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Morning.
The warm sunlight streamed into the clouds, washing away the last shadows and filtering through the portholes.
The men breakfasted, bathed, shaved, smoked, sat, twisted their fingers, looked out the ports. They were silent men, with dark shadows about their eyes and with tight, white-lipped mouths.
Frequently, the clouds near them were cut by swift, dark shapes swooping downward. The shapes were indistinct in the cotton-like whiteness, but obviously they were huge, like a dozen Wanderers made into one.
"Those ships are big," someone murmured, without enthusiasm.
"It's a busy spaceport," grumbled Captain Wiley.
Thoughts, words, movements came so slowly it was like walking under water. Enthusiasm was dead. The men were automatons, sitting, waiting, eating, sitting, waiting.
A day passed, and a night.
"Maybe they've forgotten us," said Fong.