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"I saw it too," Paul said a bit sourly "He was driving an open-top car at the time, and had an accident - because he was so fascinated by the stars, he said Turned out he&039;d been drinking"
"Yes, but the people with him in the car backed him up And later there were phone calls to the planetariu"
"I knoe had some at the Moon Project," Paul said "Just the usual business ofyou about was taken a week ago, and it was of soet it , we got a photo of Pluto showing three faint star-squiggles But get this - Pluto hadn&039;t shifted at all! Its i about that?"
"Ordinarily you don&039;t get startled at starlight or even star i Earth&039;s atmosphere does it, same as it makes hills waver on a hot day - in fact, that&039;s what makes the stars twinkle But in this case, whatever isting the starlight had to be out beyond Pluto This side of the stars, but beyond Pluto"
"How far away is Pluto?"
"Almost forty tiht way out in space?"
"That&039;s what puzzles the big boys Soh it would have to be very strong"
"How about the other photos?" Margo pro truck "The second, taken four nights ago by our astro satellite and TV&039;ed doas the same story, except that the planet involved was Jupiter, and the area of the tas larger"
"So that whatever ested
"Perhaps Incidentally, Jupiter&039;s moons hadn&039;t wavered either The third photo, which I saw day before yesterday, showed a still larger area of tith Venus in it Only this ti one"
"As if the light had been twisted this side of Venus?"
"Yes, between Venus and Earth Of course it could have been atmosphere-waver this tirew silent
"Well?" Margo prodded him "You said there were four photos"
"I saw the fourth today," he told her guardedly "Taken last night Still larger areas of twist This tie hadn&039;t wavered"
"Paul! That ht"
"I don&039;t think so," he told her "You can hardly see any stars near the moon with the naked eye Besides, these reports by lay"
"Well," she countered, "it certainly does sound as if so up on thecloser each time"
The road curved south and the darkly bronzedwith the his left hand for a ot the same idea myself, so I asked Van Bruster about it He says it&039;s coh space, was responsible for the four twists He thinks there were four different twist fields involved, not connected in any way - so there can&039;t be any question of so up on the moon What&039;s more, he says he&039;s not too surprised at the photos He says astronomers have known the theoretical possibility of such fields for years, and that evidence for the to show up now, not by chance, but because of the electronically araphic eone into use this year The twists show up in star snapshots where they wouldn&039;t in long exposures"
"What did Morton Opperly think of the photos?" Margo asked
"He didn&039;tNo, wait, he was the one who insisted on plotting the course of the twist fields from Pluto to the moon Say, we just passed Monica Mountainway! That&039;s the fancy new road across the ht now"
"Was the Pluto- to be deflected
"No, the darndest zig-zag io insisted
Paul hesitated, then said, "Oh, he chuckled, and said soet, they&039;re getting closer with each shot&039; "
"You see?" Margo said with satisfaction "You see? Whatever it is, it&039;s ai at planets!"
Barbara Katz, self-styled Girl Adventurer and long-time science-fiction fan, faded back across the laay frolobes and the Palht, and slipped behind the thick jagged bole of a cabbage pal her way She thanked Mentor, her science-fiction god, that the long-hoarded, thirty-inch nylon foot-gloves she earing below her black playsuit were black, too - one of the popular pastel shades would have shown up even without the flash The bag dangling from her shoulder was a black one, of the Black Ball Jetline She didn&039;t worry about her face and arht - and get herto do her bit for integration, but just the same she sometimes resented it that she tanned so dark so fast
Another burden for Jews to bear bravely, her father h her father wouldn&039;t have approved of stouthearted girls hunting millionaires in their hoators Or of such girls carrying bikinis in their swiped shoulder bags, either
The police the shrubs across the street now, so she continued across the lawn springy as foam rubber She decided that this was certainly the house fro while she&039;d sneaked her swiot very dark around her as she advanced As she rounded another palmetto, she heard the whisper of a tiny electric motor, and she almost overran a white suit that was seated at the eyepiece of a big white telescope supported on a white-legged tripod and directed at the western sky
The suit got up with a kind of lurch that showed it was helped by a cane, and a voice quavered fro," Barbara Katz responded in her warmest, politest voice "I believe you knowinto the black-and-yellow striped bikini May I watch the eclipse with you?"