"We've got a whole hold full of spare batteries and a double set of replacement cathodes. There is a shipload of gravanol aboard, too. You'll need that and so will we. By the time we finish this jaunt, we'll have been about as far out as anybody ever gets."
"Yeah—got any precise figures? We've been running on a guess and a hope. I make it out about seven hundred million."
"Make it eight and a half. At 6-G, you'll cover another hundred and fifty million miles before you stop. Take it twenty-two hours at 6-G—and then another twenty-two at 6. That should put you right back here but going the other way at the same velocity. But wait, you've been coasting. Mark off that last twenty-two hours and make it like this: You'll be one thousand million miles from Sol when you come to a stop at the end of the first twenty-two hours at 6-G. That hangs you out beyond the orbit of Saturn by a couple of hundred million. Make it back forty-four hours at 6-G, turnover and continue. By that time we'll all be in so close that we can make any planet at will—preferably you to Terra and we'll head for Venus Equilateral. You'll come aboard us? No need for you to go with the rest."
"I can have the scooter sent out," said Channing. "How's Arden?"
"I'm fine, you big runabout. Wait until I get you!"
"Why Arden, I thought you might be glad to see me."
"Glad to see you?"
"But Arden—"
"Don't you 'But Arden' me, you big gadabout. Glad to see you? Boy, any man that makes me chase him all over the Solar System! You just wait. As soon as I get ahold of you, Don Channing, I'm going to—bust out and bawl like a kid! Hurry up, willya?"
"I'll be right over," said Don soberly.
And, strangely enough, Don did not deviate this time.
THE END