Part 10

Five minutes to go. No ship in sight. Nothing but star dust and more star dust and the smoldering light of Sol, like a mocking beacon.

Finally Rock had to say bitterly, “Time’s up. I’m afraid we’re licked. There’s no sign of the _Northern Cross_.”

“We’ve got to find that ship!” Kalmus cried. “I’ll search for it if it takes a hundred years!”

“It won’t do any good to search without knowing where to look,” Rock reminded him.

“It won’t hurt to try anyhow,” Kalmus proposed. “We might be lucky. I’ve sunk too much in this expedition to turn back now!”

“We still intend to pay up our share of the costs, Tony,” Rock assured him. “You needn’t worry about that part of it.”

“Finding the ship means as much to you as it does to me—or so you said, Rock,” Kalmus went on stubbornly. “Why are you giving up so easily?”

“Of course it means a lot to me, but I’m not going against terrific odds. It would be crazy.” Suddenly Rock thought of something and turned to Sparky Finn. “Sparky, are you absolutely certain you figured out that navigational problem correctly? Yours was the trickiest of all.”

“I went over it twice, Rock,” Sparky replied solemnly.

“Better look at it again,” Rock proposed. “There’s a possibility we might have botched up our figures somehow. If your calculation is right, we’ll all recheck ours.”

Sparky’s math proved to be correct. Then each of the boys went over his own figures again. Halfway through his, Hugh caught an error in his work.

“Take me for a numbskull!” he burst out. “Look what I did! No wonder I flunked out in cadet school!”

“We are too far out from Venus,” Rock told Kalmus. “We’ve got to go in closer to the planet.”

The _Dog Star_ swung into its new orbit. Kalmus became enthusiastic again, and Rock felt that they would meet with success this time, but if they didn’t, there was nothing more to do but admit defeat.

It was Johnny Colfax who first spotted an interesting “blip” on the radarscope screen two space days later. Half the eleven-man crew was asleep, but Johnny’s shouts brought everyone running into the main control room.

“Look, Rock, I think I’ve found it!”

Rock set the telescope in synchronization with the radar set. Then he put his eye to the telescope eyepiece and turned the hairline focus adjustment. Yes, it was really a cigar-shaped craft, man-made, just about the general shape the _Northern Cross_ was supposed to be. It was a streamlined ship built to slide through the atmosphere of Venus.

Rock judged it to be a few hundred miles away. “It seems to be the _Northern Cross_,” he announced.

“Let me see that thing!” Kalmus blurted and pushed up to the telescope. “There’s our dream ship!” he purred, like a miser over his gold sacks. “I can almost see a dollar sign on that baby!”

A few gentle manual corrections later brought the _Dog Star_ alongside the ghost ship. The smaller ship’s crew clustered at the broad port. Only a few thousand yards away, the ship was a giant thing, gray and meteor-scarred from the years that it had wheeled about in space, alternately feeling the torrid heat of the naked sun and the bitter cold when the sun was eclipsed behind the big planet.

As Rock stared, his heart beat faster. Here was the graveyard of his valiant father and his crew who had battled nature for a share of her wealth and had lost. Rock felt a mixture of feelings—of repulsion and of being drawn to the scene. He was attracted by thoughts of the treasure ore that might fulfill his father’s dream of a satellite hospital, but he was repelled by thoughts of what he might find in that space tomb.

Although circling the planet Venus at high velocity, both ships were as if stationary in space and in relation to each other. Rock, Shep, Hugh, Kalmus, and Judas suited up in preparation to going outside and across to the other ship.

With an extended safety line securing himself to the exit door of the _Dog Star_, Rock was the first to launch himself into the gulf between the ships. He carried a length of electrical cable which he would attach by magnetic force to the side of the _Northern Cross_. Then his companions could hook onto the cable with their own safety lines and cross the gulf without risk of drifting off. They had done some repair work on the unsafe lines that had given them trouble before. They felt more secure with them now.

After the cable was set up, Shep pushed off from the doorstep of the _Dog Star_, and his momentum carried him through the vacuum toward Rock on the other side, his safety line slipping along the cable for security. Behind Shep, the others followed.

Shep had brought two cutting torches for opening the door seams of the _Northern Cross_. He handed one to Rock and they both set to work, the brilliant flare of their tools lighting the blackness like twin novae. The sun was on the other side of the space ship, leaving this shadow side in absolute darkness.

Finally the door was cut all around. All that it appeared to need now was a good strong push. Rock and Shep tried it together, a little gingerly perhaps as they realized their weightlessness, and hence, helplessness. The door hung stubbornly in place. When Kalmus saw their ineffective efforts, he lifted his big booted feet and boldly slammed them hard against the door. The door section caved inward, but the reaction sent Kalmus scooting backward.

Kalmus gave a terrified yell as he went drifting all the way back to the other ship. Not knowing how to navigate in weightlessness, he barged into the wall of the _Dog Star_ with such force that it caused him to bounce back across the gulf again. His safety line kept him from being in any danger of caroming off into space.

Hugh, holding on to the ship, caught Kalmus’ body as it came back to them. The big fellow was moaning from fright, and the boys got secret enjoyment out of Kalmus’ comical and harmless experience.

Then Rock sobered quickly as he faced the grim task that was to follow. He sighed heavily and stepped through the opening into the air-lock tunnel of the ghost ship, followed by the others. His shoes clung to the floor, indicating that the magnetic floor current was still going after twenty years. Leaving the air lock, Rock and his companions found themselves in a lounge. Everything was in neat order, just as if it had been set to rights only today.

“It’s in excellent preservation!” Rock marveled. “The reflector blinds must have kept the temperature in here pretty even through all the years.”

They found other parts of the ship also in neat order. Rock had been told by his mother that his father had been a very orderly man. As yet there was no sign of what had made the vessel a ghost ship.

Rock dreaded every new room they entered. Which one would reveal to him the skeletons of the ghost crew—one of them his father’s, a father he had never seen?

The searchers carried Geiger counters as a check on stray radioactivity from the atomic engines. But so far the only clicks the meters gave off were apparently from the ever-present cosmic rays out in space.

Since no bodies had yet been found, it was supposed that the four crewmen were together in one place. The searchers had entered the _Northern Cross_ near the rear and had been working their way forward. Rock guessed that the bodies must be in the main control room.

In the galley, remains of a meal were still inside sealed plates. The bits were rock hard. An examination of wall pressure gauges showed that the entire ship was open to the vacuum of space.

“Where is the ore?” Kalmus growled. “I don’t like the looks of this!”

The search party moved down ghostly corridors that hadn’t felt the thump of space boots for two decades. Just before reaching the main control room, Rock came to a door-marked, “Stores.”

“This may be it!” he said hopefully and opened the door.

No one needed to tell anyone else that this was the goal they had been looking for. It was a vast, oblong cell, its metal bins piled nearly to the ceiling with gray lumps of rock. The rest of the room was crowded with mining equipment. However, the bigger stuff had evidently been left on Venus.

Kalmus gave a shout and flung himself into one of the bins. He fondled the stones, bathing himself in the wealth. “I’m rich! I’m rich!” he kept saying.

Rock turned away disgustedly, his young friends following. For some reason he almost wished their mission had been a failure. Sharing this treasure that his father had died to accumulate for unselfish motives made Rock feel sick for a moment.

“Want to go into the pilot’s room, Rock,” Shep asked in gentle consideration, “or shall we just pass it up?”

“No, Shep, I’ve got to see if Dad is in there,” Rock answered.

Leaving Kalmus and Judas to play in their wealth, the three youths left the room and moved farther down the corridor to the main control room, the door to which bulged outward. It took considerable ramming to force it open.

The disorder of the compartment was in shocking contrast to the neatness of the rest of the _Northern Cross_. Plastic seats were warped, and it looked as if a giant with a padded sledge hammer had gone about recklessly putting dents in the lightweight metal of the walls. An emergency air lock stood wide open, revealing the stars, its door hanging by one hinge. It was on the side away from the _Dog Star_. The huge console that housed the instruments and gauges also showed great depressions, and nearly all the glass dial covers were shattered.

“What do you think happened in here, Rock?” Shep asked.

“It looks like a high-pressure build-up of gas,” Rock answered. “Probably in the ventilating system. When the pressure got too high, either the air lock was the first to give way or somebody opened it in desperation. I imagine all the men were trapped in here and couldn’t get the door open.”

There were no bodies in the room. All four had evidently been swept through the air lock by the rapidly escaping gas. Rock’s companions could read the truth as easily as he had done himself, and they were considerate enough to remain silent. Rock stared about him for several moments. This was so unexpected, not finding his father. He didn’t quite know how to take it.

The boys went out to join the others. Kalmus and Judas were chattering over their success, already making plans for the future.

Kalmus was not concerned whether Rock had found his father or not. “Let’s hurry up and get this stuff loaded on the _Dog Star_,” was the first thing he said.

“Sure,” Rock said absently.

As they went aft again, Rock’s mind was full of what they had seen. He was rather disappointed in the way he felt. He had thought he would be jumping in elation when they found the alconite ore. Instead, he was almost sorry. It seemed like a violation of his father’s honor to share his property with these men of greed.

The shock of not finding his father’s body continued to disturb him. He had hoped to take it back and give it a decent burial. Yet, as he thought further, perhaps this was the way his dad would have wanted it, because he was first and last a spaceman. Also, his widow would not have to relive the pain of his loss again. Yes, it probably was best this way.

The five of them crossed over on the cable again and made preparations for transferring the ore to the _Dog Star_. They would carry it over in regular space transfer crates secured to the cable. An empty crate would be shoved across the gulf, filled up in the _Northern Cross_, and then sent back over to be emptied of its contents.

The crew was split into two parties, five remaining aboard the _Dog Star_ to unload and the other six going over to the _Northern Cross_ to load the treasure aboard the crates.

The work began and moved along smoothly, but it was going to be a drawn-out operation, if not a rigorous one. Carrying the containers of ore down the corridors of the _Northern Cross_ was a simple matter since they were perfectly weightless and so had only to be guided along by the touch of a hand.

The hours dragged along slowly as load after load was drifted down the corridors of the ghost ship and pushed across the vacuum to the _Dog Star_. The storage bins of the smaller ship bulged higher and higher with the valuable mineral.

As the transference neared completion, Rock took Shep aside, near one of the ports of the _Northern Cross_. Then he began speaking very softly so that none of Kalmus’ men working in the ship could pick up the conversation by helmet radio.

“We’re nearly through, Shep,” he whispered, “and you know what that means for Kalmus.”

“It means he’s got what he came for and that he should be satisfied,” Shep finished.

“To me it’s more than that,” Rock continued. “It means that he doesn’t need any ex-cadets anymore. You heard him say that Judas could run the ship.”

Rock could barely see the frown on Shep’s face through the filtered facepiece of his helmet. “What are you getting at, Rock?”

“The fewer men who return to port with the treasure ore, the fewer there will be to share the profits,” Rock said, his radio-altered voice carrying a sinister inflection.

“You mean you think that Kalmus is going to ditch us?” Shep asked in a fierce whisper. “Right out here in the middle of space?”

“I’m not saying I believe that definitely,” Rock corrected, “but I do think we should start being on our guard for any funny moves Kalmus might make. You’ve seen yourself how greedy he is.”

“What, exactly, do you think we should do?” Shep asked.

“I think that you, Johnny, Hugh, and myself should go on over to the _Dog Star_ right now and tell Kalmus that we believe the ship has got as much ore as she should carry. That will prevent his stranding us over here. If he wants to, let him come over and get the rest of the ore himself.”

“Since we’re making wild guesses,” Shep said, “maybe Kalmus has other plans for dealing with us, such as making us prisoners on the _Dog Star_ as we head back.”

“That’s possible too,” Rock agreed, “but he would need weapons for that, since we outnumber them. I took a quick look through their things before we left port to make sure he and his men had no weapons, and I don’t think they brought any along.”

“Maybe we’re being unfair with the guy, suspecting him at all,” Shep said.

As the words left his lips, he happened to glance out the port and saw Ben Spooner, who had been working on the _Northern Cross_, thrust out across the gulf empty-handed.

“Hey, look!” Shep cried. “Ben’s in a big hurry and he’s not carrying a crate across!” He seized Rock’s space suit. “Now there goes Judas right behind him and he’s empty-handed too!”

Rock felt his heart take a dive. “Shep, they must be going to do exactly what I feared!” He sprang into action. “Come on, we’ve got to get Hugh and Johnny!”

“They can’t maroon us in space!” Shep said, furious, as he tagged along behind Rock down the corridor. “It’s the same as murder!”

“They’re not even waiting to carry the rest of the ore across!” Rock said. “As soon as we find the fellows, we’ll get over to the _Dog Star_ right away!”

Sparky, Ed, and Leo were already in the other ship. Rock and Shep quickly rounded up Johnny and Hugh and the four of them hustled toward the air lock, bumping into crates in their hurry. As they reached it, Johnny pointed out the open doorway.

“Look, Sparky’s coming over!” he said.

“Maybe he’s found out what’s going on,” Hugh spoke.

They gave Sparky a hand into the ship.

“What’s up, Sparky?” Rock asked.

“Jack Judas told me you wanted help in finishing up over here and for me to come over,” Sparky replied.

“We didn’t send for you,” Rock told Sparky. “It must be a trick to get the most of us over here. Come on, you guys! We’ll go over and have a show-down with Kalmus right away!”

But before they could launch themselves, Kalmus had already begun his act of treachery.

“Look what those crooks are doing!” Shep exclaimed.

The boys could hardly believe what they saw. It was more like a bad dream. The cable had jerked away from the side of the _Northern Cross_ as its magnetic attraction was broken. Then the five saw Kalmus lean out and pull it into the _Dog Star_.

“We’re too late!” Rock groaned.

The ex-cadets shouted in frustration and anger at the cold-blooded act. Over their suit radios, they warned their former partners of the consequences of abandoning men in space. But even as they yelled themselves hoarse, Rock knew it wasn’t going to do any good. Kalmus had simply gotten the jump on them, something that had probably been planned at the very beginning of the voyage.

The outer door of the _Dog Star_ closed. A feeling of utter desperation took possession of Rock. Here they were, five of them, marooned on a ghost ship in space, without any foreseeable chance of returning alive to Earth.

An hour had passed since the five ex-cadets had been cut off from the mother ship. The _Dog Star_ had blasted off and was now out of sight. Rock guessed that Kalmus and his rebel crew had compelled Leo and Ed to assist Jack Judas in running the ship.

During this time, the castaways had been taking stock of their situation. Any hopes of sending an SOS were virtually gone. The radio antenna had been badly damaged at its base when loosened by the bulging wall. The radio’s present range could not be over a few thousand miles.

However, things did not look nearly so dark now as they had earlier. The boys found air tanks that would sustain them for quite a while, if not indefinitely. Upon refilling their suits with the aged gas, they found it breathable but carrying a metallic odor.

There was a fair abundance of irradiated food such as all space craft carried. By receiving special treatment in an electronic oven, such food could be preserved for years. Although hard and rather tasteless, the present supply would at least keep them alive. The water-making machine was still in good order, and a drink from it was as fresh as if just drawn from a spring.

However satisfactory these three main essentials were, though, they would all run out some day. That meant that the _Northern Cross_ would have to move out of her stagnant orbit if there was any chance for survival.

Rock was hopefully expectant that the ship would run again. Save for temperature changes, there had been no weather erosion to damage the craft and its fittings. Since the ship’s electrical power came from sunlight and the big solar mirror had continued to gather light over all these years, the electric system worked, and the batteries were still charged. A long-range inspection of the atomic-engine unit showed no radiation leakage. The unit had been shut down ever since the accident to the _Northern Cross_; the boys found the hafnium safety rods plunged well home into the atomic pile to prevent chain reaction. The automatic oil and grease feeds in the ship’s motors had given out by now, and many bearings were squeaky dry, so they replenished these.

The boys were now in the pilot’s room ready to try out the ship under its own power. The console had pretty well resisted the crush of air pressure that had caused the explosion, for the gauges were working. But of course working gauges did not necessarily mean working jets. The boys had made minor repairs in the main control room. They had reconciled themselves to living inside space suits for the rest of the way home since the _Northern Cross_ was open to the vacuum of space, and the air lock was too badly damaged to close again.

When everything was in readiness for a test blast, Rock sat at the console with the others crowding around him to keep their eyes on the many dials. The electronic brain and autopilot were in satisfactory order and would be called upon later if the ship were able to move under its own thrust.

Rock pressed colored buttons and shoved knife switches and floor levers.

“Jet chamber pressures are up!” Johnny said happily.

“The fuel flow gauge is right!” Sparky called.

“The coolant is circulating!” Hugh reported.

The boys felt a vibration and heard a muted hum. Then they felt a slight tug. They had already been traveling at substantial speed under orbital velocity, but the slight increase was unmistakable. A check of the dynamometer, that recorded thrust, indicated that the jets were operating properly. Rock cut off so that they could make plans.

“We could reduce speed and try for landing on Venus,” Rock proposed, looking out the port at the big planet that was buried within its dense veil, “but we’d have to be awfully lucky to land within radio range of any of the research settlements. Besides our radio being weak, there’s a lot of static on Venus from sunspots.”

“I’m in favor of trying to get back home,” Shep declared. “Even if we get off course we may be close enough to radio Luna or some of the space stations for help.”

“As a matter of fact, Luna will be right in our path on the way back,” Rock said.

Shep’s suggestion seemed to be the best idea and was voted for unanimously. After all had helped in figuring out the mathematics of their course, Rock fed the tape into the autopilot. Next everyone took to shock couches.

The _Northern Cross_ was in the fortunate position of being headed Earthward, meaning that its orbital speed could be added to their required velocity. In a manner of speaking, it was as if Venus were a slingshot hurling the pebble of the _Northern Cross_ into space.

Under the crushing pressure of their mounting acceleration, Rock watched the rising space speed in his overhead prism with concern. Would the engines of the ship, inactive for so long, respond at maximum efficiency? If they did, would the old vessel hold together under the strain?

The jets responded, at any rate. Rock’s body seemed to be squeezed flat, his eyeballs pressed deeply into their sockets, his vision blurred.

Then the ship began leveling off, and the pressure lifted from Rock’s body. Before long it was gone entirely, and he knew they could unstrap. The first thing the boys did when they were up was to check the dials on the console. Everything appeared to be satisfactory enough; the _Northern Cross_ should be able to carry them all the way. The radio was set on automatic SOS. Although extremely remote, there was the distant possibility that some ship might be within range.

Later the same day, when Rock had a moment of relaxation, he located his father’s private cabin. Being among his father’s things was almost like being in his presence and seeing him for the first time. There were the few neat clothes still hanging in the closet and the polished black boots in an orderly row.

On a wall desk he saw a picture of his mother and a fountain pen lying with the cap off. On the floor he found a sheet of radiogram paper on which his father had evidently been writing before the disaster.

Rock read the letter that his father had intended to radio to his wife on Earth. The boy’s eyes grew misty and there was a thickening in his throat.

The twenty-year-old message carried a tone of foreboding. It was as though Dr. Merrill felt that the four remaining less-experienced men of his original crew of nineteen could not successfully bring the ship back to port. “So close to my dream of a satellite hospital and yet so far,” were his unhappy words. “And yet we shall try with all our might, my dear, to come home. This treasure of ours _must_ not go to waste. There is so much good that it can do.”

The letter ended abruptly as Dr. Merrill wrote, “Fox has just called me forward. I think they may be having trouble. I’ll tell you all about it when I get back.”

But of course neither Dr. Merrill nor anyone else ever told what had happened.

Rock tenderly folded the brittle paper and tucked it away safely. His mother would cherish this last word from her husband.

Rock knew now why his mother had scrimped and saved, working at the algae canning plant, to make him eligible for cadet school. But he didn’t know how hurt she must have been when he washed out. She hadn’t told him that.