Lunch was over and General Hill had taken the floor.
"Gentlemen, while we're awaiting the occupants' awakening or until we
decide we've waited long enough, we must learn all we can. If they
awake and decide to leave, we'll at least have obtained specific
knowledge of how _one_ spaceship works!
"We've only a vague suspicion of how the propulsion mechanism operates.
But fortunately we've found equipment very similar to ours. Simpler in
some respects. Probably worked _from_ transistors instead of _to_ them.
"The electronics men may have a free hand except for the bulkhead
instrument. We'd better not tinker there until we're reasonably sure we
know what we're doing. It may spell life or death to the crew. Some may
prefer to study the books which we found," he added thoughtfully. "If
so, speak up!"
"I would," Winthrop cut in. "I'd like Rabin and Norris to join me."
"An electronics engineer should round out the group," General Hill
said. "Okay, Lizio. Now, gentlemen, shall we go?"
Rabin was a practicing psychologist with a strong background in
semantics, linguistics, astronomy and a half-dozen other curiously
diversified sciences. Yet, as Winthrop looked at him again, there was
doubt--not as to Rabin's capability, but as to his _dependability_?
Was it some sense of inward nervousness, something contained in himself
which he could not tolerate in others?
Rabin was studying the horribly graphic pictures as though each were a
major work of art. Winthrop saw in the man's dark eyes something that
had been in the little girl's eyes. He looked away.
The other men he felt more sure of. Norris--a top physicist at White
Sands, thoroughly familiar with man's attempts at space flight. Lizio,
an electronics engineer, with an alert, intelligent face, and excellent
reputation.
Reassured by their competence he joined them as they bent over the
larger volume. They found upon each drawing what certainly indicated a
scale. Preceding the last, persistently identical symbol was a tailless
arrow pointing left. They quickly named the last symbol "scale" and the
arrow "equals."
"I'll do some measuring," Lizio said, and left. Winthrop and Norris
began listing the various symbols, noting their frequency of appearance
and relative positions.
An hour later Lizio returned, and began comparing his measurements with
symbols on the drawings.
"They're definitely drawn to different scales," he said. "The symbols
and measurements are not alike. That means different identifiable
numbers. Lads, we can crack the math!"
They arrived at a unit, found that one hundred ninety-six units equaled
slightly less than one meter, and from the precisely-marked drawings
managed to label the symbols from one to fourteen. The fifteen symbol
proved to be a fourteen followed by a one.
They were interrupted then as the book was taken to the Astoria signal
center for photostating. They talked, while General Hill telephonically
cut red tape to have computers rushed to them.