‘In the groove.’
‘Time?’
‘About a minute. Son, keep your mind on your duck shooting and don’t fret.’
He wiped his hands on his shirt and did not answer. For some seconds silence obtained, then Hazel said quietly, ‘Unidentified radar beacon blip on the screen, sir. Robot response and a string of numbers.’
‘Does it concern us?’
‘Closing north and starboard. Possible collision course.’
Roger Stone steeled himself not to look at his own screen; a quick glance would tell him nothing that Hazel had not reported. He kept his face glued to the eyeshade of the coelostat. ‘Evasive maneuver indicated?
‘Son, you’re as likely to dodge into it as duck away from it. Too late to figure a ballistic.’
He forced himself to watch the star images and thought about it. Hazel was right, one did not drive a spaceship by the seat of the pants. At the high speeds and tight curves at the bottom of a gravity well, close up to a planet, an uncalculated maneuver might bring on a collision. Or it might throw them into an untenable orbit, one which would never allow them to reach Mars.
But what could it be? Not a spaceship, it was unmanned. Not a meteor, it carried a beacon. Not a bomb rocket, it was too high. He noted that the images were steady and stole a glance, first at his own screen, which told him nothing, and then through the starboard port.
Good heavens! he could see it!
A great gleaming star against the black of space… growing growmg!
‘Mind your scope, son,’ said Hazel. ‘Nineteen seconds.’
He put his eye back to the scope; the images were steady. Hazel oontinued, ‘It seems to be drawing ahead slightly.’
He had to look. As he did so something flashed up and obscured the starboard port and at once was visible in the portside port — visible but shrinking rapidly. Stone had a momentary impression of a winged torpedo shape.
‘Whew!’ Hazel sighed. ‘They went that-a-way, podnuh!’ She added briskiy, ‘All hands, brace for acceleration — five seconds!’
He had his eye on the star images, steady and perfectly matched, as the jet slammed him into his pads. The force was four gravities, much more than the boost from Luna, but they held it for only slightly more than one minute. Captain Stone kept watching the star images, ready to check her if she started to swing, but the extreme care with which he had balanced his ship in loading was rewarded: she held her attitude.
He heard Hazel shout, ‘Brennschluss!’ just as the noise and pressure dropped off and died. He took a deep breath and said to the mike, ‘You all right, Edith?’
‘Yes, dear,’ she answered faintly. ‘We’re all right.’
‘Power room?’
‘Okay!’ Pollux answered.
‘Secure and lock.’ There was no need to have the power room stand by, any correction to course and speed on this leg would be made days or weeks later, after much calculation.
‘Aye aye, sir. Say, Dad, what was the chatter about a blip?’
‘Pipe down,’ Hazel interrupted. ‘I’ve got a call coming in.’ She added, ‘Rolling Stone, Luna, to Traffic — come in, Traffic.’
There was a whir and a click and a female voice chanted:
‘Traffic Control to Rolling Stone, Luna — routine traffic precautionary: your plan as filed will bring you moderately close to experimental rocket satellite of Harvard Radiation Laboratory. Hold to flight plan; you will fail contact by ample safe margin. End of message; repeat — ‘ The transcription ran itself through once more and shut off.
‘Now they tell us!’ Hazel exploded. ‘Oh, those cushion warmers! Those bureaucrats! I’ll bet that message has been holding in the tank for the past hour waiting for some idiot to finish discussing his missing laundry.’
She went on fuming: ‘ “Moderately close!” “Ample safe margin!” Why, Roger, the consarned thing singed my eye-brows!’
‘ “A miss is as good as a mile”.’
‘A mile isn’t nearly enough, as you know darn well. It took ten years off my life — and at my age I can’t afford that.’
Roger Stone shrugged. After the strain and excitement he was feeling let down and terribly weary; since blast-off he had been running on stimulants instead of sleep. ‘I’m going to cork off for the next twelve hours. Get a preliminary check on our vector; if there’s nothing seriously wrong, don’t wake me. I’ll look at it when I turn out.’