a phone-call."

He went to a pay visiphone. And again there were different levels of
awareness in his mind--one consciously and defensively cynical, and one
frightened at the revelation of his unimportance, and the third finding
the others an unedifying spectacle.

He put the call through with an over-elaborate confidence which he
angrily recognized as an attempt to deceive himself. He got the office.
He said calmly:

"This is Jed Cochrane. I asked for a visiphone contact with Mr.
Hopkins."

He had a secretary on the phone-screen. She looked at memos and said
pleasantly:

"Oh, yes. Mr. Hopkins is at dinner. He said he couldn't be disturbed,
but for you to go on to the moon according to your instructions, Mr.
Cochrane."

Cochrane hung up and raged, with one part of his mind. Another part--and
he despised it--began to argue that after all, he had better wait before
thinking there was any intent to humiliate him. After all, his orders
must have been issued with due consideration. The third part disliked
the other two parts intensely--one for raging without daring to speak,
and one for trying to find alibis for not even raging. He went back to
the ticket-desk. The clerk said heartily:

"Here you are! The rest of your party's already on board, Mr. Cochrane.
You'd better hurry! Take-off's in five minutes."

Holden joined him. They went through the gate and got into the
tender-vehicle that would rush them out to the rocket. Holden said
heavily:

"I was waiting for you and hoping you wouldn't come. I'm not a good
traveller, Jed."

The small vehicle rushed. To a city man, the dark expanse of the
space-port was astounding. Then a spidery metal framework swallowed the
tender-truck, and them. The vehicle stopped. An elevator accepted them
and lifted an indefinite distance through the night, toward the stars. A
sort of gangplank with a canvas siderail reached out across emptiness.
Cochrane crossed it, and found himself at the bottom of a spiral ramp
inside the rocket's passenger-compartment. A stewardess looked at the
tickets. She led the way up, and stopped.

"This is your seat, Mr. Cochrane," she said professionally. "I'll strap
you in this first time. You'll do it later."

Cochrane lay down in a contour-chair with an eight-inch mattress of foam
rubber. The stewardess adjusted straps. He thought bitter, ironic
thoughts. A voice said:

"Mr. Cochrane!"

He turned his head. There was Babs Deane, his secretary, wit