"Oh, Tom!" I liked the way she said it this time. "Then you are free-lancing?"
"Free is the word for it. The list they put me on is black as the night side of Pluto. No outfit in space would hire me for a swamper after this. And you can't space-rat without a ship to rat in. As a matter of fact, I have a great future behind me. All because I had a great idea."
"What was the idea, Tom? I know you didn't come all the way out here just to talk to me."
"Well, it would have been worth it, but that wasn't it. I was on my way to Jupiter to prove once and for all that there isn't any Warp and that there are pirates on Callisto. Then I broke down a few hours out of Mars, with too much velocity to get back on the chemicals. After a while you came along, and I saw the camp, and managed to set her down. I didn't know this was your rock."
"All right, let it go. I'm done with crazy ideas. The wildest one I have at the moment is to talk your uncle into thinking that I can earn my keep here and a passage back to Earth."
"Good--and I'll talk him into not sending you back with the Patrol."
"Yes--our time here is half gone, and they are due any day to pick up our data and preliminary report. They're overdue right now, as a matter of fact. I thought you were the Patrol cruiser at first. Our figures are hardly worth coming after, unless they've got some good readings on Thule."
I had stopped listening. Patrol regulations make the rescue of distressed spacemen mandatory. They would take me to Earth and turn me loose with a hundred credits bonus, and I could look for a job as a shoe salesman. Or write my memoirs. The Tale of a Disappointed Space Hound. That ought to sell. Back to Earth. I wasn't happy about it. I had crossed four hundred million miles of space to find Betty and I wanted to stay.
I looked at her. She crinkled her nose at me and stood up. "Come on, Tom, don't look so glum. How about something to eat? If you're not hungry I am."
She crossed to the galley end of the room and I followed. Cooking was simple--stick a couple of cans in the diatherm and wait until the signal beeped. It tasted better than what I had had on the Aspera, though. I told her so, and Betty laughed. Then suddenly she jumped to her feet.