Joe Berne gasped, and then the truth swept over him. Ye Gods, he thought, what a fool I am! I almost got him, almost brought him down with the projector. The heavy weapon slipped from his nerveless fingers. He sat down heavily on a rock, staring bitterly into the dimness.
"You can't stay out there forever, Sam," Berne said dully. "Maybe I can't kill you with a rocket, but I can kill you with something else."
"I know I can't fight you," Hervey said reasonably. "You're bigger and you're stronger. But you've got to catch me, Joe—and I can run faster than you ever could, you big dumb ox."
Berne shook his head. Everything was wrong. What had happened?
"You can't stay out there forever, Sam," he repeated.
The chuckle came again, thin and ghostly in the earphones. "No," Hervey said. "But Joe—neither can you!"
What did Hervey mean? Berne looked back at the ship, then at the dull metallic dome of Astarea Station.
And then it came to him, what Sam Hervey had tried to say.
He, Joe Berne, did not dare return to the ship so long as Sam Hervey lived, for then Hervey could make a dash for the safety of the station. Nor did Berne dare go to the station, for that would leave the ship unprotected. If Berne went to either place, Hervey could easily reach the air lock of the other refuge, slip through, dog down the doors and sit it out, waiting for the Space Patrol to come.