As the bartender brought a tray of drinks, Calder said, "Let the Fourth Estate pay for this round, gentlemen. I want to pump some information out of you."
"That might take a lot of rounds."
To Kinsman, Calder said, "Congratulations, my boy. Colonel Murdock must think very highly of you."
They all burst out laughing.
"Murdock?" said Kinsman. "You should've seen his face when he told me I was it!"
"Looked like he was sucking on lemons." 71
Tenny explained. "The selection for the mission was made by the personnel computer. Murdock wanted to be absolutely unprejudiced, so he went strictly by the perfor- mance ratings in the computer—and out came Kinsman's name."
"It was a fix," muttered Colt, mainly for effect.
"If Murdock hadn't made so much noise about being so damned impartial," Tenny went on, "he could've reshuffled the program and tried again. But 1 was right there when the personnel officer came in with the name, so he couldn't back out of it."
"We was robbed," said Smitty.
Calder's ancient, weathered face creased into a grin. "Well, at least the computer thinks highly of you, Captain Kinsman, even if Colonel Murdock doesn't. I suppose that's still some kind of honor."
"More like a privilege. I've been watching that Celebrity chick through her training. Ripe."
"She'll look even better up in orbit."
"Once she takes off her space suit . . . et cetera."
"Hey, y'know, nobody's ever done it in orbit."
"Yeah . . . weightlessness, zero gravity."
Kinsman looked thoughtful. "Adds a new dimension to the problem, doesn't it?"
"Three-dimensional." Tenny took the cigar butt from his mouth and laughed.
Calder rose slowly from his chair and spread his arms to silence the others. Looking fondly down on Kinsman, he said;
"My boy—more years ago than I care to think about, I became a charter member of the Mile High Club. It was in 1915, during the height of the Great War, when, at an altitude of precisely 5,280 feet—as near as my altimeter could tell me—while circling over St. Paul's Cathedral, I successfully penetrated an Army nurse. This was in an open cockpit, mind you. I achieved success despite fogged goggles, cramped working quarters, and a severe case of windburn."
