Ishie. "Perhaps we could disregard so narrow a differential...."

"In your opinion, doctor," the captain asked, "would it be safe to
return the personnel to the rim? Of course, I would have to return the
entire ship to normal conditions in order to give the machine shop or
any other part of the rim its normal six-foot shielding," he added,
"so please consider your answer carefully."

"I think you would be quite safe to do so, captain. Considering the
fact that otherwise we may go into the Van Allen belt, I think it
should be done without question."

To himself, Mike chortled gleefully. This grave, pedantic physicist
was about as unlike the co-conspirator with whom he had worked for the
past nearly ten hours as was possible. "The guy's a genius at a lot of
things," he thought to himself. "Puts on the social mock-up expected
of him like you'd put on a suit of clothes--and takes it off just as
completely," he added as an afterthought.

* * * * *

The return to the rim was slower than had been the evacuation--but it
was complete within twenty minutes of the decision to return the
satellite to normal.

In the machine shop, Paul and Tombu, with Ishie and Mike, were
gathering the materials they'd need for the odd construction--Paul
singing to himself as he worked.

_"I got in the shuttle, thought it went to the Base;_
_I'd learned my trade; there I'd take my place_
_Safely on Earth; but I found me in space--_
_I'd went where I wasn't going!"_

"What's that song?" asked Ishie of the spaceman.

"Oh, that's just 'The Spaceman's Lament.' You make it up as you go
along." His voice grew louder, taking the minor, wailing key at a
volume the others could hear.

_"I got on the wheel, thought I'd stay for the ride--_
_I'd found a funny suit in which to hide--_
_But I went through a closet--and I was outside!_
_I'd went where I wasn't going!"_

Tombu and Mike joined happily in the chorus, bawling it out at the top
of their lungs as they began the work that would make the big
Confusor.

_"Oh ... there's a sky-trail leading from here to there_
_And another yonder showing--_
_But when I get to the end of the run_
_It'll be where I wasn't going!"_

Meanwhile, facsimile copies of the official drawings had been made for
the other interested scientists aboard, and also sent by transfax to
U.N. headquarters for distribution among Earth's