The _Asterite_ beat the _Orionad_ to Terra by a few hours, and in
sufficient time for the report of Maynard's trip to be reviewed by the
Bureau of Ordnance. When they came to the incident of the painting,
they laughed first, and then called Malcolm Greggor to ascertain the
moment of the _Orionad_'s landing. Armed with the information they went
to the big landing area at Sahara Base, and waited for the big ship to
touch.
Greggor was there; he arrived almost as they did.
"What's the meaning of this?" he stormed.
Patrol Marshal Mantley grinned at the irate man and answered: "Your
erstwhile employee has demonstrated his sub-screen to excellent effect,
Greggor. He hung a gallon of red paint on the _Orionad_ without their
notice."
"This is preposterous!" exploded Greggor.
"Not at all," said Mantley. "Sector Commander Maynard was merely
bringing home the effectiveness of his own invention. If he can do that
to the _Orionad_, no Martie can hope to best us. You must admit that he
has something good."
"That I admit. But to play such a prank--"
"No prank, Greggor. This was a very convincing demonstration. How
can you possibly classify such an epoch-making act as a prank? It is
deplorable that your pride and joy should be thus decorated by a
mere ... he was but Senior Executive Maynard at the time ... destroyer,
a spacecraft one tenth the tonnage of the _Orionad_. But I insist that
it does not detract from the pride of the _Orionad_ to have been bested
by such a weapon."
"I feel as though I've been made a fool of."
"Ridiculous! It is not an admission of defeat to acknowledge a minor
defeat at the hands of a man who is responsible for making Pluto
inhabitable. After all, Greggor, Maynard is one in fifty billion."
Greggor smiled wryly. "When you put it that way, I must admit," he
said. "Any man who can bring the means of warming a planet to human
climates certainly must be capable of decorating the _Orionad_. Maybe I
should grow angry again; why should such a genius stoop to tamper with
my ship?"
"It was available and the best thing we have to boot."
Maynard interrupted. "Surely you would not believe me capable of
bringing ridicule upon you, Marshal Greggor. It was but a splendid
opportunity to demonstrate what could have been done to an enemy with a
torpedo. What if I had been a Martian?"
"I agree," said Greggor. Then he laughed uproariously. "We'll pink
Patrol Marshal Inkland with the idea," he said. "Tell him that his
ship was destroyed in space by a real destroyer; that he must have
been asleep. Roast him good, and see what happens. Here she comes--and
Maynard, that splotch of red paint sticks out like a miniature sun.
What a mal-beautiful job of decoration."
The _Orionad_ landed, and Inkland came across the sand toward the
little group as soon as he saw who it was. He shook hands all around
and smiled until Greggor told him of the decoration.
Inkland turned red and blustered. "Nothing was within detector range of
me!" he insisted.
"That slab of red paint says you're wrong," said Greggor sternly.
Inkland inspected the red paint from where they stood and was forced to
admit that _something_ had been close enough to do it while in space.
"Who did that?" he stormed.
Mantley indicated Maynard, and Inkland strode over to Guy with murder
in his eye. "You insolent young puppy--I'll see that you lose your
rank, senior executive." He whirled to the assembly and said: "No
matter what was done, the fact that a mere senior executive did it is
good enough to prove that it was a prank--"
"Just a moment," snapped Maynard. "First, I resent being called a
puppy. I dislike being called insolent. And third, I defy your intent
to deprive me of my rank!"
"Why you--"
"For your troubles, Patrol Marshal Inkland, I shall consider my success
complete upon the day that I command the _Orionad_ myself!"
"Ridiculous."
"Inkland," said Mantley softly, "I would speak more even. You are at
fault, and the fact that Sector Commander Maynard has decorated your
ship in a complex space maneuver of his own device should bring praise
from you instead of hatred."
"Sector Commander?" asked Inkland.
"His insignia has not been properly installed," said Space Marshal
Greggor with a fatherly smile. "But his rank has. And if young Guy
Maynard puts his aim at commanding the _Orionad_, I'm beginning to
believe that I would start looking for another job, if I were you."
* * * * *
Inkland turned upon his heel and left, with no further word.
The group of high-ranking officers followed him at length, leaving
Maynard to watch the mighty _Orionad_ being serviced and unloaded.
He stood there for some time, relaxing and enjoying the fresh air
and watching the operations. He found a comfortable spot, and seated
himself lazily.
He did not sleep, though he did drowse a bit, and a sparse circle
of cigarette butts began to surround him. He did not care; his last
sojourn into space had made him appreciative of the comforts of just
being on Earth where he could watch the sky and the ground meeting at
the horizon.
He was not molested; though many people came to see the monster
_Orionad_, none bothered him until the day wore into late afternoon.
His first visitor was Laura Greggor.
"Guy," she said. Her voice was neither sharp nor inviting, but rather a
flat tone of greeting.
Guy leaped to his feet and reached for her hands. "Laura!" he breathed.
"It's good to see you!"
"I thank you for that," she said coldly.
"Why," he asked her, "what's the matter?"
"Guy, before I go any further, I want to know something. Did you, or
did you not decorate father's ship?"
"Why," he answered proudly, "I most certainly did."
"I didn't believe it of you," she said sharply.
"There was nothing wrong with it," he said. "It was the best thing that
happened to me."
"You believe that?" asked Laura.
"I certainly do. After all, it proved the worth of my invention.
And," he added eagerly, "it gave me another set of insignia to have
installed."
"If the worth of your invention is more interesting to you than the
interest of my father's office," said Laura sharply, "your latest rise
in power--made by using father's finest ship as a stepping stone--is of
little interest to me."
"But Laura. I'm a sector commander now. And you may have my senior
executive's stars."
"I have a fair collection," said Laura coldly. "You may bring me your
patrol marshal's nebula when you're raised to sector marshal. Good day!"
She stamped off angrily, and Maynard searched his mind for the answer
to the question, and gave it up as one of the unanswerable mysteries of
life. If Malcolm Greggor could look upon the incident without rancor,
why should she turn upon him? Any reasoning he did made no sense.
And as he stood there, footsteps made him aware of another visitor. He
turned to see Joan Forbes.
"Hello," she said brightly. "I was on my way to the lunchroom and
passed by to see the Big Fellow." She indicated the _Orionad_ now being
illuminated by mighty floodlights in the dusk. "I found you instead."
"Hi," he said to her. "What's new?"
"Nothing in my life," she said with a broad smile. Her eye caught the
boxed insignia in Guy's clenched hand. "I see that something is new in
yours. May I salute you, Sector Commander?"
Guy looked at her with a half-smile as she stepped back and cast him a
womanly salute. "Congratulations," she said, offering her hand.
Guy looked first at her face, and then at her outstretched hand.
Instead of taking it in his for a handshake in friendship, which
was the manner of its offering, Guy placed the opened box in the
outstretched fingers.
Joan blinked, and looked down at the box in surprise for a moment. Then
she brightened.
She stepped forward and removed the rayed stars from Guy's lapel and
replaced them with the circularly tailed comets. She stepped back,
saluted him silently, and then came forward and kissed him on the lips.
Her caress was affectionate, but brief.
"You're properly installed, commander," she told him. "But if I don't
hurry, I'll be un-installed by my boss. I've got to run along. Keep
rising, Guy!"
And with that she was gone.
Guy looked at the empty box, and then at the comets on his lapels.
And from them, across to the _Orionad_.
And a challenge arose to confront him. He would be sector marshal one
day, and whether he took his patrol marshal's insignia to Laura Greggor
depended only upon her. And he would also command the _Orionad_.
He clenched his fist upon the empty box, crushing it. His question was
not: Would he command the _Orionad_? It was: How long would it take?
* * * * *
It took five years. Five long, toilsome years.
But five years of constantly increasing, constantly expanding,
constantly improving. He never forgot the day of the _Orionad_'s
landing in all that five years, though there was evidence that Laura
Greggor had been reprimanded by Malcolm Greggor for her actions. But
Maynard remembered, and it was Joan Forbes that pinned the silver
nebula on his lapels--in public as befitted a Patrol Marshal--just
before he stepped aboard the _Orionad_ to take his first major command.
He hoped that Laura Greggor remembered.
Then the _Orionad_ sped into the sky above Sahara Base on the way to
Pluto.
Guy Maynard was on his way to the top. Ertene was a dim remembrance by
now, and though he could almost pick out the spot of the nomad planet's
present position, it occurred to him only at odd intervals. Ertene was
gone. But the strength of Ertene's knowledge was serving both him and
Terra, and her brief visit was not wasted.
Maynard lost himself in reverie for a half hour, relaxing in the
luxury of the master's office aboard the mighty _Orionad_. Then Guy's
active mind asserted itself, and he called the chief technician for a
conference.
Senior Executive Martin Carrington entered the office and stood at
attention, and Guy recalled briefly that on his first command, he
had been of the same rank as his chief technician now. Then he asked
Carrington to be seated.
"Carrington, I've been worrying."
"Worrying, sir?"
"Suppose we are attacked by a sub-ship? How may we detect him?"
"You are supposing that the Martians gain the secret."
"I fear they will, some day. We haven't all the brains, you know."
"But a Martie, sir?"
"They may capture one of ours by a fluke. Then we'd all be bear-meat."
"Hardly possible, sir."
"Then accept it as hypothetical, Carrington. Take off from there and
answer my question."
"That I cannot do, sir. Frankly, I do not know."
"Then listen. I have an idea; I want you to pass on its value."
"I shall try, sir."
"Carrington, is it possible to establish a celestial globe that is
capable of giving a negative action? No, wait, I'll explain. Our
present celestial globe is positive; it operates by three-dimensional
fluorescence in the sphere, glowing when a positive radiation comes in
from a spaceship. What I want is a negative indication: one that will
glow in any location from which there comes absolutely zero radiation.
Is that possible?"
"Hm-m-m," mused Carrington. "Our present level of detection is based
upon the maximum level of celestial radiation, which is fairly constant
in all directions save Solward. Your supposed sphere would operate on
the celestial radiation--with the normal globe the entire sphere would
glow--and be dark everywhere except in a place where all radiation were
absorbed. It would be devilishly ticklish, sir."
"You follow my reasoning?"
"Oh certainly. Your idea is to prepare a sphere that glows with no
signal. That can be done with a local signal, which is cut when
no-radiation enters. Hard to say in words, isn't it?"
Maynard laughed cheerfully. "As long as you get my thought, I don't
care how you say it. The barrier-screen absorbs all radiation.
Therefore any position holding a sub-ship would produce zero radiation.
It would then show on the negative sphere. Right?"
"I think that's about it," said Carrington.
"Good. We agree on that. Want to work on it?"
"Absolutely."
"It's yours, then. Go ahead and make it tick."
"That I'll do, sir. We'll have it by the time we hit Pluto."
"One more thing, Carrington. Keep it under your hat. It's a military
secret, you know."
"I'll say nothing."
"Check. I'll be down and see you later."
Carrington left, and as he went back to his quarters, he told several
of his contemporaries that the new commander was everything that they
had ever heard of him.
* * * * *
Finding Pluto was a good job of work for the combined efforts of the
astrogator and the chief pilot. Pluto was completely hidden just as
Ertene was, and Maynard knew the completeness of that shield. It was
done gropingly, by sheer hit and miss effort, but finally a black
circle in the starry sky established above them. And as the pilot
announced his success, it began to spread from a minute spot to
mightiness. Then they passed through the barrier, and Pluto was a
warm, greenish planet above them, much the same as Terra as seen from
Luna.
The _Orionad_ dropped onto the Spaceport; the entire trip without
incident.
Maynard signed his command into the base marshal's office and ordered
his chief executive officer to grant planet liberty as he saw fit.
Space Marshal Lincoln smiled at the younger man and told him: "I think
you'll be interested in the experiments going on in the radiation
laboratory."
"Yes?"
"They're having a bit of trouble on one of your gadgets."
"Which one?"
"The stellar light-filter. Somehow, it doesn't work as you predicted."
"Why didn't they ask for me sooner?" wondered Maynard. "It's been six
years since I thought that one up--they've had plenty of time."
"It's possible," admitted Lincoln. "But you forget that it was
extremely complex and highly theoretical. Also, no good use has ever
been found for it. Unlike your other inventions, this seems to be an
experiment in pure research. So we didn't start on it until last, and
it's been three years in the building."
"So long?"
"Oh yes. Some of the parts were entirely unheard of before, and many
of the major components had to be built of parts that were designed
for the job. When you design the minor components to assemble the
major components--which also require design--you pyramid the time and
difficulty."
"I hadn't thought of it that well."
"I wish you'd go over and tell them what's wrong. Kane, the publisher
came in for the unveiling of the thing, and we'd hate to present him
with a complete failure, in spite of its uselessness."
"Kane's here? Good, I'll go right over."
Maynard was youthful enough to be amazed that the weight of his rank
opened a path through the grouped technicians to the complex instrument
that lined the entire wall of the huge laboratory. Kane was near the
center, and the only one in the group that knew Guy Maynard well enough
to call him by his first name: therefore he was the first to speak.
"You invented this thing, Guy. Can you make it work?"
Guy blushed. "I didn't invent it--" he started and then saw Kane's
puzzled look, which caused him to pause; then he nodded and finished:
"--I merely worked on it theoretically. I did not have enough equipment
in the lifeship to build any more than a few of the more complex
circuits."
"Good enough," laughed Kane. "Well you may know more than we do at
that. After all," he said in defense of his statement, "these men have
been working on it for a couple of years."
A man with the rayed stars of a senior executive offered: "That's not
strictly true, Mr. Kane. We started to work on it about three days
ago--if you consider the instrument as a whole. There have been many
groups working on the components separately, building them up. We
assembled the whole last week."
"Take a swing at it, Guy."
"It's a maze to me," admitted Guy. "Let me see the circuits."
* * * * *
It took Maynard some time to figure them out. He was working from
memory now, and it was none too good, plus the fact that he had
memorized the complex circuit in Ertinian symbols and in Ertinian
constants, and they all required conversion to Terran terms. He called
for the group leaders of the various components, and asked them to
report on the functions of their parts.
Together, they pinned the error down, and corrected it. Then Maynard
turned the thing on himself.
The broad plate took on a gray-green background, mottled with huge
circular blotches of white. He turned the focusing knob, and the
mottling contracted into individual circles of intense, flaming white.
He reduced the intensity control, and the eye-searing brightness
dimmed to a more comfortable level. More fiddling with the focus, with
alternate adjustment of the intensity, for they were inter-reacting,
and the plate took on the appearance of the sky.
"So far so good. Now for the shaping control," said Maynard. He
drove the left hand end swirling upward on the plate with one knob,
stretched the stars across the top of the plate, and compressed them
along the right side. He caused them to whirl circularly, and gradually
the distortion dropped until the constellations appeared.
"There you are," he told the chief technician.
"Fine. Now what can we do?"
"Well, there aren't too many planets," said Maynard. "We can decrease
the response of celestial bodies that shine by reflected light. That
one," he said needlessly, since they all knew it well, "is Jupiter.
Watch him fade!" and Maynard turned the knob. After the demonstration,
he returned it to its original position again.
"On the other hand, we have a lot of stars," he said, turning the other
knob. The starry heavens faded, leaving a widely scattered group of
pinpricks grouped about a deeper black disk. He pointed to the disk and
said: "Since it is the brightest, we may expect it to be the darkest
too. Can't beat Sol from here. At any rate, this knob causes the fading
of all bodies that shine by intrinsic light. The reflected-light bodies
remain, so."
"Marshal, sir, there are nine of them," said the technician.
"Well," interrupted Kane, "there are nine planets, aren't there?"
"Not from one of them," answered the technician. "Or," he asked
Maynard, "would we appear along with the rest?"
"No," said Maynard slowly. "You're right. There are nine planets, which
counting the one we're on makes a total of ten."
"You realize what you're saying?" stammered Kane. "That means you've
discovered a new planet with this gadget."
Maynard shook his head in dazed unbelief. "Another planet?" Then he
shook off the amazement and said: "It may be so. But before we shout
too loud, we must investigate and be certain."
"Of course."
Maynard turned the stellar intensity knob up slightly, bringing the
stellar background into faint light. "Get the constants of that planet,
and we'll check. Kane, you'll come along as a representative of the
Terran Press?"
"I wouldn't miss it for the world itself," said Kane. "Any chance of
missing it?"
"If we get the linear constant of that planet from Pluto, here, we'll
line-drive out there. Once within a few million miles, passing by if
need be, we'll know it."
"Couldn't we pack this thing aboard the _Orionad_?"
"Not unless we tear the side out of the ship," grinned Maynard. "We'll
fly this blind, and that won't be too hard."
"And then we may find that planet is but a flyspeck," said Kane.
"It could be," agreed Maynard. But he knew better. He was thinking of a
huge panel; a brilliant painting in a vast hall lined with paintings.
The one he faced showed Sol--and _ten_ planets.
And Maynard had patiently waited for all these years for the stellar
light-filter to be built. He knew that the unknown planet was so far
from Sol and at such an angle that it would remain unseen until they
made the filter work. After all, it had been unseen for hundreds of
years during the advent of space travel, and for hundreds of years
of pure stellar research from Terra before space travel gave the
astronomers a chance to prove their planetary theories. He had not been
worried that his find would be found too soon, but he would have broken
all rules to get to Pluto at the time he did. Luckily, there was no
reason to break rules.
Now he could go anywhere and do anything except the short periods when
he was under explicit orders.
He wondered whether his action had been too abrupt, and then remembered
that his position permitted a large amount of snap-decision and some
eccentricity. The quickness of his action would add to the legends of
one Guy Maynard, and would cover up the fact that he had been planning
this particular party for years.
At the end of the usual landing duration, Guy gave orders for the
_Orionad_ to go out to the new planet.