Rendezvous With Rama - Arthur C. Clarke Page 0,77

Earth; he had already been warned that any messages might be tapped, perhaps by relay devices on the bomb itself. That left the whole responsibility in his hands.

There was a story he had heard somewhere about a President of the United States—was it Truman or Pérez?—who had a sign on his desk saying “The buck stops here.” Norton was not quite certain what a buck was, but he knew when one had stopped at his desk.

He could choose to do nothing, and wait until the Hermians advised him to leave. How would that look in the histories of the future? Though Norton was not greatly concerned with posthumous fame or infamy, he would not care to be remembered forever as the accessory to a cosmic crime that it had been in his power to prevent.

And the plan was flawless. As he would have expected, Rodrigo had worked out every detail, anticipated every possibility, even the remote danger that the bomb might be triggered when tampered with. If that happened, Endeavour could still be safe, behind the shield of Rama. As for Rodrigo himself, he seemed to regard the possibility of instant apotheosis with complete equanimity.

Yet even if the bomb was successfully disabled, that would be far from the end of the matter. The Hermians might try again, unless some way could be found of stopping them. But at least weeks of time would have been bought; Rama would be far past perihelion before another missile could possibly reach it. By then the worst fears of the alarmists might have been disproved. Or the reverse….

To act or not act—that was the question. Never before had Norton felt such a close kinship with the Prince of Denmark. Whatever he did, the possibilities for good or evil seemed in perfect balance. He was faced with the most morally difficult of all decisions. If his choice was wrong he would know very quickly. But if he was right he might never be able to prove it.

It was no use relying any further on logical arguments and the endless mapping of alternative futures. That way, one could go around in circles forever. The time had come to listen to his inner voices.

He returned the calm, steady gaze of Cook from across the centuries.

“I agree with you, Captain,” he whispered. “The human race has to live with its conscience. Whatever the Hermians argue, survival is not everything.”

He pressed the call button for the bridge circuit and said slowly, “Lieutenant Rodrigo, I’d like to see you.”

Then he closed his eyes, hooked his thumbs in the restraining straps of his chair, and prepared to enjoy a few moments of total relaxation. It might be some time before he would experience it again.

CHAPTER 40

SABOTEUR

The Scooter had been stripped of all unnecessary equipment; it was now merely an open framework holding together propulsion, guidance, and life-support systems. Even the seat for the second pilot had been removed, for every kilogram of extra mass had to be paid for in mission time.

That was one of the reasons, though not the most important, why Rodrigo had insisted on going alone. It was such a simple job that there was no need for extra hands, and the mass of a passenger would cost several minutes of flight time. Now the stripped-down scooter could accelerate at over a third of a gravity; it could make the trip from Endeavour to the bomb in four minutes. That left six to spare. It should be sufficient.

Rodrigo looked back only once when he had left the ship. He saw that, as planned, it had lifted from the central axis and was thrusting gently away across the spinning disc of the North Face. By the time he reached the bomb, it would have placed the thickness of Rama between them.

He took his time flying over the polar plain. There was no hurry here, because the bomb’s cameras could not yet see him, and he could therefore conserve fuel. Then he drifted over the curving rim of the world—and there was the missile, glittering in sunlight fiercer even than that shining on the planet of its birth.

Rodrigo had already punched in the guidance instructions. Now he initiated the sequence, and the scooter spun on its gyros and came up to full thrust in a matter of seconds. At first the sensation of weight seemed crushing; then Rodrigo adjusted to it. He had, after all, comfortably endured twice as much inside Rama, and had been born under three times as