a year on the asteroid when we were due to pass Mars. So our
first anniversary was spent in checking our movements with a telescope,
a camera and a chronometer. We discovered our mass--or that of Asteroid
57GM--had depreciated another 25 per cent. It now had only half the mass
it was supposed to have. This was too much of an error for even a grade
school student.

"I'll bet some astronomers back on earth will get redder than my hair
when we get home," Red said.

I shook my head. "It hasn't anything to do with their observations," I
said. "It's what is happening now to you and me. We're losing mass
someway."

There was only one way to check it and that was to weigh ourselves. So I
rigged up a rude sort of a balance by weighing out chunks of rock until
we had a mass equal to what we should weigh, placing them on a
teeter-totter arrangement I rigged up in the lab.

"It'll be close enough to learn if we've lost half our mass," I said.

Red showed a weight loss equal to about 20 pounds on earth. I had gained
a little weight. These figures were only relative, and dependent on
whether or not the rocks we'd used on the balance had lost mass also.
But something was wrong with Red and I decided to watch him carefully.

"Your scales are cockeyed," Red said. "I feel fine. Never felt better,
in fact. Except that I'm lonesome ... not that I don't enjoy your
company, pal, ole pal, but I'd like Dollie's better."

Something on the far side of the room caught my eye. It was along the
glass partition between the lab and the living room. It might have been
a reflection of some sort, because the sun was up and its beams were
coming right through the transparent roof at that moment. But for a
fleeting instant I thought I saw a figure there. A tall, shapely,
black-haired girl, dressed in a flowing robe of orange. The next instant
she was gone.

I said I thought it might be a reflection, but I was pretty sure it
wasn't. "Red," I said. "We've got company."

"Huh?"

"I'm sure of it, Red. There's somebody else here besides us."

"There's no one else. You're crazy." Red looked around the room. Then he
looked at me. His gaze was sharp and penetrating.

"You can't see it now," I said. "But I'm sure I saw something. A woman.
Over there." I pointed to where I'd seen the thing that might have been
a reflection.

"Maybe you'd better lie down, Jay. You've been working too hard. A year
out on this rock could make a man see King Solomon's h