“I don’t want to hurry you,” said Norton’s persuasive voice from half a kilometer below, “but the sooner the better.”
Jimmy looked at his precious souvenir, the only flower in Rama. He wrapped it carefully in his grimy handkerchief, knotted the fabric, and tossed it over the edge of the cliff.
It fluttered down with reassuring slowness, but it also took a very long time, getting smaller, and smaller, and smaller, until he could no longer see it. But then Resolution surged forward, and he knew that it had been spotted.
“Beautiful!” exclaimed the Commander enthusiastically. “I’m sure they’ll name it after you. OK—we’re waiting.”
Jimmy stripped off his shirt—the only upper garment anyone ever wore in this now tropical climate—and stretched it thoughtfully. Several times on his trek he had almost discarded it; now it might help to save his life.
For the last time, he looked back at the hollow world he alone had explored, and the distant, ominous pinnacles of the Big and Little Horns. Then, grasping the shirt firmly with his right hand, he took a running jump as far out over the cliff as he could.
Now there was no particular hurry; he had a full twenty seconds in which to enjoy the experience. But he did not waste any time, as the wind strengthened around him and Resolution slowly expanded in his field of view. Holding his shirt with both hands, he stretched his arms above his head, so that the rushing air filled the garment and blew it into a hollow tube.
As a parachute, it was hardly a success. The few kilometers an hour it subtracted from his speed were useful, but not vital. It was doing a much more important job: keeping his body vertical, so that he would arrow straight into the sea.
He still had the impression that he was not moving at all, but that the water below was rushing up toward him. Once he had committed himself, he had no sense of fear; indeed, he felt a certain indignation against the Skipper for keeping him in the dark. Did he really think that he would have been scared to jump if he’d had to brood over it too long?
At the last moment he let go of his shirt, took a deep breath, and grabbed his mouth and nose with his hands. As he had been instructed, he stiffened his body into a rigid bar, and locked his feet together. He would enter the water as cleanly as a falling spear.
“It will be just the same,” the Commander had promised, “as stepping off a diving board on Earth. Nothing to it—if you make a good entry.”
“And if I don’t?” he had asked.
“Then you’ll have to go back and try again.”
Something slapped him across the feet—hard, but not viciously. A million slimy hands were tearing at his body; there was a roaring in his ears, a mounting pressure, and even though his eyes were tightly closed, he could tell that darkness was falling as he arrowed down into the depths of the Cylindrical Sea.
With all his strength, he started to swim upward toward the fading light. He could not open his eyes for more than a single blink; the poisonous water felt like acid when he did so. He seemed to have been struggling for ages, and more than once he had a nightmare fear that he had lost his orientation and was really swimming downward. Then he would risk another quick glimpse, and every time the light was stronger.
His eyes were still clenched tightly shut when he broke water. He gulped a precious mouthful of air, rolled over on his back, and looked around.
Resolution was heading toward him at top speed. Within seconds, eager hands had grabbed him and dragged him aboard.
“Did you swallow any water?” was the Commander’s anxious question.
“I don’t think so.”
“Rinse your mouth out with this, anyway. That’s fine. How do you feel?”
“I’m not really sure. I’ll let you know in a minute. Oh… thanks, everybody.” The minute was barely up when Jimmy was only too sure how he felt.
“I’m going to be sick,” he confessed miserably.
His rescuers were incredulous. “In a dead calm—on a flat sea?” protested Sergeant Barnes, who seemed to regard Jimmy’s plight as a direct reflection on her skill.
“I’d hardly call it flat,” said the Commander, waving his arm around at the band of water that circled the sky. “But don’t be ashamed. You may have swallowed some of that stuff. Get rid of it as