Norton, Andre - Anthology by Gates to Tomorrow (v1.0) Read Free Book Online Page B

basket, could
remove his vague apprehension.
                   A cold cloud of worry shadowed his mind until
he fell asleep.
                   At 0500, an hour before his usual rising time,
Latham, Officer-of-the-Watch, called him.
                   "Captain, the lattice shows a small cloud
of meteoric dust approximately seventy-five thousand kilosecs in diameter. The
density is point zero zero four. I get a spectral classification of Fe dash
one-three-nine-four dash alpha nine-three delta over six. It is located
seventy-two light-minutes from our course at one thirty-six degrees above the axial plane. May I have
your permission to decelerate to chart the cloud?"
                   "I'll be out in a few minutes."
                   He dressed himself quickly with smooth fluid
motion. He paused for a moment before opening the panel leading from his flight
quarters to the captain's gallery. Visions of his vessel's sleek, silver sides
and streamlined length washed the background of his mind like a welcome dream.
The Bureau of Ships called it a Dispatch Freighter, but no captain commanding a
mighty thousand-meter exploring battleship would ever experience the soul-satisfying
thrill his ship filled him with. A wave of pure contentment filled him as his
eyes ran over the narrow welded seams of the ivory-dyed bulkhead. He paused
there to listen to his ship: the soft whisper of the muffled air ducts was as
soothing as a muted lullaby. The thin, tiny creak of the outer hull responding
to its airless environment was as thrilling as a triumphant, stellar symphony.
A frown of perplexity flickered between his gray eyes as he sniffed the air.
                   The atmosphere seemed slightly tainted. It
lacked the heady, tingling, euphoric quality the conditioners normally imparted
to the ship's atmosphere. One of the tubes working the negatron must have blown
during the night. He realized he couldn't depend on Bickford and that he would
have to be watched closely. The thought flashed through his mind of the
consequences if Bickford were to be careless. What if he got sloppy, and something did go wrong with their air? He had once seen the results of slow
asphyxiation in an attack transport. He forced the unwelcome memory from his
mind.
                   He stepped out on the gallery.
                   "Good morning," Nord said, as the
watch officer snapped to attention.
                   Three meters below him the helmsmen were bent
over the green-lighted circular telegator screen. The tiny red and amber lights
over the instrument banks imparted a soft, restful gloom to the darkened
bridge.
                   He walked the length of his gallery. On the
right brushing his sleeve were the telepanels: the spy plates hated alike by
officers and crew. The plates that brought him visual contact with all
compartments of the ship and that he never used except in drills. On his left,
at waist-high level, were the master's meters, duplicates of the instrument
banks on the bridge deck below.
                   'Midship, in front of his own telegator
screen, he paused, adjusted the magnification of the tiny green light
indicating their course and which speared the exact center of the screen. He
measured the circumference of the dot with a micrometer of sodium light, ran
off the difference in the calibrator.
                   "Latham," he leaned over the rail.
                   Latham stepped forward of the steering gang,
looked up. "Yes, Captain."
                   "Three-millionths of a millimeter in ten
million miles is not very much angulation, but in fourteen light-years it
amounts to several hundred miles of unnecessary travel. You are off your
course," he made it sound like a joke between old friends, "three
point two angstrom units."
                   He stepped over to the lattice, checked