d also drift down for recovery and
analysis.

Inside the ship, Quartermain sniffed the air and curled his nose.
"Let's get this thing on the road," he spoke into his throat mike.
"Some of that Florida air must have seeped in here."

"Four minutes to final countdown," blockhouse control replied. "Turn on
your blowers for a second."

Outside the ship, the fuel crews cleared their equipment away from the
pad. The same ripe, heavy odor hung in the warm night air.

At 8:02 p.m., twenty-eight days after the new milks made their first
appearance, Major Quartermain blasted off in a perfect launching.

At 8:03 p.m., the two other Melody Mix hulls standing on nearby pads,
began to melt.

At 8:04 p.m., the still-roaring engine fell from the back end of
Quartermain's rocket in a flaming arc back towards Earth. Fifteen
seconds later, he hurtled his escape capsule out of the collapsing
rocket hull. The parachute opened and the daring astronaut drifted
towards the sea.

Simultaneously, in a dozen labs around the nation, blocks and molds of
Melody's Mix made from that first batch of milk, collapsed into piles
of putrid goo. Every day thereafter, newer blocks of the mix reached
the twenty-eight-day limit and similarly broke down into malodrous
blobs.

* * * * *

It was a month before the stinking, gooey mess that flowed over the
launching pads at the Cape was cleaned up by crews wearing respirators
and filter masks. It took considerably longer to get the nation's three
top plastics firms back in operation as the fetid flow of unfinished
rocket parts wrecked machinery and drove personnel from the area.

The glob that had been Quartermain's vehicle fell slowly back to Earth,
disintegrating every minute until it reached the consistency of thin
gruel. At this point, it was caught by a jet air stream and carried in
a miasmic cloud halfway around the world until it finally floated down
to coat the Russian city of Urmsk in a veil of vile odor. The United
States disclaimed any knowledge of the cloud.

* * * * *

"LAS VEGAS, NEV., May 8 (AP)--The Atomic Energy Commission today
announced it has squeezed the last drop from Operation Milkmaid."

"After a year of futile experimentation has failed to get anything
more than good, Grade A milk from the world's two most famous cows,
the AEC says it has closed down its field laboratory at