A startled expression passed over his likeable rugged features. "By George!" he said aloud. "I wonder!"
Later, when the lights had been extinguished again, he lay awake in the dark—tense, listening. The fo'cs'le was quiet. At length, satisfied that everyone was asleep, he slid from his bunk, crossed the deck to the mess-room.
The faint yellow night light was burning. He sat down at a table, lit a cigarette, waited. He was chain-smoking his third cigarette before he heard a step. He glanced up quickly. Tamis was standing in front of him.
Joel said, "I thought you must have gone to sleep."
Tamis sat down facing him. She'd removed the contact lenses. The liquid luminous depths of her eyes were hypnotic. "No. I couldn't sleep. We need men like you too badly. You especially."
"Me?" he said, startled. "You need me?"
She smiled. "My people, Joel, are a timid race, unwarlike, unaggressive. There are many differences between us. Not of an organic nature. We are fundamentally alike. The differences lie in our culture."
"How do you mean?"
"It is difficult to explain. But your race is so far advanced in the physical sciences that it terrifies us. With your incomprehensible machines you could sweep us into extinction in the wink of an eye.