There was a roar of disgust in my earphones and McIvers’ Bug suddenly lurched forward. It rolled down past me, picked up speed, with McIvers hunched behind the wheel like a race driver. He was heading past me straight for the gray ledge.
My shout caught in my throat; I heard the Major take a huge breath and roar: “Mac! stop that thing, you fool!” and then McIvers’ Bug was out on the ledge, lumbering across like a juggernaut.
The ledge jolted as the tires struck it; for a horrible moment, it seemed to be sliding out from under the machine. And then the Bug was across in a cloud of dust, and I heard McIvers’ voice in my ears, shouting in glee. “Come on, you slowpokes. It’ll hold you!”
Something unprintable came through the earphones as the Major drew up alongside me and moved his Bug out on the ledge slowly and over to the other side. Then he said, “Take it slow, Peter. Then give Jack a hand with the sledges.” His voice sounded tight as a wire.
Ten minutes later, we were on the other side of the cleft. The Major checked the whole column; then he turned on McIvers angrily. “One more trick like that,” he said, “and I’ll strap you to a rock and leave you. Do you understand me? One more time—”
McIvers’ voice was heavy with protest. “Good Lord, if we leave it up to Claney, he’ll have us out here forever! Any blind fool could see that that ledge would hold.”
“I saw it moving,” I shot back at him.
“All right, all right, so you’ve got good eyes. Why all the fuss? We got across, didn’t we? But I say we’ve got to have a little nerve and use it once in a while if we’re ever going to get across this lousy hotbox.”
“We need to use a little judgment, too,” the Major snapped. “All right, let’s roll. But if you think I was joking, you just try me out once.” He let it soak in for a minute. Then he geared his Bug on around to my flank again.
At the stopover, the incident wasn’t mentioned again, but the Major drew me aside just as I was settling down for sleep. “Peter, I’m worried,” he said slowly.