big spark. The beam must have charged me good. Then I worked my way to the true hull. After that there were handholds.

Finally I got to a porthole in the living quarters, and I looked in, and there was Jeff jawing away at my empty seat. I put my helmet against the hull and very faintly I heard him say, “Joseph, I’m still worried about the enemy. I keep thinking I hear him or it. I’m going to make us some coffee, so we’ll stay real alert. You break out the guns.”

I don’t suppose anyone ever moved quite so quietly and so quickly in a spacesuit as I did then. I got in the airlock, I got her up to pressure, I got unsuited—and all in less than five minutes, I’m sure. Maybe less than four.

I swam to the cabin. It was empty. I slid into my seat just as Jeff floated in with the coffee.

He went real pale when he spotted me. I saw there might be some trouble this time with the Joseph-Joe transition. But I knew the only way to play it was real cool. I nested there in my seat as if I hadn’t a worry or urge in the world—though my nerves and throat were just screaming for a squirt of that coffee.

“Joe!” he squeaked at last. “Migod, you gave me an awful scare. I thought you’d done a bunk, I thought, you’d spaced yourself, I kept picturing you outside the ship.”

“Why no, Jeff,” I answered quietly. “One way or another, I’ve been in this seat ever since take-off.”

His brow wrinkled as he thought about that.

I looked at the board and noticed that our terminal trip-velocity read fifteen miles a second. My, my.

Finally Jeff said, “That’s right, you have.” And then, just a shade unhappily, “I might have known. You always tell the truth, Joe—you’re perfect.”

END

 TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

This etext was produced from Worlds of Tomorrow, August 1963. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

Punctuation has been normalized. Spelling and hyphenation have been retained as they were in the original book.

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