Back at Christmas Island, the American pilot was still asking why. He asked it of Dr. Valdez, a grey-haired man, chief of the spacemedic team. "You're right," Dr. Valdez said. He was sitting in a chair on the veranda of the infirmary, hands folded behind his head, looking out to sea. "The Center did ask my advice on this matter. I told them what I thought the odds were against a successful rescue operation. I also told them that, for scientific reasons alone, I thought it was worth attempting." "But why?" The American looked down at him. Dr. Valdez looked at the sea. "It is now just about twenty-four hours since Duport jumped into space. His beacon is still operating, and the orbital plot has been completed. The rescue ship will launch in about thirty hours from now. Estimating six hours between lift-off and rendezvous, this means that Duport will have been alone in space for a total of about sixty hours. Two and a half days." The American said nothing, waiting for him to go on. "Think of him up there." Dr. Valdez closed his eyes. "Completely alone. Total silence except for the sound of his own breathing. He sees nothing but stars, intensely bright, above him, beneath his feet, on all sides, the silver smear of the Milky Way, the Clouds of Magellan, the nebulae. The Earth is a great, swollen balloon that swings past his field of vision now and then, the Moon a smaller bubble. Without a reference point there is no sense of depth, no perspective. He can reach out and touch the stars. He swings in space, beyond time and distance, completely alone." "So what?" the pilot said at last. Dr. Valdez straightened in his chair and leaned his elbows on his knees. "So there are some things we--I--would like to know. I'd like to know what is happening to him, out there. What he has seen, perhaps heard. The effects on his body, if any. Above all, the effect on his mind. No human being has ever experienced anything like it before. There's something else I'd like to know. We worked with him for nearly a year. He finished with the highest rating in his class. We never would have sent him out if we hadn't been sure about him. But somewhere we made a mistake, there was something we failed to see. I'd like to know what made him jump." This time the American looked out to sea. He was silent. The doctor took out an old briar pipe and began filling it from a leather pouch. "Strange. His radio beacon is functioning normally. There's no reason why his transmitter and receiver shouldn't be working too. Yet we've been trying to contact him by means of voice communication, and he doesn't answer. Maybe he's dead already. There's no way to tell." "Do you think he's worth saving?" the pilot asked after a minute. "I'd like to know why he jumped." * * * * *