Spacehounds of IPC | Page 7

be a creamy blonde, but as she turned to be introduced
to him, Stevens received another surprise--for she was one of those rare,
but exceedingly attractive beings, a natural blonde with brown eyes and
black eyebrows. Sun and wind had tanned her satin skin to a smooth
and even shade of brown, and every movement of her lithe and supple
body bespoke to the discerning mind a rigidly-trained physique.
"Doctor Stevens, you haven't met Miss Newton, I hear," the captain
introduced them informally. "All the officers who are not actually tied
down at their posts are anxious to do the honors of the vessel, but as I
have received direct orders from the owners, I am turning her over to
you--you are to show her around."
"Thanks, Captain, I won't mutiny a bit against such an order. I'm
mighty glad to know you, Miss Newton."
"I've heard a lot about you, Doctor. Dad and Breckie here are always
talking about the Big Three--what you have done and what you are
going to do. I want to meet Doctor Brandon and Doctor Westfall, too,"
and her hand met his in a firm and friendly clasp. She turned to the
captain, and Stevens, noticing that the pilot, with a quizzical expression,
was about to say something, silenced him with a fierce aside.
"Clam it, ape, or I'll climb up you like a squirrel!" he hissed, and the
grinning Breckenridge nodded assent to this demand for silence
concerning children and nursemaids.

"Since you've never been out, Miss Newton, you'll want to see the
whole works," Stevens addressed the girl. "Where do you want to begin?
Shall we start at the top and work down?"
"All right with me," she agreed, and fell into step beside him. She was
dressed in dove-gray from head to foot--toque, blouse, breeches, heavy
stockings, and shoes were of the one shade of smooth, lustrous silk; and
as they strolled together down the passage-way, the effortless ease and
perfect poise of her carriage called aloud to every hard-schooled fibre
of his own highly-trained being.
"We're a lot alike you and I--do you know it?" he asked, abruptly and
unconventionally.
"Yes, I've felt it, too," she replied frankly, and studied him without
affectation. "It has just come to me what it is. We're both in fine
condition and in hard training. You're an athlete of some kind, and I'm
sure you're a star--I ought to recognize you, but I'm ashamed to say I
don't. What do you do?"
"Swim."
"Oh, of course--Stevens, the great Olympic high and fancy diver! I
would never have connected our own Doctor Stevens, the eminent
mathematical physicist, with the King of the Springboard. Say, ever
since I quit being afraid of the water I've had a yen to do that
two-and-a-half twist of yours, but I never met anybody who knew it
well enough to teach it to me, and I've almost broken my back forty
times trying to learn it alone!"
"I've got you, now, too--American and British Womens' golf champion.
Shake!" and the two shook hands vigorously, in mutual congratulation.
"Tell you what--I'll give you some pointers on diving, and you can
show me how to make a golf ball behave. Next to Norman Brandon,
I've got the most vicious hook in captivity--and Norm can't help
himself. He's left-handed, you know, and, being a southpaw, he's
naturally wild. He slices all his woods and hooks all his irons. I'm
consistent, anyway--I hook everything, even my putts."

"It's a bargain! What do you shoot?"
"Pretty dubby. Usually in the middle eighties--none of us play much,
being out in space most of the time, you know--sometimes, when my
hook is going particularly well, I go up into the nineties."
"We'll lick that hook," she promised, as they entered an elevator and
were borne upward, toward the prow of the great interplanetary cruiser.
CHAPTER II
----But Does Not Arrive
"All out--we climb the rest of the way on foot," Stevens told his
companion, as the elevator stopped at the uppermost passenger floor.
They walked across the small circular hall and the guard on duty came
to attention and saluted as they approached him.
"I have orders to pass you and Miss Newton, sir. Do you know all the
combinations?"
"I know this good old tub better than the men that built her--I helped
calculate her," Stevens replied, as he stepped up to an apparently blank
wall of steel and deftly manipulated an almost invisible dial set flush
with its surface. "This is to keep the passengers where they belong," he
explained, as a section of the wall swung backward in a short arc and
slid smoothly aside. "We will now proceed to see what makes it tick."
Ladder after ladder of steel they climbed, and bulkhead after bulkhead