MEASURE FOR A LONER
By JIM HARMON
SO, GENERAL, I came in totell you I've found the loneliestman in the world for theSpace Force.
How am I supposed to rate hisloneliness for you? In Megasorrowsor Kilofears? I suspect Iknow quite a library on the subject,but you know more aboutstripes and bars. Don't try tostop me this time, General.
Now that you mention it, I'mnot drunk. I had to have somethingto back me up so I stoppedoff at the dispensary and stolea needle.
I want you to get off my backwith that kind of talk. I've gotenough there—it bends me overlike I had bad kidneys. It isn'tany of King Kong's little brothers.They over rate the stuff. Itisn't the way you've been ridingme either. Never mind what I'mcarrying. Whatever it is—andbelieve me, it is—I have to getrid of it.
Let me tell it, for God's sake.
Then for Security's sake? Ithought you would let me tell it,General.
I've been coming in here andgiving you pieces of it formonths but now I want to letyou be drenched in the wholething. You're going to take itall.
There were the two of them,the two lonely men, and I foundthem for you.
You remember the way Ifound them for you.
The intercom on my blonddesk made an electronic noise atme and the words I had been arrangingin my mind for themorning letters splattered intoalphabet soup like a printerdropping a prepared slug oftype.
I made the proper motion tostill the sound.
"Yes," I grunted.
My secretary cleared herthroat on my time.
"Dr. Thorn," she said, "there'sa Mr. Madison here to see you.He lays claim to be from theStar Project."
He could come in and file hisclaim, I told the girl.
I rummaged in the wastebasketand uncrumpled the morning'sfacsimile newspaper. Itwas full of material about theStar Project.
We were building Man's firstinterstellar spaceship.
A surprising number of peopleconsidered it important. Flippingfrom the rear to page one,Wild Bill Star in the comics whohad been blasting all the way toforty-first sub-space universe fordecades was harking back to thegood old days of Man's first starflight (which he had made himselfthrough the magic of timetravel), the editor was callingthe man to make the jaunt theLindbergh of Space, and thestaff photographer displayed astill of a Space Force pilot inpressure suit up front with hisface blotted out by an air-brushedinterrogation mark.
Who was going to be theLindbergh of Space?
We had used up the Columbusof Space, the Magellan of Space,the Van Reck of Space. Now itwas time for the Lone Eagle,one man who would wait out thelight years to Alpha Centauri.
I remembered the first Lindbergh.
I rode a bus fifty miles to seehim at an Air Force Day celebrationwhen I was a dewy-earedkid. It's funny how kids stillworship heroes who did everythingbefore they were even born.Uncle Max had told me aboutstanding outside the hospital witha bunch of boys his own age theevening Babe Ruth died of cancer.Lindbergh seemed like anold man to me when I finally sawhim, but still active. Nobody hadforgotten him. When his speechwas over I cheered him with therest just as if I knew what hehad been talking about.
But I probably knew moreabout what he meant then as aboy than I did feeling the realityof the newspaper in myhands. Grown-up, I could onlysmile at myself for wanting togo to the stars myself.
Madison rapped on my officedoor and breezed in efficiently.
I've always thought Madisonwas a r