"Yeah?" said Muldoon interestedly. "What's your speed?"
"On test flights," answered Warren proudly, "about a thousand. But that was straight cruising speed. In an emergency we might be able to make as much as twelve-fifty."
"What! A cruising speed of a thousand miles per second? But—but that's over ten million miles per day!"
"And with Venus in inferior conjunction," said Nora excitedly, "we can be there in two and a half days!"
"Well, not quite. You have to allow a time lag for acceleration and deceleration. But—" Captain Warren grinned happily—"three days should do the trick. Not bad, eh, Gary?"
Gary Lane said dazedly, "Not bad! Mister, when they start giving medals for understatement, you ought to get one as big as the United Nations Victory Tower. Why, the universal record for an Earth-Venus flight is almost a day longer than that."
"Three days," supplied Warren, "eighteen hours, twenty-three and a half minutes. Which same so-called 'record' we're going to bust six ways to hell-and-gone on this little shuttle. Only—" he admitted ruefully—"our new record won't count, seeing as how it's unofficial as hell. Well, Venus it is? I'll be leaving you, then, to chart the course and trajectory. Hawkins, show our guests to their quarters. We'll meet later in the lounge."
And he vanished bridgeward.
So set the Liberty forth upon the first leg of its argosy. The next three days sped swiftly. So fraught with activity, indeed, were his waking hours, that Gary Lane found scant time in which to acquaint himself with the Liberty and its personnel. One thing he learned from his space commander friend: that there were, in addition to himself and his companions, fifteen souls aboard the craft. Of these, three were Patrol officers: Hugh Warren himself, his mate, Lieutenant Angus MacDonald, and the Chief Engineer, a lean, taciturn man named Sebold. Two more were subalterns: Bud Howard, the assistant engineer, and Tommy Edwards, the ship's Sparks. The enlisted men included Herby Hawkins, the steward; Tony, potentate of the galley; four able-bodied spacemen; and four blasters of the jet-chamber crew.