help?"

"No radio," Henry mumbled. "The drive tube wouldn't work either."

"What were you doing in a bunged-up suit like that? You'll never live to be as old as me if you take such chances. If this station had visular, I'd have picked you up in that, but the company said I wouldn't have no use for it."

"Where is everybody?" Henry asked, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet.

"Everybody who? Are you hungry? How long since you had anything to eat? There's nobody here but me. Karoly and Wilbur both passed beyond, Wilbur just two weeks ago. He was only 94 too. The company's sending some help, they say. I don't see how they expect one man to run an ice-sweeper, even if he is handy like me. This is a dangerous job, although you might not think so. Do you realize, young fellow, we're whizzing around Saturn once every nine hours, four minutes, and twelve seconds? That's an orbital velocity of nineteen point eight kilometers per second! We've got to go that fast to stay in this orbit."

"There's no one else here but you?" Henry said.

"Think what would happen if something slowed us down!" Ranjit exclaimed. "We'd start falling toward Saturn and finally crash! Meteors are scarce out here, but what if a spaceship came around retrograde and smashed this station head-on? There ain't a thing I can do if it starts falling. Part of it's a ship, but the company took the motor out. All I've got is the flywheel steering gear. The control room's right up there above my bunk."

Ranjit pointed to a sandwich bunk hoisted against the pipes and conduits that crisscrossed the ceiling in abstract patterns. He said, "I can spin this sweeper like a top, if I want to, but I can't accelerate it." He squinted through the small window beside the airvalve. "Speaking of spaceships," he rambled, "there's one out there now. Wonder who it is? There's not a thing on the schedule. Looks like they would've called in."

Moving to the radio, the old man fumbled with knobs and switches and pounded on the cabinet with his fist. "This radio's deader than a asteroid!" he yelled. "First the teletype and now the radio. I'm supposed to report all ships to Titan, but how can I with no equipment? Maybe that's your ship come hunting you. What did you say your name is?"

"Henry," said Henry.

"Henry, huh? My name's Ranjit. I better get up 

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