For the first time since he had known her, Gret Helmuth smiled. It was a warm smile and it did strange things to Pell. Before she could reply to his peace offering, his arms were around her and he kissed her. She seemed to respond instinctively for a moment, then pushed him away.
She laughed and said cynically, "That was a rather obvious development, wasn't it?" She disappeared down the narrow passage-way to the waist.
Pell savored the memory of her lips for a moment, then grimaced to himself. She was right, of course.
He exhaled a cloud of smoke and watched its tendrils stream around the control panel and fluff against the plastine observation shield. He tried not to look at the blackness outside because it hurt his eyes. Men had been known to go mad from looking too long at the alien strangeness of this extra-dimensional space which was not for human eyes. Its very nothingness seemed to twist at one's mind.
He glanced at his instruments, then at the celestial navigation globe. In normal space the ship had traveled some four and one-third light years. But in hyper-space it had moved very little during the two hours it had been under the Thelmard.
He turned to Gret. "We've arrived—at least that's what this thing says." He patted the globe. "How's Heintz?"
"Okay now. I gave him some more amytal."
"Umm. That's dangerous stuff—be careful," Pell said. "We're going to fall free again—watch it!"
He cut the converter and deftly cranked up the detectors to full sensitivity. Then he held his breath as he cut the Thelmard and dropped out of hyper-space for an instant. He jumped in spite of himself as all hell broke loose. The detector alarm clamored deafeningly and its red light blinked feverishly.
Throwing up the Thelmard again, Pell turned to the girl and mopped his brow. "I don't think they caught us on their own detectors, but we almost dropped out in their laps." He grinned.