“Blast!” Seaton’s voice came tinnily over the helmet radios. “I can’t see a foot. Can you, DuQuesne?”
“No, and these joints don’t move more than a couple of inches.”
“These suits need a lot more work. We’ll have to go by feel. Pass ’em along.”
DuQuesne grabbed the girl nearest him and shoved her toward the spot where Seaton would have to be. Seaton
seized her, straightened her up, and did his heroic best to compress that suit until he could at least feel his sweet-
beart’s form.
He was very much astonished to feel motions of resistance and to bear a strange voice cry out, “Don’t! It’s me!
Dottie’s next!”
She was, and she put as much fervor into the reunion as he did. As a lovers’ embrace it was unsatisfactory; but it was
an eager, if distant, contact.
DuQuesne dived through the opening; Crane groped for the controls that closed the lock. Pressure and temperature
came back up to normal. The clumsy suits were taken off. Seaton and Dorothy went into each other’s arms.
And this time it was a real lovers’ embrace.
“We’d better start doing something,” came DuQuesne’s incisive voice. “Every minute counts.”
“One thing first,” Crane said. “Dick, what shall we do with this murderer?”
Seaton, who had temporarily forgotten all about DuQuesne, whirled around.
“Chuck him back into his own tub and let him go to the devil!” he said, savagely.
“Oh, no, Dick!” Dorothy protested, seizing his arm. “He treated us very well, and saved my life once. Besides, you
can’t become a cold-blooded murderer just because he is. You know you can’t.”
“Maybe not . . . Okay, I won’t kill him-unless he gives me about half an excuse . . . maybe.”
“Out of the question, Dick,” Crane decided. “Perhaps he can earn his way?”
“Could be.” Seaton thought for a moment, his face still grim and hard. “He’s smart as Satan and strong as a bull …
and if there’s any possible one thing he is not, it’s a liar.”
He faced DuQuesne squarely, grey eyes boring into eyes of midnight black. “Will you give us your word to act as
one of the party?”
“Yes.” DuQuesne stared back unflinchingly. His expression of cold concern had not changed throughout the con-
versation: it did not change now. “With the understanding that I reserve the right to leave you at any time-“escape” is
a melodramatic world, but fits the facts closely enoughprovided I can do so without affecting unfavorably your
ship, your project then in work, or your persons collectively or individually.”
“You’re the lawyer, Mart. Does that cover it?” “Admirably,” Crane said. “Fully yet concisely. Also, the fact of the
reservation indicates that he means it.” “You’re in, then,” Seaton said to DuQuesne, but he did not offer to shake
hands. “You’ve got the dope. What’ll we have to put on to get away?”
“You can’t pull straight away-and live-but . . :’ “Sure we can. Our power-plant can be doubled in emergencies.”
“I said `and live.”‘ Seaton, remembering what one full power was like, kept still.
“The best you can do is a hyperbolic orbit, and my guess is that it’ll take full power to make that. Ten pounds more
copper might have given me a graze, but we’re a lot closer now. You’ve got more and larger tools than I had, Crane.
Do you want to recompute it now, or give it a good, heavy shot and then figure it?”
“A shot, I think. What do you suggest?”
“Set your engine to roll for a hyperbolic and give it full drive for . . . say an hour.”
“Full power,” Crane said, thoughtfully “I can’t take that much. But
“I can’t either,” Dorothy said, foreboding in her eyes. “Nor Margaret.”
“-full power is necessary,” Crane continued as though the girl had not spoken, “full power it shall be. Is it really of
the essence, DuQuesne?”
“Definitely. More than full would be better. And it’s getting worse every minute.”
“How much power can you take?” Seaton asked. “More than full. Not much more, but a little.”
“If you can, I can.” Seaton was not boasting, merely stating a fact. “So here’s what let’s do. Double the engines up.
DuQuesne and I will notch the power up until one of us has to quit. Run an hour on that, and then read the news.
Check?”
“Check,” said Crane and DuQuesne simultaneously, and the three men set furiously to work. Crane went to the
engines, DuQuesne to the observatory. Seaton rigged helmets to air- and oxygen-tanks through valves on his board.
Seaton placed Margaret upon a seat, fitted a helmet over her head, strapped her in, and turned to Dorothy. Instantly
they were in each other’s arms. He felt her labored breathing and the hard beating of her heart; saw the fear and the
unknown in the violet depths of her eyes; but she looked at him steadily as she said: “Dick, sweetheart, if this is
good-bye . . .”
“It isn’t, Dottie-yet-but I know . .
Crane and DuQuesne had finished their tasks, so Seaton hastily finished his job on Dorothy. Crane put himself to
bed; Seaton and DuQuesne. put on their helmets and took their places at the twin boards.
In quick succession twenty notches of power went on. The Skylark leaped away from the other ship, which con-
tinued its mad fall-a helpless hulk, manned by a corpse, falling to destruction upon the bleak surface of a dead star.
Notch by notch, slower now, the power went up. Seaton turned the mixing valve, a little with each notch, until the
oxygen concentration was as high as they had dared to risk. As each of the two men was determined that he would
make the last advance, the duel continued longer than either would have believed possible. Seaton made what he
was sure was his final effort and waited-only to feel, after a minute, the surge of the vessel that told him that Du-
Quesne was still able to move.
He could not move any part of his body, which was oppressed by a sickening weight. His utmost efforts to breathe
forced only a little oxygen into his lungs. He wondered how long he could retain consciousness under such stress.
Nevertheless, he put out everything he had and got one more notch. Then he stared at the clock-face above his head,
knowing that he was all done and wondering whether DuQuesne could put on one more notch.
Minute after minute went by and the acceleration remained constant. Seaton, knowing that he was now in sole
charge of the situation, fought off unconsciousness while the sweephand of the clock went around and around.
After an eternity of time sixty minutes had passed and Seaton tried to cut down his power, only to find that the long
strain had so weakened him that he could not reverse the ratchet. He was barely able to give the lever the backward
jerk which broke contact completely. Safety straps creaked as, half the power shut off, the suddenly released
springs tried to hurl five bodies upward.
DuQuesne revived and shut down his engine. “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din,” he said, as he began to
make observations.
“Because you were so badly bunged up, is all-one more notch would’ve pulled my cork,” and Seaton went over to
liberate Dorothy and the stranger.
Crane and DuQuesne finished their computations. “Did we gain enough?” Seaton asked.
“More than enough. One engine will take us past it.” Then, as Crane still frowned in thought, DuQuesne went on:
“Don’t you check me, Crane?”
“Yes and no. Past it, yes, but not safely past. One thing neither of us thought of, apparently-Roche’s Limit.”
“That wouldn’t apply to this ship,” Seaton said, positively. “High-tensile alloy steel wouldn’t crumble.”
“It might,” DuQuesne said. “Close enough, it would … What mass would you assume, Crane-the theoretical
maximum?”
“I would. That star may not be that, quite, but it isn’t far from it.” Both men again bent over their computers.
“I make it thirty-nine point seven notches of power, doubled,” DuQuesne said, when he had finished. “Check?”
“Closely enough-point six five,” Crane replied. “Forty notches . . . Ummm . . . ” DuQuesne paused. “I went out at
thirty-two. . . . That means an automatic advance. It’ll take time, but it’s the only. . . .”
“We’ve got it already-all we have to do is set it. But that’ll take an ungodly lot of copper and what’ll we do to live
through it? Plus pressure on the oxygen? Or what?”
After a short but intense consultation the men took all the steps they could to enable the whole party to live
through what was coming. Whether they could do enough no one knew. Where they might lie at the end of this wild
dash for safety; how they were to retrace their way with their depleted supply of copper, what other dangers of dead