‘Well… It’s not an Earth custom ..’ said Nettie, still furious. ‘But… thanks for developing the film for me. That’s exactly what I was looking for.’
‘It was my pleasure,’ said Corporal Golholiwol, gazing adoringly at Nettie. ‘Most of the photos seem to have come out OK. I also re-electro-plated your nail scissors, restored several missing teeth to your comb, and re-silvered your little mirror.’
‘Why! Thank you so much, Corporal!’ Nettie had regained her composure and was searching through the photographs that Golholiwol had developed. Then suddenly she found what she was looking for. ‘Here! Look, Dan! It’s the rectory! They came out! Those long exposures! Look! THEY CAME OUT!’
Dan felt he was a bit out of his depth, but he just said, without enthusiasm: ‘Oh, good! It’ll be nice to have a souvenir.’
Nettie, however, had already spun round and run off towards a group of Yassaccans who were talking gloomily over the roasting snork.
‘Rodden!’ Nettie called out, and the Navigational Officer turned around. ‘Rodden! I’ve got it! YOU CAN GET US BACK TO EARTH!’ Nettie thrust two of the photographs into his hands. He took them unwillingly, not wishing to get involved in any fantasy that this attractive but dim female might have concocted.
‘Well!’ cried Nettie, hardly able to contain her excitement. ‘Look at them! What do you see?’
Rodden reluctantly looked down at the photos in his hand, and studied them. ‘It’s a house… on Earth I assume…’ he said slowly. ‘A former rectory… by the look of it… with planning permission for commercial use…’
‘That’s amazing!’ exclaimed Nettie. ‘How d’you know all that?’
The Navigational Officer smiled smugly as he took off his translatorspecs and said: ‘It’s written on the estate agents’ board.’ He loved baffling beautiful but not too bright females.
‘Oh! Right… Anyway it’s the place Dan and Lucy were going to buy before your Starship smashed into it.’
‘So?’ Rodden was suddenly looking at them with increasing attention. ‘How do you suppose these will help you?’
‘I took them at night!’ cried Nettie excitedly. ‘Look at the sky! Especially that one, there! Look!’
A broad smile suddenly creased across Rodden’s face.
‘YOU CAN SEE THE STARS!’ cried Nettie.
‘My dear young woman,’ said Rodden. ‘You must forgive me for underestimating your…’
‘Easy-over on the flattery!’ replied Nettie. ‘I don’t mind what you thought! The main thing is can you get any co-ordinates on those star patterns that will show where the Earth is? Are there enough stars in the shot?’
Rodden was silent for some time. Nettie watched him anxiously, and suddenly Dan, who had joined them by this time, found Nettie’s hand in his and she was squeezing it.
Rodden stared and stared at the photo. Finally he looked up. ‘Theoretically,’ he said. ‘Yes. It should be a simple questlon of three-dimensional geometry. There is only one place in the galaxy in which the stars will appear in that exact configuration… But I’m not sure this photo will provide enough information…’
The Earth folks’ hearts sank. The Navigational Officer was clearly trying to let them down gently. Nettie cursed herself; she had allowed her hopes to get too high. She was always doing that – especially with her men.
‘But,’ the Navigational Officer was continuing. ‘I think I could enhance the image – do you have the negative?’
‘It’s here!’ shouted Corporal Golholiwol,
‘Then let’s see what we can do,’ said Rodden. And with that the party suddenly started to seem more cheerful for everybody concerned.
25
It took two Dormillion days to run the enhanced photos of the night sky on Earth through the Great Astronomical Computer, at the University of Yassaccanda. The Computer went through fifteen trillion billion five hundred thousand million seven thousand four hundred and sixty-nine different comparisons before it finally came up with a star configuration that matched. It was on an outer spiral arm of the Galaxy in a sector that, quite frankly, had always been assumed to be uninhabitable. If Julius Caesar had been given a photograph of Australia and told its exact location on the planet, it would not have seemed so remote as did the Earth to these honest Yassaccans.