elerator, indifferent to
the whining complaint of the jeep's motor.

It was eight miles from his sprawling house to the Mesa Dry Lake
launching site, due east, into the sun. He pulled to the top of Six Mile
Hill and stopped in the middle of the highway. Two miles ahead was
Launching Base I, throwing long, sharp shadows at him in the rosy dawn
light. A cluster of squat, gray blockhouses; a long runway tapering into
the distance with an Air Force B-52 motionless at the near end; that was
all.

Except the Ship.

The Ship towered high, dominating the desert like a pinnacle of bright
silver. Even silhouetted against the eastern sky, it sparkled and
glistened. Impassive it stood, graceful, seeming to strain into the sky,
anxious to be off and gone. The loading gantry was a dark, spidery
framework beside The Ship, leaning against it, drawing strength from its
sleek beauty.

Johnny watched it in silence for a moment, then turned his eyes up, to
the sky. Somewhere up there a tiny satellite spun wildly about the
earth, a little silver ball in some celestial roulette wheel. Gradually
it would spiral closer and closer, caught by the planet's implacable
grasp, until it flared brightly like a cigarette in the heavens before
dissolving into drops of molten metal.

But it would have served its purpose. In its short life it would have
given Man knowledge; knowledge of space, knowledge enough that he could
go himself, knowing what he would find in the emptiness between the
earth and the moon. Or knowing nearly.

_What's it like out there?_

The satellite answered partly; the Ship would answer more.

Johnny slammed the jeep into gear, hurtled down the other side of Six
Mile Hill. Through his mind ran the insistent repetition of an old song
he knew, and he hummed it tunelessly through closed teeth.

_I had a true wife but I left her ... oh, oh, oh._

The jeep skidded to a halt beside Control. Mitch Campbell's green
station wagon was already there, creaking and settling as the motor
cooled.

Control was full of people; Air Force brass, technicians, observers,
enlisted men of indiscernible purpose. The room hummed with the muted
buzz of low, serious conversation.

Mitch Campbell sat in one corner, apparently forgotten in the confusion.
He had nothing to do. Not yet. He was already in flight dress, holding
the massive helmet in his hands morosely, turning it over and over,
staring at it as though he thought he might find his h