"Sure, I know Hennesey," said Jim bitterly. "And he doesn't count. Not in something like this. This is big, and important, and I'm going to announce it. I want the credit for discovering it. It'll be called Cochran's Theory, and some University will offer me at least an honorary Ph.D. Is that bad?"
Sam shook his head. "Of course it's not bad. But I wonder what the public reaction will be like, and how about Congress—especially if this business about possible poisoning from moondust turns out to be correct? There might be a lot of pressure to cut funds and maybe cancel the whole moon project."
"If moondust is lethal, there's no better time to be warned against it than right now!"
He spent the following week, eighteen hours a day, at the chemical analysis panel in the tracking station. As long as the moon was above the horizon, day or night, he kept experiments going—checking, re-checking, calibrating, searching for loopholes.
There were no loopholes. There was no malfunction of equipment. The atoms of the moon's elements were not the same as those of the rest of the galaxy.
When Allan next came to visit on leave from his own station, Jim told him what had been found. Allan's face paled a little as he listened in awe to the story. He stood up and paced across the room as Jim finished.
"I always knew there would be something—something extra in this," he said. "You look up at night and you know the moon can't be just another piece of earth. Now—you've found out what it is!
"How far could it have come? How old can it be? Imagine stepping out onto a world so old, from so far away!"
"You haven't heard it all," said Mary tensely.