Blish,James – And all the Stars a Stage

“Hmm. Pretty cold star. Anything else?”

“Very little as yet, sir,” the boy said stiffly. “Except that the star is

a double.”

“A double? With planets?”

“Yes, Director. There’s a small white dwarf located

And all the Stars a Stage 181

about half a light year below the south pole of the yellow sun, and their

masses are such that at that distance they have to be in orbit around each

other. les almost a duplicate of the doublet system we passed at extreme

range just a few weeks ago. But the larger star here has planets; we can

even see the biggest one from here, just barely.”

“I see. Very good. Dismissed.”

‘Mank you, sir. Uhm … Director?”

“What is it?”

‘Do you have any further orders, sir?”

Jorn frowned. He did not; that was his trouble. It was, of course, remotely

possible that the lonely and decrepit Javelin had finally found herself a

stop, but it was not very likely-sureIy not in a system as outr6 as this

one. One more Yellow Warning like this and he would be convinced for good

and all that the computer, like the one the black men had devised and

entrusted their fate to, was deranged; none of its choices, now that he

came to think of it, had ever been very close to the model it was supposed

to have been set to scan for.

And did they really want a stop? Now, after all this time? They were in no

shape to fight for a planet, not only with hostile natives, but even with

blind nature. It would be so much easier simply to glide onward forever.

Now that they could be sure that they were not likely to run head-on into