Would he be following it? Would his last plunge end that way? For the first time he began to feel a twinge of fear. The sweat started out on his forehead, and he could feel it under his arms. He loved his wife and every one of those seven kids. He wished he could see just one of those kids again. Especially Eric. His memory showed him Eric's grinning face, and he bit back a sob. But to die out here, millions of miles--hundreds of millions of miles!--away from them, so that they wouldn't even know it for months: that was too much. "We're ready to start," Petrone said. "I'm coming down myself to get you." Nils didn't answer. He was thinking. How long have I been here already? How much longer can I hold out? "Nils?" "I'm okay," he managed to mutter. What would it be like? How fast would you go? And what would you see, down there on the bottom of the liquid layer of the Uranian atmosphere? There would probably be more of those funny brittle yellow plants that sometimes floated even this high; but no man had ever explored the floor of the liquid air. Would it be smooth, like a ball? Kerr would be down there to keep him company. Damn it, he'd liked Kerr. Was it his imagination, or was he really starting to slip? The trouble was that there wasn't anything he could use to measure by, no fixed point to tell whether he was already going down or not. But once the air line broke, he'd be dead like that. He'd never see the bottom even when he got there. Hundreds of millions of miles! "Eric!" Petrone's voice said, "What?" But Nils ignored him. What would it be like to die like that? Would he even know it? Or would he strangle and gasp and shriek? He was sweating heavily now. Just once, O Lord, just once more. Just to see them. Well, this was his last plunge, either way. He was going to quit as soon as he had his seventh lion; he had it now, and he was through. One way or another. "Gotcha!" It was Petrone's voice. Nils couldn't hear the new cable click into place in his back; but he felt it. And then he felt the slow and steady pull as he was drawn up out of the depths.