Reymont went to the closest instrument panel. He stood before its goblin eyes with head bent and thumbs hooked in belt. “Well,” he mumbled. “If you really want me to take charge.”

“I think you had better.”

“Well, in that case. They’re good people. Morale is upward bound again, now that they see some genuine accomplishment of their own. I think they’ll be able to realize, not just intellectually, but emotionally, that there’s no human difference between a million and a billion, or ten billion, light-years. The exile is the same.”

“The time involved, though—” Telander said.

“Yes.” Reymont looked at them again. “I don’t know how much more of our life spans we can devote to this voyage. Not very much. The conditions are too unnatural. Some of us can adapt, but I’ve learned that others can’t. So we absolutely have to push tau down as low as may be, no matter what the dangers. Not simply to make the trip itself short enough for us to endure. But for the psychological need to do our utmost.”

“How is that?”

“Don’t you see? It’s our way of fighting back at the universe. Vogue la galere. Go for broke. Full steam ahead and damn the torpedoes. I think, if I can put the matter to our people in those terms, they’ll rally. For a while, anyhow.”

The wee birdies and the wild flowers spring,

And in sunshine the waters are sleeping—

CHAPTER 16

The course out of the Milky Way was not straight; it zigzagged a little, as much as several light-centuries, to pass through the densest accessible nebulae and dust banks. Nevertheless, the time aboard was counted in days until she was in the marches of the spiral arm, outward bound into a nearly starless night.

Johann Freiwald brought Emma Glassgold a piece of equipment he had made to her order. As had been proposed, she was joining forces with Norbert Williams to devise long-range life detectors. The machinist found her trotting about in her laboratory, hands busy, humming to herself. The apparatus and glassware were esoteric, the smells chemically. pungent, the background that endless murmur and quiver which told how the ship plunged forward; and somehow she might have been a new bride making her man a birthday cake.

“Thank you.” She beamed as she accepted the article.

“You look happy,” Freiwald said. “Why?”

“Why not?”

His arm swept in a violent gesture. “Everything!”

“Well… a disappointment about the Virgo cluster, naturally. Still, Norbert and I—” She broke off, blushing. “We have a fascinating problem here, a real challenge, and he’s already made a brilliant suggestion about it.” She cocked her head at Freiwald. “I’ve never seen you in this black a mood. What’s become of that cheerful Nietzscheanism of yours?”

“Today we leave the galaxy,” he said. “Forever.”

“Why, you knew—”

“Yes. I also knew, know I must die sometime, and Jane too, which is worse. That does not make it easier.” The big blond man exclaimed suddenly, imploringly: “Do you believe we will ever stop?”