Blish,James – And all the Stars a Stage

four. And we’ve been out nearly half a year already.”

“And you’ve been listening to them?” Jorn whispered. ‘It must be an inferno

back there.”

‘It is wholly horrible,” Kamblin said gravely, “and it will get much worse.

That’s why I bring the matter up now. It could have waited, otherwise. But

in view

88 lames Blish

of this, it seems to me that the general cheerfulness on board ship lately

is not only unwarranted-it’s extremely dangerous.”

“It is,” Ertak rumbled. “It is. But there’s one thing about it that’s

absolutely certain: It won’t last.

“Give them a little time to reflect and the hopefulness will give way to

despair and then-well, mark my words, the cheerfulness won’t last.”

I

7

And of course it did not. As the year stretched out toward its end, bringing

closer the moment when nothing more could be heard from home thereafter,

more and more people began to vote in the wardrooms to hear whatever was

coming from there. Kamblin had suggested that access to those broadcasts be

confined to the bridge, but the Director overruled this, for reasons he did

not see fit to explain.

The messages all came through originally in a high, disquieting chittering

which had to be recorded and played back at well under its reception speed

to be intelligible at all. Even then, not very much that anyone could

comprehend came through. Entertainment broadcasting had long since died,

that was clear; now nothing was being transmitted but routing orders, pleas

for help, hard news in hard codes, and other matters of official business