"Yes. Yes, I can. Better be careful, that's all I can say."
"Relax. We'll start now."
Mrs. Entwhistle was bulky in her vac suit, and two attendants had to
help her through the narrow lock of the ship. After that Socrates saw
to it that she was strapped securely into her seat, and her face looked
peculiarly green under the lights of the instrument panel.
Socrates jumped outside to tell something to one of the attendants and
he saw Farquhart there waiting for him.
"Hello, Smith. Nice day."
"Yeah. How's it coming? Your investigation, I mean."
"Surprisingly, fine. I'd say that if everything checks through with a
clean bill of health today I'll be leaving on tomorrow morning's liner.
If."
Perhaps Farquhart had not meant the if to sound so ominous, but it came
out that way because Socrates immediately associated it with what Norma
had said the night before. He smiled a bit weakly now and readjusted
his helmet. Then he mumbled, "I'll see you on Ganymede in a few years,"
and he went back in through the lock.
* * * * *
They cruised at fifteen miles a second, and within an hour they were
passing under the outer ring. Automatically he lowered their speed.
Mrs. Entwhistle craned her neck upward, and through the top of her
glassite helmet her face looked like a fish underwater. "I thought we
go _in_ the ring, Mr. Smith."
He nodded. "Of course we do. We're a thousand miles out now. See? If
you look carefully, you probably can see some of the bigger particles
shining."
"Um, yes."
"But we don't go in here. This is the outer ring and we pass under it.
We also go under Cassini's Division--the dark band which separates this
from the inner ring. I'll take you there, through the brighter ring, up
to the border of the crepe one. But then we turn back. That would be
dangerous."
"Why?"
"Because the crepe ring receives no sunlight. It's dark, that's why,
and we'd have to rely on radar to keep the ship out of trouble. It's
tricky business and it's dangerous. A little light flashes on and off
and it tells you which way to steer, but unless you can see what you're
doing--like you can in the bright ring, it's dangerous."
In another few minutes Socrates cut the ship sharply upward, and before
long the solid whiteness of the ring had been replaced by a chaos of
flying rock. That's what it looked like--huge boulders, ton piled upon
ton, and the closer they came, the faster the rocks seemed to move. In
another moment the rocks were below as well as above them, and Mrs.
Entwhistle screamed.
"What's the matter?"
"I'm afraid. Please, Mr. Smith--"
"You have nothing to worry about--"
"I can't help it if I'm afraid. Take me back!"
Socrates turned sharply and the ship zoomed through an empty space. The
rear port showed only a massive rock; it had been that close.... "If
you don't keep quiet. Please--"
"Take me back!"
Socrates had had a few cases like this, and taking the customer back
was comparatively simple. Although this bright ring was the largest,
and although it did have a longitudinal width of sixteen thousand
miles, its latitudinal depth was no more than ten miles. Now he gunned
the ship up and in a moment they hung poised in deep space above the
ring. "We'll stay clear of the ring and go back to Mimas--"
"Why?"
"You were afraid. You said so, that's why."
"Well, I changed my mind. What would all the girls on Earth say if they
knew I hadn't actually seen the ring? Take me back, Mr. Smith. I'll be
brave."
Socrates smiled. "That's a good girl," he said, and they dove again for
the brightness of the ring. But he almost wished she hadn't changed
her mind. Then he could have returned to the spacefield and watched for
Norma.
* * * * *
He cut a zigzag course through the hurtling meteors. Someone, he knew,
had once bothered to chart all the tiny particles of the ring, but it
had taken a lifetime and it was far from accurate. Socrates preferred
the seat-of-the-pants method.
In less than two hours they had cut through the width of the ring and
ahead was darkness--darker, it seemed, than space itself.
"A thousand miles of void, and then the crepe ring," Socrates
explained. "We'll be turning back now. Fun, Mrs. Entwhistle?"
"Great," she agreed, but she had taken off the fishbowl helmet, and
now she was mopping her brow. "I must try it again sometime. In a few
years, of course--"
Socrates jammed down on the rocket pedal and the fore-tubes blasted
their fire against the blackness. The little ship shuddered and Mrs.
Entwhistle emitted a sound which could have been the shrill shriek of a
tea kettle. Then Socrates turned them slowly in a great arc so as not
to harm the delicate two-hundred pound creature sitting by his side
with too much acceleration.
Something flashed by beneath them. It could have been a meteor, except
that this was a void area. Attraction of the planet Mimas, and the
other satellites were such that no meteoric material could exist in
this space--which explained the thousand mile separation of the crepe
ring.
Yet something had passed them, something shining brilliantly with
reflected sunlight.
A ship! It could have been nothing but a spaceship.... Socrates knew he
had the only ships in the area, but the crepe ring was out of bounds.
The strange ship had been gunning for it at ten per--
Socrates barked into his radio:
"Hello, hello! Who's out here?"