"It would. It always does." The admiral was very much in earnest now, but it was a glad, proud earnestness. "You are to be as nearly absolutely free an agent as it is possible for a living, flesh-and-blood creature to be. To the man on the street that would seem to spell a condition of perfect bliss. Only a gray Lensman knows what a frightful load it really is; but it is a load that such a Lensman is glad and proud to carry."
"Yes, sir, he would be, of course, if he——"
"That thought will bother you for a time—if it did not, you would not be here—but do not worry about it any more than you can help. All I can say is that in the opinion of those who should know, not only have you proved yourself ready for release, but also you have earned it."
"How do they figure that out?" Kinnison demanded, hotly. "All that saved my bacon on that trip was luck—a burned-out Bergenholm—and at the time I thought that it was bad luck, at that. And VanBuskirk and Worsel and the other boys and Heaven knows who else pulled me out of jam after jam. I'd like awfully well to believe that I'm ready, sir, but I'm not. I can't take credit for pure dumb luck and for other men's abilities."
"Well, coöperation is to be expected, and we like to make gray Lensmen out of the lucky ones." Haynes laughed deeply. "It may make you feel better, though, if I tell you two more things: first, that so far you have made the best showing of any man yet graduated from Wentworth Hall; second, that we of the court believe you would have succeeded in that almost impossible mission without VanBuskirk, without Worsel, and without the lucky failure of the Bergenholm. In a different, and now, of course, unguessable fashion, but succeeded, nevertheless. Nor is this to be taken as in any sense a belittlement of the very real abilities of those others, nor a denial that luck, or chance, does exist. It is merely our recognition of the fact that you have what it takes to be an unattached Lensman.
"Seal it now, and buzz off!" he commanded, as Kinnison tried to say something; and, clapping him on the shoulder, he turned him around and gave him a gentle shove toward the door. "Clear ether, lad!"
"Same to you, sir—all of it there is. I still think that you and all the rest of the court are cockeyed; but I'll try not to let you down." And the newly unattached Lensman blundered out. He stumbled over the threshold, bumped against a stenographer who was hurrying along the corridor, and almost barged into the jamb of the entrance door instead of going through the opening. Outside he regained his physical poise and walked on air toward his quarters; but he never could remember afterward what he did or whom he met on that long, fast hike. Over and over the one thought pounded in his brain: unattached! Unattached!! UNATTACHED!!
And behind him, in the port admiral's office, that high official sat and mused, smiling faintly with lips and eyes, staring unseeingly at the still-open doorway through which Kinnison had staggered. The boy had measured up in every particular. He would be a good man. He would marry. He did not think so now, of course—in his own mind his life was consecrate—but he would. If necessary, the patrol itself would see to it that he did. There were ways, and such stock was altogether too good not to be propagated. And, fifteen years or so from now—if he lived—when he was no longer fit for the grinding, grueling life to which he now looked forward so eagerly, he would select the Earthbound job for which he was best fitted and would become a good executive. For such were the executives of the patrol. But this daydreaming was getting him nowhere, fast; he shook himself and plunged again into his work.
Kinnison reached his quarters at last, realizing with a thrill that they were no longer his. He now had no quarters, no residence, no address. Wherever he might be, throughout the whole of illimitable space, there was his home. But, instead of being dismayed by the thought of the life he faced, he was filled by a fierce eagerness to be actually living it.