d which they were
moving. It was so small against the massive cloud that he lost it
easily.

Each time he took his eyes away, he lost it, and had to search for it
again.

"It's not too far in," Wyatt said at last, breaking the silence.
"We'll move down the cloud to the nearest point, then we'll slow down
and move in. Should take a couple of days."

Beauclaire nodded.

"Thought you'd like to see," Wyatt said.

"Thanks." Beauclaire was sincerely grateful. And then, unable to
contain himself, he shook his head with wonder. "My God!" he said.

Wyatt smiled. "It's a big show."

Later, much later, Beauclaire began to remember what the Commandant
had said about Wyatt. But he could not understand it at all. Sure,
something like the Hole was incomprehensible. It did not make any
sense--but so what? A thing as beautiful as that, Beauclaire thought,
did not _have_ to make sense.

* * * * *

They reached the sun slowly. The gas was not thick by any Earthly
standards--approximately one atom to every cubic mile of space--but
for a starship, any matter at all is too much. At normal speeds, the
ship would hit the gas like a wall. So they came in slowly, swung in
and around the large yellow sun.

They saw one planet almost immediately. While moving in toward that
one they scanned for others, found none at all.

Space around them was absolutely strange; there was nothing in the sky
but a faint haze. They were in the cloud now, and of course could see
no star. There was nothing but the huge sun and the green gleaming dot
of that one planet, and the endless haze.

From a good distance out, Wyatt and Cooper ran through the standard
tests while Beauclaire watched with grave delight. They checked for
radio signals, found none. The spectrum of the planet revealed strong
oxygen and water-vapor lines, surprisingly little nitrogen. The
temperature, while somewhat cool, was in the livable range.

It was a habitable planet.

"Jackpot!" Coop said cheerfully. "All that oxygen, bound to be some
kind of life."

Wyatt said nothing. He was sitting in the pilot chair, his huge hands
on the controls, nursing the ship around into the long slow spiral
which would take them down. He was thinking of many other things, many
other landings. He was remembering the acid ocean at Lupus and the
rotting disease of Altair, all the dark, vicious, unknowable things he
had approached, unsuspecting, down the years.

..