Looking at him in astonishment, she stepped back, and watched with him this unprecedented action.
With its foot Hanlon made the bird throw the little switch that activated the writing mechanism, and then with its beak began pecking at the keys. Luckily there was paper in the machine, a letter she had not finished. The admiral stepped up to where he could see, but waved the girl back when she started to follow. It seemed impossible that the bird could write anything sensible ... but the admiral was beginning to be not too sure of that.
His eyes opened wide with surprise as he saw the letters appear one by one on the paper:
a n d r m a 7
No longer did he doubt. How it was possible, the future might tell. But he did know the significance and the urgency of that message. He ripped the paper from the machine and pocketed it, then jumped to his desk and flipped the intercom switch.
"Captain Jessup! A company of marines, in full armor and all weapons, at the main gate in trucks in two minutes. Hipe!"
He ran to a cabinet in one corner of the room and threw open the door. "Come and help me!" he commanded the astonished girl, dragging his own long-unused space armor out and starting to climb into it. With her help he was completely encased in the minute, and was strapping on his weapons. "You can go home now," he told her.
He turned to the desk where the bird was watching with its beady eyes, and held out his arm curved at the elbow. With a quick swish of wings the pigeon launched itself toward the suited figure and rested on the out-stretched wrist.
The admiral plunged through the door and into the hall, where his private elevator waited. "Ground!" he yelled, and the bird was lifted from his wrist by the sudden plunging descent, but fluttered back and rode that wrist as the admiral dashed out of the elevator, through the halls and out the front door to the waiting, marine-filled trucks. Willing hands hauled him aboard the lead truck, and he threw the pigeon into the air.
"Follow that bird!" he commanded, and the incredulous driver did so, wondering secretly if the Old Man had suddenly gone bats.