Buried in the loose, powdery dust that covered Proxima Centauri I, a spacecraft lay concealed. Ten miles across the blazing flatlands of dust, Galactic Survey Station I was clearly visible. From the station the spacecraft blended so well with the dust that it could not be seen. Only a sharp observer who knew where to look and what to look for could have seen the turret of the spacecraft lofting above the dusty plains. The long-barrelled machine rifle would have been invisible to the sharpest of eye.
Several miles to the other side of the Survey Station there were a group of furrows kicked-up in the plain where test-bursts from the machine rifle had landed.
A television detector was set upon the area between the concrete landing deck and the main spacelock of the Survey Station so that any erect, moving object that intersected the detector-line would cause the machine rifle to fire so that its projectiles would pass through the moving object.
The man in the hidden spacecraft had been playing solitaire for day upon day; the record of his score on the wall of the ship was long—and not too honest.
Eventually the detector-alarm rang and he dropped his cards. He ran to shut off all of the detecting equipment because detecting equipment itself could be in turn detected and he wanted no reprisals. He set his eye to the telescope and watched the new arrival.
Paul Grayson landed his ship on the concrete apron and donned space attire for his walk across the airless planet to the Station. He came from his ship—and though he had seen it countless times before—Paul paused to view the beauty of the airless midnight sky. He looked for Sol, hidden in the starry curtain. He looked at Proxima, a tiny star but utterly brilliant at this distance. It blinded him; luckily the beautiful binary of Alpha Centauri was behind the little planet and he was saved the hurt of looking at that brilliance.
With the same thrill of anticipation he had enjoyed for day upon day now, Paul turned from his ship and started to walk toward the Station. What he might learn there would change the thinking of the galaxy. It was the culmination of years of thought and experimentation; it was the crux of the matter, the final evidence that would give Paul the weight and the conviction. From here he could go on and up; here, now, at any rate soon, was the incontrovertible truth.
He checked his gear thoroughly, but it was force of habit caused by the desire of his own safety. He had planned well. He had forgotten nothing.
He chuckled happily.
He had forgotten nothing. The lissome sweetness of Nora Phillips and the promise of complete fulfillment was sweet recollection.