Bryan Kimberly cried then. Cried of exhaustion, frustration, loneliness and terror. He lay on his back seeing only the ceiling, a gray mass of steel in which were set the thick lenses that barred even the faint infrared radiation of the chemical lights which illumined the chamber.
How long he lay there looking up at that gray, hypnotic field with its glowing white spot he didn't know. He knew that he could not get to his feet again, and knew equally well that sooner or later he would begin struggling. But not just yet — not just yet.
This would work out all right, he tried to reason with himself. Someone would find him and relieve the ridiculous situation he had placed himself in.
Who? When?
This was Friday night. He glanced at the little clock face in the headpiece. It was after ten p.m. In the morning someone would miss him. But who? He thought carefully. Bernice expected him to be on his way to the cabin now. She wouldn't expect any communication from him. No one would.
Roy was driving her to join him Sunday morning. That meant not before ten o'clock, anyway. Thirty-six hours away. And it would take them time to become alarmed over his absence. They would make calls. There would be investigations by the police, fumbling, bumbling, wild guesses. Someone would finally think of checking clear back to the plant. His secretary, Doris, would remember that he hadn't left when she had.
But who would finally think to look for him in the icebox?
It would be Monday at least before they got around to searching the plant in such detail.
By then it wouldn't matter. He had been watching the air gauge for a long time now. There was only enough air for thirty-two hours at the most.
He lay there for another hour without moving. His mind seemed stunned beyond functioning by the calamity of his fall.