And yet, finally, incredibly, the trip really was to "come off." No one man knew more than a fraction of the details, though Jeremy Brill and his beloved Company turned out to be more of a force than even Dr. Farrar visioned in his most facetious dreams.
The doctor did have to be present at the U. A. loyalty tests, however, and would remember the rocking yet silent mirth of the entire commission to his dying day. The old people had been so outspoken, so set in their ways, but what a multitude of ways, that no bloc could be very seriously offended with them as a group. When little old Miss Severinghouse stated firmly, "I can't say as I trust anybody particularly, but President Wilson was a fine man," open-armed affectionate acceptance was assured. Laughter freshened the air; world tensions eased.
The months that followed were packed with unusual activity. Dr. Farrar, still at the helm of the Riston Physiological Observing Hospital, saw and heard little of it, beyond what he inferred from the questions of the newsreporters who were constantly trying to get beyond his office into the guarded privacy of Block Nineteen. He knew what assignments had been given to which of the "post-adults" (a newspaper phrase which had become universal). He knew, for instance, that Tim Daneshaw was at Annapolis with a number of others receiving advanced officer-training to prepare him for command. But he knew no details. He did not know how....
... Dr. Francis Keighley registered under an alias for a refresher course in the hospital that had borne his name for thirty-odd years. He smilingly declined special work in obstetrics and put down his name for epidemiology, parasitology and degenerative diseases as well as the usual surgery and internal medicine....
... Thorsten Veere, the pilot of the first moon-rocket, and Arthur Fisher, the designer of the Colonia, entered a formal objection to the United Assembly that the slower reflexes of the "post-adults" would make safe landing on Venus an improbability. They were told that they had exactly eleven months and three days to design and install a safe-and-sane mechanical-plus-radar landing device....
... Maeva McGaughey titrated deftly, dipping the straw-tinted flask behind the mask of the colorimeter and back with smiling approval. The old skill that had made her a master beautician was returning rapidly as she became a Pharmacist's Mate. She hummed softly, abstractedly, unaware of the absence of Miss Phillips' brisk voice saying, "Please stop that buzzing, Mrs. McGaughey. I'm sure I don't know how you expect the other ladies to get any rest with that noise going on...."
... Alice Kaplan was having two new dentures made at the clinic. The fluorine shortage in Stowe reservoir had not been known when she was a girl and the town had been too small for a dentist of its own. These would be good teeth with which to eat her own cooking. She had already helped the dietician of the hospital work out a more tasty substitute for the eternal creamed spinach for breakfast, though it was rather hampering to try to work up interesting meals with no carbohydrates and practically no animal fats. But she would use these new teeth on good beef-flour muffins and sharp cheese....
... Ole Sorensen put down the peck measure of mixed concentrates and began to toss forkfuls of fragrant alfalfa hay into the racks before the prize hospital herd. The muscles of his back and shoulders rippled as the fork swung and he moved rapidly down the line of gleaming white mangers. Between the windows behind him hung the placard filched from the Block Nineteen lobby, HASTE WASTES LIFE. Beneath this profound message was scrawled in black crayon, "Life without haste may be waste"....
... Joe Kolensky, second astrogator of the Per Aspera, whistled admiringly over the pages of calculations on the desk before him. That old gheez Avery had come up with another shortcut in Advanced Orbit Plotting. It was a legitimate shortcut, all right, but Joe had only come across it himself after two years of course work. Avery was almost twice as quick as that old Mr. White who used to teach math at Dayton Tech.