Arden jumped. She sailed upward, and as she passed through the opening, Channing caught her by one arm and stopped her flight. "At that speed you'd go right on across," he said.
She looked up, and there about two hundred feet overhead she could see the opposite wall.
Channing snapped on the lights. They were in a room two hundred feet in diameter and three hundred feet long. "We're at the center of the station," Channing informed her. "Beyond that bulkhead is the air lock. On the other side of the other bulkhead, we have the air plants, the storage spaces, and several cubic inches of machinery."
"Inches?" asked Arden. Then she saw that he was fooling.
"Come on," he said. He took her by the hand and with a kick he propelled himself along on a long, curving course to the opposite side of the inner cylinder. He gained the opposite bulkhead as well.
"Now, that's what I call traveling," said Arden. "But my tummy goeswhoosh, whoosh, every time we cross the center."
Channing operated a heavy door. They went in through rooms full of machinery and into rooms stacked to the center with boxes; stacked from the wall to the center and then packed with springs. Near the axis of the cylinder, things weighed so little that packing was necessary to keep them from bouncing around.
"I feel giddy," said Arden.
"High in oxygen," said he. "The CO2drops to the bottom, being heavier. Then, too, the air is thinner up here because centrifugal force swings the whole out to the rim. Out there we are so used to 'down' that here, a half mile above—or to the center, rather—we have trouble in saying, technically, what we mean. Watch!"
He left Arden standing and walked rapidly around the inside of the cylinder. Soon he was standing on the steel plates directly above her head. She looked up, and shook her head.
"I know why," she called, "but it still makes me dizzy. Come down from up there. Or I'll be sick."
Channing made a neat dive from his position above her head. He did it merely by jumping upward from his place toward her place, apparently hanging head down from the ceiling. He turned a neat flip-flop in the air and landed easily beside her. Immediately, for both of them, things became right-side-up again.
Channing opened the door to the room marked: "Air Plant." He stepped in, snapped on the lights, and gasped in amazement. The room was empty! Completely empty! Absolutely, and irrevocably vacant. Oh, there was some dirt on the floor and some trash in the corners, and a trail of scratches on the floor to show that the life-giving air plant had been removed, hunk by hunk, out through another door at the far end of the room.
"Whoa, Tillie!" screamed Don. "We've been stabbed! Arden, get on the -type and have ... no, wait a minute until we find out a few more things about this!"
They made record time back to the office level. They found Burbank in his office, leaning back, and talking to someone on the phone.
Channing tried to interrupt, but Burbank removed his nose from the telephone long enough to snarl, "Can't you see I'm busy? Have you no manners or respect?"
Channing, fuming inside, swore inwardly. He sat down with a show of being calm and folded his hands over his abdomen like the famed statue of Buddha. Arden looked at him, and for all of the trouble they were in, she couldn't help giggling. Channing, tall, lanky, and yet strong, looked as little as possible like the popular, pudgy figure of the Sitting Buddha.
A minute passed.
Burbank hung up the phone.
"Where does Venus Equilateral get its air from?" snapped Burbank.
"That's what I want—"
"Answer me, please. I'm worried."
"So am I. Something—"
"Tell me first, from what source does Venus Equilateral get its fresh air?"
"From the air plant. And that is—"
"There must be more than one," said Burbank thoughtfully.
"There's only one."
"Theremustbe more than one. We couldn't live if there weren't," said the Director.
"Wishing won't make it so. There is only one."
"I tell you, there must be another. Why, I went into the one up at the axis yesterday and found that instead of a bunch of machinery, running smoothly, purifying air, and sending it out to the various parts of the station, all there was was a veritable jungle of weeds. Those weeds, Mr. Channing, looked as though they must have been put in there years ago. Now, where did the air-purifying machinery go?"
Channing listened to the latter half of Burbank's speech with his chin at half-mast. He looked as though a feather would knock him clear across the office.
"I had some workmen clear the weeds out. I intend to replace the air machinery as soon as I can get some new material sent from Terra."
Channing managed to blink. It was an effort. "You had workmen toss the weeds out—" he repeated dully. "The weeds—"
There was silence for a minute. Burbank studied the man in the chair as though Channing were a piece of statuary. Channing was just as motionless. "Channing, man, what ails you—" began Burbank. The sound of Burbank's' voice aroused Channing from his shocked condition.
Channing leaped to his feet. He landed on his heels, spun, and snapped at Arden: "Get on the -type. Have 'em slap as many oxy-drums on the fastest ship they've got! Get 'em here at full throttle. Tell 'em to load up the pilot and crew with gravanol and not to spare the horsepower! Scram!"
Arden gasped. She fled from the office.
"Burbank, what did you think an air plant was?" snapped Channing.
"Why, isn't it some sort of purifying machinery?" asked the wondering Director.
"What better purifying machine is there than a plot of grass?" shouted Channing. "Weeds, grass, flowers, trees, alfalfa, wheat, or anything that grows and uses chlorophyll. We breathe oxygen, exhale CO2. Plants inhale CO2and exude oxygen. An air plant means just that. It is a specialized type of Martian sawgrass that is more efficient than anything else in the system for inhaling dead air and revitalizing it. And you've tossed the weeds out!" Channing snorted in anger. "We've spent years getting that plant so that it will grow just right. It got so good that the CO2detectors weren't even needed. The balance was so adjusted that they haven't even been turned for three or four years. They were just another source of unnecessary expense. Why, save for a monthly inspection, that room isn't even opened, so efficient is the Martian sawgrass. We, Burbank, are losing oxygen!"
The Director grew white. "I didn't know," he said.
"Well, you know now. Get on your horse and do something. At least, Burbank, stay out of my way while I do something."
"You have a free hand," said Burbank. His voice sounded beaten.
Channing left the office of the Director and headed for the chem lab. "How much potassium chlorate, nitrate, sulphate, and other oxygen-bearing compounds have you?" he asked. "That includes mercuric oxide, spare water, or anything else that will give us oxygen if broken down?"
There was a ten-minute wait until the members of the chem lab took a hurried inventory.
"Good," said Channing. "Start breaking it down. Collect all the oxygen you can in containers. This is the business! It has priority! Anything, no matter how valuable, must be scrapped if it can facilitate the gathering of oxygen. God knows, there isn't by half enough—not even a tenth. But try, anyway."
Channing headed out of the chemistry laboratory and into the electronics lab. "Jimmy," he shouted. "Get a couple of stone jars and get an electrolysis outfit running. Fling the hydrogen out of a convenient outlet into space and collect the oxygen. Water, I mean. Use tap water, right out of the faucet."
"Yeah, but—"
"Jimmy, if we don't breathe, what chance have we to go on drinking? I'll tell you when to stop."
"O.K., Doc," said Jimmy.
"And look. As soon as you get that running, set up a CO2indicator and let me know the percentage at the end of each hour! Get me?"
"I take it that something has happened to the air plant?"
"It isn't functioning," said Channing shortly. He left the puzzled Jimmy and headed for the beam-control room. Jimmy continued to wonder about the air plant. How in the devil could an air plant cease functioning unless it were—dead! Jimmy stopped wondering and began to operate on his electrolysis set-up furiously.
Channing found the men in the beam-control room worried and ill at ease. The fine co-ordination that made them expert in their line was ebbing. The nervous work, that made it necessary to run the men in ten-minute shifts with a half hour of rest in between, demanded perfect motor control, excellent perception, and a fine power of reasoning. The barely perceptible lack of oxygen at this high level was taking its toll already.
"Look, fellows, we're in a mess. Until further notice, take five-minute shifts. We've got about thirty hours to go. If the going gets tough, drop it to three-minute shifts. But, fellows, keep those beams centered until you drop!"
"We'll keep 'em going if we have to call our wives up here to run 'em for us," said one man. "What's up?"
"Air plant's sour. Losing oxy. Got a shipload coming out from Terra, be here in thirty hours. But upon you fellows will rest the responsibility of keeping us in touch with the rest of the system. If you fail, we could call for help until hell freezes us all in—and no one would hear us!"
"We'll keep 'em rolling," said a little fellow that had to sit on a tall stool to get even with the controls.
Channing looked out of the big plastiglass dome that covered the entire end of the Venus Equilateral Station. "Here messages go in and out," he mused. "The other end brings us things that take our breath away."
Channing was referring to the big air lock at the other end of the station, three miles away, right through the center.
At the center of the dome, there was a sighting 'scope. It kept Polaris on a marked circle, keeping the station exactly even with the Terrestrial North. About the periphery of the dome, looking out across space, the beam control operators were sitting, each with a hundred-foot parabolic reflector below his position, outside the dome, and under the rim of the transparent bowl. These reflectors shot the interworld signals across space in tight beams, and the men, half the time anticipating the vagaries of space-warp, kept them centered on the proper, shining speck in that field of stars.
Above his head, the stars twinkled. Puny man, setting his will against the monstrous void. Puny man, dependent upon atmosphere. "Nature abhors a vacuum," once said Torrecelli. What braggadocio! If Nature abhorred a vacuum, why did she make so much of it?
Arden Westland entered the apartment without knocking. "I'd give my right arm up to here for a cigarette," she said, marking above the elbow with the edge of her other hand.
"Na-hah," said Channing. "Can't burn oxygen."
"I know. I'm tired, I'm cold, and I'm ill. Anything you can do for a lady?"
"Not as much as I'd like to do," said Channing. "I can't help much. We've got most of the place stopped off with the air-tight doors. We've been electrolyzing water, baking KClO3, and everything else we can get oxy out of. I've a crew of men trying to absorb the CO2. Jimmy Dickson is bringing me hourly reports on the CO2content and we are losing. Slowly, Arden, but we are losing. Of course, I've known all along that we couldn't support the station on the meager supplies we have on hand. But we'll win in the end. Our microcosmic world is getting a shot in the arm in a few hours that will reset the balance."
"I don't see why we didn't prepare for this emergency," said Arden.
"This station is well balanced. There are enough people here and enough space to make a little world of our own. We can establish a balance that is pretty darned close to perfect. The imperfections are taken care of by influxes of supplies from the system. Until Burbank upset the balance, we could go on forever, utilizing natural purification of air and water. We grow a few vegetables and have some meat critters to give milk and steak. The energy to operate Venus Equilateral is supplied with the photoelectric collectors—sun power, if you please. Why should we burden ourselves with a lot of cubic feet of supplies that would take up room necessary to maintain our balance? We are not in bad shape. We'll live, though we'll all be a bunch of tired, irritable people who yawn in one another's faces."
"And after it is over?"
"We'll establish the balance. Then we'll settle down again. We can take up where we left off."
"Not quite. Venus Equilateral has been seared by fire. We'll be tougher and less tolerant of outsiders. If we were a closed corporation before, we'll be tighter than a vacuum-packed coffee can afterwards. And the first bird that cracks us will get hissed at."
Three superliners hove into sight at the end of thirty-one hours. They circled the station, signaling by helio. They approached the air lock end of the station and made contact. Their bulk tipped the station slightly, tipped it and rotated it by gyroscopic reaction. The air lock was opened and space-suited figures swarmed over the mile-wide end of the station. A stream of big oxygen tanks were brought into the air lock, admitted, and taken to the last bulwark of huddled people on the fourth level.
From one of the ships there came a horde of men carrying huge square trays of dirt and green, growing sawgrass.
For six hours, Venus Equilateral was the scene of wild, furious activity. The dead air was blown out of bad areas, and the hissing of oxygen tanks was heard in every room. Gradually the people left the fourth level and returned to their rightful places. The station rang with laughter once more, and business, stopped short for want of breath, took a deep lungful of fresh air and went back to work.
The superliners left. But not without taking a souvenir. Francis Burbank went with them. His removal notice was on the first ship, and Don Channing's appointment as Director of Interplanetary Communications was on the second.
Happily he entered the Director's office once more. He carried with him all the things that he had removed just a few short weeks before. This time he was coming to stay.
Arden entered the office behind him. "Home again?" she asked.
"Yop," he grinned at her. "Open file B, will you, and break out a container of my favorite beverage?"
"Sure thing," she said.
There came a shout of glee. "Break out four glasses," she was told from behind. It was Walt Franks and Joe.
It was Arden that proposed the toast. "Here's to a closed corporation," she said. They drank on that.
She went over beside Don and took his arm. "You see?" she said, looking up into his eyes. "We aren't the same. Things have changed since Burbank came, and went. Haven't they?"
"They have," laughed Channing. "And now that you are my secretary, it is no longer proper for you to shine up to me like that. People will talk."
"What's he raving about?" asked Joe.
Channing answered. "It is considered bad taste for a secretary to make passes at her boss. Think of his wife and kids."
"You have neither."
"Maybe so. But it is still not proper for a secretary to—"
"You can't call me a secretary in that tone of voice," snapped Arden. "I quit! I resign! I refuse to be secretary to a man like you!"
Channing looked helplessly at Franks.
Walt looked at Arden, saw what was in her eyes, and told Channing: "See if you can wriggle out of what comes next!" He took Joe by the arm and said: "Joe, now that the ban is off, may I buy you a drink?"
And Joe answered: "It is a beautiful night out, isn't it?"
It is always a beautiful night on Venus Equilateral. The stars shine forever in a sky that holds a molten ball. Sol flares endlessly in an absolutely black, star-studded sky. There is no moon. The air is always soft and warm and unchanging.
And at the moment that Channing was finding out why Arden resigned, a little man of Northern Venus handed a message to the operator in the International Hotel in Detroit, Michigan. It went out on the land wires to Hawaii; to Luna; to Venus Equilateral; to the rotating relay stations that circle Venus five hundred miles above the planet; down through the raging heaviside layer to Northern Landing; and across the Palanortis Country to Yoralen.
Channing was still investigating his secretary's resignation when Korvus, the Magnificent, read:
TYPE 56-XXD FLIER F. O. B. DETROIT, MICHIGAN, TODAY. WILL BE DELIVERED ON NEXT FREIGHT SHIP.WILNEDA.
TYPE 56-XXD FLIER F. O. B. DETROIT, MICHIGAN, TODAY. WILL BE DELIVERED ON NEXT FREIGHT SHIP.
WILNEDA.
THE END.