Congressmen gave speeches and clergymen spoke and doctors gave opinions and scientists differed. A government seldom known for its cooperation announced that its new atomic-powered rocket was about to effect the rescue single-handedly. But the atomic part blew up in front of the video cameras and took some of the landscape with it. The Council of the United Nations called a meeting. The newspapers and networks covered everything.
A man known for his brilliance came on the air.
"The batteries of the Lady Luna have run down," he said. "We must get there in less than ten days."
They tried to do it.
A second rocket exploded in France.
A third blew up in Germany.
The fourth would not be ready for space for sixty days.
That was seventy long days after Holt's landing.
Without a miracle, Holt would be dead, even if the experts were wrong.
Protestants prayed, Catholics crossed themselves, and Mohammedans called it kismet and let it go at that. A scientist suggested that since there was no habitable planet in the solar system and that mankind could never reach the stars, there was small point in this effort to make space travel pay off. An economist computed the sum of money shelled out already and called it damned foolishness. A Senator Maculay suggested that taxes could be lowered if such expenditures were cut out.