Gary shook his head. He stole a swift glance at the girl and her face seemed pale. Perhaps she was remembering.
Chapter Four
Trail's end, Pluto's single community, cowering at the foot of a towering black mountain, seemed deserted. There was no stir of life about the buildings that huddled between the spacefield and the mountain. The spiraling tower of the radio station climbed dizzily spaceward and beside it squatted the tiny radio shack. Behind it stood the fueling station and the hangar, while half a mile away loomed the larger building that housed the laboratories of the Solar Science commission.
Caroline moved closer to Gary.
"It seems so lonely," she whispered. "I don't like loneliness now…
after…”
Gary stirred uneasily, scraping the heavy boots of his spacesuit over the pitted rock. "It's always lonely enough," he said. "I wonder where they are.”
As he spoke the lock of the radio shack opened and a space-suited figure strode across the field to meet them.
His voice crackled in their helmet phones. "You must be Nelson," it said.
"I'm Ted Smith, operator here. Kingsley told me to bring you up to the house right away.”