His sister touched his shoulder. “Cut it out. If there is anything stupider than flogging yourself over something you can’t help, I’ve yet to meet it. Anyhow, we are doing something about it.”
“What? I thought you said nothing could be done?”
“Shut up and let your mind coast. The folks are going to make a Ramsbotham jump, five hundred to one, twenty years for two weeks. They’ve already signed a contract with Entropy, Incorporated. Dad has resigned from General Synthetics and is closing up his affairs; they’ll kiss the world goodby this coming Wednesday which is why he was being sterh about your plans to be away at that time. You’re the apple of his eye Heaven knows why.”
Rod tried to sort out too many new ideas at once. A time jump . . . of course! It would let Dad stay alive another twenty years. But “Say, Sis, this doesn’t get them anything! Sure, it’s twenty years but it will be just two weeks to them . . . and Dad will be as sick as ever. I know what I’m talking about; they did the same thing for Hank Robbin’s great grandfather and he died anyhow, right after they took him out of the stasis. Hank told me.”
Captain Walker shrugged. “Probably a hopeless case to start with. But Dad’s specialist, Dr. Hensley, says that he is morally certain that Dad’s case is not hopeless twenty years from now. I don’t know anything about metabolic medicine, but Hensley says that they are on the verge and that twenty years from now they ought to be able to patch Dad up as easily they can graft on a new leg today.”
“You really think so?”
“How should I know? In things like this you hire the best expert you can, then follow his advice. The point is, if we don’t do it, Dad is finished. So we do it.”
“Yeah. Sure, sure, we’ve got to.”
She eyed him closely and added, “All right. Now do you want to talk with them about it?”
“Huh?” He was startled by the shift. “Why? Are they waiting for me?”
“No. I persuaded them that it was best to keep it from you until it happened. Then I came straight in and told you. Now you can do as you please pretend you don’t know, or go have Mum cry over you, and listen to a lot of last minute, man-to-man advice from Dad that you will never take. About midnight, with your nerves frazzled, you can get back to your preparations for your survival test. Play it your own way but I’ve rigged it so you can avoid that, if you want to. Easier on everybody. Myself, I like a cat’s way of saying goodby.”
Rod’s mind was in a turmoil. Not to say goodby seemed unnatural, ungrateful, untrue to family sentiment but the prospect of saying goodby seemed almost unbearably embarrassing. “What’s that about a cat?”
“When a cat greets you, he makes a big operation of it, humping, stropping your legs, buzzing like mischief. But when he leaves, he just walks off and never looks back. Cats are smart.”
“Well . .”
“I suggest,” she added, “that you remember that they are doing this for their convenience, not yours.
“But Dad has to”
“Surely, Dad must, if he is to get well.” She considered pointing out that the enormous expense of the time jump would leave Rod practically penniless; she decided that this was better left undiscussed. “But Mum does not have to.”
“But she has to go with Dad!”
“So? Use arithmetic. She prefers leaving you alone for twenty years in order to be with Dad for two weeks. Or turn it around: she prefers having you orphaned to having herself widowed for the same length of time.”
“I don’t think that’s quite fair to Mum,” Rod answered slowly.
“I wasn’t criticizing. She’s making the right decision. Nevertheless, they both have a strong feeling of guilt about you and”
“About me?”
“About you. I don’t figure into it. If you insist on saying goodby, their guilt will come out as selfjustification and selfrighteousness and they will find ways to take it out on you and everybody will have a bad time. I don’t want that. You are all my family.”