Guy turned his grief-stricken face to me. "Then the hatch closed and we don't dare go near the ship. It was supposed to fire in five minutes, but it hasn't. Those damned owls could have...."
There was a glare in the east. We all turned and saw a brief streak of gilt pencil its way up the black velvet beyond the mountains.
"That's it!" Guy shouted. "That's the ship!" Then he moaned. "A total loss."
I grabbed him by the shoulders. "You mean it won't make it to Venus?"
He jerked away in misery. "Sure, it will make it. The automatic controls can't be tampered with. But the rocket is on its way without any recording instruments or TV aboard. Just a load of owls."
My son laughed. "Owls! My dad can tell you a thing or two."
I silenced him with a scowl. He shut up, then danced off across the terrace. "Man, man! This is the biggest! The most—the greatest—the end!"
The phone was ringing. As I went to the box on the terrace, I grabbed my boy's arm. "Don't you breathe a word."
He giggled. "The joke is on you, Pop. Why should I say anything? I'll just grin once in a while."