It took three hours for General Criswell's ferrets to obtain facsimiles of the reports needed. A sweating staff (borrowed from the cryptographic section to preserve secrecy) finally broke them down to three probables: a Lunar courier which had aborted and returned to base for no clean cut reason, an alleged training exercise in three body orbits with the instructors' seats inexplicably filled with nothing lower than the rank of Lieut. Commander and a sour smelling sortie out of Guantanamo labeled Operation Artifact.
Jordan remained sold on the latter for half an hour until fuel consumption and flight time log figures failed to correlate with an orbital flight, and the bottom fell out of the case. As it turned out it was the courier after all. Both the pilot and his commander refused to talk until presented with the alternative of court-martial proceedings.
Senator Darius: Now, Admiral, I'm going to put the question to you this way, just to see if I can get a straight answer. Did you or did you not issue orders to Lunar Courier G771 specifying in general substance that it was to retrieve satellite '58 Beta?
Admiral Flack: (hurt but proud) The Navy, sir, has a long record of gallantry, a tradition of derring do dating back to John Paul Jones ... a tradition we are all proud of and which we continue and will always continue....
Senator D: (with acid patience) Again, if I may put the question, Admiral. Did you or did you not issue the order?
Admiral F: (defiantly) '58 Beta is Navy property, sir! I am glad and proud to say that I issued the order to retrieve her.
Senator D: Aha! (to the recording secretary) Did you get that? And now, Admiral, will you explain to this committee why this action, in view of the exigencies of the present situation, didn't strike you as singularly high handed, not to say out of your jurisdiction?
Admiral F: (after a whispered consultation with an aide) Well, sir, there is a precedent. May I recall to your attention an incident recorded in Navy history about eighty years ago. An officer of flag rank, if my memory holds, in defiance of instructions and in a damaged ship, at great danger to himself and his crew, acting on an operational plan which had been scathingly disapproved by his superiors, went to the rescue ... the successful rescue ... of a three-man Lunar exploration party which had become lost near the south scarp of Sinus Iridum. The officer's name, I am almost certain, was Captain Steven Darius ... the Senator's grandfather, I believe ... an officer the Navy will never cease to honor.