ought to have perfected and simplified space travel for one thing. Made it safer and easier—put it on a commercial basis, like we have with air travel.”
“Supposing we had? The public would never take the risks. I know astronomers have a good idea of what dangers to expect on other worlds, but we don’t know everything.”
“We would with my projector as the white mouse,” Bob said slowly.
“Projector?” Mona stared at him. “What projector? Don’t tell me you’ve a magic lantern hidden away in that shack we call home.”
“No, nothing like that. Just a theory I’ve got. Forget it. An idea I’ve doped out between times. Sometimes I have nothing to do up here but sit and think—and then I get the most marvellous notions.”
“Maybe the altitude,” Mona murmured, then turned and looked at the reflector. At the moment the tremendous mirror upon which it was focussed was blank.
“Any chance of one tiny little peep?” she asked coyly.
Bob sighed. “Oh, so you’re after a star tour again, are you? One might think this reflector was installed purely for the spouses of astronomers to come and look through.”
“Only one spouse, darling—or is there something I don’t know about?”
“Stop clowning, can’t you?” Bob roared; then he checked himself. “Okay—no harm in a little tour, I guess. The staff are busy at the moment checking on what they’ve got. Now, where’d you want to go?”
“Suppose you tell me? That’ll give you a fine chance.”
Bob gave her a look, so Mona relaxed and waited as the monster came to life again. Her eyes lighted with genuine pleasure. Bob stood beside her at the rail and together they gazed down on the mirror as the mammoth probe crawled at random through the firmament.
“There’s something about this that always gets me,” Mona whispered. “I don’t know exactly what is it: perhaps the goddess in my wild soul.”
“Peeping into eternity like this certainly does hit you in the eye,” Bob acknowledged.
“Come to think of it, it would be rather wonderful if we could get safer and easier space travel. Be much better than strato-flying, anyway. That has so many limitations....”
Mona suddenly stopped talking—so suddenly indeed that Bob glanced at her in surprise.
“Anything wrong?” he enquired.
Mona did not answer. All recollection of what she had been saying seemed to have gone out of her head. She pointed to the reflector-mirror with a somewhat unsteady hand, pointed to a star which shone balefully bright. In the main it was blue-white, varying at times to an almost Martian red, then back once more to white.
“Bob, what star is that?”
All the habitual levity had gone from the girl’s voice. It was strained; taut as steel wire.
“Why, Sirius,” Bob answered, still astonished. “About the brightest star in the heavens. Star A in Canis Major, distance 8.7 light years....”
“It’s horrible!” Mona whispered, and her face was drawn as she watched the star move through the graded squares on the mirror. “It’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen!” she declared passionately.
Bob gave a rather uneasy laugh. “But that’s absurd, Mona! It’s really quite beautiful, especially now when one can sort of see it at such close quarters....”
He stopped, dumbfounded. Mona’s legs had suddenly given way and she dropped soundlessly to the polished metal flooring. For about five seconds Bob just could not believe it. Mona, of the steel nerves, who was not afraid of dying, going out in a faint? Then he came to himself and lifted her limp body in his arms, depositing her in the control chair. Reaching out, he stopped the reflector mechanism.
“Mona,” he said sharply. “Mona, what’s wrong?”
For a while she lay sprawled in the snug grip of the chair; then, as he rubbed her hands vigorously, she began to show signs of recovery.
“Darling, what’s wrong?” Bob caught her shoulders tightly and looked into her face as colour began to return to it.
She smiled wanly. “You’re asking me! I—I— What on earth happened, anyway?”
“Why, you were talking about Sirius and then suddenly you went out like a blown flame.” Bob grinned reassuringly. “Maybe it’s the air up here. It does get you right in the middle sometimes. I’ve bowled over before today, especially with the dome open. Can’t keep the air at normal pressure.” He stopped and frowned. “But that should make your nose bleed,” he mused. “And it isn’t doing so.”
“Maybe it would if you punched me on it for being such a fool.”
There was silence for a moment, then Mona struggled unsteadily to her feet.
“No, it isn’t the altitude,” she decided. “I’ve been way up in the sky before today without an oxygen mask and my heart never missed a beat. First time in my life I ever did that. I just don’t understand it! Maybe the old ticker’s a bit overstrained from extreme acceleration. I’ve been doing a lot of fast rocket-flying lately.”
Bob gripped her arm. “Better see a doctor, Mona. Promise me you will.”
“You bet I will! I can’t go risking other people’s lives in a plane if I’m liable to go out like that....” Mona turned and gazed at the now blank mirror. “Almost looked as if something happened to me when I gazed at Sirius, didn’t it? First time I’ve ever seen Sirius close up.”
“Truly, but at other times we’ve viewed different parts of the heavens.” Bob made a gesture. “Hang it all, dear, this is absurd. How could Sirius...?”
“Of course, how could it?” she exclaimed; then she smiled with something like her old carelessness and picked up her flying helmet from the table. “Just the same, Bob, I’m taking no more tours with ‘Tiny’ until I find out what’s wrong with me. Maybe I’ve got astrophobia.”
“Huh? What in blazes is that?”
“Fear of heights. Standing gazing into space on that mirror is a pretty dizzy business at that.”
Bob nodded slowly, frowning. It struck him that Mona’s conclusion was illogical. An ace strato-pilot bowling over just through looking into a space-mirror...?
“Well....” Mona tightened the helmet strap under her chin. “That seems to be all, except for goodbye. I’ve got to get back to the airport. No, no, don’t worry about me!” she added quickly. “I’ll be quite all right. See you at home—I hope.”
She had been striding across the polished floor as she spoke; now the door closed behind her. A few minutes later Bob heard her fast rocket-plane scream over the Observatory’s lofty height. Through the big window he watched it descending in an ‘S’ of sparks towards the cloud-pack low down in the moonlight. Below, far below, lay Los Angeles.
Moodily, shaken by Mona’s queer lapse, he turned back again to ‘Tiny’, switched it on again and studied Sirius for himself, long and earnestly. Certainly he could not see anything about it to occasion horror—nor did he feel unbalanced in any way. Finally he decided to study the data concerning the star.
“Spectrum deficient in dark lines, proving metallic absorption,” he muttered. “Star not surrounded by metallic vapours, thereby putting it in Class B, totally apart from the G-type dwarf like our own Sun. A hydrogen envelope, mostly transparent....” He closed the file and scowled. “Damned if I know why I’m reading this stuff anyway!”
“Hello there!” the loudspeaker bawled suddenly, and Bob gave a start. He reached across and snapped on the microphone.
“Yes? What’s wrong?”