Expedition to Pluto

Within the Goddard's hurtling hull Captain "Steel-Wall" McCausland, hero of the space fleets, nursed his secret plan for an Earth reborn. Reuter the scientist cuddled his treacherous test-tubes. And Air Mate Longworth grappled an unseen horror that menaced a billion lives!

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Winter 1939. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

"_Now passing Phobos, the second moon of Mars. From this point to the orbit of Jupiter we are in the planetoid belt, the most dangerous portion of our voyage. This ship's armor of twenty-inch beryll-steel may be perfectly adequate to keep meteorites out, but let just one of those planetoids, little worlds, hit us and this broadcast would end right now. Here we are! Phobos at our left and down, if there is any up or down out here in empty space. It's a little red moon, cracked and seamed, all rock; it has no atmosphere and no weather. The rocks stand up, jagged and sharp. There she goes! Good-bye Phobos--we're making 9,250 miles an hour past Phobos, according to a message from Captain McCausland which has just been handed to me. The Captain doesn't look well this morning. He seems depressed and the difficulties of this expedition are weighing on him. That's all for today. This is 7-LOP, the interplanetary expedition ship Goddard, on the exploring expedition to Pluto. Your reporter, Paulette de Vries speaking. Interplanetary time 0-six-0-0, May 24, 2432._"

The girl snapped the key of her microphone off and turned angrily to the young man who had tapped her on the shoulder. "What do you mean by interrupting my broadcast, Adam Longworth?"

The tall young man was frowning at her. "You know the crew listens in on these broadcasts, don't you?"

"Well, what am I supposed to do about that? Give three cheers?"

"Listen, Paulette. On an expedition as dangerous as this, is it right to let the crew know the Captain is feeling depressed or doubtful? I didn't mean to make you sign off, though."

"I signed off because I was through. Don't flatter yourself! Trouble with you is you try to run everybody's business. I thought you might have got over that in the ten years since I knew you in school, but you haven't. Trying to keep me out of the control room so I wouldn't hurt myself! Wake up, Mr. Longworth, this is 2432; you're still living back in the nineteen-hundreds when woman's place was in the home."

Longworth glanced at a bandage around the girl's left wrist. Paulette reddened.

"All right, I slipped and sprained my wrist. So what? So you have my things moved to another cabin, where I'll be more comfortable. You're an interfering old woman, Mr. Longworth. You're hopeless!"

Longworth reddened uncomfortably.

"Very well, Paulette, I'll stop interfering as you call it. But really, you ought to stop referring to the Captain in such a manner as to break down the morale of the expedition."

The girl glared at him. "I'll take orders about that kind of thing from Captain McCausland and nobody else. And I don't think the man I'm going to marry will censor what I have to say."

Adam Longworth's face set as he stood for a moment irresolute. Then, as Paulette said nothing more, he turned and left the cabin. Outside he paused, gazing down the long main corridor of the space ship toward the open fo'castle lock, where the crew lolled in the month-long idleness of space-voyaging. He frowned, strode off to find Captain McCausland.

* * * * *

Captain McCausland--"Old Steel-Wall" as he was known in the League of Planets Space Service--was poring over the course plotted on the chart table. The handsome, saturnine face and straight back were those of a youth; but he was forty-five and had twenty years of service behind him and had won the honor medals of three planets. He was so absorbed that he did not notice the Mate till Longworth touched his arm.