"Nothing," rejoined Murdock dryly, "if you've lived an exemplary life.
It's not pleasant, though, to live over and over again a period when
you committed murder say, or were terribly frightened, or even did some
little thing that you've been trying your best to forget since."
Saxon, caught a brief mental flash from the T.I.S. agent, as he shoved
the picture of a girl with pretty Slavic features out of his mind.
"I'm not looking forward to the Little Death!" Murdock said dryly, and
returned his eye to the scanner.
Saxon leaned back in the acceleration chair. The captain was bending
over the three-dimensional space-charts along with the third mate. A
spaceman stood at the robot pilot. Another, whom Murdock had replaced
at the scanner, was reclining in a second acceleration chair.
There was an air of tension in the control room. Saxon realized
suddenly that the captain was checking the robot controls.
That could mean only one thing. It was nearing time for Villainowski to
switch the _Shooting Star_ onto the stellar drive. They would be going
into the Little Death any moment. Saxon sat up abruptly. "How long
before we switch over, Captain?"
The captain looked up from the charts. "We've attained minimum
velocity. Villainowski's in the engine room now. I'm expecting orders
to turn her over right away."
Murdock turned from the scanner again, fixed Saxon with his pale blue
eyes.
"By the way, Jon, you've been prowling the ship from stem to stern the
past three days." His voice was pitched too low to reach the officers
checking the star maps and robot controls. "Have you a line on Q62 yet?"
Saxon could read suspicion in the T.I.S. agent's mind. "No," he
admitted, "and I'm more puzzled than you. Ileth doesn't know who Q62
is, or even if he's aboard, although she's been commanded by General
Atomic to take her orders from him."
"You're sure of that?"
"Yes. I'm sure of it."
There was a pause, each man busy with his own thoughts.
"I'd swear," Saxon broke the silence, "that Q62 isn't aboard, nor any
other General Atomic agents."
Murdock regarded him speculatively and Saxon caught his thought, "_What
the hell makes him so damned sure?_"
* * * * *
Sure? Saxon thought to himself. He wasn't sure about anything. The
alien stowaway was still aboard. His sixth sense had warned him of her
nearness a hundred times during his sporadic jaunts about the ship. But
he had been unable to establish contact with her.
He had kept his mind open to the wash of thoughts from crew and
staff, but, so far as he had been able to learn, they were all loyal
to Government. Not even in their secret innermost thoughts had he
discovered any evidence that a traitor was aboard.
Murdock interrupted his reflections, asking, "Have you any idea what
that N.P.A. had discovered before he died?"
Saxon started, looked at the T.I.S. agent uncomfortably. Murdock's
irrelevant question had conjured a vivid picture in his mind of the
death of the N.P.A. in Villainowski's office.
"I don't know," he said miserably, beginning to understand how
uncomfortable the Little Death might be. "I would give a lot to know.
He may have had a clue to what I am."
Murdock's cold blue eyes narrowed, and he regarded Saxon with a
peculiar intensity. "_That's a devilish odd way for him to put it_,"
the T.I.S. agent was thinking. "_What he is! Now why the hell would he
say that?_"
Saxon realized with chagrin that he had made a slip. He should have
said, "Who I am," not "What I am." No human ever doubted that he was a
genuine specimen of _homo sapiens_.
The engine room telegraph buzzed suddenly, and when the captain
answered, Villainowski's voice reached the two men.
"Sound the general alarm, Captain. Turn the ship over to the robot
control. We're going into the Little Death."
"Right," said the captain. He looked pale and worn and older. He
snapped off the telegraph, turned to the third. "Sound the general
alarm and turn on the public address system, then go to your cabin."
The third nodded, reached for the switch.
An ugly clangor broke through the _Shooting Star_ from stem to
stern, followed immediately by a harsh metallic voice issuing from
strategically placed audios.
"All officers, members of unlicensed personnel and staff report to your
quarters at once and lie on your bunks."
There was a series of clicks as the ship went smoothly over to the
robot controls.
The command ordering everyone to their cabins was repeated three more
times.
Saxon realized there was no one in the control room, but himself,
Murdock, and the captain.
"Coming?" asked the captain from the doorway.
"In a minute," Murdock replied.
The captain departed hastily, and Saxon followed the T.I.S. agent
across the deck to the control board, where a single dial was marked
off in parsecs.
"I'm damned curious about this four dimensional drive," Murdock
confessed, as he dropped into an acceleration chair before the dial.
"I've been through it before. But I'd like to follow its operation here
in the control room as long as possible before we blank out. Are you
game?"
"Sure," Saxon's voice was eager. He took a seat beside Murdock, staring
at the dial marked off in parsecs with fascination.
He became conscious of a sobering silence. The robot controls had cut
off the jets. A giddy feeling of weightlessness possessed him.
Suddenly the radiograph began to click off a message. He saw Murdock
frown, tear off the tape, read it.
"Good Lord!" the T.I.S. agent burst out. "Read it! We've got to get to
Villainowski before we go onto the stellar drive!" He leaped to his
feet, went soaring in the air, a pained expression on his face. Murdock
had forgotten their weightless condition now that the jets were off.
Saxon who had snatched the strip of paper, flashed his eye over the
words.