It was gone. The stars gleamed alone in the deep purple of the night.
A click sounded. The hum of the Elton ray died into silence. The luminous wall of the room sprang into opaque reality.
I sat up, blinking, shivering, to find Dr. Weatherby standing before me.
“That, Leonard, is the start. Shall we see the vehicle itself?”
III
LAUNCHED INTO SPACE!
We were to leave at dawn, and during that night a thousand details ended our attention: Jim’s resignation from the service, which he gave to the superior through verbal traffic department without so much as a word of explanation; my own resignation, leaving the post of Commander 3 of the 40 N temporarily to Argyle.
Temporarily! With what optimism I voiced it! But there was a queer pang within me, an exaltation—which I think was as well a form of madness—was upon us all. This thing we were about to do transcended all our petty human affairs.
I was standing at the door of the workshop, gazing at a tree. Its leaves were waving in a gentle night breeze, which as I stood there fanned my hot, flushed cheeks with a grateful coolness. I found Alice beside me.
“I’m looking at that tree,” I said. “Really, you know I’ll be sorry to leave it. These trees, these hills, the river—I wouldn’t like to leave our earth and never come back, Alice. Would you?”
“No,” she said. Her hand pressed mine; her solemn blue eyes regarded me. She was about to add something else, but she checked herself. A flush rose to her cheeks; it mantled the whole column of her throat with red.