Keeping one eye on the enigmatic liquid beyond the port, Drai rolled the other toward the pilot.
“Lee, go up about ten miles, and start travelling. It doesn’t matter which way, I guess.” He was obeyed in silence. Even though Lee did not take the shortest route to the ocean, the speed of the ship even within the atmosphere was such that only minutes passed before the fabulous “flatland” lay beneath them — the closest any of them had dared to approach it in twenty Sarrian years. Dumbly the commander gestured downward, and presently they hung a few hundred feet above the waves. Drai looked for a long time, then spoke three words to Ken: “Get a sample.”
The scientist thought for a moment; then he found the small bomb in which he had taken the frost sample on Mars, pumped out the air, and closed the valve. Redonning his armor, he clumped into the air lock after voicing dire warning to Lee about keeping the vessel level. He fastened a wire to the bomb itself and another to the valve handle; then, opening the outer door, he lowered away until the loss of weight told him the bomb was submerged. He pulled the other wire, waited a moment, pulled up the filled bomb, closed the valve again, and sealed the outer door of the air lock.
Naturally, the bomb exploded violently within a few seconds of the time that sulfur ceased condensing on its surface. Ken felt thankful that he had not yet removed the armor — parts of the bomb had actually scored the metal — and after some thought tried again. This time he let down a tiny glass wool sponge, hoping the liquid had a significant amount of natural capillary action. He placed the sponge in another bomb, and by the same method he had used with the Martina sample eventually determined the molecular weight of the substance. It came out higher then before, but eventually he found the deposit of salts on the sponge and allowed for their weight. The result this time left little doubt that the substance was indeed hydrogen oxide.
He looked down for a minute at the tossing blue expanse, wondering how deep it might be and whether it would have any real effect on the conditions of the Planet of Ice; then he turned, climbed out of the armor — he had stayed in it for the rest of his experiment, after the first blast — and went to report to Drai.
The drug-runner heard him in silence. He still seemed a little dazed by the overthrow of his former belief. It was many minutes before he spoke, and then he simply said, “Take us back to One, Lee. I have to think.” Ken and Feth eyed each other, but kept all expression of glee from their faces.
20
“Well, you seem to have done it now.” Feth was still unhappy.
“In what way?” queried Ken. The two were ostensibly engaged in checking the mechanical adequacy of the refrigerated vivaria.
“I’ve been working for years to support this flatland myth — I realized it was never more than a theory, but Drai had to be shown the difference between that and fact — and I’ve been doing my level best to keep the production of tofacco down to a minimum.”