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Reinhardt walked like any man.
My network considered your Cygnus project, Booth said bluntly, gesturing to
take in the dome and ship around them, a waste of the taxpayers money,
Doctor. The Administrators of the territories of India, Southeast Asia and
South Africa all lost their posts be-cause they supported you.
So the jackals of the press hounded the heels of government until the
farsighted among them were destroyed. Reinhardt s voice was now as cold as
the space outside the tower, and as impersonal. He had heretofore been almost
apologetically polite. Now he was seething.
The men you speak of will be enshrined by the cit-izens of the future for
their bravery in the face of igno-rance and barbarism. The memories of those
who slaughtered their careers will become dust, less than footnotes in the
pages of history. They are the short-sighted fools who are always blind to the
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fact that some things can t be measured in monetary terms. All such primitives
will eventually pass the way of the Ne-anderthal, weeded out of mankind by
sensible social selection, as were the racists of the dark centuries.
Fortunately, the Cygnus was on her way and out of the system before those
idiots could think to call her back.
Dr. Reinhardt? McCrae purposely made herself sound as helpless and childlike
as possible. The man might be a blind visionary, but he was not insensitive.
Procuring the funds for construction of the Cygnus had required understanding
as well as force.
Her approach worked. His manner changed with startling abruptness as he turned
to face her. The smile he bestowed on her verged on the paternal.
My dear child, I know who you are, as I know the identities of your
companions. I can foresee your ques-tion. I m sorry to have to dash your
hopes, but your fa-ther is dead.
McCrae sagged despite her belief that she had prepared herself for that
answer. Holland comforted her as best he could. To imagine that her father
might be alive was one thing. No amount of preparation had actually readied
her to hear his actual fate from the lips of the one man in a position to
know.
Sorry, Kate. Durant wished there were more he could say. He was as inept
with words as Holland. They left that department to Booth and to the
ram-bunctiously glib Pizer.
A man to be proud of, Reinhardt continued, try-ing to console her. It was a
grave personal loss to me, though never as strong as it must be to you. He was
a trusted and loyal friend.
Diplomacy or no, Holland found he could no longer ignore the questions raised
by the emptiness of the tower and the sections of the Cygnus they had already
passed through.
And the rest of the crew? He watched the scientist closely.
They didn t make it back, then? Reinhardt ap-peared simultaneously hurt and
surprised, as if he had expected Holland s words but had hoped not to hear
them.
No. What do you mean, make it back? What... ?
Pity. A good crew, good people all. Dedicated to their mission.
Wait a minute, said Booth sharply. I m missing something here. We know that
the mission was eventu-ally recalled to Earth. Yet you and the ship are here,
and you say the crew is... ?
Expenses again. Yes, murmured Reinhardt.
What happened after the recall was issued? You did receive it? Would
Reinhardt, Booth wondered, have a reasonable explanation for the mystery that
had teased the people of Earth for twenty years?
The scientist took a deep breath, then began without looking at them. I did
as you would expect me to argued, pleaded, even threatened. But an order like
that could not be ignored, though I would have done so if I could.
But there were others aboard and I knew their sen-timents. Also, we had been
gone from Earth for many years. The feelings of many of the crew toward their
mission had changed. Weakened, I would say, but they were all, after all, only
human. The reaction was to be expected.
He paused for a moment, waiting for comments. There were none.
We turned about and set course for Earth to com-ply with the orders. Despite
all our precautions, we ran into difficulty. We encountered a phenomenon no
one had expected, not those of us aboard ship nor the people who had designed
the ship.
While traveling at supralight speeds, we passed through a vast field of a
unique variety of heavy par-ticles. We were through the field before its
effects or even its presence could be predicted. There our drive was
permanently disabled, despite the best efforts of our technical-repair staff.
All our communications fa-cilities were likewise damaged, beyond any hope of
calling for aid.
There was one remaining option abandoning the ship and utilizing two of our
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three auxiliary survey craft to return directly to Earth. As their drive
systems had been quiescent during the particle-field storm, they proved to be
undamaged.
Booth started to say something, but Holland placed a restraining hand on his
arm.
Reinhardt nodded at the reporter, then continued his story. I knew this was
the choice the crew preferred, he said. And so I made it easy for them by
ordering them to abandon ship and return home as directed. I told them I would
attempt to put the Cygnus on the same course to return ... at sublight
velocity. He smiled.
Everyone knew that traveling from our position at the time would take me some
three hundred years to make Earth orbit. Perhaps it was another of what you
term my theatrical gestures, Mr. Booth, but I chose to remain behind, aboard
my ship. He gestured, a wide sweep that took in the interior of the tower
and, by in-ference, the whole of the ship.
I fought too hard and too long for the Cygnus to leave her, certainly not to
return to Earth and admit failure. I thought it proper to uphold the ancient
tradi-tion of the captain going down with his ship. His ex-pression mocked
them.
You have experienced the gravitational power of the wonderfully complex
stellar object nearby and know that the Cygnus and I may yet pursue the
anal-ogy of the sinking ship with considerable fidelity. His tone softened as
he again regarded McCrae.
Your father believed. He chose to remain with me. We never learned what
happened to the others, those who left on the two survey craft. But when years
passed and no rescue ship came to find us, we could guess. I am saddened to
learn for certain that they did not make it home.
Booth looked thoughtful. Odd that two separate ships failed to make it back,
or even to make contact with Earth or a navigation beacon, he ventured.
Not so, Reinhardt responded. Neither vessel was equipped with the
deep-ranging communications equip-ment of the Cygnus, nor with her highly
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