Part 8 (1/2)
”Propriety be d.a.m.ned. I'd rather have David's child, alive.” She slipped her boots back on, took a flashlight from the cupboard, and went out the door. As she opened it, the wind came straight in and hit Magnus across the face.
”In the land of Chinchanchou, Where the winds blow tender From a sea like purple wine Foaming to defend her, Lives a princess beautiful (May the G.o.ds amend her!) Little known for virtue, but Of most female gender.”
AS he came around the gyro housing and pulled himself forward to the observation deck, David Ryerson heard the guitar skitter through half a dozen chords and Maclaren's voice come bouncing in its wake. He sighed, pushed the lank yellow hair back out of his eyes, and braced himself.
Maclaren floated in the living section. It was almost an in-sult to see him somehow clean all over, in a white tunic, when each man was allowed a daily spongeful of water for such purposes. And half rations had only leaned the New Zealander down, put angles in his smooth brown countenance; he didn't have bones jutting up under a stretched skin like Ryerson, or a flushed complexion and recurring toothache like Nakamura. It wasn't fair!
”Oh, hullo, Dave.” Maclaren continued tickling his strings, but quietly. ”How does the web progress?”
”I'm done.”
”I just clinched the last bolt and spotwelded the last connec-tion. There's not a thing left except to find that germanium, make the transistors, and adjust the units.” Ryerson hooked an arm around a stanchion and drifted free, staring out of sunken eyes toward emptiness. ”G.o.d help me,” he murmured, ”what am I going to do now?”
”Wait,” said Maclaren. ”We can't do much except wait.” He regarded the younger man for a while.
”Frankly, both Seiichi and I found excuses not to help you, did less out there than we might have, for just that reason. I've been afraid you would finish the job before we found our planet.”
Ryerson started. Redness crept into his chalky face. ”Why, of all the-” His anger collapsed. ”I see. All right.”
”These weeks since we escaped have been an unparalleled chance to practice my music,” remarked Maclaren. ”I've even been composing. Listen.
”In their golden-masted s.h.i.+ps Princes come a-wooing Over darkling spindrift roads Where the gales are brewing.
l.u.s.ty tales have drawn them thence, Much to their undoing: When they seek the lady's hand She givesthemthe-”
”Will you stop that?” screamed Ryerson.
”As you like,” said Maclaren mildly. He put the guitar back into its case. ”I'd be glad to teach you,” he offered.
”No.”
”Care for a game of chess?”
”No.”
”I wish to all the h.e.l.ls I'd been more of an intellectual,” said Maclaren. ”I never was, you know. I was a playboy, even in science. Now . . . I wish I'd brought a few hundred books with me. When I get back, I'm going to read them.” His smile faded. ”I think I might begin to understand them.”
”When we get back?” Ryerson's thin frame doubled in midair as if for a leap. ”If we get back, you mean!”
NAKAMURA entered. He had a sheaf of scribbled papers in one hand. His face was carefully blank. ”I have com-pleted the calculations on our latest data,” he said.
Ryerson shuddered. ”What have you found?” he cried. ”Negative.”
”Lord G.o.d of Israel,” groaned Ryerson. ”Negative again.”
”That pretty well covers this...o...b..t, then,” said Maclaren calmly. ”I've got the elements of the next one computed- somewhere.” He went out among the instruments.
A muscle in Ryerson's cheek began to jump of itself. He looked at Nakamura for a long time. ”Isn't there anything else we can do?” he asked. ”The telescopes, the-Do we just have tosit?”
”We are circling a dead sun,” the pilot reminded him. ”There is only feeble starlight to see by. A very powerful instrument might photograph a planet, but not the telescopes we have. Not at any distance greater than we could find them gravita-tionally. S-s-so.”
”We could make a big telescope!” exclaimed Ryerson. ”We have gla.s.s, and . . . and silver and-”
”I've thought of that.” Maclaren's tones drifted back from the observation section. ”You're welcome to amuse yourself with it, but we'd starve long before a suitable mirror could be ground with the equipment here.”
”But-Maclaren, s.p.a.ce is so big! We could hunt for a million years and never find a planet if we can't . .
. can't see them!”
”We're not working quite at random.” Maclaren reappeared with a punched tape. ”Perhaps you've forgotten the principle on which we are searching. We position ourselves in an orbit about the star, follow it for a while, check our position repeat-edly, and compute whether the path has been significantly perturbed. If it has been, that's due to a planet somewhere, and we can do a Leverrier to find that planet.
If not-if we're too far away-we quarter to another arc of the same path and try again. Having exhausted a whole circ.u.mference thus, we move outward and try a bigger circle.”
”Shut up!” rasped Ryerson. ”I know it! I'm not a schoolboy. But we'reguessing!”
”Not quite,” said Maclaren. ”You were occupied with the web when I worked out the secondary principle . . . yes, come to think of it, you never did ask me before. Let me explain. You see, by extrapolating from data on known stellar types, I know approximately what this star was like in its palmy days. From this, planetary formation theory gives me the scale of its one-time system. For instance, its planets must have been more or less in the equatorial plane; such quant.i.ties as ma.s.s, angular momentum, and magnetic field determine the Bode's Law con-stants; to the extent that all this is known, I can draw an orbital map.
”Well, then the star went supernova. Its closer planets were whiffed into gas. The outermost giants would have survived, though badly damaged. But the semimajor axes of their orbits were so tremendous-theoretically, planets could have formed as much as a light-year from this star-that even a small percentage of error in the data makes my result uncertain by Astronomical Units. Another factor: the explosion filled this s.p.a.ce with gas. We're actually inside a nonluminous nebula. That would shorten the orbits of the remaining planets; in the course of millions of years they've spiraled far inward. In one way that helps us: we've an area to search which is not hope-lessly huge. But on the other hand, just how long has it been since the accident? What's the density distribution of the neb-ula now, and what was it back then? I've taken some readings and made some estimates. All very crude, but-” Maclaren shrugged-”what else can we do? The successive orbits we have been trying are, more or less, those I have calculated for the surviving planets as of today. And, of course, intermediate radii to make sure that we will be measurably perturbed no matter where those planets actually are. It's just a matter of getting close enough to one of them.”
”If our food lasts,” groaned Ryerson. ”And we have to eat while we finish the web, too. Don't forget that.”
”We're going to have to reorganize our schedules,” declared Maclaren thoughtfully. ”Hitherto we've found things to keep us occupied. Now we must wait, and not go crazy waiting.” He grinned. ”I hereby declare theSouthern Cross dirty limerick contest open and offer a prize of-”
”Yes,” said Ryerson. ”Great sport. Fun and games, with Chang Sverdlov's frozen corpse listening in!”
SILENCE clapped down. They heard the air mumble in the ventilators.
”What else can we do with our poor friend?” asked Nakamura softly. ”Send him on a test rocket into the black sun? He deserved better of us. Yes-s-s? Let his own people bury him.”
”Bury a copy of him!” shrieked Ryerson. ”Of all the sense-less-”
”Please,” said Nakamura. He tried to smile. ”After all it is no trouble to us, and it will comfort his friends at home; maybe yes? After all, speaking in terms of atoms, we do not even wish to send ourselves back.
Only copies.” He laughed.
”Will you stop that giggling!”
”Please.” Nakamura pushed himself away, lifting aston-ished hands. ”Please, if I have offended you, I am so sorry.”
”So sorry! So sorry! Get out of here! Get out, both of you! I've seen more of you than I can stand!”