Part 12 (1/2)

Then I saw it, a mere moving dot of black; but suddenly it clarified.

I saw a dot which I could imagine was a shape with discs along its edge, moving with high velocity. Grantline was s.h.i.+fting our field to hold it.

”Got it, Gregg. By G.o.d, that's it! Now we'll see.”

Then presently we saw that from its bow a very faint radiant beam was streaming. Beside me I heard Grantline gasp, ”Gregg, am I crazy or is that bow beacon like the light-beam planted in Greater New York?”

There did seem to be a similarity, but thought of it abruptly was swept from my mind. Our cubby was alive with signals. Both the bow and the stern observers saw the enemy s.h.i.+p now with their 'scopes gazing directly along our Benson-light. And Drac was calling, ”I've got the measurement of its velocity. Doubling every ten seconds. G.o.d, what acceleration!”

I flung off the Benson-light. The enemy s.h.i.+p had come from behind the limb of the Moon; our straight-light telescopes showed it clearly. It was heading unmistakably in our direction.

Drac was pleading, ”We need velocity! Are you coming to the turret?”

”Yes.”

Grantline and I rushed out upon the catwalk. Waters was mounting the spiral ladder from the deck. ”Into your cubby,” I shouted. ”Call Earth. Keep calling until you get them.”

Grantline rushed for the deck. I gained the control turret, Drac, with his thin face white and set, met me at the door. ”We need velocity.”

I nodded. ”We'll get it, Drac; have no fear of that.”

I set the gravity-plates for the greatest possible acceleration forward and added the stern rocket engines for narrow-angle maneuvering.

With gathering speed we plunged directly for the oncoming enemy s.h.i.+p.

6

”But there's something wrong, Drac.”

”We've got grade five acceleration.”

Grantline had joined us in the control turret. ”How far would you say, at a rough guess, that s.h.i.+p is from us now?”

”Thirty thousand miles; about that.” Drac scanned his page of calculations. ”Impossible to gauge with any exactness; they change their pace so often and I can't figure out how large the d.a.m.n thing is.”

”Say they've got a forty thousand velocity; added to our ten, that's fifty.”

”And we're accelerating. In half an hour we'll be within range.”

”But there's something wrong,” I persisted.

For several minutes now I had been aware that the _Cometara_ was acting strangely. A sluggish response to the controls, I thought, but when I called engine chief Franklin, he had not noticed it. Yet I was certain.

Grantline stared at me. ”Something wrong?”

”Yes. Drac, try orienting us. I did it ten minutes ago.” I shoved him at my equations, giving the angles with the Sun, Earth and Moon which we should now have. ”There's our flight course as it ought to be.

Measure how we're heading, actual position. If it's what it ought to be, with the plate-combinations I'm using, then I'm crazy.”

”Oh, you're just naturally apprehensive,” Grantline said.