Part 4

"Not as much as I'd like to do," said Channing. "I can't help much. We've got most of the place stopped off with the air-tight doors. We've been electrolyzing water, baking KClO_{3}, and everything else we can get oxy out of. I've a crew of men trying to absorb the CO_{2}. Jimmy Dickson is bringing me hourly reports on the CO_{2} content and we are losing. Slowly, Arden, but we are losing. Of course, I've known all along that we couldn't support the station on the meager supplies we have on hand. But we'll win in the end. Our microcosmic world is getting a shot in the arm in a few hours that will reset the balance."

"I don't see why we didn't prepare for this emergency," said Arden.

"This station is well balanced. There are enough people here and enough space to make a little world of our own. We can establish a balance that is pretty darned close to perfect. The imperfections are taken care of by influxes of supplies from the system. Until Burbank upset the balance, we could go on forever, utilizing natural purification of air and water. We grow a few vegetables and have some meat critters to give milk and steak. The energy to operate Venus Equilateral is supplied with the photoelectric collectors--sun power, if you please. Why should we burden ourselves with a lot of cubic feet of supplies that would take up room necessary to maintain our balance? We are not in bad shape. We'll live, though we'll all be a bunch of tired, irritable people who yawn in one another's faces."

"And after it is over?"

"We'll establish the balance. Then we'll settle down again. We can take up where we left off."

"Not quite. Venus Equilateral has been seared by fire. We'll be tougher and less tolerant of outsiders. If we were a closed corporation before, we'll be tighter than a vacuum-packed coffee can afterwards. And the first bird that cracks us will get hissed at."

* * * * *

Three superliners hove into sight at the end of thirty-one hours. They circled the station, signaling by helio. They approached the air lock end of the station and made contact. Their bulk tipped the station slightly, tipped it and rotated it by gyroscopic reaction. The air lock was opened and space-suited figures swarmed over the mile-wide end of the station. A stream of big oxygen tanks were brought into the air lock, admitted, and taken to the last bulwark of huddled people on the fourth level.

From one of the ships there came a horde of men carrying huge square trays of dirt and green, growing sawgrass.

For six hours, Venus Equilateral was the scene of wild, furious activity. The dead air was blown out of bad areas, and the hissing of oxygen tanks was heard in every room. Gradually the people left the fourth level and returned to their rightful places. The station rang with laughter once more, and business, stopped short for want of breath, took a deep lungful of fresh air and went back to work.

The superliners left. But not without taking a souvenir. Francis Burbank went with them. His removal notice was on the first ship, and Don Channing's appointment as Director of Interplanetary Communications was on the second.

Happily he entered the Director's office once more. He carried with him all the things that he had removed just a few short weeks before. This time he was coming to stay.

Arden entered the office behind him. "Home again?" she asked.

"Yop," he grinned at her. "Open file B, will you, and break out a container of my favorite beverage?"

"Sure thing," she said.

There came a shout of glee. "Break out four glasses," she was told from behind. It was Walt Franks and Joe.

It was Arden that proposed the toast. "Here's to a closed corporation," she said. They drank on that.

She went over beside Don and took his arm. "You see?" she said, looking up into his eyes. "We aren't the same. Things have changed since Burbank came, and went. Haven't they?"

"They have," laughed Channing. "And now that you are my secretary, it is no longer proper for you to shine up to me like that. People will talk."

"What's he raving about?" asked Joe.

Channing answered. "It is considered bad taste for a secretary to make passes at her boss. Think of his wife and kids."

"You have neither."

"Maybe so. But it is still not proper for a secretary to--"

"You can't call me a secretary in that tone of voice," snapped Arden. "I quit! I resign! I refuse to be secretary to a man like you!"

Channing looked helplessly at Franks.

Walt looked at Arden, saw what was in her eyes, and told Channing: "See if you can wriggle out of what comes next!" He took Joe by the arm and said: "Joe, now that the ban is off, may I buy you a drink?"

And Joe answered: "It is a beautiful night out, isn't it?"

It is always a beautiful night on Venus Equilateral. The stars shine forever in a sky that holds a molten ball. Sol flares endlessly in an absolutely black, star-studded sky. There is no moon. The air is always soft and warm and unchanging.

And at the moment that Channing was finding out why Arden resigned, a little man of Northern Venus handed a message to the operator in the International Hotel in Detroit, Michigan. It went out on the land wires to Hawaii; to Luna; to Venus Equilateral; to the rotating relay stations that circle Venus five hundred miles above the planet; down through the raging heaviside layer to Northern Landing; and across the Palanortis Country to Yoralen.

Channing was still investigating his secretary's resignation when Korvus, the Magnificent, read:

TYPE 56-XXD FLIER F. O. B. DETROIT, MICHIGAN, TODAY. WILL BE DELIVERED ON NEXT FREIGHT SHIP.

WILNEDA.

THE END.