Space Station 1
friendly with strangers without in any way inviting familiarity.
There was a certain paradoxical timidity in her gaze too. It was
manifesting itself now in an obvious reluctance to be startled too
abruptly by space engineering talk from a young man who had taken
her companionability for granted and who was obviously given to snap
judgments.
She brushed back the hair on her right temple, her brown eyes upraised
to study Corriston more closely.
He hoped that she would realize upon reflection that she was behaving
foolishly. He had taken a certain liberty in talking to her as he would
have talked to an old acquaintance in a long-awaited meeting of minds.
On the big screen a space station that couldn't be built was sweeping
in toward the ship with eighty-five years of unparallelled scientific
progress behind it.
First had come the Earth satellites, eight of them in their neat little
orbits. They had used low-energy fuels, had kept close to the Earth,
and no one had seriously expected them to do more than record weather
information and relay radio signals. For fifteen years they could be
seen with small telescopes and even with the unaided eye on bright,
cloudless nights in both hemispheres.
First had come these small, relatively unimportant artificial moons and
then, on a night in October 1972, the first space platform had been
launched. Soon the sky above the Earth was swarming with radar warning
platforms, a dozen men to operate them, and carrier-based jets equipped
with formidable atomic warheads.
Nevertheless, how could anyone have known that in another twenty years
interplanetary space flight would become a war-averting reality? How
could anyone have known that by the year 2007 there would be human
settlements on Mars and by the year 2022 the actual transportation to
Mars of city-building materials?
2
Corriston was beginning to feel uncomfortable. He wished that the girl
would say something instead of just continuing to stare at him. She
seemed to be interested in his uniform. She appeared to be gazing at
him interrogatively, as if she wanted to know more about him before
promising anything.
He wondered what her unconscious purpose was. Did she see in him
the quiet, determined type who was all set to accomplish something
important. Or was she regretting he wasn't the hard-living, cynical
type who had been everywhere and done everything?
Well, one way to find out was to be himself: a man average in every
way, but with a hard core of idealism in his nature, a creative mind
and enough independence and self-assurance to give a good account of
himself in any struggle which brought his central beliefs under fire
or placed them in long-range jeopardy.
And so Corriston suddenly found himself talking about the Station again.
"Not many people have grasped the importance of it yet," he said. "One
station will service our needs, instead of fifty-seven, one tremendous
central terminal and re-fueling depot for _all_ of the ships. Do you
realize what that could mean?"
Abruptly there was a startling warmth in the girl's eyes, an
unmistakable look of interest and encouragement.
"Just what could it mean?" she asked.
"Any kind of steady growth across the years leads to centralization, to
bigness. And that bigness becomes time-hallowed and magnified out of
all proportion to its original significance. The Space Station is no
exception. It started with the primitive Earth satellites and branched
out into fifty-seven larger stations. Now it's tremendous, a single
central station that can impose its influence in ship clearance matters
with an almost unanswerable finality."
A shadow had come into the girl's eyes. "But not completely without
checks and balances. The Earth Federation can challenge its supremacy
at any point."
"Yes, and I'm glad that the challenge remains a factor to be reckoned
with. As matters stand now the Station's prestige can't be implemented
with what might well become the iron hand of an intolerable tyranny.
As matters stand, the Station is actually a big step forward. People
once talked of centralization as if it were some kind of indecent
human bogey. It isn't at all. It's simply a fluid means to an end,
a necessary commitment if a society is to achieve greatness. If the
authority behind the Station respects scientific truth and human
dignity--if it remains empirically minded--I shall serve it to the best
of my ability. No one knows for sure whether what is good outbalances
what is bad in any human institution, or any human being. A man can
only give the best of himself to what he believes in."
"Sorry to interrupt," an amused voice said, "but the captain wants
you to join him in a last-minute celebration: a toast, a press
photograph--that sort of nonsense. A six hour trip, and he hasn't even
been introduced to you. But if you don't appear at his table in ten
minutes he'll throw the book at me."
Corriston looked up in surprise at the big man confronting them. He had
approached so unobtrusively that for an instant Corriston was angry;
but only for an instant. When he took careful stock of the fellow his
resentment evaporated. There was a cordiality about him which could not
have been counterfeited. It reached from the breadth of his smile to
his gray eyes puckered in amusement. He was really big physically, in
a wholly genial and relaxed way, and his voice was that of a man who
could walk up to a bar, pay a bill and leave an everlasting impression
of hearty good nature behind him.
"Well, young lady?" he asked.
"I'm not particularly keen about the idea, Jim, but if the captain has
actually iced the champagne, it would be a shame to disappoint him."
Corriston was aware that his companion was getting to her feet. The
interruption had been unexpected, but much to his surprise he found
himself accepting it without rancor. If he lost her for a few moments
he could quickly enough find her again; and somehow he felt convinced
that the big man was not a torch-carrying admirer.
"I'll have to stop off in the ladies' lounge first," she said. She
had opened her vanity case and was making a swift inventory of its
contents. "Two shades of lipstick, but no powder! Oh, well."
She smiled at the big man and then at Corriston, gesturing slightly as
she did so.
"We've just been discussing the Station," she said. "This gentleman
hasn't told me his name--"
"Lieutenant David Corriston," Corriston said quickly. "My interest in
the Station is tied in with my job. I've just been assigned to it in
the very modest capacity of ship's inspection officer, recruit status."
The big man stared at Corriston more intently, his eyes kindling with
a sudden increase of interest. "Say, I wonder if you could spare
me a few minutes. When my friends ask me I'd like to be able to
talk intelligently about the terrific headaches the research people
must have experienced right from the start. The expenditure of fuel
alone...."
"See you in the Captain's cabin, Jim," the girl said.
She moved out from her chair, her expression slightly constrained. Was
it just imagination, or had the big man's immoderate expansiveness
grated on her and brought a look of displeasure to her young face?
Corriston couldn't be sure, and his brow remained furrowed as he
watched her cross the passenger cabin and disappear into the ladies'
lounge.
"I'm Jim Clakey," the big man said.
Corriston reseated himself, a troubled indecision still apparent in his
stare. Then gradually he found himself relaxing. He nodded up at the
big man. "Sit down, Mr. Clakey," he said. "Ask me anything you want.
Security imposes some pretty rigid restrictions, but I'll let you know
when you start treading on classified ground."
Clakey sat down and crossed his long legs. He was silent for a moment.
Then he said: "You know who she is, of course."
Corriston shook his head. "I'm afraid I haven't the slightest idea."
"She isn't traveling under her real name only because her father is a
very sensible and cautious man. You'd be cautious too, perhaps, if you
were Stephen Ramsey."
Clakey's gaze had traveled to the ladies' lounge, and for an instant he
seemed unaware of Corriston's incredulous stare.
"You mean I've actually been sitting here talking to Stephen Ramsey's
daughter?"
"That's right," Clakey said, turning to grin amiably at Corriston.
"And now you're talking to her personal bodyguard. I'm not surprised
you didn't recognize her, though; very few people do. She doesn't like
to have her picture taken. Her dad wouldn't object to that kind of
publicity particularly, but she's even more cautious than he is."
The door of the ladies' lounge opened and two young women came out.
They were laughing and talking with great animation and were quickly
lost to view as other passengers changed their position in front of the
viewscreen.
The door remained visible, however--a rectangle of shining whiteness
only slightly encroached upon by dark blue drapes. Corriston found
himself staring at it as his mind dwelt on the startling implications
of Clakey's almost unbelievable statement.
"Biggest man on Mars," Clakey was saying. "Cornered uranium; froze out
the original settlers. They're threatening violence, but their hands
are tied. Everything was done legally. Ramsey lives in a garrisoned
fortress and they can't get within twenty miles of him. He's a damned
scoundrel with tremendous vision and foresight."
Corriston suddenly realized that he had made a serious psychological
blunder in sizing up Clakey. The man was a blabbermouth. True,
Corriston's uniform was a character recommendation which might
have justified candor to a moderate extent. But Clakey was talking
outrageously out of turn. He was becoming confidential about matters
he had no right to discuss with anyone on such short acquaintance.
Corriston suddenly realized that Clakey was slightly drunk.
"Look here," Corriston said. "You're talking like a fool. Do you know
what you're saying?"
"Sure I know. Miss Ramsey is a golden girl. And I'm her bodyguard ...
important trust ... sop to a man's egoism."
An astonishing thing happened then. Clakey fell silent and remained
uncommunicative for five full minutes. Corriston had no desire to
start him talking again. He was appalled and incredulous. He was
debating the advisability of getting up with a frozen stare and a firm
determination to take himself elsewhere when the crazy, loose-tongued
fool leapt unexpectedly to his feet.
"She's taking too long!" he exclaimed. "It just isn't like her. She'd
never keep the captain waiting."
As he spoke, another woman came out of the ladies' lounge. She was
small, dark, very pretty, and she seemed a little embarrassed when she
saw how intently Clakey was staring at her. Then a middle-aged woman
came out, with a finely-modeled face, and a second, younger woman
with haggard eyes and a sallow complexion who was in all respects the
opposite of attractive.
"She's been in there for fifteen minutes," Clakey said, starting toward
the lounge.
"It takes a good many women twice that long to apply makeup properly,"
Corriston pointed out. "I just don't see--"
"You don't know her," Clakey said, impatiently. "I may have to ask one
of those women to go in after her."
"But why? You can't seriously believe she's in any danger. We both saw
her go into the lounge. She made the decision on the spur of the moment
and no one could have known about it in advance. No one followed her
in. You were sitting right here watching the door."
But Clakey was already advancing across the cabin. He was reeling a
little, and a dull flush had mounted to his cheekbones. He seemed
genuinely alarmed. Corriston was about to follow him when something