"Yes. The authorities isolated her, and then shipped her off on the
_Star Queen_. Your well-informed friends, Jensen, didn't know what
their government was going to do!" Nordenfeld paused, and said more
coldly still, "They didn't handle it right. They should have killed
her, painlessly but at once. Her body should have been immersed, with
everything that had touched it, in full-strength nitric acid. The
same acid should have saturated the place where the ship landed and
every place she walked. Every room she entered, and every hall she
passed through, should have been doused with nitric and then burned.
It would still not have been all one could wish. The air she breathed
couldn't be recaptured and heated white-hot. But the chances for
Altaira's population to go on living would be improved. Instead, they
isolated her and they shipped her off with us--and thought they were
accomplishing something by destroying the lift-ship that had her in an
airtight compartment until she walked into the _Star Queen's_ lock!"
The skipper said heavily, "Do you think she's brought chlorophage on
board?"
"I've no idea," said Nordenfeld. "If she did, it's too late to do
anything but drive the _Star Queen_ into the nearest sun.... No. Before
that, one should give warning that she was aground on Altaira. No ship
should land there. No ship should take off. Altaira should be blocked
off from the rest of the galaxy like Kamerun was. And to the same end
result."
Jensen said unsteadily; "There'll be trouble if this is known on the
ship. There'll be some unwilling to sacrifice themselves."
"Sacrifice?" said Nordenfeld. "They're dead! But before they lie down,
they can keep everybody they care about from dying too! Would you want
to land and have your wife and family die of it?"
The skipper said in the same heavy voice, "What are the probabilities?
You say there was an effort to keep her from contagion. What are the
odds?"
"Bad," said Nordenfeld. "The man tried, for the child's sake. But I
doubt he managed to make a completely aseptic transfer from the room
she lived in to the spaceport on Altaira. The authorities on Altaira
should have known it. They should have killed her and destroyed
everything she'd touched. And _still_ the odds would have been bad!"