"What do you expect?" Sanford was saying derisively. "We're clay pigeons. We're a perfect target. We've just so much ammunition now. You say you may send us more in three weeks instead of a month. I admire your persistence, but it's really no use! This is all a very stupid business...."
He felt Joe's presence. He turned, and then sharply struck the communicator switch with the heel of his hand. The image on the television screen died. The voice cut off. He said blandly: "Well?"
"I want," said Joe, "to take a garbage-disposal party out on the outside of the Platform. I came to ask for authority."
Sanford looked at him in mocking surprise.
"To be sure it seems as intelligent as anything else the human race has ever done," he observed. "But why does it appeal to you as something you want to do?"
"I think," Joe told him, "that we can make a defense against bombs from Earth with our empty tin cans."
Sanford raised his eyebrows.
"If you happen to have a four-leaf clover with you," he said in fine irony, "I'm told they're good, too."
His eyes were bright and scornful. His manner was feverishly derisive. Joe would have done well to let it go at that. But he was nettled.
"We set off the last bombs," he said doggedly, "by shooting our landing rockets at them. They didn't collide with the bombs. They simply touched off the bombs' proximity fuses. If we surround the Platform with a cluster of tin cans and such things, they may do as well. Things we throw away won't drop to Earth. Ultimately, they'll actually circle us, like satellites themselves. But if we can get enough of them between us and Earth, any bombs that come up will have their proximity fuses detonated by the floating trash we throw out."