"I didn't know he was here!"
"He just arrived. They sent him here to rest his heart, but the rocket flight was almost too much for him."
"Oh, Alex, we've got to save him! We can't let a man like that die because of red tape."
Landau shook his head wearily. "Red tape has killed more people than bullets, dear girl. Far more."
Friday 3 December 1999:
1120hrsUT
Ir WAS STILL NIGHT on the Sea of Clouds, a night that would continue for another week. But the waxing crescent of the Earth, nearly half full now, cast a soft light on the lunar landscape.
Kinsman stood on a slight rise that overlooked the broad undulating plain, listening to the sound of his own breathing and the suit's airblower. A pair of dune buggies were inching their way across the plain, off in the distance. Not far from where Kinsman stood, a group of lunar-suited Americans and Russians were deep in earnest conversation.
Next to him stood Colonel Leonov, in a bright red pressure suit almost identical to Kinsman's own, except for slight differences in the helmet and backpack.
"It should be a good race," Leonov said. Kinsman heard the radio voice in his helmet earphones.
"Yes," he answered. "And this year we ought to win, for a change."
"Hah! Wait until you see the special buggy we have put together."
"Not another rocket job?" 328
"You'll see."
While they talked, Kinsman took a pad from his belt. Clumsily,, with his gloved hands, he wrote, "Is your suit bugged?" He held the note up before Leonov's visor.
"I checked this suit personally before putting it on," Leonov answered. "It is perfectly safe."
"We ought to take a look at this crater," Kinsman said, clumping to the rim of a thirty-meter-wide depression. "It's close enough to the racecourse to be marked off, don't you think?"
"That depends on how steep the interior is." Leonov followed him.
They walked slowly down the interior slope, picking their way through rocks and loose rubbie by the lights on their helmets, until they were out of sight of the race committee and the standing crawlers and buggies. Out of sight meant out of radio contact. Now they could talk to each other without being overheard.
"What happened yesterday?" Kinsman asked, lowering his voice unconsciously. "Your message wasn't very clear."
