The commodore said impatiently, “I don’t need a lesson in the idiosyncrasies of the One Man Scout, Lieutenant. I piloted one for nearly five years. I know their shortcomings—and those of their pilots.”

“I don’t understand, sir.”

The commodore looked down at the ball of his thumb. “You’re out in deep space for anywhere from two weeks to a month. All alone. You’re looking for Kraden ships which practically never turn up.”

“Yes, sir,” Don said meaninglessly.

The commodore said, “We here at Command figure on you fellows getting a touch of space cafard once in a while and, ah, imagining something wrong in the engines, getting your wind up and coming in. But…” at this point the commodore cleared his throat, “… four times out of six? Are you sure you don’t need a psych, Lieutenant?”

Don Mathers flushed. He said, “No, sir. I don’t think that I do.”

The other’s voice went expressionless. “Very well, Lieutenant Mathers. You’ll have the customary three weeks leave before going out again. Dismissed.”

Don saluted snappily, wheeled and marched from the office.

Outside, in the corridor, he muttered an obscenity under his breath. What in the hell did that chair-borne brass hat know about space cafard? About the depthless blackness, the wretchedness of free fall, the claustrophobia, the tides of primitive terror that sometimes swept you when you realized that you were far away from the environment that had given you birth. That you were alone, alone, alone. A million, a seemingly million-million miles from your nearest fellow human. Space cafard, in a craft whose cabin was little larger than a good-sized closet, what did the commodore know about it?

Don Mathers had conveniently forgotten the other’s claim to five years service in the One Man Scouts. And in the commodore’s day the small spaceships had been tinier still and with less in the way of safety devices and such amenities as video-tape entertainment.