Page:Weird Tales volume 36 number 01.djvu/16

30 by a gigantic, menacing platter. A monstrous missile of death. The planet Jupiter—dead on our course!

Lancelot Biggs' face, which had been keen and alert a moment before, was suddenly a dull, blank mask of horror. Strangled words fought their way from his throat.

"I—I didn't realize! I forgot all about Jupiter when I plotted the return course!

"Forgot!" roared the skipper. "Great comets—forgot!" Then his wrath died in anxiety. "Do something. Turn off that blasted unit of yours so we can loft over her—"

But Todd shook his head.

"That's no use, Skipper. I thought of that. We're too close. We're caught in her gravitational attraction anyway. Even if we were to turn off Biggs' device, there still wouldn't be time to get the rockets hot."

"Lance—" began the skipper. Then, "Where did he go?"

ECAUSE Biggs had turned, suddenly, and raced from the room! Fled, still clutching the space-chart. Fled, and not a word of advice, regret or hope. And with him went our last dwindling hope of salvation.

Dick Todd's voice was thin.

"Maybe he has an idea, sir?"

Hanson grasped at the thought as a drowning man.

"That's it, Todd. He'll pull us out of this. He's never failed us in the past—"

But even this wishful expression was doomed to swift contradiction. For at that moment the bridge audio flashed, and the voice of a sailor clacked from somewhere below.

"Captain Hanson, sir? There—there's trouble down here! Lieutenant Biggs has violated regulations, sir! He knocked down two men and forced his way into the auxiliary lifeboat! He—he's locked the door, sir. What shall we do?"

In the moment of silence that followed, I saw something I hope I shall never be forced to look upon again. I saw a proud man wilt before my eyes; I saw a strong man age ten years in as many seconds.

The man was Captain Hanson. The strength sloughed from his shoulders; pain burned deep furrows in his eyes; I could barely hear the whisper that crept from his lips.

"A coward!" he husked. "The man my daughter loves—a coward!"

And there was nothing I could say to refute the accusation. Lancelot Biggs' action had branded him more damningly than any mere words. A crisis had come—and it had found him wanting. He had deserted his comrades, his ship, and had fled to a lifeboat. Perhaps even now he was getting ready to cast off.

In a swift burst of comprehension, I thought I could understand the reason for this last, unreasonable defection. Lancelot Biggs had met difficulties before and without flinching.

But that was an old, a different, Biggs. Love had come into his life now. Love, and a woman, and all the dreams that happy men dare wish upon.

And these things, staunch and noble in themselves, had weakened the moral fibre of Biggs. Weakened it to the point where, in the face of danger, nothing was important except that he live to return to the arms of his loved one.

These things I could understand. But I could not forgive them. Because love or no love, fear or no fear, a spaceman has a tradition to live up to. And Lancelot Biggs had tossed into the discard the very tradition now upheld by Dick Todd as he said, quietly, "Shall I advise the men, sir?"

And by Captain Hanson who said, "Yes, Todd. And—and order Garrity to cut off Mr. Biggs' intensifier. We may die, but