Remaining with the Aes Triplex was Captain Yancey,
Lieutenant Thurlow, now executive officer and astrogator, Sublieutenant Peters, now chief engineer, Cadet Jensen, chief communications officer, and Cadets Jarman and Dodson, watch officers, all departments-and Dr. Picketing, ship's surgeon.
Commander Miller, captain of the Pathfinder, had one less officer than Captain Yancey, but all of his officers were experienced; Captain Yancey had elected to burden himself with the cadets. He would have assumed command of the derelict himself and taken his chances with her, except for one point- the law did not permit it. He could place a master aboard her and put her back in commission, but there was no one present with authority to relieve him of his own ship-he was prisoner of his own unique status, commanding officer operating alone.
In her original flight plan it had been intended that the Pathfinder should make port at Deimos, Mars, when Mars overtook her and was in a favorable position. The" delay caused by the disaster made the planned orbit quite out of the question; Mars would not be at the rendezvous. Furthermore Captain Yancey wanted to get the astounding evidence contained in the Pathfinder to Terra Base as quickly as possible; there was little point in sending it to the outpost on Mars' outer satellite.
Accordingly reaction mass was pumped from the Aes Triplex to the smaller ship until her tanks were full and a fast, fairly direct, though uneconomical, orbit to Earth was plotted for her. The Aes Triplex, using an economical "Hoh-mann"-type, much longer orbit, would mosey in past the orbit of Mars, past the orbit of Earth (Earth would not be anywhere close at the time), in still further, swinging! around the Sun and out again, catching up with Earth J nearly a year later than the Pathfinder. She had mass to Hohmann, Dr. Walter-The Attainability of the Celestial Bodies, Munich, 1925. This pioneer work in astrogation, written long before the flight of the Kilroy Was Here, remains the foundation work in its field. All subsequent work is refinement of basic principles set forth by Hohman. accomplish this, even after replenishing the Pathfinder, but she was limited to time-wasting, but fuel-saving, orbits more usual to merchant vessels than to ships of the Patrol.
Matt, in one of his multiple roles as assistant astrogator, noticed a peculiarity of the orbit and called it to Oscar's attention. "Say, Oz, come and look at this-when we get to perihelion point, the other side of the Sun, we almost clip a cloud off your home town. See?"
Oscar looked over the charted positions. "Well, darn if we don't! What's the nearest approach?"
"Less than a hundred thousand miles. Well tack on her a bit-the Old Man is a heller for efficient orbits, I find. Want to jump ship?"
"We'd be going a trifle fast for that," Oscar commented dryly.
"Oh, where's the old pioneer spirit? You could swipe one of the jeeps and be gone before you're missed."