it, then arrived at a decision. Reaching into his own coat, Duran took
out the pack of cigarettes, extending it to his son.

"Care for a cigarette?" he asked.

The youth looked at him doubtfully for an instant. Then he smiled his
first smile that evening.

"Thanks, Dad," he responded, taking one and lighting it
self-consciously. He added, "You've been out of town so much, I didn't
think you knew I'd started--"

"I know, Rog," the man said, aware of a rising flood of
self-condemnation. "Go on, son. About the rocket. What kind of fuel
did you use?"

"Oh, nothing special. It had a liquid bi-propellant motor. We used
ethanol and liquid oxygen. Pretty old-fashioned. But we didn't know
how to get hold of the fancier stuff, and didn't have any way of
synthesizing it. Then, at the last minute, we found that one of the
valves feeding into the nozzle was clogged up. That's why we were late
to class."

"Couldn't that have been dangerous?" Duran asked, and realized at once
that he had said the wrong thing.

The boy merely shrugged.

"Well, it must have been a pretty good machine if it flew sixty miles
and hit its target," Duran went on.

"Oh, we had it radio-controlled, with a midget T.V. transmitter
mounted in it. Grasso took care of that. He did a terrific job. Of
course, it was pretty expensive."

He glanced at his father tentatively for a moment, then bent his gaze
to the cigarette.

"I don't have my car any more. But I guess I won't be needing it now."

There was a cautious knock on the door.

"Listen, Rog," Duran began, "I'll try to get to see you tomorrow
before I leave. Remember that your mother and I are both on your side,
without qualification. You've done a pretty terrible thing, of course.
But I have to admit, at the same time, that I'm really rather proud of
you. Does that make sense?"

"Sure," said Roger huskily, "I guess so."

* * * * *

The flight home was a quiet one. Duran found himself with many
thoughts to think, not the least of which was what his wife's reaction
would be. The difficulty lay in the fact that their married life had
been too easy, too free of tragedy, to enable him to foresee her
response. But life would not be quite the same now, even if Roger
escaped the more concrete forms of punishment. And perhaps it would be
the most difficult for Ernest, who would forever be expected either to
live up to or down to his older brother's reputation. When al