Putney sat down gently in the comfortable chair in the "library" aboard
the ship. It was also the conference room, study and den for the two
friends. A phonograph was going in the after part of the ship now,
and a good meal had put all in a better frame of mind. Warren sat
down, after closing the door behind him. The glow of the tube-lights
was steady and clear, the air in the ship warm and refreshing, and
though the earth was a countless inexpressible distance away in time
and space, the warm air, the food, the music--all seemed to bring it
near. Here in the heart of the ship, under the influence of the gravity
fields, it seemed impossible that they were anywhere than in their room
on earth.
Putney chuckled softly as he tamped down the tobacco in his pipe.
"Seems scarcely possible, sitting here."
How and When Is the Return to Be
"Doesn't, does (puff-puff) it?" replied Warren, struggling to light his
own pipe. "The question is, how are we going to get back, for we know
it's not only possible, but a fact."
"Another question too, comes to my mind," said Putney softly. "_When_
are we going to get back?"
Warren looked at him sharply, Putney continued to look steadily at
the ceiling. "Are we going to get back a few days after we left," he
went on, "or are we going to come back a million million years ago or a
million million years in our future?"
"As I before said, I don't know."
"Do you think the time-rates will be the same?"
"I know they aren't. The differences we see show the two spaces aren't
the same. We can determine the time rate of this space in reference
to itself--and I suspect it will be slightly different. What I mean
is--we have brought yard sticks from our own space, but they have been
distorted by this space. How much, we naturally can't tell. If we find
by them that the speed of light is say 300,000 miles per second, by our
also-carried-over clocks, then we know the time-rate here. But we can't
determine the relative time-rates of the two spaces.
"Why?"
"Would we be able to go back without knowing that?"
"I think we can, Putt. The power works here, evidently, and that
time-rate change will affect all things equally, here."
"Suppose that one minute here represented an hour on earth, and we
spend a week investigating space-constants, then spend a year or so
exploring. What happens?"
"Well--we'd get back to earth a good many years after we started--sixty
years late, wouldn't we, Putt?" Warren was thoughtful.
"So is it wise to spend any longer here than we have to? Seventeen
years and our patents would be gone. By the way, what happens to them?
They're made out in your name you know, and you are dead, and they can
prove that you died in the terrible explosion of your laboratory. Some
experiment we were working on went all wrong, and the laboratory was
wrecked in a series of explosions. Probably fused into the bargain."
Putney added.
"So that's what they'll say." Warren paused thoughtfully. "And somebody
will inherit my patents, and then Nestor will buy them up, because the
poor fool won't know what it's all about. I believe it's some distant
cousin of mine who always made me want to take a picture of him. He's
such a perfect model for the hen-pecked husband. Works in a little
country bank.
"And the ten or twenty thousand dollars, that Nestor will offer, will
be a tremendous fortune from the Gods, and he'll thank them on bended
knees that they permitted you to live long enough to die and leave
him something worth so much--when he could sell them for a hundred
_billion_ dollars. The nations of earth would form a syndicate to buy
those plans." Putney grinned sourly. "We were fools not to expect that."
"And Nestor and Atkill walk off with the gravy, don't they?"
"No," replied Putney, "_they_ don't. I've been doing a little
investigating, when Nestor started lying so very low, and being so
very nice. Atkill got fired when he didn't beat you, and because he
hadn't discovered it. Nestor had a win-or-lose contract with him,
before Atkill took it, ten million if he won, and 100,000 win-or-lose.
He lost--and got the hundred thousand. Only Nestor, the dear old fox,
had a cute little apparatus clause. In case of loss, Atkill paid for
the apparatus. It cost seventy-five thousand. Atkill was sore, and the
two weren't on speaking terms--but American Super-power, the new Power
Combine, and Nestor were surprisingly close. I was a bit surprised.
Nestor told them the whole story, and said, quite truly, you could
wreck them. They combined--and apparently bought a few bombing planes
for good measure."
Warren's square-cut jaw was hardening. "You know," he said in a coldly
precise voice, "I think we'll hurry right home--if we can.
"Let's turn in."
Protracted Determinations and Calculations
They started work the next day, setting up their apparatus for the
determination of the all important space characteristics. They knew the
exact procedure, and had trained men, and trained mechanicians, but the
problem was not one of complex apparatus, but of many observations.
They were enormously helped by the great power at their command, by
the space-fields they themselves could build, and by the mobility of
their ship. But there was no star near them, and the nearest was more
than two light-years away. It was impossible to visit it, and get the
assistance so much needed, that only the enormous mass could render,
but they did their best from a distance.
It was nearly two weeks later, by their chronometers, when the
determinations alone had been made.
"And," said Warren, "that's only the preliminary. I've still got to
find out how to use them. We've got to do some calculating. You know I
took down the readings of all the instruments, don't you? As soon as I
found what had happened, and where we were, I mean. And I had notes on
that little laboratory release-flame, so I know the thing that threw us
this way, and the character of that space, and I know the character of
this space, so all I have to do is calculate what will do it the other
way."
"Uh-huh. That's all," grinned Putney.