Chapter II: Part 2

Several of the pentapods were loitering at this end of the corridor. They made no objection as the doctor investigated the control beside the elevator door, and finally manipulated it; but two of them entered the car with Little and half of his crew, and accompanied them to the ground level. Little obtained one more bit of information as they started down: the elevator controls were like those of an Earthly automatic car, simply a row of buttons. He indicated the lowest, and made a motion as though to push it, meanwhile looking at one of the guards. This creature came over beside him, and with one of its tendrils touched a stud less than a third of the way down the panel. Little smiled. Evidently the fort was more underground than above, and must be a far larger structure than he had thought. It was nice to know.

They waited at the lower level, while one of the men took the car back for the others; then, accompanied by several more of the guards, they went outside. None of the men could discover how the doors of the entrance chamber were manipulated; none of the creatures accompanying them appeared to touch a control of any sort. The piles of supplies and equipment were still in front of the gate; nothing had been touched. Squads of the pentapods were hurrying this way and that around the great ship; some were visible, clinging to nets suspended far overhead against the hull, evidently repairing, cleaning, or inspecting.

A long line of the creatures was passing continually back and forth between one of the ports of the vessel and a small gate, which the men had not previously noticed, in the wall of the fort. They were bearing large crates, which might have contained anything, and various articles of machinery. Little watched them for a moment, then turned his attention to their own supplies.

The men loaded up and returned to the elevator, into which the food was piled. One man started up with the load and the others went back to the piles. This time Little turned his attention to the stove, which the cook had demanded. It had already been worked out of its pile and was awaiting transportation. The doctor first inspected it carefully, however.

It was an extremely versatile piece of equipment. It contained a tiny iron converter of its own, but was also designed to draw power from any normal standard, if desired. Being navy equipment, it also had to be able to work without electric power, if circumstances required precautions against detection; and a tube connection at the back permitted the attachment of a hydrogen or butane tank--there was even a clamp for the tank.

Little saw a rack of three gas tanks standing by a nearby pile, and was smitten with an idea. He detached one of them and fastened it into the stove clamp which, fortunately, it fitted. Four men picked up the stove and carried it inside. The other tanks were removed from the rack and carried after it. They contained, it is needless to say, neither hydrogen nor butane. Little hoped that none of the watching guards had been present at the actual looting of the _Gomeisa_, and knew where those tanks came from. He had tried to act normally while he had fitted the cylinder and given orders to bring the others.

* * * * *

The elevator had not yet returned when they reached its door. The men set their burden down. To Little's surprise, none of the guards had accompanied them--they had deduced, from the weight and clumsiness of the device the men were carrying, that watching them would be superfluous until the machine was set up. Or, at least, so reasoned the doctor. He took advantage of the opportunity to tell the men to be very careful of the cylinders they were carrying. They asked no questions, though each man had a fairly good idea of the reason for the order. They already knew that the atomic converter of the stove was in working order, and that heating gas was, therefore, superfluous.

When the elevator finally arrived, Little ordered the man who had brought it to help the others bring the rest of the food from outside. There was still a good deal of it, and it might as well be brought in, though a large supply had already accumulated in the storeroom. He finished his orders with:

"You're free to try any smuggling you want, but be careful. They already know what an ion gun looks like, and we have been told that they're very good at guessing. We don't know, of course, what articles besides weapons they don't want us to have; so be careful in taking anything you think they might object to. I'm going to take this load up." He slid the door to and pressed the top button.

The same group of guards were waiting at the top. They watched with interest as several men helped the doctor carry the stove to the room which was to serve as the kitchen. There was not too much space left, for food supplies filled all the corners. Little smiled as he saw them--it seemed as though Magill were anticipating a long stay. He was probably justified.

Denham, the cook, grinned as he saw the stove. He had cleared a narrow space for it and fussily superintended the placing. He looked at the gas tank attached to it, but before he could express any surprise, Little spoke. He kept his voice and expression normal, for several pentapods had followed the stove into the room.

"Act as if the tank were just part of the stove, Den," he said, "but use the iron burner. I assure you that the gas won't heat anything."

Denham kept his face expressionless and said, "O.K., doc. Good work." As though nothing unusual were occurring, he began digging supplies from the surrounding heaps, preparing the promised dinner. The doctor sought out Magill, who had just completed the task of assigning men to the rooms.

"Have you found out how this place is ventilated?" asked Little, as soon as he could get the quartermaster's attention.

"Hello, doc. Food in? Yes, we located the ventilators. Ceiling and floor grilles. Too small to admit a pair of human shoulders, even if we got the bars out."

"I didn't mean that, exactly. Do you know if the same system handles the rest of the building? And whether those grilles keep blowing if we open the window in a room?"

"We can find out the answer to the second, anyway. Come along."

* * * * *

The two entered one of the rooms, which had been set aside as a sleeping room for three men. All the chambers on this side of the corridor had transparent ports opening onto the roof; after some juggling, Magill got one open. Little, standing beneath the ceiling inlet, was gratified to feel the breeze die away. He nodded slowly.

"I think we should form the habit of keeping the windows open," he remarked. "Of course, not being too pointed about it. It may get a trifle cool at night, but we can stand that. By the way, I forgot to have the men bring up those sleeping bags; I'll tell them the next time the elevator comes up. Do you think our faithful shadows"--Little nodded toward the two pentapods standing in the doorway--"would object if we went out on the roof? They let us open the window, and we could go out that way, in a pinch. There must be some more regular exit."

"No harm in trying," replied Magill. He led the way into the corridor, the two watchers moving aside for them, and after a moment's hesitation turned left, away from the elevator. The guards fell in behind. The room they had been in was the last of those occupied by the Earthmen, and several lightless doorways were passed before the end of the passage was reached. They found it similar in arrangement to the other end, containing a large, transparent panel through which was visible a broad expanse of roof.

Magill, who had opened the window in the room, began to examine the edges of the panel. It proved openable, the control being so high above the floor as to be almost out of reach. The pentapods could, without much effort, reach objects eight feet in the air. The quartermaster, with a little fumbling, finally released the catch and pushed the panel open.

The guards made no objection as the men went out on the roof, merely following a few yards behind. This end of the hall opened to the southeast--calling the sunrise point east--away from the ship. From a position a few yards outside the panel, it was evident that the prison quarters occupied a relatively small, rectangular pimple near the north corner of the half-mile-square roof. The men turned left again and passed along the side of the protuberance. Some of the crew saw them through the windows, which Magill beckoned them to open. Denham had already opened his and cooking odors were beginning to pour forth.

Crossing the few yards to the five-foot parapet at the edge of the roof, the men found a series of steps which raised them sufficiently to lean over the two-foot-thick wall. They were facing the forest to which Albee and the others who had escaped had made their dash. From this height they could see down the declivity at its edge, and perceive that a heavy growth of underbrush was present, which would probably seriously impede travel. No sign of the refugees caught the eye.

* * * * *

The bow of the ship protruded from behind the near corner of the structure. Little and Magill moved to this wall and looked down. The line of pentapods was still carrying supplies to the vast ship, whose hull towered well above the level of the two watchers. It hid everything that lay to the northwest. After a few minutes' gaze the officers turned back to the quarters. They were now at the "elevator" end of the superstructure, and found themselves facing the panel which had not yet been opened. Two of the men were visible, watching them from within; and Magill, walking over to the entrance, pointed out the catch which permitted it to open. No outside control was visible.

"The men have come with the rest of the food, sir," said one as soon as the panel opened, "and Denham says that dinner is nearly ready."

"We'll be in shortly," said the quartermaster. "You may tell the men they are free to come out and explore, if they wish."

"I would still like to know if the ventilator intake is on this roof," remarked Little as they walked on. "It must be somewhere, and the wall we saw was perfectly smooth. There doesn't seem to be anything out in the middle of this place, so if it's anywhere, it must be hiding in the shadow of the parapet. Can you see any irregularities near the edges?"

"No," said Magill after straining his eyes in every direction. "I can't. But we're half a mile from two of the walls, and might easily miss such a thing at a much shorter distance. If it's here, one of the men will find it sooner or later. Why do you worry about it, if you want us to use outdoor air directly?"

"I thought it might be a useful item of knowledge," replied Little. "I succeeded in smuggling up my three remaining cylinders of geletane, disguised as part of the stove. I don't suppose there's enough to put the whole garrison out--but still, it would be nice to know their ventilating system."

"Good job, doctor. After we eat we'll find out what else, if anything, the boys succeeded in bringing up, and more or less take inventory. Then perhaps we can arrange some plan for getting out of here. I wish we knew what has become of the _Gomeisa_; I don't suppose we could manage the controls on that ship outside." Magill made this remark with such perfect seriousness that Little was forced to grin.

"You may be a little optimistic. Keys. Remember the Vegans, who are far from stupid creatures, have been here for some time and have failed to get to first base to date."

"They are handicapped physically, doc. They can't live for long outside without supplementary ultraviolet sources, and they have to plan with that in mind. Furthermore, this gravity is nearly twice that of Vega Five, and they can't move at any rate better than a crawl."

Little was forced to admit the justice of this argument, but remained, in Magill's opinion, pessimistic. He had developed a healthy respect for their captors, along with a slight comprehension of their motives. The trouble was, the Vegan's description of the way the pentapods seemed to guess the purpose of a device before it was completed did not tie in very well with his theory concerning those motives. More thought was indicated. He indulged in it while Magill steered him back to the prison and dinner.

* * * * *

The meal was good. There was no reason why it shouldn't be, of course, since the cook had all the usual supplies and equipment; but Little was slightly surprised to find himself enjoying dinner while in durance vile as much as if he were on his own ship. It didn't seem natural. They ate in the hallway, squatted in a circle in front of the kitchen door. The Vegans, whose quarters were directly opposite, watched from their doorways. They also commented from time to time, but were very seldom answered, since both hands are required to speak Vegan. They would probably have felt slighted if one of them--not the one who had acted as interpreter--had not understood some English. He got about two words in every five, and succeeded in keeping his race in the conversation.

The meal concluded, the meeting of the ways and means committee, which consisted of all human beings and Vegans in the neighborhood, was immediately called to order. The presence of nonmembers, though resented, was perforce permitted, and discussion began under the watchful eyes of eight or ten pentapods. Little, rather than Magill, presided.

"The first thing we need to know," he said, "is everything possible about our five-sided friends. The Vegans have been with them longer, and probably know more than we; but owing to the relative slowness of their speech, we will save their contribution until last. You who understand English may translate the substance of our discussion to your fellows if you wish, but we will hold a second meeting afterward and go over everything in your own language. First, then, will anyone who succeeded in smuggling any weapons or probable-contraband tools up here please report? Keep your hands in your pockets and your eyes on me while you do so; there is a high order of probability that our friends are very good at interpreting gestures--even human gestures."

A man directly across the circle from Little raised a hand. The doctor nodded to him.

"When we were loading food, before we made that break, I dropped my testing kit into my pack first of all. I didn't try to cover it up and I concentrated on boxed articles of food afterward to make it look natural." The speaker was one of Goldthwaite's assistants, a tall fellow with the insignia of a technician's mate. Little knew him fairly well. He had been born on Earth but showed plainly a background of several generations on the colony-planet Regulus Six--big bones, dark skin, quick reactions.

"Good work, Dennis. What is in the kit?"

"Pliers, volt-ammeter, about sixty feet of assorted sizes of silver wire, two-thousand-line grating, midget atomic wire-welder, six plano-convex lenses of various focal lengths, support rod and two mirrors to go with them, and a small stroboscope."

"Item, one portable laboratory," remarked Little. "Congratulations. Leo, I suppose you have outdone your brother?"

Leo Dennis, the twin brother of the first speaker, shook his head. "Just an old-fashioned manual razor. I'll start accepting offers tomorrow." Little smiled and fingered his chin.

"You're too late, unless someone brought scissors to start with. Safety razors weren't built to cope with a ten-day growth, more or less. Never mind, we may find a use for it--it's a cutting tool, anyway. Next?"

* * * * *

There was a pause, with everybody looking expectantly at his neighbor. Evidently the total had been reached. Little spoke again.

"Did anybody try to smuggle something and fail?"

"I tried to salvage Goldy's liquor, and had it taken from me," answered another man. "I guess they're firmly convinced it's lethal. I wish them luck in analyzing the stuff--we never could."

"How far did you get before they took it from you?"

"They let me pick up the bottles that were lying around, and put them in the case; half a dozen of them watched me while I did that. But when I started to carry the case toward the gate--of course, that was some job, as Goldy found out--they all walked up and just took it away. They didn't get violent or anything like that."

"Then it wasn't really a case of detected smuggling; you made no effort to mask your real intentions. Is that right?"

"Yes, sir. I don't quite see how any one could hide either that case or the bottles; I was just sort of hoping against hope."

Little nodded and called for more contributions. A gunner responded.

"I found a couple of cases of grenades and stuck several into my pockets. The next thing I knew, one of the starfish was holding my arms, and another taking them out again. He handled them as though he knew what they were."

"I suppose you checked the safeties before you pocketed the bombs?"

"Of course, sir."

Little nodded wearily. "Of course. And that was enough for our admittedly astute friends. I admit it's usually a very good idea to obey regulations, but there are exceptions to every rule. I think the present circumstances constitute an exception to most of them. Any others?"

Apparently no one else had seen anything he coveted sufficiently to attempt to sneak out of the piles. The doctor didn't care particularly; he believed he had enough data from that source, and an idea was rapidly growing. Unfortunately, the primary principle of that idea required him to learn even more, though not about his captors. Possibly the Vegans could supply the information, but Little was not prepared to bet on it.

Magill closed the discussion by mentioning the anæsthetic which Little had made available, and requesting an early communication of all ideas. The men withdrew into smaller groups, talking in low tones among themselves, and gradually drifted through the doors to their rooms, or out onto the roof. Magill followed to take a small group down again for the sleeping bags.

* * * * *

Little remained with the Vegans. He had a good deal to ask them, and material which could be covered in an hour of verbal conversation would probably take three or four hours of arm-waving. He sat just outside the fan of intense light from one of the doorways, and the creatures formed a semicircle just inside--the door was wide enough for the four of them, since it had been constructed to admit the pentapods. The doctor opened the conversation.

"How long have you been here?" was his first question. It was answered by the individual who had acted as interpreter.

"Since our arrival there have passed about two hundred of the days of this planet. We are not sure just how long they are, but we believe they are about thirty of your hours. We have no idea of the length of time that elapsed between our capture and our arrival at this place, however. We were driving a small private ship on a sightseeing trip to a world which had recently been reported near the galactic center by one of our official exploring vessels, and were near its reported position when we were taken. They simply engulfed us--moved up and dragged our ship into a cargo lock with magnets. We were on their ship a long time before they put us off here and left again, and we were not allowed to obtain any of our belongings except food and ultraviolet lamps until we arrived; so we don't know how long the trip lasted. One of us"--the Vegan indicated the individual--"got up courage enough to venture onto the roof one night and saw what he thinks was the Galaxy; so we believe this world lies in the Cloud. You will be able to tell better for yourselves--you can stand the dark longer than we, and your eyes are better at locating faint details."

"You may be right. We were heading toward the Cloud when we were taken," answered Little. "How freely have you been permitted to move about this fort?"

"We may go almost anywhere above ground level," was the answer. "Some of these watchers"--a supple antenna gestured toward the ever-present guards--"are always with us, and they prevent us from taking the elevators any lower. Then there are a few rooms on the upper levels which are always sealed, and two or three which are open but whose thresholds we are not permitted to cross."

"How do they prevent your entering?"

"They simply get in front of us, and push us back if we persist. They have never used violence on us. They never need to; we are in no position to dispute their wishes. There is no comparison between them and us physically, and we are very much out of our natural environment."

"Have you been able to deduce the nature or purpose of the rooms from which you are barred?"

"We assume that they are control rooms, communication offices, or chart rooms. One of them contains several devices which look like ordinary television screens. Whether they are for long-range use or are merely part of a local system, of course we cannot tell." Little pondered for several moments before speaking again.

"You mentioned constructing several devices to aid in escape, only to have them taken away from you just before they were completed. Could you give me more details on just what happened? What were you doing, and at what stage were you interrupted? How did you expect to get away from the planet?"

"We did not expect to get away. We just wanted to make them go, so we could take over the fort. When we disconnected their tube lights to put in our own, he"--indicating the creature beside him--"managed to retain a sample of the tube. On its walls were absorbed layers of several gases, but neon was the chief component. We had smuggled in the neutrino converters and stabilizers from our ship"--and Keys said these fellows were helpless, thought Little--"and it occurred to us that we might set up a neon-oxygen reaction which would flood the place with ultraviolet. We had already noticed that they could not stand it any better than you. The half life of the process would have been of the order of twelve hours, which should have driven them out for a period of time ample for our purpose. A neutrino jet of very moderate power, correctly tuned, could easily have catalyzed such a reaction in every light tube in the place. We had built the projector, disguising it as another ultraviolet lamp, and were connecting the converter when about fifty of the guards dived in, took the whole thing away, and ran out before the lamps we already had going could hurt them."

* * * * *

Little heroically forbore to ask the creatures why they had not smuggled in their ship while they were about it and flown away. The Vegans wouldn't have appreciated the humor.

"I believe I understand the purpose of the actions of these creatures," he said. "But some of their characteristics still puzzle me. Their teamwork is perfect, better than that of well-trained human fighters, but if my idea is correct their technical knowledge is inferior to ours. I have already mentioned to my captain their apparent lack of conceit--that is also based on my guess as to their motives in capturing us. One thing, however, I do not understand at all. How do they communicate? I have always been reluctant to fall back on the 'explanation' of telepathy; there are reasons which make me doubt that it can ever be a satisfactory substitute for a language."

The Vegans looked at him for a moment, astonishment reflected in the tenseness of their antennae.

"You do not see how they talk?" signaled one at length. "That is the first and only thing we have been able to appreciate in their entire make-up."

Little leaned forward. "Explain, please," he waved tensely. "That may be the most important thing any of us has yet ascertained."

The Vegans explained at length. Great length. The recital was stretched out by Little's frequent questions, and once or twice delayed by his imperfect comprehension of the Vegan language. The sun was low in the west when the conversation ended, but the doctor had at last what he believed to be a complete mental picture of the habits, thoughts, and nature of the pentapods, and he had more than the glimmerings of a plan which might set the human and Vegan prisoners free once more. He hoped.

He left his nonhuman allies, and sought out Magill. He found him at the western corner of the roof, examining the landscape visible beyond the tail of the spaceship. A couple of pentapods were on hand, as usual. Leo Dennis was making himself useful, sketching the western skyline on a pad he carried, with the apparent intention of marking the sunset point. Magill had evidently decided that an assistant navigator should be able to get his own location on a planet's surface as well as in space. Dennis was slightly handicapped by a total lack of instruments, but was doing his best. Little approached the quartermaster.

"Has anything new turned up, Keys?"

The officer shook his head without turning. "The men are all over the roof, to see if there are any ventilator intakes or anything else. One of them pointed out that the lack of superstructure suggested that the roof might be used as a landing place for atmosphere craft, and found some blast marks to back up the idea. No one else has made any worth-while reports. If there are any aircraft, though, I'd like to know where they stow them."

"It might help, though I hope we won't be driven to using them. I suppose the boys have their eyes open for large, probably level-set trapdoors in the roof. But what I wanted to find out was: with whom am I sharing a room?"

"Don't recall, offhand," replied Magill. "It doesn't matter greatly. If there is any one in particular you want--or don't want--to be with, you're at liberty to trade with someone. I told the boys that."

"Thanks. I want to spend some time with the Dennis boys, without making it too obvious. I suppose they're already together. By the way, seeing I'm still a medical officer, has anyone reported sick? The air is just a shade on the thin side, and we've been breathing it long enough for effects to show, if there are going to be any."

Magill shook his head negatively, and Little strolled over to Leo, who had completed his sketch and was trying to mark the position of the sun at five-minute intervals. He was wearing one of the few watches possessed by the party. He was perfectly willing to have his erstwhile roommate replaced by the doctor, especially when Little promised work to be done. He agreed to speak to his brother and to Cauley, who had originally been assigned to their room.

"Tell Arthur to bring his pack, with the kit he sneaked along," added the doctor. "We will probably have use for it." Leo nodded, grinning, and resumed his attempts to fix the position of an object, much too bright to view directly, which had an angular breadth on the order of half a degree. He didn't appear discouraged yet.

* * * * *

Little wandered off across the roof, occasionally meeting and speaking to one of the men. Morale seemed to be good, he noted with relief. He had always considered that to be part of the business of a medical officer, since it was, after all, directly reflected in the health of the men.

A motion in the direction of the setting sun caught his eye. He turned to face it and saw a narrow, dazzling crescent low in the western sky, a crescent that rose and grew broader as he watched. The planet had a satellite, like Mars, so close that its period of revolution was less than one of its own days. Little wondered if a body so close to the planet might not prove useful. He filed the thought away for future reference.

The sun set as he watched, and he realized he had been right about the thinness of the air. Darkness shut down almost at once. The moon sprang into brilliance--brilliance that was deceptive, for details on the landscape were almost impossible to make out. Stars, scattered at random over the sky, began to appear; and as the last traces of daylight faded away, there became visible, at first hazily and then clear and definite, the ghostly shape of the Galaxy. Its sprawling spiral arms stretched across a quarter of the sky, the bulk of the system inclined some thirty degrees from the edge-on position--just enough to show off the tracing of the great lanes of dust that divided the arms.

The men began to drift toward the orange glow that shone through the entrance panels and windows of the "penthouse!" They were greeted by the whistle of Denham, who had just completed preparation of another meal. It was eaten as the first had been, in the corridor with a silent audience of guards. The men had grown used to the creatures, and were no longer bothered by their presence. The conversation was desultory, except when Arthur Dennis offered to take the place of Denham's helper for the evening. It was the most plausible excuse for entering the kitchen-storeroom, where the packs had been stowed. No one commented, though everybody guessed the reason.

Windows and doors of all rooms were left open, the first because of Little's advice, the second because the pentapods had removed all means of closing the entrances--privacy was impossible, which did not in the least surprise Little. At the conclusion of the meal, he accompanied Leo Dennis to the latter's room, which was near the end of the corridor farthest from the elevator, and waited for the arrival of Arthur. A little investigation solved the secret of turning out the room's tube lights, which darkened the place somewhat, but the light from the corridor was sufficient to move around by.

* * * * *

Arthur entered after about fifteen minutes, carrying three packs under his arms. Two of these he tossed to his brother and the doctor, remarking, "Pillows in one suite, anyway!" The other he retained. The three men rolled up the packs and placed them under the canvas at the heads of their sleeping bags, conscious meanwhile of the never-ending scrutiny from the door; then they leaned back against the wall and relaxed.

The twins had tobacco, and all three smoked as they talked. A remark of Leo's, which opened the conversation, eased Little's mind of one problem which had been bothering him.

"Before we do or say anything else, doc," said the navigator, "please think carefully before you tell us anything. I suppose you found out a good deal from the Vegans, and I wouldn't be surprised to know you have a campaign all mapped out; but I don't want to know more than necessary. I have developed, from what the Vegans said and from what I've seen myself, a very healthy respect for the intuition, or guessing powers, or whatever it is, of our silent watchers. It makes me uncomfortable. And the less I know the more natural I can let myself act. All right?"

"All right; that was my own idea, too," answered the doctor. "I will tell you no more than necessary. In the first place I should, like Magill, like to know our location on this planet and the planet's location in space. That, unquestionably, is your job, Leo. Then I want to get the information to the handiest United base or ship. That's all. I don't believe we could break out of here, though probably Keys will try. I pin my hope on our broadcasting a message from inside and letting people already outside do the rest."

The brothers nodded. "That's clear enough," said Leo, "and I can probably locate us fairly well if.... Art, did you say you had a grating in that kit of yours?"

"Yes," was the answer. "Do you need it?"

"Uncertain, but probably. I'll have to identify the local navigation beacon somehow, and its spectrum will be the most outstanding hallmark. Why don't doc and I go outside now and do some star-gazing, while you curl up in your sleeping bag and see if the shadows don't follow us? If they do, you can rummage in the kit without being seen, and come out in a few minutes with the grating and a couple of the lenses you mentioned. If they don't, we'll do what we can with the naked eye and come back. Sound?"

"Solid. Be seeing you."

Arthur extinguished the stub of his cigarette, loosened his belt and shirt, and began removing his boots, while Leo and Little rose and went out into the hallway. Pentapods, scattered along the corridor, eyed them as they emerged, but made no move to intercept them. The door opening outside had been left ajar by the Earthmen in their policy of avoiding the use of the building's ventilation system, and the guards were evidently following a policy of noninterference with regard to everything but weapons. The panel was still partly open.

Little pushed it wide, and the two human beings went out onto the roof. To their surprise they were not followed; but both realized that there might already be guards on the roof. They moved out of the path of the light from the door and approached the nearest wall.

* * * * *

The mountains to the northeast were silhouetted against the almost equally dark sky; the forest at their feet was indistinguishable. No glow or spark of light suggested the presence, anywhere in the scene, of the men who had escaped nine hours before, though Little and Dennis strained their eyes looking. Not even a reflection from the river the doctor believed must be present broke the dark expanse.

The sky offered more material for comment. The Galaxy was lower in the west and the moon higher. Dennis, looking at the latter, did some rapid mental arithmetic. It had risen about an hour and a half ago, and would probably reach the zenith in a little more than another hour. Its siderial period, then, must be about eight hours, and its distance, if this world had the same size and mass as Earth, a little over eight thousand miles from the surface. It was now nearly at "first quarter," but its dark side was faintly visible, presumably illuminated by the reflected light of the planet. Somewhat less than four hours after sunset, the satellite should enter the planet's shadow and be eclipsed for about forty minutes, unless its orbit were more highly inclined to that of the planet than appeared to be the case.

Little was looking at the stars, spread over the sky in unfamiliar constellations. "Which of these is the local navigation beacon, and how do you identify it?" he asked. "And why do you pick out one star to call a beacon?"

"It would be possible to obtain our position from any three stars whose location is on the charts," answered Dennis, "but it is much easier, as a rule, to use certain individuals, because tables have been computed for use with them, and they are easier to identify. I don't have the tables with me, of course, but the beacon for this neighborhood and the Galaxy, together, would give me a fairly good idea. We use the brightest available stars for beacons, naturally--Rigel and Deneb in the Solar sector, for example. For navigation in the Larger Cloud we use a slightly different system, which employs two super-giant stars back in the Galaxy and the one local beacon which covers the whole Cloud--S Doradus. It shouldn't be hard to find, even without instruments, since it's a first-magnitude star at a thousand parsecs; but we always like to check the spectrum, if possible. Most beacon stars, of course, are O, B, or M supergiants, but there are usually detectable individual differences which can be picked out by a good instrument. We haven't a good instrument but fortunately S Doradus has a very distinctive spectrum."

Little nodded. "I can see that much. Don't tell me how you reduce the observations to get your position; it would certainly go beyond my mathematical limit, and I don't like to be shown up."

"It's not difficult--elementary spherical trig. If you know what a direction cosine is, you're all right. Matter of fact, that's how positions are indicated--three direction cosines from a given beacon, plus distance. I don't know how we'll get the distance--I can estimate brightness to a tenth of a magnitude, but that may answer to a small percentage of an awful distance. We usually can triangulate, but not in the Cloud."

"I'll take your word for it," replied the doctor. "Can you see anything that might be your beacon?"

"There's a fairly bright specimen sitting just above the north horizon, that seems to have a tinge of yellow; and there's another right overhead. If Art ever gets here with the lenses and grating I'll test them. I suppose he can't make it, since the dumb chums didn't follow us out here and give him a chance to burrow into the kit."

"He may find a way to do it, anyway," remarked the doctor.

"It would be just like him to try, and lose the kit," was the pessimistic answer.

* * * * *

Even Little was growing discouraged by the time Arthur finally arrived. They had been out nearly an hour, Little amusing himself by strolling along the walls to see whether anything were visible below, and Leo observing the satellite as it approached the zenith. He had already come to the conclusion, from the fact that the sun had set practically "straight down," that they were near the equator of the planet. It now seemed that the moon was in the equatorial plane, since it was rising to a point directly overhead. It was well past first quarter now, but the unlighted crescent was still visible. Leo had just noticed this fact when Arthur's voice interrupted his pondering.

"I assumed you wanted the lenses for a telescope of sorts, and chose accordingly," said the technician. "It took me a long time to work the kit out of the pack and into the sleeping bag because the guards were looking in every two or three minutes. I don't know what will happen when they find me gone."

"I do, you chump," answered Leo. "Two or three of them will drift out here after us, and some more will seize the chance to investigate the pack whose position you changed so often."

"Think so?" asked Arthur. "Here are the lenses and grating. I brought the rod and lens clamps, too, but I'm afraid you'll have to get along without a tube." His brother accepted the assortment and fell to work. The doctor looked on silently. Arthur had brought a light also, and held it on the step which served as a workbench.

Leo, after a moment's thought, discarded one lens and used the other--the one of longer focal length. He clamped this at one end of the rod, with the plane side toward the center. The grating was smaller than the lens, and he clamped it against the plane face of the latter with the excess glass blocked off with paper. Another sheet of paper--a leaf torn from his sketch pad--was clamped to the rod at the focal distance of the lens, completing the crude spectroscope.

He set the instrument on the wall, propping it so that it was pointed toward the northern horizon and one of the stars he had mentioned. He leaned over it, to cut off the moonlight. The other two also leaned forward to see the results.

A little streak of color, narrow as a pencil line, was just visible on the paper screen. Leo brought his eyes as close as he could, striving to perceive the tiny dark gaps that should have existed; but the resolution of the instrument was not sufficient. After a moment's pause, he returned to the original idea, removing the paper and clamping the other lens in normal eyepiece position. This proved successful. He could make out enough to identify both the stars he had counted on as unquestionably sun-type G stars, probably no more than a few parsecs distant, and definitely not the giant he sought.

* * * * *

The navigator began to wear a worried expression. There were several thousand stars visible to the naked eye, and only a few of them were obviously not the object of his search. After a few minutes, however, he began a methodical examination of all the brighter yellow and white stars, one after another. Arthur and the doctor saw that interruption would not be helpful, so they withdrew a few yards and conversed in low tones.

"What will you do if Leo does get our position?" asked the technician. "I suppose you have some idea."

"The idea I have depends almost entirely on you," answered Little. "I have been told that a second-order transmitter is less complicated than an ordinary radio. Could you build one?"

Dennis frowned and hesitated. "If I had all the materials and no interruptions, yes. Here and now, I don't know if the necessary equipment is available, and I'm reasonably sure we wouldn't be allowed to do it, anyway."

"You said there were two atomic tools in your kit, a heater and a stroboscope," said Little. "Would their parts be enough?" Once again Dennis paused to think.

"The welder wouldn't--it's just a converter and a tungsten element. The stroboscope converts with a direct electron current and a variable oscillator and--I believe it could be done. But it wouldn't handle much power, and the range would be nothing to speak of."

"That doesn't matter, as I see it. All I want to know is that you can build a vision transmitter with the material on hand--"

"Wait a minute!" interrupted Arthur. "I didn't say a vision unit. What do you need that for? All I was counting on was voice transmission. That won't be very difficult."

Little shook his head. "Vision or nothing. I don't want to tell you why, for the reason Leo gave. But please, if you don't want me to have to re-design the whole plan, find a way to construct a vision transmitter. And I hate to be too exacting, but I'd like it done before that ship leaves again. I don't know how long they usually stay here, but I notice they're stocking up."

"Sure," groaned Dennis. "Right away. Doc, if it were anyone else I'd know he was crazy, but with you it's only a strong suspicion. I'll try--but Lord knows where I can come by an icon tube."

Little grinned invisibly in the darkness. "The Vegans said they smuggled up a complete neutrino assembly. It was taken away from them later, but it gives you an idea of what can be done."

"They didn't give you an idea of their technique, I suppose? I'm not too proud to learn."

"I didn't ask them. There were guards around. Good luck!"

* * * * *

Little went back to Leo, who was resting his arms. Not a single O class spectrum had yet been picked up by the instrument.

"If I were sure it were there, I wouldn't mind so much," he said, wiping his forehead. "But it's just as likely to be in the daylight half of the sky. I'd rather not have to wait here half of whatever time it takes this world to amble around its sun, just to get a rough idea of where I am."

Little nodded sympathetically--after all, he was the one who wanted their location. "Does the moonlight interfere any?" he asked.

"It did, until I made a rough tube out of paper. It's a little hard to hold together. But speaking of the moon, doc, have you noticed anything strange about it?"

"I wouldn't," answered Little. "Is something wrong? It looks natural to me."

"It doesn't to me. It did right after sunset, when it was a narrow crescent. We could see the rest of it then, but reflection from this planet could have accounted for that. But it doesn't now! The darn thing's nearly full, and you can still see the strip that the sun doesn't reach. This world can't possibly reflect enough light for that. What's lighting it up?"

"I'm afraid it's no use to ask me," said the doctor. "I can guarantee it's not radioactivity, because that much radioactive matter so close would have prevented the existence of life on this world. It would have been burned sterile; we'd probably be dead now ourselves. I don't know any astronomy, but I can tell you all you want to know about gamma-ray burns."

"That occurred to me, too," agreed Leo. "It seems that there must be something, at present invisible to us, shining on that satellite. I think in a few minutes we'll be able to get an idea of where it's shining from, too."

"How?" asked Little and Arthur with one voice.

"The moon should pass into this planet's shadow very shortly," answered Leo. "A lunar eclipse. The satellite must have one every revolution--almost four times a day, I should say. The sun's light will be cut off, except for the fraction scattered by the atmosphere of this world, and we should be able to tell from the shape of the part illuminated by this mystery source, the direction of the source. We'll wait." The other two nodded. Even Little, who was no astronomer, understood the mechanism of an eclipse. The three settled themselves on the broad steps inside the wall.

* * * * *

They had not long to wait. It was about three and a quarter hours after sunset, and the first outlying tentacles of the looming Galaxy were just dipping below the western horizon, when Leo marked the first darkening of the eastern limb of the nearly full moon. It was not like the protracted lunar eclipse of Earth; the satellite was moving far more swiftly, and took less than a minute to travel its own diameter. There was a feeble, preliminary reddening as it plunged into the region illuminated only by air-scattered light; then this was gone, as the little body passed on into the umbra of the planet's shadow.

It should have disappeared. No possible reflection from the planet it circled could have given it a touch of illumination, for it looked down only on the night side of the world. Yet part of it was still to be seen--a ghostly, dim-lit crescent, a little less than half full, its convex side facing _east_. There was no possible question of the nature of the light source. Leo estimated the distance of the moon above the eastern horizon, and the angular breadth of illuminated surface; there was only a small difference.

"It will rise before long," he said. "I'm staying to see. You fellows can go back to sleep if you wish; we've been out over two hours and we'll need some sleep."

"We'll stay," said Little. "This gets interesting. Do you think there's another, very bright, moon? Large enough, perhaps, to be habitable?"

Leo shook his head. "I don't believe any possible moon could do that," he said. Arthur nodded in silent agreement, and for many minutes the three sat without speaking as the dimly lit crescent dipped lower toward the eastern horizon. Leo had judged roughly that the eclipse should last about forty minutes.

It had not ended when Arthur pointed silently to the east. A spur of the mountain range whose principal peaks lay to the northeast had become a little clearer, silhouetted against a suddenly brighter patch of sky. The brilliance grew and spread, paling the stars in that quarter of the heavens as though dawn were breaking; and quite suddenly the source rode clear of the concealing hill and presented itself to view. The undulations of the landscape were abruptly visible, standing out against the long shadows cast by the light of the newcomer, which hung, far brighter than the moon at its best, just above the peaks.

The men looked on in awe. They had seen the mad splendor of the spiraling gas streams hurled forth from binaries like Beta Lyrae; they had driven through the hearts of globular clusters, with giant suns by the myriad on every hand; but somehow the lonely, majestic grandeur of this object was more impressive. A star--too distant to show a perceptible disk--too bright to be gazed at directly, putting to shame the surrounding celestial objects. Even the moon, sliding out of the shadow in an apologetic fashion, no longer seemed bright.

Arthur Dennis was the first to speak. "It gets you, doesn't it? I suppose it's a companion to the sun, or else--"

"Or _else_," said Leo flatly, snatching the spectroscope. The great star was white, with just a suspicion of topaz in its glow, and Leo was prone to jump to conclusions. One glance through the instrument, sweeping it slightly from left to right, was enough. He grinned, removed the eye lens, and replaced the paper screen of the original arrangement, and three heads bent once more to look at the streak of color.

It wasn't a streak this time. A single bright point centered itself directly behind the objective lens, and to either side of this there extended a broken series of dashes--the intense emission bands, bordered on the violet side by relatively sharp dark lines, which characterize what the early astronomers called a "P Cygni" star. The continuous background spectrum was too faint to show; the grating was so coarse that several orders of the spectrum fell on the paper at once.

"And that's your beacon!" remarked Little after a few moments of silence. "Well, it certainly earns the name."

"You can get our location now?" asked Arthur. "I should think you wouldn't need to say much but 'Near S Doradus,' from the looks of that thing."

"Wrong, blast it," answered Leo. "When I said I could judge brightness to a tenth of a magnitude, I was thinking of decent stars with visual mags between zero and plus six. For this thing, I don't know whether it's minus five or minus fifteen--whether the blasted thing is three quarters of a parsec or eighty parsecs away. I'll get the direction, though, and maybe I'll find a way to measure the brightness. I'll look after that; you people worry about what to do with it if I get it. Good night."

The dismissal was rather pointed, and Leo turned his full attention to the pad on which he was computing, so Little and Arthur silently retired. So did all but one of the guards who had been watching, invisible in the shadow of the superstructure.

* * * * *

Dr. Little opened his eyes with a start and realized it was full daylight. It had been the first sleep under normal gravity in several weeks, and his body had made the most of it. The other two sleeping bags were empty, but the Dennis brothers were both present. They were by the window, removing a piece of canvas that had apparently been draped across it. Little sat up.

"What are you fellows up to now?" he asked. "Leo, don't you ever sleep?"

"Sure, when necessary. You have been sleeping for twelve hours, doc. Did we wake you up?"

"Twelve hours! No, it was probably my conscience. What's the idea of window curtains? We haven't even a door, so it can't be privacy."

"We were screening out the sunlight Leo didn't want," answered Arthur. "He was trying to get the sun's spectrum, and just wanted a narrow beam through the grating."

"Did you get it?"

"Sure." It was Leo speaking again. "And we found a use for the razor. The edges of the blades are good for making a slit for the beam. This fellow, of course, didn't have anything in that wonderful testing kit that would do. By the way, Art, have you still got the kit, or did our friends take it last night?"

"Someone poked around in it," Arthur answered, "but they left it here. Maybe they thought there was nothing in it that we could put to use."