"What was the idea, Tom? I know you didn't come all the way out here just to talk to me."
"Well, it would have been worth it, but that wasn't it. I was on my way to Jupiter to prove once and for all that there isn't any Warp and that there are pirates on Callisto. Then I broke down a few hours out of Mars, with too much velocity to get back on the chemicals. After a while you came along, and I saw the camp, and managed to set her down. I didn't know this was your rock."
"You have the craziest ideas, Tom!"
"All right, let it go. I'm done with crazy ideas. The wildest one I have at the moment is to talk your uncle into thinking that I can earn my keep here and a passage back to Earth."
"Good—and I'll talk him into not sending you back with the Patrol."
"The Patrol?"
"Yes—our time here is half gone, and they are due any day to pick up our data and preliminary report. They're overdue right now, as a matter of fact. I thought you were the Patrol cruiser at first. Our figures are hardly worth coming after, unless they've got some good readings on Thule."
I had stopped listening. Patrol regulations make the rescue of distressed spacemen mandatory. They would take me to Earth and turn me loose with a hundred credits bonus, and I could look for a job as a shoe salesman. Or write my memoirs. The Tale of a Disappointed Space Hound. That ought to sell. Back to Earth. I wasn't happy about it. I had crossed four hundred million miles of space to find Betty and I wanted to stay.
I looked at her. She crinkled her nose at me and stood up. "Come on, Tom, don't look so glum. How about something to eat? If you're not hungry I am."
She crossed to the galley end of the room and I followed. Cooking was simple—stick a couple of cans in the diatherm and wait until the signal beeped. It tasted better than what I had had on the Aspera, though. I told her so, and Betty laughed. Then suddenly she jumped to her feet.