The Marrying Man

The story follows Pete Cooper, an interstellar pilot who marries successive women partly as a financial strategy tied to life-insurance payouts amplified by relativistic travel. Time dilation during long voyages causes wives on Earth to age and die between his visits, creating a tension between his professed affection and pragmatic motives. When he courts a young woman named Nancy, he promises marriage and plans a short survey trip, confronting the recurring ethical conflict between genuine attachment and a career that treats spouses as temporal investments. The tale explores love, loneliness, and moral compromise under futuristic conditions.