They entered Barden's office and as they did, Tim Evans came running in. Barden nodded and said: "Miss Ward, this is Tim Evans, my head mathematical physicist. Tim, this is Dr. Ward."
They acknowledged the introduction, but Tim was excited. "Look, Tom, did it work?"
"We had trouble on Ship One but we fudged Two up and made it sing like an angel." Barden explained sketchily.
"Oh," said Evans, his face falling slightly.
"Why?"
"Because I've been thinking along another line and I've come up with another kind of superdrive. If yours didn't work, this one is certain."
"Yes? Go on."
"No need to," said Evans. "Yours is far more efficient and less bulky. Mine would get you there but it would take up a lot of extra space. Besides, it doesn't offer the chance to see where you're going directly, but only through a new type of celestial globe. Furthermore, it wouldn't move as fast. So, forget it."
"New type of celestial globe?" asked Barden. "We could use it, maybe. We can see out all right, but that's due to the intermittence. The present celestial globe system is an adaptation of the pulse-ranging transmission-time presentation, you know. When you're running above light the globe is useless."
"But look, Tom," objected Edith. "You won't need one at superspeed. You'll not be maneuvering, and if you hit something a few million miles ahead in the globe, you're past it before anything could work anyway."