Chapter VI: Part 6

“All of us,” Rock began, “except you—if you’re not up to it—will come back over here. We’ve already proved that the trip can be made without their seeing us. We’ll station ourselves around the air lock, except for one who will climb the formation and kick rocks down again on the ship. This time Kalmus will be sure it’s us, and they’ll come out to investigate again. When they come out, our bunch will slip inside. If Judas has been left to watch Leo and Ed, he shouldn’t give us much trouble by himself if we slip up on him and catch him unawares. Once we’ve locked out the other three they’ll give in willingly just to get back inside.”

“That’s pretty daring,” Shep said doubtfully, “but I guess we’ve got to be daring if we’re going to save the boys.”

As they walked, Rock radioed the _Northern Cross_ with the walkie-talkie he’d been carrying on his back, telling the boys of their close call.

When the two reached the ladder bridge across the rift, Shep had difficulty crossing with his injured foot. He went first, and as Rock steadied the frail bridge, he held his breath tensely for fear Shep would slip. They had used the safety rope again, but, if one of them should fall, he could easily rip open his suit as he thudded against the jagged side of the chasm.

Once more, however, they got across without mishap and were soon back at the ship. The boys helped them in eagerly.

“Are you fellows ready to go back with me?” Rock asked them.

They looked at him in amazement. He explained his new plan to them. All considered it taking a big chance, but, not being able to think of anything better, they agreed that they might as well try it.

“Kalmus is getting mean and nasty,” Shep told them. “This thing seems to be getting on his nerves. There’s no telling what he’ll do to the boys before this is all over. He and his men have blasters, and they mean business.”

The boys prepared a snack for themselves, then began to dress, trying to choose the best of the antiquated suits.

Shep did not suit up. He said that he wouldn’t be able to help any because of his ankle, which was noticeably swollen now. He wouldn’t let any of the others stay behind with him, however.

When all were dressed and ready to go, they said good-by to their crippled buddy.

“What’ll I do if you don’t come back?” Shep asked Rock.

“I guess you’ll just have to come over and join us,” Rock replied, half-jokingly. “Two could possibly get the ship back to port in a pinch but not one man alone.”

“I think I’ll prefer your coming back,” Shep said, with a broad grin. “Good luck, you guys.”

The four of them started out. Rock showed his friends the route he and Shep had taken before, one that appeared safe from possible inquiring eyes aboard the _Dog Star_. It took them some time to cross the chasm, since each fellow had to tie on the safety rope as he went over.

“I’ll climb the lunabase formation,” Rock told them, “because I was up there before and know the way. The rest of you keep away from the ports and sneak up to the air lock over there. When I see that you’re ready, I’ll kick some stone down onto the ship. That should bring them outside in a few minutes. We’ve already made our plans from then on.”

Rock watched Hugh, Sparky, and Johnny slip agilely into the open and bound like gazelles over to the air lock. Then he started to climb the wall as he and Shep had done before.

It was then that the shocking collapse of Rock’s bold plan came about.

Kalmus and all three of his men darted swiftly from behind the ship, two on each side. They leveled their blasters at the boys, warning them to stay in their tracks.

“Keep them covered, Ben,” Kalmus ordered. “Come on, Jack and Mumbly. There’s another one around here somewhere. I saw four of them.”

The shocking suddenness of the countermove had left Rock numb and immobile for a few seconds. But he quickly regained his composure and sprang into action. He leaped to the ground and scrambled madly to safety behind the lunabase formation.

He had barely ducked behind a monolith before two helmeted heads loomed some twenty feet away. A glance in the other direction showed him the third. He had to get out of there quickly.

He dashed into the open and with great leaps tried to put as much distance between himself and his pursuers as he could. He got a good start on them before they caught sight of him and gave chase.

“Stop!” Kalmus roared. “We’ll shoot if you don’t!”

Rock kept running, heading for the chasm. If the three were shooting at him, he had no way of telling in the near airlessness of the planet. He wouldn’t know unless he felt the hot stab of a heat ray and the explosive loss of air from his suit.

Reaching the rift, he cast a hurried glance behind and saw the three still following. Not having time to tie on the safety rope, Rock started across the chasm.

Over his radio he continued to hear Kalmus’ threats. The voice grew louder as the pursuers drew close. Being able to move ten feet or so at a jump, it wouldn’t take them many seconds to reach the chasm.

Rock clutched at the far bank and hauled himself onto safe ground. As he exhaustedly pulled the ladder across out of reach of the others, he looked up to see them almost at the edge. But without the ladder, they were helpless to advance any farther.

Fearing a well-placed shot, Rock scrambled for cover behind a protective clump of boulders not far off. Only then did he feel that he could dare take a deep breath since the terrible ordeal had begun. Kalmus and his two companions seemed reluctant to attempt a jump of the chasm and headed back to the _Dog Star_.

Rock continued on to the _Northern Cross_.

When Shep admitted him into the ship, Rock related the unhappy story with bitter tears in his eyes.

“You guys should have set me adrift long ago!” Rock burst out. “I’ve been giving orders ever since we started, and every plan has backfired! Now there are only the two of us left!”

“We had to have a leader,” Shep said more calmly. “We chose you because we thought you were the best. We still do. Now quit feeling sorry for yourself!”

“I don’t know what could have happened!” Rock sighed, shaking his head.

“_I_ know,” Shep said. “Kalmus just happened to see you fellows coming, that’s all.”

Rock sat down wearily. “You take over from here, Shep. I’m licked.”

Shep could see that his friend was genuinely distressed. He concealed the harrowing pain he felt in his ankle and tried to think of their next move. Minutes passed without Rock speaking. He merely stared out the port at the star-jeweled sky and the shimmering ball of Earth that could look so close to a person in space and yet be so far away.

“You said that two could run this ship in a pinch,” Shep spoke to break the silence. “We’ll just have to take the _Northern Cross_ back to port ourselves and get help from the Space Guard. The boys will probably try to stall longer and keep the _Dog Star_ on the ground.”

“I guess that is the only way,” Rock admitted, then added dismally, “If the ship isn’t here when the Guard comes back, we probably won’t see the fellows anymore, that’s all.”

“What you need is a good rest, Rock,” Shep told him. “None of us has had one since we came here. Let’s get a few hours of sleep, one at a time, and then get back to the problem when we’re more refreshed. I’ll stand first watch to see if the _Dog Star_ takes off.”

“I am pretty tired,” Rock said. “This time we’ll do what you say, Shep,” he smiled feebly. “You be sure to wake me to relieve you.”

Rock stretched out in a chair and fell asleep almost immediately.

The next thing he remembered was his friend shaking him. Rock stirred sleepily.

“I guess I’ll be shot for going to sleep on guard duty,” Shep confessed. “I just couldn’t help it, though.”

Rock had no reason to doubt that the _Dog Star_ would not still be in its same spot, but some impulse prompted him to look out the port just the same. His heart suddenly seemed to go dead inside of him.

“The ship is gone, Shep!”

“Oh, no!”

The glasses revealed indisputably that the ship had blasted off. There was only a blackened ring and a depression where the _Dog Star_ had been before.

“They’ve gotten the jump on us again!” Rock said brokenly.

“Kalmus must have threatened the boys, or else Judas got the ship off,” Shep said.

“Whatever it was, they’re gone now,” Rock said hopelessly. “They can be heading for almost any place in the solar system.”

“What do you think we should do now?” Shep asked.

“Go ahead with our same plan to notify the Guard, I guess,” Rock replied tonelessly. “They’ll probably send out some cruisers to look for the _Dog Star_.”

Rock stared solemnly out the port. “It’s my fault all this has happened. My fault that we ever started out on this crazy treasure hunt and my fault that the boys are in the hands of these space pirates!”

“Don’t blame yourself, Rock. The fellows knew very well what they were getting into. It’s not your fault that things haven’t worked out.”

Rock tried to shake off the pall of despair that had dogged him for the past few hours and got busily to work. “Well, no use just sitting here on Luna talking about it,” he murmured. “Let’s get that ankle of yours bandaged and then we’ll start up the engines.”

It was going to be a tricky undertaking to manage all the complicated controls between the two of them. Shep was further hindered by his ankle that had stiffened while he had slept. Rock had remembered seeing a first-aid kit and he went for it. He wrapped the ankle tightly so that Shep would be able to get about with a minimum of pain. They had to cut the sides of Shep’s magnetic-soled shoe so that there would be as little discomfort as possible. Shep could have done without magnetic shoes altogether, being content to float about weightlessly in the ship when they were beyond Luna’s gravity pull, but this would have interfered with running the ship, which required a certain amount of body leverage.

The two got their individual duties synchronized so that there would be no hitch, Rock taking the bulk of the work.

They calculated their figures and prepared the tape for the autopilot. Then they strapped down in the couch room for the take-off. Rock still did not trust the _Northern Cross_ too far, and at this moment he was concerned lest the old ship might not respond to the lift of her jets. The next few moments would tell the story.

Rock felt the vibration of the ship as the fuel pumps went to work. The overhead prism showed the flow meter registering properly, but the big question was still whether the ship would be able to lift itself into the heights. Then a sudden movement seemed to cut Rock’s breath off in his throat. His body pressed deeply into his couch, aching, but Rock was glad. The ship was rising from the soil of Luna.

They pushed the _Northern Cross_ along at the top speed they believed was reasonably safe. The ship creaked and groaned under the burden of maximum thrust. As yet she had given no indication of suffering worse than this, but it was clear that the space vessel had seen her best days.

When the _Northern Cross_ was about two-thirds of the way home, a suspicious dot was seen on the radarscope, moving too slowly for a meteor.

“Shep!” Rock called. “Take a look at this, will you?”

Shep limped over as Rock got out his binoculars.

“I can’t believe it!” Rock blurted. “It’s the _Dog Star_!”

“What!” Shep cried, and grabbed the binoculars from Rock. “It _is_ the _Dog Star_!”

“Kalmus has got more nerve than I thought he had!” Rock said. “I didn’t think he’d risk heading straight for Earth!”

“Whatever the reason, we’ve got him in our sights,” Shep said. “What’ll we do?”

“Follow him in, I guess,” Rock answered. “Whatever station he heads for, we’ll put the Guard right on him and his cronies.”

“I’d advise our keeping our distance so we won’t scare him off,” Shep suggested.

Rock nodded. “When we get closer in, we may be able to radio a warning to the stations to be on the lookout for him.”

They followed the _Dog Star_ for an entire space day, keeping the same distance between the ships. The craft was undoubtedly still heading for Earth and its company of artificial satellites. If her occupants had spotted the other ship, they did not seem alarmed. Kalmus appeared to be walking right into capture at a time when victory seemed to be completely his. It didn’t make sense.

Hours later, Rock was interrupted from study of a sky chart when Shep cried out in an anguished voice. Rock dashed over to the port where his friend was looking out.

“There’s been an explosion aboard the _Dog Star_!” Shep blurted. “A big burst of flame poured out of it!”

“We’ve got to get to her right away!” Rock said hoarsely.

It took some time to change course and swing around in pursuit of the _Dog Star_’s new glide path. Rock fretted impatiently. He had nightmare visions of what might have happened or might now be happening to his buddies aboard the stricken vessel.

As soon as the _Northern Cross_ had matched flight paths with the other craft, Rock reduced their velocity so they could creep up on the _Dog Star_ “overhead.” The maneuver was accomplished as quickly as possible. The _Northern Cross_ now lay “above” the _Dog Star_, with a space of about a hundred feet between.

Rock set the controls on hold positions as Shep procured a long towline. The boys dressed hurriedly in space gear, then opened the air lock closest to the ragged topside hole they had seen in the other ship. They secured the safety line to an outside anchor ring, then Rock fastened the line to his own suit.

“Maybe you’d better stay out of this with that bad ankle of yours,” Rock told Shep.

“And let you go across on your own?” Shep retorted. “No, I’m sticking with you this time.”

Rock shoved off briskly from the ship’s hull and floated across the gulf of vacuum toward the _Dog Star_. He landed on the hull not far from the explosion hole that was amidships near a rocket-tube cluster. Shep pulled in the line and then launched himself across the emptiness. Rock steadied him as he landed.

The two scrambled immediately down through the gaping cavity, careful not to snag their suits on the sharp edges. The boys climbed down along the bulkheads of the corridor where smoke swirled like fog.

Reaching the floor, they were met by four running figures in space suits. The boys recognized Kalmus and his three companions in a desperate hurry.

Rock lashed out boldly at Kalmus who was rushing at him. He heard the big fellow groan over his suit radio as the blow landed. But then Rock was charged by Jack Judas. He was lifted off the floor and, because of his helplessness when not in contact with it, was sent crashing heavily against the wall of the corridor.

Rock scrambled down off the wall to resume the battle. Shep was courageously taking on all four of their attackers. Rock leaped into the middle of it all, swinging fiercely. Another blow sent him careening into the wall. Shep was flat on the floor now.

Expecting no mercy from the victors, Rock was amazed to see the four withdraw from the fight and run off down the corridor in the direction they had been heading in before. Rock and Shep tiredly climbed to their feet.

“They weren’t after us!” Shep gasped. “They were just trying to get away!”

“They’re heading for the lifeboat rockets, I guess,” Rock panted. “They looked scared to death!”

“Let’s get to the fellows!” Shep said.

They hurried along to the main control room. It was empty, so they moved farther along to the navigation room. The door was locked and from inside there came the sound of beating fists. With their heavy space boots Rock and Shep began kicking the light metal door with passionate vigor. Finally they tore the lock loose and the twisted door swung inward.

Sparky, Ed, and Johnny were sagging against the far wall, their eyelids half-closed. Leo was giggling strangely and chattering as if enjoying himself. Sparky kept crying out, “I can’t hear!”

Only Hugh appeared normal. It was he who had been beating on the door. His face was red with fright and shiny with sweat.

“The air pressure is down!” Hugh gasped to Rock and Shep. “Give us air!”

Rock and Shep slammed the door to save as much remaining air as possible and hurried to the supply room. They gathered up all the oxygen bottles that they could carry and rushed back with them. They opened the petcocks on all, and the life-giving precious gas began flooding the room.

But the gauge on the wall still showed a subnormal air pressure. Shep and Rock found space suits in the supply room and began helping their companions into them. The victims could help a little, but, except for Hugh, they were still in such a state of anoxia that their rescuers had to do most of the work.

Finally the five were safely encased in suits, with clean pressurized air filling their lungs.

When the others felt like it, they began to talk.

“Kalmus had us locked up in the navigation room while they went to eat,” Hugh explained. “Then when the explosion came, Kalmus and his men must have been in such a hurry that they forgot all about us.”

“You might know that the only thing that would have made Kalmus abandon the treasure would be the saving of his own neck,” Rock said contemptuously. “You fellows had better get a physical as soon as we get to port.”

Shep asked the fellows what had happened since their capture.

“Kalmus made us blast off soon after he caught us,” Hugh was the first to reply.

“Whatever made Kalmus head for Earth?” Rock asked. “We thought that would be the last place he’d want to carry all of you since you’d be able to incriminate him.”

“Kalmus didn’t intend to land at a space station!” Ed cut in. “He was going straight for Earth and touch down in the Arizona desert where he could unload the ore without being noticed. Then he and the others were going to sell it a little at a time over a long period.”

“Carry the _Dog Star_ directly to Earth!” Shep exclaimed. “This ship isn’t made for atmospheric travel! It would have been turned into a meteor by skin friction!”

“That’s what we tried to tell that crazy man!” Sparky said. “But he thought we were trying to fool him and get him to dock at one of the space stations. Judas knew the danger too, but Kalmus wouldn’t listen to him either.”

“How did you keep the _Dog Star_ at such slow velocity?” Rock asked.

“We shorted out the circuit to a couple of jets,” Johnny replied. “Told Kalmus it was an accident. We had Judas fooled too. We were trying to stall reaching Earth as long as possible.”

“We hoped we’d get a chance to jump the fellows,” Hugh put in. “We even had an outside hope that you might catch up with us.”

Rock went back to the earlier capture of Leo and Ed. Kalmus wanted only two of the boys to run the ship, Leo explained, so that they could be easily watched by the four. That was why they had sent Sparky back over after the transfer of the ore.

Ed said that he and Leo had made such an unsatisfactory job (intentionally) of running the ship that Kalmus had made Judas take over. But Judas was so rusty with his piloting that he botched up the controls, making a forced landing on Luna necessary. The boys then got the idea of trying to contact the _Northern Cross_ by radio, which they had done in one of Kalmus’ unguarded moments. Kalmus had been so infuriated to discover this that he had destroyed the radio. He mistakenly thought he had done it before a message had been sent.

“Let’s hope we’ve seen the last of that Kalmus bunch,” Shep declared. “If everything turns out all right for us, I don’t care whether they are ever caught or not.”

“Do you suppose they got off in the lifeboats?” Hugh suddenly asked.

During their discussion of past events, they had almost forgotten about the present whereabouts of Kalmus and his men. They went to check the escape hatches and found one of four lifeboat rockets gone.

“I don’t see how they expect to reach any of the space stations with their limited knowledge of navigation,” Sparky said.

“Even Judas can find his way home from here,” Rock told him. “We’re only a few thousand miles from the outer radio relay satellite. The lifeboats have simple instructions printed on the walls that practically anybody can follow.”

Shep changed the subject. “Anybody know what caused the explosion?”

“Probably a valve lock somewhere in the chemical fuel system,” Hugh answered. “That’s what all of us think, judging from the sound of the blast. Our tinkering with the jets might have caused it.”

“The thing to do now,” Rock said, “is to get these ships back to port, that is, if the _Dog Star_ has still got its power. I suggest we split into two groups, four on the _Northern Cross_ and three on the _Dog Star_.”

It was discovered that the damage from the explosion would prevent the _Dog Star_ from traveling at its best speed because one entire rocket section was out of order. But it would run.

They drew lots to see who would ride in which vessel. Rock, Hugh, Ed, and Shep drew the _Northern Cross_ and Leo, Sparky, and Johnny the _Dog Star_.

Rock and his three companions who would return to the _Northern Cross_ went back to the ship by way of the towline. The ghost ship still hovered overhead in the same position it had occupied before, even though the two craft were traveling at a good pace through the deeps.

The space ships were brought back into their original Earthward paths, and in a few hours’ time the braking rockets were ready to cut in.

Several futile attempts had been made to contact a space station by radio, and it wasn’t until this point that the _Northern Cross_ was able to establish its first contact over the crippled set. This was by way of a continuous signal beamed out through space by a rotating antenna atop the outermost artificial satellite, the radio relay station, 50,000 miles from Earth.

Hugh signaled for an operator and when he came in, Hugh gave the name of the ship and its position.

“Who did you say you were?” Rock heard the operator ask in amazement.

“The _Northern Cross_,” Hugh answered, “serial number A45-J, World Spacecraft, manufacturer.”

There was silence on the other end for several moments. Hugh winked at Rock. “We’ll have some fun with them,” he said.

“When did the ship go out?” the operator asked.

“Twenty years ago,” Hugh replied.

“Is this a joke?” the other retorted.

“Not at all,” Hugh assured him.

The radioman chose not to argue any further. “I’ll give you approach instructions,” he said.

“There are two ships,” Hugh told him. “We’re together.”

The operator sputtered again when Hugh told him that the _Dog Star’s_ radio was completely out. “How do you expect me to bring a ship in without a radio?” he complained.

“If you give us both instructions,” Hugh answered, “we’ll relay those for the other ship to them by suit radio. We’re close enough for that.”

“I guess you know this is highly irregular,” the operator replied. “I still think you’re pulling my leg!”

As the approach instructions were given, Rock relayed them to the _Dog Star_. The connection was rather feeble because of the low power of Rock’s suit radio transmitter, but by hooking up his own suit radio to the ship’s antenna, damaged though it was, Leo, acting as radioman, could hear well enough.

As the ships moved in parallel to the spinning station, a final adjustment by the forward jets synchronized the ships’ motion with that of the rotating station.

“Pretty good approach,” the operator admitted grudgingly. “You two will come into adjoining Docks 5 and 6. Stand by.”

Presently two sets of long, flexible metal arms reached out from the space station like the arms of an octopus and attached themselves magnetically to the sides of the ships. Then slowly the _Northern Cross_ and _Dog Star_ were pulled into their docks.

Word of arrival of the derelict space ship had been spreading all over the station apparently, for Rock and his friends found the entire high brass there to meet them as they crossed through the coupling tubes into the satellite.

The boys were conducted to the official quarters of the commanding officer where he was gathered with the other members of his staff. There Rock related the entire story of their trip. At first mention of Kalmus’ name, Colonel George had spoken to one of his officers and sent him out.

When Rock was through with his story, Colonel George shook his balding gray head, although it was a gesture not without humor.

“It sounds like a fiction piece, Merrill,” the officer said, his eyes glowing with an excitement that suggested he might have enjoyed sharing such an adventure himself.

“Not that I disbelieve you! I don’t mean that. It’s just so incredible what a group of young fellows have done!” He looked at his spellbound officers and they nodded approvingly.

“I’ve sent one of my men to see if Kalmus had docked here,” Colonel George went on. “He’s probably a scoundrel with a bad record. That must have been why he was in such a hurry to get started from the servicing station, before his references could be checked at central identification on Earth. You mentioned, Merrill, that he appeared very generous in extending credit to you. I suppose you realize now that he must have planned to take over the ship from the very beginning and therefore his original so-called credit would be only a fraction of the wealth he expected to bring back.”

“Yes, we finally guessed that, sir,” Rock said.

There was a wait until the officer returned with the facts on Kalmus. He handed a yellow sheet to the commanding officer who read it with a show of regret.

“Kalmus and his men docked here about two hours ago,” Colonel George said. “As soon as they docked, they immediately jumped on a ferry going Earthward. The ferry landed some time ago and they can be anywhere on Earth. I’m afraid Kalmus and party have given us the slip. We’ve already notified the authorities to initiate a search for them. Too bad you men were unable to get in touch with us by radio so that we could have been ready for them.”

“He may have escaped, sir,” Rock reminded him, “but not with the ore treasure, not even his own half.”

Colonel George chuckled. “That’s right. And if he should turn up to claim it, we’ll charge him with a crime that is quite serious.”

“If he and his men are ever captured, sir,” Rock said, “we’ll make a settlement with him then. He may need the money for some good lawyers.”

The colonel smiled. “I see you fellows want to do the right thing even if he hasn’t. Let me say here that I consider what you men have done, bringing into port two crippled ships, the most remarkable space performance I have ever heard about in my career. I’d have given anything to be thirty years younger and one of you!” He sighed regretfully. “In view of all this, I believe it would be embarrassing to the Space Academy not to reconsider you seven for cadet school. I’ll personally make a strong recommendation for you.”

The boys, except for their leader, were profuse in their thanks. Rock was quietly grateful and filled with a heart-warming satisfaction. For all these long weeks since their blast-off, he had suffered remorse for having brought his friends into such perils as they faced. Now it had all worked out for a purpose. Where they might never have come back, now they had not only returned without harm, but they would reclaim the opportunity for a space career that had appeared to end for them with their washout from the Space Academy.

As Rock happily thought over these things, an officer wearing the insigne of a metallurgist came into the room.

“I’ve made an assay of the ore cargo on the _Northern Cross_, Colonel,” the man said. “It’s good alconite ore and is worth a fortune, and of course the ship is quite valuable too. It’ll tell us a lot about long-period effects of space conditions.”

“Now my success is complete,” Rock thought. “Dad did not lose his life for nothing. The satellite hospital will be a living memorial to his unselfish ambition. Even with all the things that happened to us, I’m glad we took the chance.”

He was sure his friends felt the same way.

SPACE STEWARD

“Carry your bags, sir?” The gentleman tourist in the space harbor looked at the youth who had stepped out of the night. Although the boy’s clothes weren’t as fine, perhaps, as those of the other baggage carriers, there was something about him which appealed to the man. The boy had a wiry, athletic build, and his gray, sincere eyes shone with spirit and good nature.

“Sure, son,” the big, white-thatched man said, smiling. “Suite 8, ‘B’ Deck.”

“‘B’ Deck!” Jim Vance echoed. “Thank you, sir!”

He hoisted the bags easily in his strong arms. Then, handing his patron one half of a baggage check, he headed briskly for the concrete pit where the throbbing space ship rested on torpedolike tail fins.

Jim was in a tingle of excitement. This was his first customer on ‘B’ Deck. He’d get a first-rate view of the _Hercules’_ luxury quarters! Jim always swallowed hard when he neared the astronaut. She was so incredibly big, so very much like the massiveness of the space which was her real home. Though the _Hercules_ was carrying some space freight this trip, she was mainly a tourist vessel; and her destination was Venus.

“I’d give anything if I could make one trip into deep space,” he thought fervently as he stepped into the outside elevator and was carried far above the brightly lighted Miami spaceport. For an instant he seemed to share a kinship with the silent stars that encircled him like a speckled bowl.

Getting off on B Deck, Jim walked slowly along the polished corridor toward Suite 8. The finery of the deck fairly numbed his senses. While studying the turquoise carpet underfoot, his eyes shifted to his worn shoes, and then he felt out of place.

It took money to go into space. If not that, it at least took extensive training to be a crewman. He had neither money nor training, not even a family. Not that Jim Vance was ready to cry about it, though. He had long ago accepted his lot without complaint.

A senior-grade lieutenant stopped him outside of Suite 8. He wore a square red mustache, and he neatly filled a uniform of gray flannel with gold piping.

“We’re blasting off at 0800 sharp, son,” he said. “Better remind your patron to get aboard.”

“I will, sir,” Jim returned. For a moment he felt like a full-fledged crewman taking orders. He liked the feel of it, and he wished desperately that it were so.

He went into the suite and set down the bags. His eyes roved over the rich trimmings, the deep honeycomb rubber cushions. An oval port looked out on the winking night lights of the coast city. There were two other rooms to the luxury quarters.

The hideaway degravity cot in the main compartment had already been pulled down out of the wall by a steward, but its front clamps were not yet snapped to the floor. Jim closed the light beryllium door of the compartment and tried out the cot. He sank down into its cloudlike softness. As he lay there dreaming of worlds beyond Earth, suddenly the front end of the cot swung upward. In trying to scramble out before he was closed up in the wall, he was sent spinning into the air by the powerful spring action of the cot. His head cracked solidly against the metal wall, and he saw more stars than there were in the night.

He lay in a daze for some time, stupefied, not realizing the passing of time. What finally roused him was the sensation of vibrating like a milk shake in a mixer. The floor beneath him throbbed like the surface of the Atlantic Ocean just beyond. Jim didn’t have to be a spaceman to know that the _Hercules_ was about to blast off.

Cold sweat flowed over him as he realized he could not leave the ship in time. The only thing he could do was prepare himself for the shock of the blast-off. He yanked down the degravity cot again, making certain this time that it was clamped to the floor. He guessed that all he had to do was recline on the cot as he had before and strap himself down with the black leather bands and plastic buckles.

He had scarcely done this before the pit of his stomach seemed to dive into his shoes, and he felt that exhilarating “first minute of acceleration” he had read so much about. When this was over, he knew the _Hercules_ had climbed above the bulk of Earth’s atmosphere and was leveling off on a horizontal curve from the planet’s surface. The rotation of the Earth would give the spaceship a final boost into the deeps.

When Jim’s stomach quieted, he unbuckled and attempted to get to his feet. The motion sent him flying up into the air! It then struck him that he had forgotten about the weightlessness of space. Some ships had artificial gravity in them; but because the _Hercules_ was chiefly a pleasure ship, the tourists preferred to “rough it.”

Jim became almost panicky in his efforts to right himself. His forehead grew hot although the cool atmosphere of the compartment was comfortable. He guessed that it wasn’t entirely the shock of no gravity that was making him sweat. He was thinking about his unpaid passage on the _Hercules_.

“I’m a stowaway,” he thought. “I’ll be sent to jail for this.” He had read about the severe penalty for trying to hitch a ride on a space vessel. This was because weight was critical, and the addition of just a few extra pounds could prevent the rocket fuel from pushing the ship to its distant port, could even cause disaster.

Jim felt his head where he had taken the near knockout blow. There was only a small bump. Who would ever believe his story of what had really happened? Besides, he’d had no business trying out the degravity cot.

While he was pondering what he should do, there was a rap on the door of the suite. Jim slunk against the far wall, dreading to be found out.

“Are you all right, Mr. Bowers?” came a deep voice.

Jim opened his mouth to reply but only a wordless croak came out. The door swung open, and a husky steward with a young face “swam” in. At sight of Jim a surprised look crossed his features.

“What are you doing here?” he blurted. “Where’s Mr. Bowers?”

Jim felt as though he were in a crazy dream. The steward was floating toward him like a phantom in a nightmare, while he himself was like a desperate fish without fins in this strange sea of weightlessness.

“I don’t know Mr. Bowers,” Jim managed to reply, then went on to explain what had happened.

The steward looked at him skeptically, his round face attempting to judge him. “Is this the truth?” he asked.

Jim nodded and showed the bump on his head. Then he waited tensely for the verdict.

“Somehow I believe you,” the steward said sympathetically.

“Thanks,” Jim returned. He quickly decided that he liked the young steward with the surprisingly deep voice.

The steward looked thoughtful. “We’ve got to figure out a way to keep you from being discovered until we return to Earth. That way, you’ll have had time to help out and pay your way. It’ll go easier with you when you turn yourself in.” Then he frowned. “What about your family, though? They’ll surely be worried about you.”

“I don’t have a family,” Jim told him. “I’m an orphan, and I’ve been on my own for two years. Don’t you think I ought to make a clean breast of everything to the captain now and hope he’ll believe me?”

The steward shook his head emphatically. “Not _this_ captain. Not Captain Coppard. He’s a stickler for regulations. He’d never believe your story. If he does find out, you’ll be on prison rations for the rest of the trip!”

“What’ll I do, then?” Jim asked, suddenly feeling very dependent on the young man he faced.

The steward’s forehead creased in a frown. “The captain doesn’t know the steward crew too well because there were some last-minute substitutions. I think you’d do best to become a steward and work out your passage that way.”

A steward on a space ship! The idea of it thrilled Jim so much that he almost forgot the seriousness of his situation. He wondered how he’d look in the neat starched white that the steward in front of him wore.

“First, I think we ought to get acquainted,” his new friend said. He extended a workingman’s strong grip, and Jim took it. “My name is Al Hogan. Everybody calls me ‘Babe’ because of my face.” He grinned boyishly.

“I’m Jim Vance,” Jim said.

“You’ll make a good steward, Jim,” Babe declared. “My job depends on being able to spot good men.”

“How’s that?” Jim asked.

“I’m chief steward in charge of personnel aboard the _Hercules_,” the other replied. “It’s lucky for you that I saw you first. I can hire you without your having to see anyone else.”

“That’s one thing in my favor,” Jim said with relief.

“I’m afraid there’s one more strike against you, though, Jim,” Babe said.

“What’s that?”

“You’ve ‘bumped’ the most important man in the space tourist business, and that isn’t good.”

“What do you mean?” Jim asked.

“I mean this suite was Mr. Bowers’, the owner of Venus Space Tours, Incorporated.”

“Why didn’t he come aboard in time for the blast-off?” Jim wanted to know.

“Mr. Bowers depends on the stewards to let him know just ahead of time because he usually has a lot of last-minute things to do.”

“I didn’t even know who he was!” Jim said. “Wow, what a mistake to make!”

“Lucky for the _Hercules_, though,” Babe remarked, “your weight has canceled out his. There’s another rub, though. Mr. Bowers may have the Miami port radio us that you’re aboard. That would expose you for sure.”

Jim had an idea that his career as a spaceman was going to be extremely brief.

Babe showed him how to navigate in the state of no gravity. By kicking out rearward, he could shoot himself along almost as smoothly as a fish in water.

“Come with me,” Babe said, “and let’s get you started as a steward. You can bunk in my extra cot. There was an odd number of men this trip, leaving the spare bed.”

Babe locked the door of Mr. Bowers’ suite so that no one would be curious about him. He told Jim that Mr. Bowers very rarely mixed with the passengers or crew. For this reason he would not likely be missed.

Babe kept Jim out of sight of the other crewmen and hurriedly got him fitted into a steward’s white uniform.

“Your job will be to show the tourists how to get along in the space ship,” Babe told him.

Jim went around with Babe to learn the ropes. Some of the steward’s friends looked at Jim curiously and asked about him. Babe satisfied them by saying that Jim was a last-minute addition.

The first jobs Jim and Babe had to take care of were several cases of space sickness. Lack of gravity did funny things to the balancing mechanism in the ear and often made amateur space travelers feel as though they were coming apart. A dose of medicine usually fixed them up. Jim was glad that he himself did not suffer from this affliction.

Jim watched Babe instruct a gentleman how to take a nap without using a couch. The only thing the man needed was a short cord secured to his ankle and to a ring on the compartment wall to make sure that his breathing did not cause him to float off. For night sleeping, Jim was told, most people preferred using the standard sleeping-bag-type cots.

“How about some lunch?” Babe asked Jim when they had left the passenger relaxing in mid-air. “We’ll have to get ours before the tourists come in.”

“I’m all for it,” Jim replied.

As they “swam” toward the crewmen’s mess, Babe said, “This is your crucial meal, Jim. If you get by this one without anyone getting curious about you, I don’t believe you’ll have to worry about them anymore.”

“I have my fingers crossed.”

He was going to need all the luck he could get, he realized, as they navigated into the mess compartment. Across the room from them was the officer with the square red mustache who had spoken to him as he carried Mr. Bowers’ bags into Suite 8!

Jim whispered to Babe about the officer. Babe told him that there was a good chance of avoiding him, since the officers sat at one table and the stewards at another.

Jim was fascinated by his first meal in space. Everyone strapped himself to his seat so that he would stay put. Then the cooks brought in individual plates which adhered to the metallic table top by magnetism. Each bite of food was impaled on a toothpick stuck into a sponge-rubber mat which was fastened to the plate.

As Jim ate with tongs and sucked his drink from a closed container, he was careful to avoid the roving eyes of the officer with the red mustache. Jim was glad that the other stewards weren’t inquisitive about him. They appeared hungry and weren’t talkative.

Having survived the crucial first day without discovery, Jim found the others that followed were much easier. When three weeks had passed and he still had not been discovered, he started believing that the tourist company owner he had “bumped” was not going to complain.

But one day late in the voyage Jim and Babe happened to run into a very important person in the corridor on the way to mess. Jim recognized the insigne of four platinum rockets that showed he was Captain Coppard. It was Jim’s first face-to-face meeting with the officer.

After the stewards’ salute Captain Coppard suddenly pulled up short, and Jim felt the trim, hawk-nosed man’s steely gaze on him. It was a stare that appeared to look clear through him. Why was the officer suddenly so interested in him? It brought an anxious lump up into Jim’s throat.

“Steward,” the chief officer said, “just a minute.”

Jim faced the officer in gray and gold, his heart pounding. Had Mr. Bowers radioed the ship about him? Or had Captain Coppard found out about him in some other way?

“Yes, sir?” Jim said.

Captain Coppard touched Jim’s blouse. “You’ve got a button undone on your uniform. Don’t let me see that again.”

“Yes, sir,” Jim replied in relief, and lost no time tidying himself. The captain “swam” off down the corridor.

“That scared the life out of me!” Jim blurted to Babe. “I thought he had found me out for sure! I know now why you didn’t want me to turn myself in yet.”

“The captain’s an expert spaceman, but he’s as strict as they come, just as I told you,” Babe replied.

After lunch Jim and Babe had a little time on their hands and “hung” by the port in their compartment looking out into space. By now Earth had dwindled to an arc light, and the endless star patterns and dusty nebulae challenged his imagination tremendously. The planet they were heading for was an enlarging brilliant disk that stood out prominently among the sparkling diamonds of black space.

“How long have you been out of the orphanage, Jim?” Babe asked suddenly.

“Over two years,” Jim said. “I’ve been working as an assistant athletic coach at Oceanside Boys’ Home outside Miami since then.”

“How come you were doing redcap service at the space harbor?”

Jim grinned broadly. “Just because I loved it. I loved to go aboard space ships and pretend I was a real passenger. I’ve wanted to go into space ever since I knew there was such a thing. It seems now as though I’m in a wonderful dream and that all this is not really true at all!”

A pause followed, as Jim looked at Babe. “You’ve never told me anything about yourself.”

Babe shrugged. “There’s not much to tell. I’m thirty-two, unmarried. Been going into space since I was seventeen. Like you, I have space in my blood, and I hope I’ll be rocketing until I’m eighty.”

Jim had a multitude of services to do for his patrons before the end of the trip. He had a half dozen mild cases of “collision,” resulting from tourists’ carelessly bumping into the walls of their compartments, not realizing their increased powers in “free fall.” On another occasion a traveler had failed to hitch onto a wall ring during a nap and had floated down the corridor half the length of the ship. A child had a minor case of radiation burn when he wandered into a restricted compartment next to the atomic reactor.

The trip was nearly over in a few weeks’ time, for the _Hercules_ was traveling the way of the straight line and crossing the orbits of the other planets. The day of landing, Jim and Babe looked out of the port in their compartment at a pearly mist. The sensation of weight had returned with the cutting in of the rocket motors.

“How long before we touch down?” Jim asked.

“Several hours yet,” Babe replied. “We’ve got to circle the planet several times to brake our speed. If we were to go straight down through this pea soup, the friction would turn us red hot.”

Jim was glad when they were dropping at respectable speed directly down. The landing, moments later, in the colony space harbor was made safely.

After Jim and Babe had made their rounds readying the passengers for debarkation, a voice came over the wall microphone:

“Steward Al Hogan, report to Captain Coppard’s suite right away.”

Jim and Babe exchanged anxious glances but did not speak as Babe left the compartment. Jim wondered if his secret had been discovered at this last moment. His concern was more for Babe than for himself. It would be an awful thing for Babe to have to pay the penalty for helping him.

To take his mind off his concern, Jim went to the side port for his first sight of Venus. Although the upper layers of the atmosphere were impenetrably dense, the air at ground level was clear except for occasional wisps of vapor floating by. The intense rising heat gave a shimmering effect to the canyon landscape. When Babe returned, he eased Jim’s mind with a grin.

“How’d you like to make the cable-car tour with me, Jim?” he asked.

“I’m all for it!” Jim said, greatly relieved that Babe had nothing bad to report.

“One of the regular cable-car drivers is sick and can’t make the trip,” Babe went on. “Captain Coppard knew I’d had experience driving the car a few times before and asked me if I wanted to make some overtime pay.”

“When do we start?” Jim asked eagerly.

“In a few hours—after the tourists have had time to rest up from the landing.”

Five hours later, Jim and Babe were helping tourists into breathing outfits. There wasn’t enough oxygen in Venus’ atmosphere to support life from Earth, although the planet had animal life of its own. The apparatus was a light helmet with an attachment covering the nose of the wearer. The gadget contained two slender tubes which fitted into the nostrils and supplied them with oxygen from shoulder tanks. Also attached to the helmet were dark lenses for protecting the eyes from the extreme brilliance.

As they left the ship, Jim saw that almost all of the many buildings of the settlement were clustered about the rim of the space harbor. Venus was still in the pioneer stage of development; the only persons living permanently on the planet were scientists, engineers, and tourist workers. The harbor lay on a broad, high plateau. On three sides of it, precipices dropped away sharply into deep canyons.

It took Jim a while to get used to the oppressive hotness of the atmosphere. It was like breathing fire each time he took a breath through his mouth. Babe instructed him and the others to breathe only through their noses in order to avoid the discomfort.

Babe led the party toward one of the edges of the plateau where the cable car rested, a hundred feet or so from the cliff. Its overhead cable extended out as far as Jim could see into the deep country.

When all were aboard, one of the tourists, weighted down with camera equipment, asked, “When are we leaving, Chief? Right away? I can’t wait to get this terrific scenery down on film! Isn’t this a fabulous place!”

The man was Mr. Benjamin, one of the more enthusiastic travelers.

“We’re leaving just as soon as we get the rear jet firing,” Babe told him. He led Jim into the foremost of two Plexiglas-enclosed drivers’ quarters that were located at each end of the car.

Jim saw that only a single lever was used to control the cable car. There was a radio set for contact with the space harbor if this were necessary.

Babe turned on the ignition and shoved the lever. The car began gliding over the ground toward the edge of the precipice. “A child can run this,” he said. “One jet behind to push us forward, one in front to slow us down.”

Jim felt his knees go weak in tingling anticipation as the car swung out into empty space, with only its slender overhead cable as a support for forty people. Babe presently let Jim try the control lever. Jim could hear the hollow _swoosh_ of the rear jet as it shot the car along, and he could hear the singing of the cable as the car rolled smoothly on its fine overhead bearings.

“We seem to be going uphill,” Jim commented.

“We are,” Babe said. “We’re heading for Point Luna, which is a thousand feet higher than where we started.”

“I don’t see how they ever got this cable in place,” Jim said.

“I’ve heard that it wasn’t too much of a job, using helicopters,” Babe explained. “It was worth the trouble because the tourist revenue from it has helped the building projects here.”

Reaching Point Luna, the car was stopped and the tourists got out to look over the view. The space harbor was only a miniature tongue of land beyond the vast spread of canyon behind them. Babe pointed out the Great Crimson Desert in the distance, which looked to Jim like a sea of fire as the heat waves rose from it up into the white sky. Jim thought it odd, not seeing a sun up there. He knew the planet was forever shut off from any view of the outer magnificent solar system because of its dense atmosphere.

The car moved on again, and presently a flock of snow-white birds began circling about. Jim knew these to be the Venus albatrosses, which often accompanied the cable car. The next peak reached was Point Hastings, named for the man who had first set foot on Venus. The spot was a rugged mesa jutting up from the canyon floor. The excited party left the car and trooped down a slope which was thick with salmon-pink umbrella fern.