A girl pilot? Well, why not? There were plenty of girl pilots working their fingers to the bone to earn passage money in Callisto City. Stowing away would be a short cut to freedom and the green hills of Earth. You couldn't blame a girl for hating the dust and roar of an atomic power plant, or the drudgery of a mining job.
I could picture her succumbing to blind panic, ripping a suit down from the locker, and crawling out into the void to tighten the gravity bolts on the naked hull with a magneto-wrench.
"Jeebies always try to kill themselves!" Pete croaked. "You get to pitying them! Your head swells and you get all choked up with pity! And that's when you know you've blown your top!"
I answered that with a voice that rang hard. "All right, have it your own way! She's a jeebie! But I'm not going to stand here pitying her! I'm going to help her!"
I never quite knew how I reached the locker, with imaginary eyes glittering at me from every corner of the ship. Pete's wild talk hadn't really shaken me. All loose talk about the mind is dangerous, of course. But I wasn't scared of anything I couldn't see.
The idea of a haunted ship seemed silly to me. Almost laughable. But I had to admit the ship had the feel of occupancy about it. I half expected that a second helmeted figure would pop out of the shadows before I could go to the aid of the first.
My palms were sweating as I struggled into a spacesuit that hadn't been occupied for at least a century. There were five suits hanging in the locker, and I picked the biggest one. It was a little too small for me, but I couldn't complain much on that score. It kinked a little, then drew tight over the shoulders, but nothing ripped when I moved.
I must have looked grotesque in that old, stiff, freakish garment, all bulges and creases. A big flaring dome over my head, feet like metal pancakes clattering on the deck.
But I wasn't concerned with my appearance, just my oxygen intake.