"All right, Lieutenant," he said, gesturing with the gun. "Go on ahead. Go on board. We're going to need you to help pilot this ship to Mars." 14 The silence in the chart room was like the hush that comes over a desert when hurricane winds have died down, or like the stillness of a rocky coast when waves have ceased to pound, and dangerous rocks stand out with all of their saw-edged teeth exposed. It was extraordinary how, at the point of a gun, a man could think and act almost automatically, and postpone making any decision at all. It wasn't cowardice; Corriston was quite sure of that. He felt only anger, deep, relentless, all-consuming. Sweat oozed in droplets from his brow, but it was the heat and the tension which made his skin stream with moisture. There was no immediate fear in him at all. He'd kept fear at bay by refusing to let his mind leap ahead. Only the gun at his back mattered, and just why it should have mattered so much was the only thing that puzzled him. It did not occur to him that what some men dread most is the fear of dying too abruptly, without foreknowledge and with just a second's glimpse of something cold and deadly before the final blackout. A gun had that kind of power. The man with the gun had asked Corriston a great many questions, urgently practical questions that dealt with cold statistics concerning zero-gravity, solar radiation, space drift and the length of time it would take to reach Mars if a single pilot took full advantage of the automatic controls and never allowed himself to become reckless. Corriston had replied to the best of his ability and knowledge, and the other had accepted his answers with a quiet grunt of satisfaction. It was only after that, when the silence had lengthened almost unendurably between them, that the more personal questions came. The killer jabbed the gun more firmly against Corriston's spine and asked in a cold, flat voice: "Do you know who I am, Corriston? Have you any idea?" Corriston stared out the viewport for a moment without replying, his face deathly pale. "I don't know your name," he said. "Probably that's not too important. I do know that you're a cold-blooded murderer, and that killing gives you pleasure. I am very tired. I wish you wouldn't question me any more." "Do you think you can pilot this ship to Mars, tired as you are?" Corriston nodded. The pressure of the gun barrel diminished. "I am very glad--for your sake. I suppose I might as well tell you my name. It's Henley, Richard Henley. We'll be seeing a lot of each other before this trip is ended, but you'll find that I'm not a particularly talkative man. When I have something important to say, though, I won't leave you in any doubt as to what I want done. Right now I must warn you that I would just as soon kill you as not." "You're lying," Corriston said. "If you killed me now you'd never get to Mars. You need me and you know it." "Corriston." "Yes."