"But they can't miss."
"No? Look, lawyer, you're not running a job that may be given a stay or reprieve. The finders run on light velocities. The solar beam runs on the speed of light squared. We'll pass that thing at five thousand miles' distance and at two thousand miles per second velocity. A microsecond of misalignment, and we're missing, see? I think we're going to be forced to put correction circuits in so that the vector sums and velocities and distances will all come out with a true hit. It will not be like sighting down a searchlight beam at high velocity."
"I see. You'll need compensation?"
"Plenty, at this velocity and distance. This is the first time I've had a chance to try it out."
The latter fact saved the Relay Girl. By a mere matter of feet and inches; by the difference between the speed of light and the speed of light squared at a distance of five thousand miles, plus a slight miscompensation. The intolerably hot umbra of Murdoch's beam followed below the pilot's greenhouse of the Relay Girl all the way past, a matter of several seconds. The spill-over was tangible enough to warm the Relay Girl to uncomfortable temperatures.
Then with no real damage done, the contact with ships in space was over, but not without a certain minimum of recognition.
"Hell!" said Kingman. "That was a space craft!"
"Who?"
"I don't know. You missed."
"I'd rather have hit," said Murdoch coldly. "I hope I missed by plenty."