"Why narrow the field of investigation?" laughed the girl. "I'd rather widen it, myself—I might prefer a general, even to a physicist!"
They went up to the main saloon and joined the mêlée there, and after one dance with Verna—all he could claim in that crowd of men—Crowninshield turned to Brandon.
"You two seem to know Miss Pickering extraordinarily well. Would I be stepping on your toes if I give her a play?"
"Clear ether as far as we're concerned." Brandon shrugged his shoulders. "She's been kicking around under foot ever since she was knee high to a duck—we gave her her first lessons on a slide rule."
"Don't be dumb, Norman. That woman's a knock-out—a riot—a regular tri-planet call-out!"
"Oh, she's all x, as far as that goes. She's a good little scout, too—not half as dumb as she acts—and she's one of the squarest little aces that ever waved a plume; but as for playing her—too much like our kid sister."
"Good—me for her!" and they made their way back down to the control room.
Stevens, after his one dance with Nadia, had already returned. Brandon and Crowninshield found him seated at the calculating machine, continuing a problem which already filled several pages of his notebook.
"'Smatter, Steve? So glad to see a calculator and some paper that you can't let them alone?"
"Not exactly—just had a thought a day or so ago. Been computing the orbit of the wreckage of the Arcturus around Jupiter. Think we should salvage it—the upper half, at least. It was left intact, you know."