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gravity, it would drift in toward Venus or toward the sun and then beyond it.
    “Fifteen-fifty, Wilson!”
    Pete nodded, pressed his thumb down on the firing button. He heard an ear-shattering roar, ran quickly to the tower window to look outside. The Mars-bound freighter was rising slowly, majestically, on a growing pillar of flame. In seven seconds he had to crane his neck upward to see it, and soon all his eyes could follow was the streak of fire. An instant later, the ship disappeared.
    “You really like to watch those ships go, don’t you, Wilson?”
    “Yes sir, Captain Saunders.”
    Smiling, the captain shook his head. “I can’t understand it, but then, I’m not complaining. Lord knows we need men like you here.”
    “What can’t you understand, sir?” Pete had a pretty good idea what the man meant, but he asked his question anyway.
    “Your knowledge of astrogation, Wilson. As if you’ve spent all your life on theory, and half of it on practice . . .”
    Pete smiled. “It’s sort of been a hobby of mine, sir.”
    “I’ll say! And the way you can map orbits in your head, without doing any paper work! Incredible.”
    “Yes. At the Aca — uh, sometime ago, I was told that was unusual. Maybe it’s intuition and split-second reasoning instead of the accepted procedure. There are maybe a handful of men all over the planet who can do that, but . . .”
    “I’ve heard of them,” Captain Saunders grinned. “But I’ve never been lucky enough to work with one, until you came along. Tell me, Wilson, do guys like you have to use radar?”
    “Sure. Of course we use radar. Only we can interpret it directly in our heads. That saves a lot of time . . .”
    “And,” Captain Saunders nodded enthusiastically, “it could also save lives. Wilson, when split-second decisions have to be made, I’d like to see you around to make them.”
    By demonstrating that special ability, Pete had been hired quite readily at the Spaceport. White Sands always needed orbit men, for most of the good ones would become astrogators and leave for space. The result was that the Spaceports had to settle for overage astrogators who had lost some of their quick reflexes with the waning years. Yet paradoxically, the orbiteers were as important as the star-pilots themselves, for they had to plan the orbits, had to change them on a moment’s notice and then perhaps change them again, had to do the actual blasting-off. Yes, even that — and it never ceased to amaze Pete. Only the smallest ships blasted off on their own accord. All the larger ones began their great elliptical flights almost like guided missiles, fired into space by the orbiteers sitting in their tower.
    “. . . so,” Captain Saunders was saying, “it indicates one of two things. Either you spent twenty years as an astrogator, which is impossible, or else you had some terrific training, like what they give at the Academy.”
    Pete’s face turned white. He must never let them suspect anything about the Academy! Otherwise everything might be uncovered and Big Pete would come running. “No,” Pete laughed nervously, “nothing like that. As I’ve told you, sir, it was a hobby of mine. But that’s all.”
    “A hobby, eh?” Saunders’ eyebrows arched quizzically. Then he shrugged, smiling broadly. “Well, I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, Wilson. I don’t care if you tell me you were born that way!”
    “If you’ll excuse me, sir, I think I’ll get something to eat.”
    “Go right ahead. Oh, and about this afternoon. We’ll be firing the Tropic of Capricorn II at Venus, sunset time. Better start plotting an orbit after lunch — no, never mind! I can’t get used to you, Wilson! Probably, you’ll figure out the entire orbit ten minutes before the sun sets, and you’ll get it right, too.”
     
    “What’s on the docket, sonny?”
    “Huh? Oh, Gus.” Pete had known this meeting would have to occur sooner or later, but a few days in the