“‘B’ Deck!” Jim Vance echoed. “Thank you, sir!”
He hoisted the bags easily in his strong arms. Then, handing his patron one half of a baggage check, he headed briskly for the concrete pit where the throbbing space ship rested on torpedolike tail fins.
Jim was in a tingle of excitement. This was his first customer on ‘B’ Deck. He’d get a first-rate view of the Hercules’ luxury quarters! Jim always swallowed hard when he neared the astronaut. She was so incredibly big, so very much like the massiveness of the space which was her real home. Though the Hercules was carrying some space freight this trip, she was mainly a tourist vessel; and her destination was Venus.
“I’d give anything if I could make one trip into deep space,” he thought fervently as he stepped into the outside elevator and was carried far above the brightly lighted Miami spaceport. For an instant he seemed to share a kinship with the silent stars that encircled him like a speckled bowl.
Getting off on B Deck, Jim walked slowly along the polished corridor toward Suite 8. The finery of the deck fairly numbed his senses. While studying the turquoise carpet underfoot, his eyes shifted to his worn shoes, and then he felt out of place.
It took money to go into space. If not that, it at least took extensive training to be a crewman. He had neither money nor training, not even a family. Not that Jim Vance was ready to cry about it, though. He had long ago accepted his lot without complaint.
A senior-grade lieutenant stopped him outside of Suite 8. He wore a square red mustache, and he neatly filled a uniform of gray flannel with gold piping.
“We’re blasting off at 0800 sharp, son,” he said. “Better remind your patron to get aboard.”
“I will, sir,” Jim returned. For a moment he felt like a full-fledged crewman taking orders. He liked the feel of it, and he wished desperately that it were so.
He went into the suite and set down the bags. His eyes roved over the rich trimmings, the deep honeycomb rubber cushions. An oval port looked out on the winking night lights of the coast city. There were two other rooms to the luxury quarters.