IX
It was night, and the overhead lights in the corridors were dimmed. Ernest Carston tossed restlessly in his bed. He could not sleep, he had been unable to sleep since seeing and hearing the Earth Council on the ethero-magnum.
Carston arose, and dressed quickly. Silently he crossed the room to the outer door, and stepped out into the corridor. He paced slowly, aimlessly, his brow knit in deep thought. Finally he made a decision, and turned his footsteps in the direction of the palace and the laboratory. He was still an Earth official; he had known all the time that he would have to take matters here into his own hands.
Before he reached the corridor leading to the laboratory, however, he heard the soft shuffle of footsteps. Carston leaped back into the shadows just as a lone figure emerged from one of the transverse corridors. It passed very close to him, and he saw that it was Cynthia Marnik; her face seemed very white, and her steps were hurried.
Carston's heart quickened a pace, as he followed her at a safe distance, keeping to the shadows. She continued along the main corridor, past the men's quarters and past the furnaces. With a shock, Carston realized she was heading for the outer air-lock.
He reached there in time to see the huge door slide open, then Cynthia stepped through, and the door closed. Carston waited, giving her time to leave the tunnel, before he followed. Finally he entered the tunnel himself, having long since learned how to operate the mechanism of these doors. Cynthia was gone; the outer doors were closed.
Carston hurried down the long tunnel. The magnetic degravitizing coils along each side were silent now, would remain so until the Spacer's return. Carston reached the racks of vacuum suits near the outer door, quickly donned one and was soon outside the Base.
Against the sun-swept horizon, a hundred yards away, he could easily discern Cynthia's metal-encased figure. She kept close to the shadows at the foot of the low lying cliffs. Not once did she look back. A quarter of a mile further, she turned sharply, entered a narrow, steep-walled canyon.
Puzzled, Carston hurried forward. He reached the canyon and entered it, realizing that this must be one of the few places on Vulcan's surface where there was anything simulating night; it wasn't really dark, but sort of a twilight gloom between the rock cliffs sheering upward.