During the long silence that ensued, Albrekt sat back and took stock of the situation. So far, everything had worked perfectly. The other tape given him by the Flanjo agent on Mars was to be run through the automatic pilot exactly 200 hours after the first one, when the By Jove!'s diverging orbit carried it beyond range of the convoy's meager radar equipment.
The control room would be his headquarters for the next few months, simply because the control room was the only deck of the By Jove! which could be locked against the rest of the ship. All the weapons—the heat guns—were in the control room, so Albrekt expected no trouble on that score.
It was going to be a dull journey from here on out, and Albrekt decided he would do well to learn as much as he could about handling a space ship. He swung the chair around and ran his eyes along the shelves of Carrel's microfilm library. The title Sailing Space, by Dr. Russo Alin, caught his attention.
Albrekt inserted the spool in the projector and started it. An intense bearded face appeared on the screen, and the recorder said:
"It is not generally known, except to students of technological history, that the steam powered and electric powered automobile gave the familiar gasoline powered automobile of the last century a close race for preference in early automotive history. The factors that caused the gasoline powered automobile to become predominant are not important here. What is important is that there were alternative methods of automotive propulsion...."
This didn't start off well. Albrekt ran the spool up about half way and tried again. This time, the author was pointing to a well-chalked blackboard.
"The radiation is so much stronger at Venus than farther out, that it is here we find most common use of the principle," he said. "Using our formula, which, you remember, is F equals rA over 2 plus gM, we...."
Disgusted, Albrekt switched it off and took out the spool. He found another, Survival for Spacemen, and tried it. It was a primer on conditions to be met in space travel, handled in popular vein. It was the sort of thing Albrekt wanted, and he settled back to listen to it.
It was about nine hours before the last red light on the control board winked out and the clanging of the last alarm bell died out below. Then Carrel's voice demanded an accounting over the intercom.
"I'm in command of the ship now," answered Albrekt, awakened from a light doze by the call. "I intend to remain so. As long as you and the others recognize that, you won't be harmed."