uld they have?--the landing of the first manned ship on our satellite
seemed to render him as obsolete as a horde of other lesser and even
greater lights. At any rate, it was inevitable that the conquest of the
moon would be merely a stepping-stone to more distant points.

Oh, no, I had nothing to do with the selection of the Red Planet. Coming
in as head of Project P-4 in its latter stages, as I did when Dr.
Fredericks died, the selection had already been made. Yes, it's quite
likely I may have been plugging for Mars below the conscious level. A
combination of chance, expediency and popular demand made Mars the next
target, rather than Venus, which was, in some ways, the more logical
goal. I would have given anything to have gone, but the metaphorical
stout heart that one reporter once credited me with is not the same as
an old man's actual fatty heart.

And there were heartbreak years ahead before the _Goddard_ was finally
ready. During this time he slipped further into obscurity while big,
important things were happening all around us. You're right, that one
really big creation of his _is_ bigger than ever. It has passed into the
language, and meant employment for thousands of people. Too few of them
have even heard of him. Of course, he was still known and welcomed by a
small circle of acquaintances, but to the world at large he was truly a
"forgotten man."

It is worthy of note that one of the oldest of these acquaintances was
present at blast-off time. He happened to be the grandfather of a
certain competent young crewman. The old man was a proud figure during
the brief ceremonies and his eyes filled with tears as the mighty rocket
climbed straight up on its fiery tail. He remained there gazing up at
the sky long after it had vanished.

He was heard to murmur, "I am glad the kid could go, but it is just a
lark to him. He never had a 'sense of wonder.' How could he--nobody
reads anymore."

Afterward, his senile emotions betraying him, he broke down completely
and had to be led from the field. It is rumored he did not live long
after that.

The _Goddard_ drove on until Mars filled the viz-screen. It was planned
to make at least a half-dozen braking passes around the planet for
observational purposes before the actual business of bringing the ship
in for landfall began. As expected the atmosphere proved to be thin. The
speculated dead-sea areas, oddly enough, turned out to be just that. To
the surprise of some