Bors had arrived at the grimmest decision of his life when his cabin speaker said curtly:
"_Captain Bors, sir. Space-yacht_ Sylva _calling. Asks for you._"
"_Are you in trouble, Captain? One of our Talents insists that you are._"
"I thought you'd gone on as you were supposed to do. Yes. There is trouble. It amounts to shipwreck. How many of my men can you take off?"
"_We've lots of room!_" said Gwenlyn. "_My father kept most of the Talents with him. We're heading your way, Captain._"
"Very good," said Bors. "Thank you." He was grateful, but help from a woman--from Gwenlyn!--galled him.
Presently the _Sylva_ was alongside. The transfer of the _Isis's_ crew began. Bors went over the ship for the last time. The ship's log went aboard the _Sylva_, as did Logan's calculated tables for low-power overdrive. Bors made quite sure that nothing else could be recovered from the _Isis_. He looked strained and irritable when he finally went into one of the lifeboat blisters on the _Isis_ left vacant by the sacrifice of two space-boats in the Garen cutting-out expedition. A boat from the _Sylva_ was there to receive him.
"Technically," said Bors, "I should go down with my ship, or fly apart with it. But there's no point in being romantic!"
"I'm the one," said his second-in-command, "who will stand court-martial!"
"I doubt it very much," said Bors. "They can't court-martial you for partly accomplishing something they're in trouble for failing at. Into the boat with you!"
He threw a switch and entered the boat. The blister opened. The small space-boat floated free. Its drive hummed and it drove far and away from the seemingly unharmed but completely helpless _Isis_. Bors looked regretfully back at the abandoned light cruiser. Sunlight glinted on its hull. Somehow a slow rotary motion had been imparted to it during the process of abandoning ship. The little fighting ship pointed as though wistfully at all the stars about her, to none of which she would ever drive again.
The _Sylva_ loomed up. The last space-boat nestled into its blister and the grapples clanked. The leaves closed. When the blister air-pressure showed normal and green lights flashed and flashed, Bors got out of the boat and went to the _Sylva's_ control-room. Gwenlyn was there, quite casually controlling the operation of the yacht by giving suggestions to its official skipper. She turned and beamed at Bors.