s labors. Mad little guy. Tragic, sort of. A
cripple...

"I'll shove off, Paul," Nelsen was saying in a moment.

Out under the significant stars of the crisp October night, Nelsen was
approached at once by a shadow. "I was waiting for you, Frank. I got a
problem." The voice was hoarse sorrow--almost lugubrious comedy.

"Math again, Two-and-Two? Sure--shoot."

"Well--that kind is always around--with me," Two-and-Two Baines chuckled
shakily. "This is something else--personal. We're liable--honest to
gosh--to _go_, aren't we?"

"Some of us, maybe," Nelsen replied warily. "Sixty thousand bucks for
the whole Bunch looks like a royal heap of cabbage to me."

"Split among a dozen guys, it looks smaller," Two-and-Two persisted.
"And you can earn royal dough on the Moon--just for example. Plenty to
pay back a loan."

"Still, you don't pick loans off trees," Nelsen gruffed. "Not for a
shoestring crowd like us. We look too unsubstantial."

"Okay, Frank--have that part your way. I believe there still is a good
chance we _will_ go. I _want_ to go. But I get to thinking. Out There is
like being buried in millions of miles of nothing that you can breathe.
Can a guy stand it? You hear stories about going loopy from
claustrophobia and stuff. And I got to think about my mother and dad."

"Uh-huh--other people could be having minor second thoughts--including
me," Frank Nelsen growled.

"You don't get what I mean, Frank. Sure I'm scared some--but I'm gonna
try to go. Well, here's my point. I'm strong, willing, not too clumsy.
But I'm no good at figuring what to do. So, Out There, in order to have
a reasonable chance, I'll have to be following somebody smart. I thought
I'd fix it now--beforehand. You're the best, Frank."

Nelsen felt the scared earnestness of the appeal, and the achy shock of
the compliment. But in his own uncertainty, he didn't want to be
carrying any dead weight, in the form of a dependent individual.

"Thanks, Two-and-Two," he said. "But I can't see myself as any leader,
either. Talk about it to me tomorrow, if you still feel like it. Right
now I want to sweat out a few things for myself--alone."

"Of course, Frankie." And Two-and-Two was gone.

Frank Nelsen looked upward, over the lighted street. There was no
Moon--site of many enterprises, these days--in the sky, now. Old Jupiter
rode in the south. A weather-spotting satellite crept across zenith,
winking red and green. A skip glider, an orbit-to-ground