“Don’t worry about me,” Mrs. Kenton said merrily. “I’ll have plenty to do unpacking our clothes and things that they dumped in the living room yesterday. I won’t even miss you four children!”
When the young folks and Dr. Kenton went outside in their space suits, Ted saw that the sun was just a little above the horizon. He had learned that men rose early on Mars to take advantage of the warmth and illumination of daylight.
Dr. Kenton looked into the purple sky through which the stars gleamed. “It’s exactly six-fifteen now,” he said.
“How did you know that?” Ted asked in surprise. “You didn’t look at your watch.”
“I didn’t have to,” his father answered. “That little disk in the sky gives it to me.”
“That’s Phobos,” Ted supplied.
“Right,” his father answered. “It takes only six hours for the moon to go from one horizon to the other, so you can actually see its movement in a few minutes’ time. By judging its distance from the star around it, I can get the time.”
“That sure must take a lot of knowledge of the stars to know just where each one should be at any one time!” Ted said.
“It does,” the scientist replied, “but you’ll learn it in school. I’ll bet Randy knows how to do it now. How about it, Randy?”
“Yes sir,” Randy replied with a grin, “but I guess I’m a little off after being away so long. I thought the time was six-thirty.”