He turned to the hangar, turned back.
"Say 'cheese.' They'll shoot the close closeups later."
I said something other than "cheese." They must have been
using telelens and been able to read my lips, because that part
of the tape was never shown.
I threw my junk in the back, climbed into a passenger seat,
and lit a cigarette. Five minutes later, Cal himself emerged
from the office Quonset, looking cold. He came over and
pounded on the side of the hopper. He jerked a thumb back at
the hangar.
"They want you in there!" he called through cupped hands.
"Interview!"
"The show's over!" I yelled back. "Either that, or they can
get themselves another baitman!"
His rustbrown eyes became nailheads under blond brows
and his glare a spike before he jerked about and stalked off. I
wondered how much they had paid him to be able to squat in
his hangar and suck juice from his generator.
Enough, I guess, knowing Cal. I never liked the guy,
anyway.
Venus at night is a field of stable waters. On the coasts, you
can never tell where the sea ends and the sky begins. Dawn is
like dumping milk into an inkwell. First, there are erratic
curdles of white, then streamers. Shade the bottle for a gray
colloid, then watch it whiten a little more. All of a sudden
you've got day. Then start heating the mixture.
I had to shed my jacket as we flashed out over the bay. To
our rear, the skyline could have been under water for the way it
waved and rippled in the heatfall. A hopper can accommodate
four people (five, if you want to bend Regs.and underestimate
weight), or three passengers with the sort of gear a baitman
uses. I was the only fare, though, and the pilot was like his
machine. He hummed and made no unnecessary noises.
Lifeline turned a somersault and evaporated in the rear mirror
at about the same time Tensquare broke the forehorizon. The
pilot stopped humming and shook his head.
I leaned forward. Feelings played flopdoodle in my guts. I
knew every bloody inch of the big raft, but the feelings you
once took for granted change when their source is out of reach.
Truthfully, I'd had my doubts I'd ever board the hulk again.
But now, now I could almost believe in predestination. There it
was!
A tensquare football field of a ship. A-powered. Plat as a
pancake, except for the plastic blisters in the middle and the
"Rooks" fore and aft, port and starboard.
The Rook towers were named for their corner positionsand
.any two can work together to hoist, co-powering the graffles
between them. The graffleshalf gaff, half grapplecan raise
enormous weights to near water level; their designer had only
one thing in mind, though, which accounts for the gaff half. At
