ose they send eight
next time? Or simply one a day for a week?"

Mike made an angry noise. "The seventh bomb shot at us knocks us out!
We're sitting ducks here too!"

Brent nodded. He said mildly:

"Yes. The Platform can't be defended against an indefinite number of
bombs from Earth. Of course the United States could go to war because
we've been shot at. But would that do us any good? We'd be shot down in
the war."

Joe said distastefully, "And Sanford's cracked up because he knows he's
going to be killed?"

Brent said earnestly. "Oh, no! He's a good scientist! But he's always
had a brilliant mind. Poor devil, he's never failed at anything in all
his life until now! Now he _has_ failed. He's going to be killed, and he
can't think of any way to stop it. His brains are the only things he's
ever believed in, and now they're no good. He can't accept the idea that
he's stupid, so he has to believe that everything else is. It's a
necessity for him. Haven't you known people who had to think everybody
else was stupid to keep from knowing that they were themselves?"

Joe nodded. He waited.

"Sanford," said Brent earnestly, "simply can't adjust to the discovery
that he's no better than anybody else. That's all. He was a nice guy,
but he's not used to frustration and he can't take it. Therefore he
scorns everything that frustrates him--and everything else, by
necessity. He'll be scornful about getting killed when it happens. But
waiting for it is becoming intolerable to him."

He looked at his watch. He said apologetically, "I'm the crew
psychologist. That's why I speak so firmly. In five minutes we're due to
come out of the Earth's shadow into sunshine again. I'd suggest that you
come to watch. It's good to look at."

He did not wait for an answer. He led the way. And the others followed
in a strange procession. Somehow, automatically, they fell into single
file, and they moved on their magnetic-soled slippers toward a passage
tube in one wall. Their slipper soles clanked and clicked in an erratic
rhythm. Brent walked with the mincing steps necessary for movement in
weightlessness. The others imitated him. Their hands no longer hung
naturally by their sides, but tended to make extravagant gestures with
the slightest muscular impulse. They swayed extraordinarily as they
walked. Brent was a slender figure, and Joe was more thick-set, and
Haney was taller, and lean. The burly Chief and the forty-one inch
figure of Mike t