<h2><SPAN name="c6" id="c6"></SPAN><i>6</i></h2>
<p>A good deal of that landing remained confused
in Joe's mind. While it was going on he was much too busy to
be absorbing impressions. When he landed, he was as completely
exhausted as anybody wants to be. It was only during
the next day that he even tried to sort out his recollections.</p>
<p>Then he woke up suddenly, with a muffled roaring going
on all about him. He blinked his eyes open and listened.
Presently he realized what the noise was, and wondered that
he hadn't realized before. It was the roaring of the motors of
a multi-engined plane. He knew, without remembering the
details at the moment, that he and the other three were on a
plane bound across the Pacific for America. He was in a
bunk—and he felt extraordinarily heavy. He tried to move,
and it was an enormous effort to move his arm. He struggled
to turn over, and found straps holding his body down.</p>
<p>He fumbled at them. They had readily releasable clasps,
and he loosened them easily. After a bit he struggled to sit upright.
He was horribly heavy or horribly weak. He couldn't
tell which. And each separate muscle in his whole body ached.
Twinges of pain accompanied every movement. He sat up,
swaying a little with the slow movements of the plane, and
gradually, things came back.</p>
<p>The landing in the ribbon-chute. They'd come down somewhere
on the west coast of India, not too far from the sea. He<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_76" id="Page_76"></SPAN></span>
remembered crashing into the edge of a thin jungle and
finding the Chief, and the two of them searching out Haney
and stumbling to open ground. After laying out a signal for
air searchers, they went off into worn-out slumber while they
waited.</p>
<p>He remembered that there'd been a patrol of American
destroyers in the Arabian Sea, as everywhere under the orbit
of the Platform. Their radar had reported the destruction of
one space ship and the frantic diving of the other, its division
into two parts, and then the tiny objects, which flew out from
the smaller cabin section, which had descended as only ejection-seat
parachutes could possibly have done. Two destroyers
steamed onward underneath those drifting specks, to pick
them up when they should come down. But the other nearby
destroyers had other business in hand.</p>
<p>The two trailing destroyers reached Goa harbor within
hours of the landing of the four from space. A helicopter found
the first three of them within hours after that. They were
twenty miles inland and thirty south from Goa. Mike wasn't
located until the next day. He'd been shot out of the ship's
cabin earlier and higher; he was lighter, and he'd floated
farther.</p>
<p>But things—satisfying things—had happened in the interval.
Sitting almost dizzily on the bunk in the swiftly roaring plane
while blood began sluggishly to flow through his body, Joe
remembered the gleeful, unofficial news passed around on the
destroyers. They waited for Mike to be brought in. But they
rejoiced vengefully.</p>
<p>The report was quite true, but it never reached the newspapers.
Nobody would ever admit it, but the rockets aimed
at the returning space ships had been spotted by Navy radar
as they went up from the Arabian Sea. And the ships of the
radar patrol couldn't do anything about the rockets, but they
could and did converge savagely upon the places from which
they had been launched. Planes sped out to spot and bomb.
Destroyers arrived.</p>
<p>Somewhere there was a navy department that could write
off two modern submarines with rocket-launching equipment,<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_77" id="Page_77"></SPAN></span>
last heard from west of India. American naval men would profess
bland ignorance of any such event, but there were acres
of dead fish floating on the ocean where depth-bombs had
hunted down and killed two shapes much too big to be fish,
which didn't float when they were killed and which would
never report back how they'd destroyed two space ships.
There'd be seagulls feasting over that area, and there'd be
vague tales about the happening in the bazaars of Hadhramaut.
But nobody would ever admit knowing anything for
certain.</p>
<p>But Joe knew. He got to his feet, wobbling a little bit in
the soaring plane. He ached everywhere. His muscles protested
the strain of holding him erect. He held fast, summoning
strength. Before his little ship broke up he'd been shaken intolerably,
and his body had weighed half a ton. Where his
safety-belt had held him, his body was one wide bruise.
There'd been that killing acceleration when the ship split in
two. The others—except Mike—were in as bad a case or
worse. Haney and the Chief were like men who'd been rolled
down Mount Everest in a barrel. All of them had slept for
fourteen hours straight before they even woke up for food.
Even now, Joe didn't remember boarding this plane or getting
into the bunk. He'd probably been carried in.</p>
<p>Joe stood up, doggedly, until enough strength came to him
to justify his sitting down again. He began to dress. It was
astonishing how many places about his body were sore to
the touch. It was startling how heavy his arms and legs felt,
and how much of an effort even sitting erect was. But he began
to remember Mike's adventure, and managed to grin feebly.
It was the only thing worth a smile in all the things that had
happened.</p>
<p>Because Mike's landing had been quite unlike the others.
Joe and the Chief landed near the edge of a jungle. Haney
landed in a canebrake. But Mike came floating down from
the sky, swaying splendidly, into the estate of a minor godling.</p>
<p>He was relatively unharmed by the shaking-up he'd had.
The strength of muscles depends on their cross-section, but
their weight depends on their volume. The strength of a man<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_78" id="Page_78"></SPAN></span>
depends on the square of his size, but his weight on the cube.
So Mike had taken the deceleration and the murderous vibration
almost in his stride. He floated longer and landed
more gently than the rest.</p>
<p>Joe grinned painfully at the memory of Mike's tale. He'd
come on board the rescue destroyer in a towering, explosive
rage. When his ribbon-parachute let him down out of the
sky, it deposited him gently on ploughed fields not far from
a small and primitive Hindu village. He'd been seen to descend
from the heavens. He was a midget—not as other men—and
he was dressed in a space suit with glittering metal
harness.</p>
<p>The pagan villagers greeted him with rapture.</p>
<p>When the searching-party found Mike, they were just in
time to prevent a massacre—by Mike. <ins class="correction" title="Transcriber's note: The original reads 'Adorning'.">Adoring</ins> natives had
seized upon him, conveyed him in high state to a red mud
temple, seemingly tried to suffocate him with evidences of
their pride and joy at his arrival, and dark-skinned maidens
were trying hopefully to win his approval of their dancing.
But the rescue-party found him with a club in his hand and
blood in his eye, setting out furiously to change the tone of his
reception.</p>
<p>Joe still didn't know all the details, but he tried to concentrate
on what he did know as he put his uniform on again.
He didn't want to think how little it meant, now. The silver
space ship badge didn't mean a thing, any more. There
weren't any more space ships. The Platform wasn't a ship,
but a satellite. There'd never been but two ships. Both had
ceased to exist.</p>
<p>Joe walked painfully forward in the huge, roaring plane.
The motors made a constant, humming thunder in his ears.
It was not easy to walk. He held on to handholds as he
moved. But he progressed past the bunk space. And there
was Mike, sitting at a table and stuffing himself with good
honest food. There was a glass port beside him, and Joe
caught a glimpse of illimitable distances filled with cloud and
sky and sea.</p>
<p>Mike nodded. He didn't offer to help Joe walk. That<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_79" id="Page_79"></SPAN></span>
wouldn't have been practical. He waited until Joe sank into
a seat opposite.</p>
<p>"Good sleep?" asked Mike.</p>
<p>"I guess so," said Joe. He added ruefully, "It hurts to nod,
and I think it would hurt worse to shake my head. What's
the matter with me, Mike? I didn't get banged up in the
landing!"</p>
<p>"You got banged up before you landed," said Mike. "Worse
than that, you spent better than six weeks out of gravity,
where in an average day you took less actual exercise than a
guy in bed with two broken legs!"</p>
<p>Joe eased himself back into his chair. He felt about 600
years old. Somebody poked a head into view and withdrew it.
Joe lifted his arm and regarded it.</p>
<p>"Weighty! I guess you're right, Mike."</p>
<p>"I know I'm right!" said Mike. "If you spent six weeks in
bed you'd expect to feel wobbly when you tried to walk. Up
on the Platform you didn't even use energy to stand up! We
didn't realize it, but we were living like invalids! We'll get our
strength back, but next time we'll take measures. Huh! Take a
trip to Mars in free fall, and by the time a guy got there his
muscles'd be so flabby he couldn't stand up in half-gravity!
Something's got to be done about that, Joe!"</p>
<p>Joe said sombrely, "Something's got to be done about space
ships before that comes up again!"</p>
<p>Somebody appeared with a tray. There was food on it.
Smoking hot food. Joe looked at it and knew that his appetite,
anyhow, was back to Earth normal.</p>
<p>"Thanks!" he mumbled appreciatively, and attacked the
food.</p>
<p>Mike drank his coffee. Then he said, "Joe, do you know
anything about powder metallurgy?"</p>
<p>Joe shrugged. It hurt. "Powder metallurgy? Yes, I've seen
it used, at my father's plant. They've made small precision
parts with it. Why?"</p>
<p>"D'you know if anybody ever made a weld with it?" asked
Mike.</p>
<p>Joe chewed. Then he said:<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_80" id="Page_80"></SPAN></span></p>
<p>"I think so. Yes. At the plant they did. They had trouble
getting the surfaces properly cleaned for welding. But they
managed it. Why?"</p>
<p>"One more question," said Mike tensely. "How much Portland
cement is used to make a cubic yard of concrete?"</p>
<p>"I wouldn't know," admitted Joe. "Why? What's all this
about?"</p>
<p>"Haney and the Chief. Those two big apes have been
kidding me—as long as they could stay awake—for what happened
to me when I landed. Those infernal savages—" Mike
seethed. "They got my clothes off and they had me smeared all
over with butter and forty-'leven necklaces around my neck
and flowers in my hair! They thought I was some kind of
heathen god! Hanuman, somebody told me. The Hindu
monkey-god!" He raged. "And those two big apes think it's
funny! Joe, I never knew I <i>knew</i> all the words for the cussings
I gave those heathen before our fellas found me! And Haney
and the Chief will drive me crazy if I can't slap 'em down!
Powder metallurgy does the trick, from what you told me.
That's okay, then."</p>
<p>He stood up and stalked toward the front of the plane. Joe
roused himself with an effort. He turned to look about him.
Haney lay slumped in a reclining chair, on the other side of
the plane cabin. His eyes were closed. The Chief lay limply in
another chair. He smiled faintly at Joe, but he didn't try to
talk. He was too tired. The return to normal gravity bothered
him, as it did Joe.</p>
<p>Joe looked out the window. In neat, geometric spacing on
either side of the transport there were fighter jets. There
was another flight above and farther away. Joe saw, suddenly,
a peeling-off of planes from the farther formation. They
dived down through the clouds. He never knew what they
went to look for or what they found. He went groggily back
to his bunk in a strange and embarrassing weakness.</p>
<p>He woke when the plane landed. He didn't know where it
might be. It was, he knew, an island. He could see the wide,
sun-baked white of the runways. He could see sea-birds in
clouds over at the edge. The plane trundled and lurched<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_81" id="Page_81"></SPAN></span>
slowly to a stop. A service-truck came growling up, and
somebody led cables from it up into the engines. Somebody
watched dials, and waved a hand.</p>
<p>There was silence. There was stillness. Joe heard voices
and footsteps. Presently he heard the dull booming of surf.</p>
<p>The plane seemed to wait for a very long time. Then there
was a faint, faint distant whine of jets, and a plane came from
the east. It was first a dot and then a vague shape, and then
an infinitely graceful dark object which swooped down and
landed at the other end of the strip. It came taxiing up alongside
the transport ship and stopped.</p>
<p>An officer in uniform climbed out, waved his hand, and
walked over to the transport. He climbed up the ladder and
the pilot and co-pilot followed him. They took their places.
The door closed. One by one, the jets chugged, then roared to
life.</p>
<p>The officer talked to the pilot and co-pilot for a moment.
He came down the aisle toward Joe. Mike the midget regarded
him suspiciously.</p>
<p>The plane stirred. The newly arrived officer said pleasantly,
"The Navy Department's sent me out here, Kenmore, to be
briefed on what you know and to do a little briefing in turn."</p>
<p>The transport plane turned clumsily and began to taxi down
the runway. It jolted and bumped over the tarmac, then lifted,
and Joe saw that the island was nearly all airfield. There were
a few small buildings and distance-dwarfed hangars. Beyond
the field proper there was a ring of white surf. That was all.
The rest was ocean.</p>
<p>"I haven't much briefing to do," admitted Joe.</p>
<p>Then he looked at the briefcase the other man opened. It
had sheets and sheets of paper in it—hundreds, it seemed.
They were filled with questions. He'd be called on to find
answers for most of them, and to admit he didn't know the
answers to the rest. When he was through with this questioning,
every possible useful fact he knew would be on file for
future use. And now he wrily recognized that this was part
payment for the efficiency and speed with which the Navy<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_82" id="Page_82"></SPAN></span>
had trailed them on their landing, and for the use of a transport
plane to take them back to the United States.</p>
<p>"I'll try to answer what I can," he said cautiously. "But
what're you to brief me about?"</p>
<p>"That you're not back on Earth yet," said the officer curtly,
pulling out the first sheaf of questions. "Officially you haven't
even started back. Ostensibly you're still on the Platform."</p>
<p>Joe blinked at him.</p>
<p>"If your return were known," continued the lieutenant,
"the public would want to make heroes of you. First space
travelers, and so on. They'd want you on television—all of
you—telling about your adventures and your return. Inevitably,
what happened to your ship would leak out. And if the public
knew you'd been waylaid and shot down there'd be demands
that the government take violent action to avenge the attack.
It'd be something like the tumult over the sinking of the
<i>Maine</i>, or the <i>Lusitania</i>—or even Pearl Harbor. It's much
better for your return to be a secret for now."</p>
<p>Joe said wrily: "I don't think any of us want to be ridden
around to have ticker-tape dumped on us. That part's all
right. I'm sure the others will agree."</p>
<p>"Good! One more difficulty. We had two space ships. Now
we have none. Our most likely enemies haven't only been
building rockets, they've got a space fleet coming along. Intelligence
just found out they're nearly ready for trial trips.
They've been yelling to high heaven that we were building a
space fleet to conquer the world. We weren't. They were.
And it looks very much as if they may have beaten us."</p>
<p>The lieutenant got out the dreary mass of papers, intended
to call for every conscious or unconscious observation Joe
might have made in space. It was the equivalent of the interviews
extracted from fliers after a bombing raid, and it was
necessary, but Joe was very tired.</p>
<p>Wearily, he said, "Start your questions. I'll try to answer
them."</p>
<p>They arrived in Bootstrap some forty-six hours after the
crashing of their ship. Joe, at least, had slept nearly thirty of
those hours. So while he was still wobbly on his feet and<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_83" id="Page_83"></SPAN></span>
would be for days to come, his disposition was vastly improved.</p>
<p>There was nobody waiting on the airfield by the town of
Bootstrap, but as they landed a black car came smoothly out
and stopped close by the transport. Joe got down and climbed
into it. Sally Holt was inside. She took both his hands and
cried, and he was horribly embarrassed when the Chief came
blundering into the car after him. But the Chief growled, "If
he didn't kiss you, Sally, I'm going to kick his pants for him."</p>
<p>"He—he did," said Sally, gulping. "And I'm glad you're
back, Chief. And Haney. And Mike."</p>
<p>Mike grinned as he climbed in the back too. Haney
crowded in after him. They filled the rear of the car entirely.
It started off swiftly across the field, swerving to the roadway
that led to the highway out of Bootstrap to the Shed. It sped
out that long white concrete ribbon, and the desert was
abruptly all around them. Far ahead, the great round half-dome
of the Shed looked like a cherry-pit on the horizon.</p>
<p>"It's good to be back!" said the Chief warmly. "I feel like
I weigh a ton, but it's good to be back! Mike's the only one
who was happier out yonder. He figures he belongs there. I
got a story to tell you, Sally——"</p>
<p>"Chief!" said Mike fiercely. "Shut up!"</p>
<p>"Won't," said the Chief amiably. "Sally, this guy Mike——"</p>
<p>Mike went pale. "You're too big to kill," he said bitterly,
"but I'll try it!"</p>
<p>The Chief grunted at him. "Quit being modest. Sally——"</p>
<p>Mike flung himself at the Chief, literally snarling. His small
fist hit the Chief's face—and Mike was small but he was not
puny. The "crack" of the impact was loud in the car. Haney
grabbed. There was a moment's frenzied struggling. Then
Mike was helplessly wrapped in Haney's arms, incoherent with
fury and shame.</p>
<p>"Crazy fool!" grunted the Chief, feeling his jaw. "What's
the matter with you? Don't you feel good?"</p>
<p>He was angry, but he was more concerned. Mike was white
and raging.</p>
<p>"You tell that," he panted shrilly, "and so help me——"<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_84" id="Page_84"></SPAN></span></p>
<p>"What's got into you?" demanded Haney anxiously. "I'd be
bragging, I would, if I'd got a brainstorm like you did! That
guy Sanford woulda wiped us all out——"</p>
<p>The Chief said angrily, between unease and puzzlement:</p>
<p>"I never knew you to go off your nut like this before! What's
got into you, anyway?"</p>
<p>Mike gulped suddenly. Haney still held him firmly, but
both Haney and the Chief were looking at him with worried
eyes. And Mike said desperately: "You were going to tell
Sally——"</p>
<p>The Chief snorted.</p>
<p>"Huh! You fool little runt! No! I was going to tell her
about you opening up that airlock when Sanford locked us
out! Sure I kidded you about what you're talking about! Sure!
I'm going to do it again! But that's amongst us! I don't tell that
outside!"</p>
<p>Haney made an inarticulate exclamation. He understood,
and he was relieved. But he looked disgusted. He released
Mike abruptly, rumbling to himself. He stared out the window.
And Mike stood upright, an absurd small figure. His
face worked a little.</p>
<p>"Okay," said Mike, with a little difficulty. "I was dumb.
Only, Chief, you owe me a sock on the jaw when you feel like
it. I'll take it."</p>
<p>He swallowed. Sally was watching wide-eyed.</p>
<p>"Sally," said Mike bitterly, "I'm a bigger fool than I look.
I thought the Chief was going to tell you what happened
when I landed. I—I floated down in a village over there in India,
and those crazy savages'd never seen a parachute, and
they began to yell and make gestures, and first thing I knew
they had a sort of litter and were piling me in it, and throwing
flowers all over me, and there was a procession——"</p>
<p>Sally listened blankly. Mike told the tale of his shame with
the very quintessence of bitter resentment. When he got to his
installation in a red-painted mud temple, and the reverent
and forcible removal of his clothes so he could be greased with
butter, Sally's lips began to twitch. At the picture of Mike
in a red loincloth, squirming furiously while brown-skinned<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_85" id="Page_85"></SPAN></span>
admirers zestfully sang his praises, howling his rage while
they celebrated some sort of pious festival in honor of his
arrival, Sally broke down and laughed helplessly.</p>
<p>Mike stared at her, aghast. He felt that he'd hated the
Chief when he thought the Chief was going to tell the tale
on him as a joke. He'd told it on himself as a penance, in the
place of the blow he'd given the Chief and which the Chief
wouldn't return. To Mike it was still tragedy. It was still an
outrage to his dignity. But Sally was laughing. She rocked
back and forth next to Joe, helpless with mirth.</p>
<p>"Oh, Mike!" she gasped. "It's beautiful! They must have
been saying such lovely, respectful things, while you were calling
them names and wanting to kill them! They'd have been
bragging to each other about how you were—visiting them because
they'd been such good people, and—this was the reward
of well-spent lives, and you—you——"</p>
<p>She leaned against Joe and shook. The car went on. The
Chief chuckled. Haney grinned. Joe watched Mike as this new
aspect of his disgrace got into his consciousness. It hadn't occurred
to Mike, before, that anybody but himself had been
ridiculous. It hadn't occurred to him, until he lost his temper,
that Haney and the Chief would ride him mercilessly among
themselves, but would not dream of letting anybody outside
the gang do so.</p>
<p>Presently Mike managed to grin a little. It was a twisty
grin, and not altogether mirthful.</p>
<p>"Yeah," he said wrily. "I see it. They were crazy too. I
should've had more sense than to get mad." Then his grin
grew a trifle twistier. "I didn't tell you that the thing that
made me maddest was when they wanted to put earrings on
me. I grabbed a club then and—uh—persuaded them I
didn't like the idea."</p>
<p>Sally chortled. The picture of the small, truculent Mike in
frenzied revolt with a club against the idea of being decked
with jewelry.... Mike turned to the two big men and
shoved at them imperiously.</p>
<p>"Move over!" he growled. "If you two big lummoxes had
dropped in on those crazy goofs instead of me, they'd've<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_86" id="Page_86"></SPAN></span>
thought you were elephants and set you to work hauling logs!"</p>
<p>He squirmed to a seat between them. He still looked
ashamed, but it was shame of a different sort. Now he looked
as if he wished he hadn't mistrusted his friends for even a moment.
And he included Sally.</p>
<p>"Anyhow," he said suddenly in a different tone, "maybe it
did do some good for me to get all worked up! I got kind
of frantic. I figured somebody'd made a fool of me, and I
was going to put something over on you."</p>
<p>"Mike!" said Sally reproachfully.</p>
<p>"Not like you think, Sally," said Mike, grinning a little. "I
made up my mind to beat these lummoxes at their own game.
I asked Joe about my <ins class="correction" title="Transcriber's note: Hyphen removed to conform to majority usage.">brainstorm</ins> in the plane. He didn't know
what I was driving at, but he said what I hoped was so. So
I'm telling you—and," he added fiercely, "if it's any good
everybody gets credit for it, because all of us four—even two
big apes who try kidding—are responsible for it!"</p>
<p>He glared at them. Joe asked. "What is it, Mike?"</p>
<p>"I think," said Mike, "I think I've got a trick to make space
ships quicker than anybody ever dreamed of. Joe says you can
make a weld with powder metallurgy. And I think we can
use that trick to make one-piece ships—lighter and stronger
and tighter—and fast enough to make your head swim! And
you guys are in on it!"</p>
<p>The black car braked by the entrance to the Security offices
outside the Shed. It looked completely deserted. There was
only a skeleton force here since the Platform had been
launched three months before. There was almost nobody to be
seen, but Mike pressed his lips pugnaciously together as they
got out of the car and went inside.</p>
<p>The four of them, with Sally, went along the empty corridors
to the major's office. He was waiting for them. He shook
hands all around. But it was not possible for Major Holt to give
an impression of cordiality.</p>
<p>"I'm very glad to see all of you back," he said curtly. "It
didn't look like you'd make it. Joe, you will be able to reach
your father by long-distance telephone as soon as you finish
here. I—ah—thought it would not be indiscreet to tell him you<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_87" id="Page_87"></SPAN></span>
had landed safely, though I did ask him to keep the fact to
himself."</p>
<p>"Thank you, sir," said Joe.</p>
<p>"You answered most of the questions you needed to answer
on the plane," added the major, grimly, "and now you may
want to ask some. You know there is no ship for you. You
know that the enemies of the Platform copied our rocket fuel.
You know they've made rockets with it. You've met them!
And Intelligence says they're building a fleet of space ships—not
for space exploration, but simply to smash the Platform and
get set for an ultimatum to the United States to backwater or
be bombarded from space."</p>
<p>Mike said crisply: "How long before they can do it?"</p>
<p>Major Holt turned uncordial eyes upon him. "It's anybody's
guess. Why?"</p>
<p>"We've been working something out," said Mike, firmly
but in part untruthfully. He stood sturdily before the major's
desk, which he barely topped. "The four of us have been
working it out. Joe says they've done powder metallurgy
welds, back at his father's plant. Joe and Haney and the
Chief and me, we've been working out an idea."</p>
<p>Major Holt waited. His hands moved nervously on his desk.
Joe looked at Mike. Haney and the Chief regarded him warily.
The Chief cocked his head on one side.</p>
<p>"It'll take a minute to get it across," said Mike. "You have
to think of concrete first. When you want to make a cubic
yard of concrete, you take a cubic yard of gravel. Then you
add some sand—just enough to fill in the cracks between the
gravel. Then you put in some cement. It goes in the cracks
between the grains of sand. A little bit of cement makes a lot
of concrete. See?"</p>
<p>Major Holt frowned. But he knew these four. "I see, but
I don't understand."</p>
<p>"You can weld metals together with powder-metallurgy
powder at less than red heat. You can take steel filings for
sand and steel turnings for gravel and powdered steel for
cement—"</p>
<p>Joe jolted erect. He looked startledly at Haney and the<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_88" id="Page_88"></SPAN></span>
Chief. And Haney's mouth was dropping open. A great,
dreamy light seemed to be bursting upon him. The Chief regarded
Mike with very bright eyes. And Mike sturdily,
forcefully, coldly, made a sort of speech in his small and
brittle voice.</p>
<p>Things could be made of solid steel, he said sharply, without
rolling or milling or die-casting the metal, and without
riveting or arc-welding the parts together. The trick was powder
metallurgy. Very finely powdered metal, packed tightly
and heated to a relatively low temperature—"sintered" is the
word—becomes a solid mass. Even alloys can be made by
mixing powdered metals. The process had been used only for
small objects, but—there was the analogy to concrete. A very
little powder could weld much metal, in the form of turnings
and smaller bits. And the result would be solid steel!</p>
<p>Then Mike grew impassioned. There was a wooden mockup
of a space ship in the Shed, he said. It was an absolutely
accurate replica, in wood, of the ships that had been destroyed.
But one could take castings of it, and use them for
molds, and fill them with powder and filings and turnings,
and heat them not even red-hot and there would be steel
hulls in one piece. Solid steel hulls! Needing no riveting nor
anything else—and one could do it fast! While the first hull
was fitting out a second could be molded——</p>
<p>The Chief roared: "You fool little runt!" he bellowed.
"Tryin' to give us credit for that! You got more sense than any
of us! You worked that out in your own head——"</p>
<p>Haney rubbed his hands together. He said softly, "I like
that! I do like that!"</p>
<p>Major Holt turned his eyes to Joe. "What's your opinion?"</p>
<p>"I think it's the sort of thing, sir, that a professional engineer
would say was a good idea but not practical. He'd mean
it would be a lot of trouble to get working. But I'd like to ask
my father. They have done powder welding at the plant
back home, sir."</p>
<p>Major Holt nodded. "Call your father. If it looks promising,
I'll pull what wires I can."</p>
<p>Joe went out, with the others. Mike was sweating. All unconsciously,<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_89" id="Page_89"></SPAN></span>
he twisted his hands one within the other. He had
had many humiliations because he was small, but lately he
had humiliated himself by not believing in his friends. Now
he needed desperately to do something that would reflect
credit on them as well as himself.</p>
<p>Joe made the phone call. As he closed the door of the
booth, he heard the Chief kidding Mike blandly.</p>
<p>"Hey, Einstein," said the Chief. "How about putting that
brain of yours to work on a faster-than-light drive?"</p>
<p>But then he began to struggle with the long distance operator.
It took minutes to get the plant, and then it took
time to get to the point, because his father insisted on asking
anxiously how he was and if he was hurt in any way. Personal
stuff. But Joe finally managed to explain that this call
dealt with the desperate need to do something about a space
fleet.</p>
<p>His father said grimly, "Yes. The situation doesn't look too
good right now, Joe."</p>
<p>"Try this on for size, sir," said Joe. He outlined Mike's
scheme. His father interrupted only to ask crisp questions
about the mockup of the tender, already in existence though
made of wood. Then he said, "Go on, son!"</p>
<p>Joe finished. He heard his father speaking to someone
away from the phone. Questions and answers, and then
orders. His father spoke to him direct.</p>
<p>"It looks promising, Joe," said his father. "Right here at
the plant we've got the gang that can do it if anybody can.
I'm getting a plane and coming out there, fast! Get Major Holt
to clear things for me. This is no time for red tape! If he has
trouble, I'll pull some wires myself!"</p>
<p>"Then I can tell Mike it's good stuff?"</p>
<p>"It's not good stuff," said his father. "There are about forty-seven
things wrong with it at first glance, but I know how to
take care of one or two, and we'll lick the rest. You tell your
friend Mike I want to shake him by the hand. I hope to do it
tonight!"</p>
<p>He hung up, and Joe went out of the phone booth. Mike<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_90" id="Page_90"></SPAN></span>
looked at him with yearning eyes. Joe lied a little, because
Mike rated it.</p>
<p>"My father's on the way here to help make it work," he
told Mike. Then he added untruthfully: "He said he thought
he knew all the big men in his line, and where've you been
that he hasn't heard of you?"</p>
<p>He turned away as the Chief whooped with glee. He
hurried back to Major Holt as the Chief and Haney began
zestfully to manhandle Mike in celebration of his genius.</p>
<p>The major held up his hand as Joe entered. He was using
the desk phone. Joe waited. When he hung up, Joe reported.
The major seemed unsurprised.</p>
<p>"Yes, I had Washington on the wire," he said detachedly.
"I talked to a personal friend who's a three-star general. There
will be action started at the Pentagon. When you came in I
was arranging with the largest producers of powder-metallurgy
products in the country to send their best men here by
plane. They will start at once. Now I have to get in touch
with some other people."</p>
<p>Joe gaped at him. The major moved impatiently, waiting
for Joe to leave. Joe gulped. "Excuse me, sir, but—my father
didn't say it was certain. He just thinks it can be made to
work. He's not sure."</p>
<p>"I didn't even wait for that, something has to turn up to
take care of this situation!" said the Major with asperity. "It
has to! This particular scheme may not work, but if it doesn't,
something will come out of the work on it! You should look at a
twenty-five cent piece occasionally, Joe!"</p>
<p>He moved impatiently, and Joe went out. Sally was smiling
in the outer office. There were whoopings in the corridor
beyond. The Chief and Haney were celebrating Mike's
brainstorm with salutary indignity, because if they didn't
make a joke of it he might cry with joy.</p>
<p>"Things look better?"</p>
<p>"They do," said Joe. "If it only works...."</p>
<p>Then he hunted in his pocket. He found a quarter and
examined it curiously. On one side he found nothing the<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_91" id="Page_91"></SPAN></span>
major could have referred to. On the other side, though,
just by George Washington's chin——</p>
<p>He put the quarter away and took Sally's arm.</p>
<p>"It'll be all right," he said slowly.</p>
<p>But there were times when it seemed in doubt. Joe's father
arrived by plane at sunset of that same day, and he and
three men from the Kenmore Precision Tool Company instantly
closeted themselves with Mike in Major Holt's quarters.
The powder metallurgy men turned up an hour later,
and a three-star general from Washington. They joined the
highly technical discussion.</p>
<p>Joe waited around outside, feeling left out of things. He
sat on the porch with Sally while the moon rose over the
desert and stars shone down. Inside, matters of high importance
were being battled over with the informality and heat
with which practical men get things settled. But Joe wasn't
in on it. He said annoyedly, "You'd think my father'd have
something to say to me, in all this mess! After all, I have been—well,
I have been places! But all he said was, 'How are you,
Son? Where's this Mike you talked about?'"</p>
<p>Sally said calmly, "I know just how you feel. You've made
me feel that way." She looked up at the moon. "I thought
about you all the time you were gone, and I—prayed for you,
Joe. And now you're back and not even busy! But you
don't—— It would be nice for you to think about me for a
while!"</p>
<p>"I am thinking about you!" said Joe indignantly.</p>
<p>"Now what," said Sally interestedly, "in the world could
you be thinking about me?"</p>
<p>He wanted to scowl at her. But he grinned instead.</p>
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