"Did she! Why, she tried to hook up the super drive herself, and when it didn't work, she came here for help. I'd say she was really interested in finding you. Going out of her way to help you, Steve, is quite a difference from the Sandra as I know her."

"Do you?"

"Say! What is the matter with you? 'Has she?' 'Was she?' 'Would she?' 'Did she?' is that the best you can do?"

"Look, John, how long ago was that?"

"About a week or so."

"What did she do, exactly."

"She came here and told us that you've been a month or six weeks overdue on that trip to Sirius. She wanted the drive fixed so that she could go out and look for you. I offered to go along, but she said no. So we fixed her drive and she took off like the devil was in her hair."

"Mac, you're a sucker!"

"Oh, now look—"

"So she's changed, has she? Full of remorse. Sputtering like a leaky alphatron field because she was hamstrung without a drive. Her heart was reeking with love for me, and she wanted, if she couldn't have me, to go out into the deep, unknown void of interstellar space and die where I had died, so we could be together in that last, long resting place."

"What are—"

"So John, please, for the small help I was to you, and for the love of Steve that lies within both of us, give me the drive so that I may go forth and seek he whom I crave. I want so little, John, and Steve is such a fine fellow—"

"Say! Have I been took?"

"The proper word is 'Taken' and the answer is in the affirmative."

"I'll be damned."

"You probably will," smiled Hammond. "Mac, all that dame wanted was to be the first human being to set foot on another, extra-solarian planet! She wanted to be known as the first person to ever seek another star."

"I take it that you haven't been further than a long stone's throw?"

"Shucks. I haven't even been out to the Los Angeles city limits."

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