"A slow moving rock?" grinned McBride.
"Doesn't really matter. If it is slow enough to keep from friction-incandescence, fine. But the eruption made by seetee contact is quite a bit different, spectroscopically. Also we can check the explosion with counters. The by-products of such a bit of eruption is full of nuclear radiations. Mere incandescence is just that and nothing more."
"Well, that's that. We can wait. What's next?"
"Radioactivity. How much and what kind? Atmosphere. How much and what kind? Et cetera. Also how much and what kind? Do we intend to land?"
"I don't know. After all, we came for the express purpose of trying out our drive on an interstellar basis, you know. It can be done with ease, neatness, and dispatch. Seems to me that a landing on one of those planets will have to be made attractive or we won't. We're equipped for all kinds of spacial research, power research, and so on. But we're not equipped for much planetary investigation, exploration, or diplomatically involved intrigue."
"Going to let Drake get away with being the only person making the first landing on an alien star system?"
"I don't give a care what happens to Drake. She can come busting in with the safety valve tied down if she wants to. Some day she'll learn that sticking that pretty little snoot of hers into strange places is a fine way to have it knocked right off of the front of her face. We're interested in technicalities, not in getting involved in a storybook adventure. Meanwhile, let's take it strictly on the easy side and investigate everything from the solar radiation from Sirius to the secondary radiation produced by Sirian radiation in the super-stratosphere."
Larry began to fiddle with the radio. There was nothing on the electronic radio at all, and Larry said: "Well, didn't expect it, really. No culture worthy of the name would be using radio in space. Too inefficient. And if they got off of their planets, they'd be using gravitics." He turned to the space radio, and covered the communication bands of the electrogravitic spectrum, switching from band to band quickly. Halfway across the third band, the panoramic tuner came to a definite stop and retraced itself minutely, vacillating a bit until the signal came in clear and clean.
"What happened to Drake?" asked Timkins. "Listen. Here she is."