After another bearing I started off again. Hell, I told myself. This Runstead thing is just a difference of temperament. He can’t see the wide-open spaces and you can. There’s no malice involved. He just thinks it’s a crackpot idea because he doesn’t realize that there are people who go for it. All you’ve got to do is explain it- That argument, born of well-being, crumbled at one touch of reason. Runstead was out on the glacier too. He most certainly could see the wide-open spaces if, of all the places on earth he could be, he chose the Starrzelius Glacier. Well, a showdown would shortly be forthcoming. ‘”Beep-beep.” I sighted through the compass and picked a black object that was dead on my course. I couldn’t quite make it out, but it was visible and it wasn’t moving. I broke into a shuffling run that made me pant, and against my will I slowed down. It was a man. When I was twenty yards away, the man looked impatiently at his watch, and I broke into the clumsy run again. “Matt!” I said. “Matt Runstead!” “That’s right, Mitch,” he said, as nasty as ever. “You’re sharp today.” I looked at him very slowly and very carefully, phrasing my opening remarks. He had folded skis thrust into the snow beside him. “What’s-what’s-” I stammered. “I have time to spare,” he said, “but you’ve wasted enough of it. Good-by, Mitch.” While I stood there dumbly he picked up his folded skis, swung them into the air, and poleaxed me. I fell backwards with pain, bewilderment, and shamed rage bursting my head. I felt him fumbling at my chest and then I didn’t feel anything for a while. I woke thinking I had kicked the covers off and that it was cold for early autumn. Then the ice-blue Antarctic sky knifed into my eyes, and I felt the crumbly snow beneath me. It had happened, then. My head ached horribly and I was cold. Too cold. I felt and found that the power pack was missing. No heat to the suit, gloves, and boots. No power to the R.D.F. coming or going. No use to pull the emergency signal. I tottered to my feet and felt the cold grip me like a vise. There were footprints punched into the snow leading away-where? There was the trail of my snowshoes. Stiffly I took a step back along that trail, and then another, and then another. The rations. I could thrust them into the suit, break the heat
seals, and let them fill the suit with temporary warmth. Plodding step by step I debated: stop and rest while you drink the ration’s heat or keep moving? You need a rest, I told myself. Something impossible happened, your head is aching. You’ll feel better if you sit for a moment, open a ration or two, and then go on. I didn’t sit. I knew what that would mean. Painful step after painful step I fumbled a Comest can from its pocket with fingers that would barely obey me, and fumbled it into my suit. My thumb didn’t seem strong enough to pop the seal and I told myself: sit down for a moment and gather your strength. You don’t have to lie down, pleasant as that would be … my thumb drove through the seal and the tingling heat was painful. It became a blur. I opened more cans, and then I couldn’t work them out of their pockets any more. I sat down at least once and got up again. And then I sat down, feeling guilty and ashamed of the indulgence, telling myself I’d get up in one more second for Kathy, two more seconds for Kathy, three more seconds for Kathy. But I didn’t.
seven I fell asleep on a mountain of ice; I woke up in a throbbing, strumming inferno, complete with red fire and brutish-looking attendant devils. It was exactly what I would have consigned a Taunton copy-smith to. I was confused to find myself there. The confusion did not last long. One of the attendant devils shook my shoulder roughly and said: “Gimme a hand, sleepy. I gotta stow my hammock.” My head cleared and it was very plain that he was simply a lower-class consumer-perhaps a hospital attendant? “Where’s this?” I asked him. “Are we back in Little America?” “Jeez, you talk funny,” he commented. “Gimme a hand, will ya?” “Certainly not!” I told him. “I’m a star-class copysmith.” He looked at me pityingly, said “Punchy,” and went away into the strumming, red-lit darkness. I stood up, swaying on my feet, and grabbed an elbow hurrying past from darkness to darkness. “Excuse me,” I said. “Where is this place? Is it a hospital?” The man was another consumer, worse-tempered than the first. “Leggo my yarm!” he snarled. I did. “Ya want on sick call, ya wait until we land,” he said. “Land?” “Yah, land. Listen, Punchy, don’t ya know what ya signed up for?” “Signed up? No; I don’t. But you’re being too familiar. I’m a star-class copysmith-” His face changed. “Ahah,” he said wisely. “I can fix ya up. Justa minnit, Punchy. I’ll be right back wit’ the stuff.”