3
for him, if it ever began, could not begin for thirteen more days. At the earliest it would be eight days too late.
* * * * *
"Well, man, 'tis a fine spot you're in now," he told himself.
"Let's find out how bad it is indeed," he answered. He reached for the light switch and tried to turn it on. The switch was already in the "on" position.
"Batteries must be dead," he told himself.
"What batteries?" he asked. "There're no batteries in here, the power comes from the generator."
"Why isn't the generator working, man?" he asked.
He thought this one out carefully. The generator was not turned by the main turbine, but by a small reciprocating engine. The steam, however, came from the same boiler. And the boiler, of course, had emptied itself through the hole in the turbine. And the condenser, of course--
"The condenser!" he shouted.
He fumbled for a while, until he found a small flashlight. By the light of this, he reinspected the steam system, and found about three gallons of water frozen in the condenser. The condenser, like all condensers, was a device to convert steam into water, so that it could be reused in the boiler. This one had a tank and coils of tubing in the center of a curved reflector that was positioned to radiate the heat of the steam into the cold darkness of space. When the meteor pierced the turbine, the water in the condenser began to boil. This boiling lowered the temperature, and the condenser demonstrated its efficiency by quickly freezing the water in the tank.
Evans sealed the turbine from the rest of the steam system by closing the shut-off valves. If there was any water in the boiler, it would operate the engine that drove the generator. The water would condense in the condenser, and with a little luck, melt the ice in there. Then, if the pump wasn't blocked by ice, it would return the water to the boiler.
But there was no water in the boiler. Carefully he poured a cup of his drinking water into a pipe that led to