I’ll find out what it is.
And do a bit of research I have in mind.
And —well, wait.”
Chan Derron’s air of lightness was growing very thin.
A hoarse little break came in his voice.
“Wait,” he whispered slowly.
“With all the equipment on the little Phantom Atom to manufacture food and air and water with atomic power, I can last a lifetime—if I must.
I can wait and listen.
Even at that distance, I ought to pick up something with the visiwave— enough to know if Chan Derron can ever come back.”
He tried to grin, again, and waved his hand at the picture of Luroa.
“Till then, my darling,” his voice came huskily,
“I guess it’s goodbye.
To you and the Legion and the System.
To every man and woman I ever knew.
To every street I ever walked.
To every bird and every tree.
To every living being I ever saw.
“Good-bye—”
Chan Derron gulped suddenly.
He turned quickly away from the two pictures on the bulkhead, and looked out into the depthless dark of space.
His eyes blinked, once or twice.
And his great tanned hands stiffened like iron on the vernier-wheel of the Phantom Atom.
The geodynes made a soft musical humming.
There was a slow muffled clicking from the automatic pilot.
Chan Derron stared northward, into the star-shot dark.
There—somewhere in Draco—lay that unknown object, the only possible haven left.
It would be like this, always, he thought.
Silence and darkness.
He would hear the murmur of his machines, and his own rusty voice, and nothing else.
He would talk too much to himself. He would look across the cold dark at the bright points of other worlds. And wonder—
Tchlink!
It was a soft little sound.
But Chan Derron stiffened as if it had been the crash of a meteor’s impact.
He spun, and his hand flashed for the blaster hanging in its holster on the bulkhead.
Then he saw the thing that had made the sound, lying on the view-plate of the star-chart cabinet.
The breath went out of him.
His hand dropped from the weapon, helplessly.
His great shoulders sagged a little.
For a long time he stood staring at it, with all the strength and hope running out of him like blood from a wound.
“Even here!”
His bronze head shook, wearily.
“Even out here.”
Slowly, at last, he picked up the sheet of heavy red paper, that had been pinned beneath the crude little serpent of black-burned clay.
He read the neat black script:
My Dear Captain Derron:
Congratulations on the brilliance and the daring of your last escape.
Samdu has long since turned back, to try to guard the New Moon—from me!
For the moment, you are safe.
But I must give you two points of warning.
You will find alarm and danger waiting for you on the moons of Uranus.