THE RUN OUT to the departure position was uneventful and reasonably pleasant.  It could have been more pleasant; spacemen welcome company aboard their ships whom they can impress with their shop talk.  But the scientists and technicians each had their own mess and, obedient to Druthen, kept themselves to themselves.  It could have been unpleasant, Grimes conceded, if Druthen had forced his company upon Sonya and himself.  He was content to let well enough alone.

Meanwhile, he could and did enjoy the society of Mayhew and Clarisse, of Billy Williams, of young Major Dalzell, of the other officers.  But during the drink and talk sessions it was hard to keep the conversation away from the purpose of their expedition, from the findings and the fates of earlier expeditions.

Why had Calver been successful (if he had be n successful)?  Why had those before him and aftee him met disaster?  "There's only one way to find out, Skipper," Williams had said cheerfully.  "We'll just have to see what happens to us!  And if you're around, the fat always gets pulled out of the fire somehow!"

"There has to be a first time for everything," Grimes told his second in command with grim humor.  "There'll be a first time when the fat won't be pulled out of the fire."

"She'll be right," Williams told him.  "Mark my words, Skipper.  She'll be right."

And all of them studied the sailing directions, such as they were, until they knew them by heart.  "Put Macbeth and Kinsolving's sun in line," the long dead Maudsley had told somebody.  "Put Macbeth and Kinsolving's sun in line, and keep them so.  That's the way that we came back.  Fifty light years, and all hands choking on the stink of frying lubricating oil from the Mannschenn Drive..."  And for fifty light years Calver had run, but with the Lead Stars in line astern.  He had logged the distance, but found nothing.  He had initiated a search pattern, and at last he had been successful.  Those following him had not experienced the same difficulties - but each successive Ship had been fitted with an improved model of the mass proximity indicator.  Calver's instrument had been no more than a prototype, capable of detection at only short ranges.