"Certainly, Mr. Taggert. And I want to thank you for this opportunity to do research work along these lines."
Brian Taggert thanked Forsythe and hurried out with the air of a man with important and urgent things on his mind.
He went up the stairs to the office directly over the one he had assigned to Forsythe and stepped in quietly. Two men were relaxed in lounge chairs, their eyes closed.
Taggert closed the door carefully and went into his own office.
General Howard Layton, USSF, looked no different from any other Space Force officer, except that he was rather handsomer than most. He looked as though he might have posed for recruiting posters at one time, and, in point of fact, he had--back when he had been an ensign in the United States Navy's Submarine Service. He was forty-nine and looked a prematurely graying thirty.
He stood in the observation bunker at the landing area of St. Thomas Spacefield and watched through the periscope as a heavy rocket settled itself to the surface of the landing area. The blue-white tongue of flame touched the surface and splattered; then the heavy ship settled slowly down over it, as though it were sliding down a column of light. The column of light shortened--
And abruptly vanished as the ship touched down.
General Layton took his eyes away from the periscope. "Another one back safely. Thank God."
Nearby, the only other man in that room of the bunker, a rather short civilian, had been watching the same scene on a closed-circuit TV screen. He smiled up at the general. "How many loads does that make, so far?"
"Five. We'll have the job done before the deadline time."
"A little. I still am, to be honest. What if nothing happens at the end of sixty days? The President isn't one of us, and he's only gone along with the Society's recommendations so far because we've been able to produce results. But"--he gestured outside, indicating the newly-landed ship--"all this extra expense isn't going to set well with him if we goof this once."
"I know," said the civilian. "But have you ever known Brian Taggert to be wrong?"
General Layton grinned. "No. And in a lesser man, that sort of omniscience could be infernally irritating. How is he progressing with Forsythe?"