The Collection (72 page)

Reeber cleared his throat.
^"
I think you
^'
d
better explain his part to him, Mr. President.
^"

President Saunderson smiled as Carmody looked toward him. He
said, "There is a more important reason, which Mr. Reebcr skipped, why we
could not choose a man who was already married, Captain. This is being done on
an international basis, for very important diplomatic reasons. The experiment
is for the benefit of humanity, not any nation or ideology. Your wife will be a
Russian.
^"

"A
Commie?
You
^'
re kidding me, Mr.
President."

"I am not. Her name is Anna Borisovna. I have not met
her, but I am informed that she is a very attractive girl. Her qualifications
are quite similar to yours, except, of course, that she has not been to the
Moon. No woman has. But she has been a pilot of experimental rockets on short-range
flights. And she is a cybernetics technician working on the big machine at
Moscow. She is twenty-four. And not, incidentally, an Amazon. As you know,
rocket pilots aren't chosen for bulk. There is an added advantage in her being
chosen. She speaks English.
^"

"You mean I've got to talk to her, too?
^"

Carmody caught the look Reeber flashed at him and he winced.

The President continued: "You will be married to her
tomorrow by a beam-televised ceremony. You blast off, both of you, tomorrow
night-at different times, of course, since one of you will leave from here, the
other from Russia. You will meet on the Moon."

"It's a large place, Mr. President."

"That is taken care of. Major Granham-you know him, I
believe?" Carmody nodded. "He will supervise your takeoff and the
sending of the supply rockets. You will fly tonight-a plane has been prepared
for you-from the airport here to Suffolk Rocket Field. Major Granham will brief
you and give you full instructions. Can you be at the airport by seven-thirty?
^"

Carmody thought and then nodded. It was five-thirty now and
there
^'
d be a lot of things for him to do and ar
^r
ange in
two hours, but he could make it if he tried. And hadn
^'
t Junior told
him he was going to be busy this evening?

^"
Only one thing more;
^"
President Saunderson said.
^"
This is strictly confidential,
until and unless the mission is successful. We don't want to raise hopes,
either here or in the Eastern alliance, and then have them smashed.
^"
He smiled. "And if you and your wife have any quarrels on the Moon, we
don't want them to lead to international repercussions. So please-try to get
along." He held out his hand. "That
^'
s all, except
thanks."

Carmody made the airport in time and the plane was waiting
for
him, complete with pilot. He had figured that he would have to fly
it himself, but he realized that it was better this way; he could get a bit of
rest before they reached Suffolk Field.

He got a little, but not much. The plane was a hot ship that
got him there in less than an hour. A liaison officer was waiting for him and
took him immediately to Major Granham
^'
s office.

Granham got down to brass tacks almost before Carmody could
seat himself in the offered chair.

He said,
^"
Here's the picture. Since you got
out of the service, we've tremendously increased the accuracy of our rockets,
manned or otherwise. They're so accurate that, with proper care, we can hit
within a mile of any spot on the Moon that we aim at. We
^'
re picking
Hell Crater-it's a small one, but we'll put you right in the middle of it. You
won't have to worry about steering; you
^'
ll hit within a mile of the
center without having to use your braking rockets for anything except braking.
^"

"Hell Crater?
^"
Carmody said.
^"
There
isn
^'
t any.
^"

^"
Our Moon maps have forty-two thousand named
craters. Do you know them all? This one, incidentally, was named after a
Father Maximilian Hell, S. J., who was once director of the Vienna Observatory
in old Austria.
^"

Carmody grinned.
^"
Now you
^'
re
spoiling it. How come it was picked as a honeymoon spot, though? Just because
of the name?"

"No. One of the three successful flights the Russians
made happened to land and take off there. They found the footing better than
anywhere else either of us has landed. Almost no dust; you won't have to slog
through knee-deep pumice when you're gathering the supply rockets. Probably a
more recently formed crater than any of the others we
^'
ve happened to
land in or explore."

^"
Fair enough. About the rocket I go in-what
^'
s
the payload besides myself?
^"

"Not a thing but the food, water and oxygen you'll need
en route, and your spacesuit. Not even fuel for your return, although you'll
return in the same rocket you go in. Everything else, including return fuel,
will be there waiting for you; it's on the way now. We fired ten supply rockets
last night. Since you take off
tomorrow
night, they'll get there
forty-eight hours before you do. So-
^"

^"
Wait a minute," Carmody said.
^"
On
my first trip I carried fifty pounds payload besides my return fuel. Is this a
smaller type of rocket?"

"Yes, and a much better one. Not a step-rocket like you
used before. Better fuel and more of it; you can accelerate longer and at fewer
gravities, and you'll get there quicker. Forty-four hours as against almost
four days before. Last time you took four and half Gs for seven minutes. This
time you
^'
ll get by with three Gs and have twelve minutes
^'
acceleration before you reach
Brennschlus
-cut
loose from Earth
^'
s
gravitation. Your first trip, you
had
to carry return fuel and a little
payload because we didn
^'
t have the accuracy to shoot a supply rocket
after you-or before you-and be sure it
^'
d land within twenty miles.
All clear? After we're through talking here I'll take you to the supply depot,
show you the type of supply rocket we're using and how to open and unload it.
I'll give you an inventory of the contents of each of the twelve of them we
sent."

"And what if all of them don't get there?"

"At least eleven of them will. And everything's
duplicated; if any one rocket goes astray, you'Il still have everything you
need-for two people. And the Russians are firing an equal number of supply
rockets, so you'll have a double factor of safety." He grinned.
^"
If
none of our rockets get there, you'll have to eat borsht and drink vodka,
maybe, but you won
^'
t starve."

^"
Are you kidding about the vodka?
^"

"Maybe not. We're including a case of Scotch, transferred
to lightweight containers, of course. We figure it might be just the icebreaker
you'll need for a happy honeymoon.
^"

Carmody grunted.

^"
So maybe," Granharn said, the
Russians'll figure the same way
and send along some vodka. And the
rocket fuels for your return, by the way, are not identical, but they're
interchangeable. Each side is sending enough for the return of two rockets. If
our fuel doesn't get there, you divvy with her, and vice versa."

^"
Fair enough. What else?
^"

"Your arrival will be just after dawn-Lunar time.
There'll be a few hours when the temperature is somewhere between horribly cold
and broiling hot. You'd better take advantage of them to get the bulk of your
work done. Gathering supplies from the rockets and putting up the prefab
shelter that
^'
s in them, in sections. We've got a duplicate of it in
the supply depot and I want you to practice assembling it."

^"
Good idea. It
^'
s airtight and heatproof?
^"

"Airtight once you paint the scams with a special preparation
that's included. And, yes, the insulation is excellent. Has a very ingenious
little airlock on it, too. You won't have to waste oxygen getting in and
out."

Carmody nodded.
^"
Length of stay?" he
asked.

^"
Twelve days. Earth days, of course. That
^'
ll
give you plenty of time to get off before the Lunar night."

Granham chuckled. "Want instructions to cover those
twelve days? No? Well, come on around to the depot then. I'll introduce you to your
ship and show you the supply rockets and the shelter."

REMOTELY MARRIED

It turned out to be a busy evening, all right. Carmody
didn't get to bed until nearly morning, his head so swimming with facts and
figures that he'd forgotten it was his wedding day. Granham let him sleep until
nine, then sent an orderly to wake him and to state that the ceremony had been
set for ten o'clock and that he
^'
d better hurry.

Carmody couldn
^'
t remember what "the ceremony
^"
was for a moment, then he shuddered and hurried.

A Justice of the Peace was waiting for him there and
technicians were working on a screen and projector. Granham said, "The
Russians agreed that the ceremony could be performed at this end, provided we
made it a civil ceremony. That
^'
s all right by you, isn't it?
^"

"It's lovely," Carmody told him. "Let's get
on with it. Or don
^'
t we have to? As far as I'm concerned-
^"

"You know what the reaction of a lot of people would he
when they learn about it, if it wasn
^'
t legal,
^"
Granham said. "So quit crabbing. Stand right there."

Carmody stood right there. A fuzzy picture on the
beam-television screen was becoming clearer. And prettier. President
Saunderson had not exaggerated when he'd said that Anna Borisovna was
attractive and that she was definitely not an Amazon. She was small, dark,
slender and very definitely attractive and not an Amazon.

Carmody felt glad that nobody had corned it up by putting
her in a wedding costume. She wore the neat uniform of a technician, and she filled
it admirably and curved it at the right places. Her eyes were big and dark and
they were serious until she smiled at him. Only then did he realize that the
connection was two-way and that she was seeing him.

Granham was standing beside him. He said, "Miss Borisovna,
Captain Carmody."

Carmody said, inanely,
^"
Pleased to meet
you," and then redeemed it with a grin.

"Thank you, Captain.
^"
Her voice was
musical and only faintly accented. “It is a pleasure."

Carmody began to think it would be, if they could just keep
from arguing politics.

The Justice of the Peace stepped forward into range of the
projector. "Are we ready?" he asked.

"A second,
^"
Carmody said. "It
seems to me we've skipped a customary preliminary. Miss Borisovna, will you
marry me?
^"

"Yes. And you may call me Anna.
^"

She even has a sense of humor,
Carmody thought, astonished.
Somehow, he hadn't thought it possible for a Commie to have a sense of humor.
He
^'
d pictured them as all being dead serious about their ridiculous
ideology and about everything else.

He smiled at her and said,
^"
All right, Anna.
And you may call me Ray. Are you ready?
^"

When she nodded, he stepped to one side to allow the Justice
of the Peace to share the screen with him. The ceremony was brief and
businesslike.

He couldn
^'
t, of course, kiss the bride or even
shake hands with her. But just before they shut off the projector, he managed
to grin at her and say,
^"
See you in Hell, Anna.
^"

And he'd begun to feel certain that it wouldn't be that at
all, really.

He had a busy afternoon going over every detail of operation
of the new type rocket, until he knew it inside and out better than he did
himself. He even found himself being briefed on details of the Russian
rockets, both manned and supply types, and he was surprised (and inwardly a bit
horrified) to discover to what extent the United States and Russia had been
exchanging information and secrets. It couldn
^'
t all have happened in
a day or so.

^"
How long has this been going on?" he
demanded of Granham.

"I learned of the projected trip a month ago."

"Why did they tell
me
only yesterday? Or wasn
^'
t
I first choice, after all? Did somebody else back out at the last minute?
^"

"You've been chosen all along. You were the only one
who fitted
all
of the requirements that cybernetics machine dished out.
But don't you remember how it was on your last trip? You weren
^'
t
notified you were taking off until about thirty hours before. That's what
^'
s
figured to be the optimum time-long enough to get mentally prepared and not so
long you've got time to get worried."

^"
But this was a volunteer deal. What if I'd
turned it down?
^"

"The cybernetics machine predicted that you wouldn
^'
t.
^"
Carmody swore at junior.