Lester del Rey: Marooned on Mars

Then the routine of the work took up his thoughts. Soldering was always a pleasure without air to corrode the cleaned surfaces of the metal. There might be disadvantages to living on a world with no atmosphere, but it had its compensations.

The second shift man relieved him eventually. Hetouched helmets with Dick before taking over. “Governor wants to see you. Chuck. Bonan sancon!”

Chuck found Governor Braithwaite expecting him. The man was almost the perfect picture of a beardless Santa Claus, with a beaming face and a hearty manner that was completely genuine in his case. Now, however, there was concern and worry behind his quick smile of greeting,

“Bonan tagon. Chuck. I’d have seen you last night, but I knew you’d be tired. I’m deucedly sorry about all this, you know. Now I’ve got a little good news for you—not much, but something, at least”

Chuck waited, while the Governor fished through his papers. “Oh, bother. Never mind, I know what it said.” He tossed the papers aside, and leaned back. “‘You’re an important young man. The President of your United States has made an official request for the UN to let you go. You made the highest rating of anyone who took the tests for the position, and Earth agrees with me that we on the Moon shouldn’t be neglected. If we can speed up action in the Council, we may get that blasted rule waived yet.”

“You shouldn’t have taken so much trouble,” Chuck began.

The Governor cut off his protests with a wave of his hand.

“Bosh. I’d have a rebellion on my hands if I didn’t, son.” He shook his head slowly. “But I’m not going to give you any false hopes. It will be difficult—very difficult. If we can stall them off in selecting someone else, and if we can cut through enough red tape in the Council, we have a slim chance. The chief trouble is that the next highest man is a young fellow from the United States of Chinese ancestry; naturally the Council’s Chinese Delegate will oppose us.”

“Just how much chance do I have?” Chuck asked.

“I wish I knew. I’d sleep better if I did. But chin up, son! We’ll do everything we can. And there’s an old law I can invoke to quarantine the appointee for medical inspection and inoculation. If we don’t get a replacement for the crew tomorrow, I’ll be able to hold him until after the ship leaves for Mars.”

“You wouldn’t”

“Wouldn’t I?” Governor Braithwaite chuckled, and| came around the desk to clap Chuck lightly on the shoulder. “I’m a quiet man. Chuck, but just a bit stubborn. You go on home now, and let yourself sleep like a young heathen. We’re all fighting for you.”

Going down the long tunnel toward his home, Chuck thought it over, and tried to feel that it was now on the laps of the gods. But it was the very uncertainty of his chances that bothered him the most. He stopped at a store to pick up the little newspaper that came out each day and scanned it carefully. Two freighters had come in that day, but there were no passengers. His replacement hadn’t come yet. Then he grinned at his own foolishness; if the man had arrived, Governor Braithwaite would have known about it first.

There was no news that night that he could find by using his radar set. He tossed and turned in his bed, telling himself that quarantining his rival would be an unfair trick, and that he should refuse to take advantage of it. But the fact that he had proved himself to be the best man for the job opposed that; it wasn’t fair to the rest of the crew to take second best, he kept thinking.

In the morning, going to work, he scanned the bulletins hastily. The Council was meeting, but a question about the order of procedure had taken up all the day before, and Braithwaite’s appeal hadn’t even been mentioned. His eyes looked at the shipping notes. There were no freighters due for the day, and no passengers had come on the late night ship.

At the Eros, men were still working, but there was very little left to do, and they weren’t worrying much about that. Men clustered together in little groups, touching helmets and conferring busily. Chuck couldn’t take their stares. He went up into the control room and shut the hatch behind him.

It was only half an hour later when the rich baritone of Dick Steele reached him through the air that now filled the ship. He opened the hatch.

“News, Chuck. Jeff Foldingchair was pulled down to Earth on emergency orders last night. He’s just landing back here now. We’ll know what’s up in a few minutes.”

Chuck nodded. He should have known that the Earth administrators would anticipate the Governor’s trick and make sure the replacement was here in plenty of time. He put his tools away neatly.

“I’m going home, Dick.”

“I’ll ride you back,” Dick suggested. He snapped down his helmet and went down with Chuck.

The men pulled back to let them pass. Chuck’s father was one of the few men not in sight, but he stuck his head out of the engine hatch and waved as Chuck climbed onto the tractor. Everyone was trying to look casual, as if nothing were happening, but they all knew what it meant.

Chuck paused to take a long look at the big rocket ship before he nodded for Dick to start the tractor. In the sky overhead, he could barely make out the tiny dot that was Mars. It seemed farther way than it had ever been before.

Chuck’s mother met him at the door, and her face was filled with worry for him.

“You’ve got company, Charles,” his mother told him. “I sent the young man into your room. I didn’t want you to be bothered.”

Chuck tried to smile at her. He nodded and went into his room.

The young man sitting there looked more uncomfortable than Chuck. The light olive complexion and the definitely Chinese eyes of the visitor showed the reason; Chuck’s replacement was not only on the Moon, but in his own room!

The stranger stood up awkwardly and held out a hand. “I’m Lewis Wong, Mr. Svensen. I guess you know why I’mhere. I—I just want you to know I think it’s a dirty trick. That’s why I came here the first thing.”

It took Chuck by surprise, and he fumbled for words, but the other went on quickly.

“I saw the figures on your tests, and you’re the man for the job. Anyhow, you had it first So I hope your Governor’s appeal goes through.”

“I thought it had been turned down,” Chuck cut in.

“No—not when I left. They hadn’t gotten to it. I’m here just in case they do turn you down. Look, Mr. Svensen, I learned how they feel about you up here—your friend Foldingchair made that clear. I… nice radar set you have there. I… oh, doggone it all, I mean, I can refuse to go, can’t I?”

Chuck turned it over, feeling as awkward as the other looked. He wondered what he would have done, had the situation been reversed. But he had to make some answer. “Suppose they picked me and I refused to go,” he began.

“Yeah.” Wong nodded, his eyes on the floor. “Yeah, I guess I wouldn’t want the position then much, either. It was just an idea. What do they call you—Chuck?”

“Except for my mother. She doesn’t like the nickname, though I guess she’s used to it. Hey, Lew, how’d you like to come out to the ship with me tomorrow? It’s about done, but I can sort of help you get the feel of things. It makes this stuff look pretty sick.”

They began to discuss Chuck’s rig then; Lew apparently knew more theory than Chuck, though he’d had less chance to practice with the super-long-range sets. This set had been one of the leading arguments in Chuck’s favor, since he’d built it out of worn or rejected parts from the .big set at the receiving station and had erected his own beamed antennas. The testing board had commented openly on the fact that it showed he could improvise—and improvising might prove important on the long journey.